Life in progress

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The Future of Publishing Crap, Part Two

I came across an article today which drives home the importance of editing and putting out one’s absolute best work when self-publishing. I would have re-blogged, but that wasn’t an option.

This: http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2014/01/28/follow-up-on-self-publishing-readers-are-not-good-gatekeepers/ is the article, by Chuck Wendig. In it, he explains how self-publishing is becoming a decent and viable option to traditional means, and how that could change if self-published authors present sub-par efforts to the reading public. It’s an excellent article. You should read it, even if you’re not an author.

If you’re wondering about the “Part Two” in the title, and you’re new around here, you can find my original post on this subject here: https://lindaghill.wordpress.com/2013/05/21/the-future-of-publishing-crap/


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2/16 Yesterday’s News – Don’t Try So Hard

In the pursuit of changing it up once in a while, we are encouraged as writers to search for different words to say the same thing. Using the same ones over and over can distract the reader from the point we are trying to make. But at the same time, if we do a bad job of it, the wrong turn of phrase can be even worse than the repetitive one.

Take the article I found in yesterday’s paper for instance. The piece is well written; it concerns the annual recognition of immigrants, refugees and international students learning English as a Second Language. There is no credit given to the writer of the article – credit is given to the paper’s “Staff,” and I have to wonder if this is the reason why:

Second Tongue

I don’t know about anyone else, but for me this phrase conjures up all kinds of horror.

Is it possible to take the whole “find another way to say it” process too far? Absolutely. You have to appreciate it when someone has the guts to publish it in a font four times the size of the rest of the text… but then again, whoever did, lacked the balls to put his/her name on it.  I know I wouldn’t.

“Yesterday’s News” is a challenge I have set for myself to post a blog entry once a day, every day until Hallowe’en, and possibly beyond.


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Published on VenusBlogs.com

I had an article I wrote published today on VenusBlogs.com.

Flying the Coop

I remember the day he was born – or rather the week he was born. He was my first. My water broke slowly over the period of that week and I slept so little that I was able to read a 1700 page novel in three days. When it was time to push (sans epidural – they didn’t offer them in the province of Quebec at the time) I did so for hours before they told me a physical defect in the base of my spine would make it impossible to deliver naturally.

You can find the entire article here.