by Stephanie Morrill | Apr 5, 2023 | Author Life, Getting Feedback On Your Writing, Writing Life
Art is subjective. We all know this. It’s why there are award-winning books that you think are terrible. Or why you loaned a book to your best friend because it was the best thing you’d ever read, and she read two chapters before declaring it was boring....
by Stephanie Morrill | Mar 29, 2023 | Author Life, Encouragement, Learning from Other Authors, Writing Life
For many years, I’ve envied those who pursue careers with well-defined paths. If you want to be a teacher, you go to college, you get your degree in education, you log your student teaching hours, and then you start applying for teaching jobs. None of that is...
by Stephanie Morrill | Mar 22, 2023 | Editing, Theme
Whenever I teach about how to accept feedback from others regarding your work, I always say something along the lines of, “If it’s just one persons opinion, weigh that differently than if multiple critiquers are saying it to you.” So a few months...
by Jill Williamson | Mar 15, 2023 | Getting Published, Learning from Other Authors
(A version of this post was originally published September 24, 2012) Query letters often feel daunting and mysterious, but they really haven’t changed much in the past dozen years. Roseanna White wrote an excellent post that you can check out...
by Shannon Dittemore | Mar 8, 2023 | Elements of Fiction, Theme, Writing, Writing Life
Today, as we explore theme, we reach the end of our series on The Five Elements of Fiction. If you’re jumping into the series now, or would like to revisit the other elements, tap the links below: The Five Elements of Fiction The Five Elements of Fiction: Style...
by Stephanie Morrill | Mar 1, 2023 | First Drafts, Genres, Historical
I’ve noticed over the years that writers tend to have a genre that comes naturally to them. For me, it’s contemporary YA. Even before I knew that YA contemporary fiction existed (true story: I thought I invented the young adult genre) most of my stories came out as YA...
by Jill Williamson | Feb 22, 2023 | Scenes and Scene Structure, Story Structure, Writing
In my early days of writing, I spent some time studying scene structure. I was trying to understand pacing, and it just wasn’t clicking for me. I eventually gave up trying to “put myself in a box,” and ever since, I’ve written my scenes...
by Jill Williamson | Feb 15, 2023 | Author Life, Brainstorming, Learning from Other Authors, Writing
I’ve been to many writing retreats. Most of them have loose schedules. We write. We eat. We write. We sleep. We write. We sometimes go out into the world for a change of pace. But we usually come right back and write. I prefer retreats where the authors who come...
by Shannon Dittemore | Feb 8, 2023 | Plot, Story Structure, The Craft of Writing, Writing
Just two elements left! Plot and Theme! If you’re playing catch up, here are the previous articles in this series introducing the Five Elements of Fiction: The Five Elements of Fiction The Five Elements of Fiction: Style The Five Elements of Fiction: Character...
by Stephanie Morrill | Feb 1, 2023 | Brainstorming, Creativity, Practicing, Story Ideas, Writing Exercise, Writing Tools
If you’re a writer, it’s inevitable that you have little sparks of inspiration written down and tucked away in various places. A Google Doc where you dump story ideas. A character idea that you wrote on a napkin. A Post-it where you documented a...
