Connecting Visionary Writers & Readers

For Writers: I help aspiring and emerging writers to make a difference as they express their life purpose through the power of the written word.  As visionary writers, we’re catalysts for creating a world on purpose.

For Readers: If you love a good story that entertains while also enlightening and encouraging you to live your own life on purpose, you’ve come to the right place. That’s visionary fiction.

If you love a good nonfiction book that both enlightens and encourages you in your life while also being entertaining, that’s visionary nonfiction, and this is the place for you as well!

Mommy – Where Do Magic Cats Come From?

My friends and writing colleagues know that one of the main reason I’m writing the Zak Bates Eco-Adventure Series is because I care greatly about our planet and the young ones who are inheriting it from us (not in all that great a shape I might add).

So, in celebration of Sunday’s Earth Day I decided it would be fun to write a short story that answers the question:

Where do magic cats come from?  Specifically where did Ra-Kit get her magic?

It just came available as a Kindle ebook this morning (Saturday, April 21), but I also realized not everyone has a Kindle or uses Kindles apps, so in an effort to make this quirky story available to more people, I’m also offering… Continue reading

Free Visionary Fiction – Saturday is the Last Day


As you may remember if you’ve been following my antics through this web site, one of my strongest passions these days is writing visionary fiction and non-fiction including short fiction.  Growing up reading science fiction and fantasy, I feel it’s my turn to give back by sharing my own speculative fiction stories.

So, this week, I’m offering one of my short stories, Hunt Along the Iron River, for free for Kindle users for three days but given this is Saturday, this is your last day.

  • Thursday, April 12
  • Friday, April 13
  • Saturday,  April 14

Just go HERE.

Remember, you can also read this story using a Kindle App on your PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, etc. And you’ll find a couple extra surprises included… Continue reading

Book Baby, Kindle or Smashwords?

What a marvelous world we live in and what an incredible time to be a writer. There are just so many opportunities and ways we can get our words and our work out into the world these days.  So many that it might at times be confusing as to which ones to use and which ones to pass on by.

Just the other day, someone posted a great question on Word Journeys: Resources for Writers, one of the

Books by Porpoise Publishing

Facebook groups I frequent. Here’s the question:

Should I ‘do’ my ebook on Book Baby, Kindle or Smashwords? I can do most of it myself, but how best to get to all the e readers….?

Yes, that is the $64,000 question, not… Continue reading

Read Review and Pass Along

Read, Review, Pass Along Form

Writers know the importance of garnering reviews of their books to draw the kind of attention that will result in more book sales.  But how do you do it when a book first comes out, and hardly anyone has bought it to review it?

You give a few books away, right?  Maybe more than a few, like dozens, but that can be costly especially if you only get one review for every book you give away.  There must be a better way.

That was my thinking a few months ago that lead me to my most recent experiment — the Read, Review and Pass Along Plan. It’s really pretty simple.  I created a Read, Review and Pass Along Form and… Continue reading

Got Purpose?

I’ve started a new series that is cataloged under “The Writer’s Life” that explores some of the qualities and attributes I believe are important to becoming a visionary writer (and overall effective human being).

And, of course, being one of the founders of Life On Purpose Institute, Inc. I feel called to explore this one early on:

Purpose

Now, I’ve gone into quite a bit of detail about the role of purpose in a writer’s life in my Manifesto for Visionary Writers (which you can read right here on the blog under that category) so this is really just to reiterate why having a clear sense of purpose is so important to writers.  Purpose gives us a sense of direction for our writing that often… Continue reading

The Balancing Act of Indie Publishing

The section of this blog is called The Learning Curve for the simple reason that I want to share with other writers what I’m learning as I continue my journey to become a successful indie publisher. Today I want to explore what I’m learning about the balancing act of being an indie publisher.

First and foremost, I am no longer just a writer or author. As one of my online mentors, Dean Wesley Smith, points out in his blog section I’m learning to “Think Like a Publisher” as well as to continue to think and act as a writer.  So, there’s a balancing aspect between these two important part of turning out new books and stories through my publishing company – Porpoise Publishing.… Continue reading

My $5.97 Lottery Ticket

I confess, I’ve never bought a lottery ticket; least not that I can remember.  The odds just seem too high for it to make sense to my frugal mind.  However, I’m playing a new writing game that feels a bit like buying a lottery ticket, and thinking of it that way is actually quite empowering.

Here’s the game, compliments of a blog post of Dean Wesley Smith. (You can read his post here.) While I’ve been concentrating my writing efforts primarily in the self publishing direction with Kindle and CreateSpace, Dean offers a more balanced approach. As he pointed out, after publishing a book, another direction to take could be down the traditional publishing avenue by writing a “short three page synopsis of the… Continue reading

Got Discipline? It’s Key to Being a Successful Writer

Is this what you're doing to your creative inner child?

As part of my series on the qualities and attributes I feel are important to develop in ourselves that will help us in becoming visionary writers (and effective human beings), today I’d like to examine the quality of discipline.

As I often do when I start making a new distinction, I like to look up the current definition of the term.  Here’s how the Miriam-Webster dictionary defines discipline:

  1. punishment
  2. obsolete : instruction
  3.  a field of study
  4. training that corrects, molds, or perfects the mental faculties or moral character
  5.  control gained by enforcing  obedience or order b : orderly or prescribed conduct or pattern of behavior c : self-control
  6. a rule or system of rules governing … Continue reading

Creating Your Own Book Covers with Fun & Ease

We’ve all heard how important it is to have a really great book cover.  Despite the old adage, “You can’t judge a book by its cover,” we know we all do — right?  Right. And you’ve probably all read how damn hard it is to create really great covers.  True?

Okay, now here’s where the contrarian in me comes out.  I say hogwash to that.  Here, let me

Covers Designed by Ann Swift & W. Bradford Swift

explain. I see many really good authors who end up getting stopped, sometimes for weeks, months or longer, in getting their book published because they don’t know how to create a really great cover, and they don’t have the funds to hire a professional.

So I say, don’t… Continue reading

Use Equal Energy Exchanges to Enhance Your Writing Career

Equal Energy Exchanges Work

One of the things I’m finding as I focus more of my life energy on being a visionary writer that’s both interesting and fun is how many different aspects of being a life coach I can apply to my writing aspirations.  For example, using Equal Energy Exchanges – a self made distinction I’ve used with many of my coaching clients in the past.

So, what is an Equal Energy Exchange (EEE) and how can we visionary writers use them to our advantage (and everyone else’s advantage for that matter)?  Well, an EEE is a way of looking at life that can free us up from the constraints often placed on us when it comes to matters of money.  You see, it’s… Continue reading

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