Character Descriptions: Avoiding the Boring Stuff – by Angela Ackerman…

Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog

on Jami Gold:

We all know characters are the beating heart of a story. Fashioned from imagination clay and given life by an author, these fictional people have yearnings, dreams, and fears just like us. They also have a past—one filled with challenges, strife, and hope—and this collection of experiences shape them into the person readers meet on the doorstep of chapter one.

Digging deep to explore a character’s hidden truths is hard and necessary work. I spend a lot of time coaching writers to drill down into the essence of who their character is so that when they write their behavior, every action and choice is driven by their motivation and authentic to them.

But there’s another aspect of character description that is easy to forget about or gloss over: their physical appearance.

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Good News: Reading Is Still Popular

Marketing Christian Books

Reading is still popular. In fact, most people have good intentions about reading!

A study conducted by OnePoll on behalf of Rakuten Kobo found that 71% of Americans say they’d like to read more than they currently do. Our busy and distracted lives present barriers to reading more. Survey respondents reported that these main barriers include:

• Scrolling through social media (49%)
• Playing games on a phone (30%)
• Watching TV shows (29%)
• Sitting in Traffic (28%)
• Constantly checking their phone (26%)

The good news is that the majority of Americans are still reading. Check out these five findings on books and reading in the United States.

Related Posts:
The Book Industry Is Still Strong
Effective Marketing to a Declining Reading Populace
Is Reading in Trouble?

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Writers Need to Rethink Rewrites

A Writer's Path

by smwright

Rewrites have a negative connotation in the writing world, and when listening to some writers talk about them, you’d suspect they were on par with a root canal! I’m well up to my head in revisions for my SciFi novel right now, but you won’t catch me griping about them. Revisions and rewrites are just a natural part of the writing process. They are only as bad as you make them.

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No Wasted Ink Writers Links — Chris The Story Reading Ape’s Blog

Originally posted on No Wasted Ink: Welcome back to writer links day here on No Wasted Ink. Each week, I select ten articles from my general reading on the internet to share with you here on the blog. I hope you like this week’s choice. Enjoy. The Fantastical Food of Fantasy Fiction Biting the Bullet…

via No Wasted Ink Writers Links — Chris The Story Reading Ape’s Blog

How to use Social Media for your Marketing — Chris The Story Reading Ape’s Blog

Originally posted on Ari Meghlen – Writer | Blogger | Bad card player: It’s Monday Marketing time, people! Today I thought I’d talk (more) about social media. Last year, I did a series on Social Media but I think discussing it specifically for Marketing is important. Not all social media is the same. Ones such as Twitter…

via How to use Social Media for your Marketing — Chris The Story Reading Ape’s Blog

Indie Book Month — Promote Your Books

charles french words reading and writing

(https://pixabay.com)

On Twitter, there is a movement called #IndieApril, so I thought it was a good idea to import to WordPress.  Independent writers are the growing force in publishing, so please take this opportunity to publicize and promote your work!

I want to offer an opportunity for all writers who follow this blog to share information on their books. It can be very difficult to generate publicity for our writing, so I thought this little effort might help. All books may be mentioned, and there is no restriction on genre. This encompasses fiction, poetry, plays, and non-fiction. If I have neglected to mention a genre, please consider it to be included.

To participate, simply give your name, your book, information about it, and where to purchase it in the comments section. Then please be willing to reblog and/or tweet this post. The more people that see it, the more publicity…

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3 Needs to Decide How Much Description to Use

The Author Chronicles

How much description and other information do we need to put into any given scene? Too much and it becomes a sleep-inducing info dump. Too little and the reader is lost and confused. So how do we find that perfect balance? How do we know what to put in when?

In a discussion at the Liars Club’s Willow Grove Coffeehouse yesterday, we discussed this very topic. The answer lies in three Needs that converge at the point of perfect balance.

• Needs of the genre
• Needs of the reader
• Needs of the Point of View (POV) character

Needs of the Genre

Every genre comes with content expectations. While a Tom Clancy espionage-thriller is expected to be heavy on technical details, a romance is not. And while romance carries an expectation of a happily ever after, many horror stories do not. Knowing what your genre expects can help guide you as to…

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