All in Writing Advice
*Previously published at the Writer's Digest blog, There Are No Rules. I blog there once or twice a month. Take a look!*
I spent my December revising a noir/crime novel (I seem to spend most Decembers revising a novel) and I also had a recent discussion with two other writers about the revision process. Both occurrences brought to mind some tips you may find useful. Mind you these are rather simple pieces of advice, and everyone has their own process that works for them, but they might help you feel a little less like you’re swimming upstream during this vital step. I hope they help. Happy revising!
1. Use One File — This is especially true in fiction, but I advise all writers to write the early drafts in one Word file (or whatever software you use). Not only does it help keep a sense of continuity as you progress, but if you make a change that affects an earlier chapter, all you have to do is scroll up. It also makes a key word search much easier without having to open multiple files. I’ve seen novelists use a new Word document per chapter (I did with my first novel way back when) but it can become a confusing jumble of files once you get up to chapter sixty, seventy, eighty…
7 Publishing Tips I Learned at Writer’s Digest Conference East 2013
I recently attended Writer’s Digest Conference East in New York City — my first writing conference in almost five years — and aside from the standard (though invaluable) advice on craft, career, and publishing options for writers, I picked up these seven tidbits of info that I found especially fascinating. You might too, so enjoy!
1. Bookmarks: Every reader needs them. Heck, I have about thirty around my apartment lying in wait and I still take more when I can. So think about creating some with your name and book title on them. They’re easy to make, inexpensive to print, and they can help spread the word about your book, name, website, or twitter handle long after someone has finished your book. It’s a great tip I picked up from Eric DelaBarre (former writer for Law & Order and author of the hit children’s novel Saltwater Taffy).
They say writing for children is harder than writing your typical adult novel, and that never became more evident for me than when I worked on my middle-reader novel The Little Blue Knight vs. The End of the World. As adults, we’ve developed an innate understanding about how to communicate with each other — how our work day went, what happened over the weekend, giving a speech at work, etc. But few of us continually communicate with children on their own level — not just telling them what to do, but actual storytelling for and from their perspective. It’s a skill that slowly goes away as we grow up, so when you decide to take up the challenge of writing a children’s book, there are many things we adults need to understand and re-learn. Here are three things to keep in mind.