The Stages of Handling Criticism

by benmweilertNo Comments
Nobody's perfect. As writers, all of us are on journeys to improve our writing. The best way to do so is to have our current writing criticized. Knowing what works and what doesn't is best achieved through the lens of other people—your readers. While we can't please everyone with our writing, we can at least try to take relevant and constructive criticism to make more readers happy. Ultimately, there are two stages of criticism: before you release a book and after you publish this book. Knowing how to handle both is key to improving your writing. Use beta reading criticism to make changes. I've written about the four things I like my beta readers to provide for my drafts, but I'll admit that it stings a little when a trusted source comes back and gives some harsh criticism of my story. Your first reaction might be to get mad. "These beta readers don't understand what I'm trying to do!" you may tell...
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Two Creative Certainties: Taxes [PART 2/2]

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It may come as a surprise that taxes are marginally easier than death when you’re a creative individual. While the latter requires explicit and detailed instructions on what to do upon your passing, the former is something you can control and often doesn’t involve more than a few extra forms when you’re filling out taxes for the year. Still, if you are selling anything that you created, the government will want a cut of that income. The one thing to be careful of here is that often this endeavor is considered a “hobby” instead of a business. If you want this extra income to be a business, it needs to be making a profit on an annual basis for many years. Consider how much you spend on stocking your inventory of products, advertising, and the variety of other costs that contribute to your creativity before determining if you’re even in the black when it comes to your business (which will...
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Two Creative Certainties: Death [PART 1/2]

by benmweilertNo Comments
Before the recent birth of my second child, my wife and I were preparing for this new life coming into the world by ensuring that our kids would be financially secure upon both of our deaths. While we’re only in our late-30s, it’s difficult to consider both of us dying unexpectedly in the near future. And yet, we have had close friends who were about our age pass away suddenly this last year, so we know it can happen. When setting up a will or trust for your next of kin, there are a lot of assets that are easily included in these documents. Houses, investments, retirement accounts, and bank accounts. However, there is one thing a creative person needs to consider when planning for their death: what happens to the rights to their creative works? If you traditionally publish, some of these details may be already covered in your contract. If you self-publish, now might be the time to think about...
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Almost Free in 2023

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Four years ago, I started writing down the projects I planned to accomplish during the year. This accountability was great to keep me on track. There's something about declaring the different goals for the year, especially when you can finish at least a few of them. For 2023, I'm finally reaching the end of some bigger projects I started a few years ago. This means I'm almost free of the obligations I put myself under. With a new infant in the house, it'll be interesting to see how much I can get done this year. Here's what I currently have planned: Stop Screaming I've been getting some good feedback on the recipes from my ice cream cookbook, Stop Screaming. I've made some changes to a few of the recipes and how they're collected in the book, so there are only a few left that need testing prior to going live with it sometime this year. Since this is a somewhat smaller passion...
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What did I do in 2022?

What did I do in 2022?

by benmweilertNo Comments
After a few years of the pandemic, 2022 felt like a return to some norms for me. Conventions were back in full swing, and I could engage with a lot more people in person compared to 2020 and 2021. I was still quite busy getting new stories out—as well as providing new forms to classic ones. I expanded my engagement with local stores this year and now have my books available for purchase at Young Bookworms in Colorado Springs, while still continuing my partnership with Sanctuary Inspired Goods in Old Colorado City. In case you missed any of my announcements this year, here's everything I did... 2022 YEAR IN REVIEW Second to None (10th Anniversary and Audiobook versions) Having completed the 10th Anniversary edition of First Name Basis last year, it was only natural that I continue with the 10th Anniversary edition of Second to None. This expanded version includes character sketches by Robin Childs, the relevant portions of the appendix from the...
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What is the scope of your success?

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An argument I often see in the writing community is how to define specific terms. Some examples are "When am I considered a writer?", "How long should my novel be?", and "Do I have to be traditionally published to consider myself an author?" Ultimately, many of these questions have one key concept: success. Just like how there are many genres out there, there are differing ideas on what constitutes a writer's success. This can either be a significant motivator or a source of endless depression, so let's look at how to measure the scope of a writer's success. What are your goals? I decided to take my writing more seriously in 2017. After cutting my teeth on the self-publishing process for a few years, I released the second edition of my debut trilogy and set a goal for myself to publish at least one book each year. Even though this goal brought me some stressful moments (and motivated me to seek therapy...
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Why NaNoWriMo Works for Me

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Just over a decade ago, I had never thought about writing a novel. As someone who had only written short stories up to that point, something like a novel felt so big and insurmountable to me. Then, talking with my cousin at Thanksgiving, I learned about National Novel Writing Month (or NaNoWriMo for short). Since then, I have participated and won the challenge 12 times in a row and am now nine years into my role as a Municipal Liaison (ML) for my local region. I almost exclusively write the first drafts of my novels during this annual challenge, and I have published at least five manuscripts that started out as a flurry of late nights writing in November. Before we continue, let me set the stage by answering the first question many people have: what is NaNoWriMo? Founded in 1999, the NaNoWriMo challenge is to write 50,000 words of a first draft of a new novel in the 30 days...
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Be a Voracious Consumer of Stories

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Being an author takes a lot of time and commitment. Depending on how fast an author can craft clean copy determines how much time they must dedicate to the various steps of finishing a manuscript. Perhaps an author is a fast writer, which might require them to spend more time editing. On the flip side, maybe an author agonizes over each word as they write, which might take longer to get through a draft but requires less time editing. Wherever you fall on the spectrum of writing and editing, there is one activity you should also dedicate some of your time to. What's nice about this activity is that it can often be relaxing. I refer, of course, to consuming stories. Read universal stories with wide appeal. While we encourage writers to pursue the stories they want to tell, if these stories only focus on wish fulfillment or other narcissistic tales, their audiences are likely to be limited to themselves. Reading other...
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Expand Your Writing with Different Genres

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Writers are inherently drawn to write the stories they like to read. There are significant benefits to knowing a genre well and building a fanbase who come to expect a certain genre from a particular writer. If you want horror, you’ll read Stephen King. If you want hard sci-fi, you’ll read Andy Weir. If you want fantasy, you’ll read Brandon Sanderson. But what if these well-known authors branched out into a new genre? Would you still read this new genre based on their reputation? Many successful authors will branch out from their core genre. Take Stephen King, for instance. We know most of the books he writes are one-shot horror stories, but the Dark Tower series blends elements of traditional fantasy and western genres with just a dash of horror (since old habits die hard). It’s important to note that people who don’t enjoy reading horror might like to read the Dark Tower series, even if Stephen King is mainly known...
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You Should Write Short Stories

You Should Write Short Stories

by benmweilertNo Comments
It’s strange to me how people are increasingly consuming short-form content like TikTok videos or Instagram Reels, but won’t read short stories. Some flash fiction is short enough to read in a few minutes, but the desire for novels and series of books instead of short stories is probably an effect of the decline of the magazine. This doesn’t mean authors shouldn’t write short stories. Some incredibly famous authors like Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, and Kurt Vonnegut used to have their short stories published in magazines like Galaxy Science Fiction, Playboy, or Collier’s. Even modern authors like Ted Chiang have found success with their short stories despite the limited audience. I started out my journey as an author by writing short stories just to get the ideas out of my head. These stories focused on a singular concept and explored it in a few thousand words. A lot of speculative fiction revolves around a dense exploration of “what if” scenarios...
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