How to Get Published

by John Bowers

Writing fiction is hard work, but it’s also fun. As a writer you get to create everything, from the world in which your characters live to the characters themselves. You get to determine whether they live or die. But sometimes writing can be daunting; for example, giving your characters a name. How, exactly, does that work?

It could be very easy, of course, if you don’t mind using the same old names as everyone else. You could call your character Dick and his girlfriend Jane, but doing that might kill your chances at a sale before anyone read past the names. If you want your characters to be memorable, you need to give them names to remember. But with millions of novels out there, and ten times as many characters, how do you find such a name that hasn’t already been used? (more…)

by Victory Crayne

If you have difficulty selling your novel, I suggest you ask someone in your critique group, your editor, or someone who can analyze your writing if your manuscript is shy on any of these three key ingredients.

Study what the bestselling novelists are doing. You will find that all bestselling novels are different from each other, but they have three things in common that are often missing in other novels.

1.  Well developed characters

Well developed means showing or telling aspects of their personal lives or personalities. Yes, this is a place where telling can be useful. Does your tale reveal your protagonist as a “real” person with a “real” life, going beyond the “bare bones” needed to move the story along? This takes extra time in designing the main characters. Most beginning writers are reluctant to spend that time. Instead they want to rush into the fun part–writing scenes.

For those authors who have characters recurring in different novels, this is critical. When you see a new book out by a favorite author and the protagonist is one you’ve read about before, are (more…)

by Al Kalar

I was re-reading a great “how to” book from Ben Bova called The Craft of Writing Science Fiction That Sells*.  This book was a great help to me when I was getting started as a writer.

In the book, Mr. Bova gives us the following list of tips that can be applied to just about any good fiction: (more…)

by Al Kalar

“No battle plan survives contact with the enemy”. - Generalfeldmarschall Helmuth von Moltke the Elder

We’ll get back to this quote.

Fine. You know who your audience is, you can write well in your chosen language, and you know why you are writing your book (or pamphlet). Now we can start in on the elements of your story.

Developing Plot and characters

Mapping

Some authors know where they are going and how they plan to get there. These “super writers” can carry around a complicated plot in their heads along with all the twists and turns they intend to include.

But most of us in the mundane world of scrivning are better off if we make a “map” of our plot. (more…)