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 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
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
Narrative Point of View in Storytelling
Today’s post includes excerpts from What’s the Story? Building Blocks for Fiction Writing, chapter six: “Narrative Point of View.” Enjoy! The terms story and narrative can be used interchangeably, meaning a sequence of events, real or fictional, that are conveyed through any medium ranging from prose to film. However, when we talk about narrative, we’re…Read More
Is It Plural or Possessed? When to Use Apostrophe -S
It’s one of those grammar glitches that makes English teachers twitch, and it’s a perplexing punctuation problem. Knowing when to use an apostrophe and when to use apostrophe -s can be tricky, but this grammar quickie provides all you need to know about plural versus possession when it comes to apostrophe -s. Pluralization You can…Read More
Debunking Common Myths About Writing
Myths abound in the world of the arts, and writers are not immune to them. Many of us succumb to the fallacies that are floating around about what it means to be a writer or what it takes to become a writer. So what’s the matter with falling for myths about writing? Myths about writing…Read More
What’s Wrong with Adjectives and Adverbs?
“The road to hell is paved with adverbs.” – Stephen King It’s not unusual for writing experts to recommend keeping adjectives and adverbs to a minimum. But many writers prefer to laden their language with modifiers, usually as a way to provide more detail and description for readers. And young and new writers tend to overuse…Read More
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