by David Colin Carr | Jul 16, 2013 | Uncategorized, Writing
To make every word count, weigh its capacity to either carry the story forward or invoke a setting or atmosphere. Note the word “invoke.” Rather than telling your reader what to feel, trust her to feel what is evoked out of her own experience. It is possible she’ll...
by David Colin Carr | Jun 25, 2013 | Editing, Uncategorized, Writing
After nine years in my house, I finally met my backyard neighbor (though for all those years I knew her dog’s name was Annie) because the fence that kept us invisible to each other needed to be replaced. As she went bounding up my steep yard she announced she was 92,...
by David Colin Carr | Jun 18, 2013 | Uncategorized, Writing
I’ve had some 60 rejections of the one fiction piece I’ve submitted to agents, even agents with whom I have some collegial relationship. The most memorable rejection is the first, not because it was the first, but because it was a xerox of a xerox of a xerox of a...
by David Colin Carr | Jun 4, 2013 | Editing, Uncategorized, Writing
Last week I wrote about the editor’s nightmare of receiving a manuscript that needs to be reformatted before it can be edited. Today we’ll look at the dream: Guidelines for preparing your manuscript so your editor doesn’t have to hack her/his way through your...
by David Colin Carr | May 7, 2013 | Uncategorized, Writing
My buddy – a broadcast journalist of many years who published his first book two years ago and recently uploaded five ebooks to Amazon’s Kindle store – announced that he is a writer, no longer someone wanting to be a writer or someone trying to write. That observation...