Guest Post

Image: a stack of seven unlabeled cassette tapes.

What Taylor Swift’s Vault Tracks Can Teach You About Not Killing Your Darlings

If a scene, storyline, character, or image doesn’t quite belong in your story, save it for later use—as Taylor Swift does with song ideas.
Image: a red flag against a blue sky

Hybrid Publishers and Paid Publishing Services: Red Flags to Watch For

If you’re an author seeking a hybrid publisher or self-publishing assistance, it’s important to know what to look out for.
Image: a man wearing a clean, sky-blue button-down shirt sits at a work surface with a paint brush in one hand and a mechanical pencil in the other. Messy globs of paint from nearby jars cover the work surface, his hands and forearms, and his utensils.

Writing Rules That Beg to Be Broken

Aspiring writers are inundated with rules to follow—but writing is creative, so don’t look to prescriptions or those who preach them.
Image: in preparation for a press conference, numerous microphones are attached to a dais, each embellished with a brightly colored triangular or square block to differentiate them.

Why You Need a Press Release in the Digital Age

Whether you write novels or nonfiction, a press release is still an essential tool for raising awareness and sharing your work’s core message.
Image: an illustration of a young woman's face in profile, in which the outline of her face is clear but the rest of her head and neck dissipates into a swirling cloud against a black background.

Demystifying Miscreant Memories and Crafting a More Authentic Narrative

Memoirists owe it to readers to tell them the truth. But what do you do when the truth isn’t black and white?
Image: rows of empty, wooden folding chairs are lined up for an event.

Writing Hasn’t Won Me Fame or Fortune, But It’s Brought Me Friendship

Even with the best promotion, there’s no guarantee your book event will fill the seats. Here are some tips for making the best of it.
Image: an open laptop with a blank white screen sits on a table with notepads, a mobile phone and potted succulents with a view of a sunlit and greenery-filled patio in the background.

The First Rule of Writing Is Writer’s Block Does Not Exist

Writer’s block is an excuse, based on fear, that gives us permission to quit as soon as writing gets hard.
Image: in an office, a detective sits staring at a bulletin board on which are arranged the salient photos, maps, and facts of a crime, trying to piece together the solution.

Designing Thriller and Mystery Twists That Work

Twists feel “twisty” because the author has carefully engineered the story to mislead readers via the protagonist’s journey and assumptions.
Image: the hand of an unseen person begins to pull back the heavy, red curtain of a theatrical stage as if they're about to emerge from the darkness.

Ghostwriting Trends: A Report from the Gathering of the Ghosts in New York City

Ghostwriters, whose literary contributions have often been made in secret, are creating more community and visibility for their work.
Image: Seen from inside the open doors of a room, a carry-on size suitcase with its handle up sits on an outdoor walkway against a backdrop of tropical foliage.

5 Ways to Make a Writing Retreat “Pay Off”

If you’d love to go on a writing retreat but worry about whether the investment will “pay off,” here are five ways to reap rewards.
Image: a young man wearing jeans and a t-shirt reclines on the grass, facing the sky, near the water's edge a cloudless day.

Beyond BICHOK: How, When and Why Getting Your Butt Out of the Chair Can Make You a Better Writer

While you can’t publish a book without sitting down to write, there are many times when we can gain insight by looking away from our work.
Image: an open spread from a hardcover copy of the book The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and Jeffrey Zaslow, showing the beginning of Part III titled "Adventures…and Lessons Learned."

Confronting Sophomore Syndrome as a Published Author

On the release of her sophomore novel, one year after her debut, a writer reflects on what she’s learned about the business of authorship.
Image: against a backdrop of vending machines that dispense toys, an adult's hand holds an orange plastic bubble containing an unknown toy.

Avoid Random Acts of Content

One way to cultivate a loyal audience is by sharing compelling content, but it’s important to understand the needs of your target audience.
Image: In a home studio, a young man holds a microphone toward the camera, as if offering it to the viewer.

To Get on Podcasts, Create a Media Kit

This excerpt from the new book How to Get on Podcasts by Michelle Glogovac focuses on the importance of creating a basic media kit.
Image: a colorful pile of pharmaceutical pills

How to Write Realistically About Drug Use in Your Novel

A new book, The Grim Reader, helps authors understand how to write convincingly about drugs and their use.
Image: black and white photo of a man dressed as a detective, wearing a trench coat and deerstalker hat, smoking a pipe, and looking at the viewer through a magnifying glass.

The Über Skill for Writers

By paying attention to how you are impacted by story, you can learn to trace those effects back to the techniques that elicited them.
Image: sitting cross-legged on a leather sofa in front of many packed book shelves, a teenage girl reads a book.

4 Things Every YA Writer Should Know About Teens

A good novel has everything teen brains are primed to crave—excitement, emotion, and escape.
Image: a clear lucite box contains dozens of blue pencils standing vertically and tightly packed. At the center of them is a single red pencil.

Your Substack Isn’t For Everyone

To ensure you’re giving value to your audience, make sure you know who your newsletter is for and what they get from it.
Image: dozens of identical plastic yellow ducks with hooks attached to their heads float in circular pool of water in a fairground game.

Researching the Right Literary Agents for You

When seeking an agent, it helps to research what they've actually repped and sold versus what they claim they’re looking for.
Image: a man's face is shrouded in darkness except for his left eye which is illuminated by a vertical sliver of light.

Add a Luke Skywalker Moment: Give Your Main Character a Bitter Choice

For a memorable story, give your main character a strong motive, a flaw, and a series of escalating decisions leading to an impossible choice.
Image: In a dark bedroom, a woman sits upright in bed and reaches for a journal resting on a side table.

Journals and Dreams: The Unsung Heroes of Literature

Like a pot of broth simmering on the stove, the contents of our journals nourish us and provide the basis for countless delicious creations.
Image: against a dramatic backdrop of mountains, twisting roads, and a cloudless deep blue sky, a bright orange road sign reads "Slow Now".

What Sleeping With Jane Eyre Taught Me About Pacing

Going too fast is one of the biggest mistakes storytellers make. When you arrive at a moment readers have been waiting for, slow things down.
Image: A roughly-fashioned cardboard sign on which is written in black magic-marker "All you need is less".

Writing a Really Short Book Description Is Harder Than It Looks

A well-crafted book blurb gives us just enough to care, to empathize with the protagonist’s plight, and leaves us wanting just a bit more.
Image: close-up photo of a single, slender, delicate mushroom growing from a mossy forest floor.

One Well-Chosen Detail: Write Juicy Descriptions Without Overwhelming Your Reader

It takes practice to write immersive descriptions that draw readers in, without going overboard and risking boredom or loss of attention.
Image: a smiling man with long dark hair and a thick dark beard and wearing a white garment, as if meant to represent a Christ-like figure, covers his eyes with his hand.

Embrace Your True Subject: A Writer’s Case Study in Running from (and Returning to) Herself

An author considers how we often try to turn ourselves into other kinds of writers instead of following our internal compass.