Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed

By Kate Phillips

 

As a reader, I always love finding books that appeal to me. As a writer, I am twice as pleased when the authors also provide Masterclasses for me within their books.

            Masterclasses take place when performance artists or musicians work one-on-one with students. Writers don't generally have this option, but I have found some books to be Masterclasses for characters, dialogue, backstories, plots, settings, voice, and/or creativity.

 

 

 

            I read Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life From Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed because of the numerous and glowing reviews it received—and I want to add another one here as her voice is true and clear and echoes within me.
 

            Strayed's story is sad, then tragic, then transformed. She is a strong woman who has dealt with adversity, made mistakes, learned from them, moved on, and, most importantly, kept going and kept writing through it all as chronicled in her bestseller Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. 
 

            Parts of her life story are also told as she answered letters from people seeking help from Dear Sugar through an online advice column at The Rumpus website. "Radical empathy" is how Steve Almond, the first Sugar, describes Cheryl Strayed's style in the Introduction. And it is. She jolts people with her takes on their situations by sharing her life experiences and brilliant insights.
 

            Strayed doesn't shy away from answering letters concerning difficult topics as she has had to deal with them since she was born into a home filled with domestic violence. Her father beat her mother starting just days after they were married. When the author was three, her paternal grandfather started molesting her and continued until her father left the family when she was six. Her mother worked hard to support the family. Still her children didn't have a lot, except when it came to love.
 

            Unexpectedly, her mother died of lung cancer at 45. Strayed was only 22. Grief swamped her, then multiplied as her stepfather and siblings scattered. However, she still had her mother's love within her as she set off to live her own life.
 

            It is this love that shines through her answers to people in need of support, guidance, or a kick in the pants. She suffers with them; dwelling on their situations for days at times in an effort to not only connect with them, but to write advice that will open them up to possibilities and different perspectives.
 

            Whether you have experienced the specific problems of the letter writers or not, we all have to deal with love or the lack of it, friendship, identity, finances, addiction, sex, jealousy, betrayal, violence, loss, and death. Sugar's answers, as penned by Strayed, are universal truths given to individuals.
 

            As a writer, I especially related to the letter Sugar received from a writer who can't write which appears on page 53. Strayed's experience of writing her own book—the story she couldn't live without telling—and advice to writers alone is worth the price of this book, but you get so much more.
 

It is Strayed's voice that captures readers. She is talking directly to each letter writer: concentrating on her; sharing with him. Strayed opens up and writes from the very depths of herself. It's painful, joyful and, most of all, hopeful.

 

What authors' voices speak to you?

Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson

 By Kate Phillips 

 

            I loved Harold and, of course, his purple crayon from the first time I read his story by Crockett Johnson, a wonderful nom de plume for David Johnson Leisk. Not only is the Harold series a delight for children, it is also a terrific life guide for adults.

        In the books, Harold has all kind of adventures. He travels comfortably in his footed pajamas accompanied by only his imagination and a purple crayon.
 

Once he chooses what he wants to do, Harold draws his own path. He only appears in profile either looking at what he is drawing or back at what he has just drawn. He decides who or what he wants to meet along the way and, with help from the crayon, they appear—although there are a few surprises along the way.
 

In the first book, Harold goes for a walk. He finds a spot he thinks is perfect for a forest so he draws a tree. It turns out to be an apple tree. To guard the apples, he draws a dragon which ends up frightening him. As he backs away with his hand shaking, he accidentally draws wavy water and then finds himself in over his head. He saves himself by drawing a boat and sailing until he made land. Finding himself hungry, he draws a picnic. And then…well you can read the rest for yourself.
 

His adventures continue with a trip to space, the circus, and his own fairy tale including a king, a witch, a fairy, and a flying carpet. What an amazing life!
 

I love that Harold decides what he wants to do and then does it. When things turn out differently than he plans, he quickly improvises. He never loses his focus. And he always achieves his goals. It made me wish my own purple crayon worked as well as his.
 

Being a writer is the next best thing.
 

I can, but don't, wear footed pajamas. With a pen and paper or a computer, I can follow my imagination along a path of my choosing, mostly. As novelists know, some characters have minds of their own.
 

Writing is more difficult than crayon drawing, but just as freeing when you are writing for yourself. (Of course, there has to be a paying job to stay afloat. If it is in the writing field, you will have assignments that may or may not interest you, but your style can shine and your technical skills can improve with each one. If it isn't a dream job, use that as a motivation to keep writing.)
 

The last two qualities are the tough ones for me. I need to work on having absolute focus on my writing projects and career as well as achieving my goals.
 

I have a purple crayon in a ceramic mug along with my pens to remind me of how I truly want to live.

 

 

What children's books inspired you?

 

 

 

 

 

The Writing Trade by John Jerome

By Kate Phillips   

 

            I read books about writing for motivation and inspiration. I especially appreciate the ones that also give insights into the life of a writer.
 

The Writing Trade: A Year in the Life by John Jerome is one of those books. It's also perfect to read now as his story begins on January 2. This is not a daily journal but reflections by month on his work.
 

At the start of a new year, his writing projects are at different stages. The Writing Trade is just beginning. He also needs to write 12 essays for a magazine column; correct book proofs arriving in 10 days, work on another book that is being reissued, and write two other articles for midsummer deadlines, plus make pitches for more assignments to pay the bills.
 

While Jerome wrote the book in 1989, he considers this a generic year in the life of a freelance writer. At that point, the author had been in the writing trade for 30 years, 20 as a freelance writer. He survived that long by following these rules: "Don't do anything on spec, don't do anything that you can't finish on up-front money, don't depend on any way on actual sales, or expect any outcome other than the receipt of the final check for the agreed upon price."
 

Through the decades, he wrote eight books with varying success and a couple of hundred magazine articles. Jerome states, "I am a competent, but essentially invisible writer, proof that one can earn a living from writing for years without ever breaking into the public consciousness…all I ever wanted was to write, quietly, for a living."

 

 

Jerome shares: how he gets ideas, his writing schedule, his thoughts on book proposals, publication and reviews, and much more. I enjoyed learning about these things, but mostly I loved his writing on the writing process.

Some of my favorite examples underlined in my reread copy:

 

Page 3: ...ready to get back into the long, steady flow of real work, chasing ideas down the page.

 

Page 38: Writing is a process of going over and over the material endlessly, getting what you're trying to say driven into a corner.

 

Page 226: What's needed to produce a solid body of work is a solid body of time.

 

Since this is a book about the writing life, quotes from other writers appear at the beginning of each month's reflections as well as within the text.
 

Jerome also details his walks with his dogs, nature scenes, and talks with his wife as they all play a part in his writing. As he notes on page 62, "In the end, all writing is about turning experiences into words…there's a great deal more experience in our lives than we ever succeed in knowing."
 

The exhilaration of writing is in chasing these experiences and ideas down the page.

 

 

What writing books inspire you?

 

90 Day Novel By Alan Watt Update 1

By Kate Phillips

           

            It's Day 6 of the 90-Day Novel challenge. I have followed the schedule and exercises in Alan Watt's The 90-Day Novel.

 

            Bestselling author of Diamond Dogs, Alan Watt's tone is friendly, that we are all writers working on novels together. Each day begins with Hi Writers. He constantly uses 'we' and 'our' as he discusses and shares his thoughts and ideas with his fellow writers.
 

            Watt allows for his readers to have different writing processes and to be at different stages in their growth as well as in their novels. He brilliantly addresses some trouble we may have come across in the past along with a solution and the importance of creativity on pages 4 & 5 and the role of the subconscious on pages 8 & 9.
 

            In the Preparation section of his book (pp. 16-18), Watt discusses that characters need dilemmas, not problems. Problems can be solved. Dilemmas take transformation. Right there, my whole relationship with my characters and novel shifted, became deeper and infinitely more interesting. I was excited to get back to writing my novel.
 

            Watt expects his readers have stories to tell and characters in mind. His exercises for each day consist of open-ended questions about his readers' heroes and other characters. I have learned some surprising "secrets" about my characters in the 10-20 minutes I spent answering the questions each day. I learned more about my novel as a whole while answering the structure questions on Day 4.
 

            I can always tell how inspiring and motivating a book is when I look back to see how many sentences I underlined and how many passages I marked and commented on in the margins. More than half the pages I have read so far have "spoken" to me.
 

I will update my 90-Day Novel project every month.

 

How are your novels coming along?

At Home by Bill Bryson

By Kate Phillips
 

 

As a reader, I always love finding books that appeal to me. As a writer, I am twice as pleased when the authors also provide Masterclasses for me within their books.

            Masterclasses take place when performance artists or musicians work one-on-one with students. Writers don't generally have this option, but I have found some books to be Masterclasses for characters, dialogue, backstories, plots, settings, voice, and/or creativity.

 

 

            Most of us just want to be home for the holidays--whether that means our own homes or the homes of loved ones.
 

After all the festivities are over, this is the perfect time of year to read At Home: A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson. You will appreciate your homes as you never have before.

 

 

            From the inside cover flap: Bill Bryson and his family live in a Victorian parsonage in…England…[where] he began to consider how very little he knew about the ordinary things of life as found in that comfortable home. To remedy this, he formed the idea of journeying about his house from room to room to "write a history of the world without leaving home."
 

Do not hear the word history and think dry and dusty facts. This book is entertaining, fun, and funny, but, on occasion, sad and poignant—even disgusting, too. Sadly, humans took a long time to realize the importance of good hygiene.
 

People who changed the course of history—and improved our homes—with inventions and discoveries were sometimes honored and rewarded and sometimes were cheated and forgotten. Yet our homes would not be the same without them. And you will be surprised how often synchronicity played a part in the evolution of our homes.
 

From page 4, "Sitting at the kitchen table one afternoon, playing idly with the salt and pepper shakers, it occurred to me that I had absolutely no idea why, out of all the spices in the world, we have such an abiding attachment to these two. Why not pepper and cardamom, say, or salt and cinnamon?"
 

Such a simple observation and questions about ordinary things led to this fascinating book.

16 Gift Book Suggestions

By Kate Phillips 

            If you are buying a book for another writer or using a gift certificate to buy one for yourself, here are 16 books I found helpful at different stages in my writing career:

At any level:

The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield. If I could only own one writing book, this is it. You are not a writer unless you are writing on a regular basis. If I am having a tough time getting started one day (or every day), I randomly open this book and read until I cannot wait to pick up my pen or go to my computer and write. It has never failed to get me going. Pressfield followed up with Turning Pro: Tap Your Inner Power and Create Your Life's Work.

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King. This bestselling author shares his life story and writing advice. It's moving and inspiring. While I am not a fan of the horror genre, I truly enjoyed Mr. King's personal tale.

Bird By Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott. This funny, irreverent author shares how and why she became a writer as well as what it really means to be a writer. She offers both specific advice and broad overviews. It's an excellent book to reread to keep a fresh perspective.

The 90-Day Novel by Alan Watt, who also wrote the bestselling award-winning novel Diamond Dogs. Despite the gimmicky title, this is one of the best writing books I have read. The author's thoughts and insights before each day's exercises are terrific and inspiring. As of this post, I am on Day 30. Future posts will track my progress.

A grammar guide that works for you. Cheryl wrote about Grammar Girl who has written several excellent books. I also use The Chicago Manual of Style at work so it carries over to my other writing, Woe is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide to Better English in Plain English, and Words Fail Me: What Everyone Who Writes Should Know About Writing both by Patricia T. O'Conner.

The Synonym Finder by J. I. Rodale is my preference when I am searching for just the right word.

In the Beginning:

Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg. This is the first book that got me to write on a regular basis which is the only way to become a better writer. Her suggestions and advice are easy and fun to follow. The most important is to fill an 80-100 page notebook every month. No excuses.

For Writers Only: Inspiring thoughts on the exquisite pain and heady joy of the writing life from its great practitioners by Sophy Burnham. The title says it all.

Zen in the Art of Writing: Essays on Creativity by Ray Bradbury. The author shares his life story, the fight to be true to himself and his muse as well as amazing writing advice. In the back of the book, his poem, "What I Do Is Me—For That I Came for Gerald Manley Hopkins", should be framed or painted on the wall of every nursery and Writing Crate, in my opinion, so children and writers and everybody would know the importance and happiness of using your unique gifts while living your lives! (Please note: God is mentioned in the poem so do not read it if you will be offended by that.)

The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life by Julia Cameron. Famous for writing The Artist's Way, this book continues the author's work to help and support people who want to be writers. A combination of essays and exercises help make her points clear and easy to follow.

