Don’t you wish you had more time to capture readers than the first chapter? #amwriting Click To Tweet In the old days, that was the case. Back when Trollop and Jane Austen were writing, they had at least two chapters before readers gave up on them. Many of today’s literary writers have the luxury of […]
People People Your Books–Eyes Wide Open!
One of the best habits you can cultivate as a writer is the power of observation. People all around you give you amazing content. Whether it’s the obnoxious barista that won’t even look at you or the friendly cashier at the local market. Everyone you encounter provide a wonderful panoply of characterizations. The only thing […]
8 Tips for Participating in a Blog Tour
One of the most important things you can do to get the word out about your book is a Blog Tour #bookmarketing Click To Tweet The more blogs that highlight your book, the better. Think about it. All blogs have a following. It may be a small following, but it consists of people you would […]
Creating a Narcissistic Personality When Creating Villains
Many of the villains in the books I read are narcissistic personalities #writingvillains #amwriting Click To Tweet These are people who display a lot of cunning and very little empathy. They may appear as sociopaths, but their tendency to want recognition for their bad behavior suggests a tendency toward a narcissistic personality type. The Norwegian […]
Five Tips for Character Development
As writers we are fascinated with people. Why? Our characters reflect real people. As such, they must act in realistic ways. We can’t have them do things that are “out of character.” We can dig deep inside ourselves and our experiences to create the people who fill our books or we can use other methods. […]
How do you know when you’re done?
Artists tell me it’s hard to know when a painting is finished. One told me that if she works on a painting for too long, she ruins it. This reminds me of my writing. I tweak and tweak and then tweak some more. Was it better before the last tweak or after the first tweak? […]
Tips for Underwriting your Overwriting
As a writer who creates something from nothing, I often catch myself overwriting. If you are a big name writer, editors leave your overwriting in your books and readers learn to skim and sigh. If you’re not so famous, you must catch your own overwriting and learn to under write. By under write, I mean […]
What to do When You’ve Run Out of Things to Say
Here I am facing another Wednesday and time to publish a new post. I’ve written about writing fiction and nonfiction. I’ve looked at the way authors develop their characters and come up with character names. I’ve examined the pros and cons for pantser styles and outliner styles. I’ve looked at grammar issues and non issues. […]
5 Tips for Eliminating Redundancy in Writing
How many times do readers need to be told something? #amwriting Click To Tweet Not long ago I read a novel in which one of the male characters had long eyelashes. In the author’s first description of the character, we heard about the long eyelashes. Later, we heard about them again in dialogue. In fact, […]
3 Tips for Creating Suspense
As a reader, I love being in #suspense #amwriting Click To Tweet I’m to the kind of reader, however, who avoids too much suspense–meaning, if it gets too scary, I’m outta there. Granted some readers love that kind of heightened suspense, but me, I like enough to keep me turning the pages without so much […]
