Category: Creativity and Craft

Creativity and Craft, Writer's Life

Tame Your Revision: 7 Tips to Finish Your Novel Before Your Battery Dies

Revising a novel is a form of bookkeeping. So many moving parts!! How do you keep from losing your mind? Never fear, writer friends! The Winged Pen is here! Ta daaaa! Give your revision Wings: Download the Tame Your Revision Infographic here. INVENTORY Make a scene list. Timeline Map of Major Scenes Draw, Doodle, Diagram, Index Card, Cut up Manuscript, Synopsis, Query Letter, Colored Markers. … Continue reading Tame Your Revision: 7 Tips to Finish Your Novel Before Your Battery Dies

Laurel Decher2 Comments
Creativity and Craft, Publishing & Promotion, Writer's Life

Creating Your Website

Welcome back to my series Basic Marketing for Authors. In the last blog post of this series, Creating Your Brand, I mentioned there are many uses for your brand including social media, promotion material, and websites. Today we are focusing on websites. A scary, but necessary part of your platform and career-long marketing. (Who am I kidding? It’s all scary!) Okay, you have your brand. How do you use that … Continue reading Creating Your Website

Halli Gomez10 Comments
Book Recommendations, Creativity and Craft

Brandon Mull’s Creative Juices

Brandon Mull writes for boys using his relentless imagination and his scouting experience. He has written Beyonders, Fablehaven, and Five Kingdom among others. Mull says in an interview with Tori Ackerman, “I wanted to go to a world where there was a lot to discover, but still light and fun.” If Brandon Mull’s series appeal to every demand of one’s imagination, it’s because the author … Continue reading Brandon Mull’s Creative Juices

Sussu Leclerc1 Comment
Creativity and Craft, Publishing & Promotion

Star in MG / YA Magazines

Although often not lucrative, magazine publications can offer you many benefits. They help your name get out there and stand out from the crowd of writers; they can give you a unique insight into the publication world; they can help you be more productive and serve as experimental pieces; they can help you connect with other authors; you might attract the attention of an editor … Continue reading Star in MG / YA Magazines

Sussu Leclerc2 Comments
Creativity and Craft, Writer's Life

Creative Cross-Pollination

Cross-pollination: the transfer of pollen from one type of plant to another type of plant of the same species, often by insects or wind. When you’re working really hard on a writing project, tunnel vision can creep in. It makes sense. Your life is busy, the publishing industry is slow, and you need to finish your book yesterday. So if you have time to do … Continue reading Creative Cross-Pollination

Gita Trelease6 Comments
Book Recommendations, Creativity and Craft

Review – How to Write Dazzling Dialogue: The Fastest Way To Improve Any Manuscript

In How to Write Dazzling Dialogue: The Fastest Way To Improve Any Manuscript, James Scott Bell promises the reader craft secrets to shape great dialogue. As a writer juggling a full life, the phrase “fastest way to improve” catches my eye and I hit Amazon’s buy now button. When the book arrives, it’s a slim 135 pages. Was it worth the price? Will it stay … Continue reading Review – How to Write Dazzling Dialogue: The Fastest Way To Improve Any Manuscript

Eileen Schnabel4 Comments
Creativity and Craft, Writer's Life

How to Break Your Resolutions & Live to Tell About It

It’s still January and everyone’s talking about goals. Making goals, keeping goals, how to write your goals and Blah, Blah, Blah! Actually, I’m a very goal oriented person. I love goals. I make goals to shatter them, not just reach them. BUT 2016 was a bit of a different story. Shortly after finalizing the edits for my first book, I hit a huge snag. A … Continue reading How to Break Your Resolutions & Live to Tell About It

Kristi Wientge8 Comments
Creativity and Craft

Craft Intensive: Building Backstory

As a couple of my fellow Pennies can tell you, I love to do a deep dive on characters’ feelings and motivations. In fact, one of my favorite things to do while writing and critiquing is to explore and uncover why the characters act the way they do. I’m also a firm believer in that old adage that the easiest way to know what someone is … Continue reading Craft Intensive: Building Backstory

Richelle Morgan3 Comments
Book Recommendations, Craft Books, Creativity and Craft, Writer's Life

Our Holiday Wish List – Craft Books!

Many of us will spend at least two weeks in December hiding from our children with our nose in a book. At The Winged Pen, our wish lists are full of books that inspire our creativity or deepen our craft. So here’s a peek at the writing books we loved and the books we hope to receive this holiday season. If you have a writer … Continue reading Our Holiday Wish List – Craft Books!

Julie Artz1 Comment
Creativity and Craft, Writer's Life

Breaking Through Writer’s Block

Last month, one of my editing clients emailed me a panicked plea for help with writer’s block. And although we’ve talked about this a bit on the blog already (How Do You Tune Out Online “Noise”?, Ideas to Hack Down Writers’ Blocks, 4 Ways Winged Pen Writers Get Words, Perfectionism and Pomodori), it can’t hurt to share the tips I gave my client for breaking through writer’s … Continue reading Breaking Through Writer’s Block

Julie Artz2 Comments
Creativity and Craft

Creativity is Messy. Get Over It!

Maybe the hardest part of creativity is to face the critical eyes of others. We have been raised to see organization everywhere, respect schedules, be on time, be logic, put things where they belong, put things in boxes. Although there is a lot of value in being organized, there is also a lot of value in creativity, in being messy. No one more than writers … Continue reading Creativity is Messy. Get Over It!

Sussu Leclerc7 Comments
Creativity and Craft, News

#Scrivathon16 – Writing for Syria Relief

There’s a lot of heavy stuff going on in the world. It’s part of why I spend such a huge amount of time fleeing into the fantasy realm with a book, a movie, or with my own writing. But last month I heard about an opportunity to help a good cause WHILE fleeing into that fantasy world: #Scrivathon16 on Saturday, November 12, 2016.     … Continue reading #Scrivathon16 – Writing for Syria Relief

Julie ArtzLeave a comment