You have worked out your story’s plot. You know the direction your story will go, you know the problems your characters will face, and how your story will resolve. Good for you. You’ve put in the time and thought to make the story plausible. But who is your protagonist? Sure, you have the general idea … Read more
Hiya! It feels like it’s been a decade since I’ve last posted, but here I am again with an attempt at normalcy. The last several posts were about various scenes or parts of a plot. I posted those bits and pieces with the intent of helping you to organize ten scenes that will help write … Read more
It’s a weird world right now. How about we do something with some normalcy? Like work on your story outline. You’ve been working on your manuscript outline draft and we’ve covered the first few of story blocks in your outline to help you get on your path to writing: the opening scene, the climax, the … Read more
I\’ve been chatting with some authors about the use of pen names. This week it\’s Steven B. Moores, author of Dead on Cuban Time, Cherub\’s Play, and Love\’s Last Stand. Tell us about you as human, and you as author. In my day job I’m an attorney with the US Environmental Protection Agency, helping keep … Read more
We’ve talked about the inciting incident, and the climax in our plotting process. Now it’s time to consider the ending. Endings can be tricky. Endings should be gratifying and fulfilling for your reader. After all, the reader has invested their time into reading your ENTIRE book and unhappy readers are not good for writers. Make … Read more
When you think of your story’s plot, it is helpful to think of a story’s parts to help you see the big picture and help you to begin to work out your story’s plot. All stories have beginnings, middles, and endings. They also have inciting incidents, midpoints, and climaxes. Regardless of the genre of book … Read more
I was recently at Colorado Gold, which is a conference geared toward writers wanting to improve their craft and writing skill. It was a great conference attended by 300+ writers. While there, I chatted with people and I noticed that for some of them, the concept of plot seemed to be an afterthought. These were … Read more
It\’s summer which is a reminder for me to evaluate my writing progress. While I don\’t make New Year\’s Resolutions at the beginning of the year, I do make a list of goals. I never achieve them perfectly, but I do move closer to achieving them over time, and I do the work step-by-step to … Read more
We’ve had a substantial number of submissions at Literary Wanderlust lately. We always take the time to read every submission with the goal of finding some really great stories to contract and turn into books. Well, that’s not actually true. There is one category of submissions that we reject without reading—books with exorbitant word counts. What? … Read more
You know how it is. You are some place, maybe waiting in a long line, or at the car repair shop. You strike up a conversation with someone. You talk about the wait time, or the weather, or the food, or some safe topic. Inevitably, the conversation will get around to the business of what … Read more