I Reread and Critiqued My Old Self-Published Novel!

I recently reread my old, 2019 self-published novel, A Silence in the Shadows. And I thought it'd be a fun idea to roast it in a blog post! 😂 Now don't get me wrong, self-publishing this novel was such an awesome experience, especially for a 14-year-old kid who'd dreamed of holding his own novel in …

3 Ways to Shorten Your Novel

When I was eleven, I sat down at our family computer armed with nothing but an empty document in front of me and not a single outlined sentence to be seen, determined to begin (and eventually complete) my very first full-length, 50,000+ word novel. And I did it! The finished first draft was officially 50,026 …

My 18th Birthday + 10 Years of Writing!

I don't know the exact day I picked up the pen for the first time and wrote my first story. However, I can strongly remember that when I was eight years old I read both The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and The Chronicles of Narnia series, and also wrote one of my most memorable …

The One Thing Your Characters are Missing

It can be hard to pinpoint the most difficult piece of writing. From descriptions, to editing, to world-building, to dialogue, to good prose in general, everyone has their own struggles and different pieces of writing they need to improve on. I certainly have quite a few! However, I think it's safe for me to say …

Cringing at My Old Writing!

Well hello there! Glad to see you here. I was randomly brainstorming some blog post ideas one day and this one popped into my head. I thought it would be entertaining if I dug up a few ancient stories in my labyrinth of LibreOffice Word Documents and see if I can't cringe at some old …

Can’t Stay Motivated With Your Writing Project? Try This!

Running out of motivation halfway through a novel, short story, or any writing project is extremely common! I've seen many ambitious young writers start a novel, stoked to write and motivated to draft the entire thing. Then, partway through, all of that drive seems to die away and get lost in the dull words and …

3 Awesome Books I Read in 2021

I read quite a few books in 2021. Admittedly, the majority of them were rereads of some of my favorite books. I'm a sucker for rereading great stories! However, I did get around to reading quite a few new novels I'd never read, and there were some in particular that I thoroughly enjoyed! Today I …

New Year’s Day: Looking Backward and Forward

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Well! Would you look at that! 2022 has already arrived! I'm honestly quite shocked! Time moves so quickly these days, it's stunning! So much has happened in the last year, and I'm so glad I was able to do several of the things I set out to do last year around this …

4 Years of Blogging!

4 years. Whoa. It's pretty crazy when I look back on it--four years of writing blog posts, interacting with readers, growing and improving in my writing. It's been a wild ride, and I wouldn't go back and erase it for the world! It has been so much fun, and so beneficial to my writing journey …

Snippets from Novelette: The Hunter’s Son

Hello hello, everyone!! I hope you're all having a delightfully exquisite day! As some of you may know from my last newsletter (follow my email list to receive that if you are not yet following!!) I wrote a short fantasy adventure novelette in early August just for fun and to stretch my writing muscles. Well …