Hey there word nerds! Today I have the pleasure of interview award-winning author Sebastian Barry, about his latest book Days Without End. Sebastian Barry is the author of seven novels, including A Long Long Way and The Secret Scripture (now a major motion picture starring Rooney Mara and Vanessa Redgrave). He has won the Costa Book of the Year Award, the Hughes & Hughes Irish Novel of the Year Award, and the Walter Scott Prize. His work has twice been short-listed for the Man Booker Prize. He lives in Ireland. Days Without End is a historical novel set during the Indian Wars in the American west, and the Civil War, about two young men who are brothers in arms and also lovers. It’s a story where the gay relationship is the only consistently joyful thing against the otherwise bleak background of war, genocide and the American empire.   In this episode we discuss: Recognizing how your real life becomes infused in your best writing. Shaking off the self-consciousness of writing. Being aware of what’s not in the books you’re reading and striving to create what’s not “out there.” Plus, Sebastian’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author Sebastian Barry is the author of seven novels, including A Long Long Way and The Secret Scripture (now a major motion picture starring Rooney Mara and Vanessa Redgrave). He has won the Costa Book of the Year Award, the Hughes & Hughes Irish Novel of the Year Award, and the Walter Scott Prize. His work has twice been short-listed for the Man Booker Prize. He lives in Ireland. Days Without End The book is inspired by and dedicated to Barry’s son, who came out as gay recently and on whose behalf Barry advocated for LGBT marriage rights during the Irish marriage referendum. The letter he wrote for the Irish Times on the subject went viral, and was read aloud in the Irish and Australian parliaments. The character of John Cole is a portrait of his son Toby’s boyfriend, Jack. Writing gay love was new territory for Barry, and part of his historical research for the novel was looking into the (elusive) history of gay life during that time through primary sources. There is a seriously researched and utterly moving history of proto drag on the frontier. John and Thomas, the main characters, first find work crossdressing, working as dance partners in saloons for lonely miners in frontier towns. Barry takes on the psychology of drag from Thomas’ point of view—what his costumes mean to his identity, which is split between his occupation as a soldier and the secret family he has built with John. Days Without End shifts the narrow expectations of what “masculine” literature can be and do. The book is in dialogue with and in some ways a rebuttal to Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain, in that the gay relationship is the only consistently joyful thing in otherwise bleak novel about genocide and American empire, rather than the source of anguish and frustration it is in Proulx’s novel. With John and Thomas, Barry wanted to portray the joy that he observes in his son’s relationship with his boyfriend, rather than shame and persecution. In Days Without End, Thomas McNulty, a “wren-sized” young man barely seventeen and an Irish refugee of the Great Famine, signs up for the U.S. Army in the 1850s with his brother in arms John Cole. The two friends are sent to fight in the Indian Wars against the Sioux and Yurok, and ultimately in the Civil War. Fans of Sebastian Barry’s subtly interconnected novels will rediscover the McNulty family—based on members of Barry’s own family—in the New World, as Thomas McNulty travels from the contested frontier plains of Wyoming, to the Union battlegrounds of Virginia and Maryland, to the starving remains of scorched earth towns in Tennessee. Days Without End is a powerful literary portrait of a time when Americans were pitted against Americans in bloody struggles fought to define the borders and identity of the nation. Barry writes of this period as it was experienced by common soldiers: men who did not determine or even necessarily understand the wars they fought, but who fought anyway, merely to survive them. Not just a war novel, Days Without End is also a poignant love story, about two men and the unlikely family they form with a young Sioux girl, Winona. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/133

  Hey there word nerds! Today I have the pleasure of interviewing Shanthi Sekaran, author of the new novel Lucky Boy, a book that has been getting a lot of pre-publication buzz and is an Indie Next Great Read pick for January 2017.   In this episode Shanthi and I discuss: The importance of fiction in humanizing different groups of people by bringing them and their experiences to life on the page. Using both research and imagination to create a vivid experience for your readers, and in particular how she crafted the dramatic immigration scenes in her book. Connection to the point of view of the characters and how to capture their experiences and emotions with authenticity. Crafting her book around the theme of motherhood, and how “mother” can mean very different things to different people. The universality of the “immigrant experience” in America, and how there are many common threads between immigrants from wildly different experiences. How there are also stark differences between immigrants with different levels of privilege, and how it’s important for us to understand these varied experiences. Why it’s important that writers live their lives and be present in the world. Plus, her #1 tip for writers. About the Author Shathi teaches creative writing at California College of the Arts, and is a member of the Portuguese Artists’ Colony and the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto. Her work has appeared in Best New American Voices and Canteen, and online at Zyzzyva and Mutha Magazine. A California native, she lives in Berkeley with her husband and two children. Lucky Boy Lucky Boy is a moving story about two unforgettable women in California: an undocumented Mexican woman and an Indian-American wife. Both love the same child but can’t have him. The novel beautifully weaves together the themes of motherhood, immigration, infertility, adoption and minority life in America (and tackles immigrant detention centers) and is a must-read in our current political environment. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/132

  Hey there word nerds! Today, I’ll be sharing a recap of all the exciting things I discovered at Digital Book World (or DBW) last week. 2017 marks the eighth year of this industry-focused event, with a shift toward solution-focused strategies paired with insightful in-depth programming. This year was also the the first time DBW has run a segment of the conference exclusively for indie authors. While this event is intended for the members of the publishing community—it truly is an industry event—there are a lot of things author can learn from DBW in order to thrive in today’s evolving landscape. And this doesn’t mean you need to be an indie author; even if writers planning to go the traditional route, there were a lot of important takeaways I got from digital book world this year. Three Main Themes at DBW While I heard a lot of fascinating statistics and gained so many new insights into publishing, there were three main themes that rose to the top.   Innovation: Cool new stuff that both publishers and authors are doing to connect with their audience and enhance the reading experience. Efficiency: To succeed in this business, it’s not just about working harder, it’s about working smarter, and this conference was brimming with awesome strategies and cool new tools I can’t wait to try. Sales: Let’s face it, if we want to create a sustainable career as writers, we have to understand sales. This means both knowing what the trends are now, and where the next opportunities might be.   This last piece is extremely important. It’s only when we understand the money piece that we can develop creative new ideas for earning a sustainable living from our writing. If we don’t know what’s going on in the industry around us, then we’re operating in a vacuum. As I go through each of these three themes from DBW, I’m also going to give you a little piece of homework—an assignment with each one—so you can implement these concepts with concrete, actionable steps. Let’s get started! Innovation What cool new stuff is the industry up to? Hands down, one of the places where I saw the most creative thinking was in platforms, and I don’t mean your author platform, but social media and other tech platforms where both authors and publishers are doing cool creative things. Trends include... Audio! By far the biggest buzz at DBW is around audiobooks. Using Facebook ads to build your email list as well as to sell directly. Platforms that are offering unique reading experiences (like Crave) or increasing authors’ reach (like Wattpad). Efficiency How can you work smarter? The two big areas of focus when it comes to efficiency focus creation and promotion. Finding new opportunities for your intellectual property (e.g. branded stories on Wattpad, capitalizing on audio rights, etc.). Agents play a huge part in helping authors make smart choices with their IP. While the query process can be tough, agents are still hungry to discover great talent. “Any given Thursday, you can walk into a bar and hear people singing karaoke who are pretty decent. But as agents, we’re not looking for ‘pretty good,’ we’re looking for someone who can sing at the Met or who can sell out Madison Square Garden.” —Regina Brooks, Lead Agent and President of Serendipity Literary Agency Understanding how to reach out to the media for publicity, and developing a multi-faceted PR approach. Take a “sniper rifle approach” to marketing and promotion, instead of a shotgun. Patience and persistence were common themes, especially at DBW Indie. You need to try different approaches but give them time to build traction (especially with SEO and digital tools). Sales What’s happening in our industry and what does this mean for authors? Perhaps my favorite session was given by Peter Hildick-Smith, Codex Group founder and president. He broke down the sales process into three steps, then talked about different strategies pertaining to each one. These steps are: Discover, conversion, and sourcing.   Discovery: Do readers know the book exists? How can we make potential readers more aware of books? Readers need two or more “exposures” to the book before they want to buy it, and that number goes up if the price of the book is higher. The good news is that the author’s connection to his/her audience can be a big influencer at this stage. Conversion: Now that readers are aware the book exists, do they want to read it? This is where cues like the cover and messaging around the book can make a big difference at this stage. Price and reviews/recommendations can also be a big influencer here. Sourcing: Readers know about the book, they want to read it, but will they buy it? Here is where things vary based on the specific book. Delivering a varied mosaic of information about the book (and where to buy it) from day one improves chances of sales.   About Digital Book World Starting with the only conference designed to address the radically changing commercial publishing environment, Digital Book World has evolved into a year-round platform offering educational and networking resources for consumer publishing professionals and their partners — including agents, booksellers and technology vendors — online and in person. You can keep up with Digital Book World and what they’re up to by following them on Twitter. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/131

  Hey there word nerds! Today’s DIY MFA Radio guest has a fantastic double life. Author Frédérique Molay began her career in politics and administration as chief of staff for a commission of the French National Assembly. She then worked for local government in Burgundy, ran in the European elections, and was elected in Saône-et-Loire. She also writes crime novels and won France's prestigious crime fiction award the Prix du Quai des Orfèvres for The 7th Woman, which went on to become an international bestseller. We had our conversation through a translator, a different format than you’re used to from DIY MFA Radio, but I hope you’ll stick with it. Molay has some brilliant insights about writing and I’m so excited to share our interview. In this episode we discuss: Publishing foreign titles in the United States with Le French Book Vulnerability and idealism in writing Work life - family life - writing life balance. Plus, their #1 tip for writers. About the Author Writing has always been a passion for Frédérique Molay, author of the award-winning international bestselling Paris Homicide series. She graduated from France’s prestigious grande école the Institut d'Études Politique and has a Master's degree in Business Administration. She began her career in politics and administration as chief of staff for a commission of the French National Assembly. She then worked for local government in Burgundy, ran in the European elections, and was elected in Saône-et-Loire.At the height of this brilliant political career, Molay was also writing crime novels and won France's prestigious crime fiction award the Prix du Quai des Orfèvres for The 7th Woman, which went on to become an international bestseller. She took a break from politics to write Crossing the Line and The City of Blood, two other titles in the Paris Homicide series.       In addition to being a knight in the Confrérie des Chevaliers du Tastevin—an order of wine lovers who promote Burgundy wines—Frédérique also taught French in middle school for a short time, sharing her passion for writing with young teens.The political virus never left her, however, and in June 2015, while writing Looking to the Woods, Frédérique returned to politics, as chief of staff for a newly elected senator. She now splits her time between Paris and Chalon-sur-Saône, between police procedurals and politics. Looking to the Woods When a ten-year-old girl's mutilated body is found in a public park in Paris, chief of police Nico Sirsky takes action. But his elite team of homicide detectives isn't on the case for even twenty-four hours before a second child is found murdered and left to rot inside a middle-school classroom. With the City of Light on edge awaiting another gruesome discovery, the clock starts ticking for Sirsky to catch the elusive killer who calls himself the gamemaster. As the pressure mounts, Sirsky is also confronted with a conundrum in his personal life: his girlfriend is inexplicably pulling away from him. But he must once again put his own problems aside when the investigation turns up nothing but taunts from the killer. It will take an entire team of police psychologists, forensic specialists, and criminal investigators to uncover the truth hidden in a web of murder more tangled than any of them could have imagined. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/130

Hey there word nerds! Today I’m thrilled to welcome Manjula Martin on the show. Manjula is editor of Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living from Simon & Schuster. She’s the creator of the blog Who Pays Writers? And was the founder and editor of Scratch magazine, an online periodical focused on the business of being a writer. Her work has appeared in various publications like the Virginia Quarterly Review, Pacific Standard, SF Weekly, The Billfold, and The Toast, plus, she is the managing editor of Zoetrope: All-Story. Today, Manjula and I will be talking about writers and money, how to make ends meet, and generate revenue from your writing. In this episode we discuss: Why it’s so difficult—but so important—for writers to talk about money. Also why it doesn’t have to be difficult. Different options and strategies for how writers can make a living beyond a book deal. The pros and cons of working for free, and the broader implications this has on the publishing landscape. Knowing your strengths and weaknesses and leveraging them to help you make a living. Plus, her #1 tip for writers. About the Author Manjula Martin is editor of Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living (Simon & Schuster, January 2017). She created the blog Who Pays Writers? and was the founder and editor of Scratch magazine, an online periodical that focused on the business of being a writer. Her writing has appeared in the Virginia Quarterly Review, Pacific Standard, SF Weekly, The Billfold, The Toast, and other publications. She is the managing editor of Zoetrope: All-Story and lives in San Francisco. You can learn more about Manjula Martin at her website: https://manjulamartin.com/. Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living A collection of essays from today’s most acclaimed authors—from Cheryl Strayed to Roxane Gay to Jennifer Weiner, Alexander Chee, Nick Hornby, and Jonathan Franzen—on the realities of making a living in the writing world. In the literary world, the debate around writing and commerce often begs us to take sides: either writers should be paid for everything they do or writers should just pay their dues and count themselves lucky to be published. You should never quit your day job, but your ultimate goal should be to quit your day job. It’s an endless, confusing, and often controversial conversation that, despite our bare-it-all culture, still remains taboo. In Scratch, Manjula Martin has gathered interviews and essays from established and rising authors to confront the age-old question: how do creative people make money? For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/129

