Writing Archives - Page 2 of 4

Building up to a book

Chad S. White on March 14, 2026

Writing a book is a major accomplishment that few people can claim. Taking the next step and trad publishing or self-publishing is an even bigger accomplishment, because so much more is required. It’s a long, long road that can take many years to traverse.

Bird by bird

Building the confidence that you can complete such a long journey is step one. When I wrote my first nonfiction book, Email Marketing Rules (1st edition), I’d already written more than a thousand articles and blog posts. It was no coincidence that I modelled that first edition after Michael Pollan’s Food Rules, which is essentially a collection of short blog posts.

I knew I could write what turned out to be 108 rules and put a nice wrapper on it, because I’d already written 10 times that number of articles. In fact, like many nonfiction authors, I mined some of those articles to create the content for the book. Beyond that, the challenge was how to organize the content into sections that created a logical flow from topic to topic. I spent more than a year collecting notes, and then an intense 3 or so months to write and edit it.

In Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, she talks about working your way through big projects bit by bit … or rather, bird by bird. That was absolutely my experience with all five of my nonfiction books. However, the experience with the two novels I’ve written so far was different.

Flight by flight

If I can expand on Lamott’s analogy, I wasn’t just describing each bird. I had to create several birds, harness them all, and fly them in different combinations from one place to another. And not just any place, but to pre-determined destinations.

Admittedly, in a number of cases, the birds took me to some places near where I’d planned to go, and often took detours or otherwise improvised. It turns out, directing a gaggle of birds is tough. They often have ideas of their own.

So, while writing nonfiction books first absolutely gave me the confidence I needed, novel-writing is nowhere near as straightforward. It’s no exaggeration to say that a novel involves a hundred times more variables and therefore decisions than a nonfiction book. For me, investing a lot of time in plotting was key, even if my birds introduced a bunch of wrinkles to the plot that I hadn’t planned from the beginning.

How to generate writing momentum

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

Confession: This is where I do all of my writing and editing

Chad S. White on March 8, 2026

While I do a fair amount of notetaking in notebooks, my Notes app, and on Post-its, once I start writing and editing, I’m 100% at this desk, which used to be my grandfather’s. It was the desk he used while working at Tesoro, an oil company in San Antonio. The company gave it to him when he retired and it was in his study until he passed away when I was in high school. I always admired it and was able to convince my parents to give it to me when I moved to New York City for grad school.

It’s now home to many of my writing essentials, including my personal computer, which shares a 32-inch monitor with my work laptop; notebooks for each of in-progress novels and series; a fresh pack of Post-it notes; and my current reads pile and one of my TBR piles. As you’ve seen in my videos, my bookcase of novel-writing books is behind my chair. Oh, and I have a big fluffy bed tucked under the edge of my desk for Peppa, our pug. (And yes, she derps all the time, even when she’s sleeping.)

On some level, I’m envious of folks who can write on their back porch or in a coffee shop, but I need consistency and quiet. I can’t see that ever changing.

Confession: I love Post-it notes

Confession: I love em dashes

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

This vs. that: Novel-writing books

Chad S. White on February 28, 2026

I’ve read more than 40 books on novel-writing and publishing. Every book has been worthwhile, but some books are more worthwhile than others. To help you prioritize and make good reading choices, I’d like to do some head-to-head comparisons.

First up, I want to compare The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell vs. The Writer’s Journey by Christopher Vogler. Believe it or not, The Hero with a Thousand Faces inspired The Writer’s Journey. However, The Hero with a Thousand Faces is a deep, deep dive into myths from around the world. Great sourcing. A deep, deep dive. The Writer’s Journey breaks down storytelling, breaks down characters. It really gives you the tools you need to make a great story.

Next up, The Fantasy Fiction Formula by Deborah Chester vs. How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy by Orson Scott Card. How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy really covers a lot of the basics—not a lot of deep knowledge—but it’s a very solid primer. The Fantasy Fiction Formula goes much deeper, gives you way more tools. There are exercises in here—lots of helpful stuff about plotting, about characters, about all the key elements you want to know about when writing a great science fiction or fantasy novel. This is the one you want.

And then lastly—and this might be the most controversial—Stephen King’s On Writing vs. Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird. Now, I hear On Writing recommended a ton. However, for me, I really didn’t see myself in here at all. You know, it’s great that Stephen King—who’s obviously massively accomplished—but it’s great that he has all this free time to structure his day, to structure his weeks to get the most out of it. I didn’t find a lot of useful advice here since I am not already an established author who’s doing it full time and has all this time to structure my life. I have a day job and I just didn’t see myself in here at all, whereas I did see myself in Bird by Bird. I found this way more helpful. So, for me, this is the one to read.

