Blooming Twig

PROMPT: Your main character comes across this cabin during their travels. Who lives here? Will they reveal information that will help or hurt your character?

Don’t be afraid to try new things in your writing. It could be a new way of telling your story, or it could be moving the climax to the middle of the story and seeing if you can up the stakes even *more.* Try changing things up because they’ll either work out or point you in the right direction.

"Breaking it down to one line, one sentence, that’s how to start." — Valerie June

(And don't do what we do, , which is write one sentence and then take a break to check Facebook or Instagram 🙃)

WATCH: Valerie June Needs Her Songs—and Her Life—to Have Soul This episode continues our video series to benefit the wonderful Mighty Writers, a Philadelphia-based non-profit that teaches reading and writing to thousands of low-income and marginalized student…

What makes a "real" reader? If you have to motivate yourself to read, does that make you a bad reader/you don't consider yourself a "reader"?

We don't subscribe to that idea. If you read books and find some sort of enjoyment or fulfillment from it, then you're a reader in our eyes (no matter what your Goodreads reading goal number is for the year!).

But we'd love to hear what you think. Let us know in the comments!

https://buff.ly/3H2kMII

Are You Really a Reader if You Have to Motivate Yourself to Read Books? Reading is supposed to be an enjoyable hobby. So why do some of us book lovers have to motivate ourselves to do it?

PROMPT: Write a 6 word story based on this picture and share it in the comments!

Want our best self-editing tip? Read everything out loud.

You'll catch things that look fine on paper, but sound weird when said aloud.

(This isn't groundbreaking advice, but it does really work. Also, it'll save you time in the long run if you do this before you plug everything into a grammar checker ✅)

Do you struggle with writing dialogue? Or maybe you find that your dialogue comes out sounding robotic or choppy?

You're NOT the only one.

Margery Bayne wrote a great article discussing the importance of subtext while writing dialogue. And they gave some great tips on things to avoid, like infodumping.

https://buff.ly/3ADl5qX

The Biggest Dialogue Mistake How to avoid stilted and unnatural dialogue

But do you want to take the easy way out?

If you've tried reading more and increasing the amount of time you spend writing, but you're still struggling to improve your writing, then you should try editing someone else's work.

It'll give you a new point of view and you'll be familiar with common mistakes to look out for in your own writing.

How Editing Can Teach You More About Writing Than Writing What I learned editing 39 blog posts in one week

How many can you identify?

(If you don't get #25, we can't be friends.)

How Many of the 100 Most Famous Passages in Literature Can You Identify? If you’re here, you’re probably pretty well read. Congratulations you! Still, it’s one thing to read a great book, but quite another to retain it. Especially considering most of u…

PROMPT: Trying to get their thoughts in order, your protagonist is walking down this street late at night. What's bothering them? Is it something in the past? Or are they anxious about something that may happen in the future?

“So long as you write what you wish to , that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only for hours, nobody can say.” ― Virginia Woolf

If you're looking for new ways to create "prose that’s concise yet poignant," we loved some of the tips in this article by Chandrayan Gupta. While sometimes telling is needed instead of showing, our favorite piece of advice was:

"If there isn’t an organic way to present a piece of information, I don’t."

3 Editing Tips for Crisp, Emotive Storytelling No matter how phenomenal the tale, nobody will enjoy it unless it’s well-written

Why not both!?

“To find the type of language that is best suited to a particular story, there is no other way than to be attentive and observant in your life. Every story should be told with its own unique language, but to find this language is an incredibly difficult task.” — Yan Lianke

Yan Lianke on Intoxicated Revolutionaries and the Importance of “Literary Distance” I spoke with Yan Lianke over WeChat in early June. His profile picture is a golden sculpture of a man with sunken eyes, contracted brows, and a soft frown hanging slightly towards one side of his f…

There are a lot of outside messages that get thrown at you as a writer.

You should be doing this, not that.
You're only a *real* writer if you write this many words per day.
You should be doing exactly what this famous writer did in order to become successful...

Not true. Every writer has their own journey, their own way of doing things, and their own story to tell. *Your* way of doing things will end up with your story being told, so in 2022, let's all try and focus on the actual writing instead of these made up rules and ideas of what being a writer has to look like.

Toxic Writing Ideas to Leave Behind in 2022 New year, new writer

What does your universe look like?

Great life advice that you can apply to your writing career as well!

