Watch Now: Empathy is not just an emotion. It’s a tool. I thought I’d do something a little different today and talk directly to writers. So, I’d like to share a snippet of my workshop on creating compelling characters. Specifically, I want to talk about something at the heart of
Read MoreWhen I was back home on my book tour, I was asked to speak to high schoolers at my alma mater. I’ve gotten pretty well versed at giving my author talk, but I knew I couldn’t rely on that to engage this crowd. They didn’t care as much about the
Read MoreI used to be a fan of the notion that no plot was no problem when it came to writing a book. I took part in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) because that mantra spoke to me. After all, I was a pantser at the time. I spent that November
Read MoreIf you have completed a first draft of a book, congratulations! That is a huge feat in and of itself. You may be wondering what to do next. Search for agents? Write a query letter? Consider self-publishing on Amazon? Before you do any of those things, I want to draw
Read MoreI fail at marinating. Perhaps part of my problem is that I can be bad at planning ahead—blame my type b personality for that one. I can balk at things like meal planning and question the benefit of marinating. It has become such a joke in my family that we
Read More5 creative writing tips learned in a cubicle I used to write about RV toilets. Fresh out of college with a creative writing degree and full of idealism, I took a job at an advertising agency. I assumed it would be a temporary gig while I wrote and published my
Read MoreI’m not going to lie; being an author is a pretty cool gig. I get to sit around in my athletic attire all day in only the company of my golden retrievers, secluded from the rest of the world as I tell stories. Sure there are those days when I
Read MoreI used to believe in the mantra “no plot, no problem.” I successfully completed National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) in 2005 with that mentality. And, while I ended the month with 50,000 words, I wouldn’t call the story developed enough to even consider it a complete manuscript. Nonetheless, I printed
Read MoreI like to write quiet stories, focused on characters. Going in-depth into their perspectives. Exploring who they are at the core. What doesn’t come as naturally to me is a page-turning, edge-of-your-seat, keep-the-reader-up-all-night plot. The question is: does a book have to be compelling? In short: yes. As someone who
Read MoreIs time really on our side? I’ve been thinking a lot about lately, even in my fiction writing. In my current work in progress, the main character is a teenage girl who finds herself pregnant. While hiding her secret, one of her closest friends introduces her to a song by
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