Books and Publishing

Editing isn’t “where the magic happens.” It’s where your draft gets gutted and rebuilt. Here’s how to survive it—and make the book better. So, you’ve finished your first draft. The excitement of typing “The End” is still fresh, but now the real work begins—editing. The editing process is where your story transforms from a rough […]

From mentors to tricksters to antiheroes, archetypes give your story texture. Use them well, and readers will remember your cast. As human beings, we often resort to mental categorizations in an attempt to bring order to the chaos around us. It’s a way of navigating the intricacies of our world and providing a sense of […]

Ordinary world. Call to adventure. Final transformation. The Hero’s Journey can give your story shape without making it predictable. After his success with American Graffiti, George Lucas, the visionary creator of Star Wars, started researching folklore. “It came to me that there really was no modern use of mythology… so that’s when I started doing […]

Start small. Spiral out. The Snowflake Method breaks your novel into doable steps—without losing the big picture. Like most authors, the first time someone suggested that I think about outlining my novels, my immediate instinct was to say no. Not only was I convinced this would take the magic out of the process, but I […]

The three-act structure isn’t formulaic—it’s foundational. Here’s how to use it to write a novel that moves. While some readers revel in beautiful descriptions, others are drawn to witty dialogue or compelling characters. Surprisingly, for me, the allure lies in structure—the blueprint a writer uses to tell a story. As a reader, I found myself […]