I Love Having Stephanie Morrill . . .
here today.

Know a teen or young adult who loves writing? Here's a chance for her/him to learn more about writing by visiting Stephanie's blog.

Or if you're into blogging, or just find blogging a boring, but necessary part of your writing career, then read on to discover how Stephanie learned that blogging was indeed her thing.

Blogging Blessings

Once upon a time, I hated blogging.

I knew it was something I needed to do, so I sucked it up, and I made myself. I tried my best to be a good blogger, but following all the advice seemed impossible. According to the experts, I needed to be interesting, I needed to be succinct, I needed to post 5 days a week, and I needed to not talk about myself. I was a stay-at-home with a toddler. If I wasn’t playing with my daughter, I was working on The Reinvention of Skylar Hoyt series. What on earth did I have to talk about 5 days a week?

For nearly 2 years, blogging was a drudgery. Especially because I was getting, like 7 hits a day. I began asking God for a solution.

I’m a YA writer, so most my email from readers comes from teens. About 99% of them tell me how much they enjoyed the books, then tack on, “I’m a writer too. Do you have any tips for me?”

One evening, while I was doing dishes and thinking about the latest teen who’d emailed me, I had the idea for Go Teen Writers. (http://goteenwriters.blogspot.com/) I thought “Instead of constantly emailing responses to that question, wouldn’t it be great to build a community of teen writers?”

Over a year later, Go Teen Writers is a growing community of teen and twenty-something writers. This year, we’re walking through the process of writing a novel, and it’s so fun to learn alongside them.

I hold writing contests every month, the most recent of which the teens were invited to submit the first 150 words of their novel to be critiqued by published authors.
(http://goteenwriters.blogspot.com/2011/06/winning-entries-from-free-write.html) The talent of those teens is astounding. I have no doubts that they will reach their goals of being published if they decide to pursue it.

My guess is Go Teen Writers isn’t tripling my book sales or anything, but I love the site regardless. I love interacting with the writers. I love learning about their culture and what they’re writing and why.

If you’re a young writer, come on over. If you’re a published writer (books or periodicals), and you’d like to invest in the next generation of novelists, please email me (http://stephaniemorrillbooks.com/contact/) and we’ll chat about possibilities.

For me, the key to enjoying blogging has been finding a way to bless my audience. My daughter, who is 3 ½, loves to tell me the story of Cinderella. She often ends it with, “And they married happily ever after.” As a girl who once upon a time hated blogging, I think the story of Go Teen Writers and why it exists would end, “And she blogged happily ever after.”

Stephanie Morrill is a twenty-something living in Overland Park, Kansas with her husband and two kids. Her only talents are reading, writing, and drinking coffee, so career options were somewhat limited. Fortunately, she discovered a passion for young adult novels and has been writing them ever since. Stephanie is the author of The Reinvention of Skylar Hoyt series and is currently working on other young adult projects. She enjoys encouraging and teaching teen writers and does so on her blog http://www.goteenwriters.com/. To connect with Stephanie and read samples of her books, check out http://www.stephaniemorrillbooks.com/.

Thank you, Stephanie, for being here today!
Blessings, readers!