Quote of the day
Chocolate has a variety of benefits for the body, such as mood-lifting neurotransmitters and powerful antioxidants. Chocolate also contains a healthy supply of vitamins and minerals and even stimulates the brain into releasing endorphins.
~JULIE PECH, author of The Chocolate Therapist: A User’s Guide to the Extraordinary Health Benefits of Chocolate
WRITING
- Seven secret weapons that will make you a better noveslist, Storyfix2.0 | Tweet
Most of the time, who makes it and who doesn’t is no accident.
→Story Fix: Transform Your Novel from Broken to Brilliant
- Anatomy of a Best-selling Story, Part Two, Kristen Lamb’s blog | Tweet
Structure is one of those topics that I feel gets overlooked far too much. There are a lot of workshops designed to teach new writers how to finish a novel in four weeks or three or two or whatever. And that is great…if a writer possesses a solid understanding of structure. If not? At the end of 4 weeks, you could very likely have a 60K word mess that no editor can fix.
→How to write a Best Selling Book
- Every story has a tipping point (plus an invitation), The Write Practice | Tweet
Good stories are made up of moments: good moments, bad moments, but most of all, life changing moments.
→The Key: How to Write Damn Good Fiction Using the Power of Myth
- 7 things about writing I learned from Jonathan Franzen, Creativindie | Tweet
I spent the day at the Budapest Book Fair listening to Jonathan Franzen talk about birds and writing, and making jokes that nobody laughed at because they were waiting for the translation to come through their headphones. I jotted down a few pearls of wisdom that should be useful to writers everywhere.
→Freedom: A Novel (Oprah’s Book Club)
- What lessons from what stories?, Terrible minds | Tweet
Writers can’t just read books. Or watch shows. It’s no longer reasonable to expect that we can just turn our brains off like a bedside lamp — click — and force our storyteller brains to go dark. (Some stories let us do this, still, and those are frequently the sign of a truly powerful tale.)
→Lessons from a Lifetime of Writing: A Novelist Looks at His Craft
SELF-PUBLISHING
- Social media dashboards for authors: Free apps may not be your best option, The Book Designer | Tweet
Who has time to sit at the computer all day scheduling tweets and LinkedIn posts? Not you, right? That’s why a key to efficiency on social media is to schedule your posts throughout the day using one or more social media dashboards.
→Social Media Just for Writers: The Best Online Marketing Tips for Selling Your Books
- On changing book titles and covers: My own experience and how you can do it too, The Creative Penn | Tweet
Here’s why and how, just in case you want to go through this sometime. It’s quite a long, confessional style of post.
→Ditch the Publisher: 40 Indie Authors on Their Unique Self-Publishing Journeys
- 6 Disastrous ebook formatting mistakes you probably don’t know you’re making, Creativindie | Tweet
Talking about ebook formatting will probably sound Greek to you, and it’s a really bad way to learn; I’m going to make a series of formatting videos soon that will be much easier to understand and learn from.
→Zen of eBook Formatting: A Step-by-step Guide To Format eBooks for Kindle and EPUB
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HEALTH
A new study finds that people who consume 60% cacao dark chocolate with L-theanine, an amino acid found in green tea, see not only reduced blood pressure in the long term but improved concentration as well. Doctors at Northern Arizona University (NAU) who conducted the study said that could be helpful in beating our afternoon energy slump, i.e. the lethargic hour just after lunch.
→The Chocolate Therapist: A User’s Guide to the Extraordinary Health Benefits of Chocolate
CREATIVITY
- To be creative is to decisively use these six things, Creative Something | Tweet
Creativity is a decision that anyone can make but that few people actually do.
→How to Be Creative: Rediscover Your Inner Creativity and Lead the Life You Truly Want
MINDFULNESS
- Don’t waste your opportunity, Zen Habits | Tweet
For most of us, our biggest sin is taking things for granted. I’m as guilty as anyone else: I wake up and rush into online work or reading, forgetting to appreciate what a miracle this new day is. I’m alive! I’ve been given another amazing day, full of opportunities, and that is truly breath-taking.
→Zen Habits: Handbook For Life
MONEY
- What’s good for poor kids isn’t bad for rich ones, The Washington Post | Tweet
Much of the discussion around last week’s big new social mobility study focused on the fates of poor kids.
→Rich Dad Poor Dad: What The Rich Teach Their Kids About Money That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!