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In all the author biographies I have read, two things seem to be constant. They are all voracious wide-ranging readers, and they all (or almost all) started writing in some form at a very early age...
I do not have enough knowledge about the book-reading community as to what pleases them. What pleases them is what you see published and sell, they wouldn't buy it and read it if it did not p...
I will start my answer from a slightly different angle than the question originally proposed. You are asking whether or not you should write a novel, and specify the purpose as writing a book with ...
In the context of an actual as opposed to training fight scene in a fictional narrative, how would one express martial arts action? Generally, martial arts has a distinctive disciplined but power...
Most political humor I see on the internet is usually directed towards persons, and the jokes are relatively easy. However, it's pretty much useless, and temporary, besides, poking at the personal...
This is a Buyer's Market. +1 'Friday Night in Frankfurt'. If you send query letters and they respond, you do not have long to send in a manuscript, you are going to leave yourself with about a wee...
Yes, but as you said it also depends on the genre. Here is an article, why a first author should write to word count. Basically, science fiction and fantasy (your main genre) is 110,000 words, and...
I've been writing a friendly tutorial series for a small art software community. Somehow I decided to write it in first person plural, so the entire tutorial is "First, let's do this..." and "Now w...
The novel is one of the most complex pieces of art that humans create, and the enjoyment of novels can be based on many different characteristics. Without trying to be exhaustive, we could distingu...
I wouldn't worry much about style, I strongly disagree with your critic. I wouldn't say there is a "most important component" because there are a few elements that must be there no matter what. T...
Clockpunk Most of the following comes from the article: Punkpunk: A Compendium of Literary Punk Genres First of all, appending "punk" at the end is often used to show that the main character or c...
If you write a serious book, people will take it seriously. If you write a book that people take seriously at age 13, people will consider you a phenom. But it almost never happens, and the reaso...
As my name probably makes clear, I'm not female. However I'm a keen reader of fantasy and SF, and I'm particularly interested in anyone with new things to say, because the power of fantasy and SF i...
No matter how hard you try to make sure that there is only one possible interpretation of your story, people will interpret it in different ways according to their experience, ideology, and circums...
Start by writing about a character into whom you have the most insight, about whom you have the most to say. Art is about vision. It is about seeing what others do not see and transforming it into ...
You don't You normally wouldn't start by writing the complete story from start to finish and then proceed to start developing the other parts of a game: gameplay, art, music, ... Regarding the st...
The good character who turns bad is a classic feature of literature. It is the essence of the literary form we call tragedy. Thus Macbeth opens with high praise for the virtuous Macbeth: SOLDIER...
If those topics are necessary a-priori knowledge to understand your reasoning then you should expect your readers to know the basics. If you can't expect them to know what you are talking about t...
If it doesn't propel the story, there is no need to even mention it. For example, I've heard an interpretation of Sam and Frodo (from J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings) as being a bit of a gay ...
The question whether or not you may use ideas, characters, stories, and so on from other works has been addressed multiple times on this site; you will find them if you use the site search. The sh...
Music is a performance art, it takes place in "real time." Writing does not. So while there is an inevitable trade-off between spontaneity and polish for a musician, the same is not true for a wr...
Neil Gaiman said "Make good art." In the same speech he says: The moment that you feel that just possibly you're walking down the street naked, exposing too much of your heart and your mind an...
The theory is bollocks. Here's why: the reader does not need any of it. A story is an entertainment. The reader needs food and water and oxygen and shelter and love. They don't need your novel. R...
I'm not sure if I am interpreting this correctly, but I would not "mix" character questions with explanatory exposition (or answers in exposition), and I wouldn't make characters too "ignorant," th...
I've changed a secondary character into a murderer, and it changes everything. This change also opposes my core philosophies, that life and art should strive to reach something higher - not somethi...
