The Writer's Workout is chock full of insights every writer needs to know.

I caught a tweet from Diane Lynn referring to her blog post over at Write Beginnings.

She said she was reading The Writer’s Workout and she was shocked to learn in Chapter 60, “Check Your Formatting,” that the standard in publishing today requires writers to put one space between sentences, not two, as was originally taught back in the day.

Here is the solution I proposed in The Writer’s Workout for writers like her:

I sometimes find myself in the unenviable position of needing to discourage a writer from the pursuit of a book deal, at least in the short run.

In the past, it was quite the opposite. I used to encourage every writer I met, if I thought they had a good book idea and the skills to break in.

But then I watched one of two things happen. Either the writer did not break in and was heartbroken.

Or the writer did break in, and nothing turned out, in the end, the way the writer had hoped.

I paid close attention to the effort expended and the results gained or not gained and what I have come to realize is that the problems in publishing do not necessarily spring from writers.

We are living in a culture full of promising, able, and skilled writers.

However book publishing has created a dynamic with regards to writers that simply must change.

To be as fixated on book deals and best sellers as we are as a community of writers is to put ourselves in continual danger of being mislead.

So I suggest that we change our focus. As a community of writers, we stop obsessing about book deals and best sellers and we focus instead on readers and meeting their needs.

We build ownership and do not allow our egos to be seduced, and eventually end up with something much more reasonable and realistic than what traditional publishers can offer the majority of writers today.

This may sound radical, but it isn’t. Focusing on micro-publishing instead of on traditional publishing in the short run, is simply a signal that writers are growing up and taking responsibility for our own fates.

And this makes us a lot less easy to seduce, wrangle and lead astray in the first place.

Register for your next round too -- now available in five levels!

Did you enjoy taking the 21 Moments Writing Challenge in 2013?

Do you know someone you think would enjoy it, too?

Then, consider buying them participation in the January round as a holiday gift.

21 Moments is for any level writer. The only requirement is a desire to write.

The series of writing prompts has been so popular that, beginning in January I will be offering five rounds!

NaNoWriMo is only one month out of the year and it’s only for folks who are working on long projects.

21 Moments is nine months of the year, it provides writing inspiration and guidance for those who do not know where to begin, and you get a chance to submit your best moment and win the next round for free to help motivate you to keep going.

21 Moments Writing Challenge is created and developed by Christina Katz explicitly for writers who are ready to write more and write better, the 21 Moments Writing Challenge is a terrific bargain at only $21 per round.

If there are two things writers in the 21st century need to learn and need to learn now, it’s how to write short, tight, and well.

Buy a round for you or a friend this holiday season and start drafting your moments. You both deserve it!

Register here for the next round, for you or a friend or both!

I start a new round of Dream Teams on January 1, 2014 and registration for participants is now open.

Dream Teams are five-month accountability groups for writers who have taken my classes.

In order to participate, you have to have a few things going for you:

1. You must be a former student
2. You must want to focus and work on the goal of the team
3. You must be ready and willing to succeed
4. You must be prepared to work with me for five months straight
5. You must be accountable for your success
6. You must be ready to say goodbye to excuses

That’s it!

The first-level Dream Team is the Beginning Dream Team. If you took and completed my class, Writing & Publishing The Short Stuff, then you qualify to register.

And exciting news! I now have a new Essay Writing Dream Team available for veteran Dream Teamers, who wish to add a second Dream Team to their writing schedules.

Get the full scoop here.

And if you want to join in but have not met the requirements yet, then please check out my classes page.

Next round of classes begins in January and puts you in position to join the next round of Dream Teams that begin in August, if you don’t have the prereqs yet.

If you have read Writer Mama LINK or Write For Regional Parenting Publications For Fun & Profit LINK, what are you waiting for?

Register now and get started building up your portfolio of published writing clips.

I love working with mom writers and I have been doing it consistently for the past twelve and half years straight.

Hope to work with you soon!

I believe that the future of publishing will look very different than it does today.

I know that the publishing today is already vastly different than it was in 2005, when I landed my first book deal.

Today, writers are still subjected to the siren calls of gurus who want to teach them how to become bestsellers by following ten easy steps.

Conferences still focus too much on featuring bestselling authors, while audience members dream of their big break some day.

And there is not enough frank discussion about how to cultivate a solid foundation that publishing success can be built upon.

In the future, publishing will be on a spectrum. Writers will have works all over the spectrum of various lengths, forms and genres. What we think of as “books” will be accompanied by formats we can not even imagine yet, many of them frictionless or streaming.

And in all of this, the most important person is the reader. Today’s quotes summarizes what many readers expect in the future.

If you are a writer and you have not started to wrap your mind around future possibilities, now is the time.

Your prospects may even get brighter the more you look to the future and the less you look to the past.

Permission Granted, 45 Reasons To Micro-publish updates the conversation to modern concerns writers and authors have on the topic. Get your copy today!

Here’s a round up of some of my past posts on Micro-publishing:

I’d like to close with a quote from literary agent Chip MacGregor. I stumbled on it today and felt like it nicely echoes the message in Permission Granted. I have always felt that Chip’s advice for writers is honest and helpful.

