Writing Quote by Michael Moorcock: Fiction Writing Techniques

"Introduce your main characters and themes in the first third of your novel. If you are writing a plot-driven genre novel make sure all your major themes/plot elements are introduced in the first third, which you can call the introduction. Develop your themes and characters in your second third, the development. Resolve your themes, mysteries and so on in the final third, the resolution."

 
 — Michael Moorcock

(born 18 December 1939)

Michael John Moorcock is an English writer and musician, primarily of science fiction and fantasy, who has also published literary novels. He is best known for his novels about the character Elric of Melniboné, a seminal influence on the field of fantasy since the 1960s and '70s. Wikipedia

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ProWritingAid's Crime Writer’s Week Free Online Workshop

ProWritingAid is running their first ever Crime Writer's Week from April 19-23. All participants will be able to take part in a range of events to help them write an unforgettable thriller.

ProWritingAid's Crime Writer’s Week is a series of events all geared towards crime writers. Whether you're crafting a police procedural, a whodunnit, or a good old-fashioned mystery, you'll learn how to keep readers turning pages.

FREE!!!

Crime Week Full Schedule

Scroll down for more detail about each event.

Monday, April 19

The Elements of a Crime Novel: From Planning to Plot (12 PM ET / 5 PM UK)

Presented by: Leigh Russell, Bestselling Author

Every genre requires a unique approach, and crime writing is no different. In this session, internationally bestselling crime author Leigh Russell will take you through the key elements of the crime writing process.

Crime Writing: Secrets of the Genre (2 PM ET / 7 PM UK)

Presented by: Anne Hawley and Rachelle Ramirez Pages & Platforms

Do you have an idea for a mystery, heist, or puzzle story but don’t yet know how to structure it? Got some bad deeds, clues, and some scenes that don’t really work together or entertain? Want to introduce moments of heightened danger and plot twists into your writing? You’re in the right place. In this webinar, you’ll learn the crime story essentials so that you can create intrigue for your readers and have them recommending your story to others.

Interview with Vaseem Khan (4 PM ET / 9 PM UK)


Interviewed by Hayley Milliman, Head of Education at ProWritingAid

Vaseem Khan is the award-winning author of two crime series set in India, the Baby Ganesh Agency series, and the Malabar House historical crime novels. His first book, The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra, was a Times bestseller, now translated into 15 languages, and introduced Inspector Chopra of the Mumbai police and his sidekick, a one-year-old baby elephant. Khan works at University College London’s Jill Dando Institute of Security and Crime Science.

Monday's Networking Event: Speed Dating (5 PM ET / 10 PM UK)


Join us on Monday night to meet your fellow Crime Writer's Week participants! You'll get to match with other participants for five minutes.

Tuesday, April 20

Crime Scene Management, Police Interviewing and Covert Tactics (12 PM ET / 5 PM UK)

Presented by: Graham Bartlett, Police Advisor

Retired detective, bestselling author and advisor to over eighty crime novelists and TV writers, Graham Bartlett will help your WIP ooze authenticy. Learn how police use mobile phones, vehicles, CCTV, and social media in their investigations, as well as authentic police interview techniques (avoiding the good cop/bad cop trope) that are used by police today. Getting police tactics right is essential if you want to write a realistic and sizzling crime novel.

Insider Advice on Getting Published (2 PM ET / 7 PM UK)

Presented by: Katherine Armstrong, Deputy Publishing Director, Crime & Thriller Fiction, at Simon & Schuster

The session is intended to demystify the publishing process for writers, give advice on how to get published and answer any questions you might have about traditional publishing.
How to Edit Your Crime Novel With ProWritingAid (4 PM ET / 9 PM UK)

Presented by: Hayley Milliman, Head of Education at ProWritingAid

It doesn’t matter how many hours you spent meticulously crafting your crime novel’s plot. If your writing isn’t clear and effective, your readers won’t engage with it. That’s where editing technology can help. In this workshop, we’ll dive into how to use ProWritingAid to make key edits to your crime manuscript.

Tuesday Night's Networking Event: Online Escape Rooms (5 PM ET / 10 PM UK)


Play detective and solve the clues in our virtual escape room. Will your team make it out?

Wednesday, April 21

The History & the Mystery: Selecting and Creating an Authentic Setting for Crime Fiction (10 AM ET / 3 PM UK)

Presented by: Fiona Veitch Smith

Fiona Veitch Smith is the author of the Poppy Denby Investigates novels, Golden Age-style murder mysteries set in the 1920s (Lion Fiction). Fiona will give tips on how to research and build an historical fictional world and the importance of selecting the right investigator within the constraints and possibilities of the period.

Thriller Writer Panel Discussion (12 PM ET / 5 PM UK)

Presented International Thriller Writers (ITW)

Award-winning author Alexia Gordon will be joined by four of her fellow International Thriller Writer's Association members for a lively discussion around the joys and pains of writing thrillers. Expect great tips and life lessons from these popular writers as they discuss their writing journeys so far.

