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Dan Brown

Using smell to improve your fiction

Guest post by Icy Sedgwick [http://blog.icysedgwick.com/] I was leaving my building this morning when I caught a strong whiff of something. I couldn’t identify the mystery smell but it provoked a rather unpleasant memory of a particularly rotten individual whom I wish I never had the

novel

What to do when you’re… waiting

Writers are excellent waiters. We have to be. It’s part of our job description. In one way or another we scribes often find ourselves in a state of anticipation, whether we’re waiting to hear back from a prospective literary agent or on tenterhooks about feedback regarding the latest

ears

6 things you can stick in your ears to improve your writing

There are many things us writers can do to tinker with our writing environment. We can write at a different time of day or we can use a different piece of writing software. The options are endless. But I like to stick things my ears. And I’ll tell you

creativity

How many writers does it take to change a light bulb?

I’ll provide my answer to the title of this post later, but you’ll probably work it out by the end of the next sentence. I think it’s high time that more writers – actually, all writers – took responsibility for their writing. My first (proper) post on Write for

holiday

Hey writers, it’s time to take a break from technology!

Goodness gracious me. When you work flat out on your writing for a significant period of time, or just work flat out in general, how easy it is to forget about the benefits of taking a break [http://writeforyourlife.net/ignore-anyone-who-tells-you-to-write-write-write]. That’s what I did last week. I went

distress

Forget your distress and focus on your writing

Earlier today I was reading an article on The Guardian’s website about the Booker Prize shortlist [http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/sep/11/booker-prize-andrew-motion-judging] . It was written by Andrew Motion, the UK’s previous poet laureate and head of this year’s Booker judging panel. I was

ebooks

Self-publishing and ebooks do not create a level playing field for writers

Watch this episode on YouTube [http://youtu.be/Rl4zuPP77sU] It’s all kicking off in the world of self-publishing and ebooks. The Kindle is now very affordable and the iPad is like the sexiest book in the world apart from a real sexy book that’s littered with filth and

creativity

Open your writing mind with the morning papers

Guest post by Helia Phoenix [http://phoenixlily.tumblr.com] Earlier this year, I started reading The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Artists-Way-Discovering-Recovering-Creative/dp/0330343580] . The strapline for the book is “a course in discovering and recovering your creative self”, and it’s one of

Creative writing

Critiquing etiquette: six ways to provide gracious feedback

Guest post by Jodi Cleghorn [http://jodicleghorn.wordpress.com/] > “Receiving feedback is difficult. But giving feedback with grace is even more so.” Casing Compliments | Bobulate [http://bobulate.com/post/893068344/casing-compliments] via Broomeshtick [http://broomeshtick.com/post/895223467/receiving-feedback-is-difficult-but-giving] To grow and evolve as a writer you must offer

fiction

How I use a mind map to build stories

Guest post by Paul Donovan Campos [http://yingleyangle.com/] A mind map is a means to visually represent ideas and their relationship to one another. It’s a brainstorming tool frequently used in education, the business world, and the entertainment industry – often in collaborative projects. In principle it’s meant