At DIY MFA, we talk a lot about “big craft” topics like character development, world-building, or story structure. Today, I wanted to do something a little different and discuss scene craft—i.e., the techniques that go into creating a compelling and engaging scene. Scenes are an essential component of storytelling because they are the fundamental building… Read more »
“Read with purpose” is one of the three pillars of DIY MFA, but it’s often the most overlooked. It’s easy to see how writing and community can contribute to our literary development, but sometimes reading can fall by the wayside. Today I wanted to talk about the importance of reading with purpose, what exactly it… Read more »
“Subplots are like the adjectives of your main story/sentence. You can still understand the sentence without them, but it’s not as fascinating.” ~Charlie Holmberg I love this quote because I think it captures the nature of subplots to a T. The main plot is like a noun or verb in a sentence, it’s the part… Read more »
Today, we embark on another three-act analysis, this time of one of the most iconic American novels of the 20th century: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Published in 1925 and set in the early 1920s, this story captures the sparkle and energy of the roaring twenties and gives us a window into the… Read more »
In most collective storytelling games I have played we’ve worked toward a happy ending. More often than I would like, a campaign will fade to nothing after one too many scheduling conflicts—such is the nature of a game played by Busy Adults with Many Important Things to Do™. And sure, there is the occasional TPK… Read more »
