As I’m getting ready to finish my manuscript and send it out into the world, I’m gathering all the information I need for querying agents. One of the most popular questions agents ask is: Who is your audience? If you Read more…
Line editing is the last layer of edits an author should do before handing off their manuscript to an editor. You should do these edits when you think your story is the best it can be and are ready to Read more…
Last week I shared my process on rewrites, and this week I want to move on to content edits. These are still major edits, but they can be addressed on a chapter-by-chapter basis since they deal more with scene edits Read more…
I’ve been wading through editing for a while now, and I’ve developed three types of edit rounds I do for my books. These don’t include any edits that come from editors but are what I do myself before showing my Read more…
Let’s talk about defining your writing. I don’t mean genre, style, voice, or any of those other craft-imposed definitions. This post is about what you want to be known for in your writing. What will readers say about your stories? Read more…
People say setting, character, and plot are the three main aspects of stories, but I want to point out the ugly stepsister in the corner. Exposition. It gets a bad reputation in the writing world, and that’s because most don’t Read more…
The basic triad of writing a tale is setting, character, and plot. Without all of these you cannot write a complete story. The point is to transport readers to another world and make them fall in love with it. Each Read more…
Already we’ve covered character voice and narrator voice, and now it’s time for the last post of the series—writer’s voice. This is the voice that is woven throughout your entire collection of writings. It’s the voice that publishers and agents Read more…
Last week I went over creating distinct character voices for your story, and now we will look at narrator voice. This one is not often addressed since it can be a combination of character voice and writer voice, but there Read more…
If I had to name one topic about writing that is the most mentioned and the least quantifiable, it’s voice. Publishers want a unique writer voice. Agents look for distinct character voices. Readers dislike reading abrasive narrator voices. On an Read more…