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Writing is a job. It's fun. It's trying. It's hard. But if you're committed to getting published, you have to put the work in. Come to Novelmasterclass.blog to get tips, read and watch interviews and book reviews, and learn how to write.
THE LOSSES
A novel
"I've just read Cully Perlman's hefty, ambitious, and radiant debut novel, The Losses, and I was flat knocked out. This is much more than a promising first novel by an inordinately gifted writer; it is a dazzling literary achievement. Perlman is an enchanter, casting his spell with lyrical prose, evocative details, and spellbinding characters. He explores familial chaos, reckless behavior, and tragic love with poise, savvy, and tenderness. What talent, what nerve, what a wondrous and spellbinding novel."
--John Dufresne
Is It Worth It to Query Literary Agents in 2026?
More and more agents are closed to queries or are only open to queries via referrals. Which means you shouldn’t waste your time querying them. They won’t likely read your query, and it’s possible you’ll just be considered a rookie or annoying. It’s like putting a no soliciting sign on your door and still having the Avon representative knocking at your door. If Avon is still a thing—I have no clue and I’m not even going to bother to Google if it is.
Cully Perlman
7 days ago9 min read
How to Write First Drafts of Novels in Weeks or Months
The shortest time it took me to write a first draft of a novel is three weeks. That’s writing all day every day, including weekends. I get that way sometimes, where I have a lot to say about some topic or other, and the stars align, writing-wise. It doesn’t always happen, but when it does, it’s pretty special. It’s a magical feeling I get where I sit down, I start writing, and the writing does not stop. For anything. Not to watch a TV show or movie. Not to read. Not to do any
Cully Perlman
Dec 9, 202510 min read
NovelMasterClass’s 200th Blog Post – What Makes a Writer a Writer?
NovelMasterClass’s 200th Blog Post – What Makes a Writer a Writer? Today’s a special day. Today is NovelMasterClass’s 200th Blog Post – What Makes a Writer a Writer? It’s a milestone that’s taken just over three years to accomplish, and I’m proud of what I’ve done in that time. Today marks the two hundredth post thrown up on NovelMasterClass.com . We’ve had interviews with some great authors, professors, and nonfiction writers, and we’ve learned plenty about the craft of writ
Cully Perlman
Dec 1, 20257 min read
WRITING THE BEGINNING, MIDDLE, AND END OF a NOVEL
Two days ago, I completed another full edit of a novel I’ve been working on for 23 years (yes, 23—that’s not a typo). I have a beginning I sort of like. I’ve worked on it again and again for over two decades. The beginning of my novel, which deals with the mental trauma experienced by a young boy in a small town, trauma that naturally follows him through the rest of his life, including during WWII and upon his return home, starts out with a lot of violence. Things change.
Cully Perlman
Nov 4, 20257 min read
A Letter to Writers
We live in a time when some of the greatest books every written have been “banned.” It’s a direct attack on the First Amendment under the guise of “protecting children.” Of course, this comes down from the top, and the top is a man who has had to pay a woman for having raped her. It comes from a man who calls his victims liars. A man who has created a country where if you’re not white and republican, you’re the enemy, and so he’s terrorizing anyone brown-skinned, or from othe
Cully Perlman
Nov 2, 20255 min read
IS FINDING TIME TO WRITE IMPOSSIBLE?
Finding Time to Write is up to You. We're all Busy. We all have Jobs. Ask Yourself This: Do I Really Want it? For some people, the answer is absolutely. For others, not so much. I bring this up today because someone in one of the writing groups that I’m a part of on social media made the comment that they weren’t able to start anything because they weren’t going to be able to finish it, or something to that effect. They have a full-time job (I don’t even think they have kids,
Cully Perlman
Oct 28, 20256 min read
5 Motivational Writing Tips to Get You Back to Work
So, on this beautiful Friday (it’s beautiful where I’m at and looks to be pretty nice all over the U.S., though Tropical Storm Melissa looks like it’s becoming a hurricane), I want to share 5 motivational writing tips to get you back to work.
Don’t Edit While You Write. Now, I’m sure you’ve heard this one before, and you know what it means. But it doesn’t have to be a full-on, abandon that adverb that sticks out like a sore thumb sort of “don’t edit.” Take that thing out!
Cully Perlman
Oct 24, 20255 min read
7 Writers and the Jobs They Did Before Becoming Famous
We all have jobs, us writers, most of us before we write and after we've published. Most of the writers (some pretty well known) can't support themselves on writing along. So, they teach at MFA in creative writing programs, in business, in whatever. In America, writing doesn't hold the same weight as it does in other countries. It's just a fact of life.
What do you do while you try to become a fulltime writer?
Cully Perlman
Oct 21, 20255 min read
The Complexities of Writing Literary Novels
In literary fiction, plot often takes a back seat to character. The focus is on the interior lives of protagonists—their fears, desires, contradictions, and growth. Creating nuanced, believable characters is a complex endeavor. It requires empathy, psychological insight, and a willingness to confront uncomfortable truths. Literary novelists must avoid stereotypes and stock figures, instead drawing on memory, observation, and imagination to breathe life into their creations.
