Melanie Kirk
Junk Words to Cut From Your Novel
This blog post is partly inspired by having recently re-edited my own 2018 novel. Four years of distance have allowed me to read it with...
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Melanie Kirk
- Apr 14
- 3 min
How to Use Dialogue Tags in Fiction
What is a Dialogue Tag? A dialogue tag is a short phrase used to denote when a character is speaking, for example “he said”/“she...
Melanie Kirk
- Mar 3
- 3 min
January/February Round-up
What I’ve Been… … Working on January is always a slower month work-wise, so I’ve been taking the time to work on my professional...
Melanie Kirk
- Jan 25
- 4 min
How to Format Thoughts in Fiction
If you’re writing a novel or short story, it’s highly likely you’ll have included your characters’ thoughts at some point. There are lots...
Melanie Kirk
- Dec 2, 2021
- 3 min
Filter Words - How to Reduce your Word Count and Tighten up your Prose
One super simple way to tighten up your prose is to watch out for filter words and phrases. What do I mean by filtering? ‘Filter words’...