by Laurie Schnebly Campbell

There’s nothing kids love more than knowing their birthday is coming up soon:

• People will sing Happy Birthday just for them!
• They’re gonna have CANDLES on their cake!!
• They’ll be the star of the whole day!!!

We all know that feeling of looking forward to a Big Day. Even after we’ve outgrown the thrill of counting candles on our cake, we still feel it before some special event... like, say, a writing conference:

• I’ll be able to chat with fellow writers!
• I’ll meet other creative people and discuss what we do!!
• I’ll get all kinds of free stuff!!!

Regardless of our age or event, anticipation is something EVERYONE loves. It makes our blood sparkle. We actively enjoy picturing some experience we know will be a treat, contemplating the pleasure ahead while sitting at a stoplight, doing a mundane chore, or anything else that can be brightened with a bit of excitement.

What gives YOU that feeling of anticipation?

You might have quite a few things, but it’s likely that one you especially enjoy is (drum roll) opening the cover of a long-awaited new book.

How will it start? Who’ll appear on the first page? What will they be doing, or thinking about, or talking about?

Will the story surprise you? Will it be what you’ve come to expect from this author? Will it make you feel challenged? Dreamy? Thrilled? Thoughtful? Scared? Entertained?

You’re probably going there in with some idea of what to expect, just from the book cover or title or author. But even so, no matter whose story you’re picking up, two crucial things determine how your expectations will be rewarded:

1. Boffo Beginnings

Ideally, the first 25 words will show whether your feeling of anticipation was justified. Maybe you’re instantly grabbed and engaged.

Maybe you’re not 100% consumed by those words, but you’re interested enough to keep reading the next 25. The next 100. The next 500. That’s a slower payoff, but it still leaves you aware that “yep, I want to know more!”

What openings have left you feeling that way?

For me, one that jumped out was from Ken Follett’s The Key to Rebecca: “The last camel collapsed at noon.” Huh? What? What’s this ABOUT?!

A friend’s recommendation of how Martha Wells opened All Systems Red turned me into a Murderbot series fan:

“I could have become a mass murderer after I hacked my governor module, but then I realized I could access the combined feed of entertainment channels carried on the company satellites. It had been well over 35,000 hours or so since then, with still not much murdering, but probably, I don’t know, a little under 35,000 hours of movies, serials, books, plays, and music consumed. As a heartless killing machine, I was a terrible failure.” Okay, I’m hooked—I’ve gotta read more!

(And you’re already thinking of openings that have done that for YOU, right?)

But you also know that the closing is every bit as important as the opening. Which takes us into the next crucial element:

2. Fab Finales

The thing about great beginnings and/or great closings: neither one is especially useful without the other. As it happens, both those books whose openings I loved ALSO delivered highly satisfying conclusions.

But sometimes, readers can get so moved or exhilarated or heartbroken or renewed by the closing of a book that—even if they couldn’t quote you the opening line—they’re definitely gonna order this author’s next title as soon as it comes out.

Remember these exceptional closings?

• “Yes,” I said. “Isn’t it pretty to think so?”
• Reader, I married him.
• “And, oh, Aunt Em! I’m so glad to be at home again!”
• So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
• He loved Big Brother.
• “After all, tomorrow is another day.”

I probably don’t even have to identify those books (although I should give the authors credit, so thanks to Ernest Hemingway for The Sun Also Rises, Charlotte Bronte for Jane Eyre, L. Frank Baum for The Wizard of Oz, F. Scott Fitzgerald for The Great Gatsby, George Orwell for 1984 and Margaret Mitchell for Gone With the Wind).

But did you notice how all these stories could be considered classics? Endings that resonate like the ones above tend to keep a book front-of-mind when recommending Great Reads, and everyone loves telling friends about their fabulous discovery.

So for writers, the trick is to have both a boffo beginning AND a fab finale, which involves quite a few techniques. Just as no two expert painters would give the exact same advice on how they create their best art, the same is true for book openings and closings...but feedback on options is always useful!

And speaking of options, you can choose whether to send in a comment for this:

Prize-Drawing Question
What’s a book you’ve loved because of (at least in part) its opening, closing or both?

Someone who answers will win free registration to Boffo Beginnings & Fab Finales, my November 3-14 email class on that very thing. This weekend I’ll have random-org draw a name and post it at the end of the comments, so check back Sunday when you'll still have a week to alert me "yes, I'll take it" at the email on my website below.

