The Author Training Manual

I am a huge fan of Alexis Grant since her Travelling Writer days, so when she launched The Write Life I subscribed immediately. 

The other day an article was posted on The Write Life which I found very useful, titled 5 Reasons You’re Not Ready to Self-Publish Your Book. I have been following the talk on self-publishing all over the internet, and this thought kept running through my mind – is it really as simple to self-publish as it was made out to be? And even if one could self-publish, surely achieving success in it would be difficult without some hard work. There must be some downsides to it, I thought. 

My questions were answered in this blog post. 

The post offered a prize of The Author Training Manual by Nina Amir to one commenter chosen at random. Now usually non-US folks are barred from such contests as the prize is mostly a print book which is mailed. To my pleasant surprise, however, it was mentioned here that an e-book would be sent to non-US winners. 

I dropped a comment anyway because I loved the post. A few days later, I got the great news from Heather at The Write Life that I had won the prize!

I am a quarter of the way through the book and it is chock full of advice that speaks to me. Among the many nuggets of wisdom, Nina Amir states one point that I think I need to work on – the Author Attitude. 

The Author Attitude encompasses a range of attributes that a writer must possess in order to get published – the willingness to learn continuously and put yourself out there, the tenacity to persist despite failures and obstacles, and to top it all, a sunny optimism to weather the storm. 

Read more about this in a detailed post by Nina Amir on Writer Unboxed. 

I am off to finish reading my prize!