Diane Sherlock

  • NaNoWriMo!

    OMGWHATHAVEIDONE! Okay, I really do have some trepidation, mostly because I really don’t have an idea for the next novel, but idea or no, I begin tomorrow! Eeek! I figured it was a good way to start and to ratchet up the commitment, I’m raising money besides! (Note: my mentor,  Rob Roberge, would never support…

  • Portrait of a Bookstore

    One of my favorite places – and most meaningful – is closing. Portrait of a Bookstore is the first place I gave a reading for my first novel, DEAD WEIGHT. They said at the time that it was one of their most successful events 😉 I love Portrait of a Bookstore – loved it before…

  • Pinterest & Daniel Craig

    I’m having a lot of fun procrastinating creating boards for my novels and one for a short story, MegaCool, that scissors and spackle just published. My European publisher has one for our book covers.  I can’t draw well (think stick figures), so it’s an outlet to display images that I had in my head while…

  • and then we came to the end

    …but not of the blog! No, the end of your novel. How do you know when you’re finished? Last night, I had dinner with a group of writers and one reminded me I’d said I knew I’d finished my novel when I was so sick of the thing, I couldn’t go over it one more…

  • Writing as triathlon

    The main thing I try to do is write as clearly as I can. I rewrite a good deal to make it clear.          ~E.B. White, The New York Times, August 3, 1942 Courtesy fightmedics.net Writing a novel has three parts to it and was thinking how they’re each a marathon unto themselves and…

  • how do you do it?

    Are you stuck in the doldrums and cannot finish your book? Welcome to the club. I don’t know a novelist who doesn’t get bored, fed up, finds the energy is gone, etc. in the middle of a novel, not to mention sick to death of the thing after going over it repeatedly in the rewrite process.…

  • is fiction a lie?

    Pet peeve – being introduced as a novelist and promptly called a liar. I don’t know who thought this was cute to begin with (I’m lookin’ at you, Albert Camus), but I’m taking issue with it. Merriam-Webster defines a lie as 1. A false statement deliberately presented as being true; a falsehood.  2. Something meant to…

  • 7 reasons annotating will improve your writing – UPDATED

    The novel I just finished writing is a dark comedy about a group of siblings prematurely vying for their inheritance. I read a  number of comic novels that dealt with crazy families, estates and wills, fights over money, etc. All of the authors taught me something useful and I found the process of annotating (nudge, nudge,…

  • a word about agents

    Thanks to C Hope Clark, I found a helpful blog by an agent. There are a number of them out there and they are helpful, so take some time and Google around. If you’re looking for an agent, take the time to read these few posts and be prepared. A day in the life of…

  • Happy New Year, new you, new writing

    Do you make resolutions? There’s a lot of snark (enough with the snark already) out there especially about how resolutions are useless and meaningless, but I say they are a sign of hope and hope is a good thing. I don’t know how you have perseverance as a writer without hope. Hope that you will…

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