Writing and Editing

Send us Fan Mail Wayne uses the example of his own published novel, Will's Dead Wife , to illustrate some aspects of literary fiction.

Send us Fan Mail This episode consists of an interview I did of Mike Ulmer, who’s a writer based in Hamilton, Ontario. He often writes for a business readership, but I was curious about asking him about the psychology of writing, about how and why someone thinks they might not be able to write any kind of book, or any kind of anything, at all. Mike’s latest book is Show and Tell Writing , and he w...

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about his messy relationship with Twitter, including about a half dozen break-ups, and one just last week.

Send us Fan Mail This episode consists of an interview I did of Mike Oppenheim, whose day job is compiling back-of-the-book indexes. I was interested in some of the nitty-gritty of practical indexing, and Mike came through with the details. He does a lot more than indexing though: he writes, podcasts, and makes music. He has a podcast about death with the great title of Coffin Talk , which I am lo...

Send us Fan Mail Wayne discusses the importance of an editor not editing a writer's ideas, but rather the writer's expression of those ideas. He ends with a half-remembered joke that ironically ended up getting him a fun editing gig with a great client.

Send us Fan Mail This episode of Editing Writing is an interview I did with my good friend Oscar Martens, who has published two collections of short literary collection with small presses. One is called The Girl with the Full Figure Is Your Daughter , and the most recent one is No Call Too Small . Both were very well reviewed—but there’s a but . It’s that even though being published by a small pre...

Send us Fan Mail This episode of Editing Writing is an interview I did with Emily Enger. She runs a marketing service for writers of all kinds—though perhaps mostly those who have self-published or have published with a small press—called Good Enough Book Marketing. She’s a book marketing coach, and as she puts it, she is “helping authors cut through the marketing noise to stay true to their first...

Send us Fan Mail The comedian who’s my guest today is actually someone I’ve known personally for the past 5 or 6 years. Matt Balaker. He and I co-wrote a biography of the great standup comedian named Greg Giraldo, which was published in 2019. Matt is a really great guy, generous, easy to talk to, and very funny. It was a real hoot working with him. I’ve never actually seen Matt perform standup—he...

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about two aspects of detail in writing: le mot juste and the telling detail. All inspired by another podcaster oversharing a little ...

Send us Fan Mail This episode of Editing Writing consists of an interview I did with Ashley Kalagian Blunt. Ashley is a writer with three books to her credit and is currently working on her fourth. She also teaches writing as well as creativity generally, and co-hosts with her husband the podcast James and Ashley Stay at Home . She was really fun to talk to, and she has a lot of practical advice f...

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about the lies in our culture, but the truth among pornographers and standup comedians.

Send us Fan Mail This episode of Editing Writing consists of an interview and chat I had with Robert Rosen on April 10. He was in New York City and I was, as usual, in Ottawa, Canada. Robert is a writer and editor who has produced several books and whose work has appeared in many magazines and periodicals. I was particularly interested though in his book about when he worked in the porn industry a...

Send us Fan Mail Wayne discusses some of the new words and uses of words that have come into English in the last couple of years since COVID began, and also how they illustrate some typical ways in which the language works.

Send us Fan Mail This episode consists of an interview I did via Zoom with Lauca (she is in Germany and I am in Canada). I had come across her website and I was interested in several aspects of her work, including the different genres she writes in, reactions to her decision to write from the point of view of a man, and her experience with self-publishing. You can check out some of her work on her...

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about the importance of tone, and consistency of tone, in writing. He defines the term, provides some examples to illustrate the meaning, and also some cases from his editing work where issues of tone need to be addressed.

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about dictionaries and words, specifically the Oxford English Dictionary , and the five possible things that happen to any word that ever enters the English language.

Send us Fan Mail Wayne makes some comments about Will Smith slapping Chris Rock during the Academy Awards ceremony, and extrapolates to talk about art in general and how it is separate from real life.

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Wayne interviews young fantasy writer Sarah Humpherys, who had her first novel published when she was just 16 years old. You can check out her website here , and purchase her novel on amazon , where (as of March 26, 2022) she has an impressive 4.5 rating based on 70 reviews. Sarah lives in Utah.

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about the use of euphemism not only in our everyday personal lives, but also in society in general as well as in contexts such as war or where the stakes are high for an organization that cannot really come out and say in plain language the truth about what it is up to.

Send us Fan Mail Wayne discusses in general how it's inappropriate to make comparisons between versions of the same work done in two different art forms, and then talks about some of his favourites: American Psycho; Hamlet; Glengarry Glen Ross; A Clockwork Orange; and The Exorcist .

Send us Fan Mail Wayne provides a list of 11 things that, as an editor, he commonly sees in the writing by his clients. How many do you know?

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about blocks, sentences, and transitions.

Send us Fan Mail Wayne receives an assignment from NATO and the EU to write a communiqué tomorrow about the war in Ukraine.

Send us Fan Mail Wayne talks about lying in in writing, in film, and in real life.

Send us Fan Mail As they say, it's like it says on the tin: Wayne discusses and gives some examples of some of the basic reference works (dictionaries and much more) that any writer should have handy.