My Courses

“I don’t think anyone should write their autobiography until after they’re dead.” – Samuel Goldwyn “If my clone writes my biography, is it really an autobiography?” – Jarod Kintz “Autobiography begins with a sense of being alone. It is an orphan form.” – John Berger “A poet’s autobiography is his poetry. Anything else is just a footnote.” – Yevgeny…

Why do you write? To feel more fully alive? To give the world meaning and purpose? If your answer is mundane or egocentric – to make money, to achieve fame – ask if your writing can serve a deeper, more profound aspiration. ______________ My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing…

“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.” – Stephen King “All the reading she had done had given her a view of life they had never seen.” – Roald Dahl “Always read something that will make you look good if you…

Good stories center on the clashing of characters’ goals and motivations. Sometimes a character’s goals and motivations arise from overcoming suppression. Here are four writing prompts for stories that center on resistance. Man vs. natureOur protagonist is ordered to secretly escort an important dignitary through an extremely dangerous terrain. What challenges of nature must the protagonist…

All stories center on conflict; arguably, the whole point of a story is to resolve some type of conflict. One way of thinking about conflict is to divide it into categories – internal and external. Internal conflict involves a character struggling with his own thoughts and emotions. The story focuses on what decision he will make.…

Sometimes the thought an author wishes to convey gets confusing once written because several pronouns are needed in it. For example: If your kids don’t like those cookies, they must be really bad.The sentence leaves the reader wondering who is bad – the kids or the cookies? This problem is called a vague pronoun reference. Readers…

“If creative work protects a man against mental illness, it is small wonder that he pursues it with avidity; and even if the state of mind he is seeking to avoid is no more than a mild state of depression or apathy, this still constitutes a cogent reason for engaging in creative work even when it…

Among the biggest distractions are social media and the Internet. When unable to come up with the next line, the urge is strong to answer the latest email or to troll through our friends’ posts. During the time you’ve set aside to write, turn off your cell phone and close all browser windows. By doing so,…