People often imagine independent publishing as a world of elegant offices, literary conversations, and endless coffee. The reality is rather more chaotic. One moment you’re the publisher, the next you’re fixing EPUBs, answering customer emails, wrestling with accounting reports, or hunting down invisible formatting errors. It’s a juggling act—but somehow, it’s still one of the most rewarding jobs there is.
Readers are remarkably good at putting two and two together. Yet many writers, worried that a character’s emotions or motivations might not be obvious enough, add a sentence explaining what the reader has already understood. Those explanations rarely add clarity—they usually weaken the scene. Here’s how to recognize when you’re explaining the obvious, and when an explanation genuinely earns its place.
Some writing obstacles aren’t plot problems or lack of inspiration—they’re upholstered. After unexpectedly finishing an entire chapter of Fall From Grace in a single day, I discovered the biggest difference wasn’t my writing. It was where I sat. The recliner I’d always considered a harmless pre-writing stop had quietly become the world’s most comfortable procrastination machine.
Fantasy readers often say they want “simpler” worlds, but is that really what they’re asking for? Maybe the problem isn’t complexity at all—it’s the steep learning curve many modern fantasy novels demand before the story can truly begin. A look at why great fantasy invites readers into its world instead of handing them an owner’s manual on page one.
Solar Sail Theory isn’t about finding stronger sources of momentum. It’s about becoming better at capturing thousands of weak sources of momentum that already exist.
One newsletter subscriber won’t change your life. One podcast appearance won’t transform your business. One new reader or conference conversation or bookstore event won’t either.
Individually, they’re almost insignificant.
That’s why the sail is enormous.
After twelve novels and a novella, the journey comes to its conclusion. Camlann, the final novel in Tracy Cooper-Posey’s acclaimed Once and Future Hearts series, is now available from Stories Rule Press and all major retailers.
Every writer thinks the manuscript is in pretty good shape—right up until the editorial feedback arrives. From confidence and outrage to revision, gratitude, and complete memory loss, here are the twelve stages writers cycle through when an editor gets involved.
A thriller writer’s Google search history can look alarmingly criminal—especially when questions about silencers, DNA and extradition sit beside tomato varieties, bitter cucumbers and homemade hummus.
Hollywood saw a beautiful woman. Hedy Lamarr was also an inventor whose wartime work helped point the way toward modern wireless communications. Her history is far more fascinating than the movie-star image suggests.
We all know about compounding, but very few of us truly understand it. The real magic isn’t in one newsletter, one blog post, one book, or one workout. It’s in the quiet accumulation of thousands of small increments that, over time, become something far greater than the sum of their parts. Solar Sail Theory isn’t about finding a shortcut—it’s about patiently building enough sail to catch the wind that’s already there.
