Tag Archives: Carolyn Wilker
Getting value from a writer’s conference — Carolyn Wilker
Having attended writer’s conferences over the years, I encourage others to try it out. Those opportunities charged and inspired me and offered the push I needed to move on. It’s one thing to sign up and say you’re going; preparing oneself to get the most from the event is just as important.
Encouraging the Disillusioned Writer — Carolyn R. Wilker
Recently I wrote a letter to a fellow writer who had become discouraged. How could I help her get her pen moving again—or her fingers to the keyboard? After thinking on it awhile, this is what I wrote: Dear Discouraged Writer There’s so much to learn, between writer’s guidelines and grammar and the struggle with… Read more »
What are you looking for in a blog — Carolyn R. Wilker
The May topic on my newsletter, FineTuned, focused on starting a blog. There I advised writers to begin a blog only if they are serious about continuing it. It takes a lot of content, and some effort to keep it going. And it’s best to have topics broad enough to address week after week and… Read more »
The Elusive Comma — Carolyn R. Wilker
Imagine trying to read a long text without commas or other punctuation. Would it be hard to figure out where one sentence begins and another ends? What about the words in the middle of those sentences? Old English was written that way. With time, punctuation was developed, and some scribes used it more consistently than… Read more »
Writing, even when it’s hard to do — Carolyn R. Wilker
In January, blogger and author Jeff Goins issued a challenge to fellow writers to write 500 words a day for the month of January. He not only issued the challenge, but he also offered a list of things to write about. While I used the word count for my own projects, journalling and letter writing,… Read more »
I Want To Write A Book — Carolyn R. Wilker
A cartoon depicted a character saying: “I’m going to write a book and someday I will be famous.” Is fame the ultimate goal? Have you been reading the tabloids lately? A client of mine, still learning English, decided to write a story about her life in the country she came from. Fair enough. When I… Read more »
Puzzling Punctuation — Carolyn Wilker
Punctuation trips up many writers, from beginner to the more experienced, so for this post, I’ll address six of the commonly used punctuation marks: hyphen, en dash, em dash, colon, semicolon, and ellipsis. Knowing correct usage is important for anyone who writes.
Active or Passive Voice? — Carolyn Wilker
As an editor I pay attention to the use of verbs in my clients’ or students’ writing and suggest when the active form would be more effective, and affirm when the passive is appropriate. Active and passive voices are different than verb tense which tells the reader if the action happens in the present, past… Read more »
The Elusive Comma — Carolyn Wilker
In writing classes, particularly when it comes to grammar, we often get in a discussion over commas. While one throws up her hands and says, “Let the editor fix it,” another asks, “Tell me again where they go.”
Showing or Telling? — Carolyn Wilker
A student wrote a story about a day she walked her dog to the park and about their discovery of a body. She had hurried to a nearby house to ask someone to call police, and when the police arrived, they wanted her to give a statement. She wrote that she felt shaken from the… Read more »