Blog – Page 171 of 451

Creating an Ironic Tone in Your Fiction

December 9, 2013December 8, 2013Uncategorized

Guest Post by Jack Smith

Let’s say you want to create an ironic tone in a story or novel—it’s just needed.

First off, what is tone? On the one hand, we might say that it’s the apparent attitude of the narrator toward the characters and the world they people. But it should also be said that everything in a fictional work relates in some way to the tone. If every character in your story drives crazily and exceeds the speed limit, this will certainly affect the tone. If all the clocks are off twenty minutes, this will too.

To create the right tone, you need to think about character actions, dialogue, and setting. All of these will affect the tone of your story or novel. But you also need to attend to matters of style. Continue reading

Twitterific

December 8, 2013February 9, 2014Twitterific

By Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

Twitterific links are fed into the Writer’s Knowledge Base search engine (developed by writer and software engineer Mike Fleming) which has over 23,000 free articles on writing related topics. It’s the search engine for writers.

Have a great week!

Rethink your writing space–by looking at other rooms in your home: http://dld.bz/ddzjG @bryancohenbooks

4 Reasons to Celebrate Your Writing Milestones: http://dld.bz/ddz6v @LyndaRYoung @AlexJCavanaughContinue reading

Approaching Messy First Drafts

December 6, 2013December 5, 2013Uncategorized

By Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

One thing that’s nice about having older children is that they can take over household tasks that we’re either not excited about, or just don’t do well. This is the way it works for me and Christmas decorations.

My daughter put up all the decorations inside the house. They look amazing. My teenage son ordinarily does all the lights on the tree and outside. Unfortunately, since he had four wisdom teeth taken out over Thanksgiving, he was knocked out of the equation. My husband was swamped with work, so I took on the outdoor lights.Continue reading

Listing Our Accomplishments

December 4, 2013December 4, 2013Uncategorized

By Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

Writer Lynda R. Young wrote a great post for the Insecure Writers Support Group: 4 Reasons to Celebrate Your Writing Milestones. In it, she talks about the benefits of thinking back on past accomplishments.

I love looking back on past achievements. That’s because my to-do list is frequently so scary that it gives me a sense of security to see what I’ve finished. I read once that to-do lists help us be more productive if we keep the crossed-off items on our list instead of making new lists all the time. I can see why—it’s motivating to see how far we’ve come, no matter if the project is writing and promoting a book or cleaning out a garage.Continue reading

How to Make Your Entire Home an Office

December 2, 2013December 1, 2013Uncategorized

Guest Post by Bryan Cohen

When my wife and I moved into our latest apartment a few years ago, we made sure to get a place with a second bedroom. I planned to use that room as an office for my freelance and personal writing. My success rate for finishing my writing has never been 100 percent in any room anywhere, but that office tops the list efficiency-wise. As important as it is to have a dedicated writing space, I wrote my first few books in a variety of places. Wherever I wrote was my office that day, whether it was the kitchen table or the bedroom. When I feel stuck on my writing in a certain location, I’m happy to move to the next room to see if it can get me past my temporary writer’s block.

Here are a few writing locations you may not have thought of.Continue reading