50 Essential Tools I Use For Blogging and Freelance Writing - BestVendor.com Seven Simple Steps to Writing Your First Book, Sid Smith I frequently receive calls from consultants and professional speakers who want to write a book, but have neither the time nor the writing skills (sometimes one, sometimes both). The most frequent comment is, "I get stuck almost as soon as I sit down to write." "That's your problem," I say. "What?" "Sitting down to write - that's your problem." "Well, then how am I supposed to write a book?" I say: "If you can talk, you can write." I'm about to reveal to you a technique that will help you to get your book written in record time. Step one - the planning phase Most people will get an idea and start writing. This is one place where, if you're strapped for cash, hiring a book writing consultant can be the best thing you ever did for yourself. Step two - the outline phase If you're working with a coach or consultant, he or she will talk you through the creation of a very detailed outline of your book. Your speaking skills will come in handy here. 1. 2. 3. Go get your book printed!
8 Writing Techniques to Win You a Pulitzer Today’s guest post is from writer Joe Bunting, who blogs at The Write Practice. We all know there are novels and then there are “literary” novels. When you read Margaret Atwood, it just feels different than when you read Tom Clancy. Literary authors are known for their unique voices and experimental styles. This is both good and bad. So if you’re salivating to win a Nobel Prize, and just don’t think your diplomacy skills are good enough to win the Peace Prize, here are eight techniques you can use to make your writing more “literary.” Long sentences can make for beautiful, complex prose that you want to read again and again to fully appreciate. Hemingway, Faulkner (both Nobel winners), James Joyce, and all those 1920s modernist authors were known for their long, run-on sentences, full of conjunctions and lacking “correct” punctuation. Isn’t that beautiful? Writing long sentences can get old. One thing. Try reading it aloud. Literary writers are well read.
How To Write A Novel Using The Snowflake Method Writing a novel is easy. Writing a good novel is hard. That’s just life. If it were easy, we’d all be writing best-selling, prize-winning fiction. Frankly, there are a thousand different people out there who can tell you how to write a novel. In this article, I’d like to share with you what works for me. This page is the most popular one on my web site, and gets over a thousand page views per day, so you can guess that a lot of people find it useful. Good fiction doesn’t just happen, it is designed. For a number of years, I was a software architect designing large software projects. I claim that that’s how you design a novel — you start small, then build stuff up until it looks like a story. If you’re like most people, you spend a long time thinking about your novel before you ever start writing. But before you start writing, you need to get organized. Step 1) Take an hour and write a one-sentence summary of your novel. Some hints on what makes a good sentence: Shorter is better.
Amanda Hocking, the writer who made millions by self-publishing online When historians come to write about the digital transformation currently engulfing the book-publishing world, they will almost certainly refer to Amanda Hocking, writer of paranormal fiction who in the past 18 months has emerged from obscurity to bestselling status entirely under her own self-published steam. What the historians may omit to mention is the crucial role played in her rise by those furry wide-mouthed friends, the Muppets. To understand the vital Muppet connection we have to go back to April 2010. We find Hocking sitting in her tiny, sparsely furnished apartment in Austin, Minnesota. She is penniless and frustrated, having spent years fruitlessly trying to interest traditional publishers in her work. To make matters worse, she has just heard that an exhibition about Jim Henson, the creator of the Muppets, is coming to Chicago later that year and she can't afford to make the trip. Then it comes to her. To which Eric replies: "Yeah. Let's jump to October 2010. Stephen Leather
Creative Writing 101 RJ Great article. Morning is definitely the time where I am most creative. I think it’s because my mind is the freshest and the least cluttered at this time of day. 10 Tips on How to Write Less Badly - Do Your Job Better By Michael C. Munger Most academics, including administrators, spend much of our time writing. But we aren't as good at it as we should be. I have never understood why our trade values, but rarely teaches, nonfiction writing. In my nearly 30 years at universities, I have seen a lot of very talented people fail because they couldn't, or didn't, write. It starts in graduate school. The difference is not complicated. Rachel Toor and other writers on these pages have talked about how hard it is to write well, and of course that's true. 1. 2. 3. 4. Writers sit at their desks for hours, wrestling with ideas. The articles and books that will be read decades from now were written by men and women sitting at a desk and forcing themselves to translate profound ideas into words and then to let those words lead them to even more ideas. 5. Years pass, and they still have the same pat, 200-word answer to "What are you working on?" 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. Michael C.
