Secondary Characters Need Agency Too
Supporting characters have a way of stealing scenes (and sometimes entire stories) from your main protagonist, but despite that possibility, writers should breath life...
Multiple POV Can Create Frameworks within Frameworks
In the latest episode of the Writing Excuses podcast, Peng Shepherd joins the hosts to explore ways in which the use of multiple point-of-view...
Hi, My Name Is…
Sometimes, our characters pop into life with the exact right name. Other times, we have only a vague idea what to call them and...
Creating Characters at Mach-IV
In a new post, Kristen Lamb takes a left turn at traditional "personality tests" to discuss how to discover what makes your characters tick....
Practice for Making Your Characters Distinct
In a new post, Mary Carroll Moore offers advice on making each of your story's characters distinct. "Developed characters, fictional or real, should be...
What’s Your Weapon of Opportunity?
In the latest in her series of Fight Write™ posts on the Writer's Digest blog, trained fighter and author Carla Hoch discusses weapons of...
How is Story Structure Like a Mixtape?
Structure. Is it an arc, with rising action and a climax? A river that meanders from its source to its ending? A spiral? An...
I Love Your Theme, but Did it Mean Anything?
In a post on Writer Unboxed, Donald Maass ponders the difference between theme and meaning, and offers advice for injecting purpose into your novel.
According...
Where Did This Come From? Where is it Going?
In a post on the SFWA blog, Kahina Necaise suggests some direct questions to ask while you're editing your story:
Does this come out...
Questions: An Overlooked Tool for Better Critiques
In the latest in their "Mistakes Writers Make" series, the Writer's Digest editors urge writers to ask questions during the drafting process. "We shouldn’t...
