New? Welcome. Let Me Save You Some Time.
If you’ve just arrived from a convention, or a friend’s recommendation, or because you typed something desperate into Google at midnight this page will get you to the right place quickly.
I’m Kevin Elliott. I write speculative fiction, and I help other writers do the same. I’ve been at this for fifteen years, through workshops, critique groups, convention panels, and one novel that took five years to finish. You can read more about me here if you want the full story, but let’s get you sorted out first.
Here’s what this site offers. Where you start will depend on where you are right now.
If You’re Just Getting Started
You’ve got a story idea. Maybe a world, maybe a character, maybe just a feeling that won’t leave you alone. But you haven’t written much yet, or what you’ve written doesn’t feel right.
Start with The Character Breakthrough.
Characters are the engine of your story. Get them right and everything else has something to hang on. Get them wrong and the best worldbuilding in the galaxy won’t save you. This guide gives you a practical system for building a protagonist with real depth, and you’ll finish it with 6 to 8 foundation scenes that can become the backbone of your novel.
And when you’re ready, move on to The Worldbuilder Workout to build the world around them.
If You’re Mid-Draft and Stuck
You’ve written ten, twenty, fifty thousand words. Something was working and now it isn’t. The story has stalled, or a scene won’t come together, or your characters have started behaving like damp cardboard.
Pick the guide that matches the problem.
My world feels thin or generic. You need The Worldbuilder Workout. It gives you five foundation documents that’ll make your setting feel lived-in rather than painted on. A few hours of focused work, and you’ll know your world well enough to unstick the story.
My characters don’t feel real. You need The Character Breakthrough. Jump to the section that matches your specific struggle. You don’t have to read it in order. If your protagonist does what the plot requires but they never surprise you, start at Section 1 (Core Spark) and work forward.
My action scenes are a mess. You need The Battle Blueprint. If the fight is vivid in your head but turns to mush on the page (geography blurring, tension draining, the reader losing track of who’s where, and so on) this guide gives you a repeatable system to fix it.
If You’re Revising
You’ve finished a draft. Great stuff. Most people never get this far, and I mean that. Now you’re reading it back and something feels off. The prose is competent but it could have been written by anyone. Or worse, it has that smooth, frictionless quality that has you worrying people will think you’ve cut-and-pasted something out of AI.
Start with AI-Proof Your Story.
Eight practical techniques for making your prose unmistakably yours. You can read it at breakfast and rewrite a scene by lunch. It’s the fastest way to close the gap between a draft that works and a draft that sings.
If You Want the Full Picture
The guides tackle specific problems. The full Writer’s Secret Toolkit course tackles everything. Characters, plot structure, worldbuilding, voice, dialogue, action, revision, and the business of getting your work into the world. It’s coming soon.
If you’d like to hear about it first, join the mailing list. You’ll also get craft tips, reading recommendations, and the occasional honest dispatch from the sequel that’s currently teaching me things the first book couldn’t.
If You’d Rather See My Work First
Absolutely. I’d rather judge a writing teacher by their fiction than their sales page, and you probably would too.
Lightmaker is my speculative fiction novel. It follows a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl, a born scientist in a world where curiosity is punished.
Go When the Light Turns Red is my short story collection, and it’s been described by the Sci-Fi and Fantasy Reviewer as deeply compelling and darkly humorous.
If you like what you read, you’ll know whether my advice is worth taking.
If You Just Want Free Stuff
I like you already.
Head to the blog, where I write about craft, about the reality of building stories in speculative fiction, and about whatever’s gone wrong with my sequel most recently. And if you join the mailing list, you’ll receive a free worldbuilding guide to get you started.
The Short Version
Here’s the cheat sheet.
Building characters → The Character Breakthrough
Building worlds → The Worldbuilder Workout
Writing action → The Battle Blueprint
Finding your voice → AI-Proof Your Story
Everything at once → The full course (coming soon)
Just browsing → The blog, and the mailing list
Welcome aboard. I’m glad you’re here, and I hope something on this site helps you write the story you’ve been carrying around.
Now go and write it.