Building Community

Need a writing buddy who writes magical realism, fabulist, or speculative fiction? Or just want someone to talk craft with who appreciates when the unexpected and spectacular coexists with reality? You’re not alone—that’s why I started this free service. When you write magical realism, speculative, fabulist, or genre-bending fiction, it can be hard to find writers who get you, which is why I want to help! I work with writers just like you, and I love helping fabulous people find each other.

Fill out the Make Literary Magic Author Match form and I’ll add you to my directory of writers. When someone who meets your social and literary preferences comes along, I’ll connect you! It’s that simple.

Writing Craft Resources

Craft in the Real World by Matthew Salhesse is my favorite new craft book. This is useful for everyone who works in publishing—writers, editors, agents, everyone who tinkers with words and keeps the gates. If you’re a white, straight, cisgender, able-bodied person who works in publishing, like I am (more or less), this book should go to the top of your reading list.

Story Club with George Saunders is a Substack for writers, and it is a total delight. Seriously, Saunders is incredibly generous with his time and knowledge. There’s a paywall for certain content, but there’s so much free content delivered to your inbox that you might not notice. If you’re not a fan of Saunders, can you still enjoy this? Absolutely. If you haven’t read his novel, Lincoln in the Bardo yet, well, it’s really really good.

The Art of Fiction by John Gardner is a classic and is full of standard literary advice. Readers should be warned that the works of primarily white, male authors are referenced in this book as examples and that Gardner is a bit of a brute. But, you’ll find classic Western literary guidance in this book that, at the very least, is worth considering, whether you decide to follow it or not.

“What is Head-hopping, and is it Spoiling your Fiction Writing?” is a helpful resource on head-hopping by editor, Louise Harnby.

“The Basics of Point of View for Fiction Writers” by Joseph Bates covers the basics in POV and will help you wrap your head around the details if you’re struggling to stay in the viewpoint character or decide on a POV for your story.

“Formatting Text Messages in Fiction” is a great article by CMOS Shop Talk that will help you make decisions about formatting text messages in your fiction.

“Formatting Thoughts in Fiction” is another helpful resource from CMOS Shop Talk that will—you guessed it—help you format thoughts in fiction.

“How to Write Accents in Fiction” is an article by editor Louise Harnby that offers excellent guidance on how to handle character accents in dialogue or first-person narrative in a way that is respectful to your characters and their cultural background.

“When Characters Speak: Formatting Dialogue” is an article from CMOS Shop Talk that offers guidance on formatting dialogue.

Traditional Publication Resources

“Start Here: How to Get Your Book Published” is the first thing you should read if you aren’t familiar with the publishing process. You’ll see a lot of articles by Jane Friedman on this resource list because Friedman provides straightforward, easy to digest information that comes from a place of knowledge and experience, and she routinely updates her resources.

“How to Write a Novel Synopsis” by Jane Friedman will make the woeful task of writing a book synopsis a little less dreadful.

“How to Write a Book Synopsis” by literary agent Carly Watters, is a concise list of best practices for writing the book synopsis.

“The Complete Guide to Query Letters” is everything you need to know to draft your query letter. Because the query letter is so important, I recommend having an editor who offers query letter editing look it over before you start sending it out. I’d be happy to help you with your query letter if you get in touch.

Manuscript Wish List is an organic way for you to find a literary agent who’s looking for a book like yours. Agents share exactly what they’re looking for, which is helpful, since what they’re looking for changes all the time.

Query Tracker is a the go-to site to help you find a literary agent.

Literary Agents of Color is exactly what it sounds like—a directory of literary agents of color.

Pitch Wars tells you everything you need to know about how to participate in #PitMad. This is a great way to put your book into the aether and hopefully attract the attention of a literary agent.

Query Shark is an excellent resource for learning how to revise your query letter if you’re on a budget and can’t afford to purchase this service from an editor. If this seems overwhelming, I offer this service.

The Shit No One Tells You About Writing is a podcast that covers a lot of ground in publishing, but it’s also a great way to learn about what agents are looking for in a query letter.

Publishers Marketplace is an excellent, paid resource that probably has more info than you’ll ever know what to do with. It features everything that’s going on in the publishing world—every book deal, every agent, every publisher. It has monthly pricing, so you can always sign up for a month and poke around.

Finding Comps seems to be the dread of every author. But this article written by Star Wuerdemann demystifies the process for you. Comps (comparable book titles) are really important to literary agents, so it’s critical to get this part of your query letter right. It shows them you did your homework, you’re professional, and it tells them where on the shelf they can envision your book in their local indie bookshop.

Self-Publishing Resources

“Start Here: How to Self-Publish Your Book” might be the best place to start the learning process if you’re considering self-publishing. This resource will help you avoid some classic mistakes.

The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi) is a paid, worldwide membership association for self-publishing authors. There are a lot of great benefits for members.

The Independent Author Network (IAN) is an affordable, paid network that provides book promotion for its members.

This video created by Natalia Leigh shows writers self-publishing on a tight budget how they can format their book for publication directly in Word. Natalia has a lot of great resources on her channel for authors looking to self-publish.

Vellum is an eBook creation software for Mac users. It’s not cheap, but it’s a one-time purchase fee (or rather it was when I created this resource page). It really does create beautiful ebooks, and if you plan to publish more than one book, it’s a great investment.

Atticus is an eBook creation software for PC users. If you want to DIY the formatting and have the money in your budget, then this will elevate the presentation of your book, assuming it’s been fully edited, of course!

This guide by Dave Chesson is an excellent resource if you really want to get into the weeds of book formatting.

Conscious Language Resources

Conscious Style Guide is an amazing resource for exploring all avenues of conscious language. Subscribing to their newsletter is a great way to stay informed about trending topics in conscious language.

Conscious Language Toolkit for Writers is an excellent resource for writers created by editor and authenticity reader, Crystal Shelley. This toolkit features entries on biased language usage that can be viewed as disrespectful to readers. The toolkit helps you understand why that language might be offensive and offers more conscious alternatives. I promise some of these entries will be new to you and will make you a more conscious language user. I own the Conscious Language Toolkit for Editors, and it’s an excellent resource.

Radical Copyeditor is run by Alex Kapitan and has some really useful blog posts on conscious language.

The Business Side of Things

The Business of Being a Writer by Jane Friedman will give you the no-nonsense truth about the business side of being a writer.  It’s not for the faint of heart.

The Poets & Writer’s Complete Guide to Being a Writer covers so many areas of being an author. I enjoyed this book so much. It’s informative and inspirational—just what every writer needs.

Before and After the Book Deal by Courtney Maum is excellent. This book tells you what to expect on the journey of traditional publication. Maum presents what could be a dry subject in a digestible, personal way that always holds the reader’s interest.