Hey Folks, First, Happy New Year. I hope last night was fun and safe for everyone. Second, you might have noticed I didn’t post last Tuesday, on Christmas Day. I’d like to say that was out of reverence or whatver, but it wasn’t. I wanted to leave up the post on Challenges for another week. After all, today’s a great day to begin a new challenge. (grin) Let me be clear: if writing fiction wasn’t the … Read more
Hey Folks, Okay, first, to get us on the same page, what I call a “tag line” is what some call a “narrative beat.” I guess there are other names for it too, but here’s why I call it a tag line. When characters are engaging in dialogue, there are two types of narrative that may accompany the dialogue. One is the tag line. The other, I call a brief descriptive narrative. They are distinctly different … Read more
Hi Folks, A long while back, in two parts, I published a post titled Safeguard Your Credibility. Here’s the Original Post and Here’s Part Two. Both posts were all about not displaying ignorance. Yet the only way to avoid displaying ignorance is to eradicate it. And the only way to eradicate it is to learn and continue learning. Of course, all of us are ignorant of some things. Nobody can be aware of everything. But I … Read more
Hi Folks, In a recent post (as I write this), Dean Wesley Smith wrote “…all that matters is the writing, not the end product.” That seemingly innocuous statement is only one of the many truly major lessons I’ve learned from him and attempted to pass along. To establish credentials, Dean Wesley Smith is a USA Today best selling novelist with over 200 novels to his credit. He has also written several hundred short stories, almost all … Read more
Hey Folks, Thriller author James Scott Bell, in the Kill Zone blog back in June, wrote “Authors I Have Learned From: John D. MacDonald.” The article is chock full of gems if you dig just a little. You can read the post for yourself. I’ll reference it at the end. But for this post, I’ll offer a few hints at those gems, then elaborate a little on each of them. To begin, there is much to … Read more
Hey Folks, Today we have a guest post from USA Today best selling writer Dean Wesley Smith. I’ve added a comment at the end. Enjoy. Dangers of Not Trusting The Creative Voice Things Stop When You Lose Faith In The Creative Voice… I watch this loss all the time and hear about it from hundreds of writers over every year. Not trusting your creative voice is deadly. This came up a couple days ago when I … Read more
Hey Folks, This is a bonus “extra” post, not in the regular rotation. It’s a short bit I thought you might find amusing and, with any luck, useful. I first saw “The Basic Rules of Flight” in an article by US Navy Pilot Nicole Scherer in the August 2018 issue of Air & Space Smithsonian magazine. The Basic Rules of Flight 1. Try to stay in the middle of the air. 2. Do not go near … Read more
Hey Folks, There were a lot of good comments on James Scott Bell’s “Editing is Dying, Grunting Soon to Follow” in the Kill Zone blog. If you haven’t read it (I recommend it) you can find the post and the comments at https://killzoneblog.com/2018/04/editing-is-dying-grunting-soon-to-follow.html. Reading the comments was an eye-opening experience. Someone, a writer no less, actually advocated for the spelling of “all right” as “alright,” which, honestly, is just laziness. It’s the same reason some folks … Read more
Hey Folks, This morning (as I write this) I read a new post on a site I often reference. I was stunned, and not in a good way. I was reminded again of the preacher in the film “Oh God.” The problem was, the preacher was a hypocrite. God (played by George Burns) said, “The guy ought to be selling Earth shoes.” That sums up my philosophy about entirely too many so-called writing instructors. I … Read more
Hey Folks, In recent years, say about the last 40 or 50, many would-be writers have gotten away from writing. They set out to write, but then allow themselves to be trapped in a vicious circle. Some don’t even actually write. Instead, they meet with writers and other would-be writers in groups and rehash all the same old advice that hasn’t worked for them thus far. They attend conferences and conventions. They strive to meet writers … Read more