5 Secrets to Creating a Compelling Series Character
Award-winning author Barry Lancet shares five secrets he’s learned in his writing career about developing a character who can carry a series of novels.
Why Point of View is So Important for Novel Writers
The following is a brief rundown of the three most common POVs and the advantages and disadvantages of each.
The Key to Creating Great Characters
Knowing a few important details about your character can go a long way into giving him or her credibility and life.
How to Craft the Perfect Antihero
Without giving away too much of the book, I can explain some of the choices I made in crafting Narby as a credible, effective, even sympathetic protagonist, despite the gaping flaws in his character.
Emotion vs. Feeling: How to Evoke More From Readers
Recognizing the subtle differences in writing emotion and writing feeling can help render both more powerfully on the page.
Female Protagonists in Crime Fiction: What You Need to Know
If you want to muscle your female protagonists into the traditionally male world of the police procedural or PI novel, here are a few things writers should consider.
How to Write Better Villains: 5 Ways to Get Into the Mind of a Psychopath
In New York Times bestselling author Peter James’s latest Detective Roy Grace novel, much of the narrative is from the point of view of antagonist Jodie Bentley, a psychopathic Black Widow systematically marrying rich men and killing them in the most sinister of ways. Here, Peter James lists his top five...
5 Moral Dilemmas That Make Characters (& Stories) Better
Readers can’t resist turning pages when characters are facing tough choices. Use these 5 keys to weave moral dilemmas into your stories—and watch your fiction climb to new heights. This guest post is by Steven James. James is the award-winning, bestselling author of 12 novels. He enjoys dark roast coffee and...
3 Things Your Novel’s Narrator Needs to Accomplish
While the list of persuasive elements is long, here are three small but crucial moves, things that narrators do when they most successfully convince us.
How to Write From the Opposite Gender’s Point Of View
Every fiction writer has to write across gender lines. I should know. I’m a fantasy / science fiction writer, and though my stories are populated with vampires, robots, and space squids, there tend to be more than a few humans in the mix. Many of those humans end up being women....
Tips for Creating Voice in Your Writing
Here are a few things to consider if you’re looking to write a story with a strong voice.
The Difference Between Character Habits And Quirks
What exactly is the difference between behaviors, habits, mannerisms and quirks? Read on to learn the subtle (yet important) differences between them.
The Four ‘R’s of Writing Characters of the Opposite Gender
As a female writer, it's tough to create powerful male narrators. To do it you have to do a lot of preparation. Here are four methods to help simplify the process for you.
Relating Historical Fiction Characters to a Contemporary Audience
Once you have built real people, that’s the time to put them into a historical context. Here's how to do both.
How to Create Instantly (& Instinctively) Recognizable Characters
Meeting characters in a novel is very much like meeting people in real life. When we start reading a book, it’s as if we moved to a new town and were meeting a whole bunch of new people at the same time. Your job as a writer is to create that...
Developing Your Writing Skills: Point of View
Point of view is among the least understood craft challenges but, along with the related question of narrative distance, it is perhaps the most powerful in effecting readers’ emotions. Here are tips on writing POV.
In Defense of the Flibbertigibbet: The Questions That Made Me a Writer
BY MEGAN KRUSE I was eighteen when I met my friend Katie at a summer camp in Washington. I must have been doing some work then, but even now it seems that my main occupation was trying to romance the other counselors, to grow friends and loves like wildflowers around me....
Namedropping: Finding Solid Names for Your Unique Characters
BY ELIZABETH SIMS What’s in a character’s name? Everything. Here’s how you, the writer, can master the neglected art of moniker-making.
5 Steps to a Great Female Protagonist
According to bestselling authors JT Ellison, Alex Kava and Erica Spindler, there are 5 key ways to make your heroine shine. Here they are.
by Jessica Strawser, reporting from ThrillerFest 2010 (New York City)
by Jessica Strawser, reporting from ThrillerFest 2010 (New York City)