Piecing Together Your Writing Future
Voice is imperative. It’s essential. It is everything. It is quite possible to have one of the greatest storylines ever created, the vast lands, the adorable and lovable characters, the perfect plot twists and the greatest ending ever penned by...
Old houses make great inspiration. Allow me to tell you a little tale. A personal experience of sorts, if you will. Following a government-backed reason for having to leave the UK, I find myself sleeping on the floor in a...
Research is touchy. Especially for writers. Women don’t like to feel made a fool of, or gullible. Men know everything and want to prove it. Readers, in general, don’t like being data dumped upon. There is a fine line between...
Almost the end of yet another month! I don’t know about you, buy March has crawled by and seemingly lasted for at least a full year or two. I am glad to see the back end of it. With that...
Hemingway Said, You Do Not Talk About Writing Rule number one: You do not talk about writing. Rule number two: You do NOT talk about writing! I always picture Brad Pitt walking around telling a group of authors all the...
Not One to Believe Fear in Dreams, I Find Myself Wondering Eleven minutes ago, I was fast asleep. Cozy, comfortable, and snuggled down in a blanket (with one leg hanging out). Ten minutes ago, I was rudely awoken, and now...
If there is one thing that every single writer faces it is the blank page. We can’t help but come across it. Every new project starts the same way: a new, shiny, blank page. Sometimes, we writers sit there, staring...
Story Arc and Archetype, Explained Today I will discuss story arc and story archetype. Wait. I hear you say. Aren’t they the same thing? I mean, arc is just an abbreviation of archetype, right? Well… no. They do have some...
What a long and crazy week this has been. I am glad it’s ove… what? It’s only Tuesday? That doesn’t bode well. Well, we take what we are given and we make the best of it, right? So, here we...
Over the weekend, we covered a couple of aspects of point of view. One had you start to think like another person, and the other showed you how important POV can be to your story. I was going to continue...
If you are pondering using a character-driven plot in your story, you have come to the right place. If you don’t know what the writing types are; you have come to the right place. Also, if you are looking for...
Do You Need A Beta Reader? No. You Need a Team of Beta Readers! Games have testers, books have readers. The idea behind them is the same: find a problem before it’s sent out for the masses. Beta-readers are the...
Chapter Length, Does it Matter? I ask myself this often. How long should a chapter be? Is there an optimal chapter length? The true answer is that there is no answer. The truth is realized when you understand… there is...
The blog post titled “How Going Outside Will Make Your Book Better” is now a guest blog post for Between The Lines. You can find the blog and all of it’s wonderful information on the BTL website by following this...
Welcome to a new month! A month of clock movement, warmer weather (hopefully) and writing a lot more words on your WiP. To start off the month, I want to begin at the ending. Essentially, we will talk about endings...
As a writer I have seen and heard it all. Everything from the mundane stereotypes all the way to the awkward assumptions. As a reader, I have read it all. Just like in movies, in a book everything has been...
Hannah Bauman is a professional, freelance literary editor. She is responsible for editing more books than I can count. Hannah was kind enough to take time out of her busy schedule to provide you with a fantastic Q&A session for...
This week (so far) I’ve asked you to write about dystopian worlds. First, we concentrated on the aftermath of what caused the dystopia, then we worked towards turning things around and building a utopia. Today, the lesson is in-line with...
A new work week has begun and it is time to turn off your work brain and get back into the writing frame of mind. Last week we covered narrative arcs in detail and created an exciting story line full...
The Rough Draft is a Perfect Draft, for What it is Is your rough draft perfect? Of course it is! Most writers think of the rough draft as the start, but it begins far sooner than that. Every writer is...
Word Count Goals and How to Make Them It’s all around you as a writer: set your word count goals and stick to them. Writing goals, words per day goals, hours per session goals, and on and on and Scooby...
There are a couple of adages running around the writer’s community. “If you want to write better; read a lot.” Also, “if you want to write better, write a lot.“ “Write every day.” That is what they tell you. The...
Why name your characters? Characters aren’t just some random made-up beings that do our bidding. Okay, so they truly are. The problem is a lot of writers out there treat them as such. Doing so makes them unbelievable. Just like...
What do I mean, “Knowing Your Characters?” Have you ever watched a movie and cried when a character gave a long, emotional speech, or when two characters finally realize they are meant for each other and hug and kiss? Knowing your...
As we gear up for the weekend, let’s see if we can’t start something new. All this week we have worked on prompts that help us build and perfect scenes. We capped it off with a post all about setting...
Setting the scene is as important as creating real-to-life characters. It is an art form and you are the artist. As an artist, we have a plethora of ways to interact with those that wish to be entertained. We act,...
Creating characters isn’t just about putting a name to some random text speaking entity. As the author, you play God. You breathe life into these paper dolls. More goes into even that though, at least for me. When I first...
Today we mark the half-way point of the month! Congratulations on making it this far into the new year. I hope that you are still working on your goals, resolutions, plans or whatever changes you told yourself you would make...
The weekend is coming and it is time to start thinking about your stories. One of the most difficult things to do when writing is to build your scene. Scene building is actually a simple thing. You have a character...
First and foremost, please forgive any semblance of attitude this post may bear. I have been taken out of my sorts by a recent article I read about writer’s block. In short: it pissed me off. I will not link...
Shall we continue our New Year’s tradition with the 11th writing prompt of the year? Yes! Okay, then. This lesson is geared to ALL writing types. I don’t care if it is poetry, copywriting, novels, those notes you make on...
As writers, we tend to have this belief in ourselves that can only come from the inside. It is a great thing. That little voice inside that tells us “You can do it, this is fantastic, keep going!” It’s that...
For the 10th, the writing prompt will focus more to the screenwriter. However, the novelist will get a good challenge from it, too. One disadvantage that screenwriters face (compared to novelists), is that they have a much more limited area...
Literary agents, publishers, editors, synopses, query letters… all scary things, all demanding, demeaning. Sometimes they can be daunting, haunting, loathing as well as loathed. Oftentimes heartbreaking, disconcerting, dispiriting. None of them hold a candle to yourself. You truly are your...
Where did The Extra Draft Writing Course come from? Here is a brief history of its conception through today (Plus a BONUS SURPRISE announcement!!). Are you ready to get personal? It All Started About 10 Years Ago… It all started...
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