Embracing 2018

January 1, 2018

I have spent a lot of time thinking about this past year and trying to decide what my word for 2018 would be. That’s when I realized I never picked a word for 2017. I’m not sure I could have come up with a word that would have fully encompassed all that 2017 has held. […]

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Some Updates

August 1, 2017

Taking a quick break from revising the fourth HFA book to bring you a few updates: The first draft is finished! It has a title! (And no, I can’t tell you yet quite yet.) It will publish in Fall of 2018. The 5th HFA book is scheduled to publish in Fall of 2019. Secondly, now […]

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On Writing: Frog Marching the Muse

November 22, 2016

(From the Writer Unboxed archives.) Here are eighteen tips I use to help me produce words when my creative muse packed up and left me, leaving no forwarding address. You can, in fact, get an entire book written this way, although it is not the most joyful of processes. Some of the things on this […]

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On Writing: What’s In A Name?

October 31, 2016

For me, naming is a huge part of character. In fact, I cannot get very far in a novel until I have the correct name. I can be brainstorming and jotting down plot notes and some basic character sketching but until the true name clicks, I’m rudderless. The character doesn’t become real to me until […]

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On Writing: Managing a Cast of Thousands

October 30, 2016

Someday, I will write a book that does NOT have a cast of thousands. Some day. But for now, that seems to dog me with every book I write. Here then, is a trick I devised to not only help me keep track of the characters, but to help the ones that need to be […]

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On Writing: Arcs

October 20, 2016

Okay, I’m going to get all math-ish on you here, but bear with me a moment. And I say this as a person who hated geometry. (I liked algebra because it mimics life–in life we are always trying to solve for the unknown–but that’s the subject of a different post…) In geometry, an arc is […]

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On Writing: The Basics–Now Make It Worse

October 14, 2016

Let’s say you’ve spent some time and come up with this perfect conflict for your character. There is even something at stake if she fails. Go you! Now think of a way to make it worse. Seriously. I had an opportunity to attend one of Donald Maass’s all day workshops, and he asked this question. […]

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On Writing: The Basics–Speaking of Conflict

October 13, 2016

Conflict drives the story. It’s pretty much that simple. If you don’t have conflict on some level, you don’t have a story. The good news is, conflict comes in many shapes and sizes, flavors and colors. The bad news is, most people tend to avoid conflict, so it can be difficult to grab it with […]

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On Writing: The Basics–Plotting: Baby Steps

October 12, 2016

Okay, so let’s say you’ve figured out—kind of—what your characters motivations and desires. You even have a pretty good idea as to what is standing in their way—a bad guy, a raging storm, a stalking fae, a lovesick werewolf, whatever. Now how do you take what you know and shape it into a plot?

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On Writing: The Basics–How To Grow Plot From Characterw

October 11, 2016

In order to understand what actions will effect a transformation in your character, there are a few things one needs to know. Debra Dixon addresses this brilliantly with her concept of Goal, Motivation, and Conflict, and if you haven’t read the book, I highly, highly recommend it. She talks at length about needing to have […]

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