Tag Archives: Writing Craft
The Little Story that Couldn’t
I suspect every writer has a story that they really believe in, and try as they might, they can’t seem to sell it to anyone. Mine is a flash story that I wrote about eight years ago, and has had … Continue reading
Posted in Inspiration, Writing
Tagged Rejection, Short Story, Submissions, Writing Craft
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The Writing Doldrums
I write at several lengths, from flash fiction to short stories to novellas and novels. Each length presents its own challenges, but one thing that I find common to all lengths is something I call the “writing doldrums.” In almost … Continue reading
The Challenge of Putting Music into Words
One of my current works in progress is a young adult book about a group of teenagers in a band who need to use their musical prowess to stave off Armageddon. It’s sort of a Percy-Jackson-meets-King-Crimson story, where the plucky … Continue reading
Posted in Inspiration, Writing
Tagged Collaboration, Work in Progress, Writing Craft
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Rounded Characters and Compelling Arcs
The success of a story often hangs on the presence of a compelling character. When I first started writing fiction and submitting it to magazines, I was fortunate to receive feedback from editors (perhaps they recognized my newbie status) via … Continue reading
A Few Thoughts on Collaboration
Writing tends to be a solitary endeavor. Most stories and books are written by a single person during which they conceive, develop, plot, write, and edit in a near vacuum. While many writers may open their work to others for … Continue reading
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
