I have some exciting news! One of my small business articles was featured on the New York Times blog today! Scroll all the way to the bottom of the article and I'm mentioned on the second paragraph to the bottom.

As a columnist/staff writer for AGBeat.com, I get to write about new and interesting startups and established businesses. It's always great to see comments on my articles and how many people shared and actually read it. But it's an even bigger pleasure when the companies you write about give you some love.

And that's exactly what I found today from CloudContacts. They liked my CloudContacts article from the beginning of the month and posted a little love on their blog. Check them out and check out the original article. They really offer a unique and much-needed service in today's business world.

I've updated my portfolio page with new and exciting writing samples! Keep checking back for additional updates.

Rio Salado just published my faculty profile for my upcoming online fiction writing class. I was sent a few questions to answer about my views on writing and fiction, and I'm very excited about this wonderful opportunity.

Check it out!

I'm ecstatic to announce that I've been offered an adjunct teaching position with Rio Salado College. I'll be teaching an online creative writing course, which focuses on building scenes.

If you're interested or you know of someone who is, class can begin on any Monday from January 9th to February 12th. And remember, this class is completely online, so it can fit into your schedule perfectly.

Click here to sign up for the class or to learn more about it.

I look forward to getting to know my future students and helping them along their creative writing journeys.

I just wanted to share my business and technology column for AGBeat.com. As an Assignment Writer and part of the AGBeat staff, I write articles on topics that include Smartphone apps, Firefox add-ons, and new startup companies across the country. Take a moment to check it out or leave a comment. Let me know what you think.

As I search for new clients, I am appalled by the offered pay rate. Just today I received a follow-up email offering one dollar for every 500-word article. One dollar! Assuming that the article takes thirty minutes to write, that's still only two bucks an hour. It's quite offensive. For some reason, writers and those hiring writers agree to obscenely low pay rates. But why? It seems to be a disgusting cycle in which everyone is stuck.

Robert W. Bly mentions this vicious cycle in his book Secrets of a Freelance Writer. He says that freelance sites like Elance--and many other sites--encourage low pay. Elance is a bidding marketplace for writing jobs. However, the winner of each job is the lowest bidder. It has nothing to do with experience or quality of the writing, just who can offer it at the cheapest rate. What that has done is created the expectation that writers work for basically nothing. This shouldn't be the case. Bly goes on to compare the pay rates of writers to equal or be less than those who work at fast food restaurants mopping the floors, with no professional skills, education, or experience. Bly believes that the only way to stop this offensive pay scale is for writers not to accept it. However, there's the problem. There will always be those writers who will write for any amount, just to be the lowest bidder.

Needless to say, I turned down the job offer today, and I've turned down many more because of the disrespect that has permeated the writing and professional communities. So, if you're a writer, raise your standards. Only accept what you're worth. That is the only way to raise the bar for writers and to have a successful writing career.

Photo Credit.

It seems that everyone is talking about "The Help", both the movie and the book that inspired it. It's the book to read right now, and many are reading it to prepare for the exciting movie release.

This morning, Yahoo featured a story about the author of "The Help", Kathryn Stockett, and her perseverance and determination to get her story published. She believed in her story and loved her characters, and that got her 60 rejection letters.

If you're a writer, you'll understand the soul-crushing experience of receiving multiple rejection letters. But 60? It's incredible that Stockett continued working on her manuscript, taking each rejection letter as motivation to making her story the best it could be.

If you'd like to read the article, click here. It's funny and sad and motivating. Remember, writers, keep plugging away and things could pay off in the end. If you believe in your book, you can find someone else who believes in it, too.

Whether you're a fiction or non-fiction writer, you have to understand what your character wants. It doesn't matter if you're writing a children's book, a novel, or a short story. Your character has to want something. It's what drives the story forward. Aristotle said, "Man is his desire." Desire and wants is what makes a person who they are.

Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter wrote an amazingly helpful book for writers. What If? guides you through the writing and rewriting processes. In their chapter, "What Do Your Characters Want?" they give you six questions to answer about your characters' motivations. Take a break from the story on which you're working and ask yourself the following questions about your characters:

1. What does the central character want?
2. What are her motives for wanting this?
3. Where in the story is this made clear to the reader?
4. How do we learn what the central character wants? Dialogue? Actions? Interior thinking?
5. What or who stands in the way of her achieving it?
6. What does the desire set in motion?

Bernay and Painter go on to say, "If you don't know the answers to these questions, you don't know your character and her desires as well as you should."

Asking yourself these questions may be what you need to perfect your story and the journey of your character. Good luck and enjoy the writing process!

As I've continued my education in creative writing, I've remembered "rules" my junior high and high school English teachers have shared. I believed them. I had no reason not to believe them. They were supposed to know everything, right? They were the teachers, after all. That was their job.

Now I know better. I wish I would've used my analytical thinking back then. I would have laughed aloud in class because some of their "rules" are ludicrous, ridiculous, and illogical.

1. Flipping to the end of a chapter to see how long it is makes you a bad reader.

This little, delightful rule was given to me by my seventh grade English teacher. I had always considered myself a reader, but I always flipped to the end of the chapter, just to see how long it was---to see if I had time to finish it. I was heartbroken to learn that I was a bad reader. Mr. Holliday was so adamant about that particular "rule." I've been entertaining the idea of writing him a letter about the things he probably shouldn't tell his students.

2. Not using contractions in writing means that you're intelligent.

This "rule" was from the same teacher as with #1, Mr. Holliday. His reference for this "rule" was a fiction book he had been reading. Apparently there was a ransom note without contractions. The investigator or detective knew the kidnapper was intelligent because of his lack of contractions. The Chicago Manual of Style recommends using contractions. It can give writing a more personal, sincere feeling. A lack of contractions can make a piece feel stuffy and make it seem that the writer has an over-inflated ego. Who knows, maybe that really is the case.

3. In a research paper, the end of every sentence needs to have a reference or citation.

This one was from my ninth and tenth grade English teachers. Whenever we were assigned a research paper, they required us to cite every sentence. That didn't leave any room for our own writing, only direct quotes or paraphrasing from the sources we referenced. I later learned that that is not a research paper; it is merely a listing of facts. There is no voice nor a writer.

As you continue your writing projects, remember that not all the "rules" you've been taught are correct. It is important to differentiate for yourself.

I hope that English teachers these days are better equipped with the proper rules for reading, writing, and editing.