Hey there word nerds! Today I have the pleasure of introducing you to someone who has been instrumental in helping me up my speaking game. Whether you’ve been hearing me speak on this podcast or have seen me speak on stage, this person has had a tremendous impact in helping me become the speaker that I am. This person is Alexia Vernon. Alexia has been branded a “Moxie Maven” by the White House Office of Public Engagement because of her unique and effective approach to developing female leaders, for a decade she has been a go-to speaking coach to CEOs, New York Times bestselling authors, media personalities, and scores of visionary entrepreneurs and change-makers who are ready to go from best-kept secrets to hotshot, transformational speakers.   Her unique background as a former Miss Junior America, public speaker, professor, actor, dancer, TEDx organizer, and corporate trainer has enabled Alexia to speak on stages such as the United Nations during the Commission on the Status of Women, INBOUND, and the Association of Talent Development (ATD). She has appeared on major media outlets like CNN, NBC, Inc., and Women’s Health Magazine. Her clients have spoken on stages like the World Domination Summit, Transformational Leadership Council, Entrepreneurs’ Organization, Off the Charts Live, and at TEDx’s around the world, not to mention scoring some amazing media coverage in publications like The New York Times, TIME, and Vanity Fair, and networks like OWN and Good Morning America.   In this episode Alexia and I discuss: The importance of public speaking for authors Finding your voice as a speaker How speaking can help you hone your ideas Plus, Alexia's #1 tip for writers. About Alexia Vernon Branded a “Moxie Maven” by the White House Office of Public Engagement for her unique and effective approach to developing female leaders, for a decade she has been a go-to speaking coach to CEOs, New York Times bestselling authors, media personalities, and scores of visionary entrepreneurs and change-makers who are ready to go from best-kept secrets to hotshot, transformational speakers. Her unique background as a former Miss Junior America, public speaker, professor, actor, dancer, TEDx organizer, and corporate trainer has enabled Alexia to speak on stages such as the United Nations during the Commission on the Status of Women, INBOUND, and the Association of Talent Development (ATD). She has appeared on major media outlets like CNN, NBC, Inc., and Women’s Health Magazine. Her clients have spoken on stages like the World Domination Summit, Transformational Leadership Council, Entrepreneurs’ Organization, Off the Charts Live, and at TEDx’s around the world, not to mention scoring some amazing media coverage in publications like The New York Times, TIME, and Vanity Fair, and networks like OWN and Good Morning America. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/128

  Hey there word nerds! Thanks for being here with me today. I’m so excited to share this interview with you. It’s a little bit different from what I usually do. Instead of being the one hosting the interview, in this episode I’m sharing an interview that I gave for my friend Joanna Penn on The Creative Penn Podcast. You might remember Joanna from episode 106 when she came on DIY MFA Radio and I got to interview her! She is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of thrillers under J.F.Penn and also writes nonfiction for authors. She’s also a professional speaker and award-winning entrepreneur. Her site, TheCreativePenn.com, is regularly voted one of the Top 10 sites for writers. She is a self-publishing superstar and I’m thrilled that she had me on her show. Embed Episode Here In this episode Joanna interviews me about: How I started DIY MFA, where I got that first glimmer of the idea, and how I built it into what you see today. The writer’s need for validation and why that “stamp of approval” needs to come from within. Honoring and understanding your process, and how there’s no right way to be a writer. The importance of author identity, and being the best version of yourself, but still be authentically you. I also share some of my signature DIY MFA techniques, like: The Angst Jar—what it is and why it’s my go-to tool for handling rejection, imposter syndrome, and any other curve ball my inner critic throws at me. The Revision Pyramid and how to use it so you can rock your post-NaNoWriMo revisions and make your manuscript sing. Visual outline techniques and why I’m so obsessed with design and graphics. Hint: It comes from my former life as a toy designer and psychology researcher. DIY MFA (the book!) Have you ever... Dreamed of writing a book but had no idea where to start? Started a writing project, but couldn’t stay motivated? Struggled to carve out time in your life for your writing? Searched for a writing community, but didn’t know where to look? Been overwhelmed by all the writing and publishing advice online? Order your very own copy direct from the publisher by clicking this affiliate link. As with any affiliate products we promote on this site, when you purchase via this link, DIY MFA gets a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you supporting DIY MFA! DIY MFA is the definitive guide for writers who can’t–or don’t want to–go back to school. Inspired by material I’ve created and compiled since the inception of this website, this is more than a writing guide in book form. Based on proven techniques and graduate-style curriculum, DIY MFA won’t just help you improve your writing skills, it will empower you to take control of your creative life. If DIY MFA were a school, this book would be the student handbook. It’s a one-stop-shop with all the fundamental elements from the website in one place. If you are new to DIY MFA, this book is the perfect springboard to get you going, and if you’ve taken one or more of our courses, this book will supplement and expand on what you learned. DIY MFA: Write with Focus, Read with Purpose, Build Your Community will help you get that graduate-level experience without going to school. Don’t put your life on hold for two or three years and accrue a huge amount of student debt. Instead, learn to recreate that MFA experience for yourself and seamlessly incorporate writing into your life. This book will show you how. I wrote this book for word nerds of all stripes, but particularly with these three particular writer groups in mind. Writers in the trenches: If you’re one of these writers, then you are in the thick of it, actively engaged in a writing project at this very moment. You work hard to improve your craft and are hungry to learn tools and skills you can apply to work-in-progress. This book will give you the techniques you crave. Serious newbies: Just because you’re new to writing doesn’t mean you’re not serious. If you’re one of these serious newbies, then you are motivated to learn all you can, so you can start your writing journey on the right foot. Learn how with this book. Career authors who need a boost: No matter how experienced a writer you are, sometimes you lose “that loving feeling” and it’s hard to get those words on the page. This book can help shake up some of those stale habits and get you pumped up about your writing again. Warning: If you are dabbler or dilettante looking for a “magic bullet” solution or a shortcut to success, this book is not for you. Seriously, it might spontaneously combust in your possession. (Just kidding. Sort of.) For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/127

Hey there word nerds! Thanks for joining me for DIY MFA Radio! I’m especially excited for this episode because today I get to interview agent Mitch Hoffman. I first met Mitch at ThrillerFest earlier this year, where I heard him speak on a panel and later got a chance to talk further at one of those conference mix-and-mingle shindigs. Right away, I knew Mitch was someone I wanted to bring on the show, not only because of his unique background both as a former editor at a major publisher and now as an agent, but also because of his measured, thoughtful approach toward publishing. Given how much has changed (and continues to change) in our industry, I wanted my word nerds to hear from someone who has been on both sides of the agent-editor realm, and also who’s been in the industry long enough to know where the book business has been, where it is now, and where it could be going. And from getting a chance to chat with him for a bit at ThrillerFest, I happen to know that he’s a pretty cool guy to talk to. Mitch joined the Aaron Priest Literary Agency as a Senior Agent in 2015. A 20-year veteran of the publishing industry, he was most recently Vice-President, Executive Editor at Grand Central Publishing.  As an editor, Mitch published over 200 books, more than 60 of which were New York Times bestsellers.  Prior to joining Grand Central Publishing in 2007, Mitch held editorial positions at Dutton and Dell Publishing, and began his career as an intern at Farrar, Straus and Giroux (or FSG).  So, basically, he’s worked at three of the “Big Apple Five” publishers.   Embed Episode Here In this episode Mitch and I discuss: The difference between an agent and an editor, and why he made the switch from the latter to the former. The acquisitions process from a publisher’s perspective, and what really happens after an editor gets a submission letter from an agent. All the different people in a publishing house who help determine whether to acquire a book or not. What an agent can do for an author trying to get published, and how agents can help authors beyond that single book deal. Plus, Mitch’s #1 tip for writers. About the Agent Mitch Hoffman joined the Aaron Priest Literary Agency as a Senior Agent in 2015. A 20-year veteran of the publishing industry, he was most recently Vice-President, Executive Editor at Grand Central Publishing.  As an editor, Mitch published over 200 books, more than 60 of which were New York Times best sellers.  Prior to joining Grand Central Publishing in 2007, Mitch held editorial positions at Dutton and Dell Publishing, and began his career as an intern at Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Mitch is actively building a list of authors writing across the spectrum of fiction and nonfiction, including thrillers, suspense, crime fiction, and literary fiction, as well as narrative nonfiction, politics, popular science, history, memoir, current events, and pop culture. If you think your book might be a good fit, visit the agency website, read the submission guidelines and send him a query. Make sure you mention in your query that you heard him speak on DIY MFA Radio. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/126

  Hey there word nerds! Today I’m speaking with Elisabeth Barrett, a romance author living in the San Francisco Bay Area. Elisabeth spends her days teaching, editing, writing sexy contemporary romance, and enjoying time with her sometimes-bearded husband and three spirited kids. She is constantly perfecting that juggling act between home/work/writing, but in her free time she loves to hike open space preserves, grow orchids, bake sweet things her husband won't eat, and sing in grand choruses. Her latest book Anywhere You Are is out now from Random House and she also has an indie published West Coast Holiday Series box set that is out just in time for the holidays.   In this episode we discuss: Crafting a series for the Romance genre and all the considerations that go with sustaining a story across multiple books. Different ways that series can play out. In Romance, one of the big trends is having series consist of “companion novels” focusing on a different romantic couple in each one. How characters can change over the course of a series, and how to adapt the story as your characters grow and evolve. Finding that work/life balance, especially when you have a family or a “day job” that compete with writing for your attention. Plus, Elisabeth Barrett’s #1 tip for writers. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/125

Hey there word nerds! If you subscribe to the DIY MFA newsletter, then you know I’ve had a lot to say lately. In this episode, I reflect on some of the recent themes I’ve been considering, themes like service, responsibility, gratitude and love. I also talk about some of the obstacles I’ve faced when building my author platform. These aren’t just external roadblocks that got in my way, but also internal factors and limiting mindsets that kept me from sharing my work. Listen in to the full episode below. In this episode, I talk about several things, including: Why it’s so important for you to share your stories, and how in doing so you not only empower yourself, but you also empower others to do the same. The “filter question” I use to assess all of my creative work, and how this one question helps me go from making a million tiny decisions every day to seeing  on the big picture. Bonus: This year, instead of doing New Year’s resolutions, challenge yourself to craft a filter question for your writing, your work, or even your life as a whole. In this episode, I also allude to several recent newsletters and articles from DIY MFA. In case you’ve missed them, I have linked to these articles below. Dream Big, Execute Small — how to reframe marketing from being all about you to being in service of your readers. Use Your Words — why now more than ever, writers have the responsibility to use their words with integrity and purpose. The Radicalism of Our TIme — in which I share a “big, scary thing” from my life, and talk about the tension between fear and love. Enjoyed this episode? Check out the webinar! I’m offering a FREE webinar next Monday, December 12th at 1pm ET designed to help you find and connect with your readers. This is all in preparation for the launch of my new course: Pixels to Platform, designed to help you build your platform and share your work in a way that is both authentic and effective. Connect with Readers, Build Your Platform Monday, December 12th at 1pm Eastern Time Register at: DIYMFA.com/PlatformWebinar For more info and show notes go to: DIYMFA.com/124

Hey there word nerds! Today I’m delighted to have Britt Alan on the show, talking about self-publishing his debut novel: Tiananmen Ascending. But before we dig into the nuts and bolts of writing and self-publishing, let me share a short anecdote that I think captures Britt’s longtime passion for that intersection between world politics and writing. When he was eight years old, he wrote the a letter to the Islamic Republic of Iran protesting the hostage crisis. Since that time, he’s had 23 years of experience in international relations, communications, and the federal government. This knowledge has very much informed his debut novel, as well as his decision to self-publish. In this episode Britt and I discuss: How he came up with the idea for the inciting incident of his book, and how he’s able to get inside the minds of his villains and truly understand their motivations. Why he proactively chose self-publishing and how he worked through the process of bringing his book to life. A few of the nuts and bolts decisions he had to make as part of the self-publishing process, and why he made those choices. Deciding which aspects of self-publishing (e.g. editing, cover design, interior design, etc.) to outsource and which ones to do yourself. How he juggles a day job, a family, and self-publishing his books. (Hint: It’s all about discipline.) Plus, Britt’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author Britt Alan’s interest in and concern about world politics started early when, as an eight-year-old child, he wrote the Islamic Republic of Iran to protest the Iran hostage crisis. The response sent to him by the Islamic Republic’s charge d’affaires, which he includes in the preface to his novel, introduced him to propaganda and years later inspired him to write Tiananmen Ascending.Alan has twenty-three years of experience in international relations, communications, the federal government and Department of Defense Science and Technology agencies and programs. He is active in the defense science and technology community and is a member of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association, the Project Management Institute, the American Marketing Association, and the Association of Proposal Management Professionals.Alan lives in Washington, DC, with his wife of nineteen years and two children, and is currently at work on his next novel of Chinese aggression and deception. His debut novel Tiananmen Ascending is out now. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/123

Hey there word nerds! Domestic suspense has been getting a lot of buzz lately, but crafting a great book in this sub-genre is much more challenging than it seems. Today I have the pleasure of interviewing author Cate Holahan about her latest book The Widower’s Wife. In this episode, Cate gives us a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into crafting a story of suspense and intrigue set in in everyday suburbia. In this episode Cate and I discuss: How she crafted the point of view for the story and why she chose to use certain characters’ point of view and not that of others. World-building in domestic suspense, and why a close setting (like a house) can be especially interesting for writers. The cultural details of the protagonist’s Brazilian heritage (like me!) and the research that went into making the details spot-on. How she wrote the investigator in this story, and why she gave this character’s role a particular twist. The artistry behind the supporting characters of the book, and why she wrote these characters in this way. Plus, her #1 tip for writers. About the Author Catherine "Cate" Holahan is an award-winning journalist, former television producer, and author. Her second novel, The Widower's Wife, was praised in a starred Kirkus review as "one of those rare thrillers that really will keep you reading all night." Her articles have appeared in BusinessWeek, The Boston Globe, The Record and on web sites for CBS, MSN Money, NorthJersey.com and CNBC. Her first novel, also published by Crooked Lane Books, is Dark Turns. She lives in New Jersey with her husband, two daughters, and dog.   The Widower’s Wife Ana Bacon, a young housewife, tumbles off a cruise ship into the dark and deadly waters, but did she take her secrets with her? Investigator Ryan Monahan is a numbers man. So when his company sends him the Bacon case, which could net a ten million dollar payout, Monahan doubts that her death is just a tragic accident. But the husband has a substantial alibi and a number of witnesses claim to have seen Ana fall. So the official ruling seems to be substantiated. Still, the more Monahan uncovers about Ana’s life, the more he realizes how many people would kill to keep her secrets hidden. And the closer he gets to the truth, the greater the odds grow that he, too, will take a fatal fall. Cate Holahan looks at the dark underbelly of a marriage from the perspectives of the detective and the victim in her tense and enthralling page-turner, The Widower's Wife.   For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/122

