K.M. Allan's Blog: K.M. Allan, page 6

Writing A Book: When To Dump An Internal Question

If your book makes use of internal questions, then you already know one secret to creating a character that’s fleshed-out instead of one-dimensional.

But, like all good things, it can be overdone and there is a point when internal questions are more of an interruption than an interesting writing trick. To avoid such a scenario in your book, try the following:

Writing A Book: When To Dump An Internal Question

Internal questions are great at letting the reader know what a character is thinking, their mood, and how they’ve reached a conclusion or made a specific decision. When it needs to be dumped is usually when…

There’s Too Many In A Row

Jenny stared at the back of Carla’s empty seat. Late as usual. What excuse will she use this time? Did her alarm fail? Did her car not start? Did she have nothing to wear? Clothes too dirty, or not trendy enough. Perhaps she fell down the stairs rushing out the door. Or she lost track of time getting ready. Did her lipstick shade clash with her eyeshadow? Did her mascara run out? Was she at the store spending money she didn’t have just so she could fit in with the people who didn’t notice Carla was even late today?

While Jenny might think these things, and it’s a good way to show she’s concerned about her friend and what she thinks about Carla trying to keep up with other social circles, there are just too many internal questions at once.

Jenny stared at the back of Carla’s empty seat. Late as usual. What excuse will she use this time? Failed alarm? Nothing to wear? A last-minute shopping spree for mascara she couldn’t afford to fit in with the people who didn’t notice Carla was even late today?

By slashing the questions, and sticking to the ones that highlight the info you’re trying to establish about Carla’s character and Jenny’s attitude, you’ve made great use of internal questions, but haven’t overwhelmed your reader, who may not make it through an entire paragraph of questions like in the first example.

Someone once told me a good rule of thumb for when your chapter needs internal questions is to add no more than three to a page. It’s a great guideline to use, and when you combine it with a good edit that only keeps the questions needed to make your point, you’ll know which internal questions to dump.

It’s Doing The Work Of The Reader

Even if your book isn’t the type of story where the reader is required to solve clues or a murder, internal questions are an effective tool for creating mystery.

Readers want something to solve and to reach conclusions on their own. They’ll do that by piecing together the right clues, and if you’ve foreshadowed and asked the right internal question at the right time, your readers will reach the conclusion you want, and they’ll be happy to do it.

If, instead, you have a character internally monologuing the question and then the exact answer right after, you’re robbing the reader of this experience. Allow them to play detective and remove any answered internal questions that do all the work for them.

It’s Repeating The Same Info

If an internal question repeats what’s already shown in the dialogue or the character’s actions, it can safely be dumped.

Remember, if the reader can conclude what’s happening from everything else going on, you don’t need to hit them over the head with repeated internal question after repeated internal question after repeated internal question after repeated internal question (it’s annoying, right? ).

It’s Diluting Impact

A character asking one important internal question at the right time, like when they’ve just discovered a devastating secret, is worth more weight than if the two pages preceding the reveal were littered with related internal questions.

The right-placed question can invest a reader in your characters and plot. The wrong kind, or too many, will exasperate them instead.

Look at the questions leading up to “the moment” and only keep one, ensuring it counts the most so that you’re not diluting its impact.

It’s Padding

When drafting or trying to hit a specific word count, throwing an internal question into your paragraphs keeps things moving and contributes to your number of words.

You may have needed it to clarify where your characters were going or what was happening next. It should have been edited out in draft three. It should have been cut during the final-final-this-time-you-mean-it draft. That was the draft that hit your exact word count, however, so it stayed. The internal question is padding. You know it. The reader will know it too. If it doesn’t move the plot or character forward—press delete.

When you do, you’ll have a story that features intriguing internal questions, not ones that dilute meaning, repeat story elements, steal conclusions from eager readers, and is the tenth one in as many sentences.

Give readers a reason to follow your characters, not roll their eyes every time another internal question pops up, and dump what doesn’t work to ensure you’re using internal questions to their best advantage!

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, and Threads. You can also sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

April 2024 Roundup

Welcome to the April 2024 roundup!

Another quick month down in what has been a fast start to the year. As usual, I’ve been working hard but also feeling like I’m not getting enough done (please tell me I’m not the only one who feels like this?). I’m also still a little out of sorts as I’m not working on any fictional stories. Thankfully, the creative dry spell I fell into after publishing my last release has lifted and I’ve started having ideas for a story that has been in the back of my mind for a number of years. I once outlined the plot a few years back in between Blackbirch drafts, so when I am ready to work on it fully, I think I’ll be off to a good start.

In what was a good end to the month, the family and I made a quick trip to Sydney for my cousin’s wedding! As for what else I got up to, please read on…

What I’ve Been…Writing

Blogs. I’ve been working on content once again, doing research on topics and making notes so I can get ahead with posts for the next few months. This has meant the outlining I was doing on my Checklist Book hasn’t progressed, but I will be making more of an effort to get into that in May. When discussing writing at a writer catch-up this month, my friend Belinda suggested going back to one of my writing routines where I spend one week focusing on “Writing” and the other on “Authoring” (you can read about that particular routine here). I did that routine when working on my Blackbirch series, but I wasn’t doing it this year as I’m not working on anything fictional, and I think that’s why I’m not making progress. So, in May, I’ll start that routine again and see if it helps put together the blogs and the Checklist Book faster.

Watching

Fallout

Based on the video game series, Fallout starts at “The End” when a nuclear bomb goes off during a child’s birthday party. The world is retro-futuristic, with a 1950s look, but technology that includes robots and the ability to create underground vaults to house survivors. One such survivor is Ella, who we meet 200 years later on her wedding day. She’s marrying a stranger from another vault, who it turns out is a surface dweller who launches a raid. During the chaos, Ella’s father is kidnapped, and she leaves her brother to go to the surface and find their dad. There, she discovers how naive she is, and how much of the world and history has been hidden from herself and the people in her vault. Across the 8 episodes, there’s so much we learn about how the war started, the current world, how it became what it did, and other characters. It’s slick, looks stunning, and there is violence and gore, but also humor and characters to root for and dislike. There are also some good twists, secrets, and a great lead-in for the next season, which I would happily watch.

The Fall Guy

One of the best movies I’ve seen in a while, and worth seeing in the cinema for the action alone (and of course Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt). When Colt Seavers, stunt man to one of the biggest movie stars on the planet, gets hurt, he disappears for a while. Drawn back out of retirement by movie producer, Gail Meyer, he agrees to the work because it’s for the former flame he ghosted after his accident. Still carrying a torch for Jody, Cole does what he can to make sure her directorial debut is the hit it needs to be. This involves finding the lost lead, pulling off historic stunts, solving a murder, a run-in with thugs, a hilarious drug-induced sequence involving unicorns, a dog that only obeys commands in French, and so many awesome stunts. Full of action, humor, romance, great plot twists, star cameos, and a fun post-credit scene, The Fall Guy is well worth a watch.