About Laurie:

After winning Romantic Times’ “Best Special Edition of the Year” over Nora Roberts, Laurie Schnebly Campbell discovered she loved teaching every bit as much as writing... if not more. Since then she’s taught in-person and online workshops including the upcoming Boffo Beginnings & Fab Finales, and keeps a special section of her bookshelves for people who’ve developed that particular novel in her classes. With 50+ titles there so far, she’s always hoping for more.

How to find balance as a writer in the real world. 

Hello there! My name is Kristin Helling.

I am an author. I’m also a mom, and I own two small businesses: an indie publishing imprint called Wordwraith Books, and a coffeehouse in the KC metro called Parkville Coffee. 

I get asked often how I am able to balance all the things. Whenever I am faced with this question, my reaction is always the same: Flattery that others think I look put together and “on it” (haha).

I am a full-time author who also has a full-time day job. By choice. For me, it was ideal to find a day job that would allow me the opportunity, time, mindspace, and creativity to publish novels. This is not everyone’s dream, and that’s okay!

I knew that I never wanted to depend on my art to put food on the table for my family. But I needed to find a career that would balance well with my publishing side. Plans and dreams are also fluid, so I know that this may not always be my goal (honestly sometimes the idea of being ‘girl moss’ in a forest far away from everyone is more appealing than the ‘girl boss’ lifestyle I live and breathe, ha!).

Some say, “You can’t have it all” and to that, I say “I’m going to try anyway”. Finding balance means some things take a backseat while I focus on what is in front of me. And sometimes that also means parts of my life aren’t even in the backseat, but all the way in the trunk! 

Combining Worlds and Interests

I also think, what balances better with books… than coffee? 

One thing that has helped me greatly, is melding my two worlds together. Back in 2018, I had my books in two different local bookstores that closed down. It was becoming harder and harder to find physical locations to house my books (Not such the case anymore! So many amazing local bookstores have opened in the last two years!). So I decided to open a small local author book nook inside my coffeehouse where local authors could sell their books on consignment.

Being an author myself, my goal was to achieve this at a low consignment rate of 20%, since I understand both sides of the wall. Now, many years later, this concept has blown up! I have more than 220 titles on the shelves. We host book launch parties, readings, signings, and a “Summer Reading Series” on the 3rd Saturday of each month running from April-August, with some sort of Book Festival in the Fall. This year, in lieu of putting together a book festival, I chose to build and open to the public a Little Free Library in the front of the shop. It’s designed to look like a mini Parkville Coffee. It houses both adult and children’s books. 

Seeing the community use the Little Free Library as well as support local authors by purchasing their books inside and coming to events, brings me so much joy. It also keeps me networking and connecting with the local author community, which is more vibrant and buzzing with opportunity than ever in the Kansas City metro. Just to be even a teeny tiny part of that feels like such an honor. 

Adding Another Connection

And then I had to go ahead and take the ‘melding of my two worlds’ just a bit further this past year, by switching lanes in the genre I write (thrillers), over to the cozy mystery genre (coffee themed, of course). I fought the urge for years, because writing a cozy mystery had seemed a bit too close to home for me. However, the stories were piling up in my mind, and yearning to get out.

So here we are, three books into the series, and I am loving it. The coffee puns just came naturally, and the job itself is truly never boring. Of course everything in this series is fictional and not a secret diary of the life of a coffeeshop owner in a small town (I promise, wink wink), but there is no shortage of inspiration in my daily life. If someone reading these books thinks something sounds oddly familiar… well once we’ve created the art and published the book, the work is no longer our own. It now belongs to the readers to interpret it however they’d like, right?  

Words of Advice and Encouragement

I have been publishing since 2014, and have owned my coffeehouse since 2017. Both of my careers are labors of love, meaning that I have to really love what I’m doing to continue making it work for me. I do like making money. But if I was in it for the financial gain alone, there are much easier ways to make money, ha! Over the years, I have learned so many things owning my own businesses. Apart from finding balance, if I had to choose two more words of advice to give someone who’s considering opening their own business (and I’ll always encourage it), it would be these:

Prioritize and Pivot.  

Apart from my love for alliteration, these two words have played a very important role in my daily life.

