By Kathy Parish Let us remember this Valentine’s Day the greatest love story of all, the romance of God’s love for us and the gift of his Son, Jesus Christ, as He woos us to relationship with Himself. It’s Valentine’s Day, the annual (commercialized) celebration of love and affection. Traditional gifts, tokens to express one’s devotion, include flowers (in particular, …
Making It Real with Deeper POV
by Gail Gaymer Martin I have learned that deep POV brings a story to life. Deep POV is the pure viewpoint of the character in a scene. First person is more personal and provides the deepest form of POV possible. Yet authors create the feeling of deep POV by avoiding phrases such as I believe and I think and even …
Change Your Motive, Change the World …and the industry
by J.A. Marx If you’ve been around ACFW for any length of time, you’ve heard the one question every agent and editor asks: “Who’s your audience?” The tighter we narrow down the audience for our story, the happier we make the marketing department. But at what point in writing a new book do we start thinking about our readers? God …
Novel Preparation 101
By DiAnn Mills We writers have habits, some quirky, that help us get started on new writing projects. Today I’d like to share with you how I organize my thoughts and preparations before writing chapter one, line one of a new novel. I’m mostly an organic/pantster writer, but some things I have to know before I begin. Idea. Oh, these …
Your Character’s Voice
by Sarah Sundin (@sarahsundin) I’m a California girl. I’m ashamed to admit I use the word like as filler on a regular basis. My young-adult children use vocabulary not even known in the rest of the country. If I were to write all my novels in my natural voice, I’d be very limited in geography and era. When we speak …
When Your Readers Bother and Bless You
by Elizabeth Musser I just returned from a book signing event where I was invited to speak to a church book club. Because I posted the event on Facebook, other readers who weren’t a part of the book club also attended. I spoke about my most recent novel, The Long Highway Home. The novel is based on true stories of …
Do the Angels Cheer for Underdogs?
by Kathy Harris Please allow me to interrupt the post I’d originally planned for today to journey into the land of “what if.” After all, we’re an organization of “what if” writers, and it’s imagination that inspires our stories. I recently interviewed Chris Fabry for my personal blog, and reading about Chris’ new book Under a Cloudless Sky reminded me …
When Is It Too Late?
By Cynthia Herron Today I wanted to approach the elephant in the room. Because success is often a popular topic at writer’s meetings and conferences, obviously, it’s something that’s near and dear to our hearts. While most of us have varying opinions of what success looks like, we can probably agree on one thing. We wish we had more time. …
Time Waits for No Writer
By Christa MacDonald I’ve been thinking a lot about ‘time’ in the last few weeks. It seems to speed up after Thanksgiving. There aren’t enough hours in the day or dates on the calendar before Christmas. The end of the year looms ever closer and there’s always too much to do and too little time in which to do it. …
“This is the Way; Walk in it”
By Michelle Shocklee A new year is upon us. I imagine most of us have hopes and dreams for 2018. Perhaps you’d like more book contracts (wouldn’t we all!), more book sales, or maybe you want to finish that first novel. Do you make resolutions? I’m not one to resolve to diet or exercise (mainly because of past failures to …