Setting is one of the key ingredients to creating a novel that readers can immerse themselves in. Without settings, your characters would be aimlessly wandering around on blank pages talking to each other. The reader wouldn’t be able to experience the world the characters were in; they’d be more or less locked out. Avoid…
As a writer you’ve probably been told at one point or another to use active voice and avoid passive voice—perhaps it was even a teacher’s comment added at the end of a high school essay. If you’re anything like I was before I studied grammar, you probably scratched your head and thought what the heck…
Some people may try and tell you that creating characters for your novel is as easy as selecting an age, gender, hair colour, and goal. But it’s not that simple. If you want your characters to compel readers to care about them enough to read your entire novel, then you have to do a lot…
You’ve woken up, eaten breakfast, and have sat down in front of your laptop. You open the file titled Best Selling Novel and push open the door in your mind that grants you access to the fictional world you’ve spent the past few months creating. You poise your fingers above your laptop’s keyboard, ready to glimpse what happens…
Let me guess, you’ve just finished writing your novel after spending the past year pouring your soul into it—writing it, then editing it again, and again, and again. You think it’s perfect, an absolute masterpiece that will be hailed alongside the works of Agatha Christie and J.K. Rowling. There’s nothing left to do now but…
So, you’ve woken up after dreaming about a dragon who convinces a witch to transform them into a human, and you think wow, what a great idea for a novel. You leap out of bed and dart towards your laptop, eager to put the story forming in your head onto paper. But you need to STOP…
Facing Demons author Marion Brownlie is interviewed on River Radio. She talks about her book and what inspired her to write this amazing autobiography. Beating the odds, she was near suicide then turned her life around – she had work to do! It still was not easy, and there were many things she had to…
Have you thought about publishing a book? Do you know how to go about it? Are you thinking ‘Do I use a publisher or publish it myself’? There are many questions to consider when undertaking the journey of becoming an author. … What do I want to achieve with my book? … How do I…
Title – The Faceless Man Author – Isaac Oosterloo Publisher – Aurora House Publishing Whether it’s leaning hard into a sharp corner in the east coast hinterland rain forest, or the endless lonely desert miles across the top end, Isaac Oosterloo puts the reader in the saddle as you join him and his best mate,…
Chapter 27 excerpt Talon turned once more and flew directly at Pete and Zed, without Matica telling him where to fly or what to do. It was all Talon’s doing. He was the one mocking the poachers and teasing them. He had a lot of fun doing that. Matica was a bit hesitant – what…
