Writerly Advice

A writer’s voice is like a fingerprint—unique. Develop your voice exuberantly, unabashedly, joyfully.

The stars and the moon don’t have to align to write. Write. Writer’s block is a myth.

Read like an omnivore eats—everything.

And write about dirt: the dirt, your dirt, our dirt. Clean dirt, dirty dirt, the dirt that roots us, buries us. No more blue/grey/cloudy/cloudless/vast skies. Dirt. Where our feet are. Where we live. That dirt.                                                                                                                                                                          Antoinette Bekker                                                          

When you're drafting, resist the urge to edit. Keep writing. It was liberating when the wisdom of Hemingway, "The first draft of anything is shit," finally seeped into my brain. I motored forward and didn't panic over finding the right words; that comes later, during an edit phase.

Brian Rendell

Become as lost and absorbed by your story as you want your readers to be. If you escape into it, so will they.

Lisa Baker  (MA)

Pour yourself a coffee or tea, grab your favourite snack (chocolate), and then sit your butt on the chair and write; first one word, then two. Soon, you'll have a paragraph, a page, a novel.

Tamara Kramer

Develop writing as a visual art. When you sit down to write your morning pages or to dive right into the next scene of your novel...every now and then take ten minutes and draw whatever is in your line of vision. Don't worry about drawing it well...it's only the back of a chair, the empty milk carton on the counter. A fork. The tree outside...Now power up your laptop, open your notebook, and write.

Heidi Grogan (MA)

Nobody loves to procrastinate quite like a writer. Stop thinking about writing. Stop wondering how it needs to sound, or how people will react. Just let it be the way it needs to be. Let it exist, all the different parts of you, as you write. Only when it's out and understood, as its own standalone creation, can you decide what needs to be done to change things. 

Michelle Calfa

Let the dog out—no leash. She will return with an unexpected offering. The dog is metaphorical, of course. Or, plant a seed—what do you need to know? Then go work in your garden. Don't think about your writing. Or dance. Or, do yoga. Walk on the beach, play with a toddler. You get the idea.

Sheila Firth