Starting this week, we’ll be posting a writing tip (or more than one!) each Wednesday. We hope you’ll come back each week to see what we’ve shared.

Today, Kate Flora is sharing something she used to share with her writing students. One of the things that’s hardest, even for those who dream of writing and have a strong desire to do so, is to make the time to sit down and write.

Far too often, the challenge is that they don’t feel entitled to take that time when they’re only beginners or when they haven’t been published. Part of my coaching is to get them to believe in their right to be writers. Not to wait until someone else has validated that or given them permission, but giving themselves permission to honor that desire to write and make the time to do it.

As part of helping aspiring writers to sit in the chair and do the work, I gave each of my students a sign that simply reads:

NOT NOW. I’m Writing

I tell them that only they will know whether that sign needs to go on the inside of the door to keep them in, or on the outside of the door to keep away friends or family members who want to interrupt them.

P.S. Want to win a bundle of mysteries to read during the long, cold winter? Just leave a comment on one of our posts between now and the end of October and you could be the lucky recipient.

Jule Selbo taught MFA students in Screenwriting for many years and one of the last things she and student would do is go through the student’s script to make sure that EVERY scene was moving the main characters or story forward.  I think it still applies to the mystery crime novel. The genre, IMO, works best with a TENSION that the crime/mystery has to be solved.  Trim out the excess.