When hanging out with other writers, you soon learn that the “rules” of writing are pretty variable. Some people talk of the importance of routine and consistency. Others talk of writing in terms of inspiration which strikes when it fancies. …
The Ebb and Flow of Story
I’m writing again. If you’ve following the blog for a while, you’ll know I generally write between 90,000 and 150,000 words of new fiction each year. On the first of March, I had written a grand total of 383 words. …
NaNo17 :: The Myth of the Tiny Cactus
In November 2016, I became involved in the local NaNoWriMo community. I attended local write-ins, and joined a Discord server to chat with others in my timezone/area about how they were progressing. There were 3-4 specific people who seemed to …
NaNo17 :: Days 1 – 10
This is my eighth year taking part in National Novel Writing Month. I began a whole new setting, character collection and plot idea. I always feel stunted in plotting until I’ve written the first couple of scenes, so on Day …
Ready Player 3: Character Swapping for Fun and Profit
Today we have a guest post from Ellie Di Julio; author of the Forgotten Relics series, about how she picked point of view characters in her latest book. I’m going to let you in on a little authorly secret. Ready? When …
Weekend WIP #12
It turns out I scheduled posts for every week except this one. Oops. As things are still up in the air, here’s a brief weekend works-in-progress update. 1) I submitted a short story to an anthology last week. 2) A magazine article …