… including its clichés.
How well should you know your fiction genre? Well enough to know not only its expectations, but also its overused elements.
If you’re writing romance, you should be familiar enough with what others have published that you avoid like the plague the well-worn technique of having two potential love interests literally bump into each other.
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Don’t clog your lines with double attribution.
The author didn’t realize she was wasting words whenever her characters spoke.
In nearly every instance, she provided not only a dialogue tag, “Christina said,” but also a “beat” or “action tag,” a phrase describing what the character did as she spoke.
Consider this double attribution line:
“I’m so sorry,” Christina said, … Continue reading
Don’t expect an instant novel.
Several friends on Facebook have been posting about working to write a novel this November.
It’s great to see their determination and progress. I just hope they realize that at the end of the month, their novel won’t be done.
They may have a first draft, even a good first draft, but it’s won’t yet be a polished novel. For … Continue reading