Archive:
Fiction
Nothing makes your hero more heroic than a worthy opponent. So don’t shortchange your villain. Spend every bit as much time crafting him as you do your lead character, if you want your story to work. (Though I will use male pronouns throughout, this applies equally if your main character is a heroine or your […]
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Writing a compelling story, especially if you’re new at this, can be grueling. Conflicting advice online can overwhelm you, making you want to quit before you’ve written a word. But you know more than you think. Stories saturate our lives. We talk, think, and communicate with story in music, on television, in video games, in […]
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Guest blog by Vanessa Tym Mary Shelley didn’t intend to invent a new book genre when she wrote Frankenstein in 1822 but now, over 200 years later, every library and bookstore has a science fiction section. Since the inception of categorizing literature, dating back to ancient Greece, we’ve been updating, expanding, and rethinking what genre […]
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Great page-turning stories live or die by their plots. “I took the dog to the park” doesn’t interest me. “You won’t believe what happened when I took the dog to the park” interests me. I want to know what happened, so I’ll stick with you as long as your story holds me. To keep me […]
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If your story starts with anything foreboding—creaking floors, snuffed-out candles, or threatening skies, you’re implying danger or terrible trouble ahead for your main character. Masterful storytellers foreshadow such things with disquieting clues of what’s to come. What is Foreshadowing? And Why is it Important? Foreshadowing is a literary device authors use to lay a foundation […]
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