Writing Archives | Page 2 of 18

4 tricks for finding time to write with a full-time job

August 6, 2018 by Maria

Finding time to write with a full-time job can be hard, but a literary agent shares the four best ways to find time to write, no matter how busy you are!

Last week, we spent a few nights at a tiny cabin near the Blue Ridge Mountains. The first thing we saw each morning was a peaceful forest with rain-soaked leaves.

We’d roll out of bed whenever we felt like it—there was no alarm clock blaring in our faces—and make ourselves coffee. Then we’d fire up our laptops. But instead of jumping into work emails, we did something we wish we could do every day. We just started writing.

We wrote each morning for a few hours straight, without the distraction of Twitter, Facebook, or Gmail—because, gloriously—there was no Wifi at the cabin.

We spent each of those three mornings living our best writer’s life, waking up with nothing to do but write or edit. I finally finished a few book proposals I’d been working on, and Jarrett made great headway on a white paper. And most importantly, we felt like we wrote better in our little cabin in the woods. Heck, give us a few weeks like that, and we’d make it rain Pulitzers (ha!).

So today I’m letting Jarrett take the spotlight and talk a little bit about what we learned at our beautiful little Getaway House. (Pepper finally learned how to look at the camera. Big stuff for her.)

Here’s Jarrett:

Back #IRL, Maria and I struggle with finding time to write with a full-time job. Even though our full-time jobs require writing, we still find ourselves sucked up in day-to-day to-dos (like responding to work emails, ugh) that prevent us from actually doing the writing part of our jobs.

So how can we fight back against all the forces in our life—stressful full-time jobs, social media, addictive TV shows—that constantly conspire to deprive us of writing time? Maria and I have come up with a few ideas over the years that have helped us with finding time to write with a full-time job, even during the busiest seasons of our lives.

Duke’s mayonnaise history: the surprising story of Eugenia Duke

June 12, 2018 by Maria

While the taste of Duke’s mayonnaise has become well-known, many people probably don’t know Duke’s Mayonnaise history and the story of Eugenia Duke…

Today I want to tell you guys a story about someone I admire. It’s also a story about mayonnaise. The best mayonnaise on the planet, in fact.

A few years ago, Jarrett and I became obsessed with Duke’s Mayonnaise. And because we (apparently?) have nothing better to do, we decided we wanted to test our marriage by co-writing an article about Duke’s for NPR’s The Salt. (Because the wedding cookbook wasn’t lunatic enough.)

As we dove into learning more about Duke’s, we immediately realized something exciting: Eugenia Duke was a total badass.

Photo credit: The C.F. Sauer Company.

She started a sandwich business from her kitchen in 1917, before she even had the right to vote. By 1923, she was a manufacturing tycoon and had opened one of the first factories in Greenville, SC. She wore big hats and a string of pearls no matter what the occasion, and personally, I would kill for that kind of swag.

But here’s the big lesson I learned from Eugenia Duke’s life:

If you love something enough, nothing can stop you. The work will become its own daily reward.

So remember that next time you’re sitting down to write or brainstorm or do that hard project. Make it for you, and make it the best you can.

(And if it’s mayo you’re making, send to P.O. Box My Stomach, Alexandria, VA.)

Worth The Whisk: How The Woman Behind Duke’s Mayo Became A Tycoon

This article originally appeared on NPR’s The Salt.

Peek into the walk-in refrigerators of the most lauded restaurants in the country, and you will likely find just one store-bought ingredient: Duke’s Mayonnaise. But what most people don’t know is that the company was founded by a Southern woman at a time when many women like her didn’t run businesses.

“We make everything from scratch at Rhubarb,” says John Fleer, a five-time finalist for a James Beard Award and the chef and owner of the farm-to-table restaurant Rhubarb in Asheville, N.C. “Duke’s is one of the few packaged items we use, but we use the heck out of it,” he says. And he’s pretty serious about his affection for the condiment. “I don’t associate with chefs that don’t use it. Or else, I enlighten them,” he adds with a smile.

Fleer and many other professional chefs are not ashamed to admit that their own fresh-whisked mayonnaise can’t compete with the magic found in a bottle of Duke’s. As the cult of Duke’s has racked up converts, and begun to expand beyond its original territory in America’s Deep South, even the yellow-capped jars themselves have become treasured collector’s items, serving as wedding centerpieces and cremation urns.

Unlike most other mass-produced mayonnaise, Duke’s contains no sugar. This gives it the signature tang that has kept both chefs and home cooks raving about it since the company was founded over 100 years ago. “When they teach you how to make mayonnaise in culinary school, they are essentially teaching you how to make Duke’s,” says Fleer. “It has the right balance of richness and acidity.”

But while the taste of Duke’s mayonnaise has become well-known, many people probably don’t know the story of how it was created…

Click here to keep reading this article on The Salt!

5 quick reads for the week

I am in deep on this trend.
Why you shouldn’t make something that’s for everyone.
Don’t just choose the words on the page–choose the words in your mind.
A treasure trove: 23 magazines and websites that want your work!
This is not a panda video.

What we’re eating this week

I’m home; I’m cookin’; I’m still obsessed with my Instant Pot. Or as Jarrett calls it, the InstaPot. (Am I allowed to bean my husband with an appliance if he’s mispronouncing its name just to get a rise out of me? What would Eugenia Duke do?)

Monday: Pork tenderloin in the Instant Pot with an extra trendy cauliflower mash and green beans. (Real talk: pork tenderloin might be the least interesting meat on the planet. I am reminded of this every time I stupidly, stupidly buy it. NEVER AGAIN, I say for the fortieth time.)

Tuesday: French onion soup, because what I need after a long day of work is to spend 45 hours caramelizing onions while my stomach growls and everyone hangry-snaps at each other, right?

Wednesday: My meal plan says, “Chicken Curry, rice, broc” but my heart says sweet, sweet, buttery spaghetti. Heart, you so bad.

Thursday: Nothing at all because I’m OOO for a surgery and am 1,000% committed to doing nothing aka being SO BORED and demanding homemade chicken soup even though it is 1,000,000 degrees and I am too opinionated about chicken soup to appreciate anyone else’s recipe. I am a dream patient.

Friday: Uh…Duke’s Mayo? Yeah. Let’s do that.

Cheers!

These are the 3 things you need to become a writer

May 29, 2018 by Maria

The 3 things you need to become a writer: a literary agent on the 3 habits that can help anyone become a writer and successfully publish a book.

I love a good origin story. A few weeks ago I got to hear three of them at a book signing at Rizzoli, and it still (still!) surprised me how similar they were.

Basically, here’s how to become a writer:

Be passionate about X subject.
Try a whole bunch of different thing to turn that passion into a job.
Find the thing that works for you, put in your 10,000 hours, and get really good at it.
Get invited to do fun things—write a book, go on TV, appear in big magazines, go on tour.
Do it all over again, forever.

As a literary agent, I get to hop on the ride around step 3 and help make step 4 and 5 go smoothly and enjoyably. But steps 1 through 3 are the most important ones to become a writer. Those are the ones where no one can help you—no agent, no editor, no powerful connection—can wave the creative wand and make you successful.

But in the nearly 10 years I’ve worked in publishing, I’ve seen that there are 3 habits that are essential if you want to become a writer. And 9 times out of 10, successful authors have all used the same exact tool to build those 3 habits.

Here are the 3 things you need to become a writer:

These are the 34 best hashtags for writers

May 15, 2018 by Maria

The best hashtags for writers: these are the 34 best hashtags for writers and authors on Instagram and Twitter!

One of my best friends has an amazing pottery business, and she was telling me the other day how she wants to start making more money from her side hustle. We got to talking about Instagram and how we are both trying to take less crappy pictures. (As you can see here, I am having middling success. It’s very meh.)

Anyway, my friend was saying how it was hard for people to find her, and she didn’t find that commenting on other people’s pottery pieces was helping that much.

“What hashtags have you been using?”

“Um, I guess I haven’t.”

Bingo.

As soon as she did some research about the best hashtags for the pottery community, she started doubling and even tripling how many likes and comments she was getting on her posts. The same is true for any niche–once you know the best hashtags for writers, a whole world of potential new friends opens up.

The best hashtags for writers: why do they matter?

Hashtags are the connecting links between you and the other people who also care about things like #pottery or #bookstagram. Without them, your post is floating in space, undiscoverable by anyone. With them, your post is tacked onto a giant bulletin board filled with other similar posts, discoverable by everyone who loves that thing, too.

Nearly all of my authors—who are savvy, successful business owners and bloggers—rely on the power of hashtags to build their Instagram followings.

So if you’re also looking to find like-minded people on Instagram and tap into the community of writers and readers on Instagram (and maybe even sell some books?), here are the best hashtags for writers.

Category: Writing