LAURENCE MACNAUGHTON

  • As a writing coach, it’s my job to help people get a little perspective on their story problems.  Recently, a client asked me to help him out with his first novel.  He’d gotten halfway through and stalled out.  I put…

  • Q:  Hi, I’m trying to write a novel about two people who meet by accident and then discover that they share an element of their two dark pasts.  I have a few general story ideas, but nothing concrete.  I know…

  • What is copyright? Want to protect your work against copyright infringement without convincing literary agents and publishers that you’re a complete amateur? (Or worse, a paranoid loon?)  Here are a few simple points to remember. Basically, copyright protects the embodiment…

  • Got writing questions?  Get answers! Q:  I have this singular, compelling image that keeps getting stuck in my mind, and it has inspired me to write my novel.  But it’s just one scene, really.  Is there any way I can…

  • Learn how to write a novel the right way. Wait, don’t tell me, let me guess — you, dear reader, want to learn how to write a novel!  (Well, the fact that you’re on a web site called “You Can…

  • Can the E-Myth show you how to write a novel? In The E-Myth Revisited, bestselling author Michael Gerber doesn’t breathe one word about how to write a novel.  But the priceless wisdom in these pages might change how you think…

  • Preditors & Editors Have you been approached by a literary agent who wants to charge you a reading fee, has pointed you to a private “commercializing” service or seems just a little bit TOO slick to be a good catch? …

  • Got writing questions?  Get answers! Q:  I have a writing question.  Actually, a rewrite question.  What do you do when you’re so sick of your novel that you just want to tear it into shreds?  I’m trying to edit my…

  • If you live in or near Denver, you know that there is no shortage of good places to sit and read.  Take the Tattered Cover, for example, a place of legendary green carpets, creaky (yet comfortable) furniture and whimsically helpful…

  • The more you write, the better you get.  That should go without saying, but discouragement can dim our perceptions, so I’m coming right out and saying it: Every hour you spend writing makes you a better writer.  I talk a…

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…