Names have many uses in fiction, both inside and outside of the book. (Pen names, anyone?) As such, this is going to be split into three sections.
This is probably the first thing you think of when you think of names in stories. After all, the characters are the most important part, right? Well I don’t think that’s entirely accurate, but character names can play a big role in your story. Continue reading “N: Names in Writing”
When you first finish a first draft, it can be easy to think it’s the best thing in the world. You can’t wait to share it with everyone you know and you immediately set about to editing, announcing to everyone that you’re going to publish this thing and maybe start amassing funds for an editor…
And then you look at the book several months later and you just ask your younger self why you ever thought this was good. And after you’ve bought a gorgeous cover and already hired an editor (not the kind of editor you needed, on top of everything else), you decide this is in absolutely no shape Continue reading “J: Jumping the Gun”
When you become a writer, when you devote yourself to all the work it takes to produce a book (or quite a few books), your occupation and the rest of your life become inextricably linked. They feed into each other constantly, and there’s not really any way to stop it, nor do I think you necessarily should stop it. In this post, I’ll outline just a few ways being a writer can influence your “normal” life. Continue reading “I: The Influence of Writing On Life”
Fun fact: I used to HATE developing wildlife for worldbuilding. It fact, I loathed it so much that I just altogether avoided it. Until I found this post by Hannah at Ink Blots and Coffee Stains and realized it didn’t have to be as hard as I was making it. I didn’t have to make everything up from scratch. Now I really enjoy developing new creatures. Plants are a bit trickier and I generally don’t develop those unless I have a very specific purpose in mind for them (for instance, they produce a certain color of dye or have magical properties), but creatures I can do. (You should check out Hannah’s post for more info on plants, because she actually gives them a whole section rather than a measly single point like I did.) So here are some things to consider when developing fantasy species. Continue reading “Wildlife in Worldbuilding”
Another letter without a book title (and another I was fairly surprised at). Since I talked last month about whether or not to share first drafts and how to do so effectively, I thought it would be a good idea to look at the other side of the coin and give some tips on how best to help someone who has asked you to look at their work. What are the best practices when you’re critiquing writing? Continue reading “C: Critique Etiquette”