Christina Katz knows micro-publishing. She teaches an excellent course on it and she has successfully micro-published several works herself. She also knows frictionless writing – writing that is succinct and easy to read that can be delivered readily and steadily to waiting readers. For any writer who has been wondering where the future of publishing and self-publishing lies, Katz creates a compelling case for short digital works playing a key role for authors and writers of many stripes. ~ Lara Krupicka

Christina Katz has written a concise, accessible overview of reasons why any writer should micro-publish. From the unknown writer to the multi-published traditional author, micro-publishing opens the doors of opportunity to increased creativity, success, income, and control over the writing and publishing process. A must-read for every writer. ~ Crystal Howe

Christina Katz has done it again! She’s taken on micro-publishing and broken it down into bite-sized pieces for any writer to digest. The take-away? There isn’t a writer around that can’t benefit from the sustainable career enhancement that micro-publishing offers. ~ Pam Torres

Permission Granted makes a compelling argument that the future is already here and micro-publishing is a promising way for writers to serve their readers. If you have ever considered micro-publishing or are just curious about it, read this book! ~ Laura Lane

For any fence-riders who might be considering self-publishing, Christina Katz’s Permission Granted might be just the push one needs to be persuaded to test the waters with micro-publishing. ~ Julia Mozingo

This is a timely book for all authors and would-be authors. Lots of information and advice in navigating the tricky world of publishing today. ~ Jan Pierce

As a student of Christina’s, I was already sold on the idea of micro-publishing. But this e-book really laid out all my future possibilities. It shows any writer how your first e-book is just the beginning. ~ Sarah Swofford

Christina pulls no punches with this informative, honest, and contagiously enthusiastic guide to the publishing wave of the future. ~ Lucie Winborne

After reading Permission Granted, I got excited at how the writing world is experiencing a revolutionary shift in power thanks to innovations in technology and self-publishing. With this empowering and thoughtful look at the future of publishing, Christina proves herself once again as an insightful and visionary leader in the writing world. This is a must-read for any professional writer. ~ Christa Melnyk Hines

Between now and the end of 2013, I will be rolling out a series of quote bubbles from Permission Granted, 45 Reasons To Micro-publish.

These quote bubbles are designed to help my fans more easily spread the word about book one of The Future Is Frictionless Series.

I hope that these quotes make you think.

I hope they challenge your assumptions and less examined beliefs, as I am accustomed to challenging my students.

More than anything, I hope they help us all wake up, and embrace a publishing future that is already here.

I have this crazy idea that publishing should be not only manageable for the average writer but also fun and celebratory.

So let the quote party begin! Please do me the favor of pinning these quotes into Pinterest.

Or feel free to grab them and post them wherever you like — in your blog, on social media sites, anywhere!

If you want to make the bubbles link back to me, simply link them back to https://christinakatz.com/. But I am not going to worry about it, since they are already attributed.

Thank you, as always, for your support.

At 1:00 pm Pacific Time today I am launching my latest micro-pub, Permission Granted, 45 Reasons To Micro-publish.

I have been micro-publishing, teaching micro-publishing, and helping to mid-wife micro-pubs into the world with my long-time students for several years now.

The reason I chose to make permission the topic of my first book on micro-publishing is because it has been an issue I have struggled with mightily over the years.

As a three-time traditionally published author, it was not easy for me to allow myself to publish outside the traditional system the first time. Of course, this got easier over the years as book advances plummeted while more and more was expected from authors for less and less.

I think most of us already know that the traditional system is undergoing massive changes, but what concerns me is most aspiring authors don’t seem to understand how much the onus is on them to produce their own success, whether they work with the traditional system or not.

You cannot read Permission Granted without gaining a clear idea of what to expect from a traditional deal vs. micro-publishing your own work. You will also learn important publishing terms and find your micro-publishing concerns addressed whether you are an author already, an aspiring author, or even an aspiring writer.

The benefits of micro-publishing are numerous, so I had no problem coming up with 45 reasons. What’s critical is to understand that a micro-publishing evolution is already coming for publishers of all sizes, whether you get with the program or not. In order for each of us to make the most informed decisions, we need to be informed about the full array of choices that we have.

Micro-publishing is a great way to learn how to treat your writing like a business, how to be in charge of producing your own works, and how to take 100% responsibility for your writing career success — which is something that I have been teaching my entire career.

Anyone who is trying to sell you on the idea of landing a book deal and becoming the famous author you always dreamed of becoming, is doing you and your future readers a dis-service.

Readers should not have to wait for you to become a famous author to hear what you have to say. There are too many things that need to be said today and too many people who are perfectly capable of saying them.

I am not saying that everyone is ready to micro-publish tomorrow. But I am saying that more people are better prepared to micro-publish than they are ready to be discovered by traditional publishing.

I predict that one year from now, micro-publishing will be as common as having a website and the benefits of micro-publishing will be widely known from personal experience.

That’s win-win-win. And win-win-win is the way things ought to be.

Stay tuned! It won’t be long now.