Four days after the publication of my second novel, The Apprentice In The Master’s Shadow, I stumbled upon an article by the publishing industry veteran, Jane Friedman, in which she presented the startling statistic that a little over 80% of published authors quit writing after their third book. In the almost two years since... Continue Reading →
Evaluating The Two Most Commonly Given Writing Tips
There are two pieces of writing advice I can guarantee that every aspiring author has received numerous times while pursuing their writing ambitions. The first advice is “read a lot,” and the second is “write a lot.” Both are simple, straightforward tips that likely seem so obvious you might wonder why anyone would find... Continue Reading →
You Don’t Have To Hang Yourself With Tropes
The term trope has a number of definitions, but for the purposes of this post it refers to a theme, convention or plot device that readers have come to expect in a work of fiction. In this context, tropes are prone to becoming clichés, and any literary genre you can think of has them.... Continue Reading →