THE RYW Blog
WRITING, SELLING, AND BALANCING YOUR LIFE
Branding, Promotion… and Grilled Cheese
Deep in deadline hell, peeps. For me, this usually means a scattered attention span, a lot of mumbling under my breath -- and a hair trigger around things that seem trivial, almost stupid. So yesterday, I tripped on one of these triggers. Thankfully, after a few...
Every Scene is a Story
Without getting too terribly esoteric, I've been seeing a lot of holographic patterning in my Year of Cruise. To display both my geek and hippy-dippy tendencies, I mean "holographic" as in "whole in every part." If you cut a hologram in two, each half will still hold...
Star Wars: Plot Points In Action
I've recently put my first reference book up on Kindle, called Rock Your Plot: A Simple System for Plotting Your Novel. It details the process I use for pre-writing and plotting my novels. It's a simple, repeatable system for anyone writing any form of commercial...
Story Structure vs. Reader Experience.
When I revise my work, or when I'm editing someone else's work, there are two main elements I consider. The first is story structure: what the story is. The second is reader experience. This is how the story is told. Structure first. When I revise, the first thing I...
What could you achieve if you were guaranteed to succeed?
I've noticed on some of the writer forums and blogs I check out, and in responses to my newsletter, that there is this obsession with getting it right. What's the right way to plot, some ask. How should this work? What do editors want to see? What should...
Constraints: the surprising secret for more powerful fiction.
I got my start writing category romance. I have also done ghostwriting, and work-for-hire. I'm not ashamed of any of those things. There are a number of reasons why I wound up writing each, not the least of which being my son enjoys things like food and a roof over...
How to build a fantastic writer’s support team.
I've said it before, I'll say it a million times: every writer writes alone, but no writer succeeds that way. The world is not necessarily kind or understanding when it comes to writers. We're not even kind to ourselves. The best way to survive is to build...
Trusting your reader: an unusual way to show without telling.
One of the things I often catch when I'm editing a manuscript is the dreaded "show, don't tell." The story's going along swimmingly, then suddenly you hit a sand trap of several lengthy paragraphs of exposition. Sometimes, I can't even remember what's happening...
The fascinating reason why you won’t do the thing.
Sometimes I get overwhelmed. Things go wrong. Or, conversely, things go unexpectedly right – only all at once. I'm surrounded by a multitude of paths, and often feel like I have no map. It's hard to prioritize when seemingly everything is about the same level of...