I hope that helps you make better reading choices. Again, all these books are worthwhile, but those are my picks.

Book review: ‘The Writer’s Journey’ by Christopher Vogler

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

Confession: I love Post-it notes

Chad S. White on February 21, 2026

I use them all the time. My desk is littered with Post-it notes. If you’ve wanted any of my video book reviews, you know that I use Post-its to mark the really important sections of books that I’m reading. I also use them as bookmarks and then I just tear them in half when I want to mark a page as being particularly important.

My friends and family members know that I love Post-its as well, so they give them to me as gifts, including these really cool ones. And although this technically isn’t a Post-it, it’s transparent so you can put it over copy in a book and then you can write on it to circle or point arrows at exactly what you want to highlight.

I have Post-its on my desk and in the hallway and on my nightstand so that anytime I have an idea I can quickly write it down and not lose it. I also put them directly into my notebooks when I am, you know, looking to record ideas. So I’ll just stick them right in the notebook along with everything else.

So I use them constantly all the time. I probably go through a pack or two a month. I really love Post-its.

Confession: I’ve written all my books in Microsoft Word

Confession: I love em dashes

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

How many point-of-view characters is too many?

Chad S. White on February 6, 2026

My dystopian sci-fi trilogy (WIP: T.A.G.) has a large cast of characters, including a female and male protagonist. Those two are the point-of-view characters for most chapters, but not all. A variety of secondary characters have POV chapters and scenes. And the antagonists have multiple scenes in each book where they’re driving the perspective. In total, I have nine POV characters in book 1.

Full disclosure: It was 11 before my developmental editor advised me to cut two of them that were one-offs. One didn’t have enough payoff, while the other one spoiled some suspense.

Justifying the need for so many POV characters

From the beginning, I envisioned my trilogy as being cinematic in its presentation. So, having multiple POVs opens up opportunities for cut-scenes, where you get more than one perspective on the same action, as well as perspectives on action taking place away from where the protagonists are. Several of my beta readers spontaneously said they could see the story as a movie or TV series, which means they were totally picking up the vibe I was going for.

Those additional perspectives allowed me to show some of what Deborah Chester, the author of The Fantasy Fiction Formula, refers to as the hidden story. That’s the part of the story that’s occurring away from the protagonists. I find it’s a great way to build suspense by forecasting danger for our heroes.

While everyone loves a good plot twist, a lot of tension can be created by forecasting danger—being careful not to spoil things by being too specific. It makes readers anticipate and worry about what’s coming, especially when you set a countdown for the calamity to hit. Forecasting has the secondary benefit of warding off the disbelief that can accompany some surprises.

Another reason I’m enjoying having so many POV characters in this story is that it’s full of antagonists in gray, rather than straight up villains in black. I want readers to understand my antagonists and there’s no better way to humanize them than to put readers into my antagonists’ heads.

Characters have to earn a POV role

In an issue of Before and After the Book Deal, Courtney Maum said that the Big Five publishers are looking for: “Earned POV—whichever character[s] have a perspective in the book have a solid, plot-driven reason for having that mic time.”

In The Fantasy Fiction Formula, Chester goes a step farther. She says, “Each viewpoint besides the protagonist’s should be developed into a subplot.” That’s a high bar for sure. All of my point-of-view characters clear that bar except one, and I have a good reason for that exception.

Chester also says, “Ideally, a book of large scope needs no more than four viewpoints. A book of huge scale might stretch to encompass six.” Here I’ll claim that since my novel is the start of a trilogy totaling more than 260,000 words, the additional POVs are proportionally in bounds. Ultimately, I think all the POVs make for a richer world and—as my beta readers noted—a more cinematic story.

Villains vs. antagonists

How I use beta readers

TTo get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

Book review: ‘Understanding Show, Don’t Tell (And Really Getting It)’ by Janice Hardy

Chad S. White on January 31, 2026

This is a book my developmental editor recommended to me after reading my manuscript. I apparently had some opportunities to tighten up my third-person close perspective—and I’ll tell you, this book really helped me understand where I wasn’t quite nailing it.

Now, the book includes an appendix that lists all of the common red flag words that indicate you may be telling instead of showing. However, you won’t need to rely on that, because the book does such a great job of explaining telling versus showing that you’ll be able to easily recognize it when it’s happening.

