Enrich Your Writing with Onomatopoeia
Has anyone ever told you to add more sound-based sensory language to your writing . . . AND then said, but don’t use the words hear or sound because they are overused? Well, it has happened to me, and here’s the solution I came up with. I discovered that many verbs not only describe a… Continue reading Enrich Your Writing with Onomatopoeia
Spice It Up with Rhetorical Devices
What are Rhetorical Devices? We all know the literary devices of metaphor and simile. Rhetorical devices are a little different. Instead of comparisons, rhetorical devices are used to add emphasis to one’s words. Most often used in oral speeches, some phrases and sentences are so powerful they go down in history as sayings everyone knows.… Continue reading Spice It Up with Rhetorical Devices
The Thesaurus: An Author’s Best Friend
January 18 is National Thesaurus Day. So it seems a perfect moment to honor the most important writing tool an author can have: The Thesaurus. The thesaurus is a type of dictionary that focuses on synonyms for the words listed. Writers has been relying on thesauruses to find just the right word for a long… Continue reading The Thesaurus: An Author’s Best Friend
Build-A-Blurb
Blurbs are those short, pithy book descriptions found on the back cover and on online book sites. Writing this is a challenge for many authors. Instead being free to develop the story over pages or writing, the author must shrink the gist of the story down to a few words. There are many ways to… Continue reading Build-A-Blurb
Pen Names: The Good and the Bad
When I started writing fiction, I decided to do so under a pen name. At the time it made sense. I was teaching, and my first novels were sexy hot. This is one of the most common reasons authors choose a pen name – not wanting to associate their everyday life with their writing. Other… Continue reading Pen Names: The Good and the Bad
Story Bibles for Writers
Every writer needs a story bible or two. A story bible (also called a series bible or universe bible) is a collection of all the materials you need to write your book, gathered in one place. Story bibles, as an organizational tool, grew out of TV series where there are often different script writers who… Continue reading Story Bibles for Writers
Kaban Boards for Writers: Staying on Task and Enjoying It
It is so easy to get distracted! I have a tendency to start work on a task, such as this blog post, and then along the way to get sidetracked by an interesting article I come across while researching, by a must-answer-at-once email that pops up, or by an unpredictable family interruption. I have tried… Continue reading Kaban Boards for Writers: Staying on Task and Enjoying It
Designing a Book Trailer with Canva
I love designing book trailers. Putting visuals and music to the story I have written really brings alive the emotions I felt while writing. In the past, I have used a variety of video editors to produce my book trailers including iMovie, Adobe Premier, Cyberlink Director, and Corel Video Studio. These are all fine video-editing… Continue reading Designing a Book Trailer with Canva
Writing to Music
Do you listen to music when you are writing? If not, maybe you should. Music has some amazing benefits for a writer. It can… How Writing to Music Works Listening to music increases blood flow to the brain. In particular, the parts of our brain that control our emotions and our memory come alert when… Continue reading Writing to Music
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