Reading

The Ruptured Sky (Gardens of War & Wasteland #1) by Jessica A. McMinn

An exciting dark fantasy full of prophecies, a Princess in hiding who is a capable hunter, and questionable characters trying to raise an old-world Goddess. This book has it all and is beautifully written too. When a secret power Amika’s been hiding all her life is exposed, she’s made an offer to learn how to control it. Coming from a man who has his own secrets, and a family dealing with the bad decisions he’s made, Amika has to decide if she can trust him enough. When her past comes back to ruin their new plans, she also has to face the life she disappeared from and the consequences of her actions. The Ruptured Sky is a great start to a promising series and is highly recommended for fans of gritty characters, interesting worlds, monsters, and magic.

Some Shall Break by Ellie Marney

The sequel to None Shall Sleep takes place 3 months after the events of that book and sees college student Emma Lewis, and FBI trainee Travis Bell, reunite to track down a new serial killer. When it becomes obvious this new creep is targeting women who look like Emma, her past trauma is re-opened as she’s forced to deal with the aftermath of her own serial killer experience, which is once again hinted at, but never told in full (which is a shame because I’d love to read a book about that story).

Some Shall Break also includes the return of Simon (book 1’s serial killer) in what at first seems like a real stretch of logic, but does pay off later in a big way. His twin sister Kristin also takes a main role and turns into one of the real stars of the series and helps lead things to a cliffhanger ending (and thankfully the author is currently working on the third book). If you loved the first book, the second ups everything, including the slow-burn romance of Emma and Travis and the banter between Simon and Emma, to create yet another read-worthy installment.

Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell

Dr Kay Scarpetta faces off with a serial killer who is going after single women and leaving behind a mysterious glittery substance. There’s lots of medical talk, scientific talk, computer talk, and just general talking in this book. As it’s from 1994, most of the DNA science is outdated now, but that doesn’t stop the story from being interesting. I’m not completely on board with the prickly Scarpetta character yet, but Cornwell’s writing style, her red herrings, and villain reveals (which I didn’t guess until the end) kept me interested and reading, so I will be checking out more of her books in the future, and recommend this one to anyone who likes forensic thrillers.

Christopher Pike Books

Inspired by the Netflix series, The Midnight Club, I’m re-reading the books of my favorite author, Christopher Pike, and enjoying the nostalgia and reading for fun and not to review. In 2022/2023, I read Pike’s YA books. For 2024, I’m reading his Adult books.

This month I read The Cold One.

If you’ve got any good book recommendations, let me know in the comments, or be my friend on Goodreads and share your books/recommendations! You can also find and follow my reviews and book recommendations on Amazon and BookBub.

If you’d like to add the Blackbirch books to your Goodreads “Want to Read” shelf and/or check out the reviews, click the following links:

Blackbirch: The BeginningBlackbirch: The Dark HalfBlackbirch: The RitualBlackbirch: The Collector Taking Photos Of

High tea and a wedding. This month I met up with two friends, Belinda Grant and KD Kells, from the #6amAusWriters for a high tea. We last saw each other in December 2023, so this was a chance to catch up in the New Year and talk about what we were working on and what else has been happening in our lives. As always, I left with my creative and social cup filled and was inspired to keep working on my current projects. I then ended the month road-tripping to Sydney with the family for my cousin’s wedding, which was a stunning occasion.

Blackbirch Review Of The Month

This month’s 4-star review is the newest for my latest book, Blackbirch: The Collector! It’s been so awesome to see how well the final book in the series has been received since its November 2023 release, and I love hearing what readers enjoyed about the books, so please keep the reviews coming.

On The Blog

In case you missed any of my posts, or want to re-read them, here are the latest blogs.

March 2024 RoundupWriting Tricks: Coincidences – Do’s And Don’tsSwitches For A Non-Working Scene

And that’s it for this month. I hope you’ve enjoyed my April Roundup. Let me know what you got up to in the comments!

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Threads, and sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

Switches For A Non-Working Scene

Sometimes, no matter how much we’ve planned, plotted, outlined, and written, a scene just doesn’t work how we want it to.

The trouble is, said scene is important. The book needs it, and you have to get it right. For when such occasions happen, here are a few options you can try to switch the scene up, and hopefully get it to where it needs to be.

Switches For A Non-Working SceneSwitch To A Different POV

If you’re writing a book with multiple point of view characters, try writing the cumbersome scene from the perspective of a different character.

Perhaps the side character processing everything from a distance will get the scene moving better than the MC. Or maybe your female main character will bring a different feel than the male main character.

If your book only has one POV character and you’re really stuck, try writing from another POV anyway. The exercise will be for your eyes only, but it may shake loose new ideas or a fresh perspective that you can add to the original scene to get it singing.

Switch Up The Acting/Reacting

If the scene involves your MC reacting to bad news and you’re just not pulling it off in the way you intend to, how would they be acting if they were delivering the bad news instead?

Switch up what the characters are doing, such as the winning ball being thrown by a team member over the MC. How would the scene play out then? What would change, and would it get your scene working? Give it a try!

Switch Up The Helpfulness

If you have a scene where your MC needs help from the other characters, but it’s just not reading right, try having the other character be non-helpful.

If, rather than finding sympathy for a situation, your MC was brushed off by everyone, how would that change the scene or the MC’s actions? Without the help they were expecting, would your MC take matters into their own hands, and would things be better or worse? Such a change could pivot your entire plot and revive your stuck scene.

Switch Up The Opening And Closing

Sometimes the scene may work in the middle, but the opening or the closing just aren’t cutting it. Switch them up and see if the shake-up works wonders.

Switch Up The Setting

There are lots of layers to a scene, and it’s not always the characters and what’s happening that’s the missing puzzle piece.

The setting of where the scene is taking place can have a big impact, after all, a scene where the MC is being stalked becomes more important and atmospheric if they’re in a dark, empty street, as opposed to a crowded park on a sunny summer day.

If your current scene is giving you grief, switch up the setting, or give it more detail to see if that helps.

Switch Up The Stakes

What’s a new complication that you can throw into the scene to get it back on track? If it feels like nothing is happening, or the urgency just isn’t there, switch up the stakes and add more drama.

Switch Up The Players

If you’ve looked at everything else in the scene, tweaked it to your heart’s content, and perfected it, but there’s still a missing element, check the players!

See which characters can be added or removed from the scene and how that alters or enhances the events. When you combine that suggestion with all or some of the others here, it should give you enough changes to get any non-working scene working again!