Hey there word nerds! Boy are you going to love this episode. It’s a bit of an adventure for me, because I have not one, not two, but three wonderful guests joining me on the show. Today, I’m speaking with Anne Trager, founder of Le French Book, and two members of her team: Amy Richards and Sally Pane. Together, these three ladies have adapted the Winemaker Detective Series, authored in France originally by Jean-Pierre Alaux and Noël Balen, and have brought these wonderful books to the United States. As we discuss the ins and outs of translating and adapting books to an American audience, you’ll get an inside look at all the nuances and details that go into bringing the Winemaker Detective Series to life for a new readership. In this episode Anne, Amy, Sally, and I discuss: What Le French Book is, and what inspired Anne to start this company. We also discuss the collaboration process of these three women. The Winemaker Series, and why it is such a perfect choice for Le French Book. How one small shift in the adaptation timeline has led to some interesting and fun changes in the series translation. The translation process and how this particular team translates and adapts this series to an American audience. How you can preserve the voice of the authors, even when translating a text from one language to another. Plus, their #1 tip for writers. About Le French Book When I read this manifesto of sorts on the Le French Book website, I knew Anne Trager and I were of the same mind. What we believe Entertainment is key. A book is a book is a book, whatever the format. It's the story that counts. Readers want to read, so they should have easy access to our books. Publishing is changing and all ways of getting books to readers are worth exploring. Reaching out and engaging with readers is where it’s at. Learn more at www.lefrenchbook.com, or follow Le French Book on Facebook and Twitter. You can also download a free copy of the first in the series Treachery in Bordeaux. Anne Trager loves France so much she has lived there since 1985 and just can’t seem to leave. What keeps her there is a uniquely French mix of pleasure seeking and creativity. Well, that and the wine. In 2011, she woke up one morning and said, “I just can’t stand it anymore. There are way too many good books being written in France not reaching a broader audience.” That’s when she founded Le French Book to translate some of those books into English. The company’s motto is “If we love it, we translate it,” and Anne loves crime fiction, mysteries and detective novels. WAmy Richards is the translation editor at Le French Book and she loves a good story, whether it’s reading it, telling it or helping someone else write it. She has spent the better part of her career as a writer and editor at both small-town and major metropolitan newspapers. Her award-winning work has ranged from capturing the economic decline of Rust-Belt communities on Lake Erie to distilling the essence of food stories in well-turned headlines. Her entrée to manuscript editing was a chance encounter in a thrift store. She overheard a first-time author talking about his novel. “Do you need an editor?” she asked. “Why yes, I do,” he answered. Since helping him polish his first two novels, she has edited more than two dozen English-first and translated works for independent authors and Le French Book. Sally Pane studied French at SUNY and the Sorbonne before receiving her Masters Degree in French Literature from the University of Colorado. Her career includes more than twenty years of translating and teaching French and Italian at  University of Colorado Boulder. She also served as the interpreter for the government cabinet of Rwanda and translated for Dian Fossey’s Digit Fund. Sally has translated a number of titles in the Winemaker Detective series. In addition to her passion for French, she studied Italian at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Rome and Siena. She lives in Boulder, Colorado with her husband. Winemaker Series An immersion in French countryside and gourmet attitude with two amateur sleuths gumshoeing around French wine country.  The Winemaker Detective series delves into the underworld of a global luxury industry, where there’s money, deceit, death, crime, inheritance, jealousy—all the ingredients needed to distill a fine detective series! That and a decent dose of Epicurean enjoyment of fine food and beverage. It follows master winemaker Benjamin Cooker and his sidekick Virgile Lanssien in their adventures solving mysteries in vineyards throughout France and beyond. Each book is a homage to wine and winemakers. This series—written by Jean-Pierre Alaux and Noël Balen—has been made into a television series in France, Blood of the Vine. The series is a huge success in France, Belgium and Switzerland, attracting an audience of over 4 million. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/121  

Hey there word nerds! I am so excited to share this new episode with you. Today I have the pleasure of speaking with author John Sandford. This, of course, is the pseudonym of the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Camp and he is the author of 45 books and counting! In case you’re curious, his writing credits include twenty-six Prey novels; four Kidd novels; nine Virgil Flowers novels; three YA novels co-authored with his wife, Michele Cook; and three standalone books, most recently Saturn Run. In this episode John and I discuss: Why he chose to base a series around a supporting character from his Prey novels, Virgil Flowers, and how humor plays into this spin-off series. How his three series tie together by existing in the same world, and the contrast between the protagonists in each. Why thrillers with a criminal as the protagonist tend to be less popular than those with sleuths or law enforcers as the focus, and where antiheroes fit into that picture. How to create antiheroes who are compelling (even if they’re unlikeable) by focusing on their motivations and using humor. Crafting a great heist story, and why it’s important for the target of the heist to be even more reprehensible than the thieves stealing the money. Where he gets inspiration for his characters’ names, and it’s not how you would expect. Plus, his #1 tip for writers. About the Author John Sandford is the pseudonym of the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Camp. He is the author to twenty-six Prey novels; four Kidd novels; nine Virgil Flowers novels; three YA novels co-authored with his wife, Michele Cook; and three standalone books, most recently Saturn Run. Nine years ago, he brought Virgil Flowers, a supporting character in his Prey series, to life launched a spin-off series around this character. The result was another riveting #1 bestselling series. Over the course of the Virgil Flowers series, Sandford’s novels have achieved enormous popularity, both among fans and reviewers, and the ninth installment in the series, ESCAPE CLAUSE, does not disappoint. For more info and complete show notes: DIYMFA.com/120

Hello hello word nerds! Welcome to another episode of DIY MFA Radio. Today I have the pleasure of speaking with author Diane Saxton. As a journalist, Diane has written for Vanity Fair, The Huffington Post, Holiday Magazine and Greenwich Review and she has covered everything from torture victims to physics, animal rights activists, exotic travel, and movie producers. She brings this same passion and gift for storytelling to her debut novel, PEREGRINE ISLAND, which we’ll be discussing today.   In this episode Diane and I discuss: Building a story from a theme and a few core characters. The contrast between the male and female characters in the story. How sometimes writers don’t realize they’re making artful choices until after they’ve made them. The long and winding path that brought her to finding the perfect home for her book with She Writes Press. How writers can use their craft to honor the lives of those no longer with us. Finding your writing rhythm, even if it’s totally different from what works for other writers. Plus, Diane’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author Diane Saxton was a journalist with Vanity Fair UK, Holiday Magazine, and Greenwich Review, and covered everything from torture victims to psychics, animal rights activists, exotic travel, and movie producers. A new chapter opened up for her after interviewing Amnesty International US founder Hannah Grunwald. Alarmed that the stories of incredible and influential lives such as Grunwald’s could be lost as the Greatest Generation passes, Saxton began capturing their histories and compiled them into a 1,000 page biographical collection, which became the inspiration for her next book. She brings the same gift for storytelling with illuminating subtext to her debut novel, Peregrine Island. Saxton divides her time between New York City and the Berkshires, where she lives with her husband, dogs and horses. Peregrine Island Have you ever wondered what the impetus was to start a certain painting? Why the artist chose to immortalize a particular subject? What if you suddenly discovered that the painting in question, your painting, was valuable? In Peregrine Island, the Peregrine family’s lives are turned upside-down one summer when so-called “art experts” appear on the doorstep of their Connecticut island home to appraise a favorite heirloom painting. When incriminating papers—and other paintings—are discovered behind the painting in question, the appraisal turns into a full-fledged investigation. Flattered at first by the art museum’s unanticipated interest, the family members quickly change their attitudes with the arrival of detectives on their terrace and the illusory but repeated appearance of a stranger reported to be concealed in a cove. The now-antagonistic family—grandmother, mother, and child—consequently begin to suspect one another, as well as the shady newcomers in their midst. As the summer progresses and the investigation reveals facts about the Peregrines’ past that even they didn’t know, they learn that people are not always who they appear to be—themselves not excluded—and art is often a reflection of their own lives. More important, in uncovering the secret of the painting they come to realize that the love each unconsciously sought has been right in front of them all along. Though Peregrine Island is driven by a mystery, it is as much characterized by its ever-present sense of spiritualism, accentuated by the symbolism of the Sound, the soul of relationships, and the wisdom of the very young and the very old. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/119

Hey there word nerds! Today I’m delighted to welcome Todd Harra to the show. It seemed fitting to have Todd as our guest for our Halloween episode, since he is the author of Mortuary Confidential: Undertakers Spill the Dirt and Over Our Dead Bodies: Undertakers Lift the Lid. As writers’ we’re often advised not to quit our “day jobs,” usually because people think having a sensible, reliable profession is safer than trying to have a creative career. In this episode, I speak with an author who not only hasn’t quit his “day job” but his profession is part of the inspiration behind his books, and helped get his start as a writer. And for the record, no, his “day job” is not in publishing or a field related to writing. This author happens to be an undertaker. In this interview we’re going to talk about drawing inspiration from our “day jobs,” using writing to process what we experience in our jobs, and--most important--how we as writers can use our words as a way to honor the lives of others. In this episode Todd and I discuss: How he got started in his “day job” and how he connected with his co-author. The collaborative process of writing not one, but two books together. Why persistence pays off, and why it’s so important for writers to be flexible and try different approaches. How the structure of his day job affected the structure of these particular books. How he uses writing to process his experiences in his “day job” and how his “day job” also fuels his writing. How he picked up and learned the business of writing, and how writers can educate themselves about the industry. Plus, Todd’s #1 tip for writers. About the Authors Todd Harra has working in the funeral profession since 2004. He is a fourth generation funeral director, working for his uncle at McCrery & Harra Funeral Homes and Crematory in Wilmington, DE. His great great great grandfather was a cabinet maker and tradesman undertaker in Milford, Delaware prior to the Civil War. Todd graduated from Elon University and the American Academy McAllister Institute of Funeral Service. He received certification in Advanced Post Mortem Reconstruction from the Fountain National Academy of Professional Embalming Skills, and is a Certified Crematory Operator. Todd appeared on the cover of the 2008 "Men of Mortuaries" calendar, a fundraiser for the KAMM Cares breast cancer foundation, where he met Ken and they decided to collaborate on a non-fiction mortuary series of books. Todd is currently working on several fiction based projects. To learn more about him and his writing, visit his website, www.toddharra.com. Kenneth McKenzie first became interested in the death care industry at the age of twelve, following his father's suicide. He has been a funeral director for over 22 years and a funeral home owner for 14. In 2007 Ken created and published the well-received Men of Mortuaries calendar, also the inspiration for this book, to benefit Breast Cancer Awareness, and he received California's Outstanding Funeral Director of the Year Award. He resides in Long Beach, CA. For more information please visit www.MenOfMortuaries.org. Links and Resources If you want to check out both of Todd’s books, visit the book websites below or purchase them via our Amazon affiliate links (where DIY MFA gets a small commission at no cost to you). As always thank you for supporting DIY MFA! Mortuary Confidential: Undertakers Spill the Dirt  |  Book Website: www.mortuaryconfidential.com Over Our Dead Bodies: Undertakers Lift the Lid  |  Book Website: www.overourdeadbodies.com For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/118  

Hey there word nerds! Today I am so pleased to have Teddy Wayne on the show. Teddy  is the author of several books, most recently his novel Loner, which is out now. Teddy has won numerous writing awards, is regular contributor to several prestigious publications, and has taught at Columbia University in NYC and Washington University in St. Louis. In this interview, we talk about Teddy’s newest book and the craft behind bringing an anti-hero to life on the page. During the episode, we geek out about anti-heroes, Hitchcock movies, and how trying to understand reprehensible characters can help expand our humanity. Listen below.   In this episode we discuss: What writers can learn about crafting an anti-hero from the TV show All in the Family, and how to create a character who is deeply flawed but also relatable. How much of an anti-hero’s character is shaped by internal qualities versus environmental or situational factors. How to avoid making an anti-hero seem over-simplified and make readers feel connected to an evil character. The difference between an extraordinary character’s slow descent into darkness, and a regular character making a terrible choice and having to “fix” the situation. The two components that writers can infuse into literary fiction to make it come to life and hook readers. Plus, Teddy’s #1 tip for writers. About the Teddy Wayne Teddy Wayne is the author of the novels Loner, The Love Song of Jonny Valentine, and Kapitoil. He is the winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award and an NEA Creative Writing Fellowship as well as a finalist for the Young Lions Fiction Award, PEN/Bingham Prize, and Dayton Literary Peace Prize. A columnist for the New York Times, he is a regular contributor to The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, and McSweeney’s and has taught at Columbia University and Washington University in St. Louis. He lives in New York. About the Book With the same knack for voice and piercing social commentary Wayne gave readers in The Love Song of Jonny Valentine and Kapitoil, LONER is a riveting, frighteningly believable portrait of obsession on a college campus. Much like Claire Messud’s The Woman Upstairs, Herman Koch’s The Dinner, and Charlotte Rogan’s The Lifeboat—and, further back, The Talented Mr. Ripley, Lolita, and Notes from Underground—it is one of those rare novels where, as the pages fly by, readers feel everything from fear to rage to empathy for characters they might not like, but nevertheless find completely mesmerizing. Wayne’s New York Times column the last couple of years, “Future Tense,” has demonstrated his critical talents for dissecting the alienating effects of contemporary culture, and LONER continues this with the misfit David Federman at the center of the novel. An academically gifted yet painfully forgettable member of his New Jersey high school class, the withdrawn, mild-mannered freshman arrives at Harvard fully expecting to be embraced by a new tribe of high-achieving peers. But, initially, his social prospects seem unlikely to change. Then Veronica Morgan Wells enters his life. Immediately struck by her beauty, wit, and sophisticated Manhattan upbringing, David falls feverishly in love with the woman he sees as an embodiment of what he’s always wanted to be: popular, attractive, powerful. Determined to stop at nothing to win her attention and an invitation into her glamorous world, he begins compromising his moral standards. But both Veronica and David, it turns out, are not exactly as they seem. Links & Resources Check out these previous podcast episodes talking about systematic and deliberate practice in writing. These interview share some great insights about how to practice as a writer. Episode 61: How to Write Spellbinding Sentences–Interview with Barbara Baig DIYMFA.com/061 Episode 89: The Power of Deliberate Practice – Interview with Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool DIYMFA.com/089 For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/117

