Straight talk from the sisters about blood, sweat and ink
Not counting my childhood Young Authors books (for a hilarious selection of those click here), I have written only one short story: a grim ghost tale featured in Pen & Muse’s Haunted House showcase. However, I’ve written many television episodes, which resemble short stories in length and substance. Writing a novel, by comparison, is like …
Continue reading “Is Your Idea a Short Story or Novel?”
Earlier this year I wrote a post about Internal Conflict based on a character’s flaws, fears and morality. Like External Conflict, Internal Conflict can be numerous and varied. The only rule is it all must get in the way of the hero achieving his/her goal. If it doesn’t, you don’t have conflict, just baggage. And …
Continue reading “Prime Inner Conflict (aka Conflicting Wants)”
It’s been soooo long since we had coffee! I’ve missed you! But alas, it is not possible to sit down and drink hot beverages out of pretty mugs in zero gravity. You see, Robin and I were on a space mission for the Blogging A to Z Challenge. Our theme: 3, 2, 1… BLASTOFF to Stellar …
Continue reading “Weekend Coffee Share – Back from Outer Space!”
Today on WriteOnSisters we have another edition of “Heather encounters a story problem and finds a way to solve it.” I’ve admitted before that my ideas come from situations not character, hence my posts about How To Choose A Main Character and Creating Character Arc From Plot, so it serves to reason that if I …
Continue reading “How To Create An Antagonist”
Mission Code Name: 3, 2, 1… BLASTOFF to Stellar Writing Security Clearance: Unclassified Mission Objectives: To meet new life forms and engage in shared and mutually beneficial discourse on a range of topics. Mission Status: Success! Co-Commander Rivera’s reflections report: While it is never easy to commit a month to a venture of any kind, …
Continue reading “2015 Blogging From A to Z Mission Debriefing”
What does “x-ray” have to do with writing craft? I didn’t choose it just because I needed an “X” word for the #AtoZChallenge, or because I already used “x-rated” for last year’s post (X-Rated: Should YA Books Have a Rating System?), but because all writers need to be able to check the spine of their …
Continue reading “X is for X-Ray”
Being a writer can take a toll on us, physically, emotionally and mentally. When we get engrossed in writing, it’s easy to forget to look after ourselves. So I’ve come up with three things I am going to try to do every day to take better care of myself… 3 Tips for Writer Wellbeing Stretch. …
Continue reading “W is for Writer Wellbeing”
I love unreliable narrators because they go hand-in-hand with surprise endings. No matter the genre, when a narrator is not telling the truth there is mystery in the story. 3 Tips for Writing Unreliable Narrators Track the truth. Whether the narrator is lying on purpose or not, you the writer need to keep track of …
Continue reading “U is for Unreliable Narrators”
One of the many things I’m learning from writing this blog is that people have different definitions for writing terms. When Robin first wrote a post on reversals, I thought to myself, “Oh, I call those Turning Points!” Perhaps that’s the screenwriting term. But both mean the same thing – a moment where the story …
Continue reading “R is for Reversal”
Questions are what keep readers interested in a story. At every moment in your novel, the reader must want to know the answer to a question, otherwise there’s no reason to keep reading. There are three types of questions in every good story, and I’ll endeavour to give you some tips on how to make …
Continue reading “Q is for Questions”