Improbable Press Blog — Atlin Merrick

I gotta start writing for these too sometime maybe possibly I hope, but in the meantime…tell me a story? Writing Prompts Are Up Every Thursday… …so please take part, write for any fandom, any original story you have, just find the inspiration to put words down. Maybe you'll build on them later for a fic or a book you're working on, maybe they'll be teeny vignettes that live here only—whatever makes you happy. And if you love this prompt, check below for more, or just click on the writing prompt link at the top here to see 'em all. More...

Writing rules are bunk. If you only get the words on the page after standing on your head and yodeling, then that's your writing rule. In my experience as a working writer and editor though, there are three single-sentence rules that help get your lovely yodel-infused writing published. 3 Tiny Tips for Getting Published * Read and follow the publisher's submission guidelines If your preferred publisher's guidelines ask for Victorian vampire fiction and you send a contemporary vampire story, you've ignored their guidelines and you'll be rejected. Please, don't do that to yourself. They know what they want, so give...

Here's our next writing prompt to inspire you. Who knows, maybe you'll start your most famous book right here, sell it for millions! YAY! Every Thursday Writing Prompts Go Live! Post the results of your creativity below in the comments if you so wish. They were fantastic to read last week. Write about whatever moves you, whether original or fandom or a mix. You do you! More Writing Prompts The truth isAll It Takes

By Atlin Merrick Like you I walk, I wait, and sometimes I want to learn cool stuff while I do that, which is why I love podcasts.99% Invisible is a brilliant podcast which recently discussed radical transparency.For example, if the city government takes a year to process building permits tell people. Giving people a hook to hang their wait on helps the wait pass more peacefully. Which leads us to this: How Long It Takes to Edit a Book (and What the Heck That Means) With radical transparency in mind, and inspired by a writer who recently asked me "what...

By Atlin Merrick I visited the Long Room in Trinity College Dublin recently.Look at that photo. Imagine being in this room that contains 200,000 books, a single example of every book published in Ireland and Britain between 1801 and about 1880. While Jane Austen is there in that room, while the Brontës are there too you know, you know that most of the voices in that beautiful room, bound inside covers of gold-stamped leather, are the voices of men, as are every one of the fifty-one busts lining its 65 metres.In that library and libraries the world over men of...