Posts by wetcircuit
The blogger These Heterogenous Tasks has been writing his analysis on specific CYOA books, and general observations about their history, trends, and common structure. https://heterogenoustasks.word...
This question is about genre and reader expectations. I'm not trying to change my story to fit a mainstream genre. I have already taken steps to broaden it's appeal, but it's too late to create an ...
I am using Ink by Inkle Studios. It's writer-oriented and open source. They have a free editor/compiler that exports an elegant web version, and they have a Unity plugin. The syntax feels more soph...
Do you want the most stories, or the least stories? The ad infinitum of plot lists is probably the book Plotto: The Master Book of All Plots by William Wallace Cook. It's a manic collection of (of...
Save the cat All the standard tricks will still work. Readers can like the protagonist through some simple actions that show he he is a kind person. Allow him to help someone in need, show a kind ...
I'm going with a frame challenge. Not all reveals are a "twist" A twist is new information that changes the meaning of earlier events. This is done by writing 2 plots with the same events. The MC...
You need a major twist earlier in the story. The promise to the reader is that there is a debate about the strange events, and that things don't always turn out as they appear. That makes your end...
Author talking points and author background might give a reviewer or journalist something to write about. 1st-time fiction authors are – publicity wise – a dime-a-dozen. If there is a way to talk ...
My question has been provoked by the fact that I have a very spicy joke for a specific situation in a sci-fi story and I'm not sure how readers would react to that. I'll stick to this spec...
It tells us nothing The phrase Gary Jules 'Mad Mad World' has no emotional resonance with me whatsoever. It is not shorthand for "a specific emotional state". Popular music is not a universal ex...
Inanna's Journey and "girly" heroes There are traditional "girly" heroes – often they take the pattern of Inanna's Journey. Rather than "leveling up" like a plucky male hero, Inanna's Journey is a...
I have an ambiguous script situation, 2 co-protagonists begin gaslighting the MC. They each have ulterior motives which they don't say. The reader is intended to infer the lies through contradictor...
Acknowledging that the top answer cautions controlling another person is abuse, and abuse is never cute, I'll try to suggest ways to minimize the issues. Avoid Blame: The lover is not at fault an...
You might want to present the in-story text as a parable which means the story has a teachable message, rather than words like "mythology" or "religion" which imply a spiritual calling. the rol...
Orson Scott Card described 4 types of story he called M.I.C.E. The goal is not to exclusively write 1 type of story, but to be aware which type your story is, and then work to include some of the o...
Hero-always-wins is a trope I wouldn't call this a plot twist. A twist is a reveal. It changes how events earlier in the story are perceived. This is subverting a trope. The trope is an expected...
Allow me to introduce you to a game-changing author who at age 19 wrote a morally complicated "pot boiler" about a privileged jerk who plays god then abandons his responsibility. This novel has eve...
How best to keep these occasionally polarizing aims balanced without creating reader whiplash? This is character conflict and it's a good thing I think it's not about which character is "wi...
Yes. It's your main character, who is a bully, and wins. There is nothing ambiguous about this. 95% of people are already well aware of it. This is only a story to the children of wealthy people...
Some people need to like the MC, yes. And they don't seem to change their mind just because the writing is good or the situation is original. Me, I need consistent characters that have believable...
In Star Wars, Luke Skywalker murders an estimated 250,000 civilian employees aboard the Death Star. The same source says there were over 1.5 million troops aboard who we learn from the sequels are ...
Every non-fiction writer should have a blog covering the topics they write about. You are trying to establish yourself as an authority on the subject, an influencer of ideas and opinions, or a cura...
Hero 1 goes through the gauntlet to become a hero, and it's left him bitter. He's angry at how unfair it was. How many good men died just to prove purity (or whatever). He is a hero, but he's broke...
5 Hours, 5 Days, 5 years (ago) Unfortunately, I don't remember where I read this, but an author/writing guide I read suggested a simple rule of character interview 5 Hours, 5 Days, and 5 Years. As...
An author website supposedly has a lot of functions, such as: Promoting one's latest book; Keeping one's audience engaged with weekly updates; Keeping track of events or convention...
