Riley Adams's Blog

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethspanncraig.com

It’s tempting to look at the books doing well in your genre and try to write something like them. But what makes readers remember your work usually isn’t how neatly you fit the mold, but the quirky details and angles that only you would have thought to stick in there.

The Things Only You Notice

Everyone sees the world through their own filter, and yours doesn’t match anyone else’s. Maybe you’re fascinated by how people organize their kitchen cabinets, or you notice the wildly different ways people react to a surprise thunderstorm. Maybe you have firm opinions about the correct way to load a dishwasher, or you’ve always wondered why some people talk to their houseplants. Those oddly specific observations that feel completely normal to you are exactly the kind of thing that sets your writing apart from everyone else’s.

Your Real Interests Come Through Anyway

What you’re genuinely curious about always reads more authentically than what you think you’re supposed to write about. If you’re endlessly interested in small-town politics, that shows up in a cozy mystery as real energy. If you keep gravitating toward stories about people starting over in midlife, that pull tends to make better characters than chasing whichever demographic seems more marketable this year. Your enthusiasm lands on the page whether you meant it to or not.

Where You’ve Been Is Material

Your job, hobbies, family, and everything you’ve lived through hand you insider knowledge other writers don’t have. A nurse writes a hospital scene differently than someone who’s only visited one. Someone who grew up in a military family knows things about that life that others would miss. A person who’s moved a dozen times sees community dynamics differently than someone who’s stayed put. None of that is a limitation. Instead, it’s the stuff that lets you write familiar territory with real detail.

What Makes You Different Is the Point

Maybe you have an unusual hobby, an interesting cultural background, or you’ve lived somewhere most people only pass through. Maybe you’ve got opinions about coffee, know more local history than is strictly reasonable, or understand the daily logistics of a blended family. These parts of you seep into the writing on their own, and they’re what make characters and situations feel fresh. . . because they’re coming from your specific reality instead of generic research.

Knowing the Market Without Copying It

Understanding what’s selling helps you make informed calls; it just shouldn’t make every call for you. Reading widely in your category shows you what readers expect, but that’s a foundation, not a template. Most genre readers want something that feels familiar and surprising at the same time. Your perspective laid over the usual conventions is what hits that sweet spot where a reader feels at home but not bored.

The writers who stand out aren’t the ones running the formula flawlessly. They’re the ones who bring something unmistakably theirs to familiar ground—the kind of thing that makes a reader think, “I never would’ve looked at it that way, but yes, exactly.”

What’s one quirky thing about your perspective that turns up in your writing whether you plan it or not?

Your quirky perspective is what sets your writing apart from others in your genre. Don't hide your weird—embrace it:
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The post Your Weird Is Your Superpower appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

LitLinks are fed into the Writer’s Knowledge Base search engine (developed by writer and software engineer Mike Fleming) which has over 70,000 free articles on writing related topics. It’s the search engine for writers. While you’re there, check out the Writer’s Digest award-winning Hiveword novel organizer.

Have you visited the WKB lately?  Check out the new redesign where you can browse by category, and sign up for free writing articles, on topics you choose, delivered to your email inbox!  Sign up for the Hiveword newsletter here. Follow the WKB on Facebook here.

The Top Writing Links From Last Week Are On LitLinks:
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The post LitLinks appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethspanncraig.com

Sometimes I reach for the obvious emotions first: happiness, sadness, anger, fear. But the moments that stick with me as a reader are usually the subtler ones like embarrassment, nostalgia, or the quiet satisfaction of something finally going right.

The Small Stuff Is Surprisingly Relatable

Some of the most recognizable moments come from minor emotional experiences, like the flash of irritation when someone interrupts you mid-thought. Or the awkwardness of running into an ex in the cereal aisle. Or maybe the satisfaction of finally finishing something you’d been avoiding for weeks. These land because readers have felt them recently, not in some dramatic once-in-a-lifetime way. They also give the bigger moments something to push against, so the emotional range of a story feels varied instead of flat.

People Rarely Feel Just One Thing

Real emotions are tangled, especially around big events. A character might be proud and terrified at once when she takes a new job. Someone could feel relieved and guilty in the same breath after ending a difficult relationship. Visiting a childhood home might bring on nostalgia and low-grade annoyance simultaneously. Those combinations add a depth that single, tidy emotions can’t reach, and readers recognize them because they’ve felt those contradictory pulls themselves.

What the Body Gives Away

Physical details let readers identify a feeling without anybody having to name it. Embarrassment shows up as heat in the cheeks and the urge to disappear. Anticipation makes it hard to sit still. Contentment might settle into loose shoulders and slower breathing. These cues let readers feel the emotion alongside the character instead of just being told about it.

Emotions That Change What Happens Next

The emotions that matter most tend to drive behavior rather than just tint it. A character who’s overwhelmed makes an impulsive decision she regrets by chapter twelve. Maybe someone flooded with gratitude goes out of his way for a stranger. A homesick character could start cooking food she hasn’t made in years. Once feelings create consequences, they’re woven into the story rather than sitting on top of it as atmosphere.

Everyone Expresses It Differently

How a character shows emotion depends on who they are and where they came from. Some people cry when frustrated, some go quiet, some turn sharply sarcastic. A character raised in a family that avoided conflict may have no idea how to be angry out loud. Someone who values restraint might convey something enormous through a very small gesture. Those differences are what make an emotional moment feel like it belongs to that particular person.

Readers don’t just want to follow the plot; they want to feel something on the way through.

What unexpected emotion have you discovered while writing a character?

Readers connect with subtle emotions like embarrassment, nostalgia, and quiet satisfaction—the feelings that fill real life:
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The post Beyond Happy and Sad: Using a Full Emotional Range appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

LitLinks are fed into the Writer’s Knowledge Base search engine (developed by writer and software engineer Mike Fleming) which has over 70,000 free articles on writing related topics. It’s the search engine for writers. While you’re there, check out the Writer’s Digest award-winning Hiveword novel organizer.

Have you visited the WKB lately?  Check out the new redesign where you can browse by category, and sign up for free writing articles, on topics you choose, delivered to your email inbox!  Sign up for the Hiveword newsletter here. Follow the WKB on Facebook here.

The Top Writing Links From Last Week Are On LitLinks:
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The post LitLinks appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethspanncraig.com

When other writers post daily word counts or announce book deals, it’s easy to feel like you’re falling behind some invisible timeline. But there’s no universal schedule for writing success.

Real Life Is a Real Constraint

Maybe you’re caring for aging parents, managing a demanding day job, or raising kids who need you. Maybe it’s health issues, financial stress, or any of the countless things that make up an ordinary complicated life. These aren’t excuses for not writing enough; they’re the actual conditions you’re writing under. Squeezing in pages between work meetings doesn’t make anyone less of a writer. It makes them someone who writes despite having a full life.

Starting From Where You Actually Are

It helps me to forget where I think I should be and just look at where I am. Instead of setting ambitious goals to make up for lost time, something manageable tends to work better. One paragraph today. Opening the document and rereading the last page. It’s better to meet small goals than to ignore your real circumstances.

Goals That Fit the Schedule You Have

If twenty minutes twice a week is what’s realistic, a daily writing goal is just setting yourself up to feel bad. During a really busy season, the goal might simply be thinking about your characters during your commute. Goals that actually fit your life can help build your momentum. Goals that ignore your constraints build guilt, because you can’t meet them.

Nobody Posts the Droughts

Social media shows us highlights, not the whole picture. The author posting daily word counts probably isn’t mentioning last month’s three-week dry spell. The writer celebrating a book deal likely won’t post about the years of rejections, or the family support that made the schedule possible.

Progress Counts, Whatever the Pace

Maybe this year you finished a short story while caring for a sick family member. Or you finally cracked your protagonist’s motivation during stolen lunch breaks. Maybe you wrote three chapters through a job transition, or finished a first draft across two years of weekend mornings. Progress is progress, and it doesn’t need to be measured against someone else’s timeline.

The goal isn’t to catch up. It’s to keep moving from wherever you’re standing today, at whatever pace your life allows.

What small writing steps are you taking?

Set goals that fit your reality, not some imaginary timeline. Progress is progress:
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The post You’re Not Behind—You’re Right Where You Are appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

LitLinks are fed into the Writer’s Knowledge Base search engine (developed by writer and software engineer Mike Fleming) which has over 70,000 free articles on writing related topics. It’s the search engine for writers. While you’re there, check out the Writer’s Digest award-winning Hiveword novel organizer.

Have you visited the WKB lately?  Check out the new redesign where you can browse by category, and sign up for free writing articles, on topics you choose, delivered to your email inbox!  Sign up for the Hiveword newsletter here. Follow the WKB on Facebook here.

The Top Writing Links From Last Week Are On LitLinks:
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The post LitLinks appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethspanncraig.com

When I’m deep in a manuscript, every word feels precious. That closeness is what makes the writing possible in the first place, but it’s also what makes editing so hard. Learning to step back and look at my own work like a stranger has turned out to be one of the most useful skills I’ve picked up.

Change How You See It

Encountering your writing in a new form can make it feel unfamiliar enough to see clearly. I’ll print chapters out and read them on paper, or use text-to-speech to hear how the dialogue and pacing actually land. Switching the font or formatting the manuscript like a finished book works too. These little tricks nudge your brain into treating the text as something new, and suddenly the repeated phrases and clunky transitions that were invisible on screen start jumping out.

