Jill Murray
Currently viewing the tag: "advice"
Last week we discussed the one thing I’ve had to work hardest at in my own writing: plot.
Despite all my hard work, I’ve come to the conclusion that most of us worry too much about plot. There are very few musts as far as plot is concerned.
Plot Musts Have one.
So yes, make [...]
Continue Reading →We got a lot done in week two.
We began with a discussion of first drafts, and how they’re supposed to be difficult and awful, but you have to finish them anyway to find out what your story’s about, and of course because it’s the only path to the next draft. I won’t share those [...]
Continue Reading →Monday night marked the kickoff of the 8-week YA writing workshop I’m leading for the Quebec Writers’ Federation.
I opened the class with a reference to this Ira Glass video I love, about storytelling, and how our amazing taste mingles with our aspirations to both guide our work and inspire self-doubt.
These videos (there [...]
Continue Reading →Writers: some of you are like “woo, outline, then fast but complete hair-pulling first draft, followed by hard-working but clearly sequential 2nd, 3rd (&4th, etc…) drafts.” You can schedule your manuscript to take 4, 6, 12, 18 or 24 months to complete.
I am more like “write 6 paragraphs, reread, edit, write 6 more paragraphs, [...]
Continue Reading →There was a recommendation for Break On Through in the Summer Reading feature of Montreal’s Hour magazine last week, and I almost missed it! I did an interview with these guys in March, but they didn’t use it for a long time, so I almost forgot I was supposed to be looking for it! [...]
Continue Reading →Skellie at ProBlogger has 5 tips for “prolific blogging” up that actually quite accurately describe my own process for getting down to the sometimes-intimidating business of novel writing. ProBlogger is a useful site in general for bloggers, but in this case, I think Skellie’s advice can apply to any kind of writing, and not [...]
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