If you’re on the lookout for free resources on writing and publishing, you’ll find a treasure trove of helpful advice from experienced authors on YouTube. Since there are so many fantastic “Authortube” channels to choose from, we gathered a list of some of the most applauded, some of which have built up years of content and millions of views!
In this compilation, you’ll find tips and insider insights from traditional, hybrid, and self-published authors on craft, productivity, the publishing process, book marketing strategies, and more. We’ve featured one video from each author as an example of what they offer on their channel. We hope these videos give you plenty of inspiration!
1. The Creative Penn
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Joanna Penn has fantastic advice on navigating the self-publishing world, improving your writing, and making a living as an author. She’s written more than 40 books in various fiction and nonfiction genres and published an enormous library of content to her Creative Penn blog, podcast, and YouTube channel.
On her channel, Joanna reposts podcast interviews with other writers and publishing professionals or discusses her own author business. In this popular episode, she reflects on her 15-year journey and shares her plans for the future, inspiring other authors to dare to change course in their careers.
2. Hello Future Me
The voice behind the popular Hello Future Me channel is Timothy Hickson, video essayist and author of On Writing and Worldbuilding. As the title of his book suggests, much of Timothy’s content focuses on world-building, but he covers a wide range of topics applicable to any writer. You’ll dive deep into writing theory on his channel, but he brings humor and plenty of specific examples and case studies from books, film, and TV to make it fun and accessible.
In one such video, Timothy analyzes the themes and character relationships that make a fascinating revolution story, ending with clear takeaways you can apply to your writing.
3. Author Level Up
Author Level Up is a channel created by Michael La Ronn, author of science fiction, fantasy, and writing guides for authors and cohost of the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi) podcast. Michael publishes new videos every week on topics like writing craft, editing and formatting, productivity, and selling more books. He’s also posted a few of his audiobooks on YouTube for free! Some of Michael’s most popular videos are his easy-to-follow tutorials on book writing tools.
In this video, Michael reviews the outlining app Plottr to help authors decide if it’s the right tool for them.
4. Quotidian Writer
Diane Callahan, creator of Quotidian Writer, is an editor, writer, and gifted teacher with over a decade of editing experience. Her channel is rich with practical advice for aspiring authors who want to improve their writing, with each 30-minute-or-less video breaking down a specific topic like writing different perspectives, creating conflict, and avoiding plotting pitfalls.
Diane recently launched a new video series where she answers subscribers’ questions about how she writes. The video below covers the topic of starting new writing projects, answering questions like “What’s the most engaging way to start a story?” and “How do you approach returning to an old project?”
5. Rachel Writes
For authors who prefer learning from others’ experiences rather than watching educational content, or using YouTube to connect with other writers, we’d highly recommend Rachel Writes by literary fiction writer, editor, and designer Rachel Lachmansingh. Rachel uses YouTube to document her writing journey, and her weekly vlogs and live “write with me” videos are worth following for insights into her process and chats with her community. Also check out her writing advice series, covering a wide range of topics from combating writer’s block to writing diverse characters.
By viewer request, Rachel once bravely recorded herself drafting her novel! This video shows a clip of the writing session as she explains her process as a pantser.
6. ShaelinWrites
Shaelin Bishop, known on YouTube as ShaelinWrites, is a short story writer published in several literary magazines. Their channel, mostly geared toward new writers, is a mix of discussion videos and reading and writing update vlogs. Shaelin goes deep into the technical aspects of writing and editing, covering topics like improving your prose, finding your author voice, and editing your own work.
A great place to start on Shaelin’s channel is their compendium of top writing tips, for a glimpse into their personal writing style and a reminder of the fundamentals.
7. Brandon Sanderson
Brandon Sanderson, an award-winning and New York Times bestselling fantasy and sci-fi author, packs his channel full of practical advice on constructing a compelling narrative, including world-building, plot, and structure. Brandon has uploaded many of the lectures from his creative writing courses at Brigham Young University to his channel — which means you’re getting access to college-level education from an accomplished author for free!
In this excerpt from Brandon’s 2020 class at BYU, he discusses his brainstorming processes when generating book ideas.
8. David Gaughran
David Gaughran is a historical fiction author and industry expert in self-publishing and book marketing. He’s written several novels under the pen name David M. Gaughran and books for independent authors including Let’s Get Digital, Strangers to Superfans, and BookBub Ads Expert. David has also published hundreds of valuable free resources for authors on his website and via his newsletter, but if you’re more of a visual learner, you can find his detailed tutorials, tips, and advice on YouTube!
In this video, David covers all the best ways to sell books and where not to waste your marketing dollars.
9. Leslye Penelope
Fantasy author Leslye Penelope hosts the podcasts Ink and Magic (cohosted with Ines Johnson) and My Imaginary Friends, which she broadcasts live on YouTube. Leslye’s videos follow her journey as a hybrid author, covering her writing processes, the tools she uses, her sources of inspiration, and her tips for new and aspiring authors. She also has a monthly series of interviews with other successful authors about how their careers have evolved.