Read for the Reader, Not Yourself

Knowing why a character does something doesn’t mean that reason actually made it onto the page. I try to ask what a reader would really take from a scene, not what I meant them to take. It’s easy to assume people will connect dots that only exist in my head. When a twist depends on something I never actually wrote down, readers end up confused rather than delighted.

Let Beta Readers Be Your Mirror

Other people catch what I can’t, because I’ve unconsciously filled in every gap myself. Beta readers spot plot holes, notice when a character suddenly acts out of character, and flag the scenes that drag or feel rushed. The ones who usually help most are readers who know your genre and will be honest rather than just encouraging. Their reactions show you where the story’s working and where it still needs you.

Make Every Scene Earn Its Spot

Attachment is what keeps us holding onto scenes that helped us as writers but don’t do much for the reader. I might love a conversation because it helped me understand a character, but if it doesn’t move the plot or reveal something that matters, it may need to go.

Stepping back this way feels cold next to the warmth of drafting, but it’s how good ideas turn into stories readers can actually sink into.

What helps you see your own work more objectively?

Time, format changes, and beta readers help you edit like a reader, not just a writer:
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The post Stepping Back From Your Own Work appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

LitLinks are fed into the Writer’s Knowledge Base search engine (developed by writer and software engineer Mike Fleming) which has over 70,000 free articles on writing related topics. It’s the search engine for writers. While you’re there, check out the Writer’s Digest award-winning Hiveword novel organizer.

Have you visited the WKB lately?  Check out the new redesign where you can browse by category, and sign up for free writing articles, on topics you choose, delivered to your email inbox!  Sign up for the Hiveword newsletter here. Follow the WKB on Facebook here.

The Top Writing Links From Last Week Are On LitLinks:
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The post LitLinks appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethspanncraig.com

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethspanncraig.com

When a task feels overwhelming, my first instinct is usually to avoid it. The only problem is that avoiding it tends to make it loom even larger. What helps me isn’t tackling everything at once, but showing up in small, doable ways, day after day.

Why Big Projects Feel So Scary

Projects feel impossible when we picture doing them all in one sitting. Writing a novel sounds overwhelming if you imagine producing 60,000 words in an afternoon. Decluttering a house feels hopeless if you picture losing a whole weekend to it. But that’s not really how anything gets done. Most finished projects are just a lot of small actions stacked up over time. When the goal becomes 200 words a day, or one tidied corner each morning, the whole thing starts to feel approachable.

The Quiet Power of Consistency

Showing up daily builds a kind of momentum that occasional bursts never quite match. Even on a day when you only manage fifteen minutes of writing, you’re keeping the project alive in your head. There’s also something about repetition that trains your brain to expect the activity. After a few weeks of daily sessions, sitting down with the laptop stops feeling like a battle of willpower and starts feeling automatic. You also have these daily wins, which makes you feel more positive about writing and your part in it.

Catching Things Before They Pile Up

A lot of overwhelm comes from letting small things accumulate. One load of laundry is no big deal; three weeks of it is a mountain. A few hundred words a day feels natural, but trying to write 10,000 after ignoring the manuscript for two months feels brutal. Keeping up a little at a time tends to stop small tasks from snowballing into something really awful.

On the Hard Days, Aim Low

Some days, the most you can do is the smallest thing that still counts—one sentence, one folded shirt, one page of research. It might feel pointless, but those tiny efforts do two things. They keep your daily streak going, and they often nudge you into doing more than you planned. Once you’ve started, momentum has a way of carrying you further. And on the days it doesn’t, you’ve still moved forward, which counts for something.

Today’s Scene, Not the Whole Book

What I like about daily chunks is that they pull my attention away from the size of the finished thing and onto the small action right in front of me. Instead of worrying whether the novel is good enough to publish, I just focus on getting today’s scene right. The goal was never speed or perfection; it’s steady progress that adds up, minus the burnout that comes from sporadic, heroic efforts.

What’s one overwhelming task you could chip away at with just fifteen minutes a day?

Feeling overwhelmed by big projects? The secret isn't doing everything at once—it's showing up with small, consistent efforts every single day:
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The post Conquering Overwhelming Tasks One Day at a Time appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

LitLinks are fed into the Writer’s Knowledge Base search engine (developed by writer and software engineer Mike Fleming) which has over 70,000 free articles on writing related topics. It’s the search engine for writers. While you’re there, check out the Writer’s Digest award-winning Hiveword novel organizer.

Have you visited the WKB lately?  Check out the new redesign where you can browse by category, and sign up for free writing articles, on topics you choose, delivered to your email inbox!  Sign up for the Hiveword newsletter here. Follow the WKB on Facebook here.

The Top Writing Links From Last Week Are On LitLinks:
Share on X

The post LitLinks appeared first on Elizabeth Spann Craig.