Writing

Expert Advice for Writing with Authenticity in Science Fiction, Fantasy, & Other Genres

Science and technology have starring roles in a wide range of genres--science fiction, fantasy, thriller, mystery, and more. Unfortunately, many depictions of technical subjects in literature, film, and television are pure fiction. A basic understanding of biology, physics, engineering, and medicine will help you create more realistic stories that satisfy discerning readers.

This book brings together scientists, physicians, engineers, and other experts to help you.

One of the biggest struggles for writers is how to convey emotion to readers in a unique and compelling way. When showing our characters’ feelings, we often use the first idea that comes to mind, and they end up smiling, nodding, and frowning too much.

All of us at Canterbury Writers are fans of this book.

Powerful Character Arcs Create Powerful Stories Have you written a story with an exciting concept and interesting characters—but it just isn’t grabbing the attention of readers or agents? It’s time to look deeper into the story beats that create realistic and compelling character arcs.

Uncover the Secrets to Creating Characters Readers Will Never Forget Award-winning author K.M. Weiland’s previous book, the acclaimed Creating Character Arcs, showed writers how to identify the five most important types of character arcs and use them to bring your own characters to life.

For characters to come across as authentic, they need a past, the same as you or me. And, like us, part of their history includes painful experiences known as emotional wounds which generate fears, insecurities, trust issues, and make it difficult for them to take risks when it matters most. This guide will lead you to specific types of trauma (and the dysfunctional behaviors tied to them) so you can choose what your character’s vulnerability is, what it will look like on the page, and develop a character arc where they overcome the past…or succumb to it.

Every character has good qualities, even the bad guy. Attributes help your characters come alive on the page by revealing their identity, showing readers how they treat other people, and giving them a moral compass to live by. This guide does a deep dive on 100 positive traits to help you brainstorm unique combinations of strengths to help your characters bend the story to their will and win reader’s hearts.

Ready to explore your character’s dark side? Protagonist, antagonist, or someone in between—all characters have negative qualities that mess up their relationships, keep them from achievement, and stymie internal growth. This thesaurus digs into over 100 character flaws, how to show them through dysfunctional behavior and attitudes, and provides ideas on how they will cause problems in the story.

Is your setting description pulling its weight in the story, or is it just sort of…there? Do more with your settings, activating their power to characterize the story’s cast, deepen emotional moments, deliver backstory without info dumps, and more. This guide does all this and more, in addition to providing you with lists of sensory description for over 120 modern locations.

One of the most powerful storytelling elements is your setting…but are you using it as well as you should? This guide not only lists sensory details for over 100 natural and personal settings, it provides options for conflict in each location and shows you how to build mood, steer the plot, and apply symbolism for deeper, more meaningful scenes.

When writing fictional characters, it’s hugely important to convey their emotions effectively so readers will be drawn in and become invested in those characters. The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Expression was written to help writers convey the quality and depth of their cha...

Fascinating fiction starts with characters who make readers care. This Live Wire Writer Guide presents a simple, effective technique to sharpen your hook, charge your scenes, and amplify your voice whether you’re a beginner or an expert.

For a story to be filled with action, you must use verbs. It's a whole new way of thinking about characters.

Get some insights into the rise and fall of a story and how you might improve the passing of your own novel.

Discover the Proven Blueprint for Creating Stories That Sell! Award-winning author K.M. Weiland’s previous book, the award-winning Structuring Your Novel, showed writers how to create stories with strong and compelling plot structure. Now it’s time to put those lessons to use!

Learn some tricks on how to structure and outline your story to create an engrossing story.

Learn How to Make Your First Draft Easy! Award-winning author K.M. Weiland’s previous book, the bestselling Outlining Your Novel, showed writers how to embrace outlines in a way that makes the writing process fun, inspiring, and easy. Now it’s time to put those lessons to use!

Body Trauma explains what happens to body organs and bones maimed by accident or intent and the small window of opportunity for emergency treatment. Research what happens in a hospital operating room and the personnel who initiate treatment. Use these facts to bring added realism to your stories and novels.

It may have been written for screenwriters, but the story structure that is presented seems to work for almost every story in existence. Get some solid advice to help with the pacing of your writing.

The first novel-writing guide from the best-selling Save the Cat! story-structure series, which reveals the 15 essential plot points needed to make any novel a success.Novelist Jessica Brody presents a comprehensive story-structure guide for novelists that applies the famed Save the Cat! screenwriti...

This book is a set of tools: literary crowbars, chisels, mallets, pliers and tongs. Use them to pry, chip, yank and sift good characters out of the place where they live in your memory, your imagination and your soul.

Award-winning author Orson Scott Card explains in depth the techniques of inventing, developing and presenting characters, plus handling viewpoint in novels and short stories. With specific examples, he spells out your narrative options–the choices you'll make in creating fictional people so "real" that readers will feel they know them like members of their own families.

What makes a romance novel a romance? How do you write a kissing book?Writing a well-structured romance isn’t the same as writing any other genre—something the popular novel and screenwriting guides don’t address. The romance arc is made up of its own story beats, and the external plot and theme need to be braided to the romance arc—not the other way around.Told in conversational (and often irreverent) prose, Romancing the Beat can be read like you are sitting down to coffee with romance editor and author Gwen Hayes while she explains story structure. The way she does with her clients. Some of whom are regular inhabitants of the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists.Romancing the Beat is a recipe, not a rigid system. The beats don’t care if you plot or outline before you write, or if you pants your way through the drafts and do a “beat check” when you’re revising. Pantsers and plotters are both welcome. So sit down, grab a cuppa, and let’s talk about kissing books.