The title promises that you’ll “really get it” and, for me, that was 100% the case. I give it 5 stars, 12 dog ears, and 2 Post-its.

It’s really about closeness to the POV character

It’s not that telling is bad all the time. Depending on what you’re trying to convey, sometimes a bit of telling can be faster and less awkward than showing. However, telling creates distance between the reader and the point-of-view character. It does that primarily by injecting the author in between the reader and POV character. That’s not ideal, because today’s readers want to occupy the POV character as much as possible.

Dialogue is the most natural way to show, not tell. I have a firm handle on that.

Description is another way to show, but the key is to filter the description through your POV character so their attitudes, tastes, and preferences color what’s being described. I wasn’t doing that all the time. In some cases, I just needed to remove tags like “he sees” and “she hears” and just describe the things seen and heard.

And the final way to show is through internal dialogue. I was the least consistent at using this tool.

A few things happened when I did an editing pass with a focus on using those three methods of showing, not telling:

My descriptions became more interesting because they also helped readers understand the POV character better
Replacing “told” reactions with internal dialogue led to more unique and colorful reactions that felt more organic and in the moment
Chapters got little tighter, with the manuscript dropping around 3,000 words overall

That may not sound like many words to cut from a 90,000 word manuscript, but it’s amazing how much faster a chapter reads when you take two unnecessary words out of this sentence and replace three okay words with great words in the next paragraph—and do that again and again and again.

Book review: ‘The Writer’s Journey’ by Christopher Vogler

Book review: ‘Story’ by Robert McKee

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

My favorite Substack newsletters on publishing

Chad S. White on January 10, 2026

Substack has a strong community of authors, editors, literary agents, and publishers. Here are some of my favorite Substack newsletters on publishing:

The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
by Bianca Marais, Carly Watters, and CeCe Lyra

These talented ladies create a lot of great articles about craft, in addition to doing interviews with authors. I particularly appreciate the pull quotes they include in their newsletter. I find inspiration from those even when I don’t get around to listening to the full interview.

I quote Paula Saunders’ interview with The Shit No One Tells You About Writing in Why are we trying to discourage aspiring novelists from publishing?

Counter Craft
by Lincoln Michel

I enjoy Lincoln’s musings on the publishing industry and his interviews with authors. He’s very down to earth, but also uses words like panopticon. Respect.

I quote Lincoln in Confession: I love physical books.

Craft with Kat
by Kat Lewis

Kat provides clear advice on tactical writing issues, often breaking issues down one by one. She gets bonus points for her series of articles on The D&D Method for Better Character Development.

The Creative Shift
by Dan Blank

Dan writes about book marketing and connecting with readers. I particularly enjoyed this article about clarity. Dan gets bonus points for sending 1,000 weekly newsletters over 20 years. Email respect.

Other Substack newsletters on publishing I recommend

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

Confession: I gained 15 lb writing my first two books

Chad S. White on January 3, 2026

Writing books is a long-term commitment to a solitary and sedentary activity. If you have a sedentary day job like me, then it can be a double-whammy for your health, as well as your social life.

Weight gain

After collecting notes for more than a year, I wrote my first book in an intense 3-month stretch. The 214-page first edition of Email Marketing Rules consumed nearly every night and every weekend. I gained 5 lbs. during the writing of it.

The second 322-page second edition of Email Marketing Rules took more than 6 months of nights and weekends to write. I gained 10 lbs. this time around.

It wasn’t just that I was sitting for 12+ hours a day. It was also that it was a series of sprints—pushing to get a draft out to beta readers, pushing to get a round of edits done, pushing to get the jacket copy finished, and on and on. For me, hitting those deadlines meant lots of caffeine and sugar to fuel late nights.

Neglect of family commitments

At the same time, I also bowed out of various family outings and pushed more household responsibilities onto my wife Kate. She was understanding with the first book, but not so much with the second.

Kate is super-understanding and supportive, but it’s fair to say that, after 6 months of shouldering an outsized percentage of parenting and household duties, she was pissed. She also knew this wasn’t my last book.

I vowed to do better. I promised not to opt-out of family activities and to wrap up evening writing sessions by 9-ish. For the three subsequent nonfiction books I’ve published and two fiction books I’ve written, I’ve kept my word.

That has required longer time-horizons for books, but I think more planning and development has been better for the quality of my books as well. And it has certainly been better for my health, as I was able to drop all the weight I’d gained.

