Write Better & Get Published
The following articles were culled from Writer’s Digest magazine to give you everything you need to write great stories.
Is Happiness Possible in a Creative Writing Program?
The following is an online-exclusive extended version of the interview that appears in the November/December issue of WD. Let’s face it: Writing ain’t easy. I’ve taught creative writing at Columbia College Chicago for more than three decades and have been privileged...
Anne Tyler’s Tips on Writing Strong (yet Flawed) Characters
Anne Tyler belongs to a disappearing generation of writers, those who came into their own in an era when it was more than enough to—well, to simply write. Intensely protective of her craft, she hasn’t given an in-person interview or participated in a book tour since...
Use Method Writing to Learn About Your Characters
Famous actors such as Robert De Niro and Al Pacino prepare for their roles through a process called method acting, originally taught by the highly respected acting teacher Lee Strasberg. Method acting is a process that requires actors to go inside themselves to recall...
Creating Characters: 4 Simple Exercises
Tips and techniques for creating characters with emotion and viewpoint in this excerpt from "Write Great Fiction: Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint" by Nancy Kress. 1. WRITE MINI BIOS FOR YOUR DREAM CAST Make a list of characters you either might want to write about...
A Checklist for Developing Your Hero and Heroine
Answer the following questions for each of your main characters. It’s usually most productive to take one character at a time, but if you run into difficulty answering the questions about one, try switching over to the other for a while. As you answer the questions,...
Should You Write a Memoir? (The Memoirist’s Dilemma)
I'm often asked why people who profess to dislike reading buy memoirs, and the answer always seems so obvious to me. As children, we devour the stories our parents tell us and even fashion our own fantasies around the stories’ protagonists. As adults, however, we...
10 Rules for Writing Opinion Pieces
by Susan Shapiro Opinionated editorial essays are often the most fun, fast and furious pieces to get into print — especially for nonfamous writers with strong opinions and day jobs in other fields. That’s because editors of newspapers and online magazines like Slate,...
Writing Advice from Stephen King Jerry Jenkins
HOW DID THE TWO OF YOU MEET? JENKINS: We happened to have the same audio reader, a brilliant voice actor named Frank Muller. In November 2001 Frank was in a horrible motorcycle accident that left him brain-damaged, incapacitated and barely able to speak. One of...
Your Novel Blueprint
by Karen S. Wiesner Writing a novel and building a house are pretty similar when you think about it. For instance, most builders or homeowners spend a lot of time dreaming about their ideal houses, but there comes a time when they have to wake up to the reality of...
One Writers Unique Journey
Writing a novel and building a house are pretty similar when you think about it. Always an avid reader, I really enjoyed the horror genre. I especially loved the books written by Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and John Saul. Those folks were my idols. I’m sure I’ve...
Fiction: Point of View
How many times have you heard this around the workshop table: “Why don’t you consider a new point of view?” (Actually, the term used more often is “POV” because it sounds a lot cooler, I suspect.) Everyone then agrees that a new POV might help matters, including the...
9 Tricks to Writing Suspense Fiction
Your heart is slamming against your rib cage, your fingertips are moist and you turn another page. The antagonist is setting up a trap. You wish you could do something to prevent the protagonist from walking into it, but you can’t. You’re helpless, totally at the...
The Action Verb and Beautiful Accidents
If a poem is dynamic, its rhythm headlong, then the tiny turbines of this momentum are the verbs. Action verbs muscle up a sentence and help its propulsion. They may also create unexpected astonishment for the reader. When we believe a poem is finished, we should...
Defining and Developing Your Anti-Hero
If you dare to write about less-than-charming characters, you don’t need to redeem them with an ending in which they see the error of their ways, mend their faults, and allow their flinty hearts to be transformed into a choir loft of goodness. You see, Hollywood...
Finding Strong Ideas for Teen Fiction
Finding the right idea is the key to beginning your YA novel. So where, exactly, do ideas come from? How can you find ideas that teenagers will enjoy? The answer to this question is both simple and complex. Ideas for your teen novel can come from anywhere. That’s the...
How to Write Successful Endings
The most-asked question when someone describes a novel, movie or short story to a friend probably is, "How does it end?" Endings carry tremendous weight with readers; if they don't like the ending, chances are they'll say they didn't like the work. Failed endings are...
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