Straight talk from the sisters about blood, sweat and ink
Regardless of whether you’re a plotter or pantser, you might come to a place mid-month where your story feels like it’s gone off the rails. A lot of people will tell you to plow through! Just keep writing! It’ll work itself out! But I think better advice is to check in with your basic story beats. It …
Continue reading “15 Story Beats to Keep Your NaNoWriMo Novel on Track”
Ever since I learned the terms “pantser and plotter”, I’ve identified as a plotter (someone who outlines a story before writing a manuscript). To me, sitting down to write a whole book without an outline (i.e. the pantser method) is impossible. And now it’s time for a confession: pantsers make me feel stupid. Why can’t …
Continue reading “Plotters vs Pantsers: Are We Really That Different?”
Confession: I saw The Princess Bride for the first time last weekend. I know, I know, my childhood was lacking. There was only one movie theatre with one tiny screen in my town, and my parents said we were too poor to see movies in a theatre. So yeah. Fast forward 29 years later, and …
Continue reading “The Princess Bride Gender-Swapped!”
Hello! We are still here and blogging! Alas, Jetpack was giving us trouble and not sending emails to our lovely subscribers. So we thought we’d better recap the last two weeks. First… We’re hosting a Princess Bride Linkup Party! It’s next weekend! Why? Because FUN! And also on September 25th, three decades less a year ago, The …
Continue reading “ICYMI: Emotional MidPoints, Character Name Tricks, + Princess Bride Party!”
This week I’m honing the middle of my WIP, so it’s time to dust off the Archives and refresh my knowledge on a story’s midpoint… Originally posted on Aug. 4, 2014. Updated and reposted on Sept. 5, 2016. Awhile ago I wrote about Mapping the Mushy Middle of a story. This is a plot-centric approach to …
Continue reading “The Hero’s Emotional Midpoint”
Do a quick search for “elevator pitch” on the Internet, and most of the information will say it is a 60-second pitch of yourself or your product (in the case of writers, your book). But seriously, 60 seconds? What elevator takes that long? Unless you do this: Do NOT do this. Or this: After all, …
Continue reading “Pitching 101: The Elevator Pitch”
This month at WriteOnSisters we’re talking about pitching! A pitch comes in many forms – query, synopsis, one-liner, or book blurb. Anything that “sells” your book to anyone else is a pitch. Usually pitches are written after a novel is complete, because that’s when a writer needs to “sell” their novel to an agent or …
Continue reading “3 Reasons to Write a Pitch Before Finishing Your Novel”
Once upon a time I was working on a revamped novel idea – a fun, scary, action-packed revenge story. It was going to be great. I was feeling especially confident after reading this blog: “Why Revenge is Such a Brilliant Plot for Beginner Writers.” I pictured myself pounding out this simple revenge story while my other …
Continue reading “6 Questions to Make Sure Your Story Has Stakes”
Last November I attempted my first NaNoWriMo, but since I’m a turtle-paced plotter and not a fast-fingered pantser, I approached it like this: A Slow Writer’s Scheme to Win NaNoWriMo. Despite that excellent plan, I didn’t win (see Results of a Slow Writer’s First NaNoWriMo). There were two reasons for that, one of which was …
Continue reading “Camp NaNo & My Escape From The Outlining Outhouse!”
I’ve been reading writing craft books for almost two decades, and it’s gotten to the point where most of them don’t tell me anything I don’t already know. But recently I had a creative crisis that prompted me to look hard for new information, and after a couple misses I came across THE ANATOMY OF STORY …
Continue reading “Character Need: Psychological + Moral”