So I decided to listen to my own advice (I generally try to do this, I swear!) by revising my first page for The Last Onest (or TLO). Back in July 2010, I encouraged my readers to revise their first page. To recap, it was after I’d listened to Ally Condie speak. At the WIFYR […]
how to create a character binder or THE BINDER OF DOOM
So I’m a neurotic planner when it comes to my books. And possibly about life, but let’s disregard that for the moment. So I have this BINDER OF DOOM and it is my life. Well, the life of my TLO story (the one for Invisible is blue). It’s quite thick, and has all of the […]
how to do a basic outline
Yes, I finally did it. I got my critique group to outline. For those of you who aren’t familiar with my critique group, it includes Shallee McArthur, Karen Krueger, Joel Smith, Kevin Smith, Rachel Giddings and me! And I want to add here that I don’t know what I’d do without them! And while each […]
you can write better
I hate to admit it, but I cringe whenever I hear an author say something like: the first few pages of my published novel are exactly as I first wrote them. Seriously? At the WIFYR conference, author Ally Condie was really brave and read us two versions of the first page of her upcoming novel, […]
in which my protagonist gets mad at me: or some things can only happen once in a manuscript (or movie)
updated August 1, 2019 Snoopy has it right. Good writing is HARD! There’s a general rule I tend to give authors, and that’s to really notice what your character is doing on the page and limit it. There are certain things that can really only happen once for a character in a whole book, or […]
Chersti Nieveen 