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Are you in the process of writing a Christian book for children? Once you have decided on your protagonist’s key goal, work towards strengthening everything that takes them there (one conflict after another), and avoiding/removing anything that doesn’t serve to move

I have been working my way through a pile of unsolicited manuscripts over the last week or so. Some have a lot of potential! However, many have one major flaw; the lack of “showing” and lots of “telling”. It’s a shame, because stories where readers are simply

Christmas is a great time to people watch, and get some tips for when you are creating characters for your novel. This Christmas, if you are meeting with family and friends, take a few moments to observe tell-tale signs that

If you write novels for 8-14s, do you need to include quotes from Shakespeare plays, make a passing reference to the Spanish Inquisition, and have your protagonist quote Scripture? We all use passing references to people, places and events we are familiar with

I think I may have mentioned something like this before in a writing tip, but it’s worth mentioning again as it’s a common problem I see in unsolicited manuscripts: when writing for this age group (8-14s) you need to start

Wordiness is one of the most common problems I see in unsolicited manuscripts – there are many ways of tightening up a story and improving the pace; here are 3 of them. Cut out unnecessary polite conversation in dialogue. Too much

Want to look professional? Presentation of your manuscript is important, whether you are approaching an agent, a publisher, or entering a competition. Here are some guidelines: Spacing: Use double line spacing throughout. Font: Times New Roman 12 point might seem

You may have a brilliantly written, exciting novel, but if the beginning is a bit dull, you risk losing your readers before they get to the good bit. This is particularly true for children, who rarely persevere with a book

Five things we need to know about our characters before starting to write: Whoever we are writing for, we need to have characters that our readers identify with. The better we know our characters, the better we can share them