Novel Writing on Edge - Development Notes From Algonkian Writer Conferences

At a conservative estimate, upwards of 250,000 writers in the U.S. are currently struggling to write or find an agent for their first commercial novel or memoir. If you understand this business, you also know why an enormous percentage are unable to make it happen.   Below are my top seven reasons why otherwise passionate writers will join the 99.9% never to become commercially published. 1. NEOPHYTE SKILL SET AND A FAILURE TO COMPREHEND THE PROBLEM   In the case of the writer's prose narrative, it just does not display the kind of energy, cinema, creativity, and polish necessary to convince a gatekeeper professional to go deeper. The first line falls with a thud, and the graph dips from there into a pond of blah. This circumstance is perhaps the number one cause of quick rejection. Usually, the writer in question is sufficiently new to the game, not aware, or at least not enough to enable productive change. Perhaps this is a first stab at fiction, the neophyte not re...

Writer's Edge Advanced Craft - Interior Monologue  Over the years, author Gail Godwin has excelled at observing and commenting on the human condition via her characters. To a significant extent, the power of her narrative depends on her ability to create interesting personalities whom she then dissects. Overall, this narrative of interior monologue serves as a model for aspiring authors looking to do something similar with their own characters. The following excerpts are from her classic novel, Evensong , the story of Margaret Bonner, the pastor of a church in a small town, and how she interprets and reacts to the people in her life. And btw, though this is in first person, the method can easily be translated into third person also. "Would Gus and Charles, as involved in their building and doctoring as Adrian and I were in our school mastering and pastoring, be able to live up to the words better than we were doing? I hoped so. I hoped so for their sakes. I sket...