Enjoy this guest blog by Chris Hoole!

You may have dreamed of being paid to write, but the reality might not live up to your expectations. Yes writing is a wonderful career to choose and it has many benefits such as being able to work from home, having the chance to write about things you love and being paid for being creative but there are down sides too and knowing how to work through these negatives can help to ensure you create great content even if your heart isn’t in it.

More Facts than Fiction

Writing for a living doesn’t necessarily mean you are able to write stories all day. In truth most writers working from home find they are constantly writing for companies who are looking to market their business online or through printed materials. If you write for a company who specialising in products you love this can be great fun, but many business out there will be marketing services and some of these can be completely out of your comfort zone, which can make writing turn from a pleasure into a chore.

Set Your Writing Free

If you have been educated in creative writing you can help to remain fresh and in love with your job by using some of the common exercises that help creative juices flow.  Free writing is a great exercise that can help you come up with ideas for topics you are uncomfortable with. Write down anything you want about the topic, you could end up with questions that inspire your next posts and then it is down to you to find out the answers and write the piece aimed at people like you who know little about the subject. Offering advice and answering questions is a great way of building a valuable blog or viable article that can really help optimise websites.

Watching people is also beneficial to writers and something that can constantly prove to be useful. Although it is rude to eavesdrop if you are in a café or waiting for a bus listen to the conversations around you. Learn what makes people tick, listen out for opinions and study the body language of those around you. While this may not help directly with your tedious writing task you can find it is useful to put yourself in the mind of the audience you are writing for.

Research and Read

If you have a regular client who wants unique content on a topic you don’t feel passionate about it is a good idea to spend time researching. By reading great blog posts, news articles and visiting similar websites you can quickly educate yourself on the basics, and from their your knowledge will be given a chance to grow. Sign up to newsletters, take advantage of free eBooks and use your time to learn something new. You may discover you do have an interest for the subject after all. This is one area that really helps me to stay in love with writing, I constantly learn new things and I enjoy finding a passion for something I felt nothing for previously.

Get Away from it All

Some days the brain will simply refuse to play ball, and on those days it is better to leave the page empty and get out of the house. Going for a walk or browsing in shops can help to reenergise your brain, plus you never know when inspirations will strike. When you go out always take a pen and paper, iPad or phone that allows you to add notes. That way if an idea does come into your mind, and it probably will, you have the ability to write it down and use it later.

These methods are used by many copywriters who remain passionate about each job they are working on. Find the passion in your writing to produce your best work.

If you have yet to hear about print on demand, you are missing out on a great feature. Print on demand is a relatively new printing technology. Instead of printing a large quantity of books, pamphlets, brochures, etc. all at once and risking having a ton of inventory left over, print on demand only prints those items needed during the time of the order.

For example, let’s say that you’re a new author who just wrote a book. Rather than pay to have millions of copies of your book printed, you can use print on demand. If you are using a website to promote your book, you simply set up the ordering process with the printer. Once an order comes through, your book will be printed and sent to the customer. This allows printing to be done one at a time instead of in bulk.

So what are the benefits of this technology versus older technologies?

1. It’s cheaper.

Having a million copies of one item printed would cost a fortune. And if you weren’t able to sell all of the copies you printed, you would be stuck paying for them out of your own pocket. With print on demand, you are only paying to print the items you need based on orders. For example, if you had an order of 10 books, only 10 books would be printed, saving you a fortune, and allowing your profits to pay for the printing of the book.

2. It allows authors to become published.

There are many aspiring writers out there with great stories to tell, but unfortunately they don’t have the resources to pay for the publishing and printing fees. With print on demand, independent authors can now become published authors through the use of print on demand. This technology does not require any financial risk, so if the author’s book is unsuccessful, they won’t end up losing all of their savings.

3. No more dealing with an agent.

By using print on demand, you can opt to print the book yourself, which means that you will not have to hire an agent to push your book out to multiple publishing companies. This will save a great deal of money, and it will also ensure that your book is published more quickly than it would be using a traditional agent.

4. Creative Control

When you have an agent, you are forced into making their changes in order to have the book published. With print on demand, you have total control over what is said in your book, how the cover looks, how many pages there are and the names of each character, amongst other things.

If print on demand sounds like something that interests you, be sure to do your research and find a company that you like. Each printing company may do things a bit differently than others, and it’s a great idea to be partnered with a company you enjoy working with.

George Simmons lives in Miami.  He likes to write in his spare time and has recently been telling others about the best Florida printing companies.

Enjoy this fun post! I grew up on the movie Psycho and totally agree that there’s a creepy element about hotels that movie-makers have exploited (much to everyone’s delight!).

What is it about a remote hotel setting that compounds the terror in a horror movie? Could it be those corridors, the length of 20 football fields that are seemingly the only avenue of escape from unspeakable horror, but always have a really unpleasant surprise lurking at each end? Is it those closed doors that lead off of a dimly lit hotel corridor behind which anything may be lurking? Fear of the unknown is part of the human condition and having movie characters battle monsters in unfamiliar surroundings adds disorientation to terror. These are not exclusively budget hotels as one might think: Horror haunts the most hallowed of halls.

