Believable dialogue is one of the most important skills a fiction writer can learn. The speed and rhythm of a character’s speech tells a lot about their personality, the environment they grew up in and their education. It is essential to give your characters a believable voice to give them life. Like a musician who […]
When our daughter was born, some twenty-six years ago, she was placed in my arms and I began to float on air. I had the same experience almost six years later when our son was born. But that’s another story. It was my daughter’s very early childhood that led to the creation of Maggie MacCormack and the […]
Writers can get attached to their syntax and feel that their way of writing the world is better than possible alternatives, simply because that writing is theirs. Often that does not turn out to best serve the author’s work. I cannot emphasize enough how important it is for a writer to foster a good relationship […]
The most amazing prose will never be read if it’s presented in an unattractive, ill suited format. Lines of type crammed together into rectangular blocks that swallow up the gutters of the page and smother the writer’s intention are a bane of printed books. You could be another William Shakespeare, having just written another Hamlet. If […]
Maggie MacCormack and the Witches’ Wheel is available for readers in Grade 7 and up . A free downloadable teacher’s discussion guide that can be modified in level-appropriate ways is available through the Resources tab under “For Educators.” This discussion guide helps educators spark lively conversations about topics for its young adult readers to think […]