Category: The Writing Life

10 Things I’ve Learned about Twitter

I’m new to Twitter this year. Call me old. Call me anti-social. I struggle with it. The following are 10 things I’ve learned about Twitter:

1. You not only are expected to send a tweet every day, you’re expected to send out tweets throughout the day.

2. It’s amazing how much you can say in 140 characters.

3. It’s amazing how much you can’t say in 140 characters.

4. Twitter for Dummies is too advanced for me.

5. As a hopeful would-be novelist, I’m told that I must have a presence and a following on Twitter.

6. As an introvert, I am pulled out of my comfort zone when I use Twitter.

7. All I wanted to do was write a book. At the age of 63, I didn’t bargain for Twitter.

8. By the time I get comfortable using Twitter, it will be obsolete.

9. Nothing I want to tweet about, such as #historicalfiction, is trending. I wonder why. LOL!

10. I might Tweet occasionally, but I refuse to let it or a SmartPhone dictate my life. If that means my novel, The Spanish Coin, will never be published… so be it.

I am willing to try to learn new things, but creating a presence on Twitter just might require more effort than I’m able to give it.

Can I write more than one book at a time?

Since I usually read two or three books at the same time, today I pose the following question:  Can I write more than one book at the same time?

I know authors often have to make final corrections in one book while writing their next book, but is it possible to work on two or three book drafts at the same time?

I’m in the self-editing stage of The Spanish Coin — my 95,000-word historical novel manuscript, but I’m eager to start writing two nonfiction books. One of my book ideas is based on the events that make such an impression on my mind that I remember them as many of 60 years later. What is it about a possibly mundane event that etches itself on our memories to such a degree that decades later we can recall them with clarity? I want to explore that and write about those events in my life.

Another idea I’m toying with literally popped in my mind while walking one morning after being diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and being told the benefits of seeking light early in the morning. I’ll leave it at that for now, not wanting to give away the details of my idea.

One of my inner debaters tells me to put these two ideas on hold and concentrate on completing The Spanish Coin. In rebuttal, another of my inner debaters says variety is the spice of life and it will expand my mind to schedule time to work on at least one of my nonfiction book ideas while I devote the majority of my time to my novel.

In a future blog post I’ll tell you which of my inner debaters won.

Have you ever worked on more than one manuscript at once? Share your experience with me and my blog followers.

Janet