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, and Threads. You can also sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

Writing Tricks: Coincidences – Do’s And Don’ts

Something new for your writing bag of tricks is coincidences (which is joincidences with a C for all you Friends fans).

While some writing advice will tell you to steer clear of using them too much or even altogether, they can be a powerful tool when done correctly. And that is where these do’s and don’ts will help you!

Writing Tricks: Coincidences – Do’s And Don’tsDon’t Use Them For Convenience

If you want to avoid your readers rolling their eyes, which I think most of us do, you’ll want to give the convenient coincidence a miss.

A convenient coincidence occurs when your MC runs into the very person they need at the right moment, or the file they need to keep their job hitting their desk seconds before the big meeting. While crossing paths with the right person, or getting the right file can happen in your story, if they happen way too easily via a convenient coincidence rather than your MC working hard to make those things a reality, you’re robbing the reader of a more interesting story.

Do Foreshadow

Is it a coincidence that your girl-scout-in-her-youth MC has been left for dead in the woods but has all the tools to survive? Sure. But you can take that coincidence and make it work by foreshadowing her history of skills before she’s left to fight for her life. When it doesn’t work is only announcing those handy skills when the MC literally uses them.

If the audience knows ahead of time that your hero has survival skills, it’s going to come across as something falling into place. That’s a better option than your reader refusing to finish the book because it became unbelievable when the woods-stranded MC knew exactly how to combine the bark of one tree with the crushed flowers of another to make a paste to starve off infection when nothing in her prior actions or backstory pointed to such knowledge.

Foreshadowing the right info earlier eliminates the kind of coincidence that will put your reader in an annoyed state of disbelief, so make the most of it.

Don’t Forget To Inject Credibility

For certain elements of your story, the MC needs to earn what they’re finding/solving/learning, and the wrong coincidences can ruin that.

Let’s say, for example, that your MC learns a vital clue via an overheard conversation where they are in the right place at the right time. Such coincidences happen, but isn’t it more credible that they find out that info through their own hard work? Don’t you think the reader would enjoy a better-earned reveal than the right info being overheard?

An even worse coincidence cliche is blind luck getting your characters in and out of every situation. Instead, inject credibility and come up with earned, layered solutions to reveal the right things rather than relying on unearned, easy coincidences.

Do Get Rid Of The Random Know-It-All

If you’re relying on the answer to the MC’s conundrum being solved by a person who enters the story via a well-placed coincidence, please don’t.

An expert in a certain field that the MC had to track down and risk their life to get to giving them the right info—yes! An MC broken down on the highway and picked up by a random trucker who dabbles in learning every topic known to man while hauling freight knows the right info—no! It’s too coincidental, too know-it-all, and not good enough.

Don’t Have Bumbling Bad Guys

Nobody can root for an MC who triumphs because bumbling bad guys make a stupid mistake, or ruin their own plans with a coincidence that doesn’t work in their favor. It isn’t a real win.

In fact, if you look at your climax and the bad guys get defeated with no real input from the MC, not only are your bad guys the worst, but the MC having no real impact on the outcome of the story is a letdown for the reader too.

The protagonist needs to defeat the antagonist—and if bumbling bad guys are creating coincidences to do the heavy lifting instead; reassess.

Do Steer Clear Of Nicks Of Time

Did the MC arrive in the nick of time to prevent the colossal explosion, even though getting from one side of the city to the other should have taken 5 hours? It’s okay, a helicopter flown by an old friend of the MC’s father who was never mentioned until the sound of helicopter blades cut through the beeping horns of the grid-locked traffic arrived—in the nick of time—to pick our hero up and get her where she needed to be!

There are better ways to use coincidences, tension, and to stop the colossal explosion, so try them first and steer clear or scale back your nick of time coincidences.

Don’t Shy Away From Plausibility

Some coincidences you need, such as the new co-worker of your MC being an old crush.

Now that they’re working together, there’s a reason for them to cross paths and reconnect. If you instead have your MC bump into their old crush at random on the street, it lacks plausibility.

While that scenario works, and is the start of multiple rom-coms, having the MC and crush reconnect at work gives more to the story. Now they can get to know each other again during shifts until the romance blooms. It’s an investment in character relationships and makes more sense for them to be in each other’s lives again instead of just a random coincidence bringing them together. By playing into the plausibility of the good coincidence of their shared history instead, you give yourself another coincidence option to mine.

Combined with the rest of the do’s and don’ts listed here, you should be able to make the most of any coincidence in your writing and add another trick to your wordsmithing arsenal.

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, and Threads. You can also sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

March 2024 Roundup

Welcome to the March 2024 roundup!

While I normally post my roundup blog on the last day of the month, for March it falls on the long weekend of Easter, so I thought I’d publish before then so I could enjoy the time off with my family.

Not too long ago, aka last year, I would have stuck to my posting schedule and worked over the long weekend, as I did with most weekends while in the midst of writing or editing. That, however, led to burnout, so I’ve been slowly changing my ways.

While that’s much easier to do without an active WIP and a deadline, I’ve found that pacing myself and having regular breaks has made me want to work on writing-related things rather than feeling like it’s a chore. Last year, I realized too late that you shouldn’t get to that point, and it put me in a weird funk for a while. Another weird funk was the constant doom-scrolling on social media. I got into this too much during the pandemic, and it was a hard habit to break.

Last November when I went on my cruise and had no Internet access for a few days, I started baby-stepping out of it, but noticed the social media overuse creeping back in. One of my 2024 New Year’s resolutions was to stay off Twitter now that it’s become even more of a cesspool, but I recently realized I was replacing my time spent there on Threads instead. Then the whole Kate-Gate saga happened where the whole of social media was overtaken by conspiracy theories about Princess Catherine. Then when she revealed her cancer diagnosis, and I saw people still trying to say her announcement video was an AI fake, I knew I was done wasting my day reading junk. Life is way too short.

Now, I’m more than happy to only go on the social media platforms I like, post my posts, check and support the accounts I love to follow, and get out of there. I’d rather be reading or writing, and I’m sorry it’s taken so long to take such an obvious revelation so seriously.

Anyway, that was my March, which I’m planning to finish off with way too many hot cross buns and chocolate. But before then, this is what I got up to…

What I’ve Been…Writing

Blogs. While I don’t have a fictional project to work on, I’m sorting out years of blog post ideas and half-written notes, as well as working out what content I’m missing from my site so I can write about the topics in the future. It’s fun, but also a slow process.

Watching

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live

Like the rest of the world, I once looked forward to every new episode of The Walking Dead. Then it got so bad I didn’t even watch the final episodes of the original series, let alone check out the plethora of spin-offs. But, this new series sees the return of Rick and Michonne, so I thought it’d be worth checking out. So far, it is, with some episodes even feeling like a return to form. After Rick was “killed” in the bridge fire, Michonne never stopped looking for his body. Years later, she finds proof he survived and sets out to find him. Rick had been taken by a community that wants to rebuild the world and use his skills to do it, but it means he can never leave. Spending years trying, and failing, to escape has left him broken, but then Michonne shows up, and if this limited series doesn’t end with them and their kids in a reunion at Alexandria, I’ll be very annoyed. Until then, I’m enjoying the episodes that have been released so far.

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire

This is the second movie in the new Ghostbusters reboot that combines new Busters with the original Busters, and I’m here for it. The Spengler family, along with science teacher turned step-father, Gary Grooberson, (played by the always funny Paul Rudd) have moved to the city to take up residence in the old firehouse and bust ghosts. This of course leads to ancient prophecies, the end of the world, and so many cameos, references, and callbacks to Ghostbuster folklore that it’s sure to please both old and new fans. The special effects are good, there are some genuinely scary scenes, and the original Ghostbuster cast, including Janine Melnitz and Walter Peck pop up at all the right moments. There’s even a funny mid-credit scene involving those cute new mini marshmallow ghosts, so stick around once the main story ends.

Reading

Making March by Hayley Walsh

Written as a diary-like story, Making March centers on Kate, a recently divorced 40-something single mother to a terrible teenage daughter who is preparing to go to her sister’s wedding. In between wedding prep, hen’s day events, and an eventful cruise, Kate dates for the first time in years and also wonders if a relationship with a friend from her past could be just what she’s looking for. This quick, fun read is relatable, funny, and sometimes very get-off-my-lawn with Kate’s rants/opinions, but it is sure to entertain and delight fans of everyday, realistic romances.

Girl Detective’s Just Wanna Have Fun By Philippa Kaye

Although slower-paced than I normally like my books/mysteries, Girl Detective’s Just Wanna Have Fun is a good intro to the characters and book world, which is part of an upcoming series. Birdie Mealing is a determined 20-something devastated by the abduction of her uncle. He’s a lawyer who was working on a case of missing money and an old bombing where the jailed perpetrator may just be innocent. Looking into those leads, Birdie and her friends cross paths with the young detective assigned to the case, who also happens to have a romantic history with Birdie. The plot is easy to follow and the ‘80s setting is sure to be a nostalgic trip for anyone who lived through that time.

The Day The Earth Turned Book 4: Spring by Chantelle Atkins

Already a fan of this brilliant dystopian series, once I started book four, I couldn’t put it down. Picking up where Winter (book 3) left off, Spring deals with the consequences of David’s fearful rule, Reuben’s near death, and help coming from London that will either save the kids of Heron or be their final downfall as the older teens try to bring back the old world. Smart, with logical lessons that aren’t overdone, this story (and the whole series) makes you think while also being entertaining. Tying up everything that came before it, resolving and making the most of the wonderful and scary character arcs, Spring also leaves enough open that more stories can be added, and I’d certainly love to revisit the world and characters brought to life by talented author, Chantelle Atkins.

Christopher Pike Books

Inspired by the Netflix series, The Midnight Club, I’m re-reading the books of my favorite author, Christopher Pike, and enjoying the nostalgia and reading for fun and not to review. In 2022/2023, I read Pike’s YA books. For 2024, I’m reading his Adult books.

This month I read The Listeners.

If you’ve got any good book recommendations, let me know in the comments, or be my friend on Goodreads and share your books/recommendations! You can also find and follow my reviews and book recommendations on Amazon and BookBub.

If you’d like to add the Blackbirch books to your Goodreads “Want to Read” shelf and/or check out the reviews, click the following links:

Blackbirch: The BeginningBlackbirch: The Dark HalfBlackbirch: The RitualBlackbirch: The Collector Taking Photos Of

My writing assistant, Luna. She’s always on hand to sit on my lap, keyboard, and desk, or hang out with me at 6am when I’m up early morning writing.

Blackbirch Teaser Of The Month

This month’s teaser comes from my debut! Blackbirch: The Beginning is book 1 in my Young Adult series, and kicks off all the magick and mystery, starting with Josh Taylor finding out that part of his disturbing dream has been depicted in an image from a book he comes across while working at his after-school job.

On The Blog

In case you missed any of my posts, or want to re-read them, here are the latest blogs.

February 2024 RoundupCreating An Author Press PackWriting Tricks: Assumptions

Other blogs…

A huge thanks to M.L. Davis, for not only re-starting her awesomely helpful writing blog but also asking me to interview with her! You can check out her fantastic questions about writing, and my rambling answers, at the following link, and don’t forget to read her new (and old) blog posts while you’re there!

Interview with K.M. Allan – Author of the ‘Blackbirch’ series

Well, that’s it for this month. I hope you’ve enjoyed my March Roundup. Let me know what you got up to in the comments!

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Threads, and sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

Writing Tricks: Assumptions

When it comes to creating a page-turner, one writing trick to get on your side is an assumption.

An assumption allows readers to fill in what they think is happening with their own experiences. If the reader believes they’ve figured out what’s going on, and the truth leads them in a different direction, not only have you blown their mind, but you’ve opened your work up to a worthy plot twist, and injected some doubt into your chapters. This is exactly what you want when crafting a great story, so give these assumption ideas a try.

Writing Tricks: AssumptionsDual It Up

To successfully pull off an assumption, you’ll want to play into it. But to make it twist-worthy as well, give the assumption a dual meaning.

An example of this can be found in the 2011 movie Crazy, Stupid, Love. In it, Steve Carell’s character, Cal Weaver, is going through a marriage breakdown and mentions not wanting “Nana” to find out.

“Nana” being a common name for a grandmother, means the audience assumes he is referring to his grandmother. They believe this until the end of the movie when it’s revealed that “Nana” is actually the nickname of his grown daughter, Hannah, a character viewers didn’t know until that point was even related to Cal.

The dual-ness of “Nana” being an obvious name for Cal’s grandmother, but in reality, the plausible nickname of Hannah is what makes this assumption work, and this is something you can pull off in your writing, too.

To try it, subtly lead the reader in the direction of an obvious assumption that also has a dual meaning with a plausible truth. Not only will you trump expectations, but the actual truth could create a crafty plot twist, a sad new truth, a sober dose of reality, or a joyful surprise.

Foreshadow!

Another way to make the most of an assumption is to ensure you’re foreshadowing it.

Let’s say that you have an MC who has been cheated on in the past. This history can be mentioned as she’s with a friend, getting ready to go to a party, and lending said friend a bracelet the MC doesn’t wear much because it always slips off.

