Written Well

Writing is hard. We make it easier.

We are a team of full-time independent authors, here to teach you how to quit your day job and write for a living.

Not sure how to get started writing your first book? Don’t know why your finished book isn’t selling?
We can help.

Written Well teaches all the skills you need to succeed as a self-published author. From the first seed of an idea through writing, editing, publishing, and most importantly, selling your books, we give you multiple paths to learning including courses, articles, videos, and more. Sign up now for 33% off your membership, or take a look below at the many skills and services we offer.

Meet Our Lead Instructors

All of our instructors are full-time independent authors. This means that we have actually used every skill, technique, and secret we share inside to start and maintain our writing careers.

Contact Us

Feel free to contact us and ask any questions you might have about the site.

The Heart of Our Site: The Genre Guides

Learning is not attained by chance. It must be sought for with ardour and attended with diligence.

Abigail Adams

This is where Written Well really outshines its competitors. We understand that from genre to genre, there can be big differences in how to effectively approach writing, designing, and advertising a book. That’s why we have complete guides to every major genre and most of their subgenres. We show you how the bestsellers in that genre are structured, what POVs and tenses they commonly employ, and how long they typically are. We list the tropes to use, what cliches to avoid, and the elements a book must have to be considered part of the genre.

We examine the covers closely, tracking font and color trends, size and placement of author name and title, and what these and the other cover components signal to potential readers. We list popular story structures and provide blueprints and story builders to get you started. We look at top sellers and break down their Amazon listings, looking for commonality in their descriptions and blurbs’ tone, structure, and use of bolding and italics.

And we do this for every genre.

But we’re not done. We examine the business, breaking down the last twelve months of the genre’s performance to gain perspective on where it’s trending and whether it’s a good genre for an indie to work in. We do a monthly live industry report detailing the trends and opportunities we’re seeing, both short-term and long, with time for questions at the end — because learning is at its best when it is interactive.

And we’re still not quite done.

Finally, for every genre, there are further study materials: books to read, sites to visit, resources both live and virtual that will be of help for a writer working on a book in that genre.

We spent a lot of time putting these guides together, and we update them constantly so that they stay current. If you’re writing a book without the information we’ve gathered — and continue to gather — for you, it’ll be like you’re typing with one hand behind your back.

The Written Well Courses

The more of wisdom we know, the more we may earn. That man who seeks to learn more of his craft shall be richly rewarded.

From The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason

From the basic skills of writing to the intricacies of publishing to the art and science of promotion and advertising, the Written Well Writing Courses teach you the knowledge and critical skills you need to succeed in self-publishing. We’ve got a complete course on writing a novel from an award-winning author. We’ve got lessons on the indie mindset and day-to-day operations of a self-published writer from an author who has been full-time for a decade. And we’ve got explanations of the analytics and math in running profitable ads from a math whiz who has won over a million dollars as a professional poker player, an occupation he has written many books about.

You need these skills. We teach these skills.

Forums for the Serious Independent Author

Writing is a solitary pursuit, but that doesn’t mean you have to do it alone. We provide a moderated area for discussion, critique, and the occasional cry for help. While there exist other places for these kind of things online, we believe ours to be the best because everyone is here for the same reason: a love of writing and a wish to be successful at it.

A single conversation across the table with a wise man is better than ten years mere study of books.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

The Written Well forums are the lifeblood of the site. When we post a new article or video, it gets a topic for discussion on it. There are topics for different genre discussions, promotion ideas, marketing plans, and a spot to promo your own releases or Kickstarters to other members. If it sounds like a lot, it is, but everything is clearly marked and explained, and moderators are there to help you if you get lost.

Along with reading widely, discussion is vital for authors. Without other writers to talk you, they turn insular, become rigid in their style, their voice, their choices of character and theme. Written Well authors remain flexible, an excellent trait for both creativity in your work and the ability to insure that work is sellable. Because we want you to both here: create beautiful books and make money doing it. And to do that, you need to be a creative, flexible author, one who knows how to write and how to sell.

Don’t know how to do that? Ask someone on our forums. They will help you out.

Help Forming Critique Groups

There is no other kind. If it’s not gentle, it’s not critique; it’s just bullying.

Written Well Founding Member Adam Stemple, on gentle critique

A fundamental truth we at Written Well believe is that if you want to improve as an author, you need to know how to both receive and deliver critique. Having critical eyes on your manuscript early and often can make the difference between a story that soars — and sells! — and one that never gets off the ground. And reading others’ manuscripts often helps you as much as it helps them, as you often spot mistakes in their work you may have missed in your own.

At Written Well, we show how to start and run a critique group, how to set rules and standards for your group, and what to do if someone doesn’t stick to them. We teach you how to be a good member of a group, how to give advice that is pointed yet kind, because our philosophy is that if it’s not kind, it’s not critique; it’s just bullying.

Rules of Critique

Our instructors have been in dozens of groups, as leaders and members. From groups of friends who shared an interest in writing to invite-only pro groups whose members have more awards and accolades than fill the shoeboxes in Stephen King’s attic. (Okay, maybe not that many, but at least a dozen major genre awards). We’ve worked with all kinds of authors in all different genres and we know what works and what’s harmful.

Weekly and Monthly Events

We’re not just written courses, videos, and forums. We also put on weekly and monthly events. Writing sprints, presentations, business reports, panels, AMAs and more are put on right through our website — you don’t even need Zoom to attend!

A Few of Our Events

• Writing Sprints — A Written Well instructor leads members on timed “sprints” where everyone attending writes for a timed period and compares word count and notes at the end.
• Business Reports — Once a month, when Amazon releases their numbers, we crunch them and identify trends and opportunities and present them in a short video.
• AMAs — A Written Well instructor or a special guest answers member questions live.
• Panels — When we get a group of guests and a subject suggested by our members, we put them all together and talk about it.
• Presentations — Our instructors and guests have special skillsets. We invite them on to talk about them.

Check out a short demo

There’s a lot more to that video and all our monthly business reports, as well as more instructors, more topics, more special guests, and more information about the art, science, and craft fo writing, publishing and selling your books.

We work with: