Every aspiring writer should include print publications in their writing career planning. It’s all about building your reputation, making publishing connections and gaining niche audience visibility. Besides all that, there are two other facts to consider: Print publications often pay astoundingly well Magazine editors live to have the perfect article pitch arrive on their doorsteps…
BLOG POSTS
Why You Should Always Put the Date on your Blog Post
This morning while researching a topic, I came across two blog posts that blatantly mimicked each other. It became immediately apparent that the plagiarist had simply taken the originator’s four points and rewritten them in his own words (same headings; same order!) Using my keywords in Google search, I came across version after version of…
A Walk in York Forest
When I look back on my early life, it isn’t the hundreds of days I went to school that stand out in my memory. It is the one single day my duty-driven father unexpectedly said to my sister and I: “Girls, it is too beautiful a day to go to school. Get in the car….
The Golden Gates
My very quiet 12 year old granddaughter just wrote her first official piece of writing. It is a cross between stream-of-consciousness narrative and personal essay and I was struck by the honesty and intensity of her feelings, so I promised her I would publish it in Copywriter’s Corner. I think this is the most I…
Silent Night
Getting old these Christmas images whirling with the snow outside my blind window fragments in glass balls, soap bubble fantasies/memories almost gone except for the sequined vest my grandmother made and the holy wafers from Poland that come no more
Why Arch Villains Bore me to Death
Sherlock Holmes had Moriarty, Superman had Lex Luthor and so on – right down through the inevitable spill-over into the movies and television, with Jethro Gibbs facing terrorist Ari Haswari and Harry Potter facing dead megalomaniac, Voldemort. The “arch” in arch enemy actually originates from the Greek “arkhos”, meaning “paramount”. Arch villains are supposed to…
Ghostwriting cat
No, it’s not called “outsourcing” when a ghostwriter suddenly finds her material being altered. It’s called “Zachary the cat”. While I was staying at my sister’s last week, I caught Zachary editing my article. He was quite smug about it. (Has your pet ever “helped” you write?)
Word of the Day: Pareidolia
PAREIDOLIA: The phenomenon of seeing faces or figures in nature. For example, I see a fat, nesting chicken in this spectacular lump of ice. The term itself originates from the Greek words “para” (“instead of”) and “eidolon” (“shape”). RELATED WORD: Apophenia: “Seeing patterns in random data” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia) What do you see when you look at…