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Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing


Aug 4, 2022

Mark interviews S.W. Millar about his new book - How to Write Brilliant Beginnings: Crafting Your Novel’s Opening Chapters Made Easy.

Prior to the main segment, Mark shares a brief personal update, comments from recent episodes, and a word about this episode's sponsor.

You can learn more about how you can get your work distributed to retailers and library systems around the world at starkreflections.ca/Findaway.

In their conversation, Mark and Shane talk about:

  • Shane's background as an urban fantasy writer and a certified Story Editor
  • Writing his first novel back in 2010, pulling it out of a drawer in 2015 and realizing how much it was lacking, and then engaging in a long period of study to better his craft and understanding of the business
  • Wanting to write the kind of books he needed when he was first starting out and wanting to learn
  • How reading Jim Butcher's Harry Desden files novels inspired Shane to want to write similar tales
  • Realizing that he wanted to train as a writer-friendly editor with Kristina Stanley from Fictionary
  • The importance of having a degree of distance when you are taking in feedback from editors or readers
  • Shane's preference for the type of fiction he prefers to edit: Urban fantasy, Thrillers, and Science-Fictio
  • How to Write Brilliant Beginnings, Shane's new book, and why it is such an important element to help with sales
  • The invisible/subtle question that you set up so that, in the reader's mind, they are compelled to keep reading to find the answer to it
  • Why it is equally compelling to end your chapters, particularly the first two or three chapters, which as much of a hook as possible
  • That "just one more principal"
  • The idea of a character "going about their current 'flawed' existence"
  • How everything a character sees and experiences is filtered through their wound and scar
  • Giving your main character something very unique to them as an identifier
  • The five top things that you should give your character for them to be three dimensional and compelling to readers
  • The value of opening the novel with some type of conflict or action beat
  • When ending chapters or cutting scenes, the element of cutting it off BEFORE the resolution that can compel the reader to keep reading
  • The way that old television programs, such as Batman that always cut to a commercial break with a hook that would make the audience want to keep watching to find out how it was resolved
  • That "know, like, and trust" thing which can be so important when engaging in social media
  • The importance of open-ended questions that can lead to engagement and detailed answers
  • Shane's books: How to Write Brilliant Beginnings, How to Plot Your Novel and How to Write Novels Fast
  • And more...

After the interview, Mark reflects on distance and objectivity as well as that end of chapter "cut to commercial" hook.

Links of Interest:

 


The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0