Moderated by Alexia Gordon

Panelists: Steve Berry, Lisa Gardner, Jennifer Hillier, Ian Rankin, Karin Slaughter
Common Police Mistakes Made by Crime Writers and How to Avoid Them (2 PM ET / 7 PM UK)

Presented by: Graham Bartlett, Police Advisor

Graham will be back again to share the most common errors that authors get wrong in their crime novels. Who really runs a homicide investigation? When does a missing person report become a murder enquiry? Find out the answers to these and many more bloopers that could spoil your next bestseller.
Wednesday's Networking Event: Crime Fiction Trivia (5 PM ET / 10 PM UK)

Join us to play pub trivia: crime author edition in small groups in breakout rooms.

Thursday, April 22

Author Interview: Nadine Matheson (9 AM ET / 2 PM UK)


Nadine Matheson has always been passionate about writing and storytelling. She was born and lives in London and is a Criminal Solicitor. In 2016, she won the City University Crime Writing Competition and completed the Creative Writing (Crime/Thriller Novels) MA at City University of London with Distinction in 2018.

Her crime novel, The Jigsaw Man, was published by HQ earlier this year.

Debut Dagger Awards Long List Announcement (11 AM ET / 4 PM UK)

Presented by: The Crime Writers' Association

For over two decades the CWA has been encouraging new writing with its Debut Dagger competition for unpublished writers. The submissions are judged by a panel of top crime editors and agents.

How to Market Your Self-Published Crime Novel (12 PM ET / 5 PM UK)

Presented by: Nick Stephenson, Crime Author and Founder of Your First 10k Readers

Marketing your book comes down to mastering three key things: traffic, conversions, and scaling up. With the right systems in place for these three things, you can grow your readership and sales without spending your entire day 'worrying about marketing'. Join USA Today Bestselling author Nick Stephenson as he breaks down some real-world results using examples from his Crime/Thriller series (and others too) and shows you how to find your first 10,000 readers by implementing these three core strategies.

Interview with Fiona Cummins (2 PM ET / 7 PM UK)

Interviewed by: Lisa Lepki, CMO at ProWritingAid

Fiona Cummins is the award-winning author of Rattle, The Collector and The Neighbour. Her work has received widespread critical acclaim from authors including Ian Rankin, Val McDermid and Lee Child. We’ll be chatting to her about breaking into the world of crime writing, and what it’s like to see her fourth book, When I Was Ten, being adapted for television.

Writing During Hard Times (4 PM ET / 9 PM UK)

Presenter: Michael La Ronn, Author and Founder of Author Level Up

Find out how to thrive as a writer no matter what life throws your way. Life happens. When it does, will you be able to keep writing and publishing books? Writing in Hard Times will help writers stay productive, using the basic principles of disaster planning to help them survive hard times such as: recessions, pandemics, injuries, illness, natural disasters, and much more.

Thursday's Networking Event: Collaborative Writing (5 PM ET / 10 PM UK)

Join us as we create a short crime story in round robin small groups.

Friday, April 23

Get access to the final day of Crime Writer’s Week with your ProWritingAid Premium license. We’ll be hosting an interview with bestselling author Peter James, an editing deep dive, and a Q+A with a police adviser. Don't miss out!
The Three Stages of Editing Your Crime Manuscript (9 AM ET/ 2 PM UK)

Presented by: Hayley Milliman, ProWritingAid's Head of Education

As nice as it would be, writing your crime novel isn’t over when you type "The End." In fact, the actual work is just beginning. During the editing process, your novel will go from rough first draft to thrilling final manuscript. In this workshop, Hayley will walk you through the most important edits you should make to your manuscript to ensure it’s publish-ready.

Interview with Peter James (11 AM ET / 4 PM UK)

Interviewed by: Lisa Lepki, CMO at ProWritingAid

Peter James has become synonymous with plot-twisting page-turners, and has won over 40 awards for his work and achieved 17 Sunday Times Bestsellers to date. Learn from the master what it takes to write gripping crime novels that keep readers hooked.

Police Advisor Q&A (1 PM ET / 6 PM UK)

Presented by: Graham Bartlett, Police Advisor

This is your chance to bring YOUR questions about police work and crime scene investigations to Graham Bartlett, retired detective, best selling author and advisor to over eighty crime novelists (including Peter James).
Meet Fellow Crime Writers at Networking Events

We will also be hosting daily networking sessions with fun activities all based around your love of crime fiction.

Monday Night: Speed Dating

Join us on Monday night to meet your fellow Crime Writer's Week participants! You'll get to match with other participants for five minutes.

Tuesday Night: Online Escape Rooms

Play detective and solve the clues in our virtual escape room. Will your team make it out?

Wednesday Night: Crime Fiction Trivia

Join us to play pub trivia: crime author edition in small groups in breakout rooms.

Thursday Night: Collaborative Writing

Join us as we create a short crime story in round robin small groups.

Writing Quote by David Morrell: Writers Need to be Tough

Writers need to be tough. This is not for the weak of will. And we have to realize that, yeah, it's never good enough. It's not like fixing a car where it's precise and we know what the end result will be definitively.

