To learn the ins and outs of writing and editing books, view Meg’s latest published content below, including iWriterly videos and feature articles.
Outside feedback is vital to the success of your manuscript. As I’ve quoted many times before on my YouTube channel, according to Terry Pratchett: “The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.” Our first drafts are imperfect translations of the perfect story in our minds. This version of the story isn’t ready for … Continue reading Writers Helping Writers Blog: How to Find Critique Partners & Beta Readers
Writing a novel is flipping difficult. It often takes years to complete your first novel (and even more years after that to write a good one). You heard that right — writers’ first books are usually a hot mess. That is because, as untested authors, we don’t yet know how to write a book. On … Continue reading Writers Helping Writers Blog: Improve Your Novel Writing: 11 Tips For Newbies
I’m about to say something controversial. Are you ready? Freelance book editors aren’t necessary to get published. I know, crazy right? And coming from a freelance book editor, no less. Here’s the thing: Editors can be helpful in getting a manuscript ready for publication. Think about it—at some point, all writers are new to this … Continue reading Writer’s Digest Blog: How Freelance Developmental Editors Fit into Today’s Publishing Landscape
As many of you know, book publishing industry professionals and readers alike have openly expressed their dislike of prologues. Let’s lay a quick foundation. Prologues aren’t inherently evil or indicative of poor writing. Prologues can—and have been—executed with skill. But are they necessary? That, in my opinion, is the biggest question—not “should I write a prologue” … Continue reading Writer’s Digest Blog: The Great Debate: To Prologue or Not to Prologue?
HEYA, BOOK NERDS! On Friday, February 15, 2019, I participated in Revise and Resub’s #10queries event on Twitter along with a fabulous team of freelance editors. Writers had the chance to submit their queries and first five pages into a drawing. Ten submissions were randomly selected for each editor, which were critiqued through the #10queries event on … Continue reading Twitter Event Recap: #RevPit #10queries, February 2019
Querying writers have quite a few hurdles to jump through to secure literary representation. For those of you who don’t know what a query is or what I mean by literary representation, let’s go over a few of the basics to start. There are a few ways to publish a book, one of those being … Continue reading Writers Helping Writers Blog: Why Querying Writers Shouldn’t Write Sequels
As time goes on and the genre of novels matures and evolves, so too does reader expectation. For example, if you look at J. R. R. Tolkien’s LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy, you will probably note that the action sequences and battles scenes are often paragraphs or pages long. In books such as SIX OF … Continue reading Savvy Authors Blog: What is Character Agency?
One of the biggest draws to stories—of any medium—are characters. So many of us want to follow the journeys of individual characters whose personalities or situations we find compelling. The biggest disappointment I often have at the end of a book, television show, or movie is a lack of character growth or change at the … Continue reading Savvy Authors Blog: Types of Character Arcs
Are you looking to hire a freelance developmental editor to work with you on your manuscript? Whether you intend to self-publish or pursue traditional publication, many writers seek out the assistance of freelance editors to polish their manuscripts. However, with so many titles flying around of different types of editors, it can be confusing to … Continue reading Savvy Authors Blog: What is a Freelance Developmental Book Editor?
With so many stories bouncing around in a writer’s mind, it likely comes as no surprise that most writers seek to write more—or to be more efficient in the time they have to write. In the month of November, known as National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) to the writing community, thousands of writers endeavor to … Continue reading Writers Helping Writers Blog: How to Write More Words
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