1. Prioritize: The to-do list has a to-do list. The tasks lead to a revolving door of more tasks needing to get done. Prioritize the most important things to you, and get those crossed off first. The rest can wait. It’s that ‘taking the back seat’ car analogy again. 

2. Pivot: Challenges will be inevitable. If something is not working, change course. Try something else. When a global pandemic ravaged the world, I had to close my cafe and send all of my employees home. But during that time, I did not stop the hustle. I loaded up my van with coffee and porch dropped beans to the surrounding neighborhoods. I built a door insert into a traditional Italian coffee pick-up window for customers to walk up to and order. I applied for government assistance to bring my employees back. The community surrounded us and lifted us up. And we supported them. 

Productivity Challenge

If you are reading this and thinking, “Well I don’t have time for any of that!” I believe that productivity is different for everyone. I have a really cool time management trick that I even have to re-do from time to time. Make a chart and label it for each hour of the day:

• Noon
• 1pm
• 2pm
• 3pm

And so on. Then, fill out what you did during each of those hours for 24 hours (A lot of those hours will hopefully say catching zzz’s). Keep tracking on this journal/productivity chart every day for one week. After doing this, you will be amazed. You will learn patterns, like what hours of the day you are most productive. But more importantly, you will also visually see pockets of time open up, and how much more time you actually have in a day than you thought you had. 

Final Thoughts

All of these are just small examples. Everyone’s definition and experience with success is different. Mine is forever changing and developing. Knowing your ‘why’ should be at the root of every decision made in both writing and business. I like to be able to keep two businesses afloat, while also making decisions for them that allow me to feel good when I lay my head on my pillow at the end of the day.

And if you’re wondering if I have any free time to do anything that’s not work, the answer is yes! I will always have time for bowls of ice cream and watching the Great British Baking Show while cuddling with my toddler. Hands down. 

Have you extended your writing world into other areas of your life?

About Kristin:

A lifelong booklover, Kristin grew up with a passion for storytelling and the idea that even the coziest places can hold the deepest mysteries. When she’s not killing people (fictionally, of course!), she owns a coffeehouse/roastery/bakery, co-owns her publishing company Wordwraith Books, is married to a photographer, and is Mama of two.

Her writing reflects her love of community, mystery, and the delicate balance of warmth and danger. Whether you prefer a comforting whodunit by the fire or a thriller that keeps you up all night, Kristin has a story to share.

You can check out her books and reach her here: www.kristinhelling.com or on facebook or instagram (@kristinhellingauthor).If you’re a fellow local KC author interested in the going-ons of the book nook at the coffeeshop, check us out here: www.parkvillecoffee.com

Images courtesy of Parkville Coffee.

by Ellen Buikema

Have you ever put off starting a project because you didn’t feel inspired and were waiting for inspiration to hit? If you plan to make a living from your art, waiting for your muse is probably not a good strategy.

Many successful artists have discovered that waiting for inspiration can be a waste of time. They don’t depend upon how inspired they feel to create. Sometimes, they produce work to feel more inspired. 

Painter Henri Matisse - “Don’t wait for inspiration. It comes while one is working.”

Writer Susan Sontag - “Do stuff. Be clenched, curious. Not waiting for inspiration’s shove or society’s kiss on your forehead.”

Painter Pablo Picasso - “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.”

Inspiration typically strikes when you least expect it—often while in the middle of working on something else.

Try using a schedule.

Schedules may sound like they’d restrict your creativity, but they can help it along. Some of the greats have stuck to schedules to help create fantastic work.

Maya Angelou rented a local hotel room, just for writing. She never slept there. Arriving early at 6:30 AM, she wrote until 2 PM and then went back home to edit, returning the following day to write more.

Prolific writer Haruki Murakami wakes up at 4 AM, writes for five hours, and then heads out for a run.

Schedules are good, but they don’t work for everyone. Inspiration cannot be forced. It would be lovely if divine inspiration would occur each afternoon at two sharp—blam, but so far that hasn’t happened. The muse likes to slip in seeds of ideas while you’re busy making other plans, or when the brain is “idle.”

Inspiration springs internally from:

• Life experience
• Personal values
• Self-reflection

Externally from:

• Other people
• Animals in the wild as well as pets
• Current events
• Nature
• Books, articles, movies, podcasts, blogs

Inspiration is all around us. Kris Maze has written a great blog on this topic.

