You know what showed up in my inbox this morning? NaNoWriMo’s preparation workshop for the year. It’s SEPTEMBER. It’s barely MID-SEPTEMBER. What the heck? What happened to waking up on November 1st and going with whatever caught your fancy at
Berries and Elephants
Information comes from the weirdest places sometimes, doesn’t it? Holly Lisle, who is one of my favorite writing teachers, has a saying about berries and elephants. I’m going to massacre it here, but the gist is that how much a
Language Barriers in Speculative Fiction
Hey hey, so apparently I was going to write this post two years ago, got as far as “WOO” and never went back to it. Good job on focusing, me. Language barriers are something common that you find in science
What is Conflict?
We talked about conflict on Tuesday at Storycraft, and I put together an info sheet on the topic, which I thought you guys might like to see. It’s pretty basic–conflict is a wide and varied monstrosity, and you could really
Pantsing vs. Plotting
Sometimes, Squiders, it’s good to go back to the basics. I would divide the writing process into the following steps: Outlining Writing Revising Editing Submission and/or Publication Would you agree with that? The first step of that is (arguably) outlining.
The Power of Talking Through a Plot Problem
We all know that writing is a solitary process, one where a writer stereotypically locks themselves away somewhere and bangs on a typewriter (keyboard) until brilliance comes out. Your story usually is between you and your brain (and your muse,
The Downside of Plotting (and a ROW80 check-in)
Well, Squiders, I’ve been working on the third book of a high fantasy trilogy recently (passed 50K this past week, hooray!). I’ve been working on this trilogy on and off for a lot longer than I like to own up
