D. Thomas Minton
writes speculative fiction from an undisclosed location in the Pacific Northwest.
Tag Archives: Writing Craft
Balancing Character, Plot, and Setting
Whew, it’s been a busy couple of weeks, and I see I haven’t posted anything here in a while. That’s not the end of the world or anything, but I made a commitment to keep posting here, even if it’s only … Continue reading
Creating vs. Analyzing
One of the things I like about National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, is I have to write fast to make it. Writing 50,000 words in 30 days means I need to average about 1,700 words a day, every day, … Continue reading
Characters: Easy as One, Two, Three
Characters are the staple of fiction. A story doesn’t exist without something that resembles characters (human or otherwise), and the more interesting the characters, generally the better the work. If I’m not interested in the characters, then a story seldom holds my … Continue reading
Feeling Tense? You Should Be
I’ve reviewed several stories for other writers recently, and it’s gotten me thinking about tension. I’m not a lit major and I don’t profess to know anything about the scholarly side of writing. If it wasn’t taught in English 101, … Continue reading
What Idiot Hunts Vampires at Dusk?
I don’t watch much television, but I’ve watched a couple of shows over the past few days (they will remain nameless to protect the guilty) whose incredibly lazy writing drove me nuts. All of its characters did stupid things to … Continue reading
Read-aloud Editing
As anyone who’s been reading my site for a while has probably noticed, I’m a terrible copyeditor. My posts are filled with typos, missing words, and all sorts of other errors. I know I’m a poor copyeditor, and knowing this, … Continue reading
Your Editor is Your Friend
An editor should be a writer’s best friend. A good editor can take a decent story and help the writer make it a very good, or even great, one. I’ve had the opportunity to work with several editors that I … Continue reading
Posted in Writing
Tagged Editing, Editors, Lightspeed Magazine, The Schrödinger War, Writing Craft
4 Comments
Pushing Through to “The End”
I know a lot of writers, myself included, who have a hard time finishing stories (are you nodding as you read this?). I don’t think this an unusual problem. Writing stories is a lot like running a race. At the beginning, … Continue reading
Killing a Story Through Revision
I mentioned last week that I was working on a story that I thought needed “one more pass” before it would be finished. It was a story I have been working sporadically on for over a year. I’m happy to say … Continue reading
Prompting Me to Write
I’ve been asked on many occasions where I get my story ideas. As those of you who read my author’s notes like know, I don’t have a single answer to this question. I don’t have an idea-generating machine or magic … Continue reading
Posted in Writing
Tagged Hoodoo, Observations on a Clock, Strand in the Web, The Schrödinger War, Writing Craft
3 Comments
