5 Simple Golden Rules for Writers
When you think about writing your book (or story or whatever it is you’re working on) does it initially seem to you like a mountain over...
Providing Rewards
See if you can immediately write down your goal as a writer. It might be that you want to make a lot of money from writing; perhaps you...
The Moment of Truth
Now we reach the moment of truth. Does your fiction achieve its desired result? You can only really tell this from completed works. Think...
Tolkien and 'The Kalevala'
’Do not laugh!’ Tolkien famously wrote in a letter to Milton Waldman ‘But once upon a time (my crest has long since fallen) I had a mind...
Quality of Style
Style is the way in which a writer uses words and other devices right there on the page in front of the reader. Â Whereas Ideas,...
A Brief Look at Desdemona in 'Othello'
If we accept momentarily that there is a female companion archetype in fiction, as outlined in How Stories Really Work , then it’s worth...
Emotional Commitment
Let’s say that you have a work jam-packed full of powerful ideas, bristling with exciting and recognisable characters, and filled with...
Attractive Power
Whether or not you have good ideas and working characters, the trick underlying everything is to be able to attract readers . Â This is a...
The Universe That 'Turns'
Of all of C. S. Lewis’s vast contribution to literature and to thought in the Twentieth Century, it is his last book, The Discarded Image...