Famous last words: “I’m going to write something stretchy.” Good for you. Now, what do you mean by “something stretchy,” and exactly how are you going to do it? My definition of “something stretchy” is something I’m not sure I know how to do, and that I’m
Read more →Fiction writers, especially those who write science fiction and fantasy, are fond of asserting that the best of them ask the hard questions about life and the world. This is, by and large, a good thing in general. The problem comes when it gets down to specifics.
Read more →Happy New Year! Traditionally, no matter how or when it is marked, a new year means a fresh start: cleaning out the old, revving up the new, and getting the stuff that’s stalled a kick in the pants. Depending on where one is in life, this can
Read more →Holidays are part of every human culture we currently know about, going back as far as we have records. There are a few that are nearly universal – planting and harvest festivals, solstices, equinoxes. Unsurprisingly, these tend to be based around natural cycles of the sun or
Read more →Before you begin, I just want to mention that I will be taking the week off between Christmas and New Years. I’m not planning to move the next Open Mic day, so it will be in six weeks as usual. That’s holidays for you…
Read more →A long time ago, a would-be writer told me in all seriousness that the important things in writing were the action and the dialog. Things like description and setting were just window-dressing, things that were only important to “literary readers.” In the intervening years, visual media have
Read more →I recently read a story in which the writer had two villains whose respective plotlines had very different endings. One villain was heading for an action climax with a dramatic set-piece battle scene; the other was heading for an emotional confrontation ending in the revelation of all
Read more →Description in stories is fractal. No matter what the writer chooses to describe, there’s another level available if they want it. Describe a room: walls, floor, ceiling, furnishings. Describe the walls – stone or plaster, painted or natural, square or circular or irregular, empty or covered with
Read more →“How did you decide what viewpoint to use for your first novel?” I was more than a little bemused by the question, because that is one of many supposedly vital writing decisions that I don’t remember making, let alone angsting over the way the questioner obviously was.
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