Lily Iona MacKenzie's Blog

As a young woman in the 50s growing up in Canada, I was intrigued by hockey and football. Baseball didn’t exist for me then. It hadn’t entered Canadian consciousness, and it would take some years before it did. I didn’t feel deprived. Hockey and football had much to offer at that time, including handsome, vigorous …

Continue reading What does baseball have to do with writing?

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Jane Friedman, a publishing industry expert upon whom I rely for trustworthy information recently updated her very helpful guide to hybrid publishing. For anyone considering this publishing route, be sure to read this guide carefully as she outlines many of the warning signs when you consider signing with a hybrid publisher. I also recommend this …

Continue reading Guest Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop reveals the pitfalls of Hybrid Publishing

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Since 2015, I’ve published four novels, one memoir, and two poetry collections. I tell you this, dear readers and writers, because for the past couple of weeks, I’ve been blasted by emails that are clearly AI generated. Individuals (or maybe robots) want to sell me their marketing services. Some offer access to major nationwide book …

Continue reading AI is scamming writers!

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Writing has become such a part of my day that if I don’t get to it, I’m constantly distracted, as if I have a lover I’m thinking about. It’s like a siren’s call, pulling me away. My husband notices it. He comments on me seeming drifty. He’s right. I’m not fully there. As happened tonight. …

Continue reading Writing into life!

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I’m thinking today of timing—how important it is to success.  Timing and perseverance:  the two go together.  I’m also noticing the seasonal aspect of creativity, how cyclic it is.  That too is hard to grasp.  I want it all the time.  I’m afraid if it isn’t there, it won’t return.  But I need to remember …

Continue reading Timing and the creative process

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Thanks to Suzanne Sherman for sharing this post on memoir writing: There were many standout messages in a webinar I attended this week by bestselling author Janet Fitch, hosted by Memoir Nation (www.memoirnation.com/about-memoir-nation).  This is one of my favorites. Fitch spoke about stimulating memory to recreate time and place. How to do that? A clue: …

Continue reading Method Writing: Stimulating Memory Is a Gateway

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The AI Generated Questions and my answers… As I wrote in a recent post, I was approached by a media company in the UK asking for an interview. This was the first of what has become a flood of AI generated emails from all over the web enticing writers to participate in what we’ve come …

Continue reading Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop shares her writing journey via AI

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Years ago, when I was first foraying into finding an agent, I was involved for several months with a small Canadian literary agency with one principal, a former practicing contract attorney (I’ll call her Virginia, though that isn’t her real name), and her associate Sandra, a woman who claimed to have years of experience in …

Continue reading A literary agent unveiled!

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When I sit in my classroom, I ask students to join me in putting their thoughts on the page. This is old stuff to me. I do it constantly, dribbling out lines that seem to come magically from the pen. They form themselves on the page into what we call sentences, made up of words, …

Continue reading On teaching writing

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It occurred to me today, during a tine when many people are taking vacations, that preparing for a trip—all the many months of planning and making reservations and thinking that the departure day will never arrive—resembles what happens when our death day arrives. Okay, I realize this may sound gloomy and will probably chase away …

Continue reading How is death like a vacation?

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