What’s New

The question I get asked most often is how I do my research. It’s a tricky question to answer–every book is different, every research question is different, every source is different.

But I did my best to boil it down into one half-hour class!

Whether you’re writing fiction, nonfiction, reported journalism, essays, or memoir, you’re probably going to have to do some amount of research.

We’ll look at how to use scientific and academic sources, and how to track down experts in any field. We’ll look at historical sources, like old newspapers and archives. We’ll talk about genealogical resources, like Census records and other public documents. I’ll show you how I conduct interviews, and when I hire expert help. I’ll tell you how to spot faulty information and keep it out of your work.

Finally, I’ll teach you to be a skeptic! How do you know what you know? How do you verify your facts?

Whatever kind of writing project you’re embarking on, this class will help you up your research game.

You can take this class now on Skillshare, which is a Netflix-style platform for online classes. This link gives you a free trial.

I recommend taking this class along with Organize Your Research in Evernote.

You can also take my writing classes on Udemy, where you pay per class for only the classes you want to take. I’ve bundled this class with my class on using Evernote to keep track of research. Go here to check that out.

If you’re about to dive into a big research project, whether it’s for a book, a dissertation, or some other kind of writing project, you’ll be so much better off if you set up a good system for organizing it all before you jump in.

This class will teach you how to keep track of all your research in Evernote. Writers can also use Evernote to brainstorm book ideas, organize a plot, and keep track of ideas for other professional projects, like teaching workshops.

You can take this class now on Skillshare, which is a Netflix-style platform for online classes. This link gives you a free trial.

I recommend taking this class along with Research: A Step-by-Step Guide for Authors.

You can also take my writing classes on Udemy, where you pay per class for only the classes you want to take. I’ve bundled this class with my class on doing research. Go here to check that out.

It’s here! I’ve created a step-by-step guide for authors who want to make high-quality videos about their books. The class is live on Skillshare now, and this link will give you a free trial to access to all the classes Skillshare has to offer.  

As the author of over a dozen books, both fiction and nonfiction, I’ve found that book videos can be useful at every stage of the publishing process, including:

Pre-publication marketing meetings with the publisher
Press kits and media pitches
Marketing to bookstores and libraries
Lining up speaking engagements
Reaching readers and book clubs
Promoting backlist titles years after publication
Fortunately, the technology is so easy that anyone with an iPad or other tablet or smartphone can shoot a high-quality video, add photos or video footage, make simple edits, and publish to online platforms.

This class walks through every step of the process that I use to make videos to promote my books. I’ll show you all the equipment and free software I use, and walk you through every step of the process I use.

For those of you who have different equipment and software, I’ll suggest alternatives. The basic concepts are the same no matter what you use to make your video.

This class will also work for anyone who wants to make a talking head-style video interspersed with photos and video clips on any subject at all, but my examples are all going to be specific to book videos.