Blog
Creating an Author Business Plan: Our Marketing Plan
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) The marketing section of our author business plan is unique in that we need to think about our overall marketing strategy as well as the specific marketing activities we’re going to use for each individual book we produce. It’s important that we look at it from both levels. Doing so provides(…)
6 Clues You’re Overusing Internal Dialogue in Your Fiction
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) Internal dialogue is one of the most powerful tools in a fiction writer’s arsenal. It’s an advantage we have over TV and movie script writers and playwrights. It’s also one of the least understood and most often mismanaged elements of the writing craft. As writers, we each tend to either overuse(…)
The Secret to Destroying Episodic Writing in Three Easy Steps
By Marcy Kennedy (@marcykennedy) One of the main causes of the saggy middle syndrome many books suffer from is episodic writing. Episodic writing also makes our books feel slow to the reader. “What’s episodic writing?” you might ask. Episodic writing is when your story is composed of a series of loosely related events. Those events(…)
50 Years Ago This Island Didn’t Exist
By Marcy Kennedy (@marcykennedy) Welcome back to my unbelievable real life feature. One of the great myths is Atlantis–the advanced civilization whose island sank into the ocean. Although Atlantis is a myth, an island actually exists in our world that appeared and is now disappearing. Surtsey formed between 1963 and 1967 from volcanic eruptions off(…)
I Have a Love-Hate Relationship with Pictures
By Marcy Kennedy (@marcykennedy) Turns out I have a love-hate relationship with pictures. I love them because they grab important moments and help keep memories alive. I find great joy in looking back at pictures from times past. I hate them because, in the last couple of years, I’ve noticed I look older in them(…)
Creating an Author Business Plan: Our Competitive Analysis
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) We’re down to the final pieces of our author business plan. (If you missed the previous sections, you can start back at the beginning with setting our goals, choosing our stories, identifying our audience, running our business, and crafting our product plan.) Today we’re tackling the competitive analysis. Traditionally, the competitive(…)
Do You Believe in Second Chances?
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) Long after I finished reading the books and watching the movies, the character from the Lord of the Rings trilogy I couldn’t stop thinking about wasn’t any of the plucky hobbits, Viggo Mortensen’s ruggedly handsome Aragorn, or Gandolf with his words of wisdom. It was Gollum. Born a hobbit-like creature named(…)
10 Writing Mistakes that Kill Your First Chapter
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) I’m teaching at a writer’s conference this week, so instead of one of my in-depth posts, I thought I’d create a quick checklist for you. Here are 10 writing mistakes that kill your first chapter (in no particular order). Get them before they get you! #1 – A Boring/Generic First Line(…)
Would You Be a Mermaid If You Could?
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) Welcome back to my unbelievable real life feature. Today I’m taking a look at one of the most unusual “schools” I’ve ever heard of–mermaid school. Apparently, mermaid schools are cropping up all over–in the Philippines, in Germany, and even in Canada. While it’s never been a dream of mine to be(…)
6 Major Writing Problems in Avengers: Age of Ultron – Part 3
By Marcy Kennedy (@MarcyKennedy) Today’s post is the final installment in the three-part mini-series I’ve been doing on what writing lessons we can learn from the mistakes made in Avengers: Age of Ultron. If you missed Part One and Part Two, I recommend you read them first. Mistake #5 – A Villain Who Is Melodramatic,(…)