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Book Review & Contest Insights from Real Reviews and Submissions
What separates great books from the rest? Below are articles with insights from real reviews and contest submissions—what works, what doesn’t, and how to improve your book. You’ll also find a wide range of articles covering writing, publishing, marketing, and more. Each article has a Comments section so you can read advice from other authors and leave your own.
Why Some Books Win Awards (And Most Don’t) — Insights From Real Contest Submissions
What separates award-winning books from the rest? After evaluating contest submissions across a wide range of genres, certain patterns become clear. Some books consistently rise to the top. Others, even with strong ideas and clear effort behind them, fall short. The difference is rarely dramatic—it...
What We’ve Learned From Reviewing Hundreds of Thousands of Books (And Why Most Don’t Stand Out)
After reviewing and evaluating books across thousands of submissions over the past two decades, certain patterns become impossible to ignore. Some books immediately stand out to reviewers. Others—even well-intentioned ones—fade into the middle or fall short. The difference is rarely luck. It comes down to...
How Characters Lie Differently to Friends, Strangers, and Themselves New!
Here's a useful character test: ask your protagonist the same uncomfortable question three times, once in front of a stranger, once with their closest friend, and once when they're completely alone. You probably shouldn't get the same answer. People lie for different reasons depending on who is...
The Petty Grudge: Using Tiny Resentments to Build Big Characters New!
Here's a simple character test: what completely insignificant thing does your protagonist still hold a grudge about? Maybe someone always takes the seat beside them on the morning shuttle. Maybe a colleague once borrowed their favourite tool and returned it slightly damaged. Maybe their brother...
How to Give a Character a Secret They Don't Know They Have New!
Most secrets in fiction work because the character is hiding something from everyone else. But there's a rarer, sharper kind: one the character is hiding from themselves. This is the buried truth, the fact they've built an entire personality around avoiding. It might be a forgotten...
What Your Character's Browser History Says About Them New!
Here's a surprisingly useful character test: imagine someone gets access to your protagonist's browser history. What would they learn that the character would never admit out loud? The answer can reveal far more than a page of backstory. People search for things when they are...
How to Write Alien Accents Without Weird Spellings New!
Have you ever opened a sci-fi novel and encountered dialogue like, "Yesss, huumaan, I am verry pleased to meet youu"? The writer wants the character to sound alien, but the spelling makes the reader spend more time decoding the sentence than listening to the character....
Future Slang Without Making Readers Cringe New!
Have you ever read a sci-fi novel where a character says something like "That's totally quantum, bro," and immediately felt the future disappear? Future slang is one of those details that can make a world feel incredibly lived-in or painfully artificial. The problem is that writers...
How Does Your World Punish Criminals? (Without Using Prison) New!
Every society draws a line between forgivable and unforgivable, then decides what happens to the people who cross it. Locking someone in a cell is the default answer in most contemporary fiction, mostly because it is the answer we know from real life. But prison is...
The Grandparent Test: How Does Your World Treat Old People? New!
Think of the oldest person in your story's world. Not the wise mentor who conveniently dies in Act Two, but an ordinary elder just living out their days. How does the world treat them? Are they cared for, feared, discarded, or worshipped? This single question,...
What Do Teenagers Rebel Against in Your Future Society? New!
Here's a simple way to test whether a futuristic society actually feels real: ask what its teenagers are angry about. Not what they are supposed to be angry about. Not the obvious dystopian government or evil corporation. Ask what makes a sixteen-year-old slam a bedroom...
The Restaurant Test: What Does a Stranger Order in Your World?
Here's a quick way to check whether a fictional world actually breathes. Drop a stranger into a diner, a tavern, or a food stall, and watch what they order. This small, ordinary moment does more worldbuilding work than a five-page appendix on politics or currency...