About The Author

Katie Salidas is a USA Today bestselling author and RONE award winner known for her unique genre-blending style.

Since 2010 she's penned five bestselling book series: the Immortalis, Olde Town Pack, Little Werewolf, Chronicles of the Uprising, and the all-new Agents of A.S.S.E.T. series. As her not-so-secret alter ego, Rozlyn Sparks, she is a USA Today bestselling author of romance with a naughty side.

In her spare time Katie also produces and hosts a YouTube talk show; Spilling Ink. She also has a regular column on First Comics News where she explores writing from a nerdy perspective.

Take Advice with a grain of salt.

As a writer, you are going to hear advice from everyone. Almost all of it is well meaning, and much of it is good. However, it may not always apply to you or your current scene. Take everything with a grain of salt and really weigh out whether or not it is really applicable.

Case in point.

I'm writing a scene where my character has been blindfolded and tossed in a car.

A critiquer suggested my scene did not feel real enough because they didn't get enough description of the surroundings.

Well, if I had taken that advice at face value and rewrote the scene detailing the car, it's interior, as well as the desert landscape the car was driving through, I would have gone out of my POV.

The advice was well meaning and did help to remind me to use the other 4 senses, but would have been wrong to take at face value.

Remember with your POV, when following a character in 1st or 3rd limited, you can only be intimate with that character. If they can't see, your narrator shouldn't be seeing and describing things either.

Now, just because that advice wasn't applicable in this situation, doesn't mean I couldn't take something from it.

Remember we have 5 senses and need to use them all when writing.

Though this character I wrote was blindfolded and kidnapped, she could still sense other things. Wind buffeting against the car, bumping and thumping of the ride, the direction of voices all around her, the direction the car turns. All of this can still be described to the reader to help complete the scene.

So really look at advice you get from critiquers or anyone in general. See what you can take from it and if it really applies. Use it or not, that's your choice.