Writing About Places You’ve Never Been To

Writing about cultures you don’t know personally and places you’ve never visited is a hard task. Some people say you shouldn’t even try, that getting it wrong is the fastest way to loose readers and ruin your career before it even begins. Just dodge writing about places you’ve never been. Who wants that grenade to…

Finishing my Manuscript in a Pandemic- Why, How, WHY?!

I’m not proud of a lot of my pandemic life- the constant Doritos-dust fingers, the growing addiction to YouTube, and the frankly uncomfortable amount of time distant relatives have spent inviting me to family zoom meetings, despite the fact we haven’t talked in years (Do you really suddenly miss me, Auntie S? Or do you just miss having a captive audience to rant to about your personal problems?)

Be a Bad Writer at the Right Moment

God, it was therapeutic. I wrote 40,000 words in two weeks. This must be how vegan youtubers feel when they drink green slime for a fortnight- cleansed, ready to start each day with a fresh sheen of annoying optimism and clear skin.

Stop, Write, Now!

Whenever we see a beautiful piece of animation or art, especially if it looks hyperrealistic, our breath is taken away. Disney spent millions of dollars and the better part of the last two decades developing software so things like the water in Moana look realistic. Artists spend entire days, weeks, months, adding layer after layer…

Writer Talk: Representation is Scary

In the weeks since I finished my first novel draft (hold your applause for another year, please), I’ve forced myself to take a break and just write whatever I want for a while. Lately, that’s been fanfiction. What? It’s anonymous, and I can just rant-write whatever I want to happen to the best characters from…

Creativity in Captivity: Top 5 Books for Uninspired Writers

It’s hard to have ideas when you haven’t got outside influences to inspire you. Here are the best books for when you want to write during quarantine but can’t figure out what to write about.

Writing Through Depression

On days where I can’t get out of bed and don’t see any point to existence, it’s hard to write. What do you do? …The answer isn’t ‘just get over it’, however much you keep telling yourself that.

50 Motivational Quotes to Get Writing and Keep Writing

“If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” -Toni Morrison

How to Write a Fight Scene

Fight scenes are the biggest risks you can take in your writing career. Movies, adverts, and other forms of visual media have trained us to see fight scenes as action, and therefore entertaining. This isn’t the case with 99% of fight scenes, because 99% of writers haven’t found this blog post. Consider yourself one lucky…

23 NaNoWriMo Survival Tips

Remember you aren’t alone; NaNoWriMo isn’t just a torture device- it’s a community of people who are here to help you; newbies and published writers alike.

Do you Need Chapters in Your Novel?

What are Chapters for? Chapters help you organise your book by: Explaining who is narrating (if your story is told by more than one character). Fast-forwarding through time and controlling the pace of your writing (not every detail of your character’s day is important, nobody cares about the marvellous piss they stopped to take on…

14 Words Your Writing Doesn’t Need

Before you read this, keep in mind: I only know about these devil-words because someone else told me.