Howdy howdy, squiders. Let’s continue with our catch-up, shall we? July’s prompt is: When to give up on a novel/story. Do you ever? The short answer is: yes. Yes, I do. But I really, really don’t like to. Since I
Character Archetypes: An Introduction
So, Squiders, over the next month we’re going to be looking at a series of the most common character archetypes. What’s an archetype? An archetype is generally defined as something–a character, theme, or situation, for example–that can be considered “universal.”
Happy October! (Updates and Misc + Sale)
First of all, Squiders, if you haven’t taken advantage of the Turtleduck Press sale (also featuring my Shards and Hidden Worlds and several anthologies I have stories in, including our newest, Under Her Protection) you have a few hours before the prices go back
Reinventing Beloved Characters
There are beloved characters in our culture, characters that everyone knows about, even if they haven’t seen or read the originating material. And they get used in phrases or idioms, or you can use them for comparison or descriptions, and
Converting Dreams to Stories
Last night, I had a nightmare. It was kind of a strange half-asleep, half-awake one, where there was this malicious entity staring at my husband and me while we slept from the shelves in our bedroom, and I tried to
Naming Your Characters Names You Wouldn’t Name Your Children
Is there such a thing as too many barbeques? I think there must be. I am barbequed out. Character naming is an interesting part of story creation. I know a lot of people who can’t write until they find the
Doing a Story Justice
On a somewhat related note to Monday, here’s another author fear that I sometimes worry about myself – doing a story justice. You know how it goes: somehow, a story worms its way into your head, as stories are wont
