Martha Conway, Author at Women Writers, Women's Books

How Do You Get From 0 to 1? From Dreaming to Writing, Writers Tell Their Stories

Martha Conway — Fri, 14 Dec 2018 13:18:07 +0000

After I graduated from college, I wanted to write a novel. I’d had this dream ever since I could remember. But first there was the small matter of supporting myself. I didn’t look for a full-time job; I wanted a job that would earn me enough money to pay for rent and food while still […]

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How to Write about Something You Know Nothing About

Martha Conway — Mon, 26 Sep 2016 08:39:00 +0000

I recently began taking piano lessons as an adult, and I can now tell you this for certain: I am no musician. On the first day, when I told my piano teacher that I wanted to learn to play ragtime, she said: “Why does everyone always want to tackle the hardest music first?” I didn’t […]

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5 Stories about Publishing that are No Longer True (and maybe never were)

Martha Conway — Mon, 21 Sep 2015 14:33:38 +0000

Maybe all professions like to scare young hopefuls — to weed the flock, so to speak — and the publishing industry, notorious for its gloom and doom predictions, is no exception. As a graduate student in a Creative Writing department, I heard all sorts of stories from teachers and other students that made it seem […]

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How to Break Up with your Novel

Martha Conway — Tue, 20 Jan 2015 12:49:04 +0000

To begin with, let me clarify: I don’t mean abandon your novel; I mean separate yourself from it. This has to happen eventually. For better or worse the novel you’ve written will come to term, and it will have to live (or not live) on its own, away from you. There may be any number […]

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How many Beta Readers do you need?

Martha Conway — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 05:15:19 +0000

Someone in my writing group recently sent his first chapters to five different people … and got five very different responses. The result: he’s more confused than ever. Beta readers—those readers you trust your manuscript to before sending it out to an agent, editor, or publishing house—can give valuable feedback. They read with more distance […]

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