On Writing

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    Your single biggest challenge writing novels

    ByJohn Brown

    I’m about to put together a brand-new novel writing boot camp, but before I do that I want to know what would be most helpful to YOU.

    So if you want to write novels, my question to you is this…

    When it comes to writing novels, what’s YOUR single biggest challenge, frustration, or concern?

    Please CLICK THE LINK to tell me.

    Click here.

    As a thank you, those that answer the question will get a seat at a virtual, 1-hour training session I’m putting on where you discover 3 key principles of keeping your readers hooked.

    I look forward to the insights.

    You’re awesome ?

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    The Little Secret that Propels So Many Blockbuster Plots

    ByJohn Brown

    I was invited to present a master class at the 2022 StoryMakers conference in Provo, Utah.

    We all want to develop plots that delight readers. Maybe we have ideas for the characters. Maybe we have ideas for the setting. Maybe we even have a couple of scenes.

    But a novel needs 40, 50, 60 or more scenes.

    How do you figure out what happens next, and do it in a way readers love?

    There’s one tool that can help.

    Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and The Da Vinci Code all had it. So did Star Wars, Raider of the Lost Ark (1, 2, and 3), Taken, James Bond, The Wheel of Time, and thousands of other stories, TV episodes, and films.

    It’s what I call the wanted object, sometimes known as the MacGuffin.

    A good MacGuffin will not only make your plotting easier, it can also inject a wow factor into your story that readers love.

    In this session, the writers learned what a MacGuffin really is and how you can use it to propel the plot and keep readers turning the page.

    Here’s a PDF of the presentation.

    2022 john brown – the secret that propels so many blockbuster plots2

    And here’s the PDF of the handout.

    2022 john brown – the secret that propels so many blockbuster plots handout

    Enjoy!

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    30 books you should read before you die

    ByJohn Brown

    An avid reader friend of mine began reading through the books in a list called “100 books you must read before you die.”

    She got to Jack Kerouac’s On The Road and went to Facebook and posted the following: “I don’t get the appeal. It’s about a group of boys/men who are irresponsible, drunks, whoring around taking advantage of others and being enabled by their women. Why is this a classic and why should I have wasted my time on it? Can some of my literary friends explain? I hated a brave new world and the handmaid’s tale too.”

    Is the book a classic?

    Should she read it before she dies?

    Is it really that important?

    Let me share an edited version of my response and then provide my list of 30 books you should read before you die.

    *

    Annette, the unfortunate truth is that these lists of “classics” are a sham because there is no objective criteria for determining literary excellence.

    Or maybe I should say that measuring quality in the arts isn’t like measuring the unambiguous, objective score of a baseball game. After books exhibit a certain level of proficiency, it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish the quality of one book from another, especially because much of this depends on a reader’s interests and subjective experience of the story.

    When it becomes hard to rank performances, people rely on other measures. One of the most powerful is social networks.

    So if two readers find two different books that blow them away, one of the books might get all the attention because the one book gets picked up by a news service (The New York Times) or a platform (the Oprah Book Club effect) or some other social network of influence. A lot of the so-called literary classics only appear on various lists because they tapped into the academic network, which kept them alive far longer than they would have lasted otherwise.

    On The Road is simply a book that made a stir among some circles in the 1950s. That’s it.

    Was it more important or of higher quality than Exodus? The Chronicles of Narnia? Lord of the Rings? A Town Like Alice? All published in the 1950s as well.

    It depends.

    If you’re wanting to understand the 1950s beat culture, it would be an important book.

    But if you’re wanting to understand fantasy writing of the time, it wouldn’t.

    If you’re wanting to read a book that’s had a huge impact on popular culture, well, LOTR beats On The Road like a dog.

    Some people have the feeling that the so-called classics have some inherent medicinal value because someone put them on a list and called them classics.

    Nope. They’re just stories. Some of which can shed light on the issues and interests of a part of the culture in a given period. But if you’re not interested in that specific sub-culture, who cares?

    And if you’re reading to be entertained, moved, uplifted, or educated—which ones do that best for Annette is for you to decide.

    So all that to say I wouldn’t devalue your reaction to the book ?

    *

    I’m now going to give you my list.

    But it’s not going to be a list of titles. Nor will it focus on a book’s impact on some sub-culture of a given period.

    It’s going to be a real list. One that focuses on what so many of us go to stories for.

    1. The one that makes you weep.
    2. The one that makes you giggle and snort.
    3. The one that reminds you of what it’s like to fall in love.
    4. The one that gives you hope.
    5. The one that you begin to read more and more slowly because you don’t want it to end.
    6. The one that scares the soup out of you.
    7. The one that you can’t put down, even though you need to wake up early in the morning.
    8. The one that makes you wish you lived there.
    9. The one that’s so good that when you close it, you immediately start to read it a second time.
    10. The one that gives you and your child hours of pleasure together.
    11. The one that gives you a sacred, spiritual experience.
    12. The one that makes you reread some of the lines because the turns of phrase are just so delicious.
    13. The one that gives you courage.
    14. The one that takes you on an awesome adventure.
    15. The one that makes you want to be a better person.
    16. The one that bores you to tears (just so know you how good the others are).
    17. The one that introduces you to a different culture that delights you.
    18. The one that makes you think.
    19. The one that lingers with you for days.
    20. The one that gives you lovely insights.
    21. The one that inspires you to love your spouse more.
    22. The one that introduces you to the sorts of people you normally don’t like and makes you actually like them.
    23. The one that delights you with its characters.
    24. The one that whisks you away to a different historical period.
    25. The one that inspires you to give your children a hug.
    26. The one that gets your adrenaline pumping.
    27. The one that sparks all sorts of ideas in your head.
    28. The one that makes you wonder and start imagining what it would be like to be there.
    29. The one that blows your freaking mind.
    30. The one that makes you stand up in your living room and cheer.

    We could do more than 30, couldn’t we?

    Like the one that makes you think people from a different time period are just like us. And the one that makes you think people from that same period are completely alien.

    But I think we’ll stop. That there above is a list.

    Those are 30 books I think everyone will want to read before they die.

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    Become A Story Idea Machine

    ByJohn Brown

    Now’s your chance

    Apply to take the next Novel Writers Academy course: How to Create Story Ideas That Beg To Be Written.

    • Six-weeks
    • Starts: Jan 2, 2022
    • Ends: Feb 21, 2022
    • Gobs of hands on practice
    • One-on-one guidance from me

    At the end of the six weeks you will be a story idea machine.

    I will be working with only a small set of people. And so you need to apply to get in.

    The deadline for applications is midnight, December 11th. So contact me now to get the application instructions.

    Get Application Instructions Now!


    A cracking good story idea requires five critical elements.

    Until you have all five, you’ll struggle to plot. You’ll write a few scenes and run out of gas. You’ll feel like the story just isn’t going anywhere.

    And that’s because it isn’t. It can’t. A story isn’t a story without all five elements.

    However, once you develop these five things, your story will suddenly roar to life. There are a few other elements that are important as well, but these five things form the core of the story setup. 

    In this course you’re not going to merely learn about all of those story elements. You’re going to go deep and learn what can only be learned by actually doing the work and developing story idea after story idea with personal one-on-one feedback from someone who knows what they’re doing.   

    When you finish, you won’t just know story theory. You will be a story idea machine. And you will be that because you have put in the work. The right work.  

    Again, this is not a course full of lectures and videos. This is a course where you’re going to work. And develop the insights and skills that only come from doing the work.

    You’re actually going to:

    • Come up with story setup after story setup after story setup
    • And improve them with one-on-one feedback. 

    It’s going to:

    • Eliminate years of you wandering about in the story wilderness trying to figure things out on your own. 
    • Put you miles ahead of other writers who have no idea what’s really at the core of story. 

    You are going to learn how to develop killer story ideas on purpose instead of on accident. Which means you’ll be able to do again and again. Reliably. Like clockwork. 

    Course details

    The focus of the class is not on learning about story, although you will do that. The majority of your time will be spent on developing stories. 

    You can’t become a carpenter by watching videos and reading books about it.

    You have to get out on the work site, cut wood, and pound nails. You have to make the mistakes all beginning carpenters make, get feedback, and improve.

    The same goes for writing.

    And you’re going to work in this class. You develop 21 story setups. In fact, you develop more because the 21 are just the ones you turn into me. And with each one your skills, insights, and abilities grow.  

    In the beginning, your setups will be bare bones. By the end, they’ll be fully developed setups that beg to be written. Setups you can use to immediately write the first draft  of your novel, whether that’s in outline or chapter form. 

    Here’s what you do each week. 

    Week 1.

    • Uncover the secrets of what’s really at the heart of story and how to generate ideas. 
    • Define your genre requirements
    • Create story setups 1-3

    Week 2.

    • Uncover the secrets to compelling characters 
    • Create character sketches
    • Create story setups 4-7 

    Week 3.

    • Uncover the secrets to formidable obstacles
    • Create story setups 8-11 

    Week 4.

    • Uncover the secrets to interesting casts
    • Create story setups 12-15

    Week 5.

    • Uncover the secrets to managing multiple storylines and series
    • Create story setups 16-19 

    Week 6.

    • Create story setups 20-21. These are your capstone projects where you apply everything you’ve learned and take it to the next level

    In this class you develop story idea after story idea after story idea. You are going to be marinated in the work of developing characters, THOMs, goals, obstacles, settings, casts, and more. And because of that, each week will not only bring an explosion of insights, but new skills and abilities.

    Every week you get two private, one-on-one, live sessions with me where you get encouragement and feedback on what you’ve developed. And you’ll have access to a private Facebook group where you can apply the principles to brainstorm even MORE ideas for each other’s stories. 

    At first you might feel a bit shy and worried about your ideas and abilities. But you’ll soon get over that. By the end of the course you’ll be one of those people that can generate terrific ideas easily. And you’ll be able to do that because you will have put in the work to become a different writer.  

    What’s the price?

    Hours of one-on-one instruction from a professional editor or author costs thousands of dollars. An MFA program can cost $25,000 to $30,000 or more!

    But this course won’t cost anywhere close to that.

    Plus you’re going to learn things here you’ll never get in an MFA program (I know. I was accepted into a top-ranked program).

    The cost of this course is $799. And I personally guarantee your results. You’ll be totally oh-my-gosh-I’m-so-happy-I-took-that-class satisfied, or I’ll give you your money back. No questions asked.

    Now’s your chance to stop spinning your wheels. I can’t tell you how much I wish I’d had something like this when I’d started:

    • The secrets about the true core of story.
    • The secrets about how to come up with ideas. 
    • Actual work with personal one-on-one feedback. 
    • Laser focused on what actually matters, not a bunch of ridiculous writing rules. 

    When you finish, you will be a story idea machine. 

    You won’t know plotting. That’s a different course and set of skills. You won’t know how to write chapters. But you’ll know how to create the engine that powers all the rest of that. You’ll know how to create the core that makes awesome plots and chapters possible. 

    If you want to take this course, click the button below and contact me. I will tell you exactly how to apply.

    I’m not going to be able to accept everyone who wants to take the class. I have a very strict limit on the number of students I can work with. So you need to get your application in before the deadline of midnight, December 11th.

    Don’t wait!

    Contact me now to get application instructions.

    Get Application Instructions Now!