One of the main concerns writers should have when planning and writing a series is consistency. But what does it mean to be consistent? It’s more than just keeping track of the character names, physical attributes, family trees, and locations in a notebook or Excel spreadsheet; it’s about presenting the logical facts that you’ve...
Writing Articles
Essential Advice for Beginning Writers: An Interview with Kerri Majors
Kerri Majors is the editor and founder of YARN, the Young Adult Review Network, an online literary journal of YA short stories, essays, and poetry. As if this role doesn’t keep her busy enough, she is also the author of This Is Not a Writing Manual, a refreshing and candid memoir geared toward young...
Knowing When to Stop: Expectations for a Satisfying Ending
Everyone struggles with how to write an ending, regardless of whether it’s a novel or a short story. Sometimes our perfect endings come to us in a dream-like vision, and other times we are left staring at the taunting, flashing cursor on our Word document, daring us to type. But your ending doesn’t have...
Make More Time for Your Writing
It’s a common lament: I could finish my novel, if only I had more hours in the day! In fact, the universal chorus of complaint from writers of all stripes seems to be “not enough time.” In this excerpt from The Productive Writer by Sage Cohen, you’ll learn how your relationship with time is moving...
Creating Emotional Frustration in Your Characters
Using emotion to create strong, emotional characters and move a plot is critical for any writer in any type of genre. Knowing what kind of emotion to use and how to use it is a different matter, however. And while our fictional characters experience the same wide range of emotions that we do, frustration is...
Writing Gender-Specific Dialogue
Writing dialogue to suit the gender of your characters is important in any genre, but it becomes even more essential in romance writing. In a romance novel, characters of opposite sexes are often paired up or pitted against each other in relationships with varying degrees of complication. Achieving differentiation in the tones and spoken...
Don’t Let Worry Drag You Down
Writers are often worriers. We’re plagued with indecision about the choices we make for our stories. We doubt the quality of our writing. We wonder if we’ll ever break through into the realm of publication, recognition, and even celebration. We sometimes fret that we’re wasting our efforts entirely in a profession with few to...
5 New Year’s Resolutions for Writers
A new year, a new writerly you. New Year’s Day is a time for reflecting on the past year while thinking about the goals, wishes, and hopes for the new year ahead. What does this mean for your writing goals? Maybe 2013 is the year you finish your novel. Maybe it’s the year you...
How to Write a Reader-Friendly Essay
Powerful, surprising, and fascinating personal essays are also “reader-friendly essays” that keep the reader squarely in focus. So how do you go about writing one? In this excerpt from Crafting the Personal Essay, author Dinty W. Moore shares a variety of methods for crafting an essay that keeps the reader’s desires and preferences in...
Reject a Hit: Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol
Let’s step once again into the role of the unconvinced, perhaps even curmudgeonly or fool-hearted editor: What harsh rejection letters might the authors of some of our favorite hit books have had to endure? This contribution comes from Chris Gay of Manchester, Conn., who found Charles Dickens’ classic A Christmas Carol to be as...
Writing for the Young Adult Audience
There’s no question about it: The young adult (YA) audience is a hot market, one that is steadily growing in popularity and garnering attention from young readers as well as literary critics. This means that this market is healthier than ever–and so is the competition for getting published. So what are the keys to...
How (& Where) to Get a Short Story Published
Fiction publishing creds are a great way to build your bio and propel your career. Here’s how—and where—to get them.
How to Build Your Author Platform
A major buzzword floating around the publishing world these days is “platform.” There’s a lot of question about what it means and whether or not authors really need to have one. Writer’s Digest publisher Phil Sexton says the importance of having a platform ultimately depends on your goals for your book. If you’re a...
5 Steps to Book Publishing
Set your goals.When it comes to indie publishing, the best place to start is at the very end. Before you dive in to the process, consider what main goals you have for your book. Do you aspire to commercial success? Are you looking to supplement your speaking career or business? Maybe seeing your name...
Writer’s Digest Mark of Quality
With the Writer’s Digest Mark of Quality review — included in nearly every Abbott Press publishing package — your manuscript will be evaluated by a professional Writer’s Digest editor. Titles deemed to be of exceptionally high literary merit will receive the Writer’s Digest Mark of Quality distinction and benefit from these unique advantages: Increased...
8 Simple Tips to Write Better
Great writing begins with an appetite for life. Try these 8 approaches to get out of your comfort zone, break rules and reap rewards.
The Basics of Building a Writer’s Platform
If you want to sell more books or simply get your name out there, a writer’s platform is essential. Chuck Sambuchino, author of Create Your Writer Platform explains what a platform is and the common building blocks of a writer’s platform. What is a Writer/Author Platform? Platform, simply put, is your visibility as an...
Improve Your Craft and Get Published
Since the 1920s, Writer’s Digest has been providing quality resources to writers like you. Today, Writer’s Digest continues to supply top-notch advice to help you refine your writing skills, but we don’t stop there. Through Abbott Press, a division of Writer’s Digest, we offer serious writers an effective way to publish and distribute high-quality...
4 Ways to Revise as You Write
Writers differ in their opinions of the revision process. Some balk at it–they see it as the “no fun” part of writing, and much prefer drafting and creation to fixing and rethinking. Other writers embrace the process and consider it an act of strengthening, polishing, and ultimately making their novel the best it can...
How to Write a Romance Novel: The Keys to Conflict
Conflict is the core of any work of fiction. Here are tips to improve your romance novel's conflict so it catches the eye of agents.
Write Fiction that Grabs Readers from Page One
In your novel, the inciting incident is the first sign of trouble for your protagonist: it’s the catalyst, the chemical reaction, that sets the plot into motion. But the inciting incident isn’t only important for your main character. Understanding how to harness it is also crucial to hooking your reader from the very first...
Selling Your Book’s Movie and TV Rights – What You Need to Know
If you’ve ever wondered how something gets made into a film—and how your work can be tapped for one, too—here’s the inside scoop on options.
The Ideas that Inspired The Hobbit, Animal Farm & 8 Other Famous Books
Ideas often percolate and simmer over time, but every once in a while lightning strikes—and a sudden flash of creativity can alter a writer’s career forever. Take, for example, these 10 famous works inspired by unexpected bolts of inspiration.
Writer’s Digest Article Index 2011
All feature articles and columns published in Writer’s Digest during 2011 are indexed by topic.. Back issues may be ordered at The Writer's Digest Shop.
Writer’s Digest Article Index 2010
All feature articles and columns published in Writer’s Digest during 2010 are indexed by topic. Back issues may be ordered at The Writer's Digest Shop.