“What does the market want?” I hear this question frequently from first-time novelists, as if there’s some secret, as if their job is to figure it out, so that they can fulfill the book market’s …
Novel / Fiction
The Courage to be Specific in Writing
Humans are full of paradoxes. We only love to the extent that we hate. We are constantly changing our minds, constantly renegotiating with ourselves and others. To be specific is to be curious about …
The Desire to Write
Whether it is conscious or not, the desire to write is connected to the desire to evolve, to untangle the lie that we have been carrying around about ourselves for a million years. The lie is that we …
Building a Body of Work
I remember one day over twenty years ago when I was bellyaching to a friend of mine about how nobody was buying my work. He looked me dead in the eye. “What’s your job?” he asked. “To sell my …
Your Writing Process is Valid
Every writer has their own way of working, a process that has to be developed and honed over many years.Margaret Atwood starts with a rough notion of how the story will develop, "which usually turns …
Ten Suggestions for Writing
Below are ten writing suggestions for anyone who is setting out to craft a novel, memoir, or screenplay. Some are obvious, while others are perhaps less so.1) Write everyday. No matter what. The …
The Protagonist’s Experience
Regardless of the medium, your reader is not interested in what your character is feeling.Seriously.In fact, if you tell your reader that Bill felt sad, dejected, elated, euphoric, or glum, your …
No Dilemma, No Story
One thing that has been coming up a lot in my classes is the tendency for writers to “figure out” their plot. This is due, at least in part, to story structure being taught by story analysts as a …
Becoming a Professional Writer
The publishing industry has undergone tremendous changes over the years. “Mid-list” writers who relied on decent advances from their publishers have found themselves shut out of the big publishing …
The Creative Process
When my son, Ray, was first learning to speak, there were so many new words each day — the syntax often fascinating and occasionally perverse. He also had a sophisticated sense of humor. He called his …