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In life, we never achieve anything meaningful without overcoming some fear or wound from our past and giving up some thought or behavior pattern that keeps us locked into one plane of existence. And it takes test after test, try after try, opportunity and failure after opportunity and failure before we finally throw up our […]

Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Underground Railroad, offers an excellent example of the relationship required between the protagonist and antagonist to craft a page-turning, stick-with-the-reader story. The Underground Railroad tells the story of (no spoilers ahead) a runaway slave girl's journey from the plantation she'd been forced to call home across the antebellum South […]

If you want to sell the idea of your novel to a literary agent or small press' acquisition editor you must have an excellent query letter. Not an excellent book, an excellent query letter. There are many excellent books out there that will never be published (by a publisher that uses editorial discretion*) because the […]

As a developmental editor, I look for many things when I evaluate a manuscript. Point of view (POV) and perspective Verb tense Rhythm and pacing Consistencies and inconsistencies Plot Story Character development Genre Length Marketability These are big picture things. Forests, not trees. All of these things are important, but this post is going to […]

HOW DO YOU DEVELOP FICTIONAL CHARACTERS WHEN YOU WRITE? Marlie Harris, a fellow Boise area writer, said and asked the following on one of her blog posts: “I would love to read your thoughts on characters, fictional or not, and how you search then find them. Are they memorable? Do you wish you could no […]