Common Plot Pitfalls to Avoid – Inventing Reality’s Newsletter for Nov. 18, 2025

Plotting Your Book: Common Plot Pitfalls to Avoid
New writers, usually due to a lack of writing experience or because they haven’t had their writing critiqued, often will make some journeyman mistakes when plotting their story. If you’re just writing for yourself, there’s nothing wrong with any of these errors; the pleasure of writing alone overrides the need to follow a writing “rule.” But if you hope to have a magazine or publisher purchase your story or don’t want readers to leave bad reviews of your self-published book, you’ll want to avoid these five plot pitfalls. READ MORE

Self-Publishing Tips: How to Upload Your Ebook
For those new to self-publishing, uploading your ebook often is a complex and frustrating process. Unfamiliar terms are used, questions that you as an author have never thought of answering are asked, and when errors occur there’s often no real explanation as to how fix them. And while online “tutorials” are offered, the articles either state the obvious or appear to have been written by software engineers rather than someone who actually understands your plight. My book Upload Your Ebook to KindleDP corrects all of that. The explanations in this book make the process easy to understand and to follow. After all, you just want to get your book uploaded so it’s up for sale, not wonder if you wasted your time writing it because of error messages! SEE BOOK

Writing Tip: Use Confidant to Reveal Hero’s Inner Turmoil
Sometimes to reveal the protagonist’s inner conflict, he shares his thoughts with another character. This character who the protagonist trusts is referred to as a confidant (or a confidante if a female). READ MORE

Self-Publishing Tip: Guidelines for Designing Your Book’s Front Cover
Given that the most important part of your cover is its very front – as that’s what potential readers will see when they consider purchasing your book in a store or online – you’ll want to spend some time thinking about and working on it. READ MORE

This Week’s Podcast: Should You Ever Co-write Your Book?
Sometimes you come up with a great story idea with another person. Or your discussions and critiques of one another’s works are inspiring. So you decide to co-write a book. Is it a good idea? LISTEN TO PODCAST

Book Marketing Tip: Five Magic Words that Sell More Books
When writing a blurb for a nonfiction book, there are certain words that can be used to increase the odds of purchase. In fact, five words – you, free, instantly, because and new – have more sway than others, if used in the right context.  READ MORE

Client Spotlight: “A Prayer for Judgment” by Dennis Blanco
A recent editing client has published his first novel! “A Prayer for Judgment” by Dennis Blanco, tells the story of Jeremy and Ray, who are kidnapped on Thanksgiving Eve and taken to a remote cabin in the Virginia mountains. Their mysterious assailant is armed with intimate knowledge of their family. Jeremy’s mother, wife, and sister are compelled to watch a livestream as he and Ray are forced to unearth buried memories. They confess secrets to a gallery of unknown and handpicked spectators, who surreptitiously have come in contact with the family in the recent past. In the crucible that is the mountain cabin, Jeremy battles to find a way of escaping their captor, save his family, and keep the darkest secrets from shattering their world. The book is available in paperback and ebook at Amazon. CHECK IT OUT

$25 Off Your Next Edit!
For being a newsletter subscriber, please take $25 off your next edit with Inventing Reality Editing Service. When scheduling your edit, be sure to mention you’re a subscriber and give the email where you received this newsletter. Minimum order of $200. Offer expires Nov. 25, 2025. SCHEDULE EDIT

My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of both aspiring and published writers and offers a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of a novel, the Storytelling 101 Quick Read series, four children’s books, more than 25 bestselling hiking guidebooks, and even a book of poetry. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.