The Deliberate Pen

A decade of writing. Fifteen books. A press and a bookshop. This is the Season One finale of The Deliberate Pen, and the most personal episode of the season. From a student who scraped C's and D's in English to fifteen published books, this episode traces what a decade at the desk actually does to a person. The English class assignment that sparked everything. A freshman year spent writing...

Your library is a reflection of your literary ambition. In this episode we explore why every serious writer needs a personal library; and why most writers are building theirs wrong. We open with a foundational truth: nothing a writer creates is truly original. Every voice is shaped by what its owner has read. The question is not whether you will be influenced, but whether that influence is deliber...

Most writers spend more time building the perfect toolkit than actually writing with it. In this episode I trace the full evolution of my writing system: from digital novel planning software like Plottr and Story Planner, through the messy experimental middle period, to the analog toolkit I use today across fifteen published books. Covered in this episode: why sophisticated software became a form...

Hemingway called the first draft garbage. Others say it's the only draft that matters. Both are right, and neither is enough! In this episode of The Deliberate Pen, we examine the first draft as a stage in a process, not a test of talent or a declaration of standards. And we ask the question most writing advice skips: "what's a first draft actually for?" We cover: - Why conflicting advice about fi...

You call yourself a writer. You have the drafts to prove it. What you don't have is a finished book. In this episode, I open with a confession: I once had five novels running simultaneously; different genres, different pen names, none of them done. Productive on the surface. Directionless underneath. This episode names the five real reasons writers don't finish, including the ones no one talks abo...

Most writers wait for inspiration. The deliberate writer builds regardless of it. In this opening episode, we explore what it actually means to write deliberately: the philosophy, the principles, and three actionable tips to start today. From a decade of writing, fifteen composed books, a publishing house, and a bookshop built along the way; this is what that philosophy looks like from the inside....