WRITING
Emotional Wound Entry: Being unfairly blamed for the death of another, Writers Helping Writers | Tweet
When you’re writing a character, it’s important to know why she is the way she is. Knowing her backstory is important to achieving this end, and one of the most impactful pieces of a character’s backstory is her emotional wound.
4 Tips for writing a satisfying ending to your story, Go Teen Writers | Tweet
Your character has gone through their final test and now … what? Do you need to have every plot thread tied up neatly with a pretty bow? What if you still have a sequel to write? Should your ending be sad or happy? Do you need an epilogue?
- How to use either, neither, or, and nor correctly, The Write Practice | Tweet
My mother seems to appreciate having a grammar lover in the family. For Christmas one year, she even bought me the book I Judge You When You Use Poor Grammar.
- 3 Smart tips for structuring powerful scenes, Helping Writers Become Authors | Tweet
It’s common wisdom that in structuring powerful scenes, we should open in media res—that is, while something is happening. And it’s generally best to bow out while things are still happening: close the dinner conversation with the last line of dialogue, not after everyone has fallen silent, gotten up from the table, washed the dishes, and gone to bed.
World Building Tip: Craft your story setting, The Write Practice | Tweet
Creating an effective environment is a key facet to your story’s success. It’s part of world-building; and no, we aren’t talking about weather, though naturally, that plays a part. No, my friends, the importance of environment can be summarized in two key reasons.
The 12-day plan of simple writing exercises, Writers Write | Tweet
Related books:
- How to write dazzling dialogue
- Writing success: Your book from start to finish to publication
- Outlining your novel
- Writing deep point of view
- The art of memoir
- Reading like a Writer
- Rock your revisions
- The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide To Character Expression
SCREENWRITING
- Great Scene: The dark night, Go Into The Story | Tweet
Some scenes just surprise the crap out of you. And then later, when you think back on it, you realize how well conceived it was from a story point of view, how perfect it was.
- Query Letter Tips: Keys to unlocking doors in Hollywood, Script Mag | Tweet
A winning query letter is your key to unlocking an executive’s door, so take your time and be as thoughtful about your query as you were when writing your screenplay. Industry professionals view query letters as a reflection of the writer’s screenplay and writing skills. So the assumption will be if the query letter is poor, then the script will be too.
- Improvising screenplays: Externalizing your character’s internal struggle, Script Mag | Tweet
We’ve all heard that hokey (but wise) bit of advice about how you shouldn’t compare your insides to someone else’s outsides. Wait, is that how that’s worded? It sounds so serial killer-y. But you know what I’m talking about. People tend to put on a brave, cool front, and peacock around, acting like everything’s going great for them, while you’re secretly thinking to yourself, “I can’t even pay my Hulu statement this month.”
- Writing and the Creative Life: Why Your Brain Loves Good Storytelling (Part 4), Go Into The Story | Tweet
Today we look at yet another HBR article: Structure Your Presentation Like a Story.
Your writing time should be ‘non-negotiable’, Go Into The Story | Tweet
What if you approached your writing time as non-negotiable?
Related books:
- Super Structure: The key to unleashing the power of story
- Screenplay: The foundations of screenwriting
- Essentials of screenwriting
- Screenwriting: The sequence approach
- 33 Ways to sell your screenplay
SELF-PUBLISHING
- Self Published Romance novels dominate the market, Just Publishing Advice | Tweet
Smashwords have released their annual ebook survey, and it is quite startling to discover how dominant self published romance novels have become. In short, the romance genre accounts for a staggering 87% of the top 100 bestsellers on Smashwords and their aggregators. Should I repeat that number? Eighty-seven percent!
How to build your author brand from scratch (and why you need to), The Book Designer | Tweet
Why does your work matter? What experiences do you have to share with others and what value do you offer that only you can provide? Because, if you can’t easily and clearly articulate your vision or the purpose behind your work, you will never be able to convey its importance to others.
- How to use facebook contests & giveaways to build a fan base, Jane Friedman | Tweet
There’s an old online myth that says if you give something away, you will only attract people who are looking for free stuff—fans who will never pay for anything. But, like many marketing myths, this one has no legs. As a matter of fact, contests and giveaways have the opposite effect according to much of the consumer research we see today.
5 Questions on self-publishing success, The Book Designer | Tweet
Peecho is an interesting solution to the problem of communicating and selling globally online, but producing printed products that have to find their way to the buyer in the real world. They call it a “global cloud print network” and I’m looking forward to learning more about it.
How to sell ebooks, Just Publishing Advice | Tweet
Related books:
- Self Publishing: My rules to staying alive and making money
- How I sold 80,000 books
- Write. Publish. Repeat: The no-luck-required guide to self-publishing success
- Createspace & Kindle Self Publishing Masterclass
- The Self-Publishing Road Map