Getting an idea when you can’t write it down is the WORST! What’s your go-to trick to remembering ideas when you’re out and about?

Happy Holidays!

We're so grateful you're a part of our little corner of the internet! We wouldn't be here without your support! 💚

PROMPT: This cozy winter cabin houses your protagonist. How long have they lived here? Does anyone live with them? Do they live near a city or are they alone in the wilderness?

(Feel free to leave other questions you would ask in the comments below!)

Do you feel like listening to audiobooks isn't the same as reading? Or maybe you find yourself changing "listened" to "read" in conversations? If so, the linked article by Gretchen Lida does a great job of explaining how she overcame audiobook shame (and how they helped her in her reading journey!)

So if you've been hiding your audiobook obsession or maybe you're just having trouble getting into audiobooks in general...we recommend taking a couple of minutes to read this article!

On Learning to Embrace Audiobooks as a Reader | Book Riot How one reader with ADD and Dyslexia learned to embrace audiobooks and thrived as a result.

"To write a world into existence — whether that’s an entirely new one or your perception of this very one right here — all you need is to be human. Because your audience, your readers, your people, they are too. [...] And it is our humanness that binds us all." — Emily Wilcox via Medium

The Number 1 Rule of Writing is a Lie No, don’t write what you know. Write what you’ve felt.

Make sure you enjoy what you’re writing about. If you’re not enjoying what you’re writing about, that’s going to come through when people read it.

Being a writer while also having ADHD is not always an easy thing to balance.

So, if you're looking for some writing tools that may help you focus better, take a look at the article below.

(We loved #6. The clickier, the better!)

Writing Tools That’ve Helped My ADHD Common and quirky methods for writing past inattention and hyperactivity

For those of you that participated in NaNoWriMo this year, how did it go?

Feel free to brag (or vent) in the comments!

PROMPT: Write a 6 word story based on this picture and share it in the comments!

Consistency is the most important part of being a writer.

Agree or disagree?

How Being Inconsistent Almost Killed My Writing Dreams And how I overcame inconsistency

“Finish reading an especially difficult book, and its cover functions more like a trophy awarded for intellectual labor.” — Peter Mendelsund and David J. Alworth

Do you have a favorite book cover from this year? If so, what is it?

What a Book Cover Can Do As a physical component of the book, the cover is a skin, a membrane, and a safeguard: paper jackets protect hardback boards from scuffing and sun damage, while paperback covers not only hold the b…

Creating good writing habits (and thinking habits!) is a recipe for success. Don’t get discouraged if you feel like your creative well has dried up. Give yourself a day off, go outside and people watch, and try again the next day.

As we start going into the holiday season, do you have a book (or a series!) that you like to reread every year? If so, what is it?

PROMPT: Nearing the end of a long journey, your protagonist sees a break in the trees. Looking through the circular—almost too-perfect—opening in the leaves, they see what they've been looking for on the other side of the lake. What is it? Is it good or bad news? Does it mean peace or fighting for them?

We all process information differently, and understanding the four ways people perceive the world around them will help you become a better writer. You can tap into the four brain dominance colors in different parts of your writing and reach more people!

What brain dominance color are you?

How to Write an Article That Speaks to Every Brain 4 brain types and 1 question to answer for each

"Complexity isn’t a sign of intelligence, simplicity is." — Taylor Foreman

(Another great piece of advice in this article is to shoot for embarrassing yourself in a year. If looking back on your writing from a year ago embarrasses you, you've improved and grown as a writer!)

My Failed Articles Were Too Complex, Not Too Simple The subtle art of keeping it simple

Everything is writable...So what do you want to write about?

Are you a fan of adaptations? Or in your opinion do they usually fall short?

Adapting a book onto the screen has a unique set of problems, and we loved reading this discussion about it between Colson Whitehead and Margaret Atwood.

Colson Whitehead and Margaret Discuss the Challenges of Adaptation The acclaimed authors discuss the experience of having their novels The Underground Railroad and The Handmaid's Tale adapted for television

Let's talk character work.

Dynamic characters are essential to an interesting story, but sometimes it can be difficult to create unique characters with a lot of depth if you're more of a plot or world-building kind of writer.

If this sounds like you, we'd suggest checking out this article that has some great exercises to help you create the characters of your dreams!

Five Fun Writing Exercises To Deepen Your Characters Relationships and motivations are the keys to driving your plot forward