Cully Perlman
Sep 25, 20255 min read
New Journalism and Norman Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song versus Capote’s In Cold Blood
Mailer’s opening goes straight into the characters. Capote’s straight into a description of the landscape. In Mailer’s opening, the key sentence is “That was Brenda’s earliest recollection of Gary.” Which immediately allows us to hypothesize that her “recollection” is likely faulty. Capote’s opening is much more based in objective fact, however adjective heavy. I’m not saying either is right or wrong; but Capote’s opening is more in line with “reporting” than is Mailer’s. Tru
Cully Perlman
Sep 23, 20259 min read
I Haven’t Written a Word of Fiction in Two Months, but It’s Not Writer’s Block
Norman Mailer said writer’s block was a “failure of the ego.” Hilary Mantel and others recommend getting away from the desk and engaging in other activities to get the juices flowing. (Hilary Mantel died in 2022, but she said it when she was alive!). Jack London said you must actively pursue inspiration rather than waiting for it. And Anthony Trollope made sure he stuck to a strict schedule so that he produced writing consistently. You do what you must.
Cully Perlman
Sep 16, 20255 min read
Three Years of Writing About Writing
Writing is a Solitary Venture, But it's One That WE Learn by Reading, Writing, and, Ideally, via Generous Mentors I started Novel Master...
Cully Perlman
Sep 9, 20255 min read
Isn't it Ironic? Maybe Not.
My daughter, who’s much more intelligent than I am, noticed the issue about two seconds in. “That’s not ironic,” she said, which 1) made me proud how quickly she picked up on the error, and 2) made me wonder how the lack of irony in those lines was allowed to make it past whoever was in charge of making sure the examples in the song were, indeed, ironic.
Cully Perlman
Sep 3, 20255 min read
The Hunt for Your Literary Agent
Literary agents are the middlemen and middle women between you and the trade publishers, often referred to as the Big 5—Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, and their imprints, meaning the smaller publishers beneath them (there are also . Of course, you can go a different route, e.g., self-publishing, using a vanity press, hitting the independent publishers like W.W. Norton, Graywolf, Akashic, Algonquin . . .
Cully Perlman
Aug 15, 20253 min read
Is My Idea a Short Story or a Novel?
What’s the underlying message I’m trying to communicate? Is it faith versus doubt? Government overreach/government against the people? Man/woman versus self? Revenge? For me, it’s likely a good combination of all of those and various/many? more. It’s just how I write, and from what I’ve read, most writers are (intentionally or not) doing the same. i.e., incorporating more than a few themes, either in their shorter works or their novels.
Cully Perlman
Aug 5, 20256 min read
What's a Memoir?
Authors, or better, memoirists, seek to tell their story. They write, or set out to write, non-fiction about their lives, or certain years and events in their lives, and they do so by trying to write a compelling narrative that makes the events they find important or of public interest in their histories interesting to their potential readers. I’ve known many aspiring memoirists, most of whom are getting ready to retire or have retired and now want to capture some of the magi
Cully Perlman
Jul 22, 20255 min read
Learn How to Write Fiction
Read Widely. There’s no substitute to reading good books on the craft of writing but also books in the genre you want to write in (assuming you’re writing fiction). Read with intention. Read out of your comfort zone. As Francine Prose says, Read like a writer. That means focus on what’s working and what’s not working. How does an author make you feel emotion? What words does the writer use? How do they create the worlds in which their characters live?
Cully Perlman
Jul 15, 20257 min read
Having Trouble Coming Up with Your Own Writing Style?
When I wrote my first novel, I copied the style directly from Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. As most writers (I’m guessing) do, I didn’t realize that you couldn’t do that. That the style of the novel was Kerouac’s and that I couldn’t just pilfer it for my own novel.
Cully Perlman
Jul 9, 20256 min read
Don’t Waste Time Writing or Reading Novels You Don’t Love
So, what’s the fastest way to not waste your time when it comes to reading books? Don’t read the ones that don’t pull you in after a page or two. Or twenty. Your time is valuable, and there’s no sense in completing a novel if you aren’t enjoying it. Yeah, I know, I get it. Lolita is great! Never finished it, though I’ve started it probably thirty times. You haven’t read Vanity Fair by Thackeray? Nope. Doctor Zhivago? Sorry. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy? Well, I di
Cully Perlman
Jul 1, 20256 min read
Cutting Your Novel Down to Its Essential Components
As writers, we dive deep—into our emotions, into the research we conduct so that we get every detail correct, every accent right, and that we pull from our readers the emotions within them that will keep them interested and thus keep them reading. To do that, we must focus on the book we’re trying to write. We need to understand that we have a central character that wants something and who goes after it, despite opposition. She never stops seeking what she wants, no matter wh
Cully Perlman
Jun 4, 20255 min read
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