Posts by Standback
The difficulty with adverbs falls to the familiar saw about "show, don't tell": If the adverb is instructing the reader how to interpret the action, the implication is that the description itself i...
I'd recommend against an overview. Short stories are short, and figuring out what they are and what they're doing is often a lot of the story's bulk. You want them coming in like a real reader woul...
The components of a really effective payoff, in my mind, are these: The reader knows something is coming But: they don't know what is coming. They have open questions; they have doubts. They're i...
I'd suggest giving some thought to how the magic actually works -- because figuring out a concrete magical effect will get you a long way towards answering the question "how does this escape the ch...
I don't want to make it too obvious before the reveal. OK, question: why not? Consider the fundamental structure of a plot twist, or a reveal. It's usually either: Reader is expecting A; ha...
Separate concerns. If you think of editing as "fixing everything in my novel," it's going to be a huge and unmanageable chore, and there's nowhere to begin it that will give you even a sense of pr...
A lot of current science-fiction and fantasy magazines have online submission systems, accepting Word documents. And where I remember, way-back-when, submission guidelines noting that (printed) man...
A story should finish what it starts. You control what, exactly, you choose to start. If you're not going to be finishing a murder mystery with a solution, you need to be careful not to set the st...
I'm advising a translation project, translating some short stories from a foreign language to English. What I'm advising about isn't the translations themselves -- but seeing the translated stories...
At extremes: yes, relying on "chance" as a plot device can be very unsatisfying. The reader knows that "chance" isn't really a matter of luck; instead, it's the author manipulating events. The re...
To decide how many points of view (POVs) you can handle, you need to take into account the demands a new POV makes on you. Each POV needs character and voice. When you have more than one or two PO...
That's a substantial bit of revision. It can definitely be done, but the question is if that's what you want to prioritize right now. During a first draft, there will be a lot of things you'll wan...
"Show don't tell," as a three-word directive, is pithy and simplistic. But it's used because it's one of the fundamentals of writing well, and one of the things new writers understand least. As La...
An immensely helpful resource on this topic is Writer Beware, a volunteer organization associated with the SFWA and MWA. Their essay on warning signs of questionable agents answers your question in...
So much of communication is