Telling Lies for Fun and Profit: A Manual for Fiction Writers by Lawrence Block. With 48 titles of his books listed in the front of the 1994 version of this book, Block is more than qualified to tell writers how to make a living—and he does so in a funny and approachable style.

With some writing experience:

The Successful Novelist: A Lifetime of Lessons About Writing and Publishing by David Morrell. The author offers lessons to writers starting with beginners and working up to writing successful books. It's the life he has led having written a couple of dozen books, novelizations, short fiction, as well as worked in Hollywood on the Rambo series, a character he created and wrote about in his debut novel, First Blood, at the age of 25.

Architecture of the Novel: A Writer's Handbook; Plot, Story, and the Mechanics of Narrative Time by Jane Vandenburgh. Plot and characters are front and center, but they are not enough alone to support a novel. A structure holding everything up and together is also necessary. This beautifully written book shows how to do this while also improving your ideas and writing.

Championship Writing: 50 Ways to Improve Your Writing by Paula LaRocque. According to the introduction, "This work is based on one chief assumption: That good writing is clear, precise, graceful, brief, and warm, and that bad writing is not." It is written for journalists and professional writers.

Is Life Like This? A Guide to Writing Your First Novel in Six Months by John Dufresne. This book is not a step-by-step guide, but rather a guide to all the facets you need in a successful novel. Each facet is discussed by Dufresne with other writers quoted or shown as examples so you can use the information and insights with your own characters, setting, dialogue, and plots to improve and complete your novels.

Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting by Robert McKee. Whether you want to write a screenplay or a book, the author's advice and insights about stories applies. The list of his students' movies and TV show credits on the back cover is impressive enough to make you buy the book—and you won't regret it.

What books do you give as gifts?

The Writer's Home Companion edited by Joan Bolker, Ed. D.

By Kate Phillips   

 

            There are authors we recognize as kindred spirits. We have all their books on our shelves, piled on tables, chairs, even the floor, or on our E-Readers. We buy their latest books sight unseen, reviews unread. They just belong to us.
 

            On Charlie Rose, author Nicole Krauss described other writers as either "of or not of her tribe". In The Writer's Home Companion, Ruth Whitman describes kindred authors as "the company I want to keep". Whatever we label it, some authors just speak to us.

 

 

As a writer, there are many books I consider company I want to keep including The Writer's Home Companion edited by Joan Bolker, Ed. D. This book is a gem, a compilation of almost thirty writers sharing their thoughts and experiences about their profession which will appeal to many other writers.

 

The book has two parts:

 

Part I: The Writing Process

 

                        Preparation

                        Beginning

                        Revision

                        Poetry

 

Part II: Becoming a Writer

 

                        Voice

                        Audience

                        Practice

 

Three to eight writers address each topic. While I found something of interest in every essay, sometimes almost every word in a piece spoke to me.
 

In the Preparation section, Donald M. Murray shares, "Write what you need to write, feed the hunger for meaning in your life. Play at the serious questions of life and death. Cultivate the silence when writing speaks…If you let the writing—or the line or tune or dance—flow, you will be carried where you never expected to go…"
 

In the Beginning section, Patricia Cumming, a published poet, lists over 200 writing prompts and creative activities she invented to get any writer started. Also, B. F. Skinner shares that Stendhal once remarked, "If when I was young I had been willing to talk about wanting to be a writer, some sensible person might have said to me: 'Write for two hours every day, genius or not.' That would have saved ten years of my life, stupidly wasted in waiting to become a genius."
 

In the Poetry section, which I almost skipped as I am not a poet, Rita Dove writes: "How restless and curious the human mind is, how quick the imagination latches onto a picture, scene, something volatile and querulous and filled with living, mutable tissue!…Every discipline craves imagination, and you owe it to yourself to keep yours alive."
 

A reprint of Helen Bendict's essay "A Writer's First Readers" in the Audience section quotes other writers. Cynthia Ozick shares, "There's nobody, really, to trust outside the critic within you."…Yet making the choice to rely only on an inner critic takes tremendous faith. John Irving believes that having it is the mark of a mature writer.
 

In the Practice section, Joan Bolker writes: "But I began to see that if I was going to be a real writer than writing had to become, with very few exceptions, the most important thing in my life."
 

