… and how to put them right! Advice and opportunities for new, aspiring and upcoming journalists and writers of non-fiction
I’ve written before about writing competitions of which I disapprove. You’ll find some background at the Copyright page on my blog. And as I said last year, it’s a mistake not to read terms and conditions. So here we go with another, this one from Cornish Traditional Cottages, who are inviting short articles for their …
Good day. Here’s a little lesson which I hope you’ll find useful. Consider three sentences: The poet Angela Smith (who had travelled from the Shetlands) said the book festival was a huge success. The poet Angela Smith, who had travelled from the Shetlands, said the book festival was a huge success. The poet Angela Smith …
I read a tweet last week, on the day of the Wikipedia blackout, by a writer pointing out that journalists might have to actually spend the day doing some proper in-depth research – for a change! – rather than click into the collaborative online people’s encyclopedia and trusting the information they found there. It was …
I’ve just administered a modest little online competition on behalf of one of my clients. It was not a writing competition or related to the publishing business in any way; it was a simple prize giveaway for subscribers of a newsletter. Three things were asked of entrants: 1. To answer a simple question. 2. To …
Because if you indulge in it, and one of the results takes you to the writing blog of a tutor who favours reading his Google Analytics stats ahead of addressing his looming deadlines, you run the risk of your search term being appropriated, occasionally for lightly comic purposes, and presented to readers in Writing-related Googling …
Too many of us are going to be, at this time of year, distracted by Christmas – presents, parties – and then later by New Year – resolutions, more parties – but what you really need to be thinking about over the coming weeks is article ideas for 2012. And what 2012 is going to …
A very quick post which I hope you’ll forgive – though it does at least suitably reflect the urgency of today’s advice: drop everything at once and go buy a copy of Woman’s Weekly’s special centenary collector’s edition – if you can still find one. Not because it’s a nice investment for your grandchildren, not …
I’m suddenly feeling a bit ambivalent towards … agreement, I guess, is the only word for it, although it doesn’t feel quite right. Agreeness? Agreeance? I see a lot of letters – ie letters to editors, for letters pages – which make a point of agreeing. “I agreed with your article on extreme knitting, and …
“No time to read, no tools to write” commented Lorraine Mace, 34 errors and almost 12 months ago, the last time I addressed this subject at Mistake No. 25. Succinct and accurate, I’d say. Perhaps I’m revisiting this too soon – particularly in light of my last post which also concerned reading, albeit how you …
As regular followers will know, I’m all for branching out of your writing comfort zone and researching subjects you know little or nothing about. I probably best make this point in an early post – Mistake No. 12. Years and years ago – late nineties, I think – I wrote an article about electronic voice …
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