Transform your writing life.
Here’s a handy quiz to help you figure that out. First, allow me to set the scene (fiction-writing joke). How books get into readers’ hands In a perfect world, our books would spring fully formed from our minds into the bookstores and online emporiums. In the actual world, our books spring in dribbles or fountains …
Not everyone can (or wants to) hire an editor. But what an editor can do is see your novel with fresh eyes. That’s harder for the writer, who’s gotten deep inside each character and scene, each sentence and paragraph. What do you need to do? Create Distance. Here, from the writer’s side of my desk, …
And How to Find It The edit is where your novel goes from good to great―where you learn your own foibles and develop your skills. It is where serious writers are made, and great works born. Martin Stewart As a developmental editor by day (and sometimes by night), I love a writer who loves editing …
Sometimes projects get a little scary. This happened to me on the third draft of a novel called LIQUID WORLD, when it started to take on a feral quality. I was worried that if I came at the revision from the wrong angle, the novel might disappear on me–or worse, turn into something lifeless. What to …
Or, How NOT to Write a Novel. Here, to celebrate Hallowe’en, is the story of 13 drafts of my historical novel, A WORLD OF LUNATICS, set in 1889 Paris at the International Exposition, with Mr. Thomas Edison as the villain (because he was!): 1st draft—a dog’s breakfast; the story told from four points of view. …