I'm Holly Lisle, a full-time novelist on a mission--I believe in paying forward. I have the best job in the world, and if you want to write for a living, too, I want to help you make that happen. So here you'll find not only information about my many novels, but a massive amount of information on how to write your own, and how to make a living doing it. Believing in your dreams and taking the action to turn them into reality is not just for other people. It's for you, too. Welcome to my home on the Web.
Who: Holly Lisle, obviously :D Professional writer for the last fifteen or so years, author of over thirty fantasy novels, Holly has also devoted a significant amount of time to developing an amazing website for writers.
What: This website is everything I think an author's site ought to be. It includes her writing diary (aka blog), information on all her published work, and a section for fans of her work that includes sample chapters, short stories and world building tidbits about her various worlds. You can download full FREE copies of her novels Fire in the Mist and Sympathy for the Devil here.
BUT, as WELL as all this, there's more :D
Holly has a section of her site devoted to writers, and it's awesome. I've read the entire content of this site twice - the first time is what kicked me into writing seriously - and I own her entire Create-A- (Plot, Character, Language and Culture) nonfiction series. (For the record, the plot clinic was the most helpful for me. But I've always struggled with structure as opposed to character, so I imagine it wouldn't be so useful for someone who already knows plot. It does have some nifty ways of communicating with your Muse, though). There are free sample chapters of these clinics available in various places around the site.
Her articles cover everything from the pros and cons of going pro, how to write in the face of adversity, bringing life to your stories, advice on how to finish and how to revise your stories, finding your themes, how to work with editors and agents, using strangeness, and how to evaluate your work.
As WELL as that, she has a free - FREE, people! - ebook called Mugging the Muse: Writing for Love and Money that you can download right here. Free stuff! Go! Read now! :D
There are also a series of newsletters you can subscribe to: the standard, once a week writing updates newletter that answers questions about writing, the free mini plot course (not so brilliant if you've read the plot clinic, but better than nothing if you're struggling with structure in your work), and a newsletter that focuses on ways to earn income that will support your writing habit called Money to Write (though the link is called Creating Royalty Income). This last one, because of its focus on earning money, is a lot pushier than the other newsletters, and if you read this one first you may be turned off by it - think internet copywriting and hard sell-speak, even if the products themselves are great. Don't let that dissuade you from digging deeper into her site, though - the writing information is still great, and the business side of things is easy to avoid; just don't sign up for that letter! :D
Where: Here, or here: http://hollylisle.com/
Why: I think, in lieu of more rambling, I'll just let you read the 'What' section again. I'm sure it's obvious that I love this site, and that I feel like it's boosted my writing career more than anything else except actually writing (and critting, but that's writing ;)).
When: Well, I'm subscribed to her newsletter, which I get once weekly, so I don't actually check her blog any more. I'm guessing it has a similar frequency - but this site is so chock full of writery goodness, it'll keep you going for a while.
PS Lol, I thought I'd better add (after an off-site comment) that I haven't actually read any of Holly's fiction. It's hard to come by in Australia. But I adore her non-fic, and that's what I'm raving about here - just to clarify ;)
No comments:
Post a Comment