The Author Guy Blog

28th June 2024 Hello out there, Welcome back. In my tenth blog, back in January of this year, I wrote about works of fiction that had made an impact on me, and, in fact, inspired me to become a novelist. My focus then was on brief books – what today would be known as a novella – and how some of them gained worldwide reader acclaim and awards such as the Pulitzer and the Nobel. I’ve self-published four novels (word count greater than 40,000 – mine were around 65,000) and my fifth, to be released early next year, will come in at around 75,000 words. But when I began my author journey ten years ago, it was the novella (21,000 to 39,000 words) I envisioned myself writing, and it’s a place I believe I will find myself returning to with my sixth manuscript. An even lesser word count, traditionally topping off at no more than 8,000 words, is the realm of short stories. I recently read of the passing of Alice Munro, a Canadian author who published fourteen collections of short stories over fiv...

12th April 2024 Hello out there, Welcome back. We’ve all likely heard the adage it takes at least 10,000 hours of applied effort to master something new. I recall reading Tiger Woods had practiced and played more than 10,000 of golf before he became a teenager. Well, for me, I long ago passed the 10,000 hours invested in all aspects of fiction writing and I feel as if I’m still in kindergarten. This despite receiving highly-regarded award-winning recognition in three international competitions. For decades I considered myself a very accomplished business writer (I have a degree in journalism), but I simply had no idea the number of moving parts inherent in the craft of fiction writing. Many authors begin their journey by achieving or attempting a MFA (Master of Fine Arts) degree or attend numerous author-focused seminars, either in-person or online. I’ve done some of that, no doubt far less than I should have, and together with independent study and research I’ve crafted my own MFA cou...

  2nd February 2024 Hello out there, Welcome back. Last week, I wrote about my affection for short books and offered several recommendations. But what is worth sharing, I believe, is that for authors penning short manuscripts, they’re swimming against the tide. Actually, more like a tsunami of bias driven by arbitrary (in my opinion) word count thresholds. To be considered “a novel” by agents, editors, publishers and professional reviewers, a manuscript must contain a minimum of 65,000 words, with 120,000 words carrying the author into a danger zone of overkill in terms of acceptability. When the word count fails to chin the bar of 65,000 words, the term “novella” comes into play – and more often than not, derisively. I’ve read and been told that short books “cheat” a reader, somehow lessening enjoyment and not offering good value for the purchase price. Others may think that way, but not me. Last week, among the short books I recommended are  Love Story, Bridges of Madison Co...