dialogue

6 Tips On How to Write Compelling Dialogue

How to Write Compelling Dialogue Writing compelling dialogue seems to be one of the hardest nuts to crack in the writing world. Many writers struggle with how to make the conversations not only feel real, but also propel the story forward. The good news is, you can learn how to write compelling dialogue in the following steps … 1) Determine the mood of your story What would you like your readers to feel overall when they read your novel or watch your screenplay? This plays an important part in how you write your dialogue. Is it a funny, heartwarming story?… Read More »6 Tips On How to Write Compelling Dialogue

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10 Quick And Easy Tips To Boost Your Writing

How To Boost Your Writing If you want to give your writing a quick and easy boost, you’ve come to the right place. Here’s a top 10 of writing tips I give most often. What I love about these is they’re straightforward and easy to implement. You can start doing them all TODAY!  Ready? Let’s go … 1) Start Anywhere Writing a whole screenplay or novel from start to finish can seem insurmountable. But what if I told you that you DON’T have to write in chronological order? Just start anywhere. GOGOGO! 2) Bullet Point It Lots of writers freak… Read More »10 Quick And Easy Tips To Boost Your Writing

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Expand Your Vocabulary: 19 New Words Writers Can Try

Keep Your Vocabulary Up To Date A great writer needs a great vocabulary. But a great vocabulary isn’t about using high fallutin’ words your readers won’t understand. The best vocabulary includes words popular with younger people and used in internet-speak around the world. So, what’s the best way to update your vocabulary? You could invite your friends over to play Scrabble on a Friday night (they will probably decline) … Or you can do something a lot easier! Check out Global English Editing’s new infographic which lists 19 must-know words for 2020. With words like “shook” and “biohacking,” it doesn’t matter… Read More »Expand Your Vocabulary: 19 New Words Writers Can Try

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4 Quick Screenwriting Tips From Novelists

Screenwriting Tips From Novelists A surprising number of famous novelists have also worked as screenwriters. It’s understandable that many writers would choose to express themselves in both ways. After all, the fundamentals are similar. Tell a story. Create engaging characters. Touch people emotionally. Although the formats may be different, screenwriting and novel writing have a lot in common. Personally, I always find it fascinating to learn from creative people who practice more than one form of art. Often, insights from one area can be applied to another. Novelists can offer unique perspectives on screenwriting. Today, I’d like to share four… Read More »4 Quick Screenwriting Tips From Novelists

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Death By Dialogue: How To Bring Your Writing Back To Life

Dialogue Death Dialogue is overrated. That doesn’t mean it’s not important, but you’ve heard the sayings … Actions speak louder than words … A picture tells a thousand words … What you see is what you get! Yet many writers still get hung up on dialogue. Either a script or novel is too dialogue-heavy or the dialogue isn’t authentic, or feels ‘in the nose’. Here are some tips to help you nail it! 1) DANGER: Why Dialogue Is Killing Your Screenplay Has your screenplay suffered death by dialogue? Don’t know how to bring it back to life? We got ya covered!… Read More »Death By Dialogue: How To Bring Your Writing Back To Life

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Top 5 Dialogue Mistakes Writers Make

Dialogue Problems Dialogue for movie and TV screenplays. Writers obsess over it, laypeople quote it on their social media profiles. It’s important. But it’s also one of things holding spec screenplays back! Supersadface. But you’re here to learn how to deal with dialogue problems in your script. Are you dropping any of these clangers?? Better check and see: 1)  Expositional Dialogue Lots of writers get confused about expositional dialogue. After all, exposition is just the background information needed to understand the story … So it is a good thing, right? Nope. If you get the note, ‘too much expositional dialogue’, this… Read More »Top 5 Dialogue Mistakes Writers Make

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6 Things Writers Can Learn From The Handmaid’s Tale

The Handmaid’s Tale, Adapted The Handmaid’s Tale is that rare beast, both critically acclaimed and commercially successful. Just two series in and it’s obvious it will go down in television history. More importantly, countless Bang2writers tell me they want to write something ‘just like it’, that ‘says something’ … But how? At London Screenwriters’ Festival last weekend, I lead a talk titled What Writers Can Learn From The Handmaid’s Tale. It was a brilliant session, with some great questions and observations from the switched-on delegates. Obviously I can’t cover all everything we talked about in one blog post, sadly. But here’s… Read More »6 Things Writers Can Learn From The Handmaid’s Tale

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38 Good Reasons Your Script Might Get Rejected

You may remember this infographic from when it was doing the rounds three or four years back, so I thought I’d revisit it and see if anything has radically changed in how I view it from B2W’s POV as a script reader and script editor. Since this blog always posits there’s no ‘right’ way to write (just multiple WRONG ways!), I thought I would take a look at the recurring problems section of the graphic. Today I’m putting all 38 of these issues under the microscope and offering up my thoughts. (By the way, whilst the infographic relates to screenplays,… Read More »38 Good Reasons Your Script Might Get Rejected

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10 Rocky Quotes To Inspire You As A Writer

The Patron Saint Of Writers That’s right, Rocky Balboa is the patron saint of writers … and I’m gonna illustrate why. But first, here’s a little story for you. Once there was a scrappy little girl, who was all knees and elbows, who wanted to be a writer. The first time she realised this, she was about 6 years old. Her mother had a big bookcase on the landing, filled with grown up books. The little girl’s Mum had weird reading taste, so some of the covers were mad-scary, but that didn’t stop the girl from dreaming about one day… Read More »10 Rocky Quotes To Inspire You As A Writer

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25 Mistakes That Send Your Screenplay To The Trash

So, I’ll be teaching Breaking Into Script Reading for the sixth year in 2020 at Ealing Studios, in conjunction with LondonSWF. I love teaching this course, which is not only for wannabe script readers but those screenwriters who want to see an ‘insider’s view’ of how their scripts may be judged from the other side of the table. To celebrate, I’ve composed a mammoth list of the issues a script reader may chuck a spec screenplay to one side … Or rather, in this new world of PDFs and virtual work, MOVE IT TO TRASH! I’ve also linked to lots of… Read More »25 Mistakes That Send Your Screenplay To The Trash

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