The 1960’s film, Psycho is a horror classic and has all the elements that make terror so tantalisingly terrible. A young woman on the run after stealing $40,000 chooses to hide out at the isolated Bates Motel that sits vulture-like atop a craggy hill similar in setting to Dracula’s castle, and seeming to rely entirely on a sinister looking moon for lighting. To have someone else go where no sensible coward has gone before and then have our cowardice justified when they are horribly mutilated, somehow reaffirms our self-esteem. This lady gets exactly what this thoroughly creepy motel suggested she would.

The number 13 features in two of the scariest movie hotels and one would think that this alone would give reason enough for pause. The Dolphin Hotel, and in particular room 1408 (adds up to 13 as if Stephen King didn’t know and maliciously assign anyway), is the scene of unrestricted evil gone berserk. Again, a supposedly intelligent individual who is the author of 3 successful non-fiction works based on the paranormal, checks into this notoriously haunted room simply because he has a sudden attack of conscience: He doesn’t actually believe that the paranormal exists and therefore feels like a fraud. The terror of this hotel is that life goes on as normal in the rest of the establishment, while demonic chaos very loudly reigns in that room only. A similar scenario erupts at the Wessex Hotel in the movie, Nightmare on the 13th floor. Guests mysteriously disappear and a reporter who is writing a review takes it upon herself to investigate. The discovery of an unmarked 13th floor immediately kills any intelligence she possesses and she sallies forth unhindered by common sense or travel companions. Some Gothic decorative touches really should have given her some indication of the satanic cult that resides on this floor.

Isolation from the comfort of a crowd also turns The Overlook Hotel in the 1980 film, The Shining, into nightmare accommodation. Long, deserted and eerily quiet corridors will soon explode with the sound of doors being hacked down as a previously sane father attempts to decimate his family with an axe while demonic forces seen only by his young son, write strange messages in blood on the walls. Lonely halls in a murky establishment that is thankfully about to close make The Yankee Pedlar hotel from the movie, The Innkeepers a place to be avoided. Evil manifests here as sound as two employees at the establishment attempt to record the ghosts who have supposedly taken up residence.

The Pinewood Motel from the movie, Vacancy continues the classic horror pattern. A car breaks down and a couple are forced to book into a room that has hidden cameras galore and knife wielding psychopaths watching. Isolation is complete as no cell-phone towers exist. Horror Hotel features a young student doing research into witchcraft with similar results to Psycho. In all cases separation from the comfort of company is what makes these hotels the terrifying residences that they are.

Amy writes about movies and works for Deal Zippy – the hotel deals website.

My husband and our kids from last fall.

You know what’s funny? A lot of people who see the title of this blog will think that I put it there with a sarcastic tone. You all know the one I’m talking about, right? A woman rolls her eyes and says “Men.” in a very condescending manner and everyone grunts or chuckles in agreement.

Well, those moments are certainly valid in certain scenarios, but that’s not where I’m going today. Since Father’s Day is coming up, I just wanted to write about how much men do for us.

I just want men out there to know that they are appreciated. It’s hard to be a good father, and for those of you who make a valiant effort to be there for your children, those said efforts don’t go unnoticed.

My mom was single and raised us. I did see my dad on a regular basis, so I can’t relate to those who don’t have a father in their life, but I think we all turn out just fine if we don’t have a male role model in our lives. However, having a positive relationship with a father figure can make a world of difference for children. It helps them to feel loved, have confidence, and gives them essential coping skills for life. The role of fatherhood is very important and I’m grateful to all those men out there who take their role seriously.

I know of plenty of stories of men dealing with wives who are being irrational for one reason or another. I wonder if they get credit for being able to handle those situations. I mean, let’s face it ladies, we are scary when we’re feeling emotional!

Sometimes I wonder how my marriage survived the pregnancies. I’m generally a level-headed kind of person. Even when I feel emotional, I can usually talk my way into calm if I can logically explain something to myself. But I was a totally different person when I was pregnant. It’s quite embarrassing to look back and see how I reacted to some things. It was like another person had control over my emotions.

Boy, am I glad that stage of life is over for me (and I daresay my husband is too!). But I’m very grateful to my husband for trying to be so understanding, even when I didn’t understand what had me so upset myself.

I know my kids are grateful that their dad takes the time to play with them when he gets home from work. I know he’s probably tired and would love to just sit back and relax when he’s home, but he finds the energy from somewhere to chase after the kids and wrestle with them. It’s so sweet to watch, plus it gives me a little break. 🙂

I know that there are plenty of men out there who do the same for their kids, and I hope they all know what an amazing gift they are giving. Their kids are going to grow up feeling loved. It can’t get any better than that.