How to Find Your Essay Voice

  Many students have trouble finding their “voice” while writing college application essays. One of the biggest problems I see is that students want to sound smart and impressive, and they often lose their natural story-telling voice by forcing in big...

Open Up: How to Connect with Emotion and Pathos

One of the best ways to connect with your reader in your college application essay is through emotion. In my new book, Escape Essay Hell!, I share writing techniques and devices you can use to bring pathos to your essay, and forge a bond with your reader. (With my...

Summer Reads for a Narrative State of Mind

College Application Essays Fun Reads to Inspire your Storytelling Skills   Nothing helps you channel the style and voice of narrative writing than reading it. Writers, like Cupcake Brown, are masters of telling true stories in a fictionalized style. This is what...

How to Find and Write Anecdotes

College Application Essays In Search of an Anecdote Just yesterday, one of my tutoring students, a high school junior, wanted help on her English assignment: To write a practice college application essay. One tip from her teacher was to tell a story. (I first...