Tag: writethink
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A Good and Happy Life
Occasionally I’ll rant in my head1. Something touched me off yesterday. I think it was a webcomic or a response to a webcomic. I don’t know. The jist of it was that an author uses his medium as a pulpit for his own opinions. At face value, this can be true. The context of the…
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Afternoon Showers on the Frontal Lobe
I did some brainstorming with Elizabeth Poole today, which was incredibly helpful. I was wavering on 7Sac, as the scope was too large and the story too small. There wasn’t enough steak and potatoes. It was mostly pre-dinner rolls. The story was at risk of falling into too many cliches, specifically the “build a team”…
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The Transition Story
Empire Strikes Back is my least favorite of the Star Wars trilogy1. This is heresy among accepted Star Wars fandom, but it is the way it is. You can rattle off the various elements of the movie that make it better than the others, a richer universe, more defined characters, a darker/grittier edge to it,…
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No One Likes a Dumb Protagonist
The subject line says it all. No one likes a dumb protagonist. We accept flawed characters and we accept that situations can be shrouded in mystery or so layered that a character cannot comprehend it on spec. They need time to peel back the layers or let the whole thing soak in before it finally…
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The
HardestHarder PartYou’ll often hear that this or that is the hardest part of writing a book. Writing a good beginning. Writing a good first sentence. Writing the middle. Writing the end. Rewriting. Revising. Querying. Being rejected. The thing is there is no hardest part, just harder parts in relation to other parts at that moment. In…
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Wind Sprint: WHAT’S BEHIND THE CROOKED DOOR?
This story began as a ponderance. I thought of it from time to time. It sat in my brain like a seed. Will it sprout or will it just lay there? It sprouted a little, but I doubted enough to make a story out of it. My wife then asked me what I was talking…
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Wind Sprint: THE SEVENTH SACRIFICE
I’m not keen on giving up on a manuscript, but sometimes a thing is broke so bad it can’t be fixed1. THE SEVENTH SACRIFICE was a manuscript I abandoned because it was all wrong. There were a few chapters I enjoyed (the introductions of the tinkers), but it boiled down to Cheshire getting off his…