How to Strengthen Emotions in Our Writing
Want to avoid flat, unemotional writing? We have to match our characters’ emotional reactions to the stimulus, whether big or small.
Pin ItNaNo Wrap-Up: Beat Sheets 101
Not familiar with beat sheets or spreadsheet programs? Learn what the different columns and rows mean and how we can update the details for our unique story.
Pin ItShowing vs. Telling: When Is Telling Okay?
We’ve probably all heard the advice to “show don’t tell” more times than we can count. Like most advice, it’s worded as an absolute, making it seem as though telling is never okay.
Once we’re experienced, we know that’s not true. Some telling is absolutely okay, and in certain cases, is preferable to showing.
Pin ItA Pantser’s Guide to Beat Sheets
Can those who write by the seat of their pants use beat sheets…without driving their muse crazy? If so, how? Here are few tips for how pantsers can draft and revise with beat sheets.
Pin ItAsk Jami: Can This Story Be Saved?
I do a lot of beta reading for friends, and sometimes they come to me with a question along the lines of: “I’ve really struggled with x aspect of this story, and I’m wondering if I should just abandon it. Can you take a look and see if this story can […]
Pin ItThree Tips for Better Storytelling
Last time, we talked about how good storytelling can salvage even a poorly written book. As I mentioned in that post, storytelling skill is different from writing skill. Many people have a hard time defining what makes good storytelling—and that makes it difficult for us to improve. Yet I’d argue […]
Pin ItWhy Is Storytelling Ability So Important?
What makes some poorly written books fall flat on their face while others succeed despite their flaws? One common answer is “storytelling ability.” But what is storytelling? The concept can seem vague and immeasurable—rather like “voice.” A recent experience with two poorly written books gave me insight into how a […]
Pin ItWhat Soap Operas Can Teach Us about Writing
I don’t watch soap operas, but a bizarre conversation tangent (in other words, a perfectly normal conversation for me) triggered my thoughts comparing soap operas to novels. On the surface, they seem very similar. They both have characters, tension, and conflict. However, the more I thought about it, the more […]
Pin ItFour Tips for Fixing the Infamous “Info Dump”
While I’m on holiday vacation this week, I’ll share a post from my early days of blogging. We’ve all heard of those eye-rolling, telling “information dumps,” yet at some point, we all have to get chunks of information across to the reader. My usual technique with world-building is to show, […]
Pin ItActions and Reactions: The End-All-Be-All of Storytelling
A story’s narrative is made up of a chain of actions (motivation/cause) and reactions (response/effect). The cause-and-effect chain, whether at the scale of story acts or sentences, creates our narrative drive: Is the story leading somewhere?
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