Writing Advice

At the start of 2025, I posted some un-producivity tips on slowing down and embracing fallow periods that may be crucial for your creativity. Joke was on me! Little did I know 2025 would be one of the busiest years of my life. I’m stumbling rather than sprinting into 2026. So let’s get real. Since […]

We writers can sometimes get so caught up in our characters and settings that we forget that we are not actually transcribing the events in an alternate world. We are storytelling. As such, it’s crucial to remember the reader on the other side of the scenes you’re constructing. In my editing work, I often see […]

Those of us in the United States are prepping our systems for turkey and stuffing, and I hope wherever you are, you have a safe and contented Thanksgiving. I’m very thankful for all of you, and appreciate But wait, there’s more! It’s almost time for our December office hours (exclusively for newsletter subscribers!) at 6pm […]

Excess verbiage is a prime culprit behind a choppy reading experience and a bloated word count. Little redundancies can pile up over the course of a novel and add tens of thousands of extra words. When I’m line editing a manuscript, there are several common phrases that instantly get cut because they are almost always […]

When writers set out to pen children’s books, they may well anchor to their own childhoods for inspiration. Which is good on the whole! I’m on record arguing that a good memory is more helpful for writing children’s books than proximity to current children. It’s important to channel what it’s like to be a child. […]

Your protagonist doesn’t need to be powerful. They don’t need to save the world. They don’t need to be smart or clever or determined or any other personality trait under the sun. They do need to try to get what they want. To me, the importance of crafting an active protagonist strikes at the heart […]