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Historical fiction based on real events is a huge part of the genre of historical fiction. In fact, the taste today seems to be for stories that are as close to historical events as possible, with ...
What you describe, if I understand it correctly, is historical fiction. That's a genre with a long and proud tradition. It includes works as diverse as Ivanhoe, War and Peace, The Three Musketeers,...
I am not a lawyer, but do business with copyright law, and this is my understanding. First, it IS possible to copyright characters in other works. Here is an excerpt from Protection of Fictional ...
Fantasy and science-fiction is a genre that's bigger on the inside, and you'll find a lot of weird fiction enjoyed and celebrated within the genre. Surrealism and oddness definitely have their plac...
Short answer: definitely, absolutely, wholeheartedly 3. Long answer: Sir Terry Pratchett wrote somewhere that since he was reading a lot as a child, when he was little there were many words he kne...
What you're looking for is beta readers. Beta readers would read all your work, and look at exactly the things you are unsure about: general flow, plot holes, etc. Who can be beta readers? Friends...
Well, first, you cannot write about any politically charged issue without being read as taking sides. If you are ideologically aligned with one side, the other will throw rocks through your window....
I'll borrow an idea Memor-X pointed out to me in my question Are there tools that can aid an author in writing a branching storyline?: yEd It's a free tool that allows you to create flowcharts. I...
If they haven't asked me to read it, or tell them what I think, I would do nothing at all. Given any opportunity that qualifies as an "ask", I would be truthful. I would not pretend to be any more...
Yes, author's do this all the time. One of the books I use frequently is The Writer's Digest Character Naming Sourcebook", it lists 25,000 first and last names and their meanings from around the wo...
How do I write LGBT characters without looking like I'm trying to be politically correct? Don't Try. Do. Actually BE "politically correct." "Politically Correct" is originally (and in my view...
A girl being pulled into a room by a man against her will is going to assume she is about to be raped, and possibly murdered in the bargain. She will scream for that, and fight that, even if she is...
Long experience has taught many of us that when you send a busy person an email with more than one question, they only answer the first one and ignore the rest. Thus many of us have gotten into the...
One thing you want to consider is how you want the scene to read: Do you want the scene to have sexual overtones? Do you want the girl to appear weak, a passive sheep, (making the reader identify...
Two thoughts. Literature is not about the character's emotions. It is about the reader's emotions. In real life, every single TV cop and mystery series detective would be invalided out with PTSD ...
First off, the easiest way to have your bad guy be less invincible and more defeatable is to make him less invincible. He's your creation. Don't give him so many benefits. Take away some of the phy...
Think about people who may use a screenreader (or like audiobooks) E-Books are very important and a lot of books are sold as hard-copies and as e-books alike. This allows people with a disability ...
Both are criminals with no redeeming qualities There's your problem. You have a pair of one-dimensional cartoon supervillains who are evil just because. Those kinds of villains are unrealistic...
How do you write a conversation? You write the dialogue: what guy A said, what guy B said. Consider how they say it, how they talk at all: are they open with each other, or are there things they ar...
You can show more of this planning and anticipation in order to make it more plausible. Show your villain expending large resources and manpower in the pursuit of plans and alternatives. Take an i...
A German letter is not much different from a letter in any other language. The first thing to be aware of is whether it is in an official context or in a private context. For example if you are w...
Write the ending. Do it now. You can revise it later, or scrap it and write it over, but get your tears out of the way. I think you dread writing the outcome; face that dread and write it. Make it...
Well, first off, like ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere mentioned, make sure to be careful with how you portray a real person. There are many possible ways to mess up, not least of which is libel which was...
I'm not sure that you do get through this. A story is an experience. To write the story, you have to live the experience, emotionally at least. When a story does not ring true, I think that is usua...
"The Old Man and the Sea" comes to mind as a novel where I don't recall any dialogue. Santiago talks to himself, talks to his hand, talks to the fish, etc., but that isn't really dialogue. Or, of y...
