These last few weeks I’ve been going over the revision process, layer by layer, beginning with foundational elements like ensuring your main character’s desire is clear on the page and that there’s a clear narrative drive. Now, finally, we can look at those finer details like stylistic choices and dialogue.

Dialogue in fiction isn't like dialogue in real life. In fiction, it serves a crucial function in revealing our characters more fully through their own words and moving the plot forward. Additionally, we want our dialogue to sound natural and interesting and believable. Easy, right?

Last week I admitted that, in the past, I've tinkered with copyedits in my own work way before I needed to. The revision process is like building a layer cake and copyediting is the icing, if not the cake topper. There's a whole bunch of other good stuff to tackle first.

One big mistake that I made when revising my own work was to tackle copyedits first. There's something so satisfying about fiddling with sentences, rearranging them, swapping words, refining dialogue, smoothing out the errors. But you know what? All those perfect sentences don't matter if the story needs major structural work.

In the months leading up to my layoff last spring, I experienced a crisis of values. Let's call it a mid-life awakening. I realized that I hadn't prioritized the things that mattered to me--not to the extent I wanted to, anyway.

You’ve polished your manuscript, found a great agent, and sold your book to a publisher. Now you get to sit back and watch your book fly off the shelf, right? Very likely not.

I was watching this interview with author Brit Bennett last week, preparing for my Book Club for Writers meeting next week, when she said something that made me sit up: A story becomes much more interesting when you tell readers things versus holding them back.

I didn’t feel great about the conclusion I came to last week on what constitutes success in writing. It’s not that I disagree with myself; I just found my conclusion rather pat. Something was missing.

I used to have a picture in my mind of what writing success was, and it looked like nothing less than a fairytale.

Our goal for the Book Club for Writers is to read and discuss books through the lens of narrative form, and our meeting last night did not disappoint!