If you’re a writer, you’ve probably been told to “Show, don’t tell,” and along with that, to “Murder your darlings.” However, as an editor, I never give this advice, and here’s why.

Stay inspired by cultivating curiosity in your own writing. Asking questions and challenging assumptions will go a long way to sustain you through draft after draft.

You’ve finished your draft—now what? This blog post discusses steps to take to edit your own manuscript, including questions to ask yourself, suggestions for outlining, and advice on prioritizing your vision for your book and developing your craft.

You’ve written a manuscript and need a professional set of eyes on it, but how do you find an editor? This post includes advice on how to find and vet a freelance editor so you can feel confident in finding the right person to help you take the next step in your journey.

One of the primary rules of telling a story is that the story must move. In this post, we’ll be chatting about two techniques from Shawn Coyne’s work The Story Grid: What Good Editors Know that you can use to get a new perspective on your manuscript and ensure that each scene shows a clear change.

Keep your creative writing juices flowing! Here we investigate the uses of Pinterest for writers, first looking at the importance of collecting inspiration, how to expand your imaginative catalogue, and how to avoid falling down the rabbit hole of curation.

Looking to add more voice to your writing? Poetic devices can be used by writers of picture books to memoir, young adult to adult in any genre. Common sentence-level devices like alliteration, assonance, consonance, and even zeugma can add wonderful flavor to your work!

Rhyme is just one of many poetic devices! Like the spices in your cabinet, if you know their names and what they taste like, you’re far more likely to use them and enjoy what they add to a dish—or in this case, how poetic devices can strengthen your writer’s voice and your story.

“Beta reader” is a term that often comes up for writers. But what is a beta reader and what can they do for you? Here, we talk about how to find a good reader, some questions you can ask to determine a good fit, and suggest a few things to consider when you’re thinking about inviting beta readers into your process.