A Week in the Writing Life, 9 September 2023

My first event of the fall is this weekend while I continue work on upcoming projects

Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1999. Photo courtesy of FEMA.

Had to get this newsletter finished early this week since I’m going to be occupied on Friday and on the road for most of Saturday going back and forth from Cedar Rapids. You might have heard about it, although if this is the first time, you’ll probably be too late to get there. I highly doubt the place will be as flooded as you see here, given the recent weather.

Anyway, let’s talk writing and a few other things.

Home Front Stuff

Not much going on at home at the moment. My wife had a bumper crop of vegetables this year, especially squash, which I think received some help from the considerable sunlight and heat we got this summer. Hope the lack of water and the abundance of heat didn’t damage the big crops around here. At least we in Lucas County, Iowa, got a brief splash of rain on Tuesday which was more than overdue, and the temperatures are down at least ten degrees under what they were last weekend, which I’m grateful for.

I seem to write a little better when it gets cooler. It’s always a bit more comfortable to write when you’re huddled up in sweatshirts and a warm drink rather than sweating to death. Maybe that’s just all a result of my Scandinavian and Wisconsinite heritage rather than anything else. My current home of Chariton is just above the 41° North Latitude, and I have no desire to live anywhere south of 40°¹.

What I’ve Been Writing

The longer I do this, I continue to learn more about the writing process. I have the sneaking suspicion the moment that I start to really know something a lot about the craft is the time I start reaching the end of my life. Well, I’ll worry about it later.

I’m starting to not only adjust to writing at a faster pace, but now I’m starting to consider exactly what I write on what days. I’ve recently run into difficulties during the past few weeks with promising to get newsletters done by midday Saturday and ending up getting them out Sunday night.

It occurred to me I have to prioritize what I have to write according to their deadlines. For example, yes I would like to get some writing done on my rough draft for The Yank Striker 2, but that is not as time sensitive as my writing for, say, the newsletter. This is especially the case if I want it to run at noon on Saturday and I want to make sure it is actually on time for once. It’s especially the case if I know I’ll be busy on Friday evening and I’ll be on the road for the vast majority of Saturday, and that I’ll only up for a quick write up by the end of the day. So, I get a good portion of the newsletter done earlier and serve it up on the scheduler for Saturday.

One of the disadvantages of this technique might be that you find yourself staring at a piece you know you want to write but there is something holding you back. Maybe you’re blocked, or maybe you’d rather write the “fun” stuff rather than the “work” stuff. I had a long discussion about the concept several months back, if you’d be interested in taking a look with a paid subscription.

However, there should be a way around it. For example, there is something I wanted to include in the newsletter, but I realized it might do better as a standalone piece. If you have a new topic to work on that is timely, it can have the same sort of effect as just a fun writing piece.

We’ll have to see whether this works, but I think I’m going to give it a shot this week. The proof of whether it works will be whether this shows up on time at midday on Saturday. The other piece I’ll produce will be available for everyone, but I’ll work to put together a paid subscriber exclusive for next week.

Also, let’s consider this section doing double duty this week as your writing advice for the week. Welcome to my TED talk.

What I’ve Been Reading/General Recommendations

I’ve finally been getting online to check out all of these writers and trying to give them shout-outs, because there’s so much good writing. Don’t consider this a case of sucking up, but

Hanne Winarsky

, the head of writer A&D at Substack, put together this interesting analysis of podcasts having a different feel on this platform rather than on others.

Podcasts look different here

I have to say I’m slightly intimidated by trying to start a podcast on Substack itself. I’ve been experimenting a bit on Anchor but it can take a lot of effort to put together a professional sounding podcast episode. I also find it a bit awkward Substack doesn’t have audio-editing capabilities on its platform like Spotify does. I’ll have to consider it, but I’m more busy writing online than talking online.

Where I’ll Be and Where You Can Find my Books

Here’s my upcoming appearances:

• From 12-6 p.m. Oct 1, I’ll be at the Windsor Heights Book Fair, 1141 69th St., Windsor Heights.

• From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 14, at MERGE, 136 Dubuque St., Iowa City, as part of the Iowa City Book Festival that week.

• And from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 4, I will be at the Elwell Building at the Iowa State Fairgrounds as part of the 8th Annual Indie Author Book Expo.

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The Holy Fool and The Yank Striker are available in paperback and ebook formats. The links for those books are on the sidebar here and in my author’s profile.

They’re also available at these Iowa bookstores:

• Beaverdale Books, 2629 Beaver Ave # S1, Des Moines

• Pella Books, 824 Franklin St, Pella

• The Book Vault, 105 S Market St, Oskaloosa.

I highly recommend all three places.

Writing Quote of the Week

I’m not sure my readers need to know too much about me. :)

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.
― G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

Final Thoughts

I always love hearing from people in the comments or by email, so say hi or let me know what made you push the subscribe button or what might tempt you to do so.

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1. 40° South Latitude might be a different deal. I’d be all right retiring in Argentina or New Zealand.