Archive:
The Writing Craft
A Guest Blog by Jodie Hurst The age of Artificial Intelligence is here, and you may be confused as to how you should feel about it. Should you feel happy that super-efficient tools can aid your writing? Or should it alarm you that AI can produce in seconds what it takes you hours or […]
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Written well, a flashback can give your readers insight into a character and add depth to your story. Done poorly, it can feel out of place, forced, and worse—cliched. A flashback constitutes an interruption of your main onstage present story to depict events from the past. If you flash back, you must have a concrete […]
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Regardless how many books I’ve written (over 200) and sold (over 70 million), I fear if I’m not learning, I’m stagnating. My late mother was a convincing example of one who never believed she had arrived. Mom was not only a piano teacher well into her eighties, but she was also a piano student. So […]
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Do you start your novel with a Prologue? Or do you dive right into Chapter One? The choice can determine whether readers are drawn in or never get past the first page. I lean away from a Prologue whenever possible. When I do use one, it’s only because there’s backstory the reader cannot do without. […]
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Want Jerry as Your Mentor? Learn More You know writing a book is going to be hard, even grueling. But synopsizing it should be easy. So, why does it feel so intimidating? It’s not just because you must convince an agent or a publisher (in as few as 500 words) that your novel or nonfiction […]
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