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Feeling Stagnated in Your Author Career? You’re Not Alone

Author: Laura Resnick

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Feeling Stagnated in Your Author Career? You’re Not Alone

Over the last year or so, I have encountered a ton of writing and publishing professionals, including editors, journalists, and authors, who are feeling, well, a bit stuck. And I felt stagnated myself despite having made several big changes in my life. Things change all the time, and the future of publishing and authorship is full of uncertainty. It ebbs and flows with market changes, industry changes, and now AI. But really, that’s just one more thing, right? Navigating all of this is situation...

career, creativity, goals, habits, mental road blocks, self care, writer psychology, Writing

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Freshening Up Our Backlists

You can never read the same story twice. Some of us complain about returning to earlier favorites only to find they’ve been rendered unreadable by visits from an imaginary being called “the Suck Fairy.” The Suck Fairy brings to our attention the unfortunate assumptions our favorite authors made as they created their fictional worlds: the racism implicit in Tarzan’s superiority over Black Africans, the antisemitism running rampant through Georgette Heyer’s invented version of Regency England, and...

business, characterization, craft, DEI, language, self-editing, tutorials, Writing

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Mindset and Momentum: How Writers Can Use CBT Tools to Overcome Challenges

As writers, we face the constant struggle of rejection, self-doubt, creative blocks and, let’s face it, isolation from hours spent alone. Unless, of course, we include keeping company with our imaginary friends. In my work as a life coach, I’ve discovered two helpful tools for when the mental grind of being a writer takes a toll on clients. Behavioral Activation and the ABC Model are part of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). CBT is a widely used psychological approach that helps individuals...

behavior, mental health, mental road blocks, new habits, self care, Tools, tutorials, writer psychology

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Book Cover Design: Strategies, Tactics, and AI

Gather savvy authors together and guess what we’re going to chat about? Writing craft, publishing, our latest manuscript woes, marketing techniques, and, yes, book covers. We asked NINC members what you wonder about when it comes to cover design, and you answered. You wanted to know about book cover strategies, tactics, and the use of AI (artificial intelligence). Even if you didn’t submit a specific question in advance, my guess is that you’ll find some helpful guidance here. Book cover strategies First,...

book covers, branding, business, cover design, genre, market research, Marketing, packaging

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Substack as an Email Alternative

I was first introduced to Substack by Joanna Campbell Slan, who migrated her newsletter list there in December 2023. “Substack has brought me 207 new subscribers,” she said. “Since I don’t pay Substack, I count that as a huge win. Previously, I was paying around $120 a month, and the other email list servers sure didn’t recommend me to anyone.” Should you use Substack to deliver your newsletters? Is it worth it to switch? Let’s look at the pluses and minuses. According to Forbes magazine, “Substack...

business, Discovery, email, Marketing, newsletters, promotion, Tools

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Giving a Good Panel

I led my first writer/reader panel nearly 30 years ago. In many ways, Giving a Good Panel is even trickier than Giving a Good Session. The latter is solely dependent upon your skills and knowledge, but the former requires a degree of cooperation, a balancing of knowledge and time, and a seriously good moderator. Over the years, I’ve seen both brilliant and disastrous panels. This can be easily measured. Did everyone stay riveted in their seats? Or did the back half of the room empty in a steady...

business, professionalism, public appearances, public speaking, tutorials

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