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C-c-considering Cadence: Understanding One Quality of Voice
The Oxford Dictionary defines cadence as “a modulation or inflection of the voice, a rhythmical effect in written text, a fall in pitch of the voice at the end of a phrase or sentence” or simply as...
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Corrections Are Good: How to Take Critique Like a Dancer
Today’s guest is Kim Bullock whose novel-in-progress (working title The Oak Lovers) has already been receiving praise. Historical fiction author Stephanie Cowell says this, “I’ve seldom read a novel...
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That Awkward Moment When…
Today’s guest is Erika Mitchell, author of Blood Money and Bai Tide, the first novel of a new series about CIA case officer Bai Hsu (Champagne Books, 2015). Erika cut her espionage teeth on James Bond...
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Feeding Your Readers Information: A Look at a Master
As so often happens, the comments on last month’s piece (What Do Your Readers Know and When Do They Know It) showed that there was a lot more to the topic than I could cover in a single column. So...
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One-Starred: The Importance of Criticism and Why You Should Take It
Flickr Creative Commons: Marco Ghitti As some of those of you who attended the fabulous Un-conference last year know, I read all my Amazon reviews, positive and negative. And while this might sound...
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How to Tackle Critique Notes
Picture of edits of an early draft I recently exchanged my manuscript with a writer friend who also had a novel she wanted me to read. We read and edited on paper (we’re old-school that way), so I now...
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How to Serve and Swallow Criticism
Generally speaking, I’m not big on podcasts (because I have a hard time focusing on and retaining audio-only information) but there is one that I make sure to tune into every week: Scriptnotes by...
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Layering: A look at Jennifer Weiner’s “Swim”
Flickr Creative Commons:Benjamin Dunn And now for something completely different. Instead of my explaining a single idea or craft point, I’d like us to look together at a complete short story, the way...
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Are You Publishable or Not? Reading the Tea Leaves.
Flickr Creative Commons: stillthedudeabides Writing never feels more lonely than after you’ve sent your manuscript out to every agent and publisher you can think of and gotten nowhere. Of course, you...
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Editorial Matchmaking
Flickr Creative Commons: Laura Appleyard You’ve taken your novel as far as you can. You’ve reworked it until you can’t really see it anymore, but still feel there’s something wrong somewhere. Or...
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Writing is Hard
It doesn’t seem that hard at first. When you’re caught up in the thrill of creating people and telling their story, writing feels like the easiest thing in the world. You just go on doing it until you...
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Truth Be Told? Truth Is on Thin Ice
Image – iStockphot: StyxClick ‘Your Capacity for Change’ Go slowly. Makes it easier if you take this one line at a time: Authenticity is equal to your unique voice, multiplied by truthfulness, plus...
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The Dreaded Editorial Letter
By Rodger Evans, via Flickr’s CC Please welcome back guest Densie Webb whose first novel is You’ll Be Thinking of Me. Densie is currently working on novels two and three, and she’s also a nonfiction...
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What a Sensitivity Reader Is (and Isn’t) and How to Hire One
Flickr Creative Commons: Bruce Guenter An interesting thing has been happening to me with increased frequency: I’ve been asked to read friends’ and acquaintances’ manuscripts as a sensitivity reader...
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Dissecting The Goldfinch
Photo by Max Pixel, CC0 While it might be more apt to describe Donna Tartt’s novel The Goldfinch as anchored by time, place and character, rather than constricted as the word “tether” implies, I...
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MFA + DIY: An Entrepreneurial Take on the MFA Debate
Please welcome Gabriela Pereira, author of DIY MFA: Write with Focus, Read with Purpose, Build Your Community, to Writer Unboxed today! Gabriela is a writer, speaker, and entrepreneur who wants to...
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Dissecting A Gentleman in Moscow
Photo by Max Pixel, CC0 If the ability to get people talking is the measure of success of a novel, then A Gentleman in Moscow was clearly a hit with the WU’s Breakout Novelist Book Dissection Group,...
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Dissecting The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
Photo by Max Pixel, CC0 The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, though far from being a mystery novel, still managed to perplex the WU Breakthrough Novel Dissection Group more than nearly...
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Critiquing for Shades of Gray
When Erin Bartels and I agreed to be critique partners, we knew we had similar writing sensibilities and a commitment to telling emotionally resonant stories. Interestingly, both of our debut novels...
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First Look: WU UnConference Session Descriptions
The Writer Unboxed UnConference If you’ve been eager to learn more about the sessions and workshops we’ll have at this year’s Writer Unboxed UnConference (in Salem, MA, 11/4-11/8), this is the post for...
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