Archives

I’ve sometimes stressed how important it is, in creating the world of story, to use accurate details. Accuracy is really important because it lends credibility even to situations that are, on the [...]

Are there secrets to good writing? You know all the platitudes as well as I do, the ones that insist that it’s mostly a matter of sweat, and very little of inspiration. The idea that persistence [...]

“I’m just so happy,” one of our mentoring participants told us recently. “I can’t tell you how happy I am. The writing’s flowing and … it just feels right.” We told her that we were happy to see [...]

“The last paragraph, in which you tell what the story is about, is almost always best left out.” This was Irwin Shaw’s advice to young writers, and I think of it often. We are always tempted to [...]

I tend to advise new writers against using the god-like omniscient point of view when they start writing. Using a distant narrator who comments on all the characters, and can see and understand [...]

When you become a writer, every sentence should be sacred to you. I give this advice a great deal in our mentoring programme. Pay attention to each word you use: does it say exactly what you wish [...]

So you’re writing the first pages of your novel and want to set up the fact that Linda is as happy as she could ever hope to be with her new boyfriend Marvin. It’s important to your story because [...]

It’s an old story oft told but one worth telling and retelling: simple is best, clear is most beautiful. It’s true that writing requires artifice and contrivance. Threaded through even the [...]

Let’s look beyond the obvious in the old tenets of writing advice. We all know that “showing” is supposed to be better than “telling”. We know, for instance, that we should use all our senses [...]

Mishaps happen all the time in writing. Most of them are little niggles, easily erased during a light edit. In one chapter the stable boy has a shock of blond hair; in the next he’s a girl with a [...]

I recently read a book called Moneyland, in which Oliver Bullough explores the many and ingenious ways in which the world’s superrich hide their wealth and avoid paying taxes. It’s as if the [...]

The instant we meet people, we start computing. We take in cues, without even realising it, and come to conclusions. Some of these we’ll adjust with time. Others we’ll confirm. It’s the same with [...]