Author Diary Entries

Have you ever wondered how to get past the OTHER kind of messy middle, with the actual process of writing your book? That’s exactly what’s happening on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly! This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of writing and self-publishing books.    TUNE IN NO...

Have you ever wondered which book in the Polyamorous Passions series you should start reading first... or how to decide which book in ANY romance series you should start reading first? That’s exactly what’s happening on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly! This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-th...

Have you ever wondered where to begin with writing a non-fiction book? Well, that’s exactly what we’re discussing on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly!   This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of writing and self-publishing books.    TUNE IN to get 5 tips for what you need to...

Have you ever wished you could get all the writing and reading tips you need and inside scoop you want in one place? Well, that’s exactly what’s happening on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly, as a special celebration of our 100th episode!  This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journ...

Are you curious about how much this author spent on book marketing, and how much I made on book sales over the course of an entire year? Well, that’s exactly what we are going to discuss on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly!  This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of writing a...

Have you ever wondered how to write—with confidence!—in a genre that might have some stigma around it? Well, that’s exactly what we are going to discuss on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly!   This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of writing and self-publishing books.   Today...

Have you ever wondered how to stay motivated when you write a story, especially when you’re participation in a competition and need to stick to a deadline? Well, that’s exactly what we are going to discuss on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly!    This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes...

Have you ever wondered about what goes into setting up the business side of being an author? Well, that’s exactly what we are going to discuss on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly!   This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of writing and self-publishing books.   Now let’s get i...

Have you ever thought that it would be cool to write a book, but it feels presumptuous or weird or self-indulgent to do that? Well, that’s exactly what we are going to discuss on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly. This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of writing and self-publ...

Are you curious about the different ways you might grow as a writer, and what might change along your writing journey as you publish more books? Well, that’s exactly what we are going to discuss on today’s episode of Indie Author Weekly.   This is the podcast for indie authors, aspiring authors, and curious bookworms who want the inside scoop, tips and motivation, and behind-the-scenes journey of...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly is a little different than usual… it features a little writing meditation. This is an episode you can return to again and again in the future, whenever you need to hear it. This writing meditation is designed to help you get into the right headspace for working on your writing projects, to overcome any overwhelm or writer’s block or demons that are holding you b...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly shares Sagan's author plans and writing projects for 2021, PLUS what you need to think about when you're planning ahead with your own writing projects for the upcoming year!  In our previous episode of Indie Author Weekly, Episode 91, I shared about how my writing plans changed over the course of 2020… so I thought you might be interested in hearing ab...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly shares how my author and writing plans changed this past year, PLUS how to handle things when YOUR writing plans change...  After all, we’re heading into a brand new year in just a couple weeks! This is a good time for reflection and assessment of the previous year, and for planning ahead into the upcoming year.  Back in Episode 41 of this Indie Author Weekly po...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly addresses how to find your voice or style as a storyteller and writer.   Finding your voice as a storyteller is something that will take time. The best way to discover it and to cultivate it is to continue writing and telling stories on an ongoing (and, ideally consistent) basis, and to review your work as time passes.   These tips will help you out:   Keep writ...

In this episode of Indie Author Weekly, let's talk about beta readers. In fact, I am officially putting the call out to invite YOU to become a beta reader for my upcoming romcom, Small Town Stilettos !  Here’s a teaser about the book:  Big city fashion designer Margaret "Peggy" Malcolm never dreamed that she'd be stuck back in her tiny hometown. But when her aunt dies, Peggy ne...

In this episode of Indie Author Weekly, I want to share about my process for how I have chosen cover images and design for my books in the past. I’ll be doing an illustrated cover for my next romcom, which I’m pretty excited about, so that got me thinking about cover images and design in general.  This is not something that comes naturally to me. I’m a writer, not a designer! I outsourced my desig...

In this episode of Indie Author Weekly, I want to share about my recent experience with writing a short story… and why I’ll be doing that on a monthly basis from now on.  I actually had plans to publish my next romcom, Small Town Stilettos , within the next few weeks. But about a month ago, I realized that I was putting unnecessary pressure on myself to hurry up and edit that book and then publish...

In this episode of Indie Author Weekly, I want to provide you with some reassurance, if you feel like everyone else is writing a book, and you aren’t.  We are currently in November, and every November is National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo. It’s that time of year when people from all across the globe come together virtually to each write a 50,000 word novel in the space of just 30 days. It’...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly shares the vital importance of “thinking” time as part of the book writing process.   What do I mean when I say “thinking” time?   Basically, that’s any time you’re thinking about your book but not actively writing it. For me, this often happens when I’m out walking or kayaking, or lying awake at night unable to sleep, or just daydreaming at random. Many people...

Do you have a fear of success? What about a fear of failure? Is fear in general holding you back from writing your book? We address all of that and more in this episode of the Indie Author Weekly podcast!  Today, we're responding to a listener comment about the fear of success... " When it comes to getting my writing out there, I’m more scared of success than failure."   If that&apo...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly shares a few tips for what you can do to fit writing a book into your busy schedule. I have a step-by-step guide, a 5-step process, for how to do just that. As a productivity strategist, I teach business owners all the time about how to improve time management and productivity… so let’s apply that to your author life.   First of all, there are 2 key things you n...

This episode of Indie Author Weekly shares the TRUTH about creativity that every writer needs to hear... are you ready for this?  Consider this your book writing pep talk of the week! Tune into this episode to hear it now...  Resources & links mentioned in this episode:   Learn more about all of Sagan's books at SaganMorrow.com/books . Tune into Indie Author Weekly on your favourite podca...

Welcome back to Indie Author Weekly, where I share my behind-the-scenes journey of writing and self-publishing books.  If you’re new to this podcast, I am a productivity strategist for multi-passionate creatives at SaganMorrow.com : I help people manage their time and energy effectively, through customized, actionable strategies that work for your unique life and business. When I’m not teaching ab...

Today's episode of Indie Author Weekly shares 5 possible reasons for why you’re struggling with writing… plus how to fix each of those problems! As we go through these, we’ll see that many of them interconnect together, so you might find that a few of these resonate with you...   TUNE IN to this episode to find out how to solve the problems and reasons for why you're struggling to write...

Today's episode of Indie Author Weekly shares 3 tips, plus a list of ideas and writing prompts, for how to start writing your novel. After all, sometimes one of the hardest things about writing your novel is actually starting it! After you write “Chapter 1”... what comes next?  I encourage you to do 3 things when you’re writing the first scene in the first chapter of your book… TUNE IN to thi...