I chose this month's first page to explain writing tight. I am a 'spare writer', meaning that I cut every unnecessary word, so the read is fast and easy. If a word doesn't tell the reader something they don't know in a compelling way, out it goes. I'm not saying that you have to cut […]

  Most novels are written on the premise of "what if." Our What-if muscles help us figure out what needs to come next in the story. Sometimes we're lucky and we just know. More often (at least for me) we often have no clue what needs to happen next. When I write non-fiction for awhile, […]

Kathryn Craft Turning Whine Into Gold In high school, I was the type of high achiever that had my teachers taking me under their wings. Turns out, that wasn’t always such a good thing. My fifth-year Russian teacher, thinking I’d follow in his footsteps, challenged me to write a research paper on a Russian ballerina—in […]

Amy Sue Nathan Twelve years ago, right in the middle of a memoir writing workshop online, I started writing fiction instead. From that day forward, I continued doing two things: writing novels, and signing up for online writing workshops. The comfort of taking a class while wearing my pajamas appeals to me almost as much […]

Lisa Hall Wilson                 Deep point of view is a great writing technique when used well, but if you’re not careful, deep POV will bloat your word count and tie an anchor to the pace of your story. Pace Must Be Strategic I’ve met very few bestselling authors […]