Your Writing Isn’t Haute Couture
Continuing their lengthy series on what not to do, the editors at Writer's Digest have some advice we agree with wholeheartedly: Don't try to...
5 Reasons for Characters to Hide and Then Confront Their Past
Backstory is critical to your characters' motivations, choices, and growth over the course of your novel. But it can be a struggle creating circumstances...
The Art of the Opening
The Stage 32 blog shares a StudioBinder video about the art of opening scenes. In the video, they provide examples of many ways to...
Portraying Women in Historical Fiction – Part 1
In part 1 of a 3-part series, M.K. Tod offers advice for portraying women in historical fiction so that the characters are relatable to...
The Difference Between Story and Plot
In a post on Writer Unboxed, Kathryn Craft offers a helpful exercise that demonstrates the difference between story and plot, and how each works...
Your Hero Has to Lose Sometimes
We often visualize our novels as an upward journey for our protagonist. During the course of the story, our hero overcomes internal and external...
Research: Enough is Enough
While we're on the subject of historical fiction, let's talk about the amount of research you need to do. Speaking from experience, it's easy...
Prepare for the Unexpected in Historical Fiction
In an article for Writer's Digest, Janie Chang asked six writers of historical fiction for their tips on research and storytelling. Some of their...
Write What You Don’t Know for Fun and Profit
In this share, we tackle another of writing's shibboleths: write what you know. Simple advice, easy to understand, but also incredibly vague and unhelpful.
In...
Advice for Writing Tasty Prose
In a new post on Writers in the Storm, Ellen Buikema offers more advice on using sensory language in your writing, this time focusing on...
