Notes on trying to become a better writer

Category How to write a novel

Storygrid and Shawn Coyne’s motivational words for writers

Shawn Coyne and Tim Grahl of the Storygrid universe have been doing a more useful job than pretty much anyone else in the world for the past three years. The job? Teaching us that story is vital, is a learnable… Continue Reading →

How to get started on a first novel. Five things I wish I’d known earlier.

There’s bags of advice out there, of course. Hopefully whatever you’ve found so far has been fabulously helpful and you’re ready to get going. As someone who’s started more novels than they’ve finished and finished more novels than they’ve published… Continue Reading →

How to get a novel published – if that’s what you really want…

Take heart. Take a big slice of heart. It’s actually easy to get published. It’s obviously a lot less easy to publish exactly what you want to write, or exactly what you’ve managed to write, and it’s pretty damned hard… Continue Reading →

How (not) to write a novel #7 – language for emotional range

A couple of sobering thoughts this week along with home truths and lessons from the mouths of pre-teen upstarts. So, why wasn’t my son able to finish that manuscript I was testing on him… Story not quite exciting enough? Characters… Continue Reading →

How to write a novel (#2) – the scenic route

It’s not easy to improve a craft. Let’s be honest, for many of us it’s not easy even to accept improvement is necessary. As Confucius would apparently have said if he’d spoken modern English, “True wisdom is knowing what you… Continue Reading →

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