When characters speak, the reader should be trapped in the moment, hooked, not pulled out of the story by unwieldy phrasing, words that simply don’t fit, or punctuation that distracts. When reading your dialogue aloud, which you should always do, if it sticks out or trips you, rework it so that it does what it’s [...]

Are you a writer? What defines you as such? Is it that you have a qualification from a college, online or real-life? Are you well published, traditionally or Indie? Do you just dabble, popping out the odd poem or short story as the mood takes you, or are you a fully-committed career scribe, chipping away [...]

When I first heard the phrase – ‘Writing is about rewriting’ - I went, ‘Huh?’ The way I saw it, the main thing was to get that story down, finished, complete, at last! I mean, there’s no doubting the satisfaction and sense of exhilaration felt when ‘The End’ is written or typed after that closing [...]

Why would you bother getting professional help with your novel? You’ve been writing years, learning your craft, pumping out short stories to beat the band, even playing around with a few in the hope of developing one into a novel. You’ve spent the last few years gaining invaluable experience, building your knowledge of the many [...]