  Hey there word nerds! Today I am thrilled and delighted to be speaking with author Amor Towles about his latest book A Gentleman in Moscow. If you’ve ever struggled with world-building, this book is a master class on how to navigate the multiple layers of setting and that’s what we talk about this interview today. As you’ll hear in this conversation, world-building is not just relevant for writers of historical fiction, science fiction, or fantasy. Setting and world-building is important for any type of story. As we discuss in this interview, world also exists on multiple levels. Like ripples in a pond, where the setting can influence your character, but your character can also affect your story’s world. In this episode Amor and I discuss: The premise latest book, and how world-building factored in from the very beginning of his writing process. How to avoid the biggest world-building mistake in writing, and how to work around these constraints wit your setting. Using supporting characters to add layers of interest to your setting, when your main character is confined in a limited space. Why it’s important to understand all aspects of a time period or culture, so you can convey multiple layers of complexity to your story. The ripple effect of world-building and how setting operates on both micro and macro levels. Why applied research and artificial details don’t capture the emotional truth of a scene or description, and how to use character to make setting come to life. Creating characters and stories that seem to extend beyond the pages of the book. How the world of your story impacts your character, and how your character can affect your story’s world. Plus, Amor’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author Amor Towles was born and raised just outside Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Yale University and received an MA in English from Stanford University. For many years a principal at an investment firm in Manhattan, he now devotes himself full time to writing. His first novel, Rules of Civility, published in 2011, was a New York Times bestseller in both hardcover and paperback. Towles lives in Manhattan with his wife and two children. To learn more about Amor and his writing, visit his website, AmorTowles.com , or follow him on Instagram or Facebook. A Gentleman in Moscow A big novel that embodies the grandiloquent style and spirit of Russia’s Golden Age of literature, A GENTLEMAN IN MOSCOW is a captivating story of personal and emotional discovery. This novel immerses us in another elegantly drawn era with the story of Count Alexander Rostov. When, in 1922, he is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, the count is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Though stripped of most of his personal possessions and his dignity, the Count remains determined to preserve his passion for life, and finds his days propelled in profound and unanticipated directions through his encounters with the hotel’s staff and guests, which unlock the doors to larger worlds within the hotel and ultimately himself. Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/116  

Hello hello, word nerds! Welcome to our latest episode of DIY MFA Radio. Today I’m speaking with Chad Dundas, the debut author of the historical sports novel: THE CHAMPION OF THE WORLD. When publishing their debuts, writers have to contend with many different hurdles. They need to grab the attention of agents and editors. They need to hook readers from the very first page. And they must do all of this at a time when they don’t yet have a track record of success and a huge fanbase to rely on. Some authors might be tempted to play it safe, but not Chad Dundas. He chooses a topic--professional wrestling--that not many people are interested in. He sets his book in a world that most people don’t know much about: the traveling carnivals of the 1920s. And he opens his book with a chapter where at the end it’s unclear whether the point-of-view character is even still alive. As writers, I think it’s so important for us to hear not just from major bestselling authors with dozens (if not hundreds) of books under their belts. I also want you to hear from authors who are just a few steps ahead of where you are. I want you to know that you can take risks in your debut novel, and I want to introduce you to writers who are doing just that. In this episode Chad and I discuss: Starting your novel when something happens Researching to get the historical elements just right The craft of writing on a chapter level Reality versus fiction in your writing and your life Plus, Chad’s #1 tip for writers. More about Chad: Chad Dundas earned his MFA from the University of Montana, and his short fiction has appeared in the Beloit Fiction Journal, Sycamore Review, Sou’Wester, and Thuglit. Since 2001, he’s worked as a sportswriter for national outlets including ESPN, NBC Sports, Sporting News, Bleacher Report, and the Associated Press, as well as local and regional newspapers. A fourth-generation Montanan, he lives with his wife and children in Missoula. To learn more about Chad check out his website, or follow him on Twitter. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/115

Hey there, Word Nerds. Welcome to this week’s episode of DIY MFA Radio. Today I’m talking to Steven Rowley, the author of the novel LILY AND THE OCTOPUS about an important topic in writing: the author's voice. There are so many different voices that authors have to sift through when writing, from authorial voice to character voice to the critical voices that try to hold you back. Steven and I talk about how to differentiate between the voices, how to find what is useful for you, and how to shed what is weighing you down. In this episode Steven and I discuss: Working through hard emotions via writing. Articulating the distinct voices of different characters in a story. “Finding” your authorial voice. Protecting yourself from the voices in your own head. What to read when you need to replenish the well. Plus, Steven’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author: Steven Rowley has worked as a freelance writer, alternative weekly newspaper columnist, and screenwriter. Originally from Portland, Maine, he is a graduate of Emerson College and currently lives in Los Angeles. For more information about Steven and his ongoing projects, check out his website, or follow him on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook.   For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/114

Hey there Word Nerds! Thanks for joining me for this episode of DIY MFA Radio. You’re gonna love today’s guest. Today I’m speaking with one of the most prolific writers working in modern fiction: Dean Wesley Smith. A USA Today bestselling author, Dean has published far over a hundred novels in forty years, and hundreds upon hundreds of short stories across many genres. In total, he has over seventeen million copies of his books in print.His monthly magazine called Smith’s Monthly, consisting of only his own fiction, premiered in October 2013 and has not missed an issue yet. With over 60,000 words per issue, including a new and original novel every month, this magazine goes to show that consistency is king when it comes to modern publishing, especially indie publishing. In this episode Dean and I discuss: How to get out of your own way and get writing. Killing the sacred cows of publishing Giving your creative voice permission to play and putting the critical voice away. Running a small publishing company. Training yourself to shift gears from creative work to business work. Plus, Dean’s #1 tip for writers. More about Dean: Considered one of the most prolific writers working in modern fiction, USA Today bestselling writer, Dean Wesley Smith published far over a hundred novels in forty years, and hundreds and hundreds of short stories across many genres. He has over seventeen million of his books in print.At the moment he produces novels in four major series, including the time travel Thunder Mountain novels set in the old west, the galaxy-spanning Seeders Universe series, the urban fantasy Ghost of a Chance series, and the superhero series starring Poker Boy. His monthly magazine called Smith’s Monthly, consisting of only his own fiction, premiered in October 2013 and has not missed an issue yet, with over 60,000 words per issue, including a new and original novel every month.During his career, Dean also wrote a couple dozen Star Trek novels, the only two original Men in Black novels, Spider-Man and X-Men novels, plus novels set in gaming and television worlds. Writing with his wife Kristine Kathryn Rusch under the name Kathryn Wesley, they wrote the novel for the NBC miniseries The Tenth Kingdom and other books for Hallmark Hall of Fame movies.He wrote novels under dozens of pen names in the worlds of comic books and movies, including novelizations of almost a dozen films, from The Final Fantasy to Steel to Rundown. Dean also worked as a fiction editor off and on, starting at Pulphouse Publishing, then at VB Tech Journal, then Pocket Books, and now at WMG Publishing where he and Kristine Kathryn Rusch serve as executive editors for the acclaimed Fiction River anthology series. To learn more about Dean’s books and ongoing projects, check out his website. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/113

Hey there Word Nerds! Welcome back for another episode of DIY MFA Radio. Today I have the pleasure of speaking with Jerry Jenkins, author of 189 books with sales of more than 70 million copies. He’s had 21 New York Times bestsellers, including the Left Behind series and he now shares his writing knowledge on his blog. Earlier this year, he launched his brand new Jerry Jenkins Writers Guild, a writing program that helps serious writers finish their book and get traditionally published. The Guild is already over 1500 members strong, and it is opening its doors to new members on September 19 for the final time this year. In this episode Jerry and I discuss: What inspired him to start writing Learning the business of publishing before you dive in Myths that come up about the process of writing and publishing The importance of editing for good writing and learning from the critique that others receive Plus, Jerry’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author Jerry Jenkins is the author of several novels, including both series and stand-alone. While most people know him as the author of the Left Behind series, Left Behind was actually his 125th book. His insatiable pursuit of great stories has also motivated him to write biographies of icons such as Hank Aaron, Orel Hershiser, Walter Payton, Meadowlark Lemon, Nolan Ryan, Mike Singletary, B.J. Thomas, and many other men and women. For the full list of his published books, click here. To learn more about Jerry or to check out some of his resources for writers, visit his website, or follow him on Twitter or Facebook. His writer's guild--which we discussed on the show--will be opening for registration soon. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/112  

Hey there Word Nerds! Thanks for joining me for this episode of DIY MFA Radio. Today I’m talking with debut author Erin Petti. Her debut novel, The Peculiar Haunting of Thelma Bee, us out now and it just might be one of my new favorites. Right away when I chatted with Erin, I felt like I had found a long-lost bestie. She lives in Massachusetts and loves to read about the same things I do: magic, dinosaurs, folklore, and ghosts. With a Masters in Education and a background in improv comedy, it’s no wonder that her fiction debut is part magic, part science, and totally hilarious. If you are a fan of Middle Grade fiction or have young people in your life who love to read, I highly recommend this book. In this episode Erin and I discuss: Writing characters’ “coming of age” moments The importance of setting to the narrative Incorporating real-life details into your fictional settings Plotting your middle grade series Diversity in books for young people Plus, Erin’s #1 tip for writers. About the Book: The Peculiar Haunting of Thelma Bee is a fantastical adventure-mystery, where science and magic intertwine. Eleven-year-old Thelma Bee is never bored; in fact, she has curiosity and adventure in her blood. She spends her time running science experiments, practicing Spanish, and daydreaming about exotic landscapes. But Thelma gets more than she bargained for when a strange woman sells a jewelry box at her father's antique shop. That night, a ghost kidnaps her father, and the only clue is the jewelry box and a word a ghost whispered in her ear: "Return". Now it's up to Thelma to get her dad back, and it might be harder than she thought because here's someone wielding dark magic, and Thelma is pretty sure they're coming after her next. About the Author: Erin Petti lives by the ocean in Massachusetts and loves to read about magic, dinosaurs, folklore, and ghosts. She has a Masters in Education and a background in improvisational comedy. Erin lives with her husband, excellent toddler, and cat (who she suspects likes her better than she's letting on).  You can follow Erin on Twitter, or check out her website erinpetti.com for more information about her and her writing. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/111    

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so glad you’ve joined me for another episode of DIY MFA Radio. Today I have the pleasure of speaking with Delia Ephron, bestselling author and screenwriter. She’s the writer behind the novel and movie Hanging Up, as well as the screenwriter for movies like You’ve Got Mail, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, and Michael. She’s also a journalist and playwright, with her articles appearing in major markets like The New York Times, O: The Oprah Magazine, Vogue, and Vanity Fair, and her hit play Love, Loss, and What I Wore (co-written with Nora Ephron) running for more than two years off-Broadway and performed all over the world. Her newest novel, Siracusa, is a haunting drama about two failing marriages and how the lives of these two couples (and one pre-teen girl) unravel on a trip to Italy. In this episode Delia and I discuss: Keeping track of details when writing multiple points of view Getting into the heads of your characters and bringing that to the page. Knowing what details to share and what to withhold. Writing people who are real and complicated. Adapting stories versus creating new material. Plus, Delia’s #1 tip for writers. About SIRACUSA Bestselling author Delia Ephron wields her keen understanding of the human psyche to mine the ruins of relationships in SIRACUSA, a thrilling emotional opus set in Italy and performed by a pitch-perfect choir of four voices. New Yorkers Michael, a famous writer, and Lizzie, a journalist whose professional life is crumbling, travel in Italy with their friends from Maine – Finn, his wife Taylor and their daughter, Snow. “From the beginning,” says Taylor, “it was a conspiracy between Lizzie and Finn to be together.” Written Rashomon-style in alternating points of view, we see friendships and relationships bend and break as secrets are exposed and the couples careen toward Siracusa and disaster. “Couples collaborate,” says Lizzie, “hiding even from each other who is calling the shots and who is along from the ride.” Snow--Taylor’s lookalike daughter--drawn into the adult drama, moves to the center of the story and is the catalyst for conflict between the women (Taylor a mother, Lizzie not) as well as a pawn between Finn and Michael. She is the mystery at the heart of SIRACUSA. Is she shy or she is cunning? Do we want to protect her or should we fear her? Ephron’s masterful writing renders each adult character in stark detail--their inner monologue revealing darker truths about disappointments, envy and ambition. In a story that unfolds with the pacing of a psychological thriller, Ephron also delivers a powerful meditation on marriage, friendship, and the meaning of travel. As the vise tightens, Lizzie ponders: Is loyalty a more honorable pledge than love? Pinging between multiple points of view and painting a detailed landscape of both the human heart and the Ionian seaside, SIRACUSA is an electrifying novel about marriage and deceit. As it spins to its shocking and unexpected end, Ephron effortlessly shape-shifts between personalities, offering insight from every character, infusing each chapter with equal parts wit and mystery, and leaving it up to the reader to untangle the truth from a wide net of lies.   Delia Ephron is a bestselling author and screenwriter. She has written novels, including The Lion Is In and Hanging Up; humor books for all ages, including How to Eat Like a Child and Do I Have to Say Hello?; and nonfiction, most recently Sister Mother Husband Dog (etc.). Her films include You’ve Got Mail, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Hanging Up (based on her novel), and Michael. Her journalism has appeared in The New York Times, O: The Oprah Magazine, Vogue, and Vanity Fair. Her hit play Love, Loss, and What I Wore (co-written with her sister, Nora Ephron) ran for more than two years off-Broadway and has been performed all over the world. She lives in New York City. To learn more, follow her on Facebook and Twitter, or visit her website. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/110

