Writing Tips

When a character suffers emotional pain, the brain’s response is to stop the discomfort, and often this results in a coping mechanism being deployed. Whether it’s an automatic response or a learned go-to strategy, a mechanism helps them cope with the stress of the moment or escape the hurt of it. But if the character The post Coping Mechanism Thesaurus Entry: Denial appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

I keep coming back to the question of why I do this, and while the easiest answer is, I like apples and I want you to like apples too, and I find them interesting, and I want you to find them interesting too, I’ve come to the realization that there’s another reason, too– Things are,

Grocery store apples are quite often shit. At best, they’re terribly boring, even if they’re not themselves terrible. Though we’ve left the Red Delicious Problem somewhat in our dust, the mass production and distribution of apples still pushes onto us an army of thick-skinned Honeycrisp taste-alikes. I had mentioned before but the last time I

Every successful story, no matter the genre or format, has some structure at its core. It’s the backbone that provides shape and purpose. Without it, even the most compelling ideas can lose focus and wander off track, making it harder for readers to engage. Whether you’re a dedicated plotter or a discovery writer who prefers The post Writing 101: Popular Structure Models that Work appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

Expectations are poisonous. I believe that. I think our experiences can be colored by our expectations that precede that experience. I don’t think we can help it, necessarily — a lot of our lives are preloaded with information before we ever get to submit to a given experience. Movie previews, book reviews, comments from friends,

Let’s talk about complex, complicated flavors. I think tasting notes are often unexpectedly, unintentionally hilarious, and I love them with all my heart and here’s why: they exist somewhere between the poles of earnest and insane. Often the more pretentious — and/or expensive — you get with a thing, the more absolutely deranged the tasting

It’s an ongoing struggle for many of us: How do I share backstory and build my world without infodumping (and boring my readers)? One of my favorite—and sometimes overlooked—tools is dialogue! Using dialogue—and the beats that go along with it—is an excellent way to develop character relationships, reveal secrets, and move the plot forward. But The post How To Use Dialogue for Backstory and Worldbuilding—Infodump-Free! appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

Speaking more about reviews — I think it’s less fun for me and less enticing for you when I review an apple that isn’t either I PUT THIS INTO MY MOUTH AND ALL MY TASTEBUDS CAME ALIVE AND SANG A CHORUS OF HALLELUJAH or IT’S LIKE SATAN ATE BAD SUSHI AND THEN TOOK A SHIT

Ruby Mac or RubyMac? I don’t know. What I do know is, the McIntosh apple — and in many cases this sport mutation of it, the Ruby Mac — is an apple people either super love or super hate, and I always think anything like that is interesting. Something that inspires strong reactions is, to

I don’t think you should name pets people names. It’s weird if your dog is named Jerry and not, say, Commander Poopypants or something. Lucky, Scoot, Scout, Patches, Batman, whatever, these are all very fine names for dogs, but then you have people who name their dogs like, Susan, or Gary, and nobody likes that.

By Janice Hardy Are you too nice to your characters?  Do you love your characters? Do you wish nothing bad would ever happen to them? Then you might suffer from Nice Writer Syndrome. This is a common malady. We spend hours and hours creating our characters, interviewing them, filling out complicated character sheets, determining which personality they are on the Myers-Briggs Scale. They become like family, and we can’t bear the thought of doing anything bad to them.We don’t throw them into conflict. We don’t let them get hurt. We don’t make them work for their rewards at the end of the novel (those slackers).It can get so bad, we stop letting them leave the house, so nothing ever happens to them. Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

When a character suffers emotional pain, the brain’s response is to stop the discomfort, and often this results in a coping mechanism being deployed. Whether it’s an automatic response or a learned go-to strategy, a mechanism helps them cope with the stress of the moment or escape the hurt of it. But if the character The post Coping Mechanism Thesaurus Entry: Asking for Help appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

Hey, here’s a fun thing that has happened: The Staircase in the Woods is doing very well for itself. The translation is, the book isn’t out in paperback until (I think) early March, and so it’s pretty early in its bookish life cycle — and even at this point in that life cycle, it’s now

Palpatine voice: Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Delicious, the Red? That’s right. We’re — er, we’re meaning I’m because you’re not here with me, it’s just an us in theory — reviewing the Red Delicious apple. Not one apple. But two of them. The first, from a grocery store. The second, from

I just had a fruit fly in my coffee and that is bullshit, but one supposes that is the price I pay for eating apples in my office like a freak. Anyway, I just ate an apple that tastes, emotionally, like having fruit flies in my coffee, so let’s just jump right to it and

Want to win editorial feedback and take your story opening from good to great? Well, my writerly friend, you’re in luck! It’s time for our monthly Phenomenal First Pages contest. In this draw, you can win… Editorial feedback on your first 10 pages This contest is closed. Please try again next month. If you’d like to The post Win Editorial Feedback on Your First 10 Pages appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

Opening pages are notoriously hard to get right, especially in early drafts of your manuscript. I’ve read hundreds of opening chapters of novels in my work as a writing instructor and book coach and one of the most common issues I see comes down to a misunderstanding of the difference between two key parts of The post How to Tell the Difference Between a Hook and Inciting Incident appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

By Janice Hardy A good story is more than a series of things that happen. It’s all about the cause and effect. Way back in 2012, I read a few pieces of plotting advice that are just as good today as they were then. They’re nothing new, nothing ground-breaking, and things countless writers have said before (including me), but the way they’re said is sheer genius. They’re probably the most applicable and easiest plotting tips I’ve ever heard. The advice refers to full scenes, but I quickly realized it was just as effective on diagnosing the action in an individual scene as well as the big picture of the novel’s plot. It’s an incredibly useful tool for pinpointing problems in a scene you know has issues, but can’t figure out what they are. Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

When a character suffers emotional pain, the brain’s response is to stop the discomfort, and often this results in a coping mechanism being deployed. Whether it’s an automatic response or a learned go-to strategy, a mechanism helps them cope with the stress of the moment or escape the hurt of it. But if the character The post Coping Mechanism Thesaurus Entry: Embracing Responsibility appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.

Happy Birthday, One Stop for Writers! It’s hard to believe, but One Stop for Writers® is officially TEN years old! When Becca and I built One Stop for Writers with Lee (the developer behind Scrivener for Windows), it was a significant departure from books and blogging. But we were on a mission to make writing The post Celebrating 10 Years at One Stop for Writers! appeared first on WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®.