I started to think about this question today when it was pointed out that my wife and I own more books than we can read in the remainder...

Let’s express one idea five ways. 1) “I’m going to the store,” said Jane. 2) “I’m going to the store, Jane said. 3) Jane...

Good evening. I am very excited to say that each month, there will now be science fiction and fantasy short stories published on this...

An unfortunate aspect of movies sharing a dominant space with literature is that the worst of the film industry has a tendency to bleed...

Happy new year! Today is Nov 8. Why am I saying happy new year? Chinese New Year is the festival that celebrates the beginning of a new...

I do not read very many biographies. I read none in my youth, and only began to entertain reading them when I was about 30. Now, though I...

Dialogue must belong to the speaker. This can mean almost anything once the author has established a character, but it encompasses...

This is not a video game reference. It is instead trying to pull together the ideas in this short series into what I call the doom loop....

I think there is a balance in the creative act between creating what we as creators want to see, read, hear, experience versus what...

Humans are an interactive group. We love to talk. Dialogue in real life serves as one of our primary windows into other people’s...

Humans seek out bad news. We are hardwired to do so. Here is an example of why. You live in a small village, under the Dunbar number,...

You are a bad writer. You are not a good runner. You are weak, and can’t lift much weight. Your garden never looks as good as the...

Depending on the genre in which you are writing, dialogue comprises a massive portion of any novel’s content. It is used to move along...

Several people have commented on the last reading blog, Read the change you want to see in the world. Because of some of these messages,...

I want to talk to you about gardening, and some lessons I have learned in the weeds. I learned similar lessons doing power lifting, and I...

I have talked about reading fiction, reading nonfiction, reading genres, reading large and reading small. Today, I want to talk about...

This one is more complex than the others because the line for when readers get annoyed, or at least when I get annoyed is fuzzy. Very...

We are all alike. I’ve noted before the similarities between fantasy and science fiction, but I have started to read more broadly of...

Life is going to go wrong. Today, tomorrow or someday, someone is going to tell you that something didn’t go the way you wanted. You...

There are some pretty fine lines at times between plot armor, world building and genre, so before we dive into them, let's define plot...