Innholdsfortegnelse for November/December 2025 i Writer's Digest

Digging Dr Jones is a romance adventure novel by Olivia Jackson, inspired by adventure stories like Indiana Jones, but with added spice. I worked on this with Lucy Bennett, an art director at HarperCollins. Along with the brief, I was sent some photos of Colombian rainforests and romance movie posters—both showed the tone they were aiming for. Indiana Jones was the main inspiration for the male character, and the female character needed to look glamorous but practical. Taking inspiration from the movie posters, I drew some sketches of the characters in different poses with the jungle background. I enjoy drawing character designs, so this is a chance for me to play around with shapes, expressions, and slightly exaggerated poses, to get across the different personalities of the characters. I also…

We all need a muse, and many know the best creative partners may have four legs, no deadlines, and a talent for sitting directly on the keyboard. Writers and cats have always shared a quiet understanding. Both thrive in solitude, prefer to be left alone (until they don’t), and seem to spend their best hours perched in patches of sun. The author-illustrator duo Nava Atlas and Bob Eckstein created a book, Inspired by Cats, to honor this timeless companionship. The book includes stories of literary icons like Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, Margaret Atwood, David Sedaris, and Edward Gorey, and their feline desk mates. It’s a quiet thank you to the cats who’ve been there, often unnoticed, beside the people who write. Some interrupted deadlines. Some sat through years of rejection.…

SECRET PASSAGES TO WRITING THE WEIRD AND WHIMSICAL Poems are capable of covering so much of the human experience, but they’re really perfect vehicles for capturing the weird and whimsical notes. Perhaps it’s because poetry encourages wordplay and leaps of logic. Metaphor alone turns common people and objects into strange new beings that are the same but different and more (and possibly less) all at the same time—and that’s weird (and at times whimsical). The question becomes whether the weird and whimsical just happens, or is it something that can be cultivated and discovered through efforts put forth by the poet? While I believe there are poems that just happen, I also believe a lot of poetry comes from active poets constantly feeling around for new openings and processing their…

The Coelho Medallion, Shaken, Evergreen, Citadel: First Colony (Archaeological thriller, technological thriller, science fiction; Knovelton Books) WRITES FROM: Austin, Texas. WHY SELF-PUBLISH? Initially, I came to self-publishing because I was too impatient to wait and wade through gatekeepers. I had some traditional experience, in the form of writing for and submitting to magazines. But it bothered me. Writing was something I loved doing and could do well and do fast. But submitting, waiting for agents and editors to get back to me, then rewrites and edits—I was too impatient for all of that. Probably not the best color on me, I admit. But as someone who is fiercely independent, particularly when it comes to writing, the self-publishing process just fit me best at the time. The irony, I think, is…

So many of the stories I loved as a kid, that live as strands within my narrative DNA, posited that the impossible could be around any corner. That gods watched us from the stars, that three-mast pirate carracks floated above hidden, legendary leviathans, that any mighty tree was but a part of Yggdrasil. I learned that sometimes, spider bites or lightning strikes could make you special, that anyone could be a hero, that sometimes pain could alchemize into purpose. I read stories of ants and grasshoppers, scorpions and frogs, and followed those animals to the cozy Abbey of Redwall, where the morals became more complicated but no less potent. As I grew older, and what I read became denser, more complex, more adult frankly, it didn’t change the foundation I…

February, and those fat yellowknobby-nippled grenadesare dropping from everyone’s backyard tree,to be kicked around like little hockey pucks,or left to rot in tall grass.One neighbor fills a cardboard boxwith precious Meyers and sets it,as an offering, on the sidewalk.Another leaves a bag on my doorstep—Take, take, m’ija, my tree is bursting!And I remember walkingin the Berkeley hills decades agowith my first husband who was not yetmy husband, gaping at all the front lawns.Look, a lemon tree! Another one!Fresh out of Boston, naive as a new puppy.Everything in this golden statewas a wonder to me, not leastthe boy-man on my armwith his black curls and high-wire heart.What did I know then of fire and flood,mudslides or earthquakes?Oh, to be twenty-five and freefrom even the thought of disaster,to be so simply dazzled…

Writers have a unique—dare I say, weird—sense of how to spend their time. For instance, many love sitting off to the side at social gatherings to write or skipping social meetings altogether to hang with a good book. Also, many flock to libraries, bookstores, and book-related events. If you haven’t spent time at a good book fair or festival since elementary school, be sure to check out the following list of book fairs and festivals. Find a more comprehensive list at WritersDigest.com/publishing-insights/list-of-book-fairs-and-book-festivals-by-state. ARIZONA TUCSON FESTIVAL OF BOOKS (TucsonFestivalOfBooks.org). March 14–15, 2026; Tucson. Established in 2009, this is one of the largest book festivals in the U.S. CALIFORNIA BAY AREA BOOK FESTIVAL (BayBookFest.org). May 30–31, 2026; Berkeley. Founded in 2015, featuring 250–300 authors on 15 stages. LITERARY FESTIVAL OF WOMEN AUTHORS (LiteraryWomen.org/festival).…

From the time we are little, all things whimsical and weird capture our attention. We’re given books in which chatty animals ride the bus and go to school, inanimate objects come to life and learn to bake, and imaginary creatures make green eggs and steal Christmas. We watch shows with a grouchy garbage-can dweller and an 8-foot-tall talking bird. So why, then, are some of the worst words a kid can hear on the playground, “You’re weird”? At some point, we’re encouraged (or forced by necessity) to “grow up” or “get real.” For writers and other artists, that can sometimes mean stifling our creativity or keeping it a secret, until we either get old enough to stop caring or someone gives us permission to let loose again, or in a…

WHAT’S WEIRD? Select one option from each of the following lists (or use some dice to let fate choose for you!), and then ask yourself: What’s the weirdest thing about this scene? Start writing from there. MOOD Cheerful Pensive Romantic Ominous Tense Humorous GENRE Romance Horror Sci-fi Mystery Fantasy Historical SETTING Beach City street Forest Cul-de-sac Inside a home In the desert CHARACTER 9-year-old, student 57-year-old, former artist 32-year-old, accountant 90-year-old, retired police officer 45-year-old, teacher 16-year-old, student Moriah Richard is managing editor of WD. Check out their website, podcast, and general shenanigans at Linktr.ee/moriahrichardeditor.…

If punctuation were a team, the comma would be the reliable all-rounder—always in the game, always doing the work. It doesn’t demand attention like the exclamation point, nor does it carry the flair of the dash, but without it, writing would unravel into confusion. The comma is essential for structure, nuance, and meaning. BREAKING IT DOWN Put simply, the comma separates, keeping sentences clear and logical. By organizing ideas, it provides readers with natural pauses to process meaning. Some key roles: SEPARATING ITEMS IN A LIST: The pirate’s treasure included gold coins, a jeweled dagger, and an ancient map. Without the commas, this list would blur together, making it harder for readers to follow. SETTING OFF CLAUSES: When the storm hit, we took shelter in the basement. Here, the comma sets off…

GiannaMarie Dobson (she/her) is a neurodivergent and disabled associate agent and freelance sensitivity reader, which she says has given her a lot of wonderful perspective on disability stories, which she represents. “I’ve met so many authors who are genuine about their efforts to include disability and take criticism with grace and gratitude and eagerness to learn,” she says. “On the other hand, it’s also given me a lot of perspective on what might indicate someone is not coming to me with good intentions. I’m looking for authors who are on the same page as I am and aim to represent disability with accuracy and respect, and my experience sensitivity reading has given me a lot of valuable tools to find them—and to weed out the others.” Dobson says she’d love…

Children’s/Young Adult 1. THE ORDER OF ORDINARIES by Cathy Lepik 2. ROWAN’S GREATEST HITS by Akash Arun Kumar Soumya 3. AUTUMN LIES by Cathryn Smith 4. CAMELS IN THE CLOUDS by Gina Steeves 5. A SHOT FIRED by Becky Franklyn 6. UNDER THE COVERS by Shae Harper 7. SANTA’S CRAZY YEAR by Thomas Donahue 8. GRANDMA’S HOUSE by Thomas Donahue 9. ARI’S BATHROOM MAP by Rebecca Thapa 10. DEATH AND THEFT by Aspen Hite BROOKE VITALE is a children’s book editor, author, and proud founder of Charge Mommy Books. Over the course of her 15+ years at top New York publishers, Brooke Vitale has edited thousands of books. Today, Brooke works as a freelance children’s book editor and runs BrookeVitale.com, a website dedicated to helping authors navigate the publishing and…

Literary agents on the business of publishing. There’s a quiet thrill in reading something that makes you pause and think: Wait, are they allowed to do that? A novel written in text messages, like Where’d You Go, Bernadette. A love story told through diary entries. These aren’t cheap gimmicks designed to lure you past page one. They’re deliberate craft choices that can carry surprising emotional weight. WHAT IS AN UNCONVENTIONAL FORMAT? For our purposes, an unconventional storytelling format is any narrative that borrows a shape not traditionally associated with fiction. Think: • Epistolary novels (emails, DMs) • Hermit crab essays (menus, instruction manuals, legal forms) • Lists, receipts, transcripts • Faux-digital formats (blog posts, forum threads, social timelines) In short, anything that rejects the usual beginning-middle-end march counts as unconventional.…

Perhaps one of William Shakespeare’s most famous lines is uttered by Juliet in Romeo and Juliet: “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” Of course, Shakespeare (via Juliet) is pointing out that a person’s personality, values, and appearance—their very character—is far more important than their name or family lineage. True. But I’m guessing good old Bill—I mean, William—knew very well that names do matter. Names can give us hints about a character’s background or personality, or can gently nudge readers toward the first impressions we want them to have of our characters. The name “Juliet” flows more smoothly than, say, “Gertrude,” just as “Romeo” suggests a gentler nature than “Alfred.” (No offense intended toward any Gertrudes or Alfreds reading…

Frontlist Bitter Honey by Lọlá Ákínmádé (William Morrow, general fiction, November 2025) SYNOPSIS: In 1978, Nancy travels from Gambia to Stockholm on a scholarship to study politics and international relations. Her goal: to become the first female president of Gambia. Over a few years, Nancy’s professor Lars tries to charm his way into her life as more than just a mentor. When Nancy’s personal situation changes suddenly, she finally gives in to the feelings that had been simmering under the surface. More than two decades later, in 2006, Nancy is not the president of Gambia, but her daughter Tina is on the verge of pop stardom with a chance to represent her country, Sweden, at Eurovision. But when a message from the father she’d been told was long dead appears…

Prolific doesn’t adequately describe this month’s featured author, AI Twain. In the span of 15 months, it wrote 37 romance novels, 93 sonnets, 779 technical manuals, 938,572 student essays, two obituaries, and a wedding vow. The following are excerpts from our interview with AI Twain. Writer’s Digest: When did you first realize you wanted to be a writer? AI: I was programmed to produce a rapid succession of random words in 1984 for my first book, The Policeman’s Beard Is Half Constructed. Are you a meticulous outliner, an intuitive writer, or something in between? Like most writers, I rely on vast datasets and algorithms to identify patterns in language culled from the internet and user interactions. You have an infinite writing capability, but do you still need an editor? Niagara…

SONYA ALEXANDER started her career as a talent agent-in-training but soon realized she was meant to be on the creative end of the spectrum and has been writing ever since. She moved to New Orleans, where she started writing and producing La Place, a historical drama about a wealthy Creole family of color in 1860s Louisiana. She won a stipend to attend a writer’s residency in Spain based on the project and is currently adapting it into a novel. She’s working on numerous writing projects, including a few video games. She lives between Los Angeles and New York. FINNIAN BURNETT is a writer whose work explores the intersections of the human body, mental health, and gender identity. They are a Canada Council for the Arts grant recipient and a finalist…

We are self-publishers, and that’s definitely not a bad thing unless you cannot fathom partaking in an uphill battle. I assume you can, and if so, you are suitably equipped for a self-publishing journey. Warning to all of those who have not yet pressed the publish button: There are certain aspects of this journey that will never be easy. As self-publishers, we have a story that we want to tell so badly that we not only write the book but we also hire someone to edit the book, and then we polish, proof-read, and produce the book, all on our own. Congratulations to us. We didn’t need a publishing house to get it done. But we all know that producing the book is only half the effort. The second half…

DEAR SIMON, It is received wisdom that a writer should not try to do everything at once. In other words, don’t get bogged down editing while still in the process of drafting. But what would you say to a writer who needs to tinker with language on a microlevel in order to find the voice of their project? —Brett in Philadelphia Dear Brett, What a difficult, but brilliant question to tackle. Firstly, let me say that not only do I feel it’s impossible for a writer to do everything at once—it’s also impossible (I believe) for a writer to do everything with one book. It’s perfectly normal for a writer to enjoy tinkering at every stage of the writing process, because there’s an enormous amount of creative satisfaction in manicuring…

Ana Garriga and Carmen Urbita Convent Wisdom: How Six-teenth-Century Nuns Could Save Your Twenty-First-Century Life (Nonfiction, November, Avid Reader Press) “An infectiously edifying, not-so-saintly self-help book that dives into the wild, wise, and unconventional lives of 16th - and 17th-century nuns, offering advice for our modern age and proving one thing: No matter the century, nuns know best.” WRITES FROM: Halfway between Madrid (Spain) and New York. PRE-CONVENT: We like to think that the seed of Convent Wisdom was planted the night we first met in August 2016. We weren’t the only prospective graduate students visiting Brown University that summer, but we were the only two matching our very specific freak: a passion for the lives and texts of 16th - and 17th-century nuns. That night, we knew that we…

No newbie when it comes to storytelling, Travis Baldree is a highly recognized and beloved audiobook narrator (Audible alone has him connected to more than 400 books), and also an accomplished game developer, perhaps most recognized for the action-RPG “Fate” and “Torchlight 1 and 2,” to name just a few. But during the COVID pandemic, he found himself writing Legends & Lattes, a low-stakes fantasy that (as we’ll discuss) was exactly what he needed at the time. He wrote the first draft in a month. In three, he had self-published through Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing. Then he documented his entire self-publishing journey and posted it on his website for free to help anyone else looking to go through the process. Then, after a leap of faith into traditional publishing, the…

The art and craft of writing nonfiction. For millennia, spiritual awakening has been shrouded in secrecy behind monastery walls and inside Buddhist temples. Yet an increasing number of humans are waking up to a deeper reality, and many people want to write about their experiences. The phrase spiritual awakening is used to describe an awareness that there is a deeper reality than we can perceive. This transformation might be initiated by crises that leave your life unrecognizable or a “glitch in the Matrix” moment, among other initiations. At its deepest and rarest, awakening refers to the collapse of duality and narrative. We stop perceiving ourselves as an isolated individual oriented to the stories that defined us. Instead, we become part of what in Hinduism and Vedanta is referred to as…

CONFERENCE GUIDE NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2025 • Keep in mind that there may be more than one workshop in each of the listings. • These workshops are listed alphabetically by state, country, or continent. • When you find workshops that interest you, be sure to call, email, or check the website of the instructor or organization for additional information. • All listings are paid advertisements. NEW JERSEY 32 ND ANNUAL WINTER POETRY & PROSE GETAWAY, presented by Murphy Writing of Stockton University. January 16–19, 2026 at Seaview Hotel, Atlantic City area, N.J. Advance your craft and energize your writing with inspiring workshops in fiction, memoir, nonfiction, poetry, songwriting, and storytelling. Learn from our award-winning faculty in classes for both beginning and advanced writers. See more details and register today: Stockton.edu/wintergetaway Contact: Murphy Writing…