Infodumps – those long passages of narrative summary that provide a huge wodge of background or plot development or characterization – have an undeservedly bad reputation among would-be writers. The allergy to infodumps is a bit of stylistic advice which is largely peddled to beginning writers, but
Read more →I seem to have acquired a reputation as some sort of worldbuilding maven, probably based on the Fantasy Worldbuilding Questions I came up with as a personal crutch during my middle career. I don’t actually think the reputation is deserved – really, it should belong to someone
Read more →Getting good comments on a work-in-process is hard. In part, this is because a) many writers think that only other writers can/will provide useful criticism, b) most people are not writers, and c) people may be very good writers and still be very bad at providing critique.
Read more →Last Saturday there was a meeting of the local Mythopoeic Society, at which they planned to discuss Thirteenth Child. They very kindly asked me to attend, and spent considerable time arranging to have the meeting on a date when I was sure I could make it. And I
Read more →Writing is difficult to talk about. I mean the real thing, the stuff that happens when you are sitting there with your paper and pen or your computer or your stone tablets and chisel and telling a story. We talk about bits and pieces of writing all
Read more →Theme is something I’ve been thinking about for years, because it’s one of those writing things that I can’t seem to ever quite grasp when it comes to my own writing process. Thanks to my excellent high school English teachers, I can pick out and analyze themes in
Read more →So I’m working along, facing my third deadline extension, way behind on everything, with lots of vital-or-at-least-urgent non-writing stuff going on. I FINALLY get past the exceedingly sticky argument scene I’ve been poking at for the last two months, and on into the next bit of wandering-around-the-settlements.
Read more →People make time for the things they love. That is why I am always a bit skeptical at first when people tell me that they can’t write because they have a day job…especially when their day job is a relatively non-demanding 40 hours per week. People have
Read more →As I said in our last exciting episode, there are two kinds of novel outlines writers do: the sort meant to sell a manuscript to a publisher, and the sort meant to help the writer write the book. This post is about the second kind. The first
Read more →“Outline – 1) A line showing the shape or boundary of something; 2) A statement or summary of the chief facts about something; 3) A sketch containing lines but no shading” – Oxford American Dictionary If you want to be a professional novelist, odds are that sooner
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