Improve Your Writing

Asking yourself the right questions about why, when, how, and how much your characters speak will help you craft more powerful dialogue.

One of the hard parts of working on a book is that day-to-day progress isn’t readily visible. Give yourself credit for all the small achievements.

Finished a first draft and unsure where to go next? Here’s a 5-point checklist of what the second draft revision process should accomplish.

With a regular five-minute meditation you’ll become a master of focus, able to dismiss distractions before they even fully form as thoughts.

The recently published LISTEN, WORLD! is a page turning biography of Elsie Robinson, the most read woman journalist of the twentieth century.

When we lean into stigmatized topics, we invite readers to wrestle with the same complexities we’re examining in ourselves.

Writers of both genres have to make decisions that somehow mold real people and events into a story with a shape, an arc, and meaning.

Even lesser-known authors can experience legal issues if they don’t perform their due diligence while writing and revising their books.

A Choctaw author offers tips on researching and connecting with First Americans in order to write respectfully and without stereotypes.

Consider the benefits and limitations of each POV, along with the feel each might lend to your story and how well it fits the tone, tenor, and genre.

Bridging the gap between research and personal experience can become a book’s greatest strength—but it might require Herculean effort.

Having a gut-punch reaction to being edited is part of the cost of doing business for writers. Here’s advice on how to survive the process.

To truly put your reader in the emotional position of your POV character, focus on conveying body language and internal narration.

Acknowledgment pages allow us to peer into authors’ lives, and reveal the fascinating web of the publishing world.

Memoirists can take steps throughout the writing and publishing process to minimize fallout and family strife.

A book map—a visual representation of your book’s structure—will help you maintain momentum and ensure a smooth journey for your reader.

While there are no fixed conventions writers need to adhere to, there is nonetheless much to think about and be aware of.

Focus on the main story’s forward momentum, and use backstory as the seasoning that makes the stew.

Your audience won’t remember the chapter where your hero took a breather. What’s memorable are the forces of antagonism, and how your hero reacted.

Before spending time on a story that doesn’t work, ensure you’ve addressed the critical questions of character, plot, goals and motivations.

Like writing, editing and revision are skills that take time to learn, and they develop only with practice.

Here are four ways to help create the mindset that we can realistically accomplish something we’ve never tried before.

It might not be essential to impose a standard arc structure on a character who’s non-traditional or isn’t affected by the story’s actions.

We writers know that critiques are an integral part of improving our work. But we rarely learn how to receive feedback or what to do after.

Central to most of Michael Lewis’ works are larger-than-life characters who find themselves at the center of major industry or societal shifts.