Understanding Your Villains (Part 1): Three Ways Villains Think
What Makes a Good Villain? (Part 2 Available Here) Nothing makes a work of fiction stand out like a memorable, well-written villain. The great ones can be the highlight of…
“Writing a Memorable Opening:” What Writers can Learn from Toni Morrison’s “Jazz”
Toni Morrison’s Jazz is, simply put, a masterpiece. The prose is spectacular, with a rhythm and life that demands you slow down and listen. The characters are incredibly real, layered,…
“Easing Your Readers into Horror:” What Writers can learn from “Rosemary’s Baby”
Hello, all! This is the last blog post I’ll be writing before Halloween, so I decided to write about something spooky: Rosemary's Baby, the much beloved horror classic by Ira…
Don’t Let Naming Slow You Down: How to Grow and Find your Characters’ Names
Naming characters is hard, and not nearly as fun as telling their stories. And, often, it’s not just less fun… it gets in the way of writing. Some writers freeze…
“Using Emotion in Figures of Speech:” What Writers can Learn from Terry Pratchett’s “Equal Rites”
It can’t be stressed, enough: Terry Pratchett was ahead of his time. In Equal Rites (the third novel in the Discworld series), Terry Pratchett uses his wit, humor, and grand…
“Layered Conflict and Emotional Scarring:” What Writers Can Learn from Alice Walker’s “The Color Purple”
Literary fiction has a bad reputation for being low on the “entertain-o-meter,” a completely imaginary device that I pretend to use to measure how engaging a novel is. So, it…
“Commitment to the bit:” What Writers and Worldbuilders can learn from Terry Pratchett’s “The Light Fantastic”
(Quick heads-up before we start: this article contains some light spoilers for the endings to both The Light Fantastic and The Color of Magic.) The Light Fantastic is the second…
Long-Distance Communication for Writers and Worldbuilders (Part 3): Complex, Nuanced Messaging
(Part 1 can be read here)(Part 2 can be read here) Long-distance communication is an important topic for writers to grasp. Stories are moved by conflict, and most of that…
Long-Distance Communication for Writers and Worldbuilders (Part 2): Simple and Coded Communication
(Part 1 of this series can be found here)(Part 3 of this series can be found here) Welcome, all, to a communications course that you aren’t getting a lick of…
Long-Distance Communication For Writers and Worldbuilders (Part 1): Binary and Pre-Arranged Signals
(Part 2 of this series can be found here)(Part 3 of this series can be found here) When I started doing research for this series of articles, I’d planned on…