Creative Writing Prompts That Explore Society and Culture
Today’s post includes a selection of prompts from my book 1200 Creative Writing Prompts. Enjoy! The unofficial motto of the United States of America is E pluribus unum, which means, “out of many, one.” It’s sometimes translated as “one out of many.” The phrase can be interpreted many ways. According to Wikipedia: “The traditionally understood…Read More
Poetry Writing Exercise: Creative Wordplay
Charles Dickens invented the word boredom. Sylvia Plath coined the term dreamscape. William Shakespeare gave us bandit, swagger, and gossip, along with over 1,700 other words that previously didn’t exist in the English lexicon. Writers have a long history of inventing new words, which shouldn’t come as a surprise. When we encounter an idea or…Read More
Action and Dialogue in Storytelling
Today’s post is an excerpt from What’s the Story? Building Blocks for Fiction Writing, chapter seven: “Action and Dialogue.” Enjoy! Action and dialogue are the wheels that carry a story forward. The easiest way to imagine action and dialogue in written narrative is to think of a movie. When characters onscreen do things, that’s action….Read More
How to Construe and Convey Tone in Poetry
In literature, tone is the mood, attitude, or emotional sensibility of a written work. In poetry, tone expresses the narrator’s disposition toward the poem’s subject, the reader, or the narrative itself. We might describe a poem’s tone as irreverent, relaxed, sarcastic, solemn, jubilant, or desperate. Tone can be any emotion or state of mind, and a…Read More
How to Develop Your Creative Writing Process
Writing experts often want us to believe that there is only one worthwhile creative writing process. It usually goes something like this: Brainstorm Research Outline Rough draft Revise (repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat) Edit, proof, and polish This is a good system — it absolutely works. But does it work for everyone? Examining the Creative Writing…Read More
How Developmental Editing Improves Your Writing
We usually think of editing as a process that cleans up our grammar, spelling, punctuation, and sentence structure. But developmental editing is a little different. A developmental editor looks at the content and structure of a writing project, paying little (or no) heed to the mechanics of the language. Developmental edits are for projects that…Read More
The Only Two Writing Tips You’ll Ever Need: Read and Write
I love collecting writing tips. You never know when you’re going to stumble across a golden nugget of wisdom that will make your writing richer and more vibrant. One of the reasons I started this website was so that I could share the many valuable tips that I’ve collected over the years. I figure that…Read More
Writing Resources: Wired for Story
This post contains affiliate links that earn commissions from qualifying purchases. Are you a storyteller? Do you want to be one? Then I suggest you pick up a copy of Wired for Story, ASAP. This is easily one of the best books on writing fiction that I’ve ever had the pleasure to read. The book…Read More
100 Poetry Prompts
My first love in writing was poetry. In my early teens, writing poetry was a creative and cathartic way to explore my ideas and vent my emotions. Writing poetry was accessible — all I needed was some paper and a pen. It didn’t even require a huge investment of time. I scrawled words onto the…Read More
Fiction Writing Exercises: Narrative Arcs
Today’s fiction writing exercise is an excerpt from my book, Story Drills: Fiction Writing Exercises. This one focuses on story structure and examines narrative arcs within stories and across multiple scenes and installments of a story. Enjoy! Narrative Arcs An arc has a beginning, a middle, and an end. The events within an arc result…Read More
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