“Give your protagonist a flaw. Your readers cannot relate to a perfect, goody-two-shoes main character.”
plot
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Have You Thought About Creating a Backstory?
Backstory. It’s the best tool you have to develop relatable, realistic, three-dimensional characters for your novel. Sketching out a backstory is not the sexiest part of writing a novel. Investigating motivations, creating genealogies, understanding the socio-political landscape of the world you’re creating— that’s pretty heavy stuff, especially since most of it won’t even make it into your novel.
A backstory is the history of the character. It addresses the following:
-
- Who the character is
- Why the character is the way he or she is
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Do You Know the Difference Between Plot and Theme?
“Every good story has a plot and every good plot needs a theme.The story is a series of events. The plot is a structure that the storyteller uses to show how the events are connected. The theme is the central message behind the story. To tell the best story possible, you need both a plot and a theme. But here’s the thing: Themes cannot be spelled out. Instead, you’ll need to leave a trail of breadcrumbs to help the reader figure out the story’s theme.”
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Kick Your Creativity Up a Notch
“Write from the seat of your pants, especially if you’re accustomed to outlining. Writing without the safety net of an outline can unshackle your creativity.”
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Break Through
Write every day, whether you feel like it or not. Good writing isn’t an accident. It comes from the daily discipline of sitting down and writing. Yes, you’ll get sick of writing, but eventually, you’ll fall in love with it. Break through to that other side where you must write every single day.
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~Write What You Know
“Write what you know. Incorporate experiences and characters from your past to add depth to your fiction. You’ll immediately be more connected to the content and your reader will feel that.”
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ How Story Ideas Emerge
““I always had plenty of ideas. I didn’t exactly have them. They grew—little by little, a half an idea at a time. First, part of a phrase and then a person to go with it. After a person, then a little corner of a place for the person to be in.” ~
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Don’t Listen to Naysayers, Don’t Quit
“A novel takes the courage of a marathon runner, and as long as you have to run, you might as well be a winning marathon runner. Serendipity and blind faith faith in yourself won’t hurt a thing. All the bastards in the world will snicker and sneer because they haven’t the talent to zip up their flies by themselves. To hell with them, particularly the critics. Stand in there, son, no matter how badly you are battered and hurt.”
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Creating a Story
“You take people, you put them on a journey, you give them peril, you find out who they really are.”
~
✒️ Writers’ Wisdom ~ Why Do You Write?
“The question we writers are asked most often, the favorite question, is: Why do you write? I write because I have an innate need to write. I write because I can’t do normal work as other people do. I write because I want to read books like the ones I write. I write because I am angry at everyone. I write because I love sitting in a room all day writing. I write because I can partake of real life only by changing it. . . .” ~ Orhan Pamuk
