If there’s one thing the internet does right, it’s allow you to learn to do basically anything you want. “How To’s” are just as much a part of the internet as funny cat videos, and they’ll actually give you amazing value.

When I decided to complete my first novel, I wanted to get as much background as possible before making too many amateur mistakes.

Today I’m going to share what I consider the best of the best that youTube has to offer for amateur writers learning the craft.

1. Ellen Brock.

Her channel is infrequently updated, but the content she has posted is priceless. Her video on “filtering” saved my novel from one of the biggest issues that would divorce the reader from my character, and it was a problem I didn’t even know existed until I saw her video. She is clear, succinct and her blog fills in a lot of the gaps in her videos.

2. K.M. Weiland

There are two things I understand about K.M. Weiland and one thing I don’t. First, she presents a constant steam of excellent writing advice on youTube, Twitter, and her blog, and second does so with amazing professionalism. The thing I don’t understand is why her youTube channel seems so undiscovered. The view counts are way too low for the level of content she provides! Plus, how the heck does she do all those videos with no jump-cuts? Damn!

3. Joanna Penn (They’re all going to be women aren’t they?)

When it comes to interviews on any writing topic under the sun, Joanna Penn is the gold standard. What makes her videos different from Ellen and K.M. Weiland is that Joanna’s tend to be closer to an hour than 3-5 min. I find that it makes her videos particularly good to watch while getting some cardio in on the stationary bike. She provides a wealth of free information and truly walks the walk of being an indie-author and professional creative.

4. Katytastic

Kat O’Keefe is a “BookTuber” who is also an aspiring author. She’s written and queried many manuscripts, but remains, as far as I know, unpublished. Which saddens me just a little, because her enthusiasm for the craft of writing is so inspirational. Honestly, I’m not a BookTuber watcher, but her nanowrimo video vlogs always get me in the writing spirits. Often when I just don’t feel like writing, I fire up one of her nanowrimo vlogs and after 8 minutes, I know what I have to do: Sit down and “get those words.” So grab a cup of coffee, a prepare for a little fun-crazy-time with Kat.

5. Mandi Lynn

Mandi Lynn is another BookTuber and author. She has a unique story in that she wrote her first novel at a very young age (13 y/o) and over the course of high school, had it professionally edited, re-wrote it some huge number of times, queried it, and decided to self-publish and video document the whole journey. It makes for a hugely interesting series with some great advice and recommendations along the way.

Tally them up…Yup, all of them are women. Does that say something about me, the internet, or writers? I don’t know, but surely I left someone off the list. Who am I missing? What great youTubers are there consistently churning out great writing advice/motivation?