How careful are you when you describe your characters? Have you ever—or ever been tempted—to fall into clichés to get your point across? If you can avoid character stereotypes, you can strengthen your writing and keep your reader captivated.
Discover how to craft a story and characters readers love by creating a main character with agency, including a clear goal, motivation, and conflict by editor and novelist, Kay Keppler.
If plot stymies you, as it does many people, you might be able to stimulate some ideas by thinking about your characters and what is likely to happen to a person like that. Ask yourself these questions. By novelist and editor, Kay Kappler.
A review of Plot MD by Adrienne Bell. Plot MD a book on how to write a story using two tools Bell created, the Character Arc and the Stacked Funnel Tool Worksheets.
A great way to hook readers—and keep them turning the pages—is to keep your readers worried about your characters. You can create and sustain this tension by constantly raising the story stakes.
Guest Columnists / Writing Tips
by Guest Contributor · Published May 13, 2019 · Last modified May 9, 2019
Epic rivalries make for memorable stories — the kinds of stories that are worth re-reading so we can immerse ourselves in the emotional intensity of the hero’s multi-layered relationship with the villain.
Recently I had the pleasure of having a guest post on writer and editor C.S. Lakin’s blog, LiveWriteThrive, “Essential Character Tips for Fiction Writers Guest Post on LiveWriteThrive.com.” *** No matter if you’re a...
Plan Your Novel / Writing Tips
by Beth Barany · Published April 17, 2019 · Last modified April 16, 2019
Today is the sixth in an 8-post series on preparing your novel for Nanowrimo. In today’s post, we focus a unique way to develop conflict in your story for pantsers. If you missed it, the...
Plan Your Novel / Writing Tips
by Beth Barany · Published March 27, 2019 · Last modified December 17, 2024
Today is the third in an 8-post series on planning your novel. In today’s post, we focus on character development. (First published on Writers Fun Zone blog in 2014.) *** If you missed it,...
Let’s say that you’ve written the first draft of your novel, and maybe you’ve even checked to see that all your turning points, your scenes and sequels, are where they’re supposed to be.
Let’s welcome back monthly columnist Catharine Bramkamp as she shares with us “Be More than The Gargoyle!” Enjoy!
I’m kinda cheating this month. I won’t be sharing much advice, although I hope it may give you some food for thought… 🙂 I suppose what I’m doing, is thinking out loud about a little writing conundrum I’m pondering; hoping you might chip in with your thoughts.
I’ve been honing my eavesdropping skills as of late, in the spirit that each of our fictional characters speak in a different voice. Whereas one character may sound like a grumbly religious naysayer, another may have the vocal inflections and vocabulary of a “valley girl”. Each character not only uses different verbiage, none speak alike in inflection or tone as well. I pondered this fact of good character development for some time before I decided the best way for me personally to get the “hang” of that was to eavesdrop on other people’s conversations in order to keep all of my characters from sounding exactly like me.
This is an article is part of an occasional series on planning your novel. Our June course on planning your novel is happening now. You can still join us. I first published this article...
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