This week I met six amazing novelist and had the pleasure of leading discussions on the craft of writing at the Master Novel Class retreat at the Highlights Foundation. Wow! It was fun. I’ve taught the Novel Revision Retreat since 1999 and I still have passion and energy to teach it and see how it […]

HELLO! (Echo: Hello!) As I child, I lived near the Continental Divide in New Mexico and we often played, “Echo!” Throwing words at a mountain is a great children’s game, but echoes can ruin your story. Repeating prose elements There are a couple major offending prose elements to be on your guard against as you […]

Reader confusion is a common problem with first drafts. Prose is ambiguous, and scene details leave conflicting ideas of the time line or the physical location of the characters. Reader Confusion: Clarify Your Prose The problem of ambiguous prose lies in the writing itself. Let’s look at some common problems and how to solve them. […]

A Rousing Tale of Danger on the High Seas Why Did You Write This Story? Soon after 9/11, I was sitting at the table with my son, his friend, and my daughter. We talked about the 9/11 tragedy and then hoped for better times. I asked, “What should I write about next?” My son said, […]

One of the hardest things to find is a great critique of the overall structure of a novel. You’ll get great feedback on a scene or line edits of paragraphs. But the overall structure of a novel is hard. Enter, the Shrunken Manuscript. I’ve taught the Novel Revison Retreat since 1999 and a mainstay has […]