✨Helen Monks Takhar's 5 Plot Twist Tips; Mary Morris Wants You to "Get a Big Table;" & Lincoln Michel on Finding YOUR Process✨

Also Inside: Tonight's the night! Sign-up for Bianca's latest course before it's too late!

Happy Tuesday, writing friends!

Thrillers are a seemingly evergreen genre. Even people who don’t tend to read the genre have likely read (or at least have heard about) Gone Girl, and that’s a problem (for anyone wanting to write thrillers since Gillian Flynn’s genre game-changer of a novel came out, at least). The more readers read, the more sophisticated they become, and the harder it is to get anything past them. But they still crave exactly that—for a writer to come along and shock and surprise them. Which of course, if you’re an aspiring thriller author, you already know. What you might not know is how, exactly, to go about it. Helen Monks Takhar, with four psychological thrillers under her belt (including her latest, The Marriage Rule, out today!), has some ideas, and she’s generously sharing them with you today in her essay just for friends of The Shit: “Plot twist! Five ways to make the unexpected reveals in your fiction more impactful”!

Or maybe it’s “plot” full stop you’re finding yourself stuck on, in which case today’s fantastic video from Mary Morris (whose The Red House is out now) might hold the key to getting your story moving. A lot of writers come to the table with what Mary calls “anchor scenes”—a few fully formed ideas that they know are going to be key to the book, even if they don’t know where they go. But then what? Mary describes it as feeling like “a moving van has come into my brain and has dropped off all this furniture and boxes and silverware and clothing and everything, and I have to figure out where it's all going to go.” Daunting, but Mary has figured out a workaround for tackling those boxes so you don’t feel like just closing the door on all that mess and pretending it’s not there before you even get started (and it clearly works. Mary’s had a long—and award-winning, literary career—so when she suggests trying something, we’re paying attention).

Speaking of tips for finding your way into your story…Bianca’s latest course is happening tonight and there are still spots available! Sign up now before it’s too late!

And speaking of Bianca...It’s less than a month until her big book launch celebration on June 9th!😱 We’ve got some additional gatherings planned for the Saturday and Sunday before the event, so if you’d like to hang out with Bianca and a bunch of other book lovers and writers, please head to our Facebook group and answer our poll so we know how many of you we’re going to get to meet!

Finally, today’s Q&A is with Metallic Realms author Lincoln Michel and contains some of the best non-advice writing advice you’re going to find anywhere. In response to our question about which writing rule he breaks, Lincoln shares that he is adamant about editing as he goes (in clear contravention of the “vomit draft” rule espoused by many), going on to add:

“To turn this into advice for others: find the process that works for you. Every writer has their own. Actually, every work often has its own.”

This, people. THIS. ⬆️ Google the definition of “advice” and you’ll see versions that include words ranging from “should” (at the fairly directive end of the scale) to “suggestion” (at the more lenient end); at the end of the day, our best advice is to try any and everything that you think might work for you (or even those that you think might not—remember, you don’t know what you don’t know). And whatever you do, don’t fall into the trap of getting all bunched up just because literary idol X does Y and your inability to do Y makes you feel like you’re doing writing “wrong.”

You’ve got this, friends. If you keep looking for ways to move forward, you will eventually find them (and we’ll keep sharing new ones with you until you find the one that gets you YOUR “yes!”).

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading! ❤️

❤️ The Shit No One Tells You About Writing Team