The Creative Writer's Toolbelt discussion

Hi all,

I have news!

The Creative Writer’s Toolbelt is relaunching on Friday 3rd September.

To catch all the new episodes you can subscribe to the podcast here:

https://the-creative-writers-toolbelt...

After a hiatus of about 18 months I am restarting the podcast. The core mission of the podcast won't be changing. Like you, I love writing and The Creative Writer’s Toolbelt will continue in its purpose of helping you and me to become better writers and produce great work.

To do this I’ll be working to identify the best advice for the writing life, as well as craft tips and insights, and techniques to help us navigate our way around the ever more complex world of creating, publishing, and distributing our work. I’ll be joined by guests who I think are interesting and have something to say that’s worth listening to.

One thing I need to tell you is that I have changed my podcast hosting platform, so the people who host the podcast files for me. It will still be available in all the usual places: Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music Overcast and the like, but via Castos so if you like the Creative Writer’s Toolbelt, check your subscription to make sure you’re still getting new episodes.

Subscribe via your favourite provider from this page:

https://the-creative-writers-toolbelt...

You’ll know you’re in the right place if you start to see episodes 162 onwards.

So what can you expect to hear on the Creative Writer’s Toolbelt in the coming months?

Well, we are going to start with a short series, three podcasts, where I speak to some determined and courageous authors about the writer’s life. How do you keep faith in your work? How do you practice good disciplines as a writer? How do you hold on to the truth that your voice matters? And how do you manage the relationships and responsibilities around you and still find the time and energy to write?

After this, we’re going to revisit the subject of story. We’re going to look at the structure of stories, and we’ll try to work out what a great story looks like. Now I love looking at this topic, and the theories of story fascinate me, but as ever we’ll try to keep it grounded in good practice, so we will look at the theories but we’ll always tie it back to practical examples. We’re going to find out how stories really work, and we’re going to get to grips with the ancient truth that we humans keep telling each other the same kinds of stories, and have done so for hundreds and thousands of years. I’ll be joined by a number of experts some of whom are writers and some will be from very different backgrounds that may surprise you, but they’ll all have something important and interesting to say.

After that, I want to revisit character and characterisation. We’ll look at what I think are the fundamental elements of a successful character, managing your cast, and hearing from different people on the subject of creating and presenting great characters, and once again I hope that we’ll be able to look at the challenge of writing the other.

Beyond that we’re going to have some series that look at genres, writing formats, the process of editing, and the big decision that confronts nearly every writer – do you try to be published traditionally or as an independent author, and if I go the indie route what are the options – spoiler alert there are quite a few of them and quite a lot to think about, but don’t let that put you off.

All this will be coming your way in the next months. The first of these new episodes, my conversation with the author and teacher Sarah Moorhead, is coming soon as episode 162.

I am delighted to be launching the podcast and I look forward to you accompanying me as we explore more aspects of the craft and the writers life. Please do subscribe and look out for new episodes, thank you, Andy.

Great to hear you're starting the podcast again!

Paul wrote: "Great to hear you're starting the podcast again!"

Thanks Paul, I hope you find it useful. Best wishes, Andy