Helping Writers Become Authors

Writers too often create unrealistic characters by imposing their own perceptions (or fantasies) onto the opposite sex.

Your opening line may be bristling with energy, danger, and barbed fishhooks with which to reel in your readers, but if the paragraph that follows pulls the old switcheroo, your reader is more likely to be irritated than impressed.

No matter where we are in our writing lives, no matter how many bad stories we write, no matter how many good stories we write, no matter how much we've learned or how much we've mastered - we still don't know anything.

If you can avoid these five boredom bombs, you can slay reader apathy before it starts and keep them riveted from page one all the way through to the end.

Let's explore four sophisticated linguistic techniques for choosing and using words.

The first-person narrator, more than any other type of narrator, is inclined to lapse into self-centered telling, in which he overpowers the story, at the expense of the other characters and even the plot itself.

Few of us would want to subsist on a steady diet of tragedy, but all of us are better for having occasionally cleansed our reading palate with the astringent bite of these unflinching portrayals of bittersweet truth.

Fight scenes, chase scenes, and other action extravaganzas appear in stories of every genre, so consider these tips to make sure yours are legendary

Are there any original stories left to be written? And, if so, how do you find one to write?

Organizing my daily writing routine into a series of specific steps helps me get the most out of every minute I spend writing.

At the end of the day, what's important isn't so much understanding the reason you write as it is accepting that you don't always need an explicit reason.

The 50-page mark is the perfect place to stop and remember where you've been, so you have a better idea of where you're going.

Let's a take a look at two means for indicating speakers and varying the rhythm of speech and narrative: the speaker tag and the action beat.

The more similar your hero and villain, the stronger your story, the more realistic your characters, and the deeper your exploration of theme.

As important as it is to claim large chunks of uninterrupted writing time, it's also important that we make time to actually live our lives.

If you've ever found yourself wishing for a writing mentor - someone with the savvy, experience, and generosity to reach down and guide you in your own writing journey - today's your lucky day!

As the creator of our worlds and our characters, we don't have to wallow in the quagmire of vague details and fuzzy ideas. We can make statements of authority because, if we're not the authority in our stories, who is?

Even if you already have a good idea of the specifics of your world, taking the time solidify your ideas by answering these, and other, questions can inject more life and realism into your setting and allow you to spot flaws and inconsistencies.

Some words are overused so often that they find their way onto the Wanted: Dead or Alive list of practically every author, agent, and editor (not to mention reader).

Thanks to laziness and fear - and often oblivion - it's much too easy to fall into comfortable patterns that eventually descend into blatant repetition.