First, I want to wish Brittany Landgrebe get well soon!

Well, it is finally summertime!  Do you have your summer reading list ready?  Yeah, me neither.  I have been considering re-reading The Lord of the Rings, and I do have a couple of non-fiction books from a used bookstore stacked up and awaiting my attention.  But, no solid plans.

But, how about this idea: instead of committing to a few buzz-worthy novels, we could instead focus on reading a lot of short stories in magazines.  Anyone up for this challenge?

And now, on to the links!

♥ Bethany Wiggins at Shooting Stars discusses the female hero.

♥ Juliette Wade of Talk To YoUniverse discusses how to handle a caste system in your fictional world.

♥ Author Judith Jance shares her thoughts on book clubs at the Seattle City Brights blog, including this gem:

“Our book club only reads IMPORTANT books or LITERARY FICTION,” both of which I translate to mean the literary equivalent of Castor Oil. Maybe the books they read aren’t fun or easy to swallow, but THEY’RE GOOD FOR YOU!

♥ Becky Levine discusses her hatred love (love?!) of the one-page query.

♥ Cassandra Jade gives us Five Reasons You Shouldn’t Write When You’re Tired.

♥ Jade Smith teaches us the Dos & Don’ts of fire-breathing critique.

♥ And finally, Suzannah Freeman at Write It Sideways asks the magic question: how do you know if your writing is good enough?