Hi again! Sorry, I’m late posting this because I had the worst trilogy of days EVER at the end of last week and couldn’t get to the computer to let you know, but Holly’s How To Revise Your Novel course is OPEN!! It’s closing on December 15 at 11:59pm US EST, so you have a […]
Wish You Could Take Your Novel From Drab To Fab In ONE Editing Pass? Read More »
One of the most commonly asked questions I get in my creative writing classes at school is how to get through middles. People get beginnings and endings intuitively, but the Middle Doldrums is where a lot of new (and not-so-new) writers have trouble. I struggled with middles for years and years, though many novels and
#WritingWorkshop Beat Sheets: A Map Through The Doldrums Read More »
Just a quick announcement that in about 30 hours, Holly Lisle’s biggest course, How To Think Sideways, will close registration for the rest of the year. She’s been making noises for a while now about moving her big courses to once-a-year-only registration, and that time is here. The cons: You only get a limited time
Last Chance For Think Sideways Writing Course Until 2016 Read More »
Urgh. Doing the last little bit of research for #FGU (more properly known as From The Ground Up: Building A World That Works) and I’ve been doing a bit of comparative work with some of the other worldbuilding books that are out there – and trust me, there are surprisingly few, which is why I
You Can’t Just Cut And Paste! Read More »
1) Panic, because the book was supposed to be YA. 2) Research the heck out of the difference between MG and YA. Some good starting points are here, here, here and here (this one may contain ‘language’). 3) Ask for a bunch of volunteers to read the book for you. Look for volunteers who read MG
What To Do When You Accidentally Wrote An MG Book Read More »
Click on the image for the Tumblr post that has a link to awesome resources at the bottom. Read more:Everything You Wanted To Know About Book SalesCommitment (Repost)How To Build A World From The Ground Up Week 5: Hot and Cold, Wet and Dry
So You Want To Get Published? Read More »
A lot of writers unfortunately aren’t really aware of the impact that scene endings can make, and if they are, it’s often in an implicit, intuitive sort of way. A few years ago, I devised this example as a way of teaching scene breaks to students, and some of my writing friends found it helpful.
The Impact of Scene Endings: A Writing Workshop Read More »
The twinny one, Liana Brooks, has an awesome article up on the Critique Circle blog about prepping for NaNoWriMo. Somewhat conveniently, it’s also generally applicable to writing a novel, and is more or less something like the process she and I actually follow when plotting novels. Definitely worth a read, particularly if you’re a writer
On Prepping for NaNoWriMo (And Novel-Writing Generally) Read More »
So you’re reading along in your story, and you think things are going great. You even make it all the way to the end, and there was just that one typo that needed fixing. The plot makes sense, it’s kind of funny, and now, it’s cleanly written. No flab, no superfluous anything. It’s great.So off
Captain Obvious (On Editing Your Own Work) (Repost) Read More »
Long-time readers will know that I am a BIG fan of author Holly Lisle’s various how-to-write courses. I have literally taken every single course that she has ever offered, and her method of teaching just really gels with the way that I learn, and the way that I write. To me, it’s intuitive, flexible and
How To Write A Series Read More »