Now, the party is being held by the MC’s new boyfriend, who she has so far had a good, trusting relationship with. After being greeted by the new boyfriend and asked to put their coats in his room, the MC and her friend enjoy their night. Later, the MC gets separated from her boyfriend for a length of time and also loses track of her friend.

Remember, she’s been cheated on in the past, and while trying to ignore her creeping paranoia, the MC eventually finds her friend. Before leaving, the MC ducks into the boyfriend’s room to grab her coat, and finds the bracelet she lent her friend on the bedside table!

With the cheating history foreshadowed, the MC (and the reader) makes the obvious assumption. She knows the bracelet is hers and that her friend was wearing it. The same friend she’d lost track of at the same time as her boyfriend. With these assumptions, the reader is now just as ready as the MC to declare war on the cheating friend and boyfriend.

But what else was foreshadowed? The bracelet was prone to falling off. That’s why the MC rarely wore it, and the boyfriend told the girls to put their coats in his room. Isn’t it likely that the slippery bracelet fell off when the friend was putting away her coat, and someone else getting their own coat found it on the floor and put it on the bedside table? Yes, it is. But the assumption and foreshadowing played their part first, giving drama to the plot and taking the reader where the writer wanted them to go.

If that bracelet had slipped off in the kitchen during the party, the MC, and reader wouldn’t have gone straight to the conclusion of an affair, but with the right foreshadowing of cheating and the location for the assumption, this writer’s trick was pulled off, creating misunderstandings, until the real truth comes out.

Let The Characters Lead Part Of The Way

One key element of assumptions that will also work in your favor is your reader believing them. And they will if the characters do too.

In our cheating example, until the truth is provided, the MC really thinks her friend and new boyfriend are having an affair.

In her eyes, the evidence is there, and she’s made up her mind. On the page, she would have gotten to this paranoid point through the internal thoughts the reader is also in on. These character-led assumptions bring the reader to the same conclusions—but only do this to a certain point. Don’t put every single assumption in black ink. It robs the reader of the fun of making their own.

Creating assumptions for themselves gets the reader invested in the story, so aim to lead for part of the way, and then allow readers to piece together the rest.

When those kinds of assumptions are combined with dual meanings and foreshadowing, you’re on track for an “I knew it!” or “I didn’t see that coming!” instead of the dreaded “I don’t understand/hate that?”

That’s the kind of result that you want from this fun writing trick, so assume away and see where it takes your characters and readers!

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, and Threads. You can also sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

Creating An Author Press Pack

As modern writers, we all have an online presence.

That may include being on all the social medias, only one, or just carving out our own corner of the Internet via a blog, website, or podcast.

Just as it’s inevitable to have these things, it’s also inevitable that at some point, someone else from all the socials, a blog, website, or podcast will ask you to guest, feature, write for, or interview with them.

You may be thrilled at this invitation. You may be filled with dread. You may experience both feelings at the same time. But don’t worry. Luckily, you can prepare yourself for such a situation with an Author Press Pack!

Creating An Author Press Pack

Whether you’re doing an interview, a podcast recording, supplying a creative piece of content, or just a writer profile, having an Author Press Pack will help both yourself and the person you’re working with.

To create one, add a folder on your desktop (or on your phone) and name it Author Press Pack. Inside, create and name the following folders:

BioLinksAuthor PicBook PicsPre-Answered Questions (optional extra)

These folders are where you’ll save the image and text files listed in more detail below.

The BasicsA Bio

In your “Bio” folder, add a text file (or your preferred text document type) and fill it with a bio about yourself that’ll provide a snapshot of who you are and what you write.

When it comes to an author bio, it’s a good idea to have two. A long bio that is 1-3 paragraphs, and a short bio that is only a sentence or two. To give you an idea, below are the current bios that I use:

Long bio:

K.M. Allan is an identical twin, but not the evil one. She started her career penning beauty articles for a hairstyling website and now powers herself with chocolate and green tea while she writes novels and blogs about writing.

When she’s not creating YA stories full of hidden secrets, nightmares, and powerful magic, she likes to read, binge-watch too much TV, spend time with family, and take more photos than she will ever humanly need. Visit her website, http://www.kmallan.com, to discover the mysteries of the universe. Or at the very least, some good writing tips.

Short bio:

K.M. Allan is the Urban Fantasy author of The Blackbirch Series and a blogger powered by chocolate and green tea. She’s also an identical twin, but not the evil one.

Having these two options allows me to include some decent info or something brief with any guest content, depending on what is required/requested.

I also use both of these bios for my own content, the long one for books, my blog, and book review sites, and the short one for social media. Having them together in an easy place to find, like an Author Press Pack, is super helpful.

Links

Often, a request to guest will come with the suggestion to provide one or more links to a place where readers can find either you or your books.

To make this process as easy as possible, add a notepad file of your most important links and include it in the “Links” folder of your press pack.

Example:

Author Pic

Most of us have an author picture we use either in our published books or on social media accounts. If you don’t have one yet or aren’t interested in having one, put together a logo or image that represents who you are and use that instead.

Whatever form the picture is in, make a large and small version of it in the highest quality that you can, and include the images in your “Author Pic” folder.

Book/s Pic

If the interview/guest content is doing the dual job of getting your name out there and helping to promote your books, you’ll need some book pictures.

You may not be asked to provide any, but if you are, having them in your Author Press Pack makes the job easier.

Like your author pic, create various sizes of your latest release, a full series, or your strongest seller. Once again, you’ll want them at the highest quality, but the lowest size possible, which can be achieved using a free tool such as TinyPNG. Once done, save them to your “Book Pics” folder.

The Optional Extra

In my experience, many guest content requests come in the form of Author Interviews, and usually, the questions are similar. This is a good thing as it will allow you to pre-answer questions.

Having answers to the most common interview questions will give you a starting point, which comes in handy if the interview request pops up at a busy time and you don’t want to miss out on the opportunity. Having some general answers locked and loaded may also help you feel less anxious about putting yourself out there.

While these questions won’t cover what you’re asked exactly, they will give you a base and can help you sort your thoughts.

Pre-answered Questions:

What do you write?Where do you get your ideas?When did you start writing?What’s your fave book? (add answers for your own work and others to cover all bases)What advice would you give to other writers?

Add and answer these questions in a text file (or make up your own) in the “Pre-Answered Questions” folder and they’ll be your interview guide.

And there you have some ideas for making yourself an Author Press Pack. Use as is or make it your own by adding the files and folders that suit you, and may it serve you well.

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, and Threads. You can also sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

February 2024 Roundup

Welcome to the February 2024 roundup!

