Writing Secrets: Pick the right detail and a character springs to life
“He was a gentleman with red whiskers who always went first through a doorway.” This is how Guy de Maupassant described a character in one of his stories. Its details […]
Writing Secrets: Hook your reader and promise them more
We like to say that the best beginning – of a book or short story – should contain a hook and a promise. Hook your reader, and promise them more. […]
Writing Secrets: What makes a verb strong?
I am constantly exhorting writers to avoid adverbs, but to use instead “strong verbs”. And they respond by saying, “Okay, but what is a strong verb, and how do we […]
Writing Secrets: The characters who shape our lives
My daughter is named for a feisty Jane Austen character. My son is called Joshua – largely, I have to admit, because I fell in love with Mordecai Richler’s Joshua […]
Writing Secrets: Your writing is as good as your last sentence
It’s your job, as a writer, to care about every level of your narrative. It’s not just about the plot, or the characters and their words, actions and reactions. Those […]
Writing Secrets: On darlings, and why they deserve to die
What is a “darling” anyway, and why should it be murdered? I was asked this in a workshop recently, and it brought me up short. We are used, as writers, […]
Monday Motivation: Write sentences that crackle, whirl and lash
Let’s talk about writing at its most granular level, where the choice of words writers make affects our experience as readers on a second-by-second basis. Take a passage like this, […]
Monday Motivation: Doubt is a writer’s best friend
Richard is on a much-deserved break, so here’s a re-post of one of our earlier Monday Motivations, from 2016. Doubt sits at the right hand of all writers. We spend […]
Writing Secrets: Revelations need not bash readers over the head
Readers are clever. They pick up the subtlest clues and don’t need the point hammered home for them. Last week I spoke about the subtle way Barbara Kingsolver leaves a […]
Writing Secrets: Let the clues fall lightly
A woman in her late 40s has lived for some time entirely alone in a forest hut as a conservation ranger. A man travels through her area of the forest, […]
Monday Motivation: Seek to be honest, seek to be truthful
The world, our institutions, and our so-called opinion-makers, speak a great deal about facts v. fiction, about fake news v. the truth. But where does the writer of fiction stand […]
Writing Secrets: The problem with the holy trinity of writing advice
If you’ve been trying to write, you will no doubt have been challenged to adhere to the holy trinity of writing advice: write what you know, find your voice and show rather than tell. The first [...]
