Beat the credit crunch – finish writing that novel!

How many wannabe writers have started writing their great epic only to lose the plot and give up?

Award-winning novelist Jean Saunders is your guide to getting published

There’s never been a better time to dig out that half-finished manuscript, dust it down and take inspiration from one Britain’s best-loved novelists.

Author and lecturer Jean Saunders knows the secret of writing and rejection.

In a writing career spanning more than 40 years, Jean has published more than 100 novels of all kinds from contemporary fiction and historical romance to crime and even erotica as well as 600 short stories. She’s best-known worldwide as Rowena Summers, the writer of many novels based in the West Country, and Rachel Moore, author of wartime sagas set in Cornwall.

But it wasn’t always so easy. “After having my first story accepted by a magazine I then had more than 40 rejection letters,” says Jean, who first started writing in the sixties when her three children were small."

“I know what it’s like to get turned down, but you have to take the advice given by editors and use it to improve.”
 
In her new book Successful Novel Plotting she shares that valuable inside knowledge. Using examples from her own work, and that of other top authors, Jean explains how to create memorable characters, generate cliff hangers and keep up a pace that will hook readers. She even gives advice on how to work with publishers and editors to make your novel a best seller.

Jean’s top tips for new writers:
 
1    Be a storyteller. Novels are about people, not just beautiful places. However exciting the background to your book, it's the characters' lives that are being told.
 
2    Be ready to take advice but remember your book is your baby. Revision is a part of the writing process and will always enhance your writing, but don't revise to death and take all the spontaneity out of your work.
 
3    Prepare to be rejected at first. Most writers are, but you may be one of the lucky ones who aren’t. Think of any rejections as part of the learning process. Brain surgeons didn't do it overnight.
 
4    Write visually, write logically, is my favourite piece of advice. Try to visualise your characters living their lives, and ask yourself if it's logical for them to behave the way they do.
 
5    Believe in yourself. Nobody knows your characters better than you do, so give them heart and emotions and all the human attributes of real people to make them come alive on the page.

About Jean Saunders - She started writing in the sixties when her three children were young. One of her first published books was a teen novel called The Fugitive.

Her WW1 saga Bannister Girls was short-listed for the Romantic Novel of the Year award. A former chairman of the Romantic Novelists Association, Jean now travels the world as a lecturer on creative writing. She also writes a monthly column for Writing Magazine. Successful Novel Plotting is the most recent in her series of how-to guide books for writers.

Jean lives in Weston-super-Mare with her husband Geoff and family.

If you would like to purchase Successful Novel Plotting by Jean Saunders Published by Accent Press available from Amazon Priced £6.99 - Click here