First things first: you can read the latest chapter of Loyalty Fallen here. In this chapter, Ren fights Xian yet again, this time, with no escape in sight.

And for today’s writing tips, we’ll talk about seven ways you can improve your writing in just half an hour per day.

1. Set a timer and reward yourself

I’ll start with the obvious one first. Use a timer to first give yourself a set amount of time to decide what to write, maybe 5-10 minutes depending on how tough it is to come up with ideas. Then simply write for the next 20. Every time you write for a full 30 minutes, reward yourself with a snack or a drink you enjoy.

2. Journal as your character

I’m not really the journaling type, though I know it can be great for a lot of people to get their thoughts and struggles on paper. However, I do enjoy pretending to be one of my characters and journaling from their point of view. It can give you a fresh perspective on scenes in your story, and if you’re stuck on a scene or you’re having trouble getting to the next chapter, it’s a good way to still practice your writing while you wait for inspiration to strike.

3. Look for writing prompts

There are plenty of places you can find basic writing prompts, including forums, books, and social platforms. I also recommend you head over to ChatGPT, which is an AI-based chatbot. While I don’t believe you should write your story with ChatGPT, you can ask it to provide writing prompts.

The nice thing about using ChatGPT is you can ask it to personalize for you and write prompts based on the idea that you only have 30 minutes to write.

4. Look up writing challenges on forums

I already mentioned forums, but some good places to look include Reddit, Scribophile, and Mythic Scribes. Scribophile has various groups you can use to find genre-specific challenges. Mythic Scribes has a weekly writing challenge that you can take a look at as well, though it’s specific to fantasy writers.

5. Head over to 4theWords.com

This website is a gamified writing app. You can write your stories while battling monsters and leveling up your character. There’s also a timer and word counter, so you can keep track of exactly how much you manage to get done in your 30 minutes.

6. Use Pinterest

Describe one photo/image per day on Pinterest. If you’re a fantasy writer, search “fantasy.” You can even go more specific and look for subgenres like steampunk, witches, dragons, and so on. Set a timer so you don’t spend too much time looking for images; limit yourself to five minutes or so to find the picture you want and then 25 minutes to write your description.

7. Typing.com

Many writers would find it a lot easier to get their thoughts out on paper if they had a faster typing speed. You can take free typing classes through typing.com, or you can take a look at nitrotype.com to compete with other typists who work at similar speeds to yourself. You’ll be amazed how much more you can get done and how much easier it is to make dialogue natural when you can type close to the speed some people can talk!

Bonus: StoryForge cards

Since these cost money and all the ones above are free, I figured I’d put this last. StoryForge cards cost $20 and you can find them on Amazon or on the dedicated website. I personally bought them through Amazon, so I’m not sure how trustworthy the website is. To keep yourself writing, pick one card or one spread of cards each day and just write based on whatever that brings up in your mind for the space of 30 minutes.

Final thoughts

I hope you enjoy following these suggestions to make your daily writing time more fun. In the meantime, please give this post a like and subscribe to the blog to get notified when the next post on how to find your writing community goes live.

Until then, enjoy Loyalty Fallen!