Today is the last Saturday before heading out West, so my thought was to do something a little different with a reblog post. I recently discovered author Bryn Donovan, who has written several books for helping writers. I’ve been reading Bryn Donovan’s website for some time now because of her awesome articles on writing well. Instead of checking out one article, I linked three down here for you all to check out and strengthen your writing skills! So read below for some summaries of these articles and start feeling more confident in your writing abilities!
Have you ever thought to yourself: I wish my work was more original and unique? Good news! Your book will never be fully original. But that’s fine! Every book is influenced by at least one other idea, even if you, the writer, don’t even notice to begin with. The key to crafting some semblance of originality in a book stems from acknowledging the influence and taking it in a new direction. Bryn gives a couple of examples of how books share similarities with others, citing how “influenced” does not translate to “bad” and what that means for your own work.
Check out Bryn’s full article on writing an original work here.
You might have heard of “infodumping.” I’ve even talked about it here a couple of times. Basically, you take all the information your readers need to know and throw it all at them until they’re left confused and frustrated. So how do you convey all the necessary information to your readers? Several methods for conveying this information require good conversation and dialogue. Bryn outlines the different paths you can take below.
You can find Bryn’s article on infodumping here.
Some writers don’t like outlines. Others need them to function (I’m one of those). Both options are perfectly acceptable, but when it comes to outlining, have you ever thought of writing a full outline out in about an hour? It may take you a lot of brain power, but Bryn gives a tentative outline for plotting an entire novel, including nailing down the genre and important character information.
Find Bryn’s article on plotting a novel here.
So that’s it! I’ll be back in a couple of weeks, hopefully ready with tons more awesome post ideas. In the meantime, Bryn Donovan’s website can be found below, as well as her books, workshops, and more writing inspiration. Happy reading and writing!
Credit to all: Bryn Donovan. Find out more here.
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