Writers of every genre have knowledge to share. Don't limit your horizons. Read. Learn from as many as possible—and keep writing!

Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman

By Kate Phillips

 

            As a reader, I always love finding books that appeal to me. As a writer, I am twice as pleased when the authors also provide Masterclasses for me within their books.

            Masterclasses take place when performance artists and musicians work one-on-one with students. Writers don't generally have this option, but I have found some books to be Masterclasses for characters, dialogue, backstories, plots, settings, voice, and/or creativity.

 

 

            As an avid reader, I never liked to consider what ten books I would want with me on a deserted island. Only ten books just wouldn't do! It's doubtful I would survive with the complete works of ten authors. I need a new supply of books to be happy, even while rereading favorites, which is why I haven't been caught on a boat in years.

 

 

            However, there is one book that would make any reading list of mine—Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman.
 

I envy you if you have not read this fabulous collection of essays on books, reading, and writing yet. It is the perfect combination of topics, knowledge, vocabulary, passion, insights, appreciation, humor, and life lessons written by a fellow bibliophile.
 

Fadiman's life has been intertwined with books from the day she was born to Clifton Fadiman, author, editor, intellectual, radio and TV personality, and Annalee Whitmore Jacoby Fadiman, an author, screenwriter, and World War II magazine correspondent. Anne's first building blocks were her father's twenty-two volume set of Trollope. (Her son, Henry, was a bit more destructive; he liked to chew and devour books when he was eight months old.)
 

Books are present in every important phase of her life. She shares the details and the titles with her readers including her introductions to sonnets, sex, and sesquipedalians. After marriage, anyone with an extensive personal library and a spouse with one, too, will relate to her painfully true tale of commingling her books with her husband's.
 

But what I appreciated most about this book is the genuine joy she shares about everything to do with books—shopping for secondhand ones, ways to shelve them, and discovering words new to her in them.
 

I, too, enjoy reading books with unfamiliar words. As a writer, expanding my vocabulary is one of my favorite hobbies. I always have a dictionary close by in the hopes that I will have to look a word up. I had to look up more than usual while reading this book, but, thoughtfully, Fadiman listed the definitions of the new-to-her words at the end of "The Joy of Sesquipedalians" chapter.
 

As an editor, I appreciated the "Inset a Carrot / Insert a Caret" chapter. Proofreading is a good, if consuming, habit. It's also a fun family affair for the Fadimans, including her brother, Kim, when they are looking at menus, newspapers, books, and birthday cakes.
 

There are eighteen essays in this book—and I love them all. Her chapter "Never Do That to a Book" will make you both laugh and cringe at the way people treat their books. A favorite pen is immortalized in "Eternal Ink". And any writer who can also make the receiving of incorrectly addressed catalogs a delightful diversion is a treasure.
 

While we have never met, and probably never will, her book is next to my Books by Friends and Relatives shelf (mentioned on page 7) as I consider kindred spirits to be good friends.

 

 

JD Robb / Nora Roberts

By Kate Phillips    

As a reader, I always love finding books that appeal to me. As a writer, I am twice as pleased when the authors also provide Masterclasses for me within their books.

            Masterclasses take place when performance artists or musicians work one-on-one with students. Writers don't generally have this option, but I have found some books to be Masterclasses for characters, dialogue, backstories, plots, settings, and/or voice.

 

 

            Nora Roberts as JD Robb provides a Masterclass in writing a series where the two leads, Eve and Roarke, aren't only memorable as a tough, attractive homicide lieutenant and a gorgeous, brilliant, and occasionally ruthless billionaire, but also for their backstories which aren't even completely revealed through the 35th book. Yes, there are 35 books in this series, plus a few novellas, and it's still going strong.
 

            The plotting is top notch. In each book, Eve and Roarke, along with co-workers, friends, and relatives, catch criminals and murderers.
 

The series works so well because the author also gave both leads very complicated, emotional, stark, scary, and overwhelming childhoods so there is plenty of conflict within and between them. This also influences how they do their jobs and deal with plot twists springing from their dark pasts. (PLEASE NOTE: These books contain adult situations, language, and graphic violence.)
 

            The author set this series about 50 years in the future with helpful robots, AutoChefs that provide delicious meals with the ease of microwaves in both homes and cars—and some of these cars can hover over traffic accidents and "fly" to get to crime scenes faster. All of this technology makes life easier, mostly.
 

            In another twist, the main characters get married early on. The marriage is sometimes another layer of conflict as Eve and Roarke occasionally fight and feel the need for distance, but they also acknowledge the strength and security this bond gives them. Their dialogue takes on various undertones depending on their moods which anyone in a long-term relationship will recognize.
 

            The supporting cast has grown wonderfully as the series progressed. These characters provide a great deal of humor to books that have very dark sides. Murder isn't neat or easy in these books, but all the characters have personalities, backstories, and lives outside the crimes which enhance the plots and keep readers waiting impatiently for the next installment.

         

 

 

 

 

I am narrowing down Nora Roberts' vast successes to her Stars of Mithra series—Hidden Star, Captive Star, and Secret Star. These books are an excellent way to learn about longer-term plotting as the conflict and action, which centers around one long weekend from the viewpoints of three best friends, has to last through three books.
 

As in most books, some characters are privy to information that others are not, but the information (in this case, two intertwined crimes) affects everyone because of the choices the first best friend makes. Each of the other two main characters then takes action based on her personality traits and strengths which add depth to the books. The men they run from, run into, hire, are suspected by, and fall in love with also have strengths, knowledge, and backgrounds to add their own spins on the various situations they find themselves in.
 

            The dialogue is well done, witty, and at times filled with outrageous lies. As romances, happy endings are guaranteed, but this plot keeps readers engaged until the very end.

  

What authors have provided Masterclasses for you?

     

 

The Elements of Style by Strunk & White

 By Kate Phillips 

While growing up, reading was second only to breathing in my life. As long as I can remember, whenever I had a problem or an interest, I went looking for and discovered books that enlightened me.
 

When I decided I wanted to be a writer, I again turned to books. I read about writing, rewriting, and editing. Not sure what genre to choose, I read about writing novels, romances, memoirs, screenplays, and non-fiction.
 

I took one writing class. I learned more about the craft, but, more importantly, I got my first two writing jobs from connections I made there.
 

Before I got these jobs, I wrote occasionally. I had to work writing in around my 9-5 job, family obligations, errands, chores, illnesses, exhaustion, and resistance. In the end, I didn't accomplish enough.
 

However, once I had professional deadlines, my writing habits became regular and ingrained. I made the time to write. Editors were counting on me and I was not going to disappoint them or myself.
 

Now my regular monthly assignments are writing articles and profiles after interviewing individuals and members of organizations. I also write book reviews and essays.
 

The word count for these assignments is a range, not a hard number. I never gave much thought to the word count when I wrote. I just wrote, rewrote, and edited until the article was done then checked the word count. It usually fell within the range so the assignment was complete.
 

But I now realize I wrote only well enough.
 

I made this discovery once I gave myself the hard word count of 500 maximum for my posts on this blog.

 

         

WRITING GOAL: While researching how to create a blog, books and other blogs I read emphasized shorter posts were preferred so I gave myself the hard word count of 500. Readers have not commented on the brevity of my posts, but this decision has improved my writing in unexpected ways. I am learning to make every word tell as recommended by Strunk & White in The Elements of Style, a book all writers should read.

 

 

I still write without a thought about the word count although I may track it. I rewrite and edit my posts four, five, six times or more.
 

Then I check the word count and, for me, the real fun of blogging begins. I refine and sharpen my sentences; this is not to say I ever reach perfection, but I improve the posts with each pass.
 

It's essential to find just the right word, the most descriptive, encompassing, or specific word, which means searching and stretching my vocabulary. When I find it, I recognize it—almost hearing a click—and no other word will suffice.
 

I have made similar rewrites and edits before, but because of the hard word count, these improvements really resonate in me, especially when I am at the 500 limit and find another change that must be made. I then have to make difficult decisions and rewrites to return to that total. At times it's frustrating, but, mostly, it is exhilarating!
 

I think writing a blog with a hard word count is one of the best ways to improve your writing. Along with the pressure of a weekly deadline, blogging is a high stakes game with a potential world-wide audience. What more could any writer ask for? Well, being paid would be better—and you might get some offers. You won't know until you blog.

 

Do hard word counts improve your writing?