 

 ~ David Morrell 

(born April 24, 1943) 

 David Morrell is a Canadian-American novelist, best known for his debut 1972 novel First Blood, later adapted as the 1982 film of the same name, which went on to spawn the successful Rambo franchise starring Sylvester Stallone. He has written 28 novels, and his work has been translated into 30 languages. Wikipedia

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Writing Quote by David Morrell: When Writing be Yourself

When I teach writing, I have a mantra: 'Be a first-rate version of yourself, and not a second-rate version of another writer.'

 

 ~ David Morrell 

(born April 24, 1943) 

 David Morrell is a Canadian-American novelist, best known for his debut 1972 novel First Blood, later adapted as the 1982 film of the same name, which went on to spawn the successful Rambo franchise starring Sylvester Stallone. He has written 28 novels, and his work has been translated into 30 languages. Wikipedia

Buy David Morrell Books at Amazon

Writing Quote by Nathan Leslie: Writing Quality Flash Fiction

To write quality flash fiction one needs to actually embrace the concept of the vignette, to loosen one’s bond to the “tightly” plotted story concept… Every word bears weight. Thus, lyrical writing tends to work well in this form. 

 –Nathan Leslie 

 
That “V” Word, quoted from The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction (p 10).

Contents

• In defense of the exercise : You and the piano bench / Pamela Painter
• Contemporary and historical roots of flash fiction : That "v" word / Nathan Leslie
• Old wine in new bottles? Flash fiction from contemporary China / Shouhua Qi
• The myth-ing link (or, linking up to myth) / Pamelyn Casto
• Flash fiction from embryo to (very short) adult / Tom Hazuka
• Finding freedom and feeling in the form : "Cheers," (or) how I taught myself to write / Jayne Anne Phillips
• Great thoughts / Stuart Dybek
• Beginnings and endings : Titled : the title : a short story story's own short short storty / Michael Martone
• Fireworks and burnt toast : the process of opening up your writing / Vanessa Gebbie
• Smart suprise in flash fiction / Jennifer Pieroni
• Making flash count / Randall Brown
• Imagery as inspiration : Forty stories in the desert / Lex Williford
• Staying true to the image / Robert Shapard
• Hanging fire : a meta-narrative on flash fiction / Stace Budzko
• Poetry versus prose : A short story theory / Robert Olen Butler
• Getting the lead out : how writing really bad poetry yields really better short stories / Steve Almond
• Flash fiction, prose poetry, and men jumping out of windows : searching for plot and finding definitions / Kim Chinquee
• Taking risks : Put yourself in danger : an examination of Diane Williams's courageous short / Deb Olin Unferth
• Flash in a pan : writing outside of time's boundaries / Sherrie Flick
• Focusing and editing : Expose yourself to flash / Mark Budman
• Plaster dust and sleeping jockeys : tapping your story for load-bearing sentences / Pia Z. Ehrhardt
• Editing and revising flash fiction : how to COAP / Rusty Barnes
• The future of flash fiction : Writing fixed-form narratives : who's going to stop you? / Bruce Holland Rogers
• A flash before the bang / Julio Ortega
• A call to action : On writing flash fiction / Ron Carlson.

Nathan Leslie’s ten books of fiction include Three Men, Root and Shoot, Sibs and Drivers, among others. He is also the author of The Tall Tale of Tommy Twice, a novel, and the poetry collection Night Sweat. Nathan’s work has appeared in hundreds of literary magazines including Boulevard, Shenandoah, North American Review, Hotel Amerika and Cimarron Review. Nathan was series editor for Best of the Web anthology 2008 and 2009 (Dzanc Books) and edited fiction for Pedestal Magazine for many years.

Recently Nathan was interviews editor at Prick of the Spindle and over the past two years he wrote a monthly music column for Atticus Review. His work appeared in Best Small Fictions 2016 and earlier this year his work was published in Flash! A flash fiction anthology published by Norton and edited by John Dufresne. Check him out on Twitter and Facebook. He is the founder and host of the monthly Reston Readings series and he teaches in Northern Virginia at Northern Virginia Community College.

Buy Nathan Leslie Books at Amazon

Writing Quote by Neil Gaiman: Main Rule of Writing

The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you're allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it's definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as best you can. I'm not sure that there are any other rules. Not ones that matter.

 ~ Neil Gaiman

(November 10, 1960)

Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, graphic novels, nonfiction, audio theatre, and films. His works include the comic book series The Sandman and novels Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, and The Graveyard Book. Wikipedia

Neil Gaiman books at Amazon

Writing Quote by Neil Gaiman: When People Tell You Something's Wrong With Your Writing

Remember: when people tell you something's wrong or doesn't work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.

 ~ Neil Gaiman

(November 10, 1960)

Neil Richard MacKinnon Gaiman is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, graphic novels, nonfiction, audio theatre, and films. His works include the comic book series The Sandman and novels Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, and The Graveyard Book. Wikipedia

Neil Gaiman books at Amazon