One aspect of writing that’s been more of a challenge for me with the next novel, as opposed to “Killing the Immortals,” has been striking a balance between keeping the suspense taut for the reader, while also giving the reader the details they need. [Read more…] about Suspense vs. Development
story
Do Away with Pesky Villains
Recently, I was told that you can tell a lot about an author by the villains they write into their stories. Maybe it does say something about you if your villains are always certain archetypes. It might say something about your past, or what your fears are, or the way your twisted little mind works.
When I heard that, though, what I thought about was, as much as I like the bad guy to win, I don’t really like “bad guys” all that much in my stories. That is to say, “bad guys” and “villains” tend to bore me a bit. I prefer a bit more complexity. At the very least, I’d like my antagonist to have some sort of logical basis for what he’s doing. I’d like him or her to be a sympathetic figure in at least some way. I think I crave moral ambiguity in my stories; I like for it to be totally defensible to root for the antagonist to win. [Read more…] about Do Away with Pesky Villains
When Your Story Goes Too Far
In the pieces I’ve been writing so far, I haven’t exactly been shying away from tough scenes, death, sex, whatever. I don’t think you can write well if you’re scared of what your mom, or some random person with delicate sensibilities will think, and I’ve made every effort not to hold back.
However, in the book I just started reading, there’s an early scene that made me think there may be limits to that. I’m not going to go too deeply into the scene (Let’s just say it involved the potential apocalypse, and some panties from a laundry basket), but I’ll say that I wondered how necessary it was. Now, it’s possible that it will have an important role in building the character that was involved, in which case I’ll just have to revisit my thoughts on this, won’t I? [Read more…] about When Your Story Goes Too Far
My Next Short(er) Story
After finishing up the rough draft of my first story, “Killing the Immortals,” a few weeks ago, I needed to kill some time while I got a bit of space from it. If you can help it, you never want to edit something you just wrote. It’s hard to catch all your stupid mistakes when you’re that close to it.
But I didn’t want to just sit here watching Netflix while it collected a bit of dust. So I immediately dove into writing a shorter piece that I could put in my bank for doing something with later. The working title for it is “Tomorrow’s News Today,” and it’s about a journalist who accidentally discovers that anything he writes will happen exactly as he wrote it. If someone compared it to a Twilight Zone episode, I’d be pretty damn pleased. Hell, let’s be honest, I’ll be happy if anyone is just willing to read it, especially if they pay to do so. But I’d definitely love to have people see a little Rod Serling there.
What I’ll do with it, I’m not quite sure. There are a few options: 1) Release it as a stand-alone work, probably charging $1.99 or $2.99 as a regular list price; 2) Keep writing these shorter pieces and package 4-5 of them into a collection that I release as a novel-length book that sells for $4.99 or so; 3) Keep it in my back pocket for potential entry into a contest or submission to go into an anthology when a publisher is looking for stories; 4) Give it away for free on my site, potentially for people to sign up for an email list I’ll be building soon. And, keep in mind, these aren’t mutually exclusive. I could, over time, do all four if I choose.
In the meantime, here’s a little tease to the story. Below, you can read the first few paragraphs of the rough draft, so you can get a look at the beginning, and the mood of the story: [Read more…] about My Next Short(er) Story
The Worst Thing You Could Say About My Story
I’m used to getting bad reviews and hate mail. Close to 20 years in journalism will do that for you. It won’t make you rich, but it’ll certainly help harden you to criticism of your writing. I’ve had my byline published thousands of times, above stories both long and short, dull and exciting, fact and opinion. I’ve written stories I was very proud of (See my Writing section for a few examples), and ones I never wanted to see again after hitting the “Send” button. And, regardless of how I felt about them, there was always a chance I’d receive email or comment from a reader, telling me why whatever I wrote was garbage, and I should crawl into a hole and die. [Read more…] about The Worst Thing You Could Say About My Story