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with Drake The Duck Muse
Multi-Genre Author ~ Editor ~ Book Designer ~ Writing Coach
The Blog Thingy
Where Emotion and Information are Dispensed Inconsistently... Sometimes
You'll find some interesting stuff here...
a few Op Eds, some Writing Craft Information, Book Reviews, and More. Poke around the categories and see what ruffles your feathers... in a good way!
What If They Erased Pooh?
March 2021 After spending the past few days nearly suffocated in the news that Dr. Seuss Enterprises (a foundation that I thought was...
7 min read
The State of Returns... We Should Be Sharing The Risk
October 2021 Since I published my first book in 1993, I've been confused about the return policy our industry seems to accept. Now,...
7 min read
Indie Publishing: Is There Too Much To Lose?
November 2021 This morning, in one of the Facebook groups I follow, I saw a post, reminding authors about the (primarily monetary) risks...
3 min read
Tears In The Reader... and A Moment of Wow
December 2021 I've been working on the new edition of my romance novel, A Tryst of Fate , lately. I'm tightening the prose, reformatting...
3 min read
The Power of The Pen! Community Service and the Written Word
January 2022 For any who take the time to get to know us, they will find that Community Service work is extremely important to Drake (my...
5 min read
The Sphere of Story
January 2022 The process of story creation can be explained as a sphere of creation. It is a process where ideas form and are passed...
4 min read
An Author's Flight Plan
February 2022 Migrating my way through the world as a writer has never been hard for me. From my duckling days, I knew that writing...
5 min read
Validate Reading… No Matter How You Choose To Do It!
February 2022 I spend a lot of time with people who love books, authors, and readers. In almost every case, the conversations are...
6 min read
Editors Protect The Rush
May 2022 I love words. I love diving deep into sentence structures, vocabulary, and the rhythm of one paragraph, flowing after another,...
4 min read
Ten Sacred Words
August 2022 Sacred [sey-krid] adjective; regarded with reverence; secured against violation and infringement. Since I was about seven...
8 min read
Writing In The Leko's Light
December 2024 When I worked in the theatre as a lighting designer, we primarily used two different types of lights to create the desired...
5 min read
So Many Stories and My Gemini Brain
December 2021 Three times, in as many days, I’ve seen posts in various groups on Facebook asking whether writers work on multiple...
5 min read
Book Reviews, Indie Authors, and Bilateral Breathing
February 2022 The impact of a book review cannot be overstated. As Indie Authors, we all know this. We live it and breathe it… But do...
4 min read
The Bicycle Seat
June 2022 I read on one of the many writing group forums today, a novice author expressing their gratitude for someone pointing them in...
5 min read
Ratings For Books? Yes!
Occasionally, I’m asked if books have a rating system, like films. We all know that reader audiences are defied mostly by age group, but...
4 min read
What's Your Genre?
The writing world has changed a lot over the decades. We began simply enough… Fiction or Non-fiction? Real or Make Believe. Then, as...
5 min read
The Writing Research Carousel
July 2023 Every writer I’ve ever met is specifically talented. Each has a storytelling gift they generously share with readers....
6 min read
Word Counts Are Only Half The Story
Dateline: January 14, 2025… At last night’s virtual writing session with Creative Slingers of Ink , Drake and I wrote a total of 499...
6 min read
Theatre and Book Festivals: Kissing Cousins
Perspectives from March 2022 The anticipation of a new festival season brings excitement and trepidation. It feels a little like the...
4 min read
Five Ways To Build Reciprocity Into Your Indie Author Marketing Plan
Since first becoming an Indie Author in 2010, I’ve focused on not only building my writing career, but I’ve also worked to share the...
9 min read
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