The Writers Chair

Jenna Moreci's YouTube channel almost didn't happen. She scripted ten polished, bleeped-out, professional-sounding videos before posting a single one — and none of them worked. Then, mid–bachelorette party, she posted a...

Jonathan Yanez quit his job, cashed in his 401k, and burned every safety net he had — all before he told his wife. The first month of self-publishing, he made thirty cents. Eight years later, he runs a full-time...

A Big Five editor once called Helen Scheuerer to say she loved her manuscript and wanted to pass it up the chain — but it would take four to eight weeks just to hear back. Helen was already close to self-publishing. She...

She took a perfectly good mug out of its shipping-safe box to fit it into a prettier presentation box for her Kickstarter — and broke two mugs before they even reached backers. It cost her $20 a mug to replace them...

In February 2023, Clare Sager was filling out day job applications. Her income had tanked after the post-lockdown "Great Correction," her savings were gone, and going back to full-time employment felt less like a...

For a while, Johnny B. Truant wrote 1.5 million words a year — the equivalent of the full Harry Potter series, plus another half, sitting on a shelf every twelve months. Then it stopped. Not from burnout, but from a...

She once deleted a character she genuinely loved — a warm, likeable hippie who was lovely in every scene — because "lovely" was all he ever did. His lines worked better coming out of someone else's mouth, so out he...

<p>There's a difference between scaring a reader and haunting one — and most horror writers never stop to think about which they're actually doing. Scaring is a jump on page 40. Haunting is the thing that's still in...

There's a difference between scaring a reader and haunting one — and most horror writers never stop to think about which they're actually doing. Scaring is a jump on page 40. Haunting is the thing that's still in your...

<p>Four years of ebooks, Amazon ads, and feeding the algorithm — and Dan is done with it. Not dramatically. Just honestly. In this behind-the-scenes episode, Daniel and his co-writer R.P. Howley take stock of where...

Four years of ebooks, Amazon ads, and feeding the algorithm — and Dan is done with it. Not dramatically. Just honestly. In this behind-the-scenes episode, Daniel and his co-writer R.P. Howley take stock of where Devil's...

<p>Writer's block doesn't exist. That's not a provocation for the sake of it — Jasper Bark will tell you exactly who invented the term (a Freudian analyst who blamed it on potty training) and why the only cure for not...

Writer's block doesn't exist. That's not a provocation for the sake of it — Jasper Bark will tell you exactly who invented the term (a Freudian analyst who blamed it on potty training) and why the only cure for not...

<p>Dan Howarth didn't set out to write a novel about far-right violence tearing communities apart. He set out to write what he knew — the north, the landscape, the idiotic magnificence of men — and the wound was already...

<p>Kayleigh Dobbs turned up to her first horror convention too nervous to speak to anyone, accidentally called Ramsey Campbell "Mr. Ramsey," and somehow came away with a fire lit under her that she hasn't stopped...