thewritingcoach's podcast

In episode 152 of The Writing Coach podcast, writing coach Kevin T. Johns shares four simple tips writers can implement to help set themselves up for long-term success. Listen to the episode now!

In episode 151 of The Writing Coach podcast, writing coach Kevin T. Johns covers three techniques writers can use to create and benefit from momentum with their writing. In this episode, you'll learn: Why writing a book is like recovering from surgery What writers can learn from Jerry Seinfeld The power of visual representations of success Why not every scene needs to be a smash hit And much more!...

In this episode of The Writing Coach podcast, I'm thrilled to interview my client Helen Pilz who just published her sweet Christmas romance New York Snow and Turquoise. Today on the podcast, I am speaking with my coaching client Helen Pilz about the release of her sweet Christmas romance story, New York Snow and Turquoise. Born into a U.S. Air Force family, Helen lived in many places around the wo...

Most writers are creative individuals filled with thousands of wonderful ideas. This creativity obviously serves writers well when it comes to developing ideas for stories. Unfortunately, that same creative spark that stimulates the initiation of a writing project is the same instinct that inspires writers to jump from one project to the next without ever finishing and publishing anything. In this...

It's Remembrance Day here in Canada and Veteran's Day in America, so in today's episode of The Writing Coach podcast, we explore veteran authors and discuss how their experiences in war may have impacted their fiction.  Listen now!

Many beginning writers want to write a long book. There seems to be some sort of belief that long equals good. Yet, as this episode of The Writing Coach podcast demonstrates, some of the greatest novels ever written are rather short. In this episode, I cover more than a dozen of my favourite books, all of which are under 60K words long. Listen now!

No one does anything alone in this world. It takes collaboration, support, and community to make anything happen. That's why I get so frustrated with the endless perpetuation of the myth of the solitary author. You know what I am talking about: the writer who goes out into the woods alone with nothing but a typewriter and a bottle of whiskey, and then, months later, returns from their cabin of sol...

In the last episode of The Writing Coach podcast, I outlined my six-step roadmap for creating and publishing a book. As I mentioned in that episode, I believe the most difficult stage in that entire process is writing the first draft. That existential battle with the blank paid can be epic. Too many writers start out strong on the manuscript and then crash and burn for a number of common reasons....

Writing coach Kevin T. Johns outlines his six-step road map for creating and publishing a book. 

Social media provides writers with the opportunity to connect with writers from across the world. But is the type of community social media provides really what writers need to find success? Or are platforms like Facebook and Twitter doing more harm than good when it comes to writers achieving their literary goals? I discuss the dangers of social media for writers in this week's episode of The Wri...

Whether you're recovering from illness, worn out after a long shift at the day job, or simply not maintaining energy levels the way you did when you were younger, every writer faces periods of low energy. That said, if you want to continue to make consistent progress on your writing, you need to develop strategies for combating those low-energy days. In this episode of the Writing Coach Podcast ,...

As a writing coach, everyday writers come to me asking how they can improve their writing. Using "Active Voice" is one of the easiest ways to improve the quality of any piece of writing. Sentences written in Active Voice organize words so that the  subject  of the sentence is doing the  action , not the  object . Confused? Don't worry, I break it down for you in this episode of  The Writing Coach...

Many writers draft an entire manuscript before learning the fundamentals of the art form. When they come to me looking for editorial advice, only to discover their characters lack an arc, and/or the book's theme is murky, and/or both their scenes and story as a whole lack structure, and/or the story doesn't demonstrate clear causality, and/or any other of a number of common problems that can emerg...

Writing a book is a complicated process and figuring out where to start can be confusing, especially for new authors. Some writers start with character. Some writers start with a theme. Filmmaker and painter David Lynch starts with transcendental meditation! In this episode of The Writing Coach , I describe the perfect way to begin developing a story and exactly where you should start. Listen to t...

Amazon's billion-dollar streaming series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Powe r has now been released . . . and it's not very good. In this episode of The Writing Coach podcast, I explain the biggest problem with the show and then describe how you can avoid making the same mistakes when developing and drafting your fiction writing. Listen now!

I love these kinds of episodes. I just love it when one of my clients works hard, makes steady process, and keeps with it through all the highs and lows that go into creating a book. Then, one day, the book is launched, and I'm able to interview them here on the show as a published author! Today is one of those days. In this episode of The Writing Coach podcast, I speak with my client, author Phil...

There are, of course, many ways to go about writing a book. But having worked with hundreds of authors over the last decade, I'm absolutely convinced the most efficient, effective, and productive way of doing so is by planning ahead. Knowing where your book is going, who it's about, what it has to say about the world, and why readers are going to love it before you even write the first page frees...

Conflict is central to storytelling. But too often when I tell my coaching clients that one of their scenes needs more conflict, they think I mean"big" conflict. They think of building exploding, dragons being slain, and lovers breaking up. Conflict, drama, and tension, however, do not require life and death stakes to evoke emotional resonance with a reader. In this episode of The Writing Coach po...

Everyone deserves a vacation from time to time. We all need opportunities to rest, unwind, and recuperate. For writers, however, vacation time can cause quite a dilemma. I am pretty sure it was our literary friend Hamlet who once said, "To write, or not to write while on vacation? That is the question!" In this week's episodes of The Writing Coach podcast, we tackle that question, and I share my a...

Every night I read to my daughter. The Hobbit, Harry Potter, The Dark is Rising . . . Most recently, I've been reading her The Pages Turners trilogy (written by yours truly).   It got me thinking about the process of rereading our own work and how our opinion about what is good, and what isn't, changes over time. In this episode of The Writing Coach podcast, I discuss how the ever-changing perspec...

If you've listened to my podcast, taken one of my courses, read one of my books, or just spend more than twenty minutes around me, then you probably know I'm a big Star Wars fan. That said, I was less than thrilled with the recent Obi-Wan Kenobi series, and it left me pondering the state of writing and storytelling on streaming television shows. In this episode of the podcast, I discuss two differ...

Do you "Wake Up Exhausted" like Tegan and Sarah song? Do you relate to Post Malone's "always tired" tattoo? Has age or health problems reduced your energy levels? Do you lack the energy to do the writing you want to do?   If so, this episode of The Writing Coach podcast is for you! In this episode, I discuss productivity, time management, and dealing with reduced energy levels.  Listen now!

My group coaching programs First Draft (for writers working on their first draft) and Final Draft (for writers in the revisions process), include a weekly question and answer session and group discussion. These are agenda-free sessions where the writers in the group are given the opportunity to discuss whatever writing-related challenges they are dealing with or topics they have on their minds. In...

No writer wants to be told by a doctor (or anyone else) that they need to step away from the keyboard for any period of time, or, worse yet, that they require surgery on their wrists. All the same, carpal tunnel syndrome remains a real and significant risk for writers. That's why, in this episode of The Writing Coach podcast, we discuss not only the importance of wrist health and good ergonomics f...