Helping Writers Become Authors

If any one of those signs sounds familiar, then you may be robbing both yourself and your audience of the wonderful gift of a mirror.

If you can give your character solid story goals that keep him running through your plot, you will never have to worry about boring readers.

Every scene in every story is an evolution.

As important as it is to create lovable, relatable, fascinating protagonists, it's every bit as important to create antagonists who can stand in your character's way, prevent him from reaching his goals, and, as a result, create conflict.

Ever wonder if you might be doing this whole writing thing wrong? Maybe we would do better on a How-Not-to-Be-a-Writer checklist.

Animate body parts can often rear their ugly heads (pun intended) without our even quite being aware of what is happening.

The tone you choose for your story can make or break your book. It will affect every single page you write. Tone guides readers in figuring how they are supposed to view a story.

Writers have to know their characters down to their cores and understand how to flesh them out in the pages of their books.

Used wrongly or too often, complex prose can create distance between your readers and your words - or, worse, just leave them confused.

Plot twists can bring a whole new dimension to your story. But done with less finesse than not, they can also submarine the whole thing.

In a nutshell, Story Cartel offers readers free e-books in exchange for honest reviews.

Could authors tap into crowdsourcing networks for help with mundane and time-consuming (and expensive) tasks like cover design, book layout, and editing?

When we place the emphasis on non-actions, we're failing to tell readers what they should be visualizing.

Always be aware of what you're promising readers.

Readers feel condescended to when you let your characters ramble on in enigmatic sentences that hint at something juicy and interesting without including readers.