Just Getting Started?

These articles are all about what to do if you're just starting out on your Author Adventure: planning, preparation, and dealing with your Inner Dickhead.

Advent calendar with text: Thisis our advent calendar. Every year we fill it with sweets and little notes to each other. This year we have filled it with ideas. Future stories.

Filling Your Bucket

Back in March 2020, it was like the entire world took a giant swig from the DRINK ME bottle, as we hurtled down the rabbit hole. I.e. the world shrunk. And individually, I shrank. Like many people, I retreated into my head, made a blanket fort, and hid there… and I stopped writing. I had nothing to

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Sometimes your words will be crap

For the past three days, I have sat at my laptop first thing in the morning and cried tears of frustration.

Every word I’ve written has been dragged out of my brain with forceps and no pain relief – and arranging those words on the page has been torture.

Almost everything I’ve written has been total crap by my usual standards.

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Vicky wears a faux-fur coat and is face down on a hotel bed in Bruges, being idle.

The Virtues of Idleness

This is a sonnet to laziness, idleness, loafing—a spirited rejection of the Puritan Work Ethic and all it implies. Read on and discover why idleness should be part of YOUR life.

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What do you want to do?

Don’t let anyone shame you into ridiculous productivity.

Don’t be pushed into doing more than you want to.

It’s okay not to be okay.

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Your body is incredible

Be grateful for what you can do.

Your body and mind (which are inextricably linked) are incredible. What you can do with them is wondrous.

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13 Books That’ll Help You Become A Better Writer

Two questions get fired at me often:
How can I become a better writer?
What books do you recommend I read to get better at marketing my business?
My answer to the first question is: write. Write every day and don’t worry too much if what you write is sometimes crap. You’ll get better.
Write. Edit. Improve. Repeat.
And read everything you can get your hands on, good and bad.

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How Talking To Your Clients Helps You Beat The Blank Page

Ever had insomnia? Not just a little trouble sleeping, but the twitchy, panicky, staring into the void teetering-on-the-edge of madness insomnia?

Every now and then, it feels like you’re poised on the knife-edge of sleep—so you grab at it, wildly, desperately, only to feel sleep slip away, leaving you grinding your teeth.

To me, that’s what the Blank Page Of Doom feels like sometimes. When I have the seed of an idea I can’t quite hold onto—or too many ideas, boiling across my brain too swift to catch.

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How to Choose a Book Coach

The short, sweet, and comprehensive guide to choosing a book coach who understands how to get your Big Book Idea out of your magical brain and onto paper

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How Do You Come Up With All Your Ideas?

Ever look at those snazzy business owners in your inbox and on the internet and wonder how on earth they come up with all their stories, emails, articles, and podcasts? Wonder no more—you can do that too.

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Neil Gaiman smiles

Writing Advice from Neil Gaiman

Every now and then I like to grab a favourite writer of mine (metaphorically speaking I do not assault authors) and share some writing advice I love.

This week: Neil Gaiman!

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a look of horror

The 67,000 mile-an-hour Book

We all have the same amount of time in the days, weeks, months, years.

So why do some people get tons of writing done, and others struggle to make any progress at all?

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Why your projects are always late…

Whether your project is a giant railway infrastructure, a cottage renovation, or writing your book, it will inevitably take way too long and cost much more than you budget. It’s because you suffer from the planning fallacy — with a healthy dose of optimism bias and overconfidence thrown in.

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Vicky hangs in a tangle of trapeze, not quite sure what she’s going to do next

The Magical Shitty First Draft

It’s a magical talisman, the first draft. It allows us to let go of our self-consciousness, let go of expectations, and play. And from it, we can make the thing we want to make.

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Writer’s Block Is A Big Hairy LIE

Have you ever been stuck? Staring at the Blank Page of Doom in despair?

Yep, me too.

Have you ever blamed it on “writer’s block”?

Yep, me too.

Here’s the thing, though: there’s no such thing as writer’s block.

It’s a made-up myth, a lie we tell ourselves to get out of doing the work.

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Wooden clown

Stop Trying to Find Your Voice

We want to be good writers, right? *Great* writers? Entertaining writers? Writers that move people? Then write.

You already have a voice, and the only way to find it is to use it.

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“I’m the kind of person who…”

The reason we fail to make the changes we want and achieve the results we desire isn’t willpower or laziness or lack of ability; it’s because what we’re trying to do is at odds with who we believe we really are.

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But WHY are You Writing this Book?

Why are you writing your book?

Is your Big Idea for your book setting your heart on fire? Do you feel butterflies when you think about creating it?

I’m asking because your WHY is important.

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Wooden clown

How to Avoid Looking Like an Amateur Author

I’m going to make a big assumption about you: you’re an expert. A pro. Same goes for your book—so the last thing you’re gonna want is for details to let you down. Check this out for everything you need to avoid looking like an amateur.

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15 Reasons to Write a Book

Ever thought about writing a book but never quite got started? You’re not alone.
Here are 15 reasons why I think you should write a book in 2020…

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Peel your eyes

Writing is a source of great anxiety to a lot of people – including me, sometimes. Just because I’m a writer doesn’t mean I have all my shit together.

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Wooden clown

Future You Will Thank You

If we wanna do a thing, we have to make time for it.

And look: I don’t hold with this idea that we all the same 24 hours in a day.

We all have 24 hours, for sure—unless you’re reading this on Mars or something in which case HI PLEASE CONTACT ME BECAUSE WE NEED TO TALK.

But our 24 hours are not the same. I don’t have children or a third job.

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New year new…?

Within the haze of end-of-year parties and admist the overindulgence of the festive feasting period glows an ember.

The glimmer of an idea.

The hope that perhaps this year will be different.

Maybe this will be the year we’ll write our books or run that marathon or start that business or go after that big contract.

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My Fave Piece of Terrible Writing Advice

People worry a lot about writing a boring-ass book.

And when I say people, I mean me. I worry. About everything, all the time—but specifically, right now, about writing a basic-bitch book.

Check out these 8 mistakes to avoid…

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? ? ? Tell me about yourself

“Tell me about yourself”

Four little words guaranteed to strike terror into most people’s hearts, especially if we’re standing in front of a roomful of people.

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Start from the End, My Friend

One of my fave writing quotes is from E. L. Doctorow:

“Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”

This is true… And also—

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Vicky holds a chainsaw aloft, triumphant over the treestump

31 Writing Tools to Get Your Book Done

There are approximately 927,833 writing tools out there to choose from, and the choice can be bewildering.

So this week, I’m sharing a quick rundown of all the writing tools I use and a brief writeup of why I use them and where you can find them.

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Just be yourself okay?

Our brains are wired that way, to always see the bad – the problem – rather than the good. It used to keep us alive back when we lived in caves.

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Throwing Grammar in the Bin?

This is a sonnet to laziness, idleness, loafing—a spirited rejection of the Puritan Work Ethic and all it implies. Read on and discover why idleness should be part of YOUR life.

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Scratching out eyes

On Finding Mudita

Of all the negative emotions, after shame, I think envy takes the biscuit: it seeps into everything we look at and it keeps us stuck.

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Start Writing Your Book Today

I'm on a mission to create 1,000 business owner-authors and help them transform their lives and businesses. Join us: get started with the 29-Day Writing Challenge. Fill out the form below and get writing...

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