LAURENCE MACNAUGHTON

  • England, 1914 . . . LORD GRANTHAM: Something seems a bit off with the new footman, wouldn’t you say, my dear? ZOMBIE: RRRGH! AARR! LADY GRANTHAM: My word. Mr. Bates, look out! ZOMBIE: MMRAAH! MR. BATES: Perfectly all right, thank…

  • Want to make your opinion heard? Want a free ebook? If you’re interested in reviewing The Spider Thief on Amazon.com or Goodreads — and getting free review copies — just send me a link to your book review site, or to any…

  • I’m super-excited to announce my new book, The Spider Thief: Omnibus, a collection of the first four Spider Thief novellas. To celebrate, I’m giving away copies to four lucky subscribers! No purchase necessary — just sign up for my newsletter. Bonus: this special…

  • The fine folks over at FreshFiction.com invited me to do a guest post about The Spider Thief series, and I’m happy to oblige! –L. Pop quiz: Do authors really imagine complex characters from the ground up, with mysterious backstories and…

  • Getting overwhelmed at the prospect of starting (or finishing) your novel? Feeling the pressure of hundreds of blank pages staring at you, waiting to be filled? No sweat. Planning out a story is like building a wall: You just do…

  • All of his life, Ash has been haunted by the ancient curse that killed his parents . . . Ash is a Robin Hood-style con artist who rips off the worst kind of crooks and uses the money to help…

  • My new book is here — The Spider Thief, Part 1: Stolen Memory — and it releases today exclusively on Amazon.com. The Spider Thief is a series of four interlinked novellas, and you can read them alone or all in a…

  • It takes a lot to make a guy like me blush. In celebration of World Book Day and Read an E-Book Week, the ever-awesome Booktrack.com has named me a Booktrack Star. Aw, shucks.

  • I recently discovered, much to my dismay, that I had eaten Satan for dinner. This is a true story. Allow me to explain. In the midst of a snowstorm, my wife and I decided to try a new restaurant. We…

  • Sun Tzu ruined my life. Don’t get me wrong, “The Art of War” contains some gems of insight for anyone engaged in a difficult struggle, like running a business. (Or fighting a war with chariots and spears.) But the problem…

From the blog

  • Want to Get Published? Read This.

    I’ve talked to dozens of best-selling authors about their early years, before they were published. And the similarities between them are striking. On average, they wrote about half a dozen unpublished manuscripts before they sold a novel. (By the way, this is what I call the Myth of the First Novel. Because it’s hardly ever…

  • Compelling Character Arcs in 4 Easy Steps

    I’ll let you in on a secret: readers want your character to change. They know, deep down, that your character is unhappy with the status quo at the beginning of your book. Something is terribly wrong in your character’s life, and things can’t keep going on this way. Something’s got to give. Readers fervently hope…