Exceeding the MICE Quotient
My novella hit problems a while back, entirely from exceeding the MICE quotient. I tried to pack too much into a 20k novella, lost focus and… it didn’t work.
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Find Your Readers Summit 2023
Daniel David Wallace returns with another writers’ event: Find Your Readers Summit 2023, running August 4th to 7th. …
The Proactivity Scale
A key question in fiction: where does your protagonist sit on the proactivity scale? Do they pursue goals beyond the everyday? Survival or escape by themselves aren’t active goals. Something has to drive change and transformation, to become better by the end than they started at the beginning.
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Independent Bookshop Week 2023
This week is Independent Bookshop Week 2023, a celebration of independent bookshops in the UK. From Saturday 17th – Saturday 24th June, this highlights the vital role independent bookshops play in their communities.
Launched in 2006 by the Booksellers Association, Independent Bookshop Week 2023 is sponsored by Hachette UK.
The key ingredient of good independent bookshops are the staff; book experts with a passion for books and reading, getting the right book into the right hands. Go to them for advice and recommendations. Can’t find a book you want? The Indies will order it for you.
Most independent bookshops work with local communities in the drive to promote reading for pleasure. Adding vitality to our high streets, independent bookshops generate local jobs and contribute to our local economy and local community.
Every bookshop celebrates Independent Bookshop Week in its own way, so find your local indie and see what’s planned. Perhaps it’s an in-store author signing, a virtual event, book club, special offers or promotions.
Shoppers are encouraged to share book purchases on social media tagging @booksaremybag and #IndieBookshopWeek.
Avoiding the Idiot Plot
Avoiding the Idiot Plot: in which characters behave like idiots. Logic and good sense go AWOL. Along with the reader’s patience.
Typically, Idiot Plots derive from non-communication and mis-communication amongst the characters. Often, in the Idiot Plot, one sentence could wrap up the entire thing before the end of Act One.
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What’s Taking So Long?
Endless posts on writing but no sign of publishing a novel; what’s taking so long?
It’s not one novel but three in a series; plus a novella to offer as a reader magnet*.
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Shepherd’s in Da House
The shepherd’s in da house again this Tuesday 6 June for Sampford Courtenay Novel Writer’s Group.
Join us at the New Inn at 11am. I’m in the chair one more time while the intrepid traveller returns. …
Essential Components of a Scene
Building a story at the scene-level, we have to understand the essential components of a scene in order to give it focus. The scene has to advance the story else it fails in its purpose, which is to drive action or reaction in the characters.
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Work in Scenes Not Chapters
Why should authors work in scenes not chapters? The answer: focus. Don’t take my word for it, this is the consensus of writing coaches across A Solid Three-Stage Book Plan
How do you define a solid three-stage book plan without writing a single line of the novel? Abigail Perry presented her Three Stages of a Solid Book Plan at this years Perfect your Process Summit.
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