After taking a break for five years to pursue my career in journalism,  I finally found my way back to creative writing. Although I hoped my writing would have naturally improved, I didn’t expect to be told by an editor pal that my writing style had changed. It turns out that while I was immersing myself in the world of nonfiction, I was picking up tools that have benefited my fiction...

It had been a year and a half since I finished my first novel. I edited this baby until I couldn’t, and so had my critique partners, beta readers, and sensitivity readers. I sent out one round of queries. All rejected.  I revised, then sent out more.  More rejections.  I revised again, feeling like I was banging my head against a brick wall. I’d fixed everything I could think to...

As most literary agents will tell their writers, a platform can help your career if done well. But first things first: what is a platform? A platform is simply equated to your ability to reach an audience. Imagine if a person with a following of 2 million women wrote a women’s lit book. How much more eager would publishers be to publish it knowing there’s potential buy-in they don’t have to pay...

One of my resolutions for 2019 was to turn my Instagram account into a more open, honest, and transparent place. Many of my followers are aspiring authors, and I wanted to share not just the highlights of being a published writer, but some of the low points, too. The reality of the business. The things I wished someone had shared with me when I was starting out. I’ve talked about...

If you’re writing a book – or fantasizing about writing a book – you probably know how important it is to secure a literary agent. Representing both fiction and non-fiction authors, literary agents are essential to the traditional publishing process. From editing manuscripts to assisting in negotiations with publishers, literary agents are the superheroes of the publishing industry. And that’s a fact. But how do you find the right literary...

Ihave this moment that I often think about, way back when I started taking writing seriously. It was 2007. I was working full time, I had a new baby, and I had just started sending query letters to agents about my first book, which was a 125,000 word behemoth about four vampires living in the suburbs. The form-letter rejections kept trickling in. You know the ones I’m talking about. “Not...

Worldbuilding is important because it’s what pulls your reader into the story, fully immersing them in the world. Without a well-crafted world, the story feels 2D. Just think about the concept of falling into a book page; worldbuilding is what makes the reader lose sense of their surroundings and starts a movie playing in their head. Every detail you give your world adds dimension to make the story feel more...

The good guys get all the attention. You spend pages developing your hero’s back story and personality but fail to give the ol’ bad guy the same love. What’s a good story without a kick-ass villain? A shallow one. From Dracula to Hannibal Lecter and a legion of others, villains are iconic. Here’s how to end favoritism and craft a juicy villain of substance: one readers can sink their teeth...