Hey there Word Nerds. I can’t wait for you to hear today’s interview with MJ Rose. A fellow New-Yorker, MJ Rose grew up in NYC, exploring the labyrinthine galleries of the Met, wandering the dark tunnels and lush gardens of Central Park, and reading her mother’s favorite books before she was allowed. She’s the author of over a dozen novels and co-president and founding board member of ITW (International Thriller Writers). She’s also the founder of the first marketing company for authors (AuthorBuzz.com) and is a book marketing mastermind. People throughout the book industry consider her an innovator and publishing pioneer. I had the pleasure of hearing her talk about book buzz and promotion at the most recent ThrillerFest and she most definitely knows her stuff. Today we’ll be talking about her new book The Secret Language of Stones and how she has put her own marketing genius to work in promoting her latest book. In this episode MJ and I discuss: The importance of buzz for your book in getting it published. Whether you should market your own book or hire an expert to market it for you. The best thing you can do to market your book. Interpersonal etiquette, or how best to approach other authors on social media and ask for help marketing your book. Plus, MJ’s #1 tip for writers. Resources You can follow MJ Rose on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Goodreads, or visit her website for more information about her and her books. Watch the TED Talk that MJ mentions about figuring out your brand. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/109  

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so glad you’ve joined me for this episode. Today I am so thrilled to be  interviewing someone who I have honor of calling a mentor and friend: James Scott Bell. Jim is the author of the #1 bestseller for writers, Plot & Structure, and numerous thrillers, including his Mike Romeo series: Romeo’s Way. He is also a wonderful teacher who has taught writing at numerous conferences and I’ve had the pleasure of hearing him speak about writing at several events. Each time I come out learning a valuable new technique that I can apply to my work right away. As a teacher, his superpower lies in the way he explains plot and story structure. Whenever I have questions about how to structure a book or plot a story, I always look first to his books or the notes I took in one of his conference sessions. So get those pens and notepads ready, people because you are going to learn a LOT during this episode. Today Jim and I talk about what is perhaps one of the most important, and yet most often overlooked elements of your story: the midpoint. In this episode Jim and I discuss: The difference between plot and story The midpoint (or mirror moment) of your story and why it’s important How to use the middle of the story to make the beginning and ending make sense Pre-story psychology of your main character Using Scrivener to help structure your story Plus, Jim’s #1 tip for writers. More about James Scott Bell: JAMES SCOTT BELL is the author of the #1 bestseller for writers, Plot & Structure, and numerous thrillers, including, Romeo’s Rules, Try Dying, and Don't Leave Me. In addition to his traditional novels, Jim has self-published in a variety of forms. His  novella One More Lie was the first self-published work to be nominated for an International Thriller Writers Award. He served as the fiction columnist for Writer's Digest magazine and has written highly popular craft books including: Write Your Novel From the Middle, Super Structure, The Art of War for Writers, and Conflict & Suspense. Jim has taught writing at Pepperdine University and at numerous writers conferences in the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand. He attended the University of California, Santa Barbara where he studied writing with Raymond Carver, and graduated with honors from the University of Southern California Law Center. To learn more about Jim and his writing, hop on over to his website, www.jamesscottbell.com, or follow him on Twitter and Facebook. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/108

Hey there Word Nerds! I am so glad you've joined me because today’s episode is going to be epic. In this interview, I speak with Andrew Piper, Associate Professor and William Dawson Scholar in the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at McGill University. Andrew is the director of .txtLAB (a digital humanities lab at McGill) and is the leader of the multinational research consortium, “NovelITM: Text Mining the novel.” Basically he uses quantitative data to gain a more in-depth understanding of thematic and stylistic elements within the novel as an art-form. Andrew and his colleague Richard So wrote an article earlier this year in The Atlantic that got a lot of people riled up. They shared research on novels written by authors either with or without an MFA and found that there wasn't any significant difference between writers in both categories. This article added depth to that perennial MFA debate. Should you (or shouldn't you) get an MFA? As you know, this is a subject near and dear to my heart. And now it turns out that there's actual data suggesting that an MFA degree isn't a very good predictor of whether someone will become a published author, or even write a great book. It seems especially fitting for this episode to air this week, just a few short days before the official NYC launch event for my own book. Embed Episode Here In this episode Andrew and I discuss: How a computer might (or might not) be able to differentiate between novels of various qualities, versus various genres. The extent to which racial and gender diversity in writing shows up in the literature produced by MFA programs (the Whiteness factor) The role of data analysis in uncovering bias in the publishing industry. Embracing data and computation in the process of growing as a creative. Plus, Andrew’s #1 tip for writers. Andrew Piper is Associate Professor and William Dawson Scholar in the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at McGill University. He is the director of .txtLAB @ McGill, a digital humanities laboratory, as well as leader of the multinational research consortium, “NovelTM: Text Mining the Novel,” which brings together 21 partners across North America and Europe to undertake the first large-scale quantitative and cross-cultural study of the novel. He is the author most recently of Book Was There: Reading in Electronic Times (Chicago 2012) as well as Dreaming in Books: The Making of the Bibliographic Imagination in the Romantic Age (Chicago 2009), which was awarded the MLA Prize for a First Book and honourable mention for the Harry Levin Prize for the American Comparative Literature Association.     For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/107

Hey there Word Nerds! Today's episode is especially dear to my heart because I'm interviewing Joanna Penn, author and creative entrepreneur. She is the mastermind behind The Creative Penn, one of the top 10 sites for writers and has penned several nonfiction books helping writers build their platforms. She also writes thrillers under the pen name J.F. Penn. She is a self-publishing superstar and I am so thrilled to have her on the show To hear me and Joanna geek out over writing, marketing and all things bookish, listen in here: In this episode Joanna and I discuss: Deciding to self-publish and how to learn the ropes Defining what you consider success in your craft The business side of writing How marketing can be creative and collaborative Figuring out the target audience for your book Plus, Joanna’s #1 tip for writers.   Check out Joanna's fabulous books on the business of writing. Joanna's books on marketing are among my go-to resources. My favorite thus far is Business for Authors: How to Be an Author Entrepreneur, which breaks down the business aspects of writing into small, manageable chunks. While I recognize that not all authors want to be entrepreneurs per se, we all need to adopt an entrepreneurial mindset and treat our writing both as an art and as a business. Joanna's books can show you how to do just that. Her latest book, The Successful Author Mindset, digs deep and unpacks all those hurdles that writers face, to help you break through those barriers. A writer after my own heart, Joanna is not one to waste time (or words) on fluff. Every book I've read by her is to the point and jam-packed with actionable advice. As with most of the to books we recommend at DIY MFA, the above are Amazon affiliate links. This means if you choose to purchase one or more of Joanna's books via those links (which you totally should, by the way) then DIY MFA will get a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting DIY MFA and our featured authors! For more info and show notes: DIYMFA/com/106

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so thrilled that you're joining me for this episode. Today I’ll be talking to Julie Zickefoose, an artist and author of three books, the latest being Baby Birds: An Artist Looks into the Nest. In today’s interview, we’ll be talking about how to turn your passion for a subject into a book (or something more), and how to keep up the motivation to pursue that passion, even when you’re not sure where it might lead. In this episode Julie and I discuss: Taking a wild idea from concept to concrete Developing your skill set to enhance your work Bringing your unique perspective to the subject Relying on your passion to help you push through the project’s obstacles Being open to the possibilities that come from the problems you face Plus, Julie’s #1 tip for writers. If you love nature writing, you can order a copy of Julie's latest book Baby Birds: An Artist Looks into the Nest, with her gorgeous watercolor artwork and written accounts following the first days of these hatchlings. It's really quite a spectacular project. And if you order via this Amazon affiliate link, DIY MFA gets a small commission at no cost to you. As always, thank you for supporting DIY MFA and our featured authors! Writer/artist Julie Zickefoose, author of Baby Birds: An Artist Looks Into the Nest (2016), The Bluebird Effect (2012), and Letters from Eden (2006), is a Contributing Editor to Bird Watcher’s Digest and her blog entertains more than 32,000 visitors each month. Julie loves to introduce people to birdwatching, and now leads natural history excursions abroad. She travels to speak for nature festivals, clubs and horticultural societies, and lives with her family on an 80-acre sanctuary in Appalachian Ohio. Indigo Hill has hosted 194 bird species and 78 species of butterflies as of 2016. To learn more about Julie, her writing and her artwork, check out her website. You can also follow her on Twitter and Instagram.     For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/105

Hey there Word Nerds! Thanks for joining me for today's awesome DIY MFA Radio interview with author Ryan North. When one of my contacts over at Penguin told me Romeo and/or Juliet and asked if I wanted to bring the author on the show, my immediate reaction: “Shakespeare meets choose-your-own adventure? Yes please!” The fact that the play being parodied was Romeo and Juliet clinched it for me. Why? Because Romeo and Juliet is perhaps Shakespeare’s most overrated (and ridiculous) play. On one hand, this play features one of Shakespeare’s most complex, interesting and all-around badass characters (i.e. Mercutio). On the other hand, this play also centers around the star-crossed lovers--Romeo and Juliet--who might just be the two most banal, boring characters in all of literature. (In case you haven't noticed, have very strong opinions about Shakespeare.) I simply HAD to see how Ryan was going to apply his choose-your-own-path model to this particular play. Let's just say, the result did not disappoint. In fact, it was even more awesome than I anticipated. If you aren’t familiar with Ryan North’s work, he is a NYT bestselling author and cartoonist, and his first choose-your-own-path Shakespeare book, To Be or Not To Be, became Kickstarter’s most-funded publishing project when it first launched. Now with Romeo and/or Juliet he has crafted a story with over 40 quadrillion possible journeys for a reader to take. It’s sort of like a book-meets-video-game with over one hundred possible endings and original illustrations from amazing artists.   Embed Episode Here In this episode Ryan and I discuss: The power of memorizing poetry Choose-your-own-adventure and the art of storytelling Shakespeare's big mistake Keeping track of everything when your story has many moving parts Making sure that your characters have choices that feel real and have an impact while coping with the reality of the world they live in. Engaging readers in with the text Plus, Ryan’s #1 tip for writers. Romeo And/Or Juliet In this choose-your-own-path version of Romeo and Juliet, you choose where the story goes every time you read! Romeo and/or Juliet has over 40 QUADRILLION possible journeys for a reader to take. Readers can choose to play as Romeo or Juliet, as Romeo and Juliet together, as Juliet’s nurse, or even as an unlockable fourth mystery character. All of the endings—there are more than a hundred—feature original illustrations from incredible artists. Written with the unique humor that fans of Dinosaur Comics and the Adventure Time comics know and love, Romeo and/or Juliet turns the Bard's beloved play into fodder for madcap comedy. Shakespeare has never been this entertaining, or this weird. We can’t think of a better way to… “celebrate” the 400th anniversary (2016) of Shakespeare’s death. To learn more about Ryan, visit his website or follow him on Twitter. If you want to get your very own copy of Romeo and/or Juliet (and you totally should because it's hilarious!) we hope you'll do so via this Amazon affiliate link, where DIY MFA gets a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting DIY MFA! For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/104    

Hello hello, word nerds! Today I have the pleasure of speaking with fellow New Yorker and awesome author, Emma Straub. I had so much fun doing this interview because it was almost like talking to a parallel universe version of myself. After the interview, Emma and I figured out that we had grown up in fairly close neighborhoods (she's a West-Sider, I'm East) and we even went to very similar schools. Talk about crazy coincidence! But now, let's get down to business. Emma Straub is the New York Times-bestselling author of The Vacationers, Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures, and the short story collection Other People We Married. Her fiction and nonfiction have been published in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Vogue, Elle, and Conde Nast Traveler, and she is a contributing writer for Rookie. Straub’s work has been published in fifteen countries, and her newest book Modern Lovers is out now.   In this episode Emma and I discuss: Point of view as a story vehicle How to decide who the true protagonist is in a multiple POV narrative Writing as collaboration with the reader Letting the characters lead the story How your real life experiences inform your writing Time as a focal point for character Plus, Emma’s #1 tip for writers. About Modern Lovers A smart, highly entertaining novel about a tight-knit group of friends from college—their own kids now going to college—and what it means to finally grow up well after adulthood has set in. Like in The Vacationers, Straub again brings her keen observation and subtle wisdom to a story of relationships that explores ambition and pleasure, the excitement of youth and the shock of middle age, all while maintaining throughout that perfect balance of amusement, substance and tenderness. Elle confirms that Modern Lovers “has the smart, cool sensibility of Straub’s other novels,” and promises that “you’re sure to love this one just as much.” If you decide to purchase a copy of Modern Lovers we hope you'll do so via this Amazon affiliate link, where DIY MFA gets a small commission at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting DIY MFA! To learn more about Emma and her books, follow her on Twitter or Facebook. You can also visit her website at: www.emmastraub.net.   For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/103  

