Your knowledge hub for mastering story craft, staying ahead of publishing industry trends, and getting your story into the hands of readers. Each article offers writing strategies and advice you can consume in just a few minutes and apply to your projects to see results. Â
Explore your earning potential as a writer, break the myth of the underpaid writer, and discover what you can do to earn more doing what you love.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
When starting or advancing your career in professional writing, knowing your earning potential is an important step in charting your path. While the old stereotype of the "penniless writer" persists, the reality is far more promising—there are plenty of lucrative and fulfilling opportunities for turning your writing passion into a career.
My advice: Don't be swayed by hearsay or well-meaning advice suggesting that writing doesn’t pay. Instead, rely on solid,...
Explore eight stories with emotional resonance, cultural and historical significance, and timeless lessons for every generation.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
Reading tear jerkers offers a unique kind of catharsis, a deep emotional release that we often need but may not get during the course of everyday life. Tear jerkers take us on carefully crafted emotional journeys, as we follow characters through their struggles and triumphs. They help us process our own emotions and contemplate more deeply what it means to be human.
Beyond the emotional release and life lessons, tear jerkers help us connect with others. In seeing the world through the eyes of fictional characters, we learn to feel empathy and compassion, not only for people who exist only on paper, but also for each other.
Discover an empowering process for requesting writing feedback, receiving it with grace, and implementing it to unlock your full writing potential.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
Requesting writing feedback is unique opportunity to gather diverse responses to your work-in-progress, find out what inspires people, and discover opportunities to develop your work further. A good critique partner, editor, or book coach can help you peer into your blind spots and uncover the hidden potential in your writing.
There's no thrill quite like finding out what someone has to say about your writing. To navigate this moment with ease, you have to be vulnerable and humble, adopt a growth mindset, and remain open to both praise and constructive suggestions.
Hear from a member of my writing community, the Author Exchange: "Receiving feedback about...
Discover the qualities of a good critique letter and explore an example to elevate your critique process.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
A critique letter is a type of writing feedback you compose to help a writer improve a piece of creative, professional, or academic writing. Critique letters are used by many people in the writing world, including developmental editors, literary agents, book coaches, critique partners, and beta readers to communicate writing advice.
Their unique format is part of what makes them particularly useful. Unlike delivering verbal feedback or marking up a manuscript with comments, writing a critique letter means you can deliver a polished, structured message to a fellow writer about their work's strengths and opportunities for improvement.
Explore writing feedback examples from real writers and get inspired for your next critique.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
Exchanging feedback with other writers offers you a valuable opportunity to improve your work and support others in their writing process. Gathering a range of opinions provides insight into how readers might respond to your work and helps you make informed decisions about how to revise. Crafting useful feedback on others' work raises your own awareness of craft and strengthens your relationships in the writing world.
In conjunction with my article, "How to Give Writing Feedback Authors Crave," I've put together four writing feedback examples to help you recognize what good feedback looks and sounds like. With permission...
Explore the craft of giving writing feedback and how this process can elevate your writing and the work of others.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
Writing feedback is the art and craft of reviewing a written work-in-progress (WIP) to identify what works and what doesn't and then delivering your impressions in a way that helps the author improve their work. As we'll explore in more detail, writing feedback can take the form of verbal or written commentary addressing a WIP's strengths and areas for improvement. For example, when reviewing a piece of creative writing, such as a novel or short story, you might praise the author's compelling cast of characters, while alerting the author to plot points that need development.
Critique vs...
Discover a simple process for outlining a novel, explore popular outlining tools, and get additional outlining tips to use throughout your writing journey.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
CONTENTS:
An outline is a document that describes and organizes all the components of a writing project. For writing a novel, an outline would show the framework of the plot and the events in chronological order.
The main purpose of a novel outline is to streamline the work you do to write a book-length story. In the early stages of the process, an outline can help orient you to the storyline. Who are the characters and what is their predicament? Later in the process, you can use an outline to refine and tighten the plot. Where do you see opportunities to add or delete scenes, improve the pacing, or put characters in more dynamic situations?
As we'll explore...
Is writing a novel outline for you? Review the purpose and benefits of an outline, as well as common challenges and frustrations writers experience, to decide.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
In going about the process of writing a novel, you come to a point when it's time to consider creating an outline. How do you write one? Should you create one? Do you need one? Will it actually help? How far can you get without one?
The answers to these questions aren't always straightforward. We all take different approaches to writing a novel. We all think differently. And we all draw upon different gifts and abilities to tell stories. For example:
Launch your writing career with these 7 steps and get answers to the top questions aspiring writers are asking about their career prospects.
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
Contents:
Professional writing is a diverse and competitive field, with many opportunities to make a living doing what you love. There are many paths you could take. Some people start in another career and then transition into writing, while others train for a writing career from the start and then upgrade their skills, job titles, and income over time.
For more background on what it means to write professionally, including essential skills, industry trends, and career paths, read my article, "Your 2024 Quick Guide to Professional Writing."
Let's explore the main steps for launching a writing...
Get your start in professional writing or advance your writing career with this 2025 quick guide!
By Julie Tyler Ruiz
Contents:
What is professional writing?
What are the genres of professional writing?
What is a professional writer?
What sets professional writers apart?
Writing professionally: what to know in 2025
Professional writing refers to any type of writing that you compose in the professional world to earn a living. As we'll explore in more depth below, professional writing encompasses a broad range of content for academic, business, and creative purposes.
To be effective, a piece of professional writing should do the following:
Professional writing comes in many forms. In...
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