Columns

10 Mothers of Famous Authors

May 6th, 2016

Sunday is Mother's Day, and to honor all the mamas out there, let's take a moment to highlight ten mothers of famous authors who played a significant role in shaping their sons' or daughters' literary careers—all while maintaining careers of their own (or, sadly, falling victim to mental illness and systemic sexism during their lifetime). Some of these moms were/are even famous authors in their own right. Happy Mother's Day! Writers, draft up something nice for your mama.

Read Column →

7 Starter Ideas For Your Mother-Daughter Book Club

May 5th, 2016

Daughters of the world: Mother’s Day is right around the corner! The obvious gift choice is a book, but what about an unexpected spin on this tried and true staple? Try buying two books. Two of the same book, in fact. One for your Mother, and one for you. I'm talking a Mother-Daughter book club!

Read Column →

"Some folks sure got a strange idea of entertainment...": The Unlucky History of Friday the 13th Books

May 5th, 2016

People are superstitious by nature, and they love to be scared. And what's scarier than a man in a mask with machete in hand? That's the question that has haunted us for 35 years now.

Read Column →

Eight Tips For Increasing Your Writing Output, From A Very Busy Writer

May 4th, 2016

My second book came out this past February. The third is scheduled for October. I’m 36,000 words into the fourth. I just finished co-writing a novella with James Patterson. This is on top of running the class program here at LitReactor, and acting as Associate Publisher at MysteriousPress.com. Oh and I have a 15-month-old daughter. I’ve been busy.

Read Column →

10 Plugins Writers Need For Their WordPress Website

May 2nd, 2016

If you have a website there’s a fair chance you use WordPress as your content management system. After all it’s the most popular blogging system on the web and is used by more than seventy million websites (check out the stats here). One of my favorite WordPress features is the ability to customize and expand both the on-site and backend functionality and features of your website via Plugins.

Read Column →

UPDATED WITH WINNERS - LitReactor's Flash Fiction Smackdown: April Edition

April 29th, 2016

Flash fiction: A style of fictional literature marked by extreme brevity Welcome to LitReactor's Flash Fiction Smackdown, a monthly bout of writing prowess. How It Works We give you inspiration in the form of a picture, poem, video, or prompt. You write a flash fiction piece using the inspiration we gave you. Put your entry in the comments section. One winner will be picked and awarded a prize.

Read Column →

11 Chumptastic Reasons That Book Clubs Are For Chumps

April 28th, 2016

1. You Never Get A Cool ID Card When You Join A Book Club It took like 10 seconds to make this: Okay, it's not exactly high quality. And Bill Clinton is the signer, but hey, why in the hell don't you get a rad I.D. when you join a book club? How is that not a thing?

Read Column →

Narrative Mechanics in Hearthstone: How a Card Game Can Tell a Story

April 28th, 2016

Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft is one of the most popular video games in the world. A free-to-play game available on nearly all computers, tablets and phones, where it entertains over 75 million players. It is frequently the most-streamed game on Twitch, and as of this writing a search for the title on YouTube returns nearly 3 million hits.

Read Column →

The Life Cycle of Books

April 27th, 2016

Books are born and die all the time. I'm not speaking of the cycle of creation that all writers know so well: the loop of ideas, draft, submissions, and eventual publication. I mean the physical lifespan of binding and pages. In celebration of Earth Day, I take a quick look at how much waste our beloved books create, and what happens when they are eventually left to rot in a garbage heap.   Life First, some quick facts:

Read Column →

Crowdfunding for Writers: 10 Tips for Running a Successful Patreon Campaign

April 26th, 2016

Crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo have made a big splash in recent years, helping creative people raise funds for everything from videogames to unicorgis. But Patreon, the new kid on the fundraising block, may be the best platform yet for writers, and I'm here to tell you why.

Read Column →