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Frequently when we’re asked to assess someone’s manuscript, or help a writer brainstorm a story idea, we have to begin by stating a fundamental principle of fiction. It is, we say, a really bad [...]

I continue to mine George Saunders’s A Swim in the Pond in the Rain for practical writing wisdom, and found myself rereading a section on revision, which I think is well worth retailing. I think [...]

We thought we’d escaped the worst effects of the latest cold spell to grip these emerald isles. In December, ten days of sub-zero temperatures left the lake on which our houseboat floats frozen. [...]

I’ve started off the new year with a close and thorough examination of a list of the four hundred plus literary agents of the United Kingdom – in search of one who’d love to represent an [...]

This month hundreds of thousands of people around the world have settled themselves down at desks or in commuter trains, in the cramped quarters of tourist class in jet airliners, on their beds [...]

Develop a character’s voice well and we’ll immediately understand more about their world view and their place in the world. Last week, I spoke about the importance of voice for showing age, [...]

I want to talk about voice today; the voice, specifically, of a dead restaurant reviewer who developed his very idiosyncratic, caustic manner into an art so addictive that hardly anyone read his [...]