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Tips & Articles for the Writer

In no particular order...we have tried to group by subject.
NTRWA does not endorse or benefit in any way from the purchase of any material. The resource materials have been collected by members, judges and contestants to help writers improve their craft.

BOOKS

• The Chicago Manual of Style 
• Scene and Sequel  by Jack Bickham
• The Emotional Craft of Fiction by Donald Maass 
• Goal, Motivation, Conflict by Debra Dixon
• The Power of Point of View by Alicia Rasley 
• The 38 Most Common Fiction Writing Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them) by Jack M. Bickham
• The Lie That Tells a Truth by John Dufresne
• Elements of Fiction Writing: Scene and Structure – by Jack M. Bickham
• Elements of Fiction Writing: Conflict, Action & Suspense by William Noble
• Self-Editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself Into Print by Renni Browne and Dave King
• The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Expression – by Angela Ackeerman and Becca Puglish
  A sample of the book can be found here.

ON-LINE RESOURCES

• The Editor's Blog  (super resource)
• Fiction University
• Writer's Digest
• Seekersville (archives on lower right-hand side)
• Romance University
• The Editor's Blog (Full Archives)
• Purdue On-Line Writing Lab
• Editor Rent (list of subjects in lower right corner)
• Writers Helping Writers
• Romance Tropes by Mindy Klasky
• Writing 4 Success by Marg McAllister
• Writers Helping Writers Thesaurus Collections
• Writer's Tools ~ free downloads available for example:

Character Arc Progression Tool (PDF)

Setting exercises (PDF)

Character Profile Questionnaire (PDF) 

FORMATTING

• Formatting digital manuscript
• Formatting a printed manuscript

 SCENES & SETTING

• Master scene types for Page-Turning Plots
• Unforgettable Writing All 5 Senses
• Setting Thesaurus
• Hooking Your Reader by Cami Tang
• Secrets of Story Structure by K.M. Weiland
• Dealing with passage of time by Janice Hardy

AUTHOR INTRUSION

• Author Intrusion Pitfalls by RITA winner Roni Loren
• Author Intrusion -- Writers.com
• Deep POV by Barbara Wallace

BACK STORY

• Back Story on Seekerville by Janet Dean 
• Back Story by Jane Friedman 
• Back story with a dump by Janice Hardy
• Early Hints of Backstory by Kathryn Craft

BASIC WRITING MISTAKES

• 8 Basic Writing Blunders by Jerry B. Jenkins

CHARACTERS

• Introducing Characters
• Whose Story Is It? by Marg McAllister
• Unforgettable Writing All 5 Senses

DESCRIPTION

• Setting Thesaurus
• Helping or hurting the story? by Janice Hardy
• Mapping Your Story’s Setting by Sara Letourneau 

DIALOGUE, DIALOGUE TAGS / ATTRIBUTIONS

• Dialogue
• Use & Misuse
• Another Take on Dialogue Tags
• Common Writing Mistakes 
• Don’t Explain
• Using Italics to Show Thoughts by Marg McAlister
• Dialogue and Tension | Bringing Scenes To Life by Marylee MacDonald

EDITING

• As,said and doing, knew, because, things started or began #2
• Debbie’sediting checks
• Take a book from good to sold
• Master scene types for Page-Turning Plots

FILTER WORDS & WORD CHOICE

• An Introduction to Filtering by Michael R. Emmert 
• Keep Readers Close To Action
• Grammar Slammer
• Names in fiction
• 1000 Strong Verbs
•  Weak words

NON-VERBALS

• Body Language Cheat Sheets

POV

• Passive Voice
• Deep POV: What's so Deep About It?
• Deep POV
• MalePOV
• Bring out emotion in first person POV
• Choosing a POV Character
• How to Choose POV 
• Becoming Your POV Character
• Reading minds(as if, as though)

  

SHOW vs TELL

• Why show don’t tell is a myth
• Show and tell--Not just a Game we Play
• Show Don't Tell
• Show (like Sherlock Holmes)

   

GE JUDGING TIPS

Here are the shortcuts to all the pages:

• WHY ARE YOU JUDGING?: http://bit.ly/GE_WhyBeAJudge
• INTERNATIONAL WRITING DIFFERENCES: http://bit.ly/GE_InternationalDiffrences
• LOGICAL ACTIONS: http://bit.ly/GE_LogicalActions
• PACING: http://bit.ly/GE_Pacing
• POV SHIFTS: http://bit.ly/GE_POVshifts
• WORD OVERUSE: http://bit.ly/GE_WordOveruse
• WRITING STYLES: http://bit.ly/GE_Style
• Judge Training 101-THE SCORE SHEET: http://bit.ly/GE_JT101_TheScoreSheet
• Judge Training 102-COMMENTS: http://bit.ly/GE_JT102_Comments
• Judge Training 103-THE OPENING: http://bit.ly/GE_JT103_Opening
• Judge Training 104-SETTING: http://bit.ly/GE_JT104_Setting
• Judge Training 105-STYLE & TECHNICAL SECTION: http://bit.ly/GE_JT105_Style
• Judge Training 106-PLOT: http://bit.ly/GE_JT106_Plot
• Judge Training 107-CHARACTERIZATION: http://bit.ly/GE_JT107_Characterization

We're always interested in articles about editing, how-to-write, constructive shortcuts or inspiration. 

Please feel free to send suggestions to the GEcoordinator@NTRWA.org

~ ~ ~

Most of the opinions on judging and interpreting the questions’ intent are my own words. I’ve been in the business over 15 years and have spoken to many authors, gathering information. A lot of the time when a question is asked, I go to authors who publish in that genre for advice. Please use your own expertise and experience, but keep our humble interpretations in mind.

~Thanks, Angi Morgan

AngiMorganAuthor.com

Contributions and edits by Fenley Grant.