Pretzels and Möbius Strips: On the Question of Plot Twists
When I was in junior high, I read Asimov’s “Foundation Trilogy.” I absolutely loved it. I re-read it multiple times throughout the years,...
Bending an Ear: When to Listen to Writing Advice
Beta readers, workshopping, editors, agents, publishers – so much advice for your work, and so much of it contradictory! One says your...
The End of the Word
There are so many things people want out of a book or story, but one of the most crucial is a satisfying ending. Without that, everything...
A Journey through Writer's Block
There is often an assumption made that writer’s block is all one thing. That also implies there is one single solution for all writer’s...
How Do I Know if My Writing Is Good?
This is a very tricky, multi-part question, because there is no single objective answer. It is a mixture of objective and subjective...
Writing “Right”: Is There One Way?
Once, at a convention, I heard one famous author comment on another’s writing style. The second author wrote more material than ever...
Keeping Characters Dynamic
One of the more frustrating things I encounter in television are characters who don’t learn from their mistakes, who don’t grow and...
What Are Stories For?
Stories are an integral part of human existence. We create stories from the time we are old enough to understand words until the time we...
The Cost of Writing
Why are books so expensive? Fifteen to thirty dollars for a fiction hardback, ten to twenty-five for a trade paperback, and a mass...
Bland or Beautiful: Standing Out from the Crowd
Recently I’ve been entering some Goodreads giveaways, because, free books. Since ideally I’d like to get books I want to read, I check...
