Struggling with revision? Well, it’s time to dig in to the second half of this awesome revision series hosted by YA Author Heather Demetrios. If you missed the first four interviews, CLICK HERE to learn more about them. Get your revision on! REVISING WITH PRIDE: A DEBUT AUTHOR ON REVISION FEELS Interview #5 with Miriam…
Are you freaked out about revision? Do you feel paralyzed about where to begin? What if you mess it up? Or even worse … what if you make it better and now you really DO have to revise the whole thing? Have no fear: YA authors Heather Demetrios and I, are the kind of sickos…
My amazing YA author-in-awesomeness Heather Demetrios (with whom I’m hosting the Pneuma 2018 Writing Retreat) has put together and AH-MAZING interview series all about revision called: Once More With Feeling! If you fear revision, psyche yourself out, or feel like you have to write a perfect first draft, then this series is for you. Revision…
Yes friends, this is happening! Heather Demetrios and I are hosting our second annual Pneuma Creative Autumn Writing Retreat, and you are not going to want to miss it. You’re freaked out about revision in general, or you don’t know how to do it – possibly, you’re both freaked out and not sure how to do…
Happy New Year friends! I can’t believe it’s almost 2018! Where did the year go? And where have I been? Holy-you-didn’t-blog-for-months-Batman! It’s true. I’ve been distracted. I took a job teaching 9th and 10th grade English at a local high school and BOY-OH-BOY I have mad respect for teachers. This job is HARD! I want…
What if your villain was your story’s protagonist? This is the question my super-amazing screenwriting friend Erik Martinez asked me over Skype last week and it exploded my brain. I was struggling with my YA Fantasy work-in-progress THE NEVERS. I knew I hadn’t developed my villain the way I needed to. I knew I was…
I am super excited to announce that I will be a faculty member for the Pneuma Creative Writing Retreat this October! If you’ve ever dreamed of working with me in person and picking my brain for three days as we sip wine and gawk at the gorgeous New England trees – this is your chance!…
Have you heard of this fancy MFA creative writing term called profluence? Proflu-whaaaaaat? Yep, it’s a complete mouthful! Profluence is a big scholarly MFA word that I’d never heard of until I was in creative writing school. It’s coined by John Gardner and it refers to the overall connective tissue, flow and energy of your novel,…
You know those scenes that you LOOOOOOOVE, but you feel like you can’t cut? You know the ones. They’re the scenes that turn you into a frothing angry velociraptor when someone suggests you might cut them. The scenes your beta-readers keep mentioning might not be necessary, and you’ve pretty much lost all faith in your beta readers…
Writers are asked for writing advice all the time. They’re asked on panels and interviews and by strangers they’ve hardly met. And you’ve probably heard plenty of stock answers like … Make sure you read as much as you can! Get your butt in your chair and finish your book! Write from your heart. Write…