How to Make the Dream Come True Every journey begins with a single step. Derek Murphy helped me navigate and overcome the obstacle course between me and my destination of becoming a successful Indie fantasy author. We met online after I’d completed my first medieval fantasy novel. I was lurking around his website, CreativIndie. As I remember, I entered one …

It’s been a week since I launched Book Craft, the writing guide I’ve been working on all year, and reviews are terrible. I don’t really have a great place to discuss this, so I’m starting a blog post here. It’s obviously not great marketing to talk about bad reviews in a defensive preface; or even in the end of the …

I’m 3 weeks out for the launch of a book I’ve been wresting with all year – it’s coming together in surprising ways. I already knew I had unique and helpful content that is absolutely critical for new authors who don’t want to look amateurish (who write for the love, but without experience). But what started as a book on …

Twists make readers react. Sometimes, a great plot twist makes your jaw hit the floor, or make you want to turn back to page one and start the book all over again, this time with a whole new perspective. Learning how to write twists will help you entertain your readers and sell your stories, especially if you write mysteries or …

A few years ago I wrote about how to craft a blurb that converts… but today I need to make a confession: I still suck at blurbs. Sometimes I think I get them right. Sometimes other people think my blurbs are awesome (and I’ve seen authors copy what I’m doing). But other times, competitors destroy me with something really different. …

Today I went down the rabbit hole of professional book coaches: you know, those people who help you write books. I’ve talked about this a little on this blog but it was probably mostly negative and my stance might be shifting a little bit.You see, I don’t really believe in coaches. Coaches help give you confidence: or, I should say, …

This is a guest post on how to use a great cover in marketing materials. Writer friends, you may have noticed how the world of design plays a big role in book launches, from covers to ads. If you’ve ever wondered how a career marketer approaches design, read on to see how I aimed for impact in my exterior and …

This is an advanced excerpt from Anna David’s new release “Make Your Mess Your Memoir.” If you’re ready to take your own experience and make it into a memoir that can help other people… There are just a few things for you to figure out first.   #1 Determine Your Message Determining your message is, as far as I’m concerned, the …

For the past few years I’ve been studying the craft of writing better books, and found woefully few useful resources on how to actually plot, write and edit your book to increase engagement. Working with cowriters, clients and writing students, I’ve started collecting new strategies to check and improve your writing without paying a developmental editor. I’m putting all that …

A few years ago I made this epic list of 300+ fonts to use for every genre. But the truth is, I rarely use those anymore, and some are even cringeworthy. So recently I spent a lot of time going through my collection and choosing NEW fantasy fonts I love. Keep in mind: most of these have decorative swirls or …

Over the past few years, my writing templates and resources have gotten a few million views on YouTube, but I wanted to make higher quality materials that were more accessible. So I took some of my best resources and put them together in a Udemy Course on writing fiction. Write a novel in 3 months  Best novel writing apps How …

Love Scrivener but hate plotting your book? I’ve turned my advanced 24-chapter novel writing cheatsheet into a free, downloadable Scrivener template you can use for your own writing projects. This video will walk you through it. Get the Scrivener novel outlining template (download and unzip the .zip folder – then open the Scivener file and save it as a template. …

Need a free plotting template to help outline your novel? Want to write your book using Google docs? I’ve just created a detailed document you can copy to your own account and use to map out your book – click the link above to download now. Get the google docs novel writing template: CLICK HERE TO ACCESS Watch the video …

If you’ve been following me for awhile, you may know I’m unfortunately cavalier and careless in any regards – I like to think of myself as a pirate or a rebel, and that sometimes gets me in trouble. This year I’ve been working with a new team of writers to put out more content around my fiction brand, Urban Epics. …

A lot of authors – almost all I talked to – are very cautious about the money. Several writers have told me they don’t want to make money with their writing, even after publishing several novels. They don’t want to make a living with their writing, because then it would be a job; if they were getting paid to do it, they …