Dear Editor, Do you have any suggestions on how to write a story as if the MC is looking back at earlier events? For my story to work, I feel my narrator needs the accumulated knowledge and wisdom to be able to describe many of the things she encounters and make sense of them. I… Read more »
The man-versus-X distinctions we were taught in school are pretty useless. In my experience, at least, knowing that an individual might struggle against nature or man or self or society does little to help me craft gripping scenes. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying conflict isn’t important. It’s absolutely essential. But giving broad labels… Read more »
I have done my beloved short forms an injustice. And I’ve led you, my readers, to believe that poems, short stories, and novellas are simply stops on the way to the writing world’s holy grail: novels. This column, Writing Small, is an exploration into this near-mystical thing called writing. My aim is to plumb others’… Read more »
I’m going to diverge a bit from the usual for the next couple of columns. As we approach the end of the year (where did 2018 go, and so fast?!) it’s the perfect time to consider something we may take for granted most of the time: our creative process. Right now, many—or some, at least—of… Read more »
If you read my last article on the Point of No Return Decision (Signpost Scene #5 in James Scott Bell’s Superstructure) you know that every Lead makes a HUGE decision that launches them into Act II. But what happens after that massive moment? For some weaker first drafts of a WIP, sometimes nothing. This is… Read more »
When I was out at drinks with a friend a few weeks ago to talk about the first three chapters of my novel I’d sent him, one of the things that kept coming up was the language. Visceral and heavy, paranoid even. These were the words he used to describe it, almost like he was… Read more »
Many authors have day jobs that are completely unrelated to their writing. For example, Caitriona Lally, who wrote her novel while working as a janitor at her alma mater, Trinity College, which recently gave her a prestigious award for her novel Eggshells. The article about Lally mentions that she graduated with a degree in English… Read more »
“Critique days” were met with both anxiety and excitement in my undergraduate creative writing courses. The whole class would sit in a circle and, one-by-one, we would each have our writing critiqued by both our peers and our instructors. Talk about nerve wracking. Sometimes the feedback would be helpful and encouraging. Other times, I would… Read more »
Last summer, Alison Walsh from the literary food blog Alison’s Wonderland Recipes sent me a surprising invitation: To write the introduction for her then-upcoming cookbook, A Literary Tea Party. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. First, it meant having a byline in a published book—and what writer wouldn’t be excited about that? Second, it… Read more »
What’s the difference between writing for kids and writing for adults? You may assume it’s something like using simpler words for kids, or ‘dumbing down’ the story, but that’s not the case. Kids can handle challenging words and concepts. Kids do have different needs and expectations, though. There’s a great DIY MFA post here with… Read more »
