Kindle Free Pick of the Week: The Writer's Idea Book

It’s a question that plagues every writer. And once you’ve got an idea, what then? Ideas without a plan, without a purpose, are no more than pleasant thoughts. So how do you come up with those ideas, and how do you turn them into writing that will engage your reader?

The Writer’s Idea Book is here to help you find the answers. Utilizing more than 400 prompts and exercises, you’ll generate intriguing ideas and plumb their possibilities to turn them into something amazing. This indispensable guide will help you:

• Develop good writing habits that foster creativity
• Explore your own life for writing material
• Draw inspiration from the world around you
• Find form for your ideas, develop them into a piece of writing, and make them better

Let The Writer’s Idea Book give you the insight and self-awareness to create and refine ideas that demand to be transformed into greater works, the kind of compelling, absorbing writing that will have other writers asking "where do you get your ideas?"

A great free pick this week.

Company Mistakenly Fires All 1,300 Employees

A British company sent and email to all 1,300 employees lettign them kknow that they were fired, when the email was intended for only one worker.

Aviva Investors' human resources department realized its mistake and recalled the offending message 25 minutes later and soon afterwards sent out another email apologizing to staff for the error.

An email which was intended for a member of staff who was leaving today was accidentally sent to all Aviva Investors staff worldwide, a company spokesperson stated.

"People were pretty quickly aware of the fact that this was a mistake ... I don't believe any of our staff would have seen it really as anything other than the mistake that it was," the spokesperson added.

The email was a standard message sent to people leaving the company, covering things such as handing back company equipment and confidentiality rules.

It was reported weeks ago that Aviva would shed about 160 jobs in a cost-cutting move.

Pictures from the 2012 NCAA Women's Gymnastics Championships - Floor

In theory, the floor exercise should be the easiest of all four events.  It's just a gymnast, some music and a padded floor.

But it's not that simple and sometimes gymnasts put too much pressure on themselves to score high on the floor that things can go wrong.

Floor exercise warm up

Drag Racer Lizzy Musi Crashes and Takes Out the Camera at Bristol

Female drag racer Lizzy Musi gets airborne in the third qualifying session of Summit Racing Top Sportsman at the 2012 ADRL Spring Drags III at Bristol Dragway and takes out a camera as she hits and goes over the wall.

She was fine and walked away from the incident.

New Book Dishes on Simon Cowell

We know he has a big ego and I can imagine he is hard to deal with, but a new unauthorized biography reveals more details about the man behind "American Idol" and X-Factor".

Sweet Revenge: The Intimate Life of Simon Cowell" is written by British journalist and biographer Tom Bower, whose previous works include books about former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, jailed media mogul Conrad Black and ex-Harrods owner Mohammad al-Fayed.

The book paints a picture of a man who struggled for years in the music business, spurred on to success out of a desire to prove his detractors wrong.

"He had 20 years — more than 20 years — of humiliation," Bower said. "At school he was a total failure and as a music producer he was a total failure.

Among the details Bower reveals: Cowell gets regular colonic irrigations because "it's so cleansing — and it makes my eyes shine brighter." He is put on a drip of vitamins and nutrients for a half hour each week.

He's not gay, despite long-standing rumors. The book reveals bedroom secrets including a brief affair with former "X Factor" judge Danii Minogue. But Bower says that Cowell isn't interested in serious relationships.

Cowell is, however, generous. Bower says Cowell gave his ex-fiance Mezhgan Hussainy, a makeup artist on "American Idol," a $5 million Beverly Hills house as a parting gift. Most of his former girlfriends have refrained from spilling the beans in the media.

Bower, though, thinks the book's portrait of Cowell is fairly positive.

While Bower has been openly hostile to some of his previous subjects — he called Gordon Brown a ruthless bully and Conrad Black a crook — he has a soft spot for Cowell.

"He's not a crook," Bower said. "So far he hasn't sued me. And it was good fun.

And this book looks like a lot of fun.

Here's where you can buy it: