Category: Writing Journey

Writing Advice: Writer’s Block

~ Kathryn Fletcher

When I was little the doctor used to prick my finger to test blood for something I didn’t understand. The prick never really hurt that bad, but the doctor squeezing my finger to get enough blood out into the tiny capillary tube hurt like crazy! That is what writer’s block is like. The type of writer’s block I’ve had was more of a 10+ year paralysis. After college I wrote 1/3 of a novel. I decided to research the craft of writing. Great idea in theory. It was like drinking from a fire hose because I decided it would be a good idea to read every book that I could get my hands on. I had no idea there was so much to learn. I became overwhelmed and didn’t know how to implement ALL that I had learned ALL at once. So I stopped writing. Life got busy anyway. I changed careers, got married, had a child, moved a couple times. Ya know…Life.

Writing Update October 2019

~ Kathryn Fletcher

It has been a while since I’ve written about what is going on in my writing world. So things are starting to settle down a bit now. *Knocks on wood* Grad school is done! Middle school is in session and I finally feel like I got my head above water for the moment. So I can focus on writing a bit. I have three projects in mind. 1- A novel based on the short story I published, 2- a nonfiction book, 3- short stories.

Writing Advice: Write What You Know

~ Kathryn Fletcher ~ 1 Comment

“Write what you know.” I’ve heard this attributed to Mark Twain but I’m not sure if this is accurately attributed. If you know more about who first said this, I’d love to hear from you in the comments or email me! The librarian in my is very concerned with giving attribution to the correct people! Many people get frustrated by this piece of advice. I was one of them because I’m a fantasy/sci-fi writer. How can one know about a creature that doesn’t really exist…dragons, unicorns (although maybe they are real, but really good at hiding), and trolls (these do actually appear on the internet all the time, just not in the literal form that I write.) I have a friend that writes about an ICU nurse who turns into an amateur sleuth. As far as I know, she’s never investigated an ACTUAL murder, although she was an ICU nurse. You get the idea right?

1st Acceptance Letter!!! My Short Story is Getting Published!

~ Kathryn Fletcher ~ 6 Comments

I was sitting at the lunch table at work going through my personal email when I saw the words "Story Acceptance" in the subject line of an email!! My heart started pounding and my face flushed as I opened the email. Yes! It said my story had been accepted and they will be publishing it in the Youth Imaginations Magazine April edition!

NaNoWriMo for people too busy to write 50k words

~ Kathryn Fletcher ~ 5 Comments

Only 4 days until NaNoWriMo! What is NaNoWriMo? Look here. Basically it is a world-wide word count challenge to write 50,000 words in the month of November. I have yet to ever write 50,000 words in one month. I haven't even come close. The most I've ever done is 15,000 words and I was pretty … Continue reading NaNoWriMo for people too busy to write 50k words