How to Use Emotions to Create Stronger Descriptions and Setting
Today we’re doing things a little bit differently. Twice a week, I like to send out writing tips that will help you improve your writing, but I’m not the only one with knowledge to share. Jenn Gott is an indie author and a writer with Reedsy (a publishing company that connects new authors with the […]
Facing Burnout
Many authors don’t believe that there is such a thing as “Writer’s Block.” They will gleefully point out that plumbers don’t have plumber’s block, and doctors don’t have doctor’s block. But the truth is that they do have it, but simply call it by other names. They might call it a “midlife crisis,” “stress,” or […]
Build a Better Battering Ram
“When do I begin approaching agents?” I get that question at least once a week, and my answer is always the same: “When your novel is done. And by that I mean, well done!” I think that it is human nature to be eager. When we are working on a novel, and we’re excited about […]
Showing, Telling, Making
New writers are often told, “Show, don’t tell.” Normally this piece of advice is given when a writer gives a vague description. He might say, “Rhonda looked tired.” A good reader will wonder about that. There are varying degrees of tiredness. Does the writer mean that the character had a blank expression on her face, […]
Stale Voices
Recently, I was reading a thriller by a bestselling author I’ve long been a fan of and I found a problem: the characters pretty much all sounded the same. The main character sounded an awful lot like the detective, who sounded like the corporate executive, who sounded like the author as the narrator and so […]
Once More, with Feeling!
I used to coach my daughter Danielle in acting. She’d get a casting call for a movie or television role, and we’d look at the script and try to figure out what it was that the director would want. If it was a Disney movie, they might want one style of acting, while a dramatic […]
Turning Points
In every story there are turning points, moments in time where the characters are forced into a new course of action and thus get unexpected results. Turning points may be simple or complex, mundane or magical. For example, you might have a character who is driving home from work, and he sees police cars on […]
Avoiding Clutter
Each quarter as I go through the stories for the Writers of the Future Contest, I search for patterns to problems. This quarter I saw that we had far more fantasy than ever before—particularly modern fairytales. That’s not a problem, really, just an observation. I’m seeing more really good stories than ever before, but I […]
Creating Obstacles for Your Character
Let’s say I have a young woman. Her name is Kate, and she must get to Tabith. What kinds of obstacles might she face? Here are thirteen types of obstacles. Intellectual obstacles. She might not know where Tabith is. Perhaps its location is secret, and one must first solve a mystery in order to get […]
Accepting Responsibility for Your Titles
It’s fairly common for editors to want to change titles. Sometimes a title might be too much like that of another book. For example, one of my novels had the working title of Berserker Prime. I turned it in without realizing that Fred Saberhagen had used the same title five years previous. This kind of […]