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6 Ways To Build An Audience

 I had an idea for a character. A character without a story. Being a fan of Twitter, I thought it might be interesting to set up an account in his name and use it as a testing ground for material to see if anything like a plot would emerge. Two years later, it had over 25,000 Twitter followers; appeared briefly in GQ magazine and Time, we made a short film (How To Be Dead); I quoted Yoda on stage to a large audience and had a whole lot of fun. I am now writing The Death Guide To Life as… Read More »6 Ways To Build An Audience

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8 Ways To Jump Start Your Novel’s Description

All About Novel Description The quality of your novel’s description can make or break your book. Novel description is one of the most important elements to be judged when you send it to an agent or publisher (or direct with a reader if you’re self publishing). Yes, yes we all *know* this … Yet STILL all too often writers do not invest in their novel description adequately. As a result authors drop a multitude of description clangers. This serves only to dissuade agents, publishers or readers from engaging with the story in front of them. So what to do? Don’t… Read More »8 Ways To Jump Start Your Novel’s Description

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5 Reasons Writers Should Consider A Transmedia Project

I am still new to the idea of transmedia, but it is a concept that has captured my imagination immensely. Transmedia can be roughly described as telling a story over different formats, mainly using digital technology. See the transmedia section of The B2W Required Reading List. For example, J.K Rowling could create a fake website for Hogwarts school, or set up a blog written by a pupil in Harry Potter’s class. It’s an attempt to bring a new layer of depth to your work and excitingly, is open to any writer who is any stage of a project. After experimenting… Read More »5 Reasons Writers Should Consider A Transmedia Project

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29 Ways To Find A Literary Agent

Many thanks to Harry from Agent Hunter for today’s guest post – some absolute submissions GOLD here, not just for novelists but screenwriters too. Enjoy – and pass on to all your writery friends! Since super-agent Carole Blake recently advised on how not to get an agent, I thought it might be helpful to suggest some good ways to secure one. Truth is, only the first few of these tips really matter, so readers with attention deficit issues can just read the opening items, then move swiftly on to playing computer games or swallowing food additives, or whatever else helps… Read More »29 Ways To Find A Literary Agent

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Top 5 Ways Writers Screw Up Their Characters

Don’t Screw Up Your Characters Characters are the lifeblood of any great story, so we don’t want to screw up on this … BUT writers frequently do. There are multiple, multiple ways to screw up on characterisation, but here are the typical ways … Characters are ‘tropey’, ie. derivative of existing characters, so boring They are stereotypes or recycle toxic myths and ideas The characters feel inauthentic Readers feel they can’t invest in the character’s journey for a specific craft reason (as opposed to personal reason) So if we don’t want to screw up, we need to keep the above… Read More »Top 5 Ways Writers Screw Up Their Characters

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5 Important Elements of Writing a Romantic Comedy

Romantic Comedies Rock So, you want to write a romantic comedy … You’ve grabbed your pen or your laptop, and you’ve decided that it’s time to finally write. If only it were that simple! Not just anyone can sit down and spew out something funny, compelling and believable. At the very least, you need to keep some things in mind. Read on to find out more to find out what you need to make YOURS work … 1) Something Fresh One of the problems with romantic comedies these days is that they all seem to be exactly the same. Therefore,… Read More »5 Important Elements of Writing a Romantic Comedy

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3 Reasons To Buy Breaking Into Hollywood: A Guerilla Pocketbook by Genevieve Jolliffe

Published on Feb 25th 2013, BREAKING INTO HOLLYWOOD is a new addition to the Guerilla Filmmaker Pocketbook series. Written by Genevieve Jolliffe, the book details – unsurprisingly – how to “break in” to Tinseltown and is divided into two parts: Part One is “Working In Hollywood” and looks at such important elements as the studios and how they break down; what agents do and the various types (large vs boutique), plus Managers; Lawyers and what they do; fees; pitching; packaging; how Television works;  The Writers’ Guild of America and The Directors’ Guild; even The Art of Schmooze and the various… Read More »3 Reasons To Buy Breaking Into Hollywood: A Guerilla Pocketbook by Genevieve Jolliffe

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5 Killer Errors That Will Sink Your Reputation … And Ways You Can Fix Them!

Killer Errors No one likes to think about spelling and punctuation errors in their writing. It’s the story that’s important. No-one’s gonna care about typos when it’s the content that counts. It’ll get corrected when it’s typeset. Yada yada yada. You can make excuses until you’re blue in the face, but the fact remains that literary professionals (including script readers) like to read well written English and if you’ve got pesky errors you will set off their grammar police sirens. Thing is, though, these mistakes are far easier to check for and to correct than you think. It just takes… Read More »5 Killer Errors That Will Sink Your Reputation … And Ways You Can Fix Them!

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Your Book Is Movie …

… I heard this advice at a seminar at London Book Fair 2010. It was a real watershed moment for me. It was quite literally the best advice I ever heard, because it finally unlocked the idea in my head that had been percolating for about five years, which enabled me to craft my novel so that it sold. But what does it mean? Seems to me there’s two ways of thinking about “your book is a movie”: Your book will want to “unlock” all possible markets … In other words, if your book can be easily adapted INTO a… Read More »Your Book Is Movie …

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An Interview with Mark Leigh by Samuel Caine

All this talking about 50 Shades has stirred up some very interesting questions about the future of publishing and e-books. Although I’d be more than happy to speak about the shifts in the publishing industry, I felt it’d be better to hear from someone a little more qualified. I donned the internet equivalent of a safari helmet and set off into the wilds, where I found Mark Leigh. He’s been writing since the late 1980s and published a whopping 45 books. He’s been extremely helpful and agreed to answer my questions about writing, publishing and the future of e-books. Sam… Read More »An Interview with Mark Leigh by Samuel Caine

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50 Shades Of Elitism by Samuel Caine

Oh, yes. This post is going exactly where you think. I’m going to talk about the much discussed 50 Shades of Grey, but I’ll confess now – I’ve not read it. This is not a critical analysis, or an endorsement of any kind. I am not defending the divisive contents of the book, which raise all sorts of issues about the glorification of consensual sexual violence, but it is a defence of sorts: it is a defence of the author and the book’s readers against the elitist demons in all of us…especially me. Over the past few months, as the… Read More »50 Shades Of Elitism by Samuel Caine

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How Do I Become A Freelance Writer?

Updated for 2017 Writing and making money from it is probably everyone’s dream … and we ALL dream of the six figure deals for our novels and screenplays! But before we get to that fabled return, we have to earn money – so it feels like we may be stuck in the boring day job FOREVER. Yet it IS possible to make money writing in OTHER ways while we write our specs and unpublished novels – welcome to the wonderful world of the freelance writer! Freelance writers are available to hire for any number of writing jobs, small, medium or… Read More »How Do I Become A Freelance Writer?

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