Your story is sacred. It springs from your very essence: your subconscious mind, which has recorded everything you’ve ever experienced and questioned, dreamed about and grieved for. The resulting p…

...but is that experience a launch pad or a rocket stage whose fuel is spent?

Detail creates story movement by inviting the reader into your story’s experience. Sometimes. If you apply that detail indiscriminately, it’s equally possible that you’ll entangle your reader and d…

First-time authors: discover how developmental editing transforms your manuscript and craft. Read more to master your story.

This coming year, I’m choosing to believe: in my work, in my fellow creatives, in the quiet miracles that happen when we show up with joy.

(with a Boxing Day giveaway)

Is your story starved for energy? I’m Kathryn Craft, and from two decades spent helping clients develop their stories—let alone from my own struggles—I know hard it can be to nourish a novel that h…

Even in 2025, AI can’t match a skilled editor’s insight, nuance, and care. Human editors bring heart, vision, and true partnership to every story.

We here at WU believe in fiction’s power, and work every day to improve how we wield it. But many of life’s real events can be spun into equally engrossing stories. This raises a quandary for…

by Kathryn Craft “To expand the reader’s perspective is one of literature’s highest callings. Memoir would be pointless without it. Perspective pervades a journalist’s best quotes, energizes speeches,...

We are incredibly excited to bring you an interview with longtime WU contributor and writing coach Kathryn Craft, featuring a book that we know will be a huge boon to the WU community, CRAFTING STO…

Want to extend an invitation to readers to stay immersed in your story? Us too! Here are 5 techniques from veteran author and editor Kathryn Craft to help.

If your book is on this list, watch out for these common pitfalls

When first setting out to write in a novel’s long form, it’s a relief to learn that after the inciting incident, the episodic nature of each scene carries the same structure: the POV character purs…

If writing voice is part word choice, part genre-driven, and part worldview, it would seem safe to deduce that one’s writing voice is as individual as their thumbprint. And yet it has constantly am…

...and my book is in production!

The day after my first presentation at the Pennwriters conference in Pittsburgh last month, I woke up without a voice. Zippo—not even a squeak. That was…special. I had only 24 hours to get it back …

NO KINGS is a mass mobilization in response to increasing authoritarian excesses and corruption from Trump and his allies. On June 14th, we’re showing up everywhere to say no thrones, no crowns, no ki...

This month, we're highlighting stories of resilience and strength. From historical fiction to modern thrillers, the women in these stories reveal their true courage and tenacity when deeply personal c...

“That was the moment I knew that I loved him.” This was a line I recently read in a published novel. I can’t recall which one, but it’s generic enough that it really doesn’t matte…

ANNOUNCEMENT: We’ve extended the balance-due deadline for the popular “half now, half later” payment option from May 31st to August 31st. Our hope is this helps you to attend Keepers of the F…

Its as true in dance as it is in story: movement is a transfer of energy. In dance, energy moves from one muscle to another, from dancer to partner, from performer to audience member. In story, it …

...from a 12-year-old underground fighter

After a string of heavy reads last fall, I wanted to get swept away in some pure entertainment. I figured the light pink, flowery cover of the 2016 mega-seller by a romance author I hadn’t ye…

After a string of heavy reads last fall, I wanted to get swept away in some pure entertainment. I figured the light pink, flowery cover of the 2016 mega-seller by a romance author I hadn’t ye…