I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Penguin magical realism author, Tabitha Bird, during our Sunday night Alumni Time to Write session. The topic of our talk was ‘voice.’ No coincidence there. Anybody who has read Tabitha’s books will be struck by the delightful ‘voice’ within all her work. She has accessed such a sweet, authentic, way of expressing her characters. How did she do that? How did she find such a unique voice? And how can you find yours?

The written word is incredibly powerful. Whether you are reading a book, a self-help social media post, an interesting newspaper article or a blog on your favourite hobby, the written word is a potent force. But there is something that can be even more compelling than reading, and that’s writing.

At the Art of Writing, we are doing everything we can to help you put The End on your ms. The final full stop. Period. The Next Draft course is for writers who have finished their manuscripts and are asking themselves now what? What are my next steps? How do I manage these words, deal with this text, and handle this story? How do I edit to approach this next draft? HELP!

One of the questions that writers often ask is ‘How do I know when I’m done? How do I know when the manuscript is ready to send out to a publisher or agent?’ There’s no straight forward answer to this. The trajectory for each manuscript might be a little different. I certainly encourage writers to develop the manuscript as well and as far as they can.

Creative writing Art of Writing tutor, Laurel, takes us through surviving rejection. Nothing worse, quite frankly, than having an agent or a publisher send back your MS with ‘we loved it, but it’s not for us.’ How do we deal with that rejection?

Often writers find their energy falling away when they are faced with a problem that seems insurmountable, or when they are feeling overwhelmed by what is ahead of them. Sometimes writers find their energy for a project depleted for no apparent reason. Just as batteries run down and need recharging over time, so do we, as writers.

Writing your MS is often the fun part. Now comes the bit where you must revise and re-work much of your text to make it even more amazing. Once you’ve fully absorbed that revisions must happen, it’s very likely that your second, third, fourth and beyond drafts will take a toll on you emotionally. That’s where this series of blogs by developmental book editor, Laurel Cohn come into play.

In this Five Part series on your manuscript development phase, Laurel discusses your revision process to prepare you psychologically as well as professionally for what can be a gruelling part of your writing growth.

I leave you with Laurel’s wonderful advice!

Disenchantment is the third final D in my four big writing D’s series. We’ve covered Distraction, Derailment, Digression, and today, Disenchantment.

Being big on synonyms, I couldn’t resist a few other words for being disenchanted. Disillusioned, disheartened, dissatisfied, disappointed. All key words for when a writer falls out of love with their project.

My 4 Big D’s - Part 3: Digression: It is utterly normal and understandable to digress when writing. It is how we come across many of our creative ideas. Free writing an idea is all about digression but you have to bring it back to exactly what you want your readers to either sense or understand. Or what it is you want to reveal.

Part 2 of My Four D’s: Derailed. What derails you from getting the writing done? Here I share some I struggle with.

Beginning the four-part series, My Four D’s : Distraction. Derailment. Disenchantment. Digression that hamper my writing will be the focus of our next four blogs. Because writers must work through all four D’s daily, sometimes hourly, sometimes every minute. Here are some distractions I experience and how I deal with them.

Over the last two weeks I’ve mentioned staying close to your characters or as I sometimes call them, my creatures. This week I need to talk about invisible (actually, sometimes they are visible) forces that nudge me away from them. Distraction, derailment, disenchantment, digression - my Four Big D’s.

I keep her near me, my character and her world. I am constantly observing the humanity around me and thinking about what I can pick or nick from it. I keep my creatures close.

I love the saying ‘make your readers believe.’ Sounds straightforward right? Well, it’s not as simple as it sounds. Getting people to believe the stuff you make up is complicated.

So what to write next? What to write next is a question that is never far from a writer’s mind. Are you feeling the throb of a new idea?

I know from past experience that the important thing is to START. Anything. A scene, a thought, a person, dialogue – any of these, and then extrapolate and explore.

Not to nag, but have you thought about having good professional profile shots taken? It’s tremendously important. Proper profile photos, where you look thoughtful and as though you have something to say, make you look competent and experienced.

I’ve come across a few writers who don’t want to share their story due to plagiarism concerns. No agent, or editor, or publisher is going to steal your idea – don’t worry! It’s way too much hard work.

The idea for a blog on passive voice came to me while listening to Joanna Penn’s podcast with editor Kristen Tate. On Joanna’s podcast the discussion centred around how human editors will always be needed and why.

Is there a writing ride that isn’t punctuated with uncertainty and insecurity? I don’t think so. But in this Art of Writing Blog, Carrie Cox, former Art of Writing attendee and now Author, tells us how she stared down disheartened doubt and won.