My last post was about agents wanting more than good writing.  This week, I'm going to give the other side of the story:  why a speci...

Many of my students and private clients are good writers.  They've taken classes to hone their writing, learned to revise, are adept a...

Rita is working on a MG (middle grade) novel. She wrote me this week with a good question about how much to use setting in her book.  Wha...

Character in fiction and memoir is built on the convoluted pathways of false belief. As readers, we witness the journey along these pathw...

I remember pitching one of my novels to agents at a writing conference.  They'd read a few chapters ahead of time, a nice perk at that ...

Your writing exercise this week is a simple but powerful one that I teach in my storyboarding classes.  Ask yourself this:  What's th...

One reason I take classes or go to writing conferences or join a writing group is to set artificial deadlines for myself. I know, after y...

Maggie, one of my past students, sent me a fun email this week.  She has been using a great technique for getting deeper into her charact...

This weekend, I'm traveling to Santa Fe, New Mexico, to join fifteen emerging (and already published) book writers for my week-long r...

I've been struggling with my antagonist. That might sound like a normal situation--antagonists create conflict--but my challenge is l...