Beta Readers: The Good, the Bad, and Where to Find Them

A good beta reader can save you time and money before you hire an editor....a bad one, not so much. Here are my tips on where to find beta readers, what to avoid, what to ask, and how to make the most out of working with them.

Editing Your BookTiffany HawkSeptember 15, 2020edit your book, beta-reader Comments

The Best Books About Writing Books: A Writing Coach’s Top 11 Recs

These are the books on writing that have helped me and my clients get published.

I’m a sucker for a good writing how-to. I’ve picked up dozens over the years, and no matter how many books I’ve purged over my 21 moves between cities, states and countries, I can’t get rid of a single one on writing.

Writing Your Book, Editing Your Book, How to Write a BookTiffany HawkAugust 17, 2020Comment

How to Edit Your Book Step-By-Step: Save Yourself Time, Money and Stress

I want to help you edit your book the easy (well, easier or somewhat less hard) way. If anyone tells you writing, editing, or publishing a book is easy, they’re trying to sell you something.

Editing Your BookTiffany HawkAugust 12, 2020edit your book, self-editComment

Is There a Trick to Writing When You Have a Busy Life?

God knows I do. I think about this all the time, so when Lauren Groff famously refused to answer the Harvard Gazette’s question about work-life balance, I was thrown. Like many of us, I cheered her on, but I was also frustrated. I reached out to some of the most prolific writing mothers (mothering writers?) I know and asked what advice they had for us.

Productivity, Writing Your Book, How to Write a BookTiffany HawkNovember 29, 2018 Comments

What I Needed to Learn About Creativity vs Productivity

I came home and fell into a serious funk. So did my husband. It took us more than a week to shake it off. (If I’m completely honest, I’m still not 100% back. In a minute I’ll get to how I’m addressing it and ask for your suggestions.) Here’s the weird thing, we were especially thrown by our malaise because we’re both lucky enough to LOVE our work and our home and our neighborhood, and now that we’re back home we aren’t sharing an itty bitty stateroom with two kids. So, why?! Why were we so deeply burned out on our lives mere days after returning from a restorative vacation?

Productivity, Writing Your BookTiffany HawkNovember 5, 2018Comment

Ask the Writing Coach: Do You Have to Write Every Day?

Nope. You don’t. You definitely, absolutely, 100% do not have to write every day to be a writer.

So why do some writers claim you do? Because they do. It’s fabulous that they can sit down and write every single day of their life. Plenty of successful authors do that. Plenty of successful authors don’t.

If a daily schedule works for you, beautiful. But if it doesn’t, that’s okay too. Like athletes, many of us need breaks to recover, adapt, recharge, and prevent burn out.

Want some proof?

Writing Your Book, How to Write a BookTiffany HawkSeptember 11, 2018 Comments

Writers and Rejection: Why You Don't Need a Thicker Skin

The only platitude I’ve heard repeated as often as “show don’t tell” is “you need a thicker skin.” Nonsense. You need a better rebound.

Literary Agents, Traditional publishing, Writing Your BookTiffany HawkAugust 14, 2018Comment

Ask the Writing Coach: Do I Need A Literary Agent?

If you want to sell your book to a major New York publisher, you need an agent, no question. As with anything in life, there are rare exceptions, but do you want to drastically narrow your chances in hopes of winning the lottery? If so, why? A good agent has relationships with editors and publishers, they know who’s looking for what, they know how to sell a book, they know how to negotiate a good contract, and

Literary Agents, Traditional publishingTiffany HawkFebruary 20, 2018

3 Simple Mistakes That Will Kill Your Novel's Opening (+ how to fix them)

You’re trying to juggle a dozen things at once – an unforgettable first line, a fresh voice, an original theme, complex characters, mood and tone and conflict and a sense of mystery, and so on and so forth. In so doing, there’s a good chance you’ve inadvertently lost the most important element of all – clarity.

Literary Agents, Writing Your Book, Editing Your Book, How to Write a BookTiffany HawkFebruary 12, 2018Revision

Get Your Book Published By Thinking Like a Gatekeeper

Once upon a time, I was a magazine editor with an inbox full of pitches from writers and publicists. Many of the senders probably submitted those queries and imagined me waiting for them to come in, reading through each one carefully to decide whether or not it had merit.

Here’s what was really on my mind each time a new pitch pinged through:

Literary AgentsTiffany HawkFebruary 9, 2018

Writing and Publishing a Book is Hard. Here's How to Get Your Mojo Back.

Rejection sucks. Writer’s block sucks. Burnout sucks. And yet, they’re all part of the job. Below are some super quick and simple exercises designed to make you feel creative, capable, and alive.

Productivity, Writing Your Book, Traditional publishing, Literary AgentsTiffany HawkApril 29, 2016Comment

Ask the Writing Coach: How Can I Handle Rejection Like a Pro?

Rejection is a cost of doing business. This is true not only for writers and other creatives but for anyone courageous enough to live wholeheartedly.

You can minimize it by

Literary Agents, Traditional publishing, Writing Your Book, Editing Your BookTiffany HawkMarch 21, 2016Comment

Six Simple Ways To Make Your Revision Easier

I spend a lot of time encouraging writers to reach into their hearts and get out of their heads (those inner critics are serious assholes). Only, there does come a time to unleash your intellect. That time is called revision.

These are my own tried and true techniques for revising without getting overwhelmed.

Writing Your Book, Editing Your BookTiffany HawkAugust 7, 2015Revision, CraftComment

How to get your book published against all odds? 1 Trite Sounding But Legit Secret

When being turned down by literary journals and literary agents and magazines and book publishers, my grad school friends and I would console ourselves by saying, “at least we’re not trying to make it as models.”

Tiffany HawkJuly 21, 2015Literary Agents, EditorsComment