If you’re writing a book with multiple viewpoints, sometimes it can be confusing to figure out who’s story this is. You may have a character that’s fun to write, or one that feels like they should be the protagonist based on genre conventions. But are they really the best choice to serve your story? You […]
When we’re talking fiction writing, what really is narrative? It’s everything that isn’t action and isn’t dialogue. Which means it’s the glue that holds it all together. More directly, narrative is how we help the reader interpret the action and the dialogue. We given them context on the history between two given characters – or […]
Are you ready for a new writing adventure and some new writing challenges? So excited about the new series of classes I’m doing for UTA Continuing Education this fall. There was such an overwhelming positive response to the Novel 1-2-3 classes that they’ve decided to test out Novel 4-5-6. If you have some writing experience, […]
I’m doing a query clinic next month, and today I’m trying to turn my time in the query trenches, and all the lessons I learned the hard way, and those I learned from critiquing other people’s queries, into a concise, helpful Power Point. Getting it right means a lot to me, because queries are make […]
I know they said not to take selfies with bears . . . One of the hardest things about humor writing is giving your reader permission to laugh. After all, you’re putting your protagonist in embarrassing, and sometimes physically painful, situations. The last think your audience is going to want is to feel mean for […]
“If there’s a book you really want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” – Toni Morrison With Free Chocolate coming out TOMORROW, I’ve been thinking a lot about that quote. If it wasn’t my series, The Chocoverse would still be exactly the kind of thing I’d jump to […]
“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.” ― Stephen King “It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it.” — Oscar Wilde “I cannot remember the books I’ve read any […]
This whole month, I want to talk about the relationship between writing and reading. I’ve talked to so many writers who say they don’t read inside their own genre because they’re afraid of copying someone else’s idea. (More on this later – I’m planning an entire post on genre as a conversation.) Or they don’t […]
In 1863 Gustov Freytag, first known as a playwright and later a novelist, published Die Technik des Dramas. (Released in English much later as Freytag’s Technique of the Drama: An Exposition of Dramatic Composition and Art.) While his novels reflected some of the ugliness and turbulence of the time in which he was writing, the […]
I just want to offer a quick public service announcement. Writers, is your work backed up somewhere? If no: rectify that immediately. I know you never think a computer crash is going to happen to you, but everyone thinks that until it happens to them. Even new computers can have bad hard drives (I actually […]
