Writing With One Hand Waving Free

The essential elements of a marketable novel author Janice MacDonald teaches in her writing course are:

Hook
Sense of place
Interesting characters
Compelling dialogue (she’s English)
Strong storyline (one with a logical pattern)
Appropriate pacing
Distinctive voice
Particular point of view
Slowly revealed secret or answer (the presentation of information)

Ms. MacDonald refers to these as the “Furnishings.” She’s speaking of the traditional novel or [...]

The plan was to spend January completing the first draft of a memoir and then going back to work on the NaNoWriMo novel revisions. That was the plan.
I did, however, get to work tangentially on writing. A friend asked me to be a beta reader on the first draft of her first novel. She’s published [...]

I only got a couple of hundred words today because I’m desperately working on writing some training materials for a presentation on Monday. I’m taking a bit of extra effort on the materials because I hope to recycle them on my web site and with other clients, but it’s proving an enormous time and energy [...]

Tonight at 12:01 a.m. NaNoWriMo starts and the clock starts running. I’m doing the NaNoWriMo to force me to complete a novel. I’ve started many and bogged down in the middle which led to eventual abandonment. This time I’m determined to make it through the first draft. Okay, I’m keeping this short because I’ve got [...]