12.7K results

I recently solicited my watchers to ask me writing questions that I would then attempt to answer in a writing guide such as this. This article is my first response, and there will be many more to come.I've been asked to give advice on ways a writer can begin to put words on a page. The bottom line is as simple as this: sit your butt down and write.Duh, right? It's the only way I know to actually write.Sure, sitting your butt in a chair is easy, but getting your fingers to move and stay moving is a challenge. Here are three things that have helped me.1) Have a goal.Your goal can be as simple as "describe the person in this picture" or as am...

Going back to school was going to be a painstaking ordeal, as it always was. Not only would I have to endure masses of homework and exam revision, I would also have my parents and the annoying teacher on my back constantly as this was my final year.Approaching the gates and dreading my first lessons, I noticed the headmaster waiting in front of a mass of students from my year. "Good day, your lessons have been swapped around today, don't worry just continue as normal but with these new time tables" He was handing out bright pink sheets with the new timetable boldly imprinted."PE first, great" I moaned to myself.The changing room was filled...

4 Tips for Writing Your Story's Midpoint Anybody Can Write a Novel 2.0 Chapter 6 “Plot Points” – Section 6 “Midpoint” “Life is truly known only to those who suffer, lose, endure adversity and stumble from defeat to defeat.” -Anais Nin In the last tutorial, I compared the First Pinch Point to the rise of a metaphorical hammer over your protagonist's skull. The next plot point—the Midpoint—is when that hammer comes crashing down and knocks your hero senseless. We see this is Star Wars – A New Hope when Luke Skywalker and his friends try to escape the Empire and save Princess Leia, resulting in the death of Ben Kenobi. This point ...

Most people abandon a story somewhere in the beginning or middle portions of their novel-to-be. This is usually because they feel stuck and have no idea on where to go. Well in this lesson I’ll be going over the basics on plotting and storycraft. However, please be aware that this guide is for longer works, and is a general purpose tool instead of an expansion specific one.  ~~~ {-Plot Overview-} ~~~ Plot: - A plot is a sequence of events in the story. Every narrative (in any medium) has a chain of events that leads from the beginning to the end. Typically speaking, stories become subjective after a certain threshold of quality is reache...

Maybe you’ve heard that first drafts are supposed to suck, but what does that really mean? What does a sucky first draft look like? How do you allow yourself to suck? Why would you even want to allow yourself to write something that sucks in the first place?Because otherwise, you’ll most likely be crippled by the writer’s arch nemesis: perfectionism.Did you just cringe? We all experience it when we sit down to write, arrange everything just so, type a sentence or two (or a bit more if you’re lucky), and then it strikes—your inner editor. It smacks you across the face and demands that you fix that grammar mistake right now.  Or worse, yo...

PLEASE NOTE THAT WHILE THIS PAGE WILL REMAIN ACTIVE FOR PURPOSES OF EDUCATION AND RECORDS, IT IS OUTDATED.  CLICK HERE   TO ACCESS THE NEWEST VERSION. 15 Tips for Writing Your Story's Third Draft Anybody Can Write a Novel Chapter 8 “Editing” – Section 2 “Editing the Second Draft” With Links to Supplementary Material Several months ago, I wrote an article about Editing and Rewriting your Story's First Draft , and today I am writing an article for editing the subsequent draft. You may be spitting your coffee and jack at the computer screen, and telling me that I am not done with story genres, yet! Very true... and I'm sorry for the mes...