Archive:
Plot Development
How do you become a better athlete, musician, scholar—or anything? You know. Practice. You run drills, play scales, review flashcards, whatever it takes. So how do you become a better writer? Speaking only for myself, I feel I get better by exercising my writing muscles. In other words, I write. Many of my colleagues swear […]
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List a handful of your favorite novels and I’ll bet they have one thing in common: an unforgettable main character. From Captain Ahab to Atticus Finch and from Harry Potter to Katniss Everdeen, such memorable characters seem like long-lost friends. Inventing characters and infusing them with the internal strength to become heroic is an art […]
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A successful novel must feature an event, known as the inciting incident, that irreversibly ignites the story. The stronger your inciting incident, the more dramatic, compelling, and engrossing your novel. A weak or nonexistent inciting incident means no reason for your main character to become heroic, or for readers to keep turning pages. What is […]
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You love to write and have been told you have a way with words. So you’ve decided to give writing a try—creative writing. The problem is, you’re finding it tougher than you thought it would be. You have a great story idea, but you’re not sure how to turn it into something people will read. […]
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Would you believe that even after writing and publishing nearly 200 books, including 21 New York Times bestsellers, I still take daily steps to hone my writing skills? Whether you’re a beginner or have been at it for decades as I have, writing well takes work. No shortcut, no secret sauce will turn you into […]
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