Tips for Young Writers 3: Let your characters think and speak for themselves.

This may sound strange, but if you're stuck while writing a story, try talking to your characters. Ask them what they would do next. Let them live. When they start answering you back, you’ll know one of two things – either they’ve truly come to life in your imagination, or it’s time to see a doctor!

Tips for Young Writers 2: Raise questions in the reader’s mind.

Readers love wondering ‘What’s going to happen next?’ or ‘How are they going to get out of this?’ or sometimes even, ‘What is this all about?’

Try starting your story with something that’s a bit hard to understand, like for example, ‘Joe clearly saw his best friend Justin steal his moneybox, which was particularly weird because Joe had been completely blind from birth.’ This sentence raises questions in the reader's mind which encourages them to keep reading.

Tips for Young Writers 1: Make your hero suffer.

This is the first of twenty or so tips for young writers I'll add to this blog over the next couple of months. Hope you like them. Hope they help your writing. Feel free to comment if you like. So, tip one is ...

Make your hero suffer.

There’s nothing a reader likes more than seeing a likable person suffer really badly in all kinds of terrible ways ... then triumph. We love to see how people find their way through big difficulties, so make the hero of your story suffer.