While most writers settle into the comfort of one format, Elizabeth Zelvin explores the contrasting realms of poetry, novels, novellas, short stories, and flash fiction, all of them distinctly different in approach, situation, and writing style. Zelvin even loves writing cross-genre. She shares freely her writing, building a community, and writing tool tips.

Elizabeth Zelvin is the author of two long-running series, the Bruce Kohler Mysteries and the Jewish historical Mendoza Family Saga as well as the Emerald Love urban fantasy mysteries. Her series and standalone short stories appear in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, and Black Cat Mystery Magazine. EQMM has called her "one of our genre's most celebrated short story writers." She currently blogs on SleuthSayers.

In addition to writing fiction, Liz is a poet, a singer-songwriter and a psychotherapist who was one of the pioneers of online mental health. Liz lives in New York City and summers at the unpretentious end of East Hampton, where she swims in the ocean, gardens, photographs the resident hummingbird, and exchanges waves with the occasional whale.

TIMINGS

• 00:40 Welcome and Introduction
• 2:30 When Poetry, Mystery, and Therapy Combine
• 6:00 The Wide-Ranging and Expanding Mendoza Family Saga
• 11:45 Narrative License yet Maintaining Historical Fact
• 14:26 Group Mystery Blogging
• 17:00 Networking and the Short Mystery Fiction Society
• 21:00 Using Track Changes in Word
• 28:45 Correcting Text, Designing Books, and Creating Covers
• 30:45 Cross-Genre Writing
• 35:00 Finding Places to Read Poetry Online
• 37:20 Closing

Total Run Time = 38:26

LINKS

Her website https://www.elizabethzelvin.com/

Poe's Deadly Daughters https://poesdeadlydaughters.blogspot.com/

Short Mystery Fiction Society https://shortmystery.blogspot.com/ and Subscribe to https://shortmystery.groups.io/g/main

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/05/618-writers-on-writing-elizabeth-zelvin.html

Thanks for listening to The Write Focus. We focus on productivity, process, craft, and tools. Our podcast is for newbies who want to become writing pros and veterans who are returning to writing after years away.

Our current focus is Writers on Writing, a series of interviews with active writers on technology, social media, process and productivity, and much more. Here’s a link to the YouTube playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXi3M_aM-d7Kctg7OayipF1tU2xl6TKjy

Support the podcast with a cup of coffee at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/winkbooksr

• You can find workbooks and templates at Buy Me a Coffee. Available is the Enter the Writing Business Workbook and templates from the Discovering Characters
• Available Now: worksheet templates and a video trailer script for Discovering Your Author Brand.

For more links and resources, visit www.thewritefocus.blogspot.com .

Write to us at winkbooks@aol.com.

If you find value in this podcast, please share with your writing friends or write a review. (We’re small beans. We don’t have the advertising budget of the big peeps. You can make a difference.)

Pamela Ebel offers a wealth of wisdom in this interview for our writer-focused series. She pursues writing with the drive and curiosity and wit that she devoted to her previous careers.

Ebel has been published in Shotgun Honey, YELLOW MAMA EZINE, Kings River Life Magazine, The BOULD AWARDS 2020 and 2021 Anthology, Tomorrow and Tomorrow 2021 Anthology, and other venues. Her poetry has appeared in the Delta Poetry Review. A native of California, she now concentrates on tales from her original home state and tales from the highways of the South. She also knows, like the Ancient Greeks and the Irish, that as a Southern writer you can’t outrun your blood.

She has turned to writing full time as of 2020, obviously either perfect or bizarre timing, and this will be her fifth career. She lives in Metairie, Louisiana, with her husband and two cats.

TIMINGS

• 00:40 Welcome / Introduction
• 6:25 Writing for the Love of It
• 8:45 The Money that Writers Make
• 11:35 Treat Writing as a Business
• 14:35 Connecting with other Writers / SMART Plan
• 18:12 Submission Guidelines / the Shunn Format
• 23:40 Writing Tools
• 26:15 Traditional vs Self-Publishing / Writing is Competitive
• 28:15 Short Story Advantages / Opening up Creativity
• 33:30 Building the Writing Resumé
• 36:36 Last Words / Closing

Total Run Time: 38:47

LINKS

The Shunn MS Format https://www.shunn.net/format/

Pamela Ebel https://pamebel.com/

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/04/617-writers-on-writing-pamela-ebel.html

Charlotte Morganti uses a variety of tech, tracking her words, editing to improve those words, and formatting, all the way into marketing and newsletters. She shares tech helps, including ones that I haven’t heard of, as well as her journey into indie writing and publishing.

Before turning to writing award-winning mysteries, Charlotte Morganti was, at various times, a burger flipper, a beer slinger, and a corporate finance/mining lawyer.

Her novels and short stories range from gritty investigations to lighter capers. She usually sets her stories in small towns that miraculously harbor both villains and the sleuths who pursue them. Find out more at https://charlottemorganti.com.

TIMINGS

00:40 Welcome / Introduction

03:05 Morganti’s Writing Journey

07:05 Going Indie

13:09 Tech and the Writing Basics

16:25 Editing Helps

21:15 Vellum / Atticus

22:55 Tracking Progress

23:40 Marketing Tech

27:45 Newsletters

30:35 Her Releases this Spring

33:08 Closing

Total Run Time = 34:08

LINKS

Morganti’s site https://charlottemorganti.com.

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/04/616-writers-on-writing-charlotte.html

Thanks for listening to The Write Focus. We focus on productivity, process, craft, and tools. Our podcast is for newbies who want to become writing pros and veterans who are returning to writing after years away.

Our current focus is Writers on Writing, a series of interviews with active writers on technology, social media, process and productivity, and much more. Here’s a link to the YouTube playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXi3M_aM-d7Kctg7OayipF1tU2xl6TKjy

Support the podcast with a cup of coffee at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/winkbooksr

• You can find workbooks and templates at Buy Me a Coffee. Available is the Enter the Writing Business Workbook and templates from the Discovering Characters
• Available Now: worksheet templates and a video trailer script for Discovering Your Author Brand.

For more links and resources, visit www.thewritefocus.blogspot.com .

Write to us at winkbooks@aol.com.

If you find value in this podcast, please share with your writing friends or write a review. (We’re small beans. We don’t have the advertising budget of the big peeps. You can make a difference.)