Most humans try to avoid conflict as much as possible, but novelists love conflict. Without conflict, a novelist has no story. Conflict keeps your novel moving forward and your readers turning pages. As Vladimir Nabokov once said, "The writer's job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them."But how do you get your protagonist up a tree? What kind of rocks should you throw?In this week's episode, I interview professional fictional rock-thrower...

Writing Conflict: How to Keep Your Protagonist on Their Toes

The Christian Publishing Show is a podcast to help Christian authors change the world. We talk about how to improve in the craft of writing, how to get published, and how to market effectively. Get expert advice from industry insiders. Hosted by Thomas Umstattd Jr.

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If you've ever transcribed a conversation between two people, you know the resulting text is a bunch of incomprehensible, run-on sentences and fragments. Natural conversation does not translate well onto the written page.When we write novels, we need to realize that good, written dialogue does not imitate the way real people talk. We also don't want our written dialogue to sound contrived and awkward.How do you write good dialogue?In this episode, Angela Hunt teaches usHow to handle dialects ...

How to write dialogue

You’re probably tired of hearing that you need a large platform to be a successful author.Some industry professionals believe having a large platform is equivalent to having a large social media following.If you’ve been listening to the Christian Publishing Show or Novel Marketing, you know that having a social media following doesn’t necessarily mean you have a platform. Nor does it mean you’ll sell more books than someone not on social media.In fact, sometimes people sell more books by spen...

Platform Overrated?

When authors attend writers conferences, they often have big expectations but make common mistakes that squash their goals and diminish the return on their investment in the conference.In this episode, you’ll learn11 common mistakes authors often make and how to avoid themHow to avoid missing opportunitiesThe right time to attend your first conferenceListen in or read the blog version to find out how to make the most of your first (or next) writers conference.Support the Show.

Mistakes to Avoid at Your First Writers Conference

The stories we ingest shape the morality we develop, but only to a point.If a story’s morality strays from reality or gets too twisted, the story fails to resonate with readers. Moral confusion is why movies and TV shows are less entertaining than they used to be.But what is morality?Why is it so important for good stories?How do you put a message into your book without being preachy?In this month’s episode, you’ll learn:Why you must carefully consider your own moral system before writing a s...

Writing Conflict: How to Keep Your Protagonist on Their Toes

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