Readers caught in the grips of suspense are kept locked upon their seats permanently so they may find answers to an unyielding question hopefully on that very next page. The means to obtain such an effect is through the proper use of information in your narrative. Boiled down to its basic components, all information reverts … Continue reading Suspense in Fiction
Tag: Fiction
Travel in Fiction
Here, There, Everywhere, and Back Again
How to Edit Your Weaknesses
One of my standard phrases pertaining to writing that I’ve absorbed into my philosophy is, “I write my strengths and edit my weaknesses.” It’s a luxury of a non-live, correctable activity that if something is sub-par or simply doesn’t work, it can be fixed later. No basketball player can undo a three-point airball and move … Continue reading How to Edit Your Weaknesses
Clearing Out Infodumps
Even with the best intentions, you’ll write yourself into a predicament expounding on your story’s background information. Sometimes it’s necessary as you’re attempting to figure out what’s happening in your story because rambling about the broader facts and setting your characters contend with helps clear up where the story goes next and why. Actions gain … Continue reading Clearing Out Infodumps
Infallible Characters
Except in the eyes of some religious devotees and in the mirrors of narcissists, no one on earth is infallible. Everyone makes mistakes. I used spell check on narcissists ten seconds ago. What allows you to progress as a person is the ability to recognize why those mistakes arose from your own failings and work … Continue reading Infallible Characters
Low Budget Novels
Monetary restrictions have been a driving force of creativity in many artistic fields. In film especially the limitation summed up in the expression, “If you want ten explosions, you have to make ten explosions.” The infinite imagination pulled down to earth by the finite resources at hand. Scenes are rewritten. Cinematography techniques modified or invented … Continue reading Low Budget Novels
Falling Action: Avoid the Slump
You can’t race up a hill forever, eventually you’ll run out of breath. For this reason story structure demands a dynamic switch between moments of greater emphasis known as rising action and those of lesser emphasis known as falling action. For shorter stories it’s possible to only have rising actions from the introduction to the … Continue reading Falling Action: Avoid the Slump
Multiple Choice Prose
Deciding On That One Tough Line
Ode to Old Technology
On a curveball spur of energy, I decided to take out an old piece of kit. That was the start of an hour of grief and consternation from what was meant to be a few minutes of quiet enjoyment. Near a decade ago I was gifted a portable digital audio converter (DAC) from an audiophile … Continue reading Ode to Old Technology
Setting Up the Bar
I want to run through an exercise for something I’m not particularly versed in. Though that statement gives me an easy out, as I often sit on the writer scale’s far discovery end I don’t put much thought to new environments when I’m building on the preexisting characters. Locations and places have always been barebones … Continue reading Setting Up the Bar
Colin Klawans 