Hi Folks, Today I’m going to write about an old saying: Let the buyer beware. Basically the saying means the buyer should perform a reasonable level of due diligence before committing to buying a product. And in the case of instruction, “buying” has a dual meaning: 1. purchasing, trading money for; and 2. believing. You know what I mean. Many of you have heard me say before, “If any writing instructor says something to you that … Read more
Hi Folks, Note: This post was originally scheduled for 8/20/2013. It didn’t post to MailChimp, so I’m posting it again now. I’ve revised the original post so it’s up to date. I started to call this “Dueling Respondents” but that wouldn’t have been quite accurate. After all, as far as I know, the two writers who served as the catalyst for this post don’t even know each other. One of those writers, upon reading my “Top … Read more
Hi Folks, Note: This post was originally scheduled for 7/30/2013. It didn’t post to MailChimp, so I’m posting it again now. I’ve revised the original post so it’s up to date. There’s been a great deal of talk in the past few months (when I wrote this) about a “new” technique called “deep point of view.” The truth is, deep POV is nothing new. Most sources define it as a way to enable the reader to … Read more
Hi Folks, Note: This post was originally scheduled for 5/12/2013. It didn’t post to MailChimp, so I’m posting it again now. I’ve revised the original post so it’s up to date. Odd… I think I’ve never written a post on Creating Realistic Characters. I taught a seminar on the subject [in May 2013] in Bisbee, and I taught the same seminar in Tucson in February. Attendance was low on that one—meaning the market’s saturated—so I probably … Read more
Note: This post first appeared in my blog in 2012. I’ve updated it with new information. Hi Folks, Seems like every other week or so someone reports to me that a writing instructor or contest judge or other self-appointed expert has advised that the writer should use less dialogue and more narrative in a given story. Recently, a respondent recalled the exact wording the professor of ludicrosity used: “If you change a lot of this dialogue … Read more
Hi Folks, In the previous two posts I mentioned using action verbs in brief descriptive narratives. The same goes for longer narratives, of course. There are three kinds of verbs: state-of-being verbs, linking verbs, and action verbs. State-of-being verbs do not show action. As their name implies, they are used to indicate a state of being. The state-of-being verbs are am, is, are, was, were, be, being and been. These are often accompanied by have, has, and … Read more
Hey Folks, Because dialogue comes directly from the character’s mouth to the reader’s ear, no other part of your story is more intimate with the reader. No other part of the story will do more to engage the reader directly. Dialogue dialogue consists of three elements: two parts narrative and one part nuance. The narrative parts are tag lines and brief descriptive narrative. Nuance is composed of the subtleties of implication. What your character says is … Read more
Wait! Before you click off ’cause maybe you aren’t interested in this topic, read this: If you are NOT a subscriber yet over at FrostProof808.com and if you ARE a writer, you want to do yourself a favor and stop over there to read yesterday’s post. I think you’ll enjoy it. (grin) Okay, now go ahead and read about Writing Memoir, below. Hi Folks, I’m pretty sure a lot of folks who read my blog are … Read more
Hi Folks, First, a kind of news flash: We’ve extended the 50%-off sale on fiction over at StoneThread Publishing through Tuesday, January 14. To take advantage of this excellent sale, Visit StoneThread Publishing to get the coupon codes for the titles you’re interested in, then Click any cover to go to Smashwords. Enter the coupon code for the book you want during checkout, and download your selected title in any ebook format (Kindle, Nook, Apple, Sony, … Read more