A Beginner's Guide to Writing a Novel Writing a novel is not an easy thing to do. Unlike many non-fiction works, publishers will not accept a novel unless it's completely finished. The more a writer knows about the basics of how to write a novel, the more easily the novel will be put onto paper and the more interesting it will be. Writers should attempt to incorporate all of the following tips in order to make their novel as good as possible: Start The Novel With a Conflict One of the best ways to hook a reader is to start in the middle of action. Create Interesting Characters A man with a square jaw isn't going to keep readers interested. Keep the Novel Pacing Fast and Tight Readers don't want to spend 50 pages reading information that doesn't have anything to do with the overall plot. Make Your Story Unique Every writer's story should stand out from competing novels. Read While You Write
Online Creative Writing Courses Offered Free by Top Universities and Educational Websites Getting Educated for Free 1. Introductory Courses Introduction to Creative Writing - University of Utah Course Creative Writing 101 - Eight Lesson Suite101 Course Intro to Creative Writing - Eight Week Course from the Crafty Writer Creative Writing Workshop - Four Lesson Suite 101 Course Writing What You Know - Introductory Course from the UK's Open University 2. Introduction to Fiction - Undergraduate Course from MIT Start Writing Fiction - Introductory Course from the UK's Open University Introduction to Screenwriting - Steve Barnes' Nine Week UCLA Writing Course Approaching Prose Fiction - Intermediate Course from the UK's Open University Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy - Quick Launch or In-Depth Courses for Writers of All Ages 3. 4. 5. 6. Utilizing Your Creative Writing Knowledge Writers do not necessarily need a degree to be successful. You can be published online, in magazines, newspapers, trade publications and in books. Salary Potential Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
Fiction Writer's Character Chart - EpiGuide.com If you're a fiction writer -- whether you're working on a novel, short story, screenplay, television series, play, web series, webserial, or blog-based fiction -- your characters should come alive for your reader or audience. The highly detailed chart below will help writers develop fictional characters who are believable, captivating, and unique. Print this page to complete the form for each main character you create. IMPORTANT: Note that all fields are optional and should be used simply as a guide; character charts should inspire you to think about your character in new ways, rather than constrain your writing. Fill in only as much info as you choose. Have fun getting to know your character! If this character chart is helpful, please let us know! Looking for more character questionnaires / charts?
How to Publish an Ebook, Step by Step Want to publish a book? You can either kill a bunch of trees, or get with the 2010s and publish it as an ebook. If you haven’t noticed already, ebooks are no longer a niche market. An ebook can provide your small business a real competitive advantage by giving you instant credibility and visibility in the marketplace. Unfortunately, the ebook sales market is fragmented. As a budding publisher, you will need to prepare your book for at least those three platforms. I have a couple of ebooks on the market, but for the past few years they’ve been available only for Kindle. Prepare for E-Publishing Before you even create your Amazon or B&N account, here’s how to get ready for your career as an e-publisher. Start with the book: First, write a book. The best advice I can offer is to spare yourself the headache and hire someone to format your book. Understand ePub: A few years ago the world of ebook formats was a mess, but today the ePub format is the most common standard.
Character Chart FAVORITES Color: Music: Food: Literature: Expressions: Book: Quote: Expletive(s) (swears): Mode of transportation: HABITS Smokes: What? How often? Drinks: What? How often? Worst bad habit? SELF-PERCEPTION One word character would use to describe self: One paragraph description of how character would describe self: What does character consider best physical characteristic? Immediate goal(s): Long range goal(s): How does character plan to accomplish goal(s)? How character react in a crisis (calm/panic/etc.)? Jewelry? Owns a computer? © (c ) copyright 1990-2011 Rebecca Sinclair ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Authors Note: I worked hard on this.
25 Insights on Becoming a Better Writer When George Plimpton asked Ernest Hemingway what the best training for an aspiring writer would be in a 1954 interview, Hem replied, “Let’s say that he should go out and hang himself because he finds that writing well is impossibly difficult. Then he should be cut down without mercy and forced by his own self to write as well as he can for the rest of his life. At least he will have the story of the hanging to commence with.” Today, writing well is more important than ever. So what can we do to improve our writing short of hanging ourselves? 1. Don’t just plan to write—write. 2. [The] Resistance knows that the longer we noodle around “getting ready,” the more time and opportunity we’ll have to sabotage ourselves. 3. Find your best time of the day for writing and write. 4. Work on a computer that is disconnected from the internet. 5. Find a subject you care about and which you in your heart feel others should care about. 6. 7. Hone your outline and then cling to it as a lifeline. 8. 9.