Tag: writing advice

  • On writing and persistence

    In 2017, my manuscript was one of five shortlisted for the Kill Your Darlings Unpublished Manuscript Award. None of the writers on the list had a book published at the time. Here’s an excerpt from the announcement: I started the creative non-fiction manuscript that became Full of Donkey in 2010. I had my first essay, […]

  • Ep 60 How to write a prize-winning novel with James McKenzie Watson, author of Denizen

    When he was 22 years old, James McKenzie Watson began to experience the first symptoms of what doctors suspected was Guillain–Barré syndrome. To test for this, they gave him a spinal tap (not the rock and roll kind). After the procedure he had to lie on his back for two hours. In that time, he […]

  • Ep 58 When your body betrays you with author Rae Cairns

    After a broken finger brought on a debilitating illness, author Rae Cairns lost two years as her doctors searched for the right treatment. A bad reaction to drugs caused her hair to fall out. When her health had stabilised enough for her to return to writing, she lost her literary agent. Undeterred, Rae self-published her […]

  • But how does your HUSBAND feel about your memoir?!

    When I started writing, one major thing I had absolutely no idea about was narrative structure. I thought I just had to write a good story – and that’s true, but it was only later that I discovered how essential structure is to good stories. It took me an embarrassing number of years to even realise […]

  • Ep 50 How to remake the world with author Sarah Sentilles

    “We have these narrow stories about what it means to be a human being,” author Sarah Sentilles says. But we have the power to expand them, just as we have the power to remake the world. Sarah Sentilles is the author of Draw Your Weapons, Breaking Up with God, A Church of Her Own and […]