The Antibiotic Crisis Scares Me So Much I Wrote A Novel About It by Rachael Sparks When I decided to write a novel, I believed the adage that you should write what you know. For me, that topic was clear: the fact that we are running out of antibiotics faster than we can develop new […]
What is a Cozy Mystery, Really? by Vicki Delaney What, exactly, is a cozy mystery? On one hand, that seems to be an easy question to answer. A cozy mystery is often described as a book containing no overt violence or sex on the page. It’s a character-and-community based mystery featuring an amateur sleuth. But […]
Hungry for Murder with Jude Dillane by Cathi Stoler There’s no getting around the fact that my protagonist in BAR NONE: A MURDER ON THE ROCKS MYSTERY, Jude Dillane, loves to eat. At five foot nine, it seems that everything she consumes goes to height, rather than her waistline, so she can slip into those […]
Think INTO The Box by CJ Lyons Want to know a secret about writing great thrillers? It’s not “think out of the box” but rather “think inside the box.” Many thrillers are big, bold, anything-can-happen rushes of adrenaline. The key words being: anything can happen. That’s an open system. There are no boundaries. Anything can happen. Once […]
Writing From The Opposite Gender by LS Hawker Jackie: How do you write women so well? Melvin Udall: I think of a man. And I take away reason and accountability. As Good As It Gets, 1997 I remember watching this movie when it came out, and Jack Nicholson’s character said the above line in response to a […]
Time Management for Writers by Justin Lee So what’s it like to write and publish a book with a full-time job and young family? If my experience is any indication, the glib answer is it’s not for the lazy, the easily stressed or those incapable of routine. The more philosophical response is that it requires […]
Takeaways from Killer Nashville Max López One of the most uplifting and simultaneously disheartening phenomena you may experience at a writer’s conference is being surrounded by hundreds of people doing the exact same thing that you are. Although it can be intimidating to see so many authors all working tirelessly to get their next book […]
Dramatic Infrastructure: Using Everyday Events to Deliver Emotional Impact by Roger Johns Success as a storyteller depends on understanding not only the mechanics of the story you’re telling, but also how to properly shape a reader’s responses to the events in the narrative. Readers quickly lose interest in writing that’s emotionally flat, but provoking, sustaining, […]