Villains vs. Antagonists

Every story needs a “bad guy,” someone or something that gets in the protagonist’s way and keeps making trouble for him or her.  For instance if my life were a novel, the “bad guy” would be an impossibly cute 3-year-old ginger cat, whose offenses include: “Decorating” the living room with shredded articles of mail Skulking… Read more »

Prompt: Collect Story Sparks

Today’s guest article comes from Julie Duffy, founder of the StoryADay Challenge. Want to learn more about Julie? Check out this video interview I did with her earlier this week. Interested in trying your hand at writing a story a day? Go to the StoryADay website for more information. Your prompt: Collect three ‘Story Sparks’… Read more »

Prompt: Write Every Day for One Week

This week’s prompt is simple, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to be easy.  In fact, it’s pretty tough to do.  For one week, commit to writing every day.  Notice that there are no stipulations as to quantity or quality of the writing.  You can write as little or as much as you like, for… Read more »

5 Pockets of Time You Never Knew You Had

Not everyone can find long blocks of time for writing because real life often gets in the way.  If you are one of those writers who can set aside large chunks of time for your writing, that’s fantastic!  Even if you’ve got tons of time on your hands (…and don’t tell us if you are… Read more »

Productivity Tools for Writers

I love hearing writers talk about process and learning about new tools that can help my writing.  I’m especially a fan of things that lend a festive and fun element to my writing.  (Because let’s face it, a lot of the time writing is HARD.  Might as well make it fun.)  In this post I… Read more »

5 Ways to Liven Up a Description

This week, we’re talking about description and detail.  On Monday we established that Description Equals Does Not Equal Exposition.  Today we’re going to discuss how to make those descriptive passages more powerful.  Here are five tips, plus a writing exercise at the end to help you put them into action. 1) Engage the Five Senses…. Read more »

Description vs. Exposition

Dialogue is easy to spot because it has those nifty little quotation marks, but not all text that isn’t dialogue can be lumped together.  The difference between description and exposition can be tricky to determine but it is most definitely there.  The key is to remember this equation: How can we distinguish between description and… Read more »

Prompt: Make a Submission Schedule

This week we’ve discussed how to submit your work.  While we’ve focused on submitting to literary magazines and online literary markets, many of the same ideas also apply when querying agents.  Today’s prompt works equally well, whether you’re a writer of short fiction or poetry and looking for markets for your work, or if you’re… Read more »

How to Use Color Theory to Boost Your Writing

As you might have noticed, I’m really into design.  A graphic designer and product manager in a past life, you could say I’m a little bit obsessed with clean lines and balanced designs.  I love problem-solving so that form and function work together seamlessly.  One of the areas that most fascinates me in design is… Read more »