Many people take up writing as a hobby or as a more serious undertaking later in life - maybe even after what would be considered by many retirement age. This article looks at one way the older writer can compete with younger rivals on a level playing field.

There you are, sitting looking at your finished book manuscript. It's probably taken at least a year - maybe a lot longer - to get to this stage.

As an author or songwriter, we should not just expect to sit down and be connected with our 'now moment inspiration flow' unless we have been exercising it! Object writing is the writers' set of bar bells to get us in the zone, and keep us primed for when one of those muse moments comes along.After recently doing some songwriting classes with Berklee music professor Pat Pattison I have become a great fan of object writing.

Writing a book may seem like an overwhelming task but it can be quite easy once you take the pressure off of yourself. This book does not have to be written a day or a week. There is no pressure other than what you put on yourself. And there is no sense of failure other than what you allow. Let me explain.

Life is full of choices. You can choose to write a book in a day thereby frying your nerves to a frazzle or you can set a more reasonable time period.

The crazy world of publishing can be a scary and confusing place for a new book writer, and it can be nice to get a little bit of guidance on how to navigate around things like writer guidelines, publishing houses,literary agents, and such. While most first time book writers think the hard work was done once they typed the end at the bottom of the last page, it turns out that there is still a whole lot left to do.

Peter Rabbit was a figment of the imagination of the very creative Beatrix Potter. The author was born in 1866 in Victorian Kensington London. Her home was large and sumptuous, her family rich. She was raised with several servants, a shy girl who wiled away many hours of every day by herself.

Beatrix Potter learned many artistic things from her governess.

You may well think that the choice of approaching an agent or publisher is academic before you have even finished your book but nothing is further from the truth. This short article discusses the pros and cons of agents and publishers - and which one you should go for.

A decision that many writers put off for as long as possible seems to be the one where they decide if they want to get an agent or go directly to a publisher.

Have you ever wondered, as you sit at your keyboard, if there are any secrets to successful novel writing? Well there are - and here are five of them. Remember these secrets and your novel writing will improve overnight!

To call the points below 'secrets' is perhaps to invest them with too great an air of mystery, yet it seems that so many words of advice are looked on as 'secrets' nowadays that I thought 'what the heck? Go with the flow - call them secrets.

The story book We Are All in the Dumps by Maurice Sendak illustrates a visual portrayal of two guys, Jack and Guy, who encounter several challenges and end up rescuing a rather poor little boy. The story itself makes you think about several issues and symbolisms.

First, the theme of "life is unfair" comes out strikingly when you see that Jack and Guy almost pounce the little boy with the black eye on the head.

Common wisdom dictates that if a grammatical "mistake" becomes common enough, it is no longer a mistake. The rules of grammar supposedly adapt to real-world usage. Real-world usage aside, the pervasive use of "me and so-and-so" in our culture drives me nuts!

It used to be, "George and I went to the store." Back in the old days of 30 or so years ago, if someone said, "Me and George went to the store," the listener would quietly come to the conclusion that the speaker was a bit slow.

Peter Rabbit was a figment of the imagination of the very creative Beatrix Potter. The author was born in 1866 in Victorian Kensington London. Her home was large and sumptuous, her family rich. She was raised with several servants, a shy girl who wiled away many hours of every day by herself.

Beatrix Potter learned many artistic things from her governess.