Essential Guide to Writing a Novel

How can we know if our scene pushes the story forward.  Does our scene contribute to the story?  The ratchet can test our scene.  I talk about the ratchet and show how Cormac McCarthy and F. Scott Fitzgerald used it.  Plus, a technique for searching for instances of telling in our manuscript so we can change them to showing.  And C.S. Lewis's rules of writing.
Here is a 20-episode master class on fiction writing—a start-to-finish course covering plot, characters, dialogue, scenes, sentence-level craft, and much more.  Each episode is focused and about 30 minutes.  The full class—all 20 episodes—is available now for a one-time price of forty-nine dollars.  If you want structured, concise guidance, click the Buy the Master Class link in the show notes to get started.
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If we emulate famous authors, won't we get better at writing?  Here are how some highly-skilled, best-selling authors write and live.  Plus: the three dumbest pieces of advice for writers.  And: George Orwell's rules of writing.
Here is a 20-episode master class on fiction writing—a start-to-finish course covering plot, characters, dialogue, scenes, sentence-level craft, and much more.  Each episode is focused and about 30 minutes.  The full class—all 20 episodes—is available now for a one-time price of forty-nine dollars.  If you want structured, concise guidance, click the Buy the Master Class link in the show notes to get started.
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How can we get readers to admire and respect our hero, maybe even to fall in love with him?  Our hero can save the cat.  Here is how the screenwriters' save the cat technique can apply to our novels.  Also, best seller Lawrence Block on how we can use our pleasure reading to improve our fiction writing skills.
Here is a 20-episode master class on fiction writing—a start-to-finish course covering plot, characters, dialogue, scenes, sentence-level craft, and much more.  Each episode is focused and about 30 minutes.  The full class—all 20 episodes—is available now for a one-time price of forty-nine dollars.  If you want structured, concise guidance, click the Buy the Master Class link in the show notes to get started.
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Keeping a tight point of view is critical for our story.  Here's how we can stay inside the mind of our main character yet learn what others in the scene are thinking.  Plus, how John Grisham works.  And: how we can reveal what a character is thinking through facial expressions.  
Here is a 20-episode master class on fiction writing—a start-to-finish course covering plot, characters, dialogue, scenes, sentence-level craft, and much more.  Each episode is focused and about 30 minutes.  The full class—all 20 episodes—is available now for a one-time price of forty-nine dollars.  If you want structured, concise guidance, click the Buy the Master Class link in the show notes to get started.
Support the show
Buy the master class.

Sometimes writing can be a grind.  Here are things that are fun while writing that'll give us energy and keep us at our desks and allow us to pour joy into our words.  Also: we should avoid vanilla, meaningless word packages.  And here's how Kate Chopin worked.
Here is a 20-episode master class on fiction writing—a start-to-finish course covering plot, characters, dialogue, scenes, sentence-level craft, and much more.  Each episode is focused and about 30 minutes.  The full class—all 20 episodes—is available now for a one-time price of forty-nine dollars.  If you want structured, concise guidance, click the Buy the Master Class link in the show notes to get started.
Support the show
Buy the master class.