I know February is the shortest month of the year, but this year, it felt like it was done and dusted quicker than usual even though we have that extra leap year day. I was busy getting back into the routine of life now that school holidays are over, and I attended a book launch and The Eras Tour. There was also a big storm that caused a 12-hour power outage, and wow, are modern people (sadly) not built for being without the internet. As for the rest of the second month of 2024, this is what I got up to…

What I’ve Been…Writing

Blogs and outlining a non-fiction WIP. It’s taken me longer than I’d like to get back to my usual routine, but the end of this month has seen more structured days than non-structured days, so I am getting there. This has allowed me to focus on blogs more, and to start outlining my next writing project. It will be something I’ve been talking about for a few years now, and that’s putting together a Writing Checklist/Routine book.

Watching

Argylle

A movie about a writer that’s advertised to be full of twists and has a decent cast made this an instant watch for me. Was the movie great? Not really. Good? Some of it.

The cast of Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell, Henry Cavill, Bryan Cranston, Catherine O’Hara, and Samuel L. Jackson had the star power, and the direction included some really amazing action scenes. But once you were on the fourth or fifth fight, all choreographed to an entire song, it wore a little thin. As for the plot, it was the typical writer’s novel unwittingly mirroring a real-world event that put them in danger. Then came the twists. Some were so obvious it was almost laughable when they played out exactly how you thought they would. Others were so absurd you wondered why they went in that direction. Then, there were a few surprises that mostly worked simply because the cast is so great at what they do. In the end, the movie did work overall. So, if you can suspend your disbelief for the crazier twists and the action scenes that would actually kill people if done in real life, instead of the heroes walking away with a scratch, Argylle is the movie for you.

Madame Web

This was another movie I was pretty excited about that turned out to be different than advertised. While it looks like a team superhero movie, it’s actually just an origin story for a character who isn’t all that great. Cassie Webb (Dakota Johnson) is exposed to a special spider bite in utero (I kid you not), when her mother goes into labor in the jungles of Peru while trying to find said spider to cure diseases (the reasons for which are a nice surprise reveal later on). Unaware of this spider bite, and the full history of her mother, a grown-up Cassie is a paramedic who doesn’t actually like people, and works with… Ben Parker. Yes, Uncle Ben from the Spider-Man movies is in this origin story too, and is one of the best parts of this uneven movie.

After an accidental death sees Cassie’s spider powers activated, she has visions of the future, mainly of a spider villain who is trying to kill three teen girls. They of course all have a loose connection to Cassie, and she takes them under her wing (while also hating the responsibility because she’s not a people-person) before she abandons them for a week to learn about her powers in Peru. The girls (Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, and Celeste O’Connor), despite the movie poster and trailers, never actually have powers in this movie, just possible powers that Cassie “sees” in the future when the final events of the movie transform her into Madame Web. If there does manage to be a spin-off/sequel showing the other girls with their powers, I’d watch it, but given how badly received Madame Web has been, I’m not sure that’ll happen.

True Detective: Night Country

I have mixed feelings about this one. On one hand, there was a lot to love. Jodie Foster and Kali Reis were fantastic in their roles as Danvers and Navarro, two police officers investigating the death of a group of scientists. They were found frozen to death, and when their case seemingly links with the previous murder of a local activist named Annie K, Danvers, and Navarro have to solve both crimes to find answers.

There are mysterious flashbacks to the loss of Danvers’ son and a murder/suicide case she worked on with Navarro that wasn’t as clear-cut as it was made out to be. All of these cases also have an underlying supernatural element thanks to Navarro’s heritage and her family connection to the afterlife. This manifests in her seeing ghosts, most of which provide some genuinely scary moments for the audience. My only issue with this was that the supernatural element just didn’t go anywhere. (Spoilers) In the final episode, the mystery of who was responsible for the deaths of Annie K and the Scientists was revealed without the supernatural element being involved at all, and I found that disappointing given the build-up to it. I also wasn’t a fan of other answers being left to the viewer to decide what they meant. In my opinion, those types of endings have too much ambiguity to pull off anything with satisfaction, which slightly spoiled the show for me. What True Detective: Night Country got right, however, I did enjoy, so if you do like a good mystery with a side of supernatural horror, it’s worth checking out the six episodes.

Reading

Shout Out To My Ex By Sandy Barker

This is the second book in the Ever After Agency series, which are romance stories centered around an agency that secretly matches couples, usually at the request of a friend or family member. For Shout Out To My Ex, we’re introduced to Elle Bliss, who is on the cusp of becoming a big fashion designer but can’t let go of the boyfriend she was with ten years ago at Fashion School. He left her one day without explanation, and she hasn’t been able to track him down. Her sister and business partner gets the agency involved, and they manage to find Leo, going by Lorenzo now, who is also a fashion designer about to hit it big. Enter Poppy, the matchmaker from the first EAA book, who got her happy ending and is now tasked with giving Elle and Leo theirs. There’s fashion, misunderstandings, paparazzi chases, fake and real romances, and secrets. Although I didn’t quite gel with Elle and Leo, I loved revisiting Poppy and the other characters from the previous book, and I can’t wait to see what they get up in the next. Recommended for fans of fun, light romance, and happy ever afters.

Redemption By GR Thomas

The fourth and final book in the A’vean Chronicles sees the Angels, led by earth-born Sophia, finally crack the trail of clues they’ve been chasing since book one. The riddles they’ve had to solve have been a real highlight of the series, as have the relationships formed, and it all comes together in the action-packed final story. Complete with a big betrayal, a huge battle, and the resolution of Sophia’s complicated romance with Ben, GR Thomas knows how to end a series, and does a great job of rounding off the story in this imaginative and entertaining world of Angels and Demons.

The Five Year Plan by Jodi Gibson

When Demi’s expectation of inheriting the family cafe she’s been running doesn’t happen, it forces her to remember The Five Year Plan she made with her best friend and sets about changing her life. This leads to an impromptu trip to Italy to visit estranged family, and an instant attraction to Leo, a rival in the cafe business who she just can’t get out of her head. When old family secrets and town rivalries threaten Demi and Leo’s relationship, she has to choose between her own happiness and family loyalty.

This was such a fun read from author Jodi Gibson, who knows how to pull the heartstrings. Filled with humor, so many tasty food descriptions, and wonderful characters, this book was a real joy to read and would be perfect for fans of romance, travel, and family stories.

Christopher Pike Books

Inspired by the Netflix series, The Midnight Club, I’m re-reading the books of my favorite author, Christopher Pike, and enjoying the nostalgia and reading for fun and not to review. In 2022/2023, I read Pike’s YA books. For 2024, I’m reading his Adult books.

This month I read The Season Of Passage.

If you’ve got any good book recommendations, let me know in the comments, or be my friend on Goodreads and share your books/recommendations! You can also find and follow my reviews and book recommendations on Amazon and BookBub.

If you’d like to add the Blackbirch books to your Goodreads “Want to Read” shelf and/or check out the reviews, click the following links:

Blackbirch: The BeginningBlackbirch: The Dark HalfBlackbirch: The RitualBlackbirch: The Collector Taking Photos Of

Book events and Taylor Swift. I started this month attending a book launch for Kylie Orr’s thrilling novel, The Eleventh Floor, and ended it by seeing Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour! Here are some photos from both, more of which can be found on my Instagram account.

Blackbirch Review Of The Month

This month, I started posting reviews and teasers for my book series again on social media, and this was the most popular—a fantastic 5-star review for the third book, Blackbirch: The Ritual.

On The Blog

In case you missed any of my posts, or want to re-read them, here are the latest blogs.

January 2024 RoundupReminders About What You Can Control In Writing Vs. What You Can’tResetting After Writing A Book

Other blogs…

A big thank you to E.S. Foster at Foster Your Writing for asking me to interview on their wonderful blog. She put forward great questions about writing and my book series, and you can find the interview here if you’d like to check it out:

Interview With K.M. Allan

Well, that’s it for this month. I hope you’ve enjoyed my February Roundup. Let me know what you got up to in the comments!

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Threads, and sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

Resetting After Writing A Book

When it comes to writing a book, there’s always plenty of advice about how to get started, research, write, edit, query, sell, publish, and promote it—and so there should be. As writers, we need to know those things.

But when the book has launched and the release day has arrived, been celebrated, and then settled into a memory, what then?

If your answer is to write the next book, you are correct!

This is what authors do when a project is complete. But sometimes that book we just released took everything out of us. After what was most likely years of writing, editing, rejections, stress, and learning new skills as we queried, revised, doubted, signed contracts, or self-published.

After such a mammoth effort, the thought of writing another book is the last thing some of us can do. If that sounds like you, here are some tips to reset.

Resetting After Writing A BookPhysically And Mentally Pack Everything Away

We put our all into writing a book and it can leave you mentally exhausted. It can also be hard to switch off from that book world and the characters. Or you could find yourself with no new characters or book world to move on to next. While waiting for inspiration to strike, do what you can to leave the previous book behind by mentally and physically packing everything away.

For the mental part, write a journal entry about what the book meant to you, your hopes and fears for it, how you felt about it ending, what you’d like to see happen with it in the future, what you’re thankful for, and what you’ve learned. Jotting down such notes should help put things into perspective and prompt you to move on.

For the physical, take any printed manuscripts, hand-written ideas, notebooks, etc, and pack it all away. This could be in a box in your writing space or somewhere else in your house. Or it might be enough to file everything in a binder/folder on your bookshelf or desk. In any case, pack up your book files and give yourself the mental and physical signals that the project is done so that you can reset and move on.

Connect Back With Your Writer Brain

If your writer-type isn’t the kind that has endless ideas, writes multiple projects at once, or already has a pile of half-started shiny-new-idea projects lying around (raises hand), you may need to connect back with your writer brain.

If you’re like me and only get ideas when you’re working on a specific MS and that MS is now complete, your writer brain may be very silent. Try not to panic. You will get ideas again, you just need a top-up from the creative well.

Read books, watch shows, go for walks, listen to music, clean the house, and let your subconscious wander. Brainstorm, or look at your ideas file and see if the various random notes you made on the back of receipts or the illegibly scribbled 2 a.m. notes made after waking from that bizarre dream are something that you can turn into your next book.

Once you’re open to writing something new and have immersed yourself in inspiration, the story ideas and characters will eventually form.

Give Yourself Time And Then Set A Deadline

If your last project was a book that took decades to write, one you queried for more than a year, had to be shelved because it never moved beyond rejections, or you self-published and it’s now out in the world doing its thing, you’re coming off years of hard work. Years that require time and space to give yourself a break.

Completing that last book to whichever stage it got to may have also left you so overwhelmed that you don’t want to do the things that usually give you purpose.

Sitting at your writing desk to create, or to share promo content, may be the last thing you want to work on right now. That’s fine. Burnout happens to all of us. Take the break, but set a limit, and when that limit is up, give yourself a deadline.

This is not a must-be-done-by deadline but one that is a solid starting point instead of the mythical one-day… deadline that is only going to ensure that you don’t start writing your next book.

Even if you have no clue what that next book is, or the idea isn’t fully formed, giving yourself a deadline to start the new project is a great motivational tool.

It could be next week, it could be next month, in 6 months, or it could be next year. Just set it and stick to it.

Slip Back Into Your Routine

If you completed a book, chances are you did so because you had a writing routine.

It could have been writing every Sunday afternoon, keeping your Tuesday evening free for plotting, or penning down words every lunch break. Whatever the routine, if it worked for you, slip back into it now.

It should be like riding a bike, even if you haven’t done so for years. Your body still remembers how to pedal, and your writer brain still remembers how to write.

So, dust off your writing routine or establish a new one and put yourself back into a familiar creative space to get writing again.

Read Research And Craft Books

If you’ve sat down at your desk, fallen back into your writing habits, looked at notes, and are still coming up with nothing, don’t despair! Now is the time to level up your writing skills.

Read writing craft books or start a course. You can find free and paid ones online at all different skill levels, and you can visit your local library and see what writing craft books you can borrow. If you thought the dialogue in your last book could be improved, now is the time to learn all about it so you can nail it with your next manuscript.

If you’re happy with your writing skills, do some research for your next work in progress. If your dream has always been to craft a fairytale retelling, re-read your favorite fairytale and research its origins to see if an idea sparks.

Get your research on and polish your skills. Pair it with mentally and physically packing your last book away, connecting back with your writer brain, setting a deadline after taking a break, and re-establishing your best book-writing routine and your reset will be complete!

After that, the final tip to remember is that you do actually enjoy writing. It might feel forgotten amongst the burnout, endless editing, rejections, lack of sales, and social media promotion, but writing a new book will bring that creative joy back. All it takes is a little reset.

— K.M. Allan

Find me on Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, and Threads. You can also sign up for my Newsletter to get my blog posts delivered directly to your inbox!

Reminders About What You Can Control In Writing Vs. What You Can’t

There are different ways that people describe their role as a writer. Some say they are the parent to their “book baby” (which I’ve never been a fan of because it’s weird), that they’re a channel for the muse, or a benevolent God-type figure making all the characters move like chess pieces on a board.

No matter the way they, or you, see yourself as a writer, it’s likely from a view of being in control.

As word-smiths, we control the world we’re building, the characters we’re molding, and their actions. As soon as we write that first draft, we are in control, so it’s hard when you realize there are parts of writing that are out of your control.

Reminders About What You Can Control In Writing Vs. What You Can’tThe Writing

What You Can Control…

When you write and how it turns out.

Getting a book written and edited from the first draft to the last is something under your control. Even if it takes years to complete what’s imprinted on the page, the timeline and the form your writing takes is up to you.

What You Can’t Control…

What others think of what you’ve written.

As much as we’d love for everyone to gush about how our work is absolutely the greatest, that’s very unlikely. If what you’ve written is good, it will be seen that way by others, but not everyone.

Just as I’m sure you’ve come across books that you didn’t connect with, your book will be like that for someone else. Maybe a lot of someone else’s. You can’t control that, so keep that in mind as you share your writing with the world, and only worry about writing to the best of your ability.

The Sale Of Your Work

What You Can Control…

For those who self-publish, you can control the price and on-sale date. For those with a publisher, you can help the sale of your work with promotion leading up to release day. In both cases, writers can plan book launches, marketing blitzes, and rally interest when there’s a debut, new release, or book anniversary. Creating awareness of the sale of your book is one thing you can control.

Post on social media, use your newsletter, website, and blog to get the word out, and make use of the writing community to spread the word about the sale of your work, not to be confused with sales, because those are…

What You Can’t Control…

You can’t control if anyone buys your book, and that’s a hard pill to swallow.

You may have been building up to a release date for weeks, months, or years, and have plenty of interest whenever the subject is raised, but come release day, expectations could fall very short.

People you know in real life may not buy a copy like you thought they would, and the realization that enthusiastic comments on social media don’t translate to real-world purchases becomes very real.

This isn’t just for debut books either. You could be on your 6th novel and have a precedent for selling hundreds of copies during the first week of release, only to have your latest not even reach double digits.

There could be a million different reasons you’d be in such a scenario, none of which is because of the quality of your book. It’s also likely you’ll never have answers for such questions and trying to guess (is it the economy? Book prices? Are readers not aware you have a new book?) will loop endlessly. You can’t control if others are going to buy your book. What you can control is making sure your socials and website advertise your book. You can also control your gratefulness to anyone who does buy it, so endlessly loop your energy to that.

Help

What You Can Control…

Asking for help.

Whether that’s help from family to get time to write, beta reading from fellow writers, formatting assistance from someone who knows how, or questions about the art of writing answered by those ahead of you in the writing community. For help, never be afraid to ask for it. I’m sure you’ll find most are willing and able to give it.

What You Can’t Control…

How fast or deep others can provide that help.

If you asked another writer to beta read, and they didn’t immediately stop their whole life to devour your 100,000-word manuscript and get back to you with in-depth feedback for every perfectly written paragraph, you need to adjust your expectations. Even if you did that as a beta for them, how and in what time frame they’ll give you their feedback is up to them.

Control what you can, which is to ask for help, to give your best help to others, and have faith that the help anyone else gives back to you is the best that they can do too.

Marketing/Social Media

What You Can Control…

The marketing you’re comfortable with.

These days, social media marketing falls to all writers—independent and traditional, and while the expectation is that you’ll do some form of it, choosing the marketing you like to do should be in your control.

Posting once a week, or every day. Using TikTok or not using TikTok. Making only graphics because you like the creativity of it, but not posting videos because you aren’t comfortable in front of the camera should be things you’re in control of. If a quarterly newsletter is the only form of marketing you can handle, control that, do that.

What You Can’t Control…

Your audience seeing it.

Unfortunately, one downside of social media is that you can get on board with posting, creating all the content you’ll ever need, scheduling posts at ideal times, and committing to regularly posting for years—and not enough people, or the right people, will ever see it.

This is because you have no control over the algorithm. What’s worse, is no one even knows what the algorithm wants. It changes all the time. Years ago, photos were all Instagram was about. Now, it’s all about Reels. But even if you switch to Reels, the chances yours will be shown, even to your own followers, are slim.

The hard truth is, you may never move past a certain number of followers and you most likely will never go viral—no matter how much you’re led to believe everyone is only one rightly timed post away from hitting the social media jackpot.

You can’t control any of that. Stick to posts you love creating and uploading, or can at least tolerate creating and posting. Modern writing demands you do it, so you might as well make it as easy on yourself as possible, and hopefully, it will entertain or inspire the people who do get to see your posts.

Book Reviews

What You Can Control…

Your reaction.

That’s it. And it doesn’t even have to be a good reaction. If a review hurts your feelings, it’s perfectly valid to privatively vent about it and inhale your body weight in chocolate. Just as a great book review might have you popping open a bottle of champagne and consuming celebratory chocolate (which is different from sad chocolate, even if it’s the same chocolate).

What You Can’t Control…

If anyone leaves a review, if it’s good, or if that 1-star rating has actual text with it so that you know why they disliked your book so much.

You cannot control those things, and trying to is just as bad as worrying about them. It won’t get you anywhere, so don’t waste your time or chocolate. If you can, get someone you trust to check reviews for marketing quotes, give the okay for any constructive review snippets to come your way, and concentrate on your next WIP. Reviews are for readers and will help the right ones find your work.

Expectations/Changing Dreams

What You Can Control…

What you expect of yourself and the dreams you want to strive for.

We may all start out wanting to write the next big thing, bask in the glow of bestseller lists, and Hollywood adaptations, or just make a living wage from our writing. Those dreams usually shift we when realize that rarely happens.

Going with that flow and adjusting your dreams to penning books that give you joy to work on, even if it’s only you and a handful of others who’ll love your work like it’s a best seller, is what you can control.

What You Can’t Control…

If those expectations/dreams happen in any form at all.

We all have that picture-perfect idea of what a successful author is, but your career might never reach such heights, and that is something we all make peace with at some point.

You may never get flowers from a publisher on release day or congrats from an agent. Your book may never be spoken about by retailers and those in the industry. You may never see it on a bookstore shelf or have a signing with a crowd in attendance. You may never garner thousands of reviews, see your book on “Best Of” lists, or be nominated for awards.

You can aim for those dreams, and you can try your best to get them, but you can’t control if you will. You may even get a measure of them, but the fact they’ll lead to better things isn’t a given.

Just because you can’t control if your writing dreams happen, however, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t daydream about them, or work toward big goals. Go with what you can control, adjust your expectations when needed, and above all, love what you do achieve.

There is so much we can’t control in the world of writing, and it is very easy to get discouraged. It’s also very easy to find the right inspiration, idea, community, and new dreams. Just lean into what’s in your control and see where it takes you.

— K.M. Allan

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