Before and After the Book Deal | Courtney Maum

Recommended by Courtney Maum

Writers at Work with Sarah Fay

Where you produce your best work, get subscribers, and build the writing career you want on Substack

SubMakk

By Rebecca Makkai

Rebecca Makkai's Substack: mostly writing and books! but also Zillow, true crime, etymology, food, general inanity

Why am I recommending this? Are you kidding? It's REBECCA MAKKAI, people!

- Courtney Maum

How To Get Unstuck

By Amy Shearn

Writing your way out of the restlessness

I would read a list of ingredients if they were written in Amy's sensitive, caring, and very funny hand, and thus I recommend her newsletter where she extends that hand to help us out of our own mess(es).

- Courtney Maum

The 7am Novelist

By Michelle Hoover

Join award-winning novelist and writing teacher Michelle Hoover with tips and special guests for your morning writing wake up call, starting with a 50-day writing challenge to help you get a new project going and keep you in your chair.

One of my favorite teachers for her pragmatic, compassionate and inspired ways, Michelle Hoover is also the generous force behind the "7am Novelist" 50-day writing challenge. You must check it out!

- Courtney Maum

The Fainting Couch

By Alice Bradley

Weekly nonserious reports on whatever's going on in my head—and recommendations for things you might enjoy.

Writing, mental health, and animals? It's what my own memoir is all about!

- Courtney Maum

It's Good to Be Here

By Amy Stewart

Dispatches from my sketchbook & my brain. Real talk on art & writing, weird history, nature, and the occasional cocktail. Plus: Art tutorials!

Amy's newsletter is one of the newsletters I've been following the longest-- it brings joy to my inbox every month. It has art, it has literature, it has cocktail recommendations: it literally contains multitudes!

- Courtney Maum

Wild Letters

By Nic Antoinette

A weekly newsletter about self-exploration and crafting a right-fit life

Wild Inventures

By Ro

Life on its own terms: a weekly column about creativity, writing, and the quest for an authenticity that feels great even if it looks weird. With a healthy dose of humor.

Creativity hacks, making peace with your computer, life as a full time worker in the cubicle of your own house and much more from this Aussie born multitasker who has kindness and humor to spare.

- Courtney Maum

Eva's Newsletter for Writers

By Eva Langston

resources for writers on the journey to publication

Real life updates from an aspiring author who got an agent after sending out 90 query letters. Lots of tips on discussion forums and hashtags for active writers to join, and other creative (and encouraging) stuff! Go Eva!

- Courtney Maum

The Optionist

By Janice Min

Great available IP for Hollywood. I do the reading for you

An insider-baseball newsletter about the topics and character arcs that are getting literary material optioned today. A subscription to this newsletter is more affordable (and easier to come by) than a meeting in Hollywood!

- Courtney Maum

52 Writing Prompts

By Suzanne Roberts

Writing prompts, inspiration, and notes on the writing life

Because we all need a little help getting to the page these days!

- Courtney Maum

Between Two Things

By Lindsey DeLoach Jones

The best thinking happens in the space between two extremes.

Submission Sunday

Eight curated literary submission opportunities every other Sunday for all genres.

This is the perfect Substack for the new year ahead-- 8 curated places to submit writing to every Sunday!

- Courtney Maum

Publishing Confidential

By Kathleen Schmidt

News and analysis about the book publishing industry that you won't read anywhere else.

Recovering

By Holly Whitaker

Examining current cultural trends through the lens of addiction, recovery, alcohol, and all the other drugs like your smartphone

Trust me, you need Holly in your life. She takes no sh*t, but is super candid and funny about the times she's taken sh*t in the past, and she's a really important voice in this battle to stay human in a digital, on-demand, super scary world.

- Courtney Maum

Love Story

By Laura McKowen

Your life is a love story, it’s just not the kind you think. An honest look at relationships, recovery, and writing.

If you're in recovery or struggle with addiction or an addictive personality, or just like reading super smart, honest female voices who "get it" and get you, Love Story's your place.

- Courtney Maum

Counter Craft

By Lincoln Michel

fiction craft, publishing demystification, weird books

Well written tips and perspectives about the writing and publishing industry. Basically, this is where MFA meets the IRS (one of the titles of a recent post). The author is a literary insider who has been "in the biz" a long time and knows of what he speaks.

- Courtney Maum

The Querent

By Alexander Chee

The person asking a question at the beginning of a Tarot card reading. Or, a newsletter project by Alexander Chee.

How to Glow in the Dark

By Neon Literary

Book publishing advice and community for authors of fiction and nonfiction, written by the agents at Neon Literary.

Expert, candid, and emotional advice from a top American literary agent.

- Courtney Maum

Adventures In "Journalism" by Sari Botton

Highlights and lowlights* (*mostly lowlights) from one Gen X lady writer's rather circuitous career path.

Sari is such an honest and needed voice about what it is like to be an overworked, frequently underpaid, but nevertheless passionate person in this crazy world of publishing.

- Courtney Maum

Men Yell at Me

By lyz

Written from a journalist in a red state, this newsletter is personal, political, sometimes funny and always raises hell.

Come for the "Dingus of the Week" dispatch, stay for the "been there, done that, but Lyz writes about it better" angle on what it is like to be a woman in America, today.

- Courtney Maum