Weekend Update: Holiday Season!

This time of year is my favorite time of year! You get two major holidays within a month of each other, and that means lots of food, time with family, and time away from work. I had a great time with my family this past week. We ate tons of good food (including some not-so-good …

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just a short note today to acknowledge the holiday. I hope you all have a day full of relaxation and time spent with family planned! I’ll be visiting my family and having dinner with them. We may also watch some football, as is tradition. The Chicago Bears are playing but their star quarterback Justin Fields …

What’s in a Name?

Ask 100 different authors what the most difficult part of writing is and you’ll probably get 100 different answers. Ask me that question, and I’ll tell you: Picking a damn title. I mean, the title is that first big impression; you can’t afford to blow it! It has to entice the reader, but not be …

Critiquing Yourself

One thing I’ve always struggled with when it comes to writing is critiquing my own work. I’ve noticed that I tend to be an extremely harsh critic of the things I write, and that’s led to a few cases of extended writer’s block. Where I don’t write anything for days or even weeks because I’m …

Sneak Peek: Czarina Barinov

Over the weekend I added a prologue to my work-in-progress, a short two-page introduction of the main antagonist. I ended up liking it so much that I had to share with y’all right away, and I think you’ll like it too! She’s quickly becoming my favorite antagonist that I’ve ever written, and I’m really enjoying …

Spend My Time

On Friday, a colleague at work offered me a pair of tickets to the Bears game yesterday. He’s got season tickets and he couldn’t go to this one. If you don’t know, I’m a big time Chicago Bears fan, especially since they drafted quarterback Justin Fields. I really wanted to go to this game because …

How to Protect Your Work

First off: I’m not a lawyer. Let’s just get that cleared up! If there’s one thing most new self-published authors fear, it’s having their work stolen! What if they send it off to an agent or beta reader, and that person just goes ahead and publishes it under their name and it sells millions of …

Weekend Update: Pumpkins!

We did some pumpkin carving at the Martuneac household yesterday! The kids picked some classic designs for theirs, a spooky ghost and cat, the wife chose Disney castle, and I made a valiant attempt at the Chicago Bears ‘C’ logo. Halloween isn’t my favorite holiday, but the kids love it and that makes the related …

Should You Use Real Presidents in Fictional Worlds?

The office of the President of the United States is arguably the most powerful, influential position in the world at this time in history. That makes whoever holds that office a pretty easy target for the authors of fiction. But should you pluck this low-hanging fruit? Last year, I read a dystopian book in which …

How to Write a Good Fight Scene

I’ve never thought of myself as particularly good at writing one kind of scene versus another, but one thing I’ve been told consistently by readers and reviewers is that they really enjoy my fight scenes. So I guess I’m pretty good at writing fight scenes. With that in mind, today I’ll be sharing some advice …