“Ghostwitch”: two thousand words of terror
This an update I actually should have shared over a month ago, but time got away from me. By which I mean, I misremembered “Ghostwitch’s” publication date in the online Two Thousand Word Terrors anthology as August instead of July, and I also have spent the summer in a fugue of work — editing, of course, and some writing, but also preparing for the 2023 Sustainability Fair in Waukesha County. If you’re in Southeast Wisconsin and looking for a fun and informative,...
Read MoreA Personal Loss
Update 7/12/2020: I appreciate the outpouring of kind words. John is remembered on this memory wall at the Tribute Archive, where I’ve posted some pictures and the eulogy I read at a small ceremony with his family. Another small memorial will be held among his friends in the coming weeks. I write this in a state of shock. My partner for just over a year, John, passed away last night or early this morning (the cause is still to be determined. I believe he went in his sleep). He had...
Read MoreMoney Management and Living on a Budget for Freelancers: the Ebook
First, I’d like to thank my mom and dad. In all seriousness, they raised me to be frugal, or at least to focus on value rather than flashiness when making purchasing decisions, and to save money whenever I could, whether it was in a piggy bank or a CD. Then I became a freelancer, and I had to be frugal by necessity. I’ve developed habits to make frugality more automatic, and I’ve learned ever more tips and methods to save on expenses or to earn extra income. Some of them I...
Read MoreMoney Management and Living on a Budget for Freelancers – Part 3: Payment Methods
Bank accounts, credit cards, Paypal—it seems being a modern economic agent means all these different options coming out of your ears. In this third section of my money management series, I’ll go over different accounts I have and how I use them, both to get paid and to pay others. Cash and ATM This is actually the last part of my expense budget in Mint, its own line item. I assign myself a certain amount per month that I can take out as cash and use however I want. These cash...
Read MoreMoney Management and Living on a Budget for Freelancers – Part 2.5: Expenses, Continued
This is part 2.5 rather than 3 because all my discussion of expenses had been intended for one post. However, I turned out to have a lot to say about coupons and grocery savings. So let’s pick up where we left off. But first, I wanted to share a relevant read from this week: Kickstarter’s Happening newsletter included a link to The Creative Independent’s Guide for Financial Survival During the COVID Crisis. It’s by a financial planner who offers in-depth advice based on...
Read MoreWelcome 2018! (What I read in 2017 and where you can find me this year)
During the fresh, can-do spirit of the beginning of a new year, it seems like a good time to have another swing at writing for this blog! As I expected last year, blogging hasn’t been my biggest priority, though I’m glad I was able to get some book reviews and publication announcements in last year. So what HAVE I been doing? Fair question! Two big things, mostly: reading, and being paid for reading. (That is, copyediting. And also writing, of course!) 2017 was the first year I...
Read More“Of the Generation” in Heroic Fantasy Anthology from Flame Tree Publishing
Flame Tree Publishing has posted the Tables of Contents for its new Gothic Fantasy anthologies: Time Travel and Heroic Fantasy. It’s pretty unreal to be on the same list as the author of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The full ToC for Heroic Fantasy is: A Matter of Interpretation by M. Elizabeth Ticknor Burned Away by Kate O’Connor Dragon and Wolf by Zach Chapman Erzabet and the Gladiators by Susan Murrie Macdonald Five Fruits I Ate in Sandar Land by Michael Haynes Laya by Voss...
Read MoreThe Big List of Writing Writing Resources, Part One
You can write your story with nothing but a reasonably flat surface and something that leaves a mark, but it’s a lot easier when you have the right tools. Happily, there are a lot of useful resources out there. Here are some of my favorites. I encountered a few while writing The Starter Guide for Professional Writers (about which I have exciting news: revisions and expansions are underway for a second edition! The past two years have seen some interesting changes in the publishing...
Read More“The Grace of Turning Back” at Beneath Ceaseless Skies
“The Grace of Turning Back,” the final story of the Curse-Strewn World sequence, appears in Beneath Ceaseless Skies Issue #179, which can be read on the BCS website or in the Kindle store. The Tynesi merchants, who traded everything from the silver rice of Timru and perfume leaves from Simrandu to chips of ivory off the Keld’s temples, had a term for a particular sort of improvidence: to throw money, time, or strength into seeing to completion a bargain they had...
Read MoreCommon edits to improve your writing
A lot of editing and rewriting involves relatively minor mechanical and technical changes. A lot. Not that I’m complaining; making these simple changes is a routine part of my work, and if nothing else it keeps me steadily employed. Many of them are changes I make to my own writing on a second draft! However, I thought it’d be helpful to share my “greatest hits”: the advice I give most often, and make use of most often when revising my own work. If you can apply this...
Read MoreAbout Therese
Therese Arkenberg's first short story was accepted for publication on January 2, 2008, and her second acceptance came a few hours later. Since then they haven't always been in such a rush, yet her work appears in places like Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Analog, Daily Science Fiction, and the anthology Sword & Sorceress XXIV. Aqua Vitae, her science fiction novella, was released by WolfSinger Publications in December 2011.
She works as a freelance editor and writer in Wisconsin, where she returned after a brief but unforgettable time in Washington, D.C. When she isn't reading, writing, or editing (it's true!) she serves on the board of the Plowshare Center of Waukesha, which works for social, economic, and environmental justice.