The Lowdown on Libel: Understanding What Libel Means for Writers
When contemplating whether to pen something potentially controversial, your best defense is knowing when your work is protected and when it crosses the line. While libel laws vary from state to state, there are general principles you can rely upon.
How To Design a Professional Ebook for Free
Discover the three major steps and a slew of free tools to help you format and design an ebook from start to finish, no design skills necessary.
Day Job Jumble Quiz: Can You Guess the Day Jobs of These Famous Authors?
The Potpourri for the Pen column in the September 2018 issue of Writer’s Digest featured a game in which you had to match the famous authors to their unexpected day jobs. Take the quiz here (and find the answers from the magazine).
Learn from The Incredibles: How to Write Super Characters
The Incredibles 2, the sequel to Pixar's iconic superhero film, offers writers the oportunity to enhance our understanding of effective character development. Here are a few lessons from the movie that you can apply in your fiction.
Maximize Your Setting: Bringing Locations, Eras and Worlds to Life on the Page
When the reader can feel as if they are physically in your story's setting, they will be more inclined to let themselves experience what the characters are seeing and hearing. Here, author Curt Eriksen offers considerations for bringing the locations and eras in your fiction to life.
Case Study: How Self-Publishing Led Author Jonathan French to Hybrid Success
Jonathan French's approach to self-publishing played an important role in how editors and agents perceived his book, and persuaded French to reevaluate his perspective on how authors can, and should, break into print.
Writing for Magazines: How to Land a Magazine Assignment
Writing for magazines is a lot like catching a fish. It requires the right bait, understanding the conditions, finesse with timing and most of all, persistence. When it all comes together, the time and effort are worth it when you net the big one.
The Writer’s Digest Annual Conference: 4 Sessions to Help Refresh and Rejuvenate Your Writing
Tap into the wisdom of professionals and get inspired with Writer’s Reserve, a brand new writing track at the Writer’s Digest Conference to help you find inspiration and rejuvenate your writing. The latest addition to our other offerings at the Writer’s Digest Conference, our new Writer’s Reserve track is meant to inspire you—whether you’re...
Writing Science Fiction: How to Approach Exposition in Sci-Fi Novels
In this excerpt from the book Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction, Orson Scott Card explains why exposition can present particular challenges when you're writing science fiction, and tips for overcoming those challenges.
How to Write Strong Scenes: 4 Key Questions to Evaluate Your Scene
The following is excerpted from the online course The Art of Storytelling 101: Story Mapping and Pacing by Terri Valentine, which explores style, concepts, characters, and how to write strong scenes. Learn more about the course and register at Writer’s Digest University. Practically speaking, scenes are the irreducible matter of novels. The...
An Illustrated Guide to Book Expo 2018
Bob Eckstein illustrated the happenings at the reimagined Book Expo 2018. Explore his observations here.
#YouToo? 11 Tips for Writing Your #MeToo Stories
In this piece about the impact of the #MeToo movement on how and what women write, Leigh Anne Jasheway explores different ways writers can approach sharing stories of sexual harassment and assault.
Literary Devices: Exploring Anaphora Through the Poetry of Walt Whitman
What is anaphora? This literary device, which appears in biblical verses as well as the works of Walt Whitman, can be used to build up tension or energy in rhetoric, poetry and prose. Here, Aaron Bauer uses Walt Whitman's "I Hear America Singing" to explore anaphora.
Top Websites for Writers: 7 Websites to Fuel Your Creativity
For the last two decades, we’ve scoured the web for our annual 101 Best Websites for Writers, a comprehensive collection of online resources for writers. This selection represents this year's creativity-centric websites for writers. These websites fuel out-of-the-box thinking and help writers awaken their imaginations.
My Book is on Submission with Publishers. Now What?
What do you do once you're done submitting a book to potential publishers? Here are four productive activities you can use while you await responses.
Searching for the Forgotten: Recalling Details When Writing a Memoir
Writing a memoir means searching for what one has forgotten. It is easy enough to remember the larger outline of a time that has passed, but it is regrettably impossible to recall the minutiae that capture the very essence of that former experience. Here's what you can do to call...
From ER Doctor to Novelist: Meet Kimmery Martin, Author of The Queen of Hearts
An emergency medicine doctor-turned-novelist, Kimmery Martin, author of The Queen of Hearts, discusses her writing journey, what she's learned about writing and publishing, and what's up next.
A Change in Perspective: Tips for Writing from Multiple Points of View
Writing from multiple POVs allows you to zip around to new settings, cut away from scenes, leave cliffhangers unresolved for longer in ways that don’t work as well if you’re following one character’s perspective through the whole thing. Here are a few tips for getting started.
Imitating the Masters: How to Use Setting to Test Your Character’s Voice
Practicing this type of imitation is useful because displacing characters and putting them in new settings and situations helps clarify how character voice affects a story as much as (or more than) plot.
The Introvert’s Guide to Writing Conferences
Attending writing conferences is a great way to learn about the craft, stay up to date on the publishing industry and meet new people. If you are introvert, this can seem intimidating, but with a little preparation and a shift in your mindset, a conference can be an incredible, life-changing experience.
How Freud’s Fundamental Rule of Psychoanalysis Applies to the Writing Experience
How does Freud's fundamental rule of psychoanalysis apply to the life of a writer? DeSales Harrison explores how his former training as a psychoanalyst helped him craft his novel—and the writing process in general.
Get Smart: How to Tell Good Publishing Contracts From Bad
Publishing contracts are as varied as book genres. It’s easy for an author hungry to be published to be blinded by any contract’s lure, to the potential detriment of their career and their hard-fought creative work. Here are three things to look out for.
5 Tips for Writing About Politics in Fiction
Politics can be a contentious topic to address in any scenario these days—but that doesn't mean you should avoid including politics in fiction if the story warrants it. Here, Aimee Agresti offers her best tips for writing about politics in a novel.
How Young Girls’ and Women’s Issues Have Evolved in Young Adult Literature Today
There has been an impressive build-up in Young Adult literature to present-day concerns. Camilla chance discusses in light of her own work.