The anatomy of act one
Creating a good plot structure is an important step in writing your historical novel. And within that structure, act one is critical. It’s your chance to pull your reader into your story and show them why it’s worth investing their time. In it, you have to 1) persuade...
The top five writing errors you don’t know you’re making
Everyone makes mistakes, even seasoned and successful authors. Normally, you don’t know you’re making them until someone else – someone not quite so close to your manuscript – points out the glaringly obvious. So, to help you get a head start, here are the five most...
What kind of editor do you need? A short guide.
When you’re trying to find an editor for your novel, it can be hard to make sense of all the different specialisms. Content editor, line editor, copy-editor, proofreader? What do they all mean and which one do you need? To help you make sense of it all, I’ve produced...
Writing case study: The Scarlet Thief
Sometimes you read a book and, from the very first page, you know it’s going to be brilliant. Reading The Scarlet Thief, the first novel in Paul Fraser Collard’s popular Jack Lark series, was, for me, one of those times. For anyone not familiar with Paul’s writing,...
Mysteries, secrets, and lies
Why do readers keep turning the page? The answer is simple – they want to find out what happens. But how do we seed the questions that they want to know the answers to? Mysteries, secrets, and lies are excellent ways of doing this. When used alongside conflict and...
Writing case study – The Serpent Sword
(Warning: spoilers ahead.) Matthew Harffy has been one of historical fiction’s best success stories in recent years, going from first-time indie author to landing a book deal with Aria Fiction for his acclaimed series, The Bernicia Chronicles. To mark the release of...
How to create internally conflicted characters
What do Tyrion Lannister, Darth Vader, and Hermione Granger have in common? Not much, you might think. Except, from a storytelling point of view, they all share one crucial feature – all three of them, in their different ways, are internally conflicted characters....
Top tips for pulling off an unreliable narrator
The first rule of good writing is to know the rules. The second is to know when – and how – to break them. Sure, you can write great stories while sticking to all the established conventions. But if you want to push the boundaries, if you want your writing to be truly...