In the first installment of this series, Leslye chats with Mary Robinette Kowal about how she defines success, the importance of connecting with your audience, and more.
10. Terrible Writing Advice
Time travel sci-fi author J.P. Beaubien is known for sharing writing suggestions through creative animated videos highlighting what you shouldn’t do. According to the channel description, Terrible Writing Advice “offers only the most sincere and genuine writing advice delivered with absolutely no sarcasm at all.”
In a characteristically snarky video, J.P. skewers the cliches he sees in scene writing. He concludes with questions authors “shouldn’t” ask themselves when revising their scenes.
11. Heart Breathings
Heart Breathings was created for self-published authors by Sarra Cannon, coach and six-figure indie author of more than 25 novels. Sarra uses her 10 years of self-publishing experience to help other indie authors navigate challenges like maintaining motivation, overcoming blocks, balancing work and home life, and feeling overwhelmed. Her openness and compassion make watching her videos feel like getting pep talks from a dear friend!
Sarra is known for her 90-day planning method, and many of her videos focus on planning and organization. In this video, she shares her unique system for setting and following through on big goals for the new year.
12. Liselle Sambury
Liselle Sambury is a young adult author whose channel chronicles the ups and downs of her journey to becoming traditionally published. Her videos offer writing, publishing, and querying advice, with an honest look at her own experiences. Some of Liselle’s most popular videos are about outlining and plotting — her channel is a must for deep analysis of story beats! — and she is fun to watch for general writing motivation.
Liselle has an excellent series on using the popular Save the Cat plotting method. In the first video of the series, she shares the process she uses to create characters before she starts plotting.
13. Writing with Jenna Moreci
Once a stockbroker and now a sci-fi author, Jenna Moreci applies her unique background of business and marketing experience to help new authors achieve their career goals. Jenna brings charismatic energy (and warning: some profanity) to her videos on topics like hosting giveaways, writing an author bio, and how to price a book.
Jenna also provides great advice by asking smart questions of other authors, such as Angela J. Ford in this informative interview about book marketing and branding.
14. Bethany Atazadeh
YA author Bethany Atazadeh coaches authors via her YouTube channel and Patreon on writing, editing, self-publishing, book marketing, and more. Her upbeat and informative videos include her Author Money series, a collection of frank talks about how much she’s made and spent as a self-published author, and her Outline With Me series of livestreams.
In another popular video series, Bethany shares everything she’s learned about formatting and teaches authors how to format a novel using Word and other easy-to-use tools.
15. K.M. Weiland
K.M. Weiland, award-winning fiction and nonfiction author of several writing guides, including Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success, has been publishing writing advice online since 2007! She runs a YouTube channel, podcast, and blog of more than 1,500 posts about everything from story theory to sentence structure, and her advice is wonderfully clear and easy to apply.
In this video podcast, K.M. dives into the topic of creating a cohesive story from multiple plotlines. She talks about different types and well-known examples of multiple plotlines and offers practical tips for working with them.
16. Stephen Aryan
Award-winning fantasy author Stephen Aryan started his career in marketing before traditionally publishing his first book. In addition to writing 11 novels, he has compiled everything he learned about publishing in his nonfiction title Good and Bad Advice About Writing and Getting Traditionally Published. Stephen’s advice is often specific to sci-fi, fantasy, and traditional publishing, though he offers tips relevant to independent publishing, too.
Stephen also regularly interviews other authors on his channel. In this interview, he chats with Christopher Ruocchio about his influences, writing process, path to publication, and development of his series.
17. Lynn D. Jung
Lynn D. Jung is a speculative fiction writer and vlogger who documented the process of writing her first full-length book, the dark academia novel Moths. As well as writing updates, publishing advice, and tips for writing fantasy, horror, and romance, Lynn’s YouTube features the video series Project Moths, where you can see how the book was made from beginning to end!
In honor of finishing the first draft, Lynn recently posted this wonderful wrap-up video discussing what’s next and answering viewer questions.
Other great YouTube channels for authors
We’ve explored some of the best YouTube content by published writers, but you can also find a ton of value in perspectives from editors and other creative professionals. We couldn’t compile this list of excellent writing and publishing channels without mentioning:
- Overly Sarcastic Productions — Red and Blue, aliases for the creators of Overly Sarcastic Productions, are writers and professionals in the performing arts. The duo makes short, entertaining videos about myths, legends, and classical literature, including a popular Trope Talk series that can provide inspiration for tropes to use in stories.
- Ellen Brock — As an editor with experience in the publishing industry, Ellen has amazing insight into every stage of the writing and publishing process from outlining to querying agents, and she generously shares it in a lot more depth than you might see elsewhere on YouTube. Her channel is designed more to educate than to entertain.
- Alyssa Matesic — A former editor at Big Five publishing houses, Alyssa also brings insider industry knowledge to her channel. Like Ellen, Alyssa specializes in developmental editing, but posts videos on a wide range of topics. Her videos are short and snappy with lots of practical writing hacks.
There are many more amazing channels to discover on Authortube, but we hope this list gives you a good start! You can find more free writing and publishing resources in our list of podcasts for authors.
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