Melissa Maygrove

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for December 2024. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  Ronel, Deniz,   Pat Garcia,   Olga Godim,   &  Cathrina Constantine! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 Can you believe it's December already? Where did the year go! December 4 question: Do you write cliffhangers at the end of your stories?  Are they a turn-off to you as a writer and/or a reader? I write romance, so, no, I do not end my books on a cliffhanger. My readers expect a happily ever after. Reader-me enjoyed a series of short works many years ago that ended with hooks and formed a complete story as a set, but they were appropriately priced for the page count, and the author rapid-released them (one every week or two?), so I didn't have to wait long for the next.  As a rule, however, I prefer full-length novels with happy or, at least, satisfying endings. I hope 2024 has a happy...

November turned out to be a busy month for me, so I'm skipping IWSG. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

I'm over at L. Diane Wolfe's blog, celebrating the release of Battered Pride with a guest post on doing research for novels set in the 1800s.  Please visit and give Diane some blog love.

Come see me show my age. 😀 Our favorite ninja, Alex J Cavanaugh, is hosting me today with a guest post to celebrate the release of Battered Pride . He asked me to choose some movies that are similar to my story. Pop on over and see which ancient flicks I dredged up . Natalie Aguirre over at Literary Rambles is also giving the book a shoutout.  Thanks, Natalie!

H. R. Sinclair was kind enough to mention my new release on her blog. Please visit and   show her some blog love . :)

I'm just popping onto the blog to announce...  * cue fireworks & streamers *   Battered Pride  is published!   This enemies-to-lovers romance is available on Amazon  in paperback, e-book, and via Kindle Unlimited. Elizabeth Seckman gave my new book a shoutout today.  Please visit and show her some blog love . :)

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for October 2024. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  Nancy Gideon,   Jennifer Lane, Jacqui Murray  & Natalie Aguirre! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 I've got news! But first, this month's question... Ghost stories fit right in during this month. What's your favorite classic ghostly tale? Tell us about it and why it sends chills up your spine. I don't read or watch much scary stuff, because I don't enjoy being scared. If a movie is dark with things jumping out and startling me, I'll shut it off. In 1979, there was a movie titled When a Stranger Calls that creeped anyone of babysitting age the heck out. This was in the days of landlines, when many phones were still rotary dial. It's not a ghost story, but I'd have to list it as my scariest. In keeping with the Halloween theme... This month is the 7th anniversary of FULL DARK: A Benefit Anthology ! This colle...

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for September 2024. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:    Beth Camp, Jean Davis, Yvonne Ventresca,  &  PJ Colando! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 I originally planned to post links to some of my past blog posts on the craft for IWSG, but after reading this month's question, I decided to do both. September's question:  Since it's back to school time, let's talk English class. What's a writing rule you learned in school that messed you up as a writer? Hm... 'Sentence fragments are not acceptable.' Other than that and generally writing in a more formal, flowery way, English class didn't hurt my writing. It gave me skills that have allowed me to write professionally and freelance as an editor. The way English class - and school in general - harmed me most was forcing me to read boring stuff for assignments. It turned me off to reading for de...

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for August 2024. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  Feather Stone, Kim Lajevardi,   Diedre Knight, C. Lee McKenzie,   and Sarah - The Faux Fountain Pen! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 Because AI has become such a divisive topic - to a level that authors' careers are being harmed over the mere suspicion of its use - I have decided to skip this month's question.  I haven't been the victim of any attacks that I'm aware of, and I don't use AI to make my covers or write my books, but Id rather err on the side of not making myself a target. On a brighter note, going part time at my job has paid off. 😊 I finished the first draft of the next book in my western series. Now the editing begins. Fun, fun. Not. (Actually, it is kind of fun to see the whole thing finally come together.) I'm reviving my Street Team . If you or anyone you know is interested in joining,...

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for July 2024. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  JS Pailly, Rebecca Douglass,   Pat Garcia, Louise-Fundy Blue,   & Natalie Aguirre! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 I waited until the last minute to write this post, hoping I might have a release date for my next book to shout about. Unfortunately I don't. But I have made progress on it since going part time last month. I like July's question. I'm excited to see what others use and recommend! July 3 question - What are your favorite writing processors (e.g. Word, Scrivener, yWriter, Dabble), apps, software, and tools? Why do you recommend them? And which one is your all time favorite that you cannot live without and use daily or at least whenever you write? I'm old school. I still use Word for most everything.  I make a document with images of my MCs and main supporting characters, including basic inf...

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for JUNE. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  Liza at Middle Passages,   Shannon Lawrence,   Olga Godim , and me. Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 Earlier this year, I posted some bold goals . I decided to give an update on them for my IWSG post today.  I'm also revealing the cover of my next book. You can skip to that if you want. 😉 Here are the goals for 2024 and my progress (or not): Publish book 4 in my western series by June . Not going to make that deadline. But I will publish it this year, possibly even this summer. Develop a regular social media / newsletter schedule by March & send out 3 to 4 newsletters this year . I'm still working on this. I blog monthly for IWSG and Cowboy Kisses, but I need to do more with Pioneer Hearts Facebook group.  The only newsletter that has gone out is this cover reveal. That said, I will have at least two mo...

I'm skipping this month's IWSG to spend time with family. Consider visiting my February post on writing goals  and grabbing the freebie. It contains a link to a printable PDF Author Planner I made.   April's post has instructions on pre-scheduling blog posts and how to get rid of the pesky white background behind text you paste into your posts. Thanks for stopping by.  See you next month!

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for April 2024. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  Janet Alcorn, T. Powell Coltrin, Natalie Aguirre,  &  Pat Garcia! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 How long have I been blogging?  Twelve years.  If you want to read my very first post, you can find it here . I decided to choose my own topic this month. At the beginning of this year, I made a new plan for my author business that included creating content in batches and pre-scheduling blog posts. (If you didn't grab the free planner, it's still there. Click the link.) Today I'm going to show you how I do it and give you some ideas for staying on top of your blogging obligations. I realize many of you already know this, but skim the post, just in case. Caveat: I use Blogger, so that is all I know and the platform the screenshots were taken from. But the principles can be applied to other platforms. ...

  This is my   Insecure Writers Support Group   post for March. Alex's awesome co-hosts this month  are:  Kristina Kelly,   Miffie Seideman, Jean Davis,   and Liza @ Middle Passages! Please stop by their blogs and say thank you .  💻💻💻💻💻 [Image purchased from Depositphotos] Believe it or not, I wrote this before Alex posted the March question. Imagine my shock when I went to get the names of the co-hosts! Have you "played" with AI to write those nasty synopses, or do you refuse to go that route?  How do you feel about AI's impact on creative writing? A few IWSGs ago, the topic was AI and whether it would replace writers. I posted, but I didn't know much about it at all.  Since then, I've dabbled a bit. Wow. *mind blown* I'm going to pause here to say that AI is a very  controversial and often divisive topic.  AI bashing within the typically altruistic writing community has risen to a shocking and frankly saddenin...