If your story requires characters whose motivations don’t come naturally to you, here are some tips to help you imagine the impossible.

A good story, like a good hiking path, simply unfolds without seeming forced. Here's a tool that helps keep complex stories on track.

An avid male reader of romantasy speaks up about his love for the genre, and what it can teach men about themselves and their relationships.

Both show and tell are essential tools for powerful storytelling. The trick is balancing their use at the line, scene, and story level.

If you’re an author thinking about wearable merch for a book launch or tour, here are some considerations to help the process go smoothly.

Even successful writers fall prey to self-doubt. Here are a few ways to strengthen yourself if and when you hear that voice in your head.

Fear can limit our ability to apply reason and logic, leading to flawed choices and behavior—bad in real life, but story gold in fiction.

Omniscient POV might be resurging, thanks to some recent bestsellers. To use it well, remember three C’s: clarity, consistency, and control.

Transitioning away too often—to a flashback or a new scene—risks losing the depth of storytelling that readers get from living inside a scene.

One memoir coach sees writers rush ahead into chapters and character detail before understanding: Why am I writing this exact story right now?

"Noticing what you notice" helps you identify your authentic material and produce work no one can ever copy.

I attempt to clarify the claim that half of all books sell fewer than a dozen copies—a statistic for which I am partially responsible.

A repeated word, phrase, motif, symbol, or image can create tension for your readers in small, barely noticeable increments.

Before trying to structure a memoir, you must understand how you’ve changed and what that process looked like—which can be hard to pinpoint.

Most characters have a challenge to overcome, but what about more serious physical or psychological issues that can’t be “cured” or ignored?

Librarians are managing AI’s real-world effects, making them publishing’s early warning system on reliability, trust, and the limits of AI literacy.

Faced with pursuing publication that might reopen old wounds, one memoirist overcame the challenge with help from therapy, community, and AI.

When a writer began to see her mother with compassion, her writing changed—and her stories started getting published.

An author decides to pay a bookstagrammer for exposure for her book, and comes to regret it so much that she asks the promotion to be deleted.

By teaching one’s own work, a writer discovers not only what they do well, but how others might use such insights to unlock their own drafts.

Readers who give three stars are often responding to the intersection between their expectations and the book—not the book’s inherent worth.

Three practices separate successful memoirists from those who underestimate the writing craft.

By learning to embrace the nonlinear nature of the ADHD brain, you can learn to write with more ease and less frustration.

Lack of support might come from fears about their own privacy, not understanding the enormity of your achievement, and/or information overload.

Booksellers discuss how BookTok has changed the demographic visiting their stores, and how publishers can better pitch their titles for placement. (Also: print galleys still matter.)