#NaNoWriMo 30-day writing bootcamp (Week 3)
Reading Time: < 1 minute Are you half way through your NaNoWriMo draft? Here’s your next week of writing prompts from Sarah Salway!
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Writing
#NaNoWriMo 30-day writing bootcamp (Week 2)
Reading Time: 2 minutes Are you surviving NaNoWriMo? Here’s your second week of writing prompts from Sarah Salway to keep you going!
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Are you doing #NaNoWriMo? Here’s your 30-day writing bootcamp! (Week 1)
Reading Time: 3 minutes So it’s November, that month when many writers start an annual obsession with word counts and sleep deprivation! Whether or not you’re joining in the annual novelathon, boost your productivity by taking Sarah Salway’s challenge to write something every day for the next 30 days.
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The Accidental Author: How Kerry Wilkinson conquered the Kindle charts
Reading Time: 7 minutes Kerry Wilkinson is something of an accidental author. His debut, Locked In, was written as a challenge to himself but, after self-publishing, it became a UK number one bestseller within three months of release. Then he signed a six-book deal with Pan Macmillan. Jon Reed asks him how he did it.
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How social media is changing language
Reading Time: 3 minutes From unfriend to selfie, social media is clearly having an impact on language. The words that surround us every day influence the words we use. Since so much of the written language we see is now on screens, language now evolves partly through our interaction with technology.
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How to write sex scenes – without cliché or embarrassment
Reading Time: 4 minutes If you’re writing romantic fiction, sooner or later you’re going to have to write a sex scene. How can you avoid cliché, embarrassment – and a ‘Bad Sex’ award? Write in your usual style, and stop worrying, says Mitzi Szereto.
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10 tips to learn from a creative writing lecturer
Reading Time: 4 minutes Some people enjoy writing for the sake of it, while others want to develop and improve. If you fall into the latter category then read this. A creative writing lecturer and published author with a new novel The Dark Light out in July 2015, Julia Bell is one of the UK’s foremost authorities on creative writing. Here, she shares with us the top ten pieces of advice she gives her students at the start of each year.
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Thinking of joining a writing group? Ask yourself these 8 questions first
Reading Time: 5 minutes As a writer, active member and chair of the London Writers’ Cafe – one of the largest writing groups in the UK – Lisa Goll knows a thing or two about how to get the most from participating in a writing community. Here she shares her top tips on finding the group that’s right for you, what to expect on joining and how to survive the writing velociraptors.
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How to break into radio writing: 7 tips by BBC Radio 4 commissioner Caroline Raphael
Reading Time: 5 minutes Whether you’re interested in writing drama or comedy, plays or sketches, BBC Radio 4 commissions hundreds of hours of original material every year – far more than BBC TV – and is always on the look out for new writing talent. BBC Radio 4 commissioner Caroline Raphael offers her top tips for aspiring radio writers.
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How to write science fiction
Reading Time: 4 minutes Want to write science fiction? Have the confidence of your own strangeness, says Matthew de Abaitua.
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How to write about food
Reading Time: 5 minutes Have you ever wanted to write about food? Award-winning food writer and journalist Andrew Webb shares his advice for capturing the culinary.
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How to write a winning book proposal
Reading Time: 5 minutes How to write a book proposal and what exactly it needs to include are two of the questions I am asked most frequently as a literary agent – and not just by new writers. Even seasoned authors and experienced journalists may not have written a book proposal previously. In any book submission process the competition will be immense and the turndown rate high, so it is worth taking the time to get a proposal right. But what does that mean?
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