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Ellen T. McKnight

~ connecting through story ~
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After Hours No. 22

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As a writer and reader, I look to books for many things: insight, beautiful language, entertainment, connection. Reading does this in a singular way. We can never be other than alone in our own heads, and yet that is where writers and readers connect, and where fiction almost magically comes to life. 

Welcome

Writing Matters

  • The Alchemy of Writing
  • Plotters vs Pantsers
  • Pace Beyond Plot
  • Voice as a Way In
  • Action and Reaction
  • Creative Courage
  • Looking Forward
  • Tension in the Telling
  • Tension Requires Release
  • Dynamic Tension in Plot
  • Stakes and Sympathy
  • Tension Begins with Character
  • Tension: The Secret to Storytelling
  • Voice is a Verb
  • Foibles and Fixes
  • The Love of a Writer
  • The Things We Carry
  • Thoughts Without Strings
  • Pushing Your Characters Deeper
  • Write to Learn
  • Movement with Meaning
  • Trees Falling Unheard
  • Leading Against Your Strengths
  • What Makes Us Cry
  • Have Your Cake and Tension Too
  • Belief in Your Artistic Vision
  • A Still Center
  • Making a Moment Count
  • Remembering To Play Pretend
  • The Truth Behind Fiction
  • Writing as a Full Body Experience
  • Resisting Your Own Autosuggest
  • The Poetry in Prose

Practical Pointers

  • Get Out to Lean In
  • Tech Tips for Writers
  • Watchman: Cynicism or Hope
  • Book Research Take Two
  • Pitch with Irony and Heart
  • Beta Readers vs Critiquers

Good Books for Writers and Readers

  • A Visit from the Goon Squad
  • Let the Great World Spin
  • The Corrections
  • The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet
  • Blue Angel
  • The Secret Life of Bees
  • Olive Kitteridge
  • Disobedience
  • The Hours
  • Digging to America
  • Memoirs of a Geisha
  • March
  • Criminals
  • The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
  • Girl with a Pearl Earring
  • Before and After

Links to Great Sites

  • Green Room
    Welcoming community for writers
  • Jane Friedman
    Writing advice for all levels
  • K.M. Weiland
    Helping writers become authors
  • Live Write Thrive
    Writing and career advice
  • Nathan Bransford
    Insights from a former agent
  • She Writes
    Writing community for women
  • Write It Sideways
    Advice from different perspectives
  • Writers Helping Writers
    Collaborative approach to better writing
  • Writer Unboxed
    Posts on craft and business

Archives

intuition • research • pace • specificity • pitch • character • hope • revision • show • voice • rhythm • stakes • scene • details • depth • change • discovery • business of writing • plot • practice • free indirect style • surprise • resilience • truth • theme • closeness • play • heart • irony • connection • reimagine • risk • trust • elasticity • state of mind • empathy • what if? • resolution • humor • sympathetic imagination • point of view • critique • tension • metaphor • insight
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