Derek MurphyAuthor of 38 Articles

I once spent an entire afternoon staring at a single paragraph—an angry little block of text that refused to...

I once slogged through the first half of a novel that started off brilliantly—there was a murder, an eccentric...

The first act of a novel is all about disruption—the protagonist’s life is thrown off course, they’re...

Ever open a book’s flap, read one sentence, and think: Okay, I need to see how this ends? That’...

Every great story has a moment where the protagonist crosses a threshold—where they step into the unknown and can’...

First chapters are brutal. They have to do everything—hook the reader, establish the protagonist, set up the world, hint...