Happy V-day! (Terrible holiday, in my opinion, but ymmv. Plus, I have to admit that I got stellar loot this year.) The other day, during my Twitch stream, someone asked if TNSTaV has a lot of plot twists. I tried to answer as honestly as I know how (without giving anything away), but it made me think about it quite
Read moreI’m this close to finishing the first draft of the second book. I said that two weeks ago. And a week ago. And last night. And I am. I really, really am this close. Except I keep not getting to the “finished” bit, and it started to feel like maybe something was wrong. Maybe I’m hovering at the this close
Read moreWhether you call it a synopsis, a summary, or a survey, I call it a giant pain in the ass. I really hate trying to write them, and I think I’m really bad at it. “Hi! I need you to write something short and descriptive about your book. It has to be intriguing, mysterious, evocative! It has to make people
Read more“Where do you get your ideas?” To hear some authors tell it, they are assaulted with this question repeatedly, at all hours of the day and night, and no one seems to know exactly how to answer it. Then, one day, some of them figure out their best answer. Eureka! It sounds good, it’s mostly true, and it leaves people
Read moreI know a guy who loves to gesture at his screen and the eighty-bajillion tabs that he has open in his browser and invite people to marvel at his multitasking genius. I once pointed out that he’s still only looking at them one at a time, and he looked at me like I’d just kicked his puppy. I don’t particularly
Read moreOctober of 2008 probably seems pretty specific, but thankfully, other people are keeping track of this stuff for me. It was October of 2008 when I heard about National Novel Writing Month for the first time (otherwise known as NANOWRIMO). It’s grown quite a bit since then, but the idea was pretty simple: you sit down during the month of
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