Having read Bellevue Square and The Innocents, I’ve been making my way through this year’s Scotiabank Giller Prize nominees, which brings me to today’s review, Dual Citizens by Alix Ohlin - a story about Lark Brossard, a dual American and Canadian citizen, and her journey towards motherhood.

Michael Crummey’s novel “The Innocents” has been shortlisted for Canada’s prestigious 2019 Scotiabank Giller Prize and for good reason. It tells the story of Ada and Evered, two young children orphaned when they were nine and eleven respectively off the coast of Newfoundland.

So if you really want to write fiction and novels, you must first write great characters. A great character should have at least 4 things mapped out: their physical characteristics, their distinct voice, their peculiar (and particular) habits, and their needs and wants. 

Whatever the case may be, this is a novel that is deliciously confusing and deserves a second or third read to unwrap the clues to the mystery that I missed the first time. The writing is beautiful, the characters layered and complex, and the story is one worth unraveling. 

What is it we’re really trying to achieve when we’re writing our novel? Is it “self-expression” or something more? The writer and teacher John Gardner has his own thoughts.

If you’re not growing, you’re dying. That’s the attitude you should take when it comes to writing. Learn from the greats, study others, and steal, because as Picasso (or was it Stravinsky or T.S. Eliot or Faulkner or Steve Jobs?). In this blogpost, I give you 10 writing tips from history’s greatest authors that you can steal today. These will help you finally finish that first novel you’ve been working on for 12 years.

John Williams’ Stoner is a novel that begs to be read multiple times—much like your high school year book begs to have the dust brushed off of it every so years. It is a book so full of nostalgia for a life you haven’t even lived.

The opening chapter of Ian Canon’s first novel “It’s A Long Way Down” which tells the destructive story of actor David Emmeret Smith on his downward spiral of drugs and depravity.

Just finished writing your first novel? In this blog, I show authors how to take a first draft and turn it into a completed, polished draft that will get you Amazon sales, literary notice, and more.

You’ve just self-published your first novel on Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) and you couldn’t be more excited. All that hard work has finally paid off and you’re an author now! Now it’s time to sit back and watch the sales roll in—but they don’t. What are you doing wrong with your advertising? How do you set them up differently?

A free short story by Ian Canon - Ever since I was a boy, I’ve always dreamed of stopping time, but I thought, “What would happen if time never unfroze?”

So I wrote a short story about just that. Enjoy “God Bless You, Philippe Audiarde”

Stephen King, in his book “On Writing” said: “If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.” But if you’re an aspiring writer writing your first novel and wondering what should you read, and how should you do it? Find out here.

Ian Canon goes through a simple, 2 step process for scanning your poetry and figuring out why some lines just aren’t working - counting syllables and checking plosives.

A short story by Ian Canon - a man plagued by agoraphobia stumbles upon a mysterious art gallery.

A short excerpt from Ian Canon’s first novel, “It’s A Long Way Down.”

The 7 step process I used to write my first novel, It’s A Long Way Down—a book you should be reading in 2020! Following my advice, you’ll be able to write your own first novel, then self-publish and start getting readers!

Ian Canon on the importance of journaling, how he does it, and why he thinks it's important for anyone trying to achieve success in their given field. 

The four pieces of literature — three fiction, one poem — that taught me, Ian Canon, that writing is an art, and inspired me to become a writer.

Ian Canon's three books on writing that taught him the most, which will teach the beginning writer how to write.

Drafts Of My First Novel, It's A Long Way Down