Chapter 3.2… Luke didn’t know who to strangle first – the blonde who looked like she could level him with one straight hard glare or Greg, the cousin who just couldn’t seem to leave him alone. RH: Can we find a balance between her glare and Greg’s … something. Greg not leaving him alone doesn’t balance the blonde who could level him with one glance. Or, just write, “the blonde or his cousin Greg, neither of whom could mind their own business and leave him alone.” “I was just trying to help,” Mackenzie said. “I just hate the fact that they think they can rule the world.” “It really wasn’t any of your business, Miss Grace.” “It’s Kenzie. And…I know.” She sighed, looking away. “Reporters just…get under my skin. A […]
Read the Rest
About Rachel Hauck
Author Archive | Rachel Hauck
Advice from agent Sandra Bishop of MacGregor Literary
A funny thing happened on my way to MacGregor Literary … I’ve been thinking a lot about how my experience as a freelance writer prepared me to help guide authors who are working hard to find their way in this tight market. Before I met Chip and turned to the dark side to join him as an agent, I freelanced for a living. One of my most steady gigs was for a national trade publication. When I first began writing there, my job was to take the dullest stories the Director of Communications needed covered and do my best to bring them to life. After a year of proving that I could be trusted with the mundane pieces (trust me – mundane is generous here) he began to come to […]
Read the RestTurn it upside down!
Hi Voices, Susie is busy with writing, four kids and doing a bit of traveling, so we’ll get back to Blog-a-Book next week. Thanks for your patience. We appreciate you all. Today I wanted to talk about some of the basics of story telling and fiction writing. A great story starts with an idea. Any idea. What makes it great is developing a seed of an idea. Take an ordinary idea — boy meets a girl — and turn it upside down. “An engaged boy meets a girl he believes is his true love. But he’s getting married in a month.” Good, but how can we turn it upside down even more? Boy approaches the girl only to discover she is just recovering from her own heartbreak — her fiance […]
Read the RestSell your synopsis, sell your book
Rachel Here: Most writers dread crafting the synopsis. We feel constrained and pressured. How can we boil down a 70,000 or 100,000 word manuscript into 3, 5, even 10 pages? We can! And we will. I’ve never dreaded writing a synopsis because it enabled me to hash out my story points, to see in a consise manner what my book was going to be. Most writers dread this process because they don’t know what the book is about, they don’t really know the characters and their story arc very well, and most likely don’t want to take the time to find out. It’s more fun to write. Or, an author might feel the story is so good with so many layers they can’t possibly leave any out, so a 20 […]
Read the Rest
