Brief caveat to this post: I do not consider myself a horror writer. In fact, I have only ever written maybe two or three stories that had any horror elements within them whatsoever. But as an audience member, I frequently experience horror. And artful storytelling has gifted me with enough experience to know that true…
When you’re writing a story, there is always that lingering peer pressure in the background to please every reader—even though that is impossible. And once you enter the Beta-Reading stage, that pressure can begin to confuse things even more. Should I change such-and-such because so-and-so didn’t like it? Should I modify every single aspect of…
Another one of those pieces of writing advice that might be hard to achieve, but works well once executed, is stopping yourself in the middle of a segment you really want to write. Much of author life is dragging your feet through all the less exciting chapters and getting to the good stuff. And once…
Sometimes we need a little help with jump-starting our imaginations. And if perusing Craigslist does not yield any helpful results, you can try this tactic instead: Find a trusty dictionary—at the bookstore where I work, we have The Word Nerd Dictionary of Obscure & Enchanting Words by Kaelin Witt, which is perfect for this kind…
Oftentimes when we set out to write a story or a screenplay, dialogue proves difficult to handle. Sometimes it’s unrealistic; sometimes it’s unnecessary. And sometimes it’s too much, usually in the way of serving up exposition to your audience or trying to make issues as crystal clear as possible. But this often bogs down your…