In January 2020, Robert Lee Brewer, senior editor at Writer’s Digest, posted 25 Ways to Start a Story.  I know what you’re thinking. Wow. Starting Chapter 1 is sooo hard.  Yeah, but it’s waaay easier if you know Ernest Hemingway’s trick: utter honesty.  “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the…

Sasha Marie Stone posted Five Ways to Find Time for Blogging on WordPress.com at https://wordpress.com/go/content-blogging/five-ways-to-find-time-for-blogging/ I’ve revised her tips for those who want to write a novel.  1. Did you actually write Chapter 1?  Congrats. If you’re feeling like a writer, you should.  Stone suggests scheduling writing dates with yourself. I feel compelled to write every day.…

Chapter 1 is about a hero who isn’t a hero yet. Chapter 2 is about the Herald and how the hero avoids the Call to Adventure. Why does the hero avoid the Call to Adventure? Isn’t that cowardly? James Scott Bell has written novels by the dozen, plus several books on how to write a…

Fair warning: if you want to write a novel, you’ll have to commit serious time. A year or two may be the minimum, unless you’re Stephen King, who apparently writes a book every other month and fills his down time with screenplays, for God sakes.  If you finish your manuscript (it’s a book after it’s…

Steps 9-12 Step 9. THE REWARD In a 300-page book, Step 9 should occur around page 200. In a two-hour movie, the audience should be watching the last 40 minutes. In an action adventure, the hero has confronted death in Step 8, the Ordeal. In Step 9, the hero takes possession of the treasure.  In…

Steps 1-4 The 12 steps of the Hero’s Journey help writers to plot a novel or a screenplay, but they can be used for memoirs or non-fiction.  The Hero’s Journey idea comes from Dr. Joseph Campbell, a Sarah Lawrence College professor who examined the myths told by tribes from the Greeks to the Norse to…

Steps 5-8 Step 5. CROSSING THE THRESHOLD Until stage 5, the protagonist isn’t a hero, and he isn’t on a hero’s journey yet. Step 5 in the hero’s journey begins around the end of Act One or the beginning of Act Two. This is a turning point because it’s the point of no return for…