Writing Disability From Experience with Crystal Seitz

Crystal joins Caitlin and Aliah to chat about her experience writing a main character that shares her own disability, and gives some thoughts that cou...

How to Write a Good Haunting with Lily Anderson

Caitlin and Aliah chat with Printz Honor winning author Lily Anderson about how to write hauntings and horror, tempering scary stories with humor, and...

Heists 101 with Caitlin Schneiderhan

What are the building blocks of a heist? Caitlin Schneiderhan chats with Caitlin (two of us! Correct spelling and everything!) to chat about her debut...

Seven Point Plot Structure: Romance Edition with Tricia Levenseller

Tricia Levenseller joins Caitlin to talk about how she plots romance, including a fun twist on Dan Wells' Seven Point Plot structure specifically for...

Setting as Character with Daniel Kraus

Throwback to when Daniel Kraus came on our show to discuss Whalefall!
DANIEL KRAUS is a New York Times bestselling writer of novels, TV, and fil...

Writing Characters with Marie Lu

Marie Lu is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Legend trilogy and The Young Elites trilogy (and lots of other fabulous books!). She gradu...

The Psychology of Characters with Eva Des Lauriers

EVA DES LAURIERS joins the Lit Service cast to chat about how she approaches writing characters based on her background in psychology and sociology an...

Character Building with Holly Black

Caitlin chats with Holly Black about building characters and her newest book The Prisoner's Throne.
Holly Black is the #1 New York Times bestsel...

How to Start Writing a Second Draft

What do you do once you've finished your first draft? Immediately send it to every agent and publisher you can find contact info for? Put it in a draw...

How to Write a Killer Ending

Caitlin, Aliah, and Kristen chat about how to approach writing a satisfying and exciting ending. 
Don't miss Caitlin's new release from Simon an...

Characters We’d Die For with Martha Wells

Martha Wells joins to podcast to chat about how to write characters your readers will love. Martha has been an SF/F writer since her first fantasy nov...

Raising the Action, Raising the Stakes with Margaret Owen

Margaret Owen joins Caitlin, Aliah, and Kristen to chat about how to help your action to rise naturally and how to raise stakes. 
Margaret is th...

What Needs to be in the Middle

Kristen, Caitlin, and Aliah chat about what goes into the middle of a book.

How to Stay Excited About Your Writing

We all hit moments where a shiny new project suddenly feels more like work. Aliah, Caitlin, and Kristen discuss strategies that allow the slog to beco...

What to Do with Writer’s Block

Aliah, Caitlin, and Kristen discuss how to keep writing when the ideas aren't coming.

What Needs to Be in a Beginning?

Aliah, Cameron, Caitlin, and Kristen discuss what is most important at the beginning of a book and how to go about approaching it in your own stories....

How to Start Writing a First Draft

Caitlin, Cameron, Kristen, and Aliah chat about how to begin writing and how to overcome some of the difficulties writers struggle with when starting...

Prewriting 101: Everything You Need to Write Before You Write

Novel Worthy Ideas

Aliah, Kristen, Caitlin, and Cameron kick of season seven with a new series on how to write a novel from start to finish beginning with how to come up...

Making Old Stories New with Marissa Meyer

Marissa Meyer joins Caitlin and Kristen to chat about how she approaches an adaptation, how to choose what to keep, what to get rid of, and where she...

All the Ways Your Liver Will Betray You with Tamsyn Muir

Tamsyn Muir joins Kristen and Caitlin to chat about alternative POV choices, non-consecutive timelines, meme culture, Women Who Suck, and all the othe...

Spinoffs with Chloe Gong

Chloe Gong joins Aliah and Caitlin to discuss the anatomy of a spinoff, how to approach writing an extension of your own world and stories that still...

Romantasy 101 with Stephanie Garber

Stephanie Garber joins Caitlin and Aliah to chat about "romantasy" and how to make it (or a developing romance in the book you are writing!) really si...

Surrealism with Britney Lewis

Britney Lewis joins the cast to chat about adding surreal elements to our stories in order to better articulate things that words can't quite describe...

Upping a Story’s IQ with Erin Beaty

Erin Beaty joins Caitlin, Kristen, and Aliah to talk about how to write stories and characters that are smarter than we are.
Erin was born and r...

Writing Different Voices with Jesse Q. Sutanto

Jesse Q. Sutanto joins the crew to chat about writing authentic voices for different age groups.
Jesse is the author of Dial A for Aunties, The...

Concise World Building with Holly Black

Lit Service was thrilled to chat with Holly Black about how to build a world, characters, and story in a more concise way. We have signed special edit...

Suspension of Disbelief with Emily X.R. Pan

Caitlin, Aliah, and Kristen chat with Emily X.R. Pan about magic in contemporary books and suspension of disbelief (as well as throwing down a gauntle...

Building Characters with V.E. Schwab

V.E. Schwab joins the podcasters to chat about how to build a character who is instantly sympathetic and fits into your story. 
A big welcome to...

The Publishing Rollercoaster with Kristen Ciccarelli

Kristen Ciccarelli joins Caitlin, Kristen, and Aliah to talk about how publishing journeys look from the inside and how to manage the rough moments an...

Bonus Episode: A Baker’s Guide to Robber Pie with Liana Tan

Actress extraordinaire Liana Tan joins Caitlin for a special reading Caitlin's middle grade fantasy debut,  A Baker's Guide to Robber Pie, which is ou...

Genre Bending with Tara Goedjen

Tara Goedjen joins the podcast to chat about the do's and don'ts of mixing genres. She's the author of The Breathless and No Beauties or Monsters whic...

Bonus Episode: A Deep Dive into Arcane

Join Caitlin, Kristen, and Aliah as they discuss some of the cool storytelling elements used in Netflix's new series, Arcane.
If you want to rea...

Some News!

Hello out there to all you lovely podcast listeners!
Thank you so much for your support and for listening during this exciting year! Hope you ha...

5.23 Magic as an Allegory with Adrienne Tooley

Adrienne Tooley joins the Lit Service cast to chat about why magic makes such a great tool for allegory in stories, especially when it comes to mental...

5.22 Working with a Publicist with Morgan Rath

Morgan Rath, senior publicist at Macmillan Children's publishing, joins Caitlin this week to talk about what a publicist actually does, what authors c...

5.21 Fake Politics

Aliah, Caitlin, Cameron and Kristen talk about constructing fake political intrigue in stories and how to make it interesting and peak amounts of "int...

5.20 Intro to Gothic Romance with Lyndall Clipstone

Lyndall Clipstone joins the podcast to chat about what gothic romance is and how to write it. Lyndall writes YA Gothic romance about monsters and the...

5.19 Nailing Character Stakes with Margaret Owen

Margaret Owen joins the Lit Service Crew to chat about character stakes, both personal and existential, and how to build them up so your readers minds...

5.18 How to Build a Scene with Ayana Gray

Ayana Gray joins the Lit Service Crew to chat about the nuts and bolts of building a scene, ways to ground your reader, how to balance different types...