How many ideas have flashed in your mind this week? A random thought while making breakfast, conversations overheard, a random meme that popped up via social media? Instead of letting these ideas slip by, grab them, and make them into something you can use. Keep a notepad of some sort nearby to get the ideas down before they fade away.

Do you think of yourself as a creative person?

If asked about your creative routine your answer might be:

“My best ideas arrive when I’m having a nice soak in the tub.”

“Ideas come out of nowhere! It just happens.”

“Some of my best ideas come to me in dreams.”

Is that all there is to it?

Problems with waiting for inspiration to strike.

Are you really procrastinating?

If waiting for inspiration is in truth procrastinating in disguise that’s a different issue entirely.

This may be fear.

• What if I’m not good enough?
• I don’t want to feel rejected.

Problems may come in the forms of limiting beliefs, self-esteem issues, ridiculously high standards you’ve imposed on yourself . . .

If you spend a lot of time waiting for an inspired spark, there may be deeper issues.

Self-sabotaging success.

If writing is a hobby, that’s great.

But what if you want writing to be your career? You have goals to achieve. There’s little time to waste while waiting for inspiration to strike.

If you’re not writing you can’t improve.

Practice doesn’t necessarily lead to perfection. However, inspired or not, if you don’t practice your art, you deny yourself the opportunity to improve.

When you practice regularly, you can look back and see how far you’ve come. Every writer I’ve encountered has commented about their early work and how much better a job they’d do on it at their current level. Every one of them.

Creative work requires practice. Make time for it. Try training your creativity like you train muscles.

What to do while waiting for inspiration.

Identify blockers.

Consider the following questions:

• Does your work need to be perfect?
• Are you afraid to fail? Afraid of success?
• Do you feel capable of doing what you’re trying to do?
• Are you tying your self-worth to your project?

Identifying what’s blocking you will free your creativity.

Set goals.

Not having a clear plan of action may result in procrastination. Get ahead of this by setting specific goals for how you’ll get there—the final outcome, not just what you’re going to create.

Set goals related to your process, like, “I’ll work on my story for at least an hour every day for a month,” or, “I’ll write two chapters every week for a month.” Not everything you write will be usable, but you’ll have a good start to your story.

Create more than you’ll need.

Keep in mind that not everything you write will be best-selling work. Some will not be stellar. No worries. Store those tales away for the future. You may find that you’ve created uncut diamonds that need to be faceted and polished into beautiful story gems.

Develop a working habit.

Having a routine can help the creative process. There is no one right way to develop a routine as it is a very personal thing.

Decide what works best for you. Some people prefer to work at their favorite pub. Others prefer a quiet room. You might find that writing at certain times of the day or night work best. Pay attention to what makes you feel most creative and use it. Maybe you work best with dimmed lights and light jazz playing in the background.

Try taking a walk, recording your thoughts on a cellphone app.

The key is to know when and where you’re most creative, then turning these triggers into a routine.

Stick to it. Experiment.

Life gets in the way, as it will always do, and mess up your routine. You may not feel like writing because there are so many other distractions that are more appealing. Look! There’s another squirrel!

Your creative time is sacred. Stick to it. Put a sign on the door, or on the back of your chair that says, “Writing time” or “Muse on board.”

If nothing is coming, experiment. Try spontaneous free association writing and see what you come up with.

David Bowie used to cut up magazines, rearrange words and phrases to create different meanings, and use them in his song writing now and then.

If you’re stuck do something related, like:

• Reading a story in your genre
• Drawing one of your characters
• Have an imaginary conversation with your characters

Stay in a creative mindset. You may be inspired to write!

Give yourself some down time.

Don’t expected yourself to create all the time. You need time to energize.

• Spend time with a friend
• Relax with a good book
• Play or listen to some music
• Watch a movie
• Eat
• Drink
• Be merry

Balance in all things is important for creativity.

How do you stick to a creative routine? Do you wait for inspiration to strike?

* * * * * *

About Ellen

Author, speaker, and former teacher, Ellen L. Buikema has written non-fiction for parents, and The Adventures of Charlie Chameleon chapter book series with stories encouraging the development of empathy—sprinkling humor wherever possible. Her Works in Progress are The Hobo Code, YA historical fiction and The Crystal Key, MG Magical Realism/ Sci-Fi, a glaze of time travel.

Find her at https://ellenbuikema.com or on Amazon.

Top Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay