I had two choices, and neither guaranteed my safety. Crouching beside a tree, I let the crickets’ song ease my nerves. I knew taking the stone pathway to the river would leave me with no immediate cover, but the other option was a route through the woods where I might Read more…
You have a website built, but now you need to put information on it. Start simple and work your way into more content as you progress in your career. You’ll need to set up a homepage, an about page, a contact page, and a place to sign up for your Read more…
Some of you are saying, “I don’t even have a book done yet.” Exactly. If you’re serious about publishing books, you need to get your name out now. Marketing is the only way you will get your books to sell. No time is too soon to get a website. You Read more…
We’ve covered first person and third person omniscient POVs; now it’s time for third person limited narration. This is narrating a story in third person but limiting it to only one perspective at a time. When you’re in a person’s viewpoint, you can only tell what that person sees, does, Read more…
Last week we discussed first person POV, and this week we are going to focus on third person omniscient narration. This is when you narrate a story from an outside perspective as if you’re watching a play on stage. It’s a bit like playing god. You can jump to any Read more…
One of the biggest problems writers have is point of view (POV) errors. Every story is narrated from a perspective. It can be an uninvolved narrator, the main character, or several characters; but POV must be consistent throughout the book. There are three main POVs: first person, third person omniscient, Read more…
Writing groups, also called critique groups, are indispensable for a writer. It’s where you gather with other passionate writers and critique each other’s work. Everyone has a different reason to join one, but it’s important to know how to find a writing group and how to be a beneficial part Read more…
The biggest question when it comes to dialogue is: how do you make dialogue realistic? I’m going on the record telling you that this is the wrong question for a new writer to ask. What you need to learn, and what the pros already know, is how to make dialogue Read more…
We already talked about dialogue tags, but what if you don’t want to repeat “he said” and “she said” a million times? This is where action beats come in handy. Action beats are sentences that break up dialogue and describe the character and setting in more detail. It’s a more Read more…
You’ve been writing for a while now, and you think you have a handle on it. Maybe you‘ve shared some of your work with someone, and maybe you haven’t. Either way, I guarantee you are making some of these amateur mistakes. How do I know that? Experience. When I started Read more…