Useful Writing Sites
- Toby Litt’s fascinating article on Sensibility
- Tips on Viewpoint
- A list of top UK independent publishers
- Haruki Murakami on Writing
- Motivation – now there’s an issue. A great article on character motivation on the BBC Writers Room.
- Perhaps, like me, from time to time you want to invigorate your thinking by trying something new. Here, Charles Bernstein has compiled an extraordinary list of experiments.
- A great collection of travel writing sites that pay for work. Definitely worth looking into. Travel Writing.
If you’re looking for a lit mag that might suit your work, you might take a look at the calls for submissions published by New Pages. Plenty of obscure names but it is kept right up-to-date. http://www.newpages.com/classifieds/calls/- Here is the fantastic Neon Books – they have a great list of magazines that are open for submissions.
- And The Grinder has a mill for refining your submissions even more.
- The Guardian has put together Ten Rules for Writing from a variety of esteemed writers http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/ten-rules-for-writing-fiction-part-one A L Kennedy’s appeal to me although I don’t think I’ll be following No 3 to the letter. It is amusing to imagine Margaret Attwood sharpening her pencils with a nail file while flying over the Atlantic. I wonder how she managed to smuggle a nail file aboard in the first place.
- If you’re looking for tips on submissions, you might be interested in Karyana McGlynn’s Top Five Quick and Dirty Submission Tricks here http://www.gulfcoastmag.org/blog/archives/51-My-Top-5-Quick-Dirty-Submission-Tricks.html I love her map of world domination. Must give that a try.
- Here are some fascinating insights into writers’ daily routines. I didn’t know Hemingway wrote whilst standing. Simone de Beauvoir’s routine is especially civilised. Take a look. http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/11/20/daily-routines-writers/
- ‘The Write Practice’ has plenty of useful advice. Writing with Empathy is definitely worth looking over http://thewritepractice.com/empathy-story/
- Want to inject a little suspense into your story? Take a look at ‘The Kill Zone’ here: http://killzoneauthors.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/8-key-ways-to-edit-suspense-pace-into.html#.UTkIbXZFBLN I especially love the section on subplots that gives tips on becoming ‘the maestro of your own orchestra of tension’
- Finding the right time to write can be hell – take a look at Julia Cameron’s advice on writing in the morning http://juliacameronlive.com/basic-tools/morning-pages/
- Now down to editing – Sarah Selecky has many useful ideas – rather than playing around with words she says that the first step is to discover what your story is actually about http://www.sarahselecky.com/2013/deep-revision-part-1/
- About waiting for inspiration – not a good idea says Jenna Avery http://www.scriptmag.com/features/get-a-new-story-dont-wait-for-writing-inspiration