Resolve to write healthier

Some activities like writing can be hard on your body. Both real and self-imposed deadlines can make them even harder. As you set your goals for the year ahead, make sure you’re not unintentionally sacrificing your health or family responsibilities.

Related posts:

Confession: I love em dashes

Confession: I love physical books

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

Using unconventional formats, in small amounts

Chad S. White on December 6, 2025

Unconventional formats are story structures that eschew the typical narrative flow of traditional formats, such as the three-act play, the Hero’s Journey, or Save the Cat. They are often less concerned with chronological time flow. And they can allow for modes of communications that are much more casual or much more formal, which can be more revealing or less revealing, depending on the device used.

Unconventional formats include vehicles such as:

Letters, postcards, emails, and DMs (epistolary novels)
Diary entries
Obituaries
Blog posts
Social media posts and forum threads
AI prompts and outputs
Outlines
Transcripts and scripts
Legal forms
Police reports, disciplinary reports, case reports, and progress reports
Recipes
Instruction manuals
Lists

How I use these in my sci-fi trilogy

While entire stories can be written in these unconventional formats, I’ve enjoyed weaving them into my sci-fi trilogy (Project T.A.G.) to change up the storytelling mode. For instance, in book 1, a messenger delivers a letter that a character reads, reacting to every few sentences. Later, the MMC writes a letter home, commenting to himself as he goes about all the details he’s not including.

In book 2, the MFC struggles to write a letter to her father, saying too much and then editing it down to its simplest, irrefutable core. That rewriting process shows readers details and feelings that would have otherwise stayed hidden had only the final letter been included.

In book 3, one of the antagonists edits video content, including using strikethroughs to indicate word changes in the script. And later, to show the passage of time, one of the government leaders reads monthly tournament ranking reports—which is what I’m working on right now.

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →

Book review: ‘The Fantasy Fiction Formula’ by Deborah Chester

Chad S. White on November 16, 2025

I read The Fantasy Fiction Formula on the recommendation of my developmental editor and found it to be highly helpful. It covers all the fundamentals of novel writing, from formulating a story plan to crafting a story climax, but also gives you a lot of tools to understand those elements better.

For instance, it includes a lot of charts and lists, including ones for different types of opening hooks and different story roles. One of my favorite frameworks is SPOOC, which shows you how the Situation, Protagonist, Objective, Opponent, and Climax all work together. Having a clear SPOOC gives you a massive headstart on writing your query letter and jacket copy. The book also includes plenty of drill exercises.

I give it 5 stars, 20 dog ears, and 5 Post-its.

For my dystopian sci-fi trilogy, two concepts from The Fantasy Fiction Formula were particularly helpful.

The moral dilemma

Chester says that “a well-written third act requires the protagonist to be cornered and forced to deal with some kind of inner dilemma. … Whatever the inner dilemma happens to be, passing this part of the final test requires the protagonist to reveal their true nature and face the internal problem squarely.”

Moral dilemmas feature prominently in the climaxes of each book in my dystopian sci-fi trilogy. But after reading Chester’s advice, I tweaked the climax of Book 3 to make the dilemma even more stark and the resulting cost even higher. [evil laugh]

The hidden story

Novels often contain as many as three story lines, says Chester.

The ongoing story
The back story
The hidden story

This was my first time encountering this concept, which I found fascinating. Chester explains that the hidden story is “running parallel to the ongoing story, although most of the time it’s not on view. Readers are unaware of it, but writers have to know what’s happening off-stage to their nonviewpoint characters.”

Fundamentally, that makes perfect sense. Of course, things are happening that you aren’t showing. What I found really interesting was that I was routinely revealing the hidden story, particularly with my antagonists.

In other craft books, I’d read about writers cheating their way to big twists and surprise reveals by artificially withholding information. Instead of being impactful, these can make readers feel cheated. Moreover, they’ve robbed themselves of the opportunity to create suspense by revealing breadcrumbs of the struggles to come.

In my trilogy, I make the hidden story visible to create dramatic irony, which is when the reader knows more than the characters do. Then readers have to experience the tension of wondering if the heroes will avoid the coming danger (Nope!) and then painfully watch as danger blindsides our unsuspecting heroes.

That said, turnabout is fair play. And sometimes the antagonists are unaware of what our heroes have been up to and don’t account for that in their plans. [evil laugh]

Book review: ‘Story’ by Robert McKee

To get future posts…

Follow me on Instagram →

Subscribe on Substack →