Hey there Word Nerds! Today I’m delighted to welcome back the founder and principal of Book Architecture, Stuart Horwitz, and his collaborator Dave Stebenne. You can listen to my previous interview with Stuart here. Stuart has spent over fifteen years helping writers become authors and his clients have reached wow-worthy levels of success. You can read the details in his bio below. More personally, though, Stuart is also a trusted colleague of mine and a good friend. When we first met over drinks at a Writer’s Digest Conference back in 2013, I knew right away that I had met a fellow writer and writing teacher whose perspective both aligns with and complemented my own. Stuart’s books are among my top go-to resources, both ones that I recommend to my students and that I use for my own writing. The newest installment of the Book Architecture trilogy–Finish Your Book in Three Drafts: How to Write a Book, Revise a Book, and Complete a Book While You Still Love It–just might be my favorite one yet. For this book, he teamed up with Dave Stebenne who created the stop-motion shorts to accompany the Book Architecture 5-year tour to create a cross between a non-fiction how-to guide and graphic novel. The result is nothing short of awesome.   In this episode Stuart, Dave, and I discuss: How the idea for this book came about The importance of both spontaneity and planning in writing Form, function, and continuity in the development of an idea Creating something that has a life beyond you Plus, Stuart’s and Dave’s #1 tips for writers. About Stuart Horwitz Stuart has spent over fifteen years helping writers become authors. His clients have signed with top literary agencies, sealed deals with coveted publishing houses, or forged a successful path as indie authors. Book Architecture’s clients have reached the New York Times best-seller list in both fiction and nonfiction, and have appeared on Oprah!, The Today Show, The Tonight Show, and in the most prestigious journals in their respective fields. Stuart’s approach is a synthesis of academic theories of narrative structure and his hands-on experience as an independent editor, book coach and ghostwriter. He has written three highly acclaimed books which together comprise the Book Architecture trilogy (affiliate links): Blueprint Your Bestseller: Organize and Revise any Manuscript with the Book Architecture Method Book Architecture: How to Plot and Outline Without Using a Formula Finish Your Book in Three Drafts: How to Write a Book, Revise a Book, and Complete a Book While You Still Love It Stuart is an award-winning essayist and poet, who has toured the Book Architecture Method through over seventy venues in North America and taught writing at Grub Street of Boston and Brown University. He holds two master's degrees—one in Literary Aesthetics from NYU, which helps him a lot with this work—and one in East Asian Studies from Harvard with a concentration in Medieval Japanese Buddhism, which helps him get out of bed in the morning. To learn more about Stuart and his work, visit his website, or follow him on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. About Dave Stebenne Dave is a 23-year veteran of the creative business, as an art director, editor and animator. Dave is responsible for the stop-motion shorts featuring action figures that are hands-down the best part of the Book Architecture 5-year tour. Having worked in broadcast media, the toy industry, advertising, publishing, and the corporate design world, he has a wide base of expertise to draw from in his work with Chick ’n Coop Pictures. He and his wife, the photographer Kristin Stebenne, live in Lincoln, RI with their two incredibly cool, sweet and adorable kids. Dave is responsible for the stop-motion shorts featuring action figures that are hands-down the best part of the Book Architecture 5-year tour. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/102    

Hey there Word Nerds! I'm so glad you've stopped by today because I've got a great DIY MFA Radio interview for you. In this episode, I interview thriller author Steve Hamilton about his new book: The Second Life of Nick Mason. This book is a fascinating study on what happens when a fundamentally decent character makes some very bad choices. In this episode Steve and I discuss: Significant experiences for writers that inform your fiction Building stories around situations versus characters Projecting characters' arcs through a series Plus, Steve’s #1 tip for writers. About the Author Steve Hamilton is the two-time Edgar Award-winning author of the New York Times bestselling Alex McKnight series and two standalone novels. His debut, novel  A Cold Day in Paradise, won both an Edgar and a Shamus Award for Best First Novel, and his standalone novel The Lock Artist won an Edgar for Best Novel of the Year, a CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for Best Thriller, and an Alex Award, given out by the American Library Association to those books that successfully cross over to the Young Adult market. He has either won or been nominated for every other major crime fiction award in America and the UK, and his books are now translated into twenty languages. His new book The Second Life of Nick Mason is the first in a new series and it's out now.  To learn more about Steve Hamilton, visit his website or follow him on Twitter or Facebook. About the Book A career criminal from Chicago’s South Side, Nick Mason got his start stealing cars and quickly graduated to safe cracking and armed robbery. But he left that life behind when he got married and settled down with his wife and their young daughter–until an old friend offered him a job he couldn’t refuse. That fateful night at the harbor landed him in prison with a 25-to-life sentence and little hope of seeing his wife or daughter ever again. When Nick is offered a deal securing his release twenty years early, he takes it without hesitation and without fully realizing the consequences. Once outside, Nick steps into a glamorous life with a five-million-dollar condo, a new car, ten grand in cash every month, and a beautiful roommate. But while he’s returned to society, he’s still a prisoner bound to the promise he made behind bars: whenever his cell phone rings, day or night, nick must answer it and follow whatever order he is given. It’s the deal he made with Darius Cole, a criminal mastermind serving a double-life term who still runs an empire from his prison cell. Whatever Darius Cole needs him to be–a problem solver, bodyguard, thief, or assassin– Nick Mason must be that man. Forced to commit increasingly more dangerous crimes and relentlessly hunted by the detective who brought him to justice in the past, Nick finds himself in a secret war between Cole and an elite force of Chicago’s dirty cops. Desperate to go straight and rebuild his life with his daughter and ex-wire, Nick will ultimately have to risk everything–his family, his sanity, and even his life–to finally break free. Elmore Leonard's 10 Rules for Good Writing Check out the original article from Elmore Leonard in the New York Times. The last rule (after #10) is what inspired Steve Hamilton's writing tip. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/101

Hello hello Word Nerds! Welcome back to DIY MFA Radio. OMG, you guys! It’s episode 100! I can’t even believe how excited I am that we’ve come this far. Today’s show is special because not only is it episode 100 and the first solo show I’ve done in quite a while, today I’m going to introduce a concept to you. I’ve been kicking this around for a long time, and I think it’s a direction that I’m going to be taking DIY MFA, so you get a sneak peek as to where DIY MFA is going. As you’ve probably already noticed, if you follow the website or the show, a few months ago I released the Storytelling Superpower quiz, a personality quiz like you see on Buzzfeed that will tell you your storytelling personality. Head on over and take the quiz if you haven’t already. When you finish the quiz, you’ll be prompted to sign up a video series. This video series is a mini master class that I put together to celebrate the launch of the DIY MFA book! In this episode I’m going to give you an overview of where the Storytelling Superpower concept came from, what it is, and where it might be going in the next few months. Embed Episode Here The Birth of an Idea I had this idea over the winter holidays. I started sketching out some ideas in my brainstorming notebook. I like to break things into categories, to put order to very complex concepts. For a while I had been asking myself how you really know what you’re good at as a writer. This is a fundamental piece to DIY MFA. I don’t believe in copying and pasting someone else’s success plan onto your own life. You never know if that thing that worked for someone else will work for you. This is where that iteration concept comes from. It’s so important that you figure out what you’re already good at as a writer, how you behave under natural circumstances and then you improve on the things that are working well instead of overhauling your whole process all the time. I started wondering how can a writer figure out what they’re good at? Wouldn’t it be great if we had a writer’s personality test that would help you figure out who you are when you’re on the page? I’m also a huge fan of personality tests. I have a masters in psychology from Cornell, and one of the things I loved studying was personality. I started thinking about what this assessment would look like. The Myers-Briggs test, you know the E/I N/S F/T J/P one, is basically a bunch of binary spectrums. People answer yes or no questions based on those four binary spectrums that then determine whether you’re introverted or extroverted, whether you’re a thinker or a feeler. Once you figure out where you fall on those spectrums, you get your personality composite, lumping together the parameters and synthesizing who you are based on your scores on the test. The Heart and Soul of Your Story I wanted to adapt that concept for writers, to take the framework and adapt it to the way writing works. What I came up with were the different types of factors that now make up the Storytelling Superpower quiz. I decided to focus on the character component because characters are the heart and soul of your story. You can have no plot whatsoever, you can have the most mundane world for your story, you can have really messy dialogue or description, you have something. If you don’t have solid characters, even if everything else is perfect, you’re not going to be able to get that book past square one. So that’s where we start. How do we determine what the character piece of the puzzle would be? I’ve mentioned the everyman versus larger-than-life heroic character. In a previous episode, I talked about the Opposite-is-Possible Theory, the idea that you need to show that the everyman character can do something grand, and that the heroic character can be vulnerable. But I started thinking that there had to be more than just those two elements to character. The other thing that drives character is what they want. That can be kind of hard to boil down to a binary thing. The character could want to go out on an adventure and see the world, or to find the love of their life, or to not be beat up by the bully at school. So I started looking at books that I loved to see if I could discover anything in common with the characters and their wants. At first it looked like they were all over the place. And then it hit me, people (and characters) want one of two things in their life. They either want to change something or they want to preserve something. This might seem really basic, but if you think about it, every single motivation that is at the crux of a book boils down to either change or preserve. In the Wizard of Oz, Dorothy wants to go home, to go back to the way things were. In the Hunger Games, Katniss wants to get her family out of the horrible situation they are in and she wants to survive the games. At the beginning of the series, Katniss wants to preserve her own life, but by the end she wants systemic change. I talk in the video series about how the character’s want changes and how you can use that to modulate a character from one archetype to another. Even if you find that one archetype speaks to you more than the others, you can shift things around and adapt characters by shifting their wants. Four Character Archetypes You can have a regular joe character who just wants to change or preserve something, or you can have a larger-than-life character who wants to change or preserve something. That gave us four archetypes. So why are these archetypes important? The key isn’t to box characters in. You don’t have to shove your character into a particular category and then stick to that category come hell or high water. Instead, you can use these frameworks to understand what your characters are about at their most basic level. Then you can break the rules, shake things up. But if you don’t know what the rules are in the first place you can’t break them. Underdog The underdog is an ordinary Joe or Jane who wants to change something. This character doesn’t have a whole lot of amazing superpowers or skills or assets, but they want to move up, to change their life and the status-quo. You can play this dynamic out in any number of circumstances, like the classic “rags-to-riches” makeover story or a comeback story where a powerful character has a major setback and has to pick themselves back up. So even though the underdog character happens to be an everyman who wants to change, you can make that story play out in a lot of different ways depending on the situation you put that character in. Disruptor The disruptor is my favorite. It’s a larger-than-life character who wants to change something, whether that’s something small in their life or something large in the world around them. Usually the disruptor is the revolutionary, the character that wants to change the world. What I find interesting is that, when I look at the data for of all the archetypes in the quiz, the disruptor is the smallest slice of the pie. Why that is, I think, is because disruptors are very hard to like. So if you’re writing a disruptor character, help the reader find something in that character that they can relate to. Survivor The survivor is the same everyman character as the underdog, except that instead of wanting to change something, they want things to stay the same. The classic survivor stories are battles against nature, where some big disaster happens and the character has to struggle to survive. What makes this archetype so relatable is the everyman-ness of the survivor character. If the survivor can get through this, then so can we. Survivors are characters that have hope woven into them. No matter how bad things get, survivors believe that they can get back to when things were good. They don’t just give up, and that makes them compelling. Protector The protector is your typical superhero, larger-than-life, using their superpowers to protect the world, to protect others. What’s so great about these characters is that they’re noble and heroic, out there saving the world. They don’t have to be superheroes, either. It could be a doctor or a lawyer, someone who wants to save those that can’t save themselves. The thing you have to watch out for is that, because they are protective, they can sometimes overstep their bounds. Like the disruptor, the protector is larger-than-life, so the key is to show some vulnerability. With the protector it’s a little easier to do, though, because their goal is to protect those around them. Putting it all together The storytelling superpower goes way beyond just the character piece of the puzzle. When I had originally sketched out this idea, I had 32 or 64 possible archetypes because of how many different factors you can consider in connection with the character element, like the type of story structure, or the way the character’s want plays out throughout the story. In the future this could go into a lot of different directions! At some point I’d like to create a full assessment to see how writers perceive themselves based on these factors versus how their stories play out when you feed stories into a computer. Later this summer I interview a professor who is doing exactly that, so listen out for that! I could get really geeky with the stats and we could get all down in the weeds about this project. But then I remind myself of what the purpose is behind the Storytelling Superpower project. It’s about helping writers find their focus. The Storytelling Superpower is a tool to help you figure out what you are uniquely good at, what characters speak to you, and how you can implement these characters on the page and adjust them so that you can make your story even better. It can also help you choose which projects to work on, and which to put aside for now. The only way to improve as a writer is to dig into your own process and understand the way you operate as a writer. Then improve on that. So go, take the quiz. Then sign up for the video series. Or if you’ve already taken the quiz, you can sign up for the video series here. The course will be available until the big book launch event in NYC this August. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/100  

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so excited to share this week’s DIY MFA Radio episode with you. But first, some news. OMG word nerds, our next episode will be number 100 and I have something really exciting planned so make sure to watch your iTunes for that release. That episode will kick-off our weeklong Storytelling Superpower video series designed to help you figure out what stories and what characters you’re BEST at writing. To access the video series and download our cheat sheet describing all the Storytelling Superpower archetypes, sign up with your email at DIYMFA.com/STSPvideo. and get all those materials. You an also take Storytelling Superpower QUIZ to discover your unique superpower as a writer. Now onto today's episode. Today I'm delighted to interview Susan Breen. In addition to being the author of the new Maggie Dove mystery series, Susan is also a wonderful writing teacher and one of my very first mentors. Many listeners have heard me tell the story about how I took a horrendous writing workshop in college. By the end of that semester I was so shaken to my core that I did touch pen to page for seven (yes, seven!) years. Susan was the wonderful teacher who coaxed me back in to writing, and she's very likely the one responsible for my wanting to be a writing teacher myself. In this episode, Susan and I talk about one of my favorite writing topics (and likely a favorite of hers too, I suspect): Characters. Embed Episode Here In this episode Susan and I discuss: Where characters come from. Navigating stereotypes while writing characters. Character flaws as character development Making sure your characters think and using description to convey emotion Naming characters Plus, Susan’s #1 tip for writers. About Susan Breen: Susan Breen is the author of a new mystery series about Maggie Dove, a Sunday School teacher turned detective. The first book of this series–titled Maggie Dove–came out yesterday and the second will be out on October 4, 2016 Susan also teaches creative writing at Gotham Writers in Manhattan, where I took my very first writing class post-college. Her first book, The Fiction Class, was published by Penguin in 2008 and it’s a fabulous read. She’s also published stories and articles in places like Best American Non-Required Reading, ComposeJournal.com, and Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. Mother of three children who are now grown up and flourishing, Susan lives with her husband, two dogs and one cat in the Hudson Valley. To learn more about Susan, you can visit her website, or follow her on Twitter, Facebook, or Goodreads. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/099  

Hey there Word Nerds! I'm so glad you're here with me today because have a great interview to share with you. Today Matthew Palmer and I talk about balancing writing and life and creating compelling characters. Matthew is a twenty-five-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He has worked as a diplomat all over the world and is currently serving as the Director for Multilateral Affairs in the State Department's Bureau of Asian and Pacific Affairs For his most recent book, The Wolf of Sarajevo, he taps his own considerable experience in the turbulent region to tell a based-in-reality story that feels like it could almost be ripped from the headlines. In this episode, Matthew Palmer and I talk about what it’s like to pull inspiration from your own life’s work and craft it into gripping fiction. In this episode Matthew and I discuss: The parallels between writing and diplomacy Understanding others’ points of view Developing distinct characters Finding the time to write Plus, Matthew’s #1 tip for writers. Link to Episode 98 (Right-click to download.) Resources: About The Wolf of Sarajevo: Twenty years after the end of the wars in the Balkans, the fighting has stopped in Bosnia…but the war is far from over. In his latest riveting international thriller, The Wolf of Sarajevo, career American diplomat and acclaimed novelist Matthew Palmer taps his own considerable experience in the turbulent region to tell a based-in-reality story that could be on the verge of grabbing international headlines. With close personal ties to the Balkans, Palmer portrays a scenario of violent conflict where peace is fragile and nationalism runs deep. If you want to purchase The Wolf of Sarajevo, we hope you'll consider doing so via this Amazon affiliate link, where DIY MFA gets a small commission at no cost to you. As always, thank you for supporting DIY MFA! Matthew Palmer is a twenty-five-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and is currently serving as the Director for Multilateral Affairs in the State Department's Bureau of Asian and Pacific Affairs. He has worked as a diplomat all over the world and while on the secretary of state's Policy Planning staff, he helped design and implement the Kimberley Process for certifying African diamonds as "conflict free." Matthew's career as a diplomat has certainly informed and inspired his fiction and he can certainly speak to the challenges of juggling writing with a very busy "day job." Writing is also practically woven into his DNA, since he comes from a family of excellent thriller authors, including his father Michael Palmer, and brother Daniel Palmer. To learn more about Matthew Palmer, you can visit the Penguin Random House website, or follow him on Facebook. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/098

In this interview I talk with writer Pamela S. Turner and illustrator Gareth Hinds about their book Samurai Rising: The Epic Life of Minamoto Yoshitsune. Pam has written historical fiction, biography and science for young readers and has won numerous awards. Gareth is the creator of the critically-acclaimed graphic novels based on literary classics like Beowulf, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet, and Macbeth. Together they make for a powerhouse team in bringing to life the amazing story of legendary samurai: Minamoto Yoshitsune. In this episode Pamela, Gareth, and I discuss: The development of an author/illustrator partnership Inspiration born of personal interests Bringing the story to life on the page Knowing your audience and writing for children The importance of having a crack design team in creating quality books Plus, Pamela’s and Gareth’s #1 tip for writers.   About the Author and Illustrator Pamela S. Turner has written historical fiction, biography, and science on diverse topics. She the author of five books in the Scientists in the Field series, including The Frog Scientist (AAAS Science Writing Prize winner) and The Dolphins of Shark Bay (a Kirkus and School Library Journal Best Book of the Year). Her newest book is Samurai Rising, a biography of famed Japanese warrior Minamoto Yoshitsune. She lives in Oakland, California and is a black-belt practitioner of kendo (Japanese swordfighting). For more about Pamela, visit her website at www.pamelasturner.com Gareth Hinds is the creator of critically-acclaimed graphic novels based on literary classics, including Beowulf (which Publisher’s Weekly called a “mixed-media gem”), King Lear (which Booklist named one of the top 10 graphic novels for teens), The Merchant of Venice (which Kirkus called “the standard that all others will strive to meet” for Shakespeare adaptation), The Odyssey (which garnered four starred reviews and a spot on ten "best of 2010" lists), Romeo and Juliet (which Kirkus called "spellbinding"), and Macbeth (which the New York Times called "stellar" and "a remarkably faithful rendering"). Gareth is a recipient of the Boston Public Library’s “Literary Lights for Children” award. His books can be found in bookstores and English classrooms across the country, and his illustrations have appeared in such diverse venues as the Society of Illustrators, the New York Historical Society, and over a dozen published video games. To learn more about Gareth, visit his website, or follow him on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, or Pinterest. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/097

  Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so glad you joined me for this episode of DIY MFA Radio because it's going to be a juicy one. Today I’m speaking with L.S. Hilton, author of Maestra. She grew up in England and has lived in Key West, New York City, Paris, and Milan, and after graduating from Oxford, she studied art history in Paris and Florence. She has worked as a journalist, art critic, and broadcaster and is presently based in London. In this episode L.S. Hilton and I discuss: Writing a flawed, yet sympathetic anti-hero. Weaving intense elements like violence and sex into the narrative without making it gratuitous. The role of art as an influence in narrative. The difference between the British and the American editorial processes. Plus, L.S. Hilton’s #1 tip for writers. Resources: ABOUT Maestra Judith has come a long way from her mother’s grimy flat in Liverpool. She has taught herself French and Italian, consumed literature, and traveled through Europe learning to squash her accent and blend in with the cultured set. When she lands a job at British Pictures, one of the best auction houses in London, she believes her hard work and hard won knowledge has finally paid off, but quickly realizes the job is mostly fetching coffee for her odious boss Rupert. A chance encounter with a girl from her past leads to a gig moonlighting at a champagne bar as a well-compensated companion for lonely drinkers, because her best Sandro suit has been worn to bits and honestly, she could use some attention. When Judith believes Rupert has mistakenly purchased a forgery she sees her chance to distinguish herself in the department and save the House from a major faux pas. Yet, when Rupert discovers her closely examining the painting he instantly fires her. With nowhere else to turn and her perfect future in ruins she turns to an old friend from her youth: Rage. Feeling reckless, Judith accompanies one of the champagne bar’s biggest clients to the French Riviera, but something goes terribly wrong and she decides to shed her identity completely. Tired of striving and the slow crawl to the top, Judith realizes: If you need to turn yourself into someone else, loneliness is a good place to start. And she’s been lonely a long time. It’s time for a new woman, with much better clothes, to take whatever she wants, however she can get it. A glamorous, ferocious thriller, Maestra (G.P. Putnam’s Sons; On Sale April 19, 2016) is the beginning of a razor-sharp trilogy that introduces this darkly irresistible femme fatale whose vulnerability and ruthlessness will keep you guessing until the last page If you want to know more about L.S. Hilton, you can visit her website or follow her on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.  For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/096

Hey there Word Nerd! Today I’m thrilled to interview Megan Dowd Lambert, author of Reading Picture Books with Children and children’s literature expert. Megan is a senior lecturer at Simmons College, where she earned her master’s degree in children’s literature after completing a B.A. at Smith College. She writes for Horn Book Magazine, served on the 2011 Caldecott committee, and worked at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art for many years, where she led Whole Book Approach story-times and trained others in her methods. She is the author of Reading Picture Books with Children (Charlesbridge) which is all about her Whole Book Approach and a new picture book titled Real Sisters Pretend (Tilbury House). The mother of six children, Megan lives with her family in Amherst, Massachusetts. In this episode Megan and I discuss: The Whole Book Approach Integrating design elements into the publishing process Teaching interaction between reader, text, and author Being intentional to convey diversity on the page of your book Plus, Megan’s #1 tip for writers. Resources: To learn more about Megan Dowd Lambert and her Whole Book Approach, visit her website or follow her on Twitter or Facebook. If you have children in your life and would like to learn more about reading picture books and how to use the Whole Book Approach, check out Megan's book: Reading Picture Books with Children (This is an affiliate link. Thank you for supporting DIY MFA!) For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/095  

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so excited because to share today's interview with you. I had the awesome chance to speak with Charlaine Harris, NYT bestselling author of the Sookie Stackhouse series (TRUE BLOOD), the Aurora Teagarden, Harper Connelly, and Lily Bard mystery series; and the Midnight, Texas novels. Seriously, I thought my inner fangirl was about to explode. This month, Charlaine's latest Midnight, Texas novel, NIGHT SHIFT, comes out. This series is set in the same world as her Sookie Stackhouse novels—which were the basis of HBO’s phenomenally successful hit drama series True Blood, and the Midnight, Texas books feature everything readers love about Harris’s writing: humor, mystery, fabulous characters, and a quirky small town setting where paranormal creatures and humans exist side-by-side. In this episode Charlaine and I discuss: Revisiting characters in a series Writing your own world with your own rules and then sticking to them Balancing different parameters between genres to help create the best story possible Writing strong women in fiction Nancy Drew and the role of mothers in fiction   Plus, Charlaine’s #1 tip for writers. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/094  

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so glad you’re here! Today's interview will be a juicy one. I’ll be talking to Stephen O’Connor about his debut novel Thomas Jefferson Dreams of Sally Hemings, a profound exploration of the ways in which the institution of slavery warped the human soul, as seen through the story of Jefferson and Hemings. In this episode, we discuss how to approach controversial topics in your writing while treating the subjects with grace and respect. In this episode Stephen and I discuss: Mindful writing about controversial topics and marginalized groups Idea evolution from short story to novel Writing outside your experience Accessing the unconscious mind as part of the writing process Issues of point of view Plus, Stephen’s #1 tip for writers.   Resources: About Stephen O'Connor Stephen is the author of two collections of short fiction, Here Comes Another Lesson and Rescue, as well as Orphan Trains, an acclaimed history of a pioneering nineteenth-century child welfare effort, and Will My Name Be Shouted Out, a memoir. His fiction has appeared in many publications, including The New Yorker and The Best American Short Stories. He lives in New York City and teaches at Sarah Lawrence. About the Book Historians have shed invaluable light on the relationship between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, yet their internal feelings and motivations remain a mystery. In Thomas Jefferson Dreams of Sally Hemings, O’Connor’s protagonists are rendered via scrupulously researched scenes of their lives in Paris and at Monticello that alternate with a harrowing memoir written by Hemings after Jefferson’s death, dreamlike sequences in which Jefferson watches a movie about his life, and a chance encounter where Hemings and Jefferson run into each other "after an unimaginable length of time" on the New York City subway. O’Connor eschews easy answers, aiming to illuminate the horrors of slavery and the hypocrisy of the Founding Father who wrote “all men are created equal,” while allowing both Hemings and Jefferson their full human complexity. Jefferson—at once admirable and despicable—becomes a vehicle for understanding a destructive imbalance of power that persists today. Hemings emerges as a powerful force, asserting her right to freedom of body and mind. To learn more about Stephen O’Connor, visit his website or follow him on Facebook. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/093  

Hey there word nerds! Thanks for joining me. Today I’m talking with New York Times bestselling author, C.J. Box, author of sixteen Joe Pickett novels, five standalones, and the short story collection, Shots Fired. He’s also won numerous awards including and won the Edgar Award for Best novel for his first standalone, Blue Heaven. Off the Grid is his sixteenth Joe Pickett novel and it’s told with pulse-pounding urgency and insight. It’s a timely look at how terror is found—and fought—in the wild expanses of Wyoming, one of the most untouched parts of the United States. This is a part of the United States that Box knows well. A Wyoming native, has has worked on a ranch and as a small-town newspaper reporter and editor. He lives outside Cheyenne, WY with his family.   In this episode C.J. and I discuss: The importance of setting in a novel How to research setting for your novel and capture the details. Using journalistic techniques to get the information you need for your story. Infusing technology into natural and low tech settings. Plus, C.J.’s #1 tip for writers.   About OFF THE GRID This latest installment begins not long after the terrifying events of Endangered, which left Pickett and his best friend, Nate Romanowski, separated and out of touch…not to mention very lucky to be alive. Nate, in fact, is living off the grid entirely, relying on survival skills he’s garnered as a rugged outdoorsman, master falconer and ex-special operator, and leaving no visible trace behind after any of his movements. That is, until an ultra-secretive government agency discovers him and corrals him (blackmails might be a better word) into finding a rogue journalist named Muhammed Ibraaheem. Ibraaheem, it seems, has gone off the grid too…but in a way that the government suspects could lead to bloodshed and mayhem. Meanwhile, Pickett’s daughter Sheridan, a college student, receives a mysterious invitation from her roommate—a nighttime gathering in the wilderness with a group of strangers who may or may not be political activists. Curious—and perhaps against her better judgment, and everything she has learned as Joe Pickett’s daughter—Sheridan agrees to go. It’s a decision that will place her directly in the middle of danger, as well as in the camp of Ibraaheem and his associates, all of whom are willing to kill for their beliefs. Yet a persistent question remains: Just what are those beliefs? Are they rooted, as Ibraaheem claims, in American individualism and freedom? Or is he truly manifesting a plot more sinister and terrifying than can be imagined? And what of Joe Pickett himself? Conducting a series of unrelated investigations, Pickett soon finds himself in Wyoming’s beautiful but unforgiving Red Desert. Unfortunately for him, he’s also about to stumble across Ibraaheem’s plans, and it will leave him stranded, miles from any civilization, without water. Even if he makes it out alive, he may be too late to save his daughter and his friend. To learn more about C.J. Box, visit his website or follow him on Twitter and Facebook. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/092  

  Hey there Word Nerd! Today I have the great pleasure of hosting Julie Duffy on the show. Julie is the founder of the StoryADay May creative writing challenge, which is basically like the short story version of NaNoWriMo. This challenge happens in May, which is only a few short weeks away, and it’s an incredible experience. More personally, though, Julie and I both started our respective projects (her StoryADay, my DIY MFA) the same year and only a few months apart. You could say we’re part of the same creative cohort and we’ve “come up through the ranks” together. Julie is one of my most trusted colleagues, probably the person I most frequently turn to for advice and insights outside the DIY MFA team, and I’m also lucky to count her as one of my good friends. Today it is an honor and pleasure to introduce my word nerds to someone who I’ve known is AWESOME for quite some time. Embed Episode Here In this episode Julie and I discuss: Whether writing one story a day for a month is easier or harder than writing a novel in a month. How to keep the creative well from running dry. Setting limits and how they can help you be more creative. Barriers to overcome in order to be more creative. Plus, Julie’s #1 tip for writers. Resources: About Julie Duffy Julie Duffy is the founder of StoryADay.org and a experienced public speaker on topics such as creativity, productivity for writers, self-publishing – with an emphasis on ebooks and print on-demand, and short stories. Her first ebook, 21st Century Publishing, was published in 2001 and grew out of her popular newsletter and website of the same name. She has been sharing tools and insights with authors ever since, in publications such as Writer’s Digest and Writers’ Journal. Julie has hosted StoryADay May since 2010 and StoryADay September since 2012. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Julie was Director of Author Services at Xlibris, the first company to offer print on-demand services directly to authors. In this role she frequently spoke at writers’ conferences about the new age of publishing that was dawning and is now shaking apart the publishing world. She personally worked with a couple of thousand authors from first-time writers to best-selling authors such as Piers Anthony and Daniel Pinkwater. She knows writers. She knows about the new world of publishing. She is happy to introduce them to each other. If you want to learn more about Julie and StoryADay, visit her website or follow her on Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest. Links from the Episode Interested in signing up for StoryADay? Go here to sign up! You can also sign up for email updates to get reminders about upcoming challenges and other StoryADay info. And don’t forget to order your copy of A Month of Writing Prompts 2016 (affiliate link). Need inspiration to jumpstart your story writing? Check out Writer Igniter. We mentioned That Guy in Your MFA during the show. Don’t forget! Sign up for the Storytelling Superpower Summit. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/091  

  Today, I have the pleasure of speaking with Anna Harwell Celenza, a music professor of Georgetown University where she teaches courses in music history, radio journalism and the music industry. She has written several scholarly books, is a writer/commentator for National Public Radio’s Performance Today, and her work has been featured on nationally syndicated radio and TV programs like BBC’s “Music Matters and C-Span’s “Book TV.” But the section of Anna’s work that I’m most familiar with are her wonderful picture books: Once Upon a Masterpiece, where she tells the story behind a famous musical masterpiece, explains the meaning of the music. In this episode Anna and I discuss: Looking for the gap on the shelf, for what is not there. The process of research and creating historical fiction that jumps off the page. How shifting point of view can enhance the story you are trying to tell. The impact of technology on music and publishing. The self-powered, targeted platform   Plus, Anna’s #1 tip for writers. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/090

Hello, hello word nerds! I’m so excited to share today’s DIY MFA Radio episode with you! I’m speaking with Anders Ericsson and his co-author Robert Pool about their new book Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise (affiliate link). Anders Ericsson is a Conradi Eminent Scholar and Professor of Psychology at Florida State University, where he studies how people become experts in various fields like music, chess, nursing, law enforcement and sports. More important, he looks at how expert performers achieve excellence by acquiring specific, complex cognitive mechanisms–ways of training their brain–through extended, deliberate practice. Today we’re going to talk about how writers can use similar techniques to improve their craft and take our writing from average to awesome. Robert Pool is a nonfiction writer specializing in science and technology and has worked as staff for both Science and Nature. He is the author of three previous books before co-authoring this one with Anders Ericsson. In this episode Anders, Robert, and I discuss: The biggest myths about talent. How to beef up your brain. The ceiling of achievement. The components of deliberate practice. Plus, Anders’ and Robert’s  #1 tip for writers. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/089

  Hey there Word Nerds! This is our last solo show before the Storytelling Superpower Summit in June. We just rolled out the Storytelling Superpower Quiz and we’ll be having a series of podcasts in June that dig deeper into the storytelling superpower archetypes. We’re focusing on figuring out what type of character really drives you so that you can dive in and get the most out of the story you decide to tell, both for your readers and for you as a writer. Today I want to talk with you about how to learn a creative skill. And this ties in nicely with the Great MFA Debate that is going on now, and that goes on every year. Usually in the spring, because that’s when people are deciding whether to enroll into programs they’ve been accepted into, a debate crops up on the internet about the pros and cons of getting a traditional MFA. Recently an article appeared in the Atlantic where a couple of researchers used computer analysis of texts to come to the conclusion that there was no distinct difference between the writing of those with formal MFA training and those without. I wanted to weigh in on this debate for two reasons. One, because it kinda goes with my territory as the instigator of DIYMFA and two because I feel like people in this debate often miss the mark and end up arguing about things that don’t actually help you evaluate whether or not getting an MFA is actually right FOR YOU. So let’s take a look at the benefits and the costs of getting a traditional MFA.   The Benefits It gives you time to write.Truthfully, committing to an MFA means you really don’t have any more excuses not to put in the time and create the content you are required to for the course. It is one path toward publication.An MFA can help you make connections in the publishing and writing world that you might not otherwise have the opportunity to pursue. It helps you become a better writer.An MFA makes you practice, and practicing your craft will help you improve in the long run. These are all good points, I’ve taken advantage of a traditional MFA myself, and each of these things rings true for me. But what happens when you become too dependent of assignments and external motivators? You might find that you’re unable to write without those external motivations. The Costs Financially, an MFA program can be prohibitive.There are many literal costs to consider, and while a lot of programs have funding for participants, most do not have total funding or funding for all their participants equally. Opportunity costsThese include having to give up a day job, moving to be closer to your program, and travelling (even for low residency programs). The Genre ProblemIf you write “genre fiction” (i.e. sci-fi, fantasy, YA, or anything other than what is considered “literary” fiction) finding an MFA program that specializes in your area is EXTREMELY difficult. You may have to put aside the writing that you really love in order to obtain this education, and that can set you back as far as time spent on the work of your heart, and can also make you feel like an outsider in your own program. What if you don’t get in anywhere? Is DIYMFA the “anti-MFA”? I get asked this a lot, especially around this debate. And the answer is emphatically no. As I said before, I have an MFA and I don’t regret the decision to get one. MFA serves a particular group of writers very well. What DIYMFA exists for is those who don’t fit into a traditional MFA. Whether it’s because you can’t afford to take time off from your job or your life, or because you can’t get accepted into the program you want to join, DIYMFA exists for you. So what does it mean to be a DIYMFA Word Nerd? If you’re part of this community, It means that you’re committed not just to becoming a better writer, but to becoming a better learner. Applying the DIYMFA concepts to your writing is awesome, but applying them to your LIFE? That’s solid gold. “In a time of drastic change, the learners inherit the future.” Eric Hoffer The publishing world is RIGHT NOW in a time of drastic change. We are in the thick of it. Every creative niche is. This age of sharing ideas and the internet has turned all creative industries on their head. Learning how to learn better means we can adapt, we can roll with the punches and embrace new ideas more quickly. So how dothe principles of DIYMFA help you learn? Write with focus. This isn't’ just about putting words on the page. This is about creative output. This principle encourages you to create a body of work. Try different skills, master them. Take a project from beginning to end whether it’s a short story or a photo series. Read with purpose. Be strategic about the information you consume. Balance your reading list to focus on what you’re interested in and also what, in your field, has stood the test of time. Dig in and think about why the pieces of each work were created the way they were. Build your community Connect with others in your niche and exchange ideas. When people exchange ideas, it’s multiplicative, not additive. When two people each have an idea and they exchange those ideas, then each person will come up with a totally different combination of those ideas. From two ideas you get four. Now imagine how many ideas you’d get from ten people sharing. A few caveats about community: WorkshopsI find that workshops, while they are useful in an educational environment, can also be reactive. Instead of giving a writer the chance to get things right before they receive critique, they expect you to get it wrong first. Feedback can be a useful tool, but not before you’re ready. Build your skills first, practice, and create something stronger than you otherwise would. Then when you get critique you’ll be ready for it. Creative distractionFinding creative friends can be a blessing. Finally people who understand you! But it can also be a curse. You can spend so much time talking about the process that you forget to actually do the creative work in the first place. Don’t forget, you can’t exchange creative ideas if you haven’t spent time developing them first. Develop your learning superpower The MFA debate a perennial conversation. But I think we should all put aside our differences of opinion and just write! If an MFA is right for you, if it helps you to be the best writer you can be, then awesome! Go do it! If you can’t or don’t want to get into an MFA program, there are worthy alternatives. You can do the same things yourself and do them just as well. Above all, let’s focus on learning. That’s what will make us adaptable as writers, as creators, as human beings. Resources: Article in the Atlantic Storytelling Superpower Summit DIYMFA book! Storytelling Superpower quiz For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/088  

Hey there Word Nerds! I’m so glad you can join me for today’s interview with Jen Calonita. Jen is a YA and Middle Grade author, and in this episode, she and I talk about writing what you know (and what you don’t know) and also how to make the shift from one writing niche to another. We dig into the various twists and turns of her writing career and discuss Charmed, the next installment of her Fairy Tale Reform School series and also her new contemporary middle grade series called VIP. The first book I’m With the Band, is out now. Embed Episode Here In this episode Jen and I discuss: Switching from magazines to fiction. Getting connected with other authors. Writing series for middle grade versus YA. Keeping the story fresh.   Plus, Jen Calonita’s  #1 tip for writers. About Jen Calonita It's no secret how Jen knows the inside scoop on Hollywood. As a former entertainment editor at a teen magazine, she started her career chronicling backstage life at Justin Timberlake concerts and interviewing Zac Efron on film sets. This work inspired her first series, Secrets of My Hollywood Life which has been published in 9 countries. Jen tackles worlds she finds familiar, from summer camp stories like Sleepaway Girls and Summer State of Mind (she was a camp counselor as a teen), to reality TV (which she also covered in magazines) in Reality Check. But it wasn't until she wrote Belles (about two polar opposite girls who share one life-altering secret) that she entered a world different from her own. It was so much fun creating a new world that Jen jumped into the fairytale world and wrote middle grade novel, Flunked. To find out more aboutJen Calonita follow her on Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, GoodReads, Pinterest, and Facebook, or visit her website: jencalonitaonline.com.     For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/087

  Welcome, welcome Word Nerds! Today I’m delighted to host Lisa Gardner on the the show. Lisa is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of seventeen previous novels, including her most recent, Crash & Burn. Her Detective D. D. Warren novels include Fear Nothing, Catch Me, Love You More, and The Neighbor, which won the International Thriller of the Year Award. She lives with her family in New England. More personally though, I’ve had the pleasure of hearing Lisa Gardner speak about creative consistency at Thrillerfest/Craftfest 2012. Her talk made a very deep impression on me back when I was just beginning to find my footing with DIY MFA. In preparing for this interview, I went back and reviewed my notes from her talk, and I realized that I internalized many of the techniques she talked about, and that in a roundabout way many have inspired and shaped elements of DIY MFA. Today I am thrilled to have Lisa Gardner on the show to discuss her newest book, Find Her, and also hear her talk about the writing process as a whole. In this episode Lisa Gardner and I discuss: Understanding your writer’s process. Committing to the time it takes to write. Incentivizing your writing process. Research to make your writing come alive. Wearing your writing and your marketing hats. Plus, Lisa’s #1 tip for writers. Lisa Gardner and her writing: Every once in a while an author writes something that is clearly set apart from anything they’ve written before. Find Her is that book for Lisa Gardner. A household name for any fan of mysteries and psychological thrillers, Gardner’s books land on the New York Times bestseller list year in and year out. Find Her stemmed from an article Gardner read about the FBI’s Office of Victim Assistance, a little-known arm of the FBI that assigns specific agents to families going through trauma. Gardner was able to set up two interviews with victim specialists whose jobs are to be at the scene of the crime, yes, but more importantly they are there when the lights and reporters are long gone and the victim is left to be “normal” again. From there she created her character Flora Dane. Lisa Gardner has always researched a lot more than your typical thriller writer. From riding along with police officers, attending the writer's police academy, handling weapons and learning defense tactics, Gardner does all of this so she can get every nuance exactly right – making her thrillers utterly believable and utterly frightening. But with the creation of Flora Dane, she takes us into the mind of a victim and of the professionals coming to save the day, giving readers her most visceral book yet. About FIND HER Flora Dane is a survivor. After being kidnapped and held by her captor for over a year, anyone would say that her matriculation back into a “normal” life was an all-around success. But normal isn’t exactly how Flora feels. When a college student–who reminds her far too much of herself–goes missing in a strikingly familiar fashion, Flora knows that she must do something to help, despite that fact that it could mean putting herself in danger. Flora is the only one who knows what a captor is capable of, even after all these years. The search to find the kidnapper at large and unravel Flora’s past twists together in a compelling dual-narrative. Gardner dives into the dark underbelly of Boston’s nightlife while also casting light onto one of the lesser-known branches of the FBI, Victim Specialists. It’s these men and women, who stick by victims long after the initial rescue, that are often the victims’ only true confidant. But all of the personnel in the world can’t keep revenge at bay, and in the end everything comes down to Flora and the ghosts from her past. If you want to learn more about Lisa Gardner, you can follow her on Facebook or Twitter (@LisaGardnerBks) visit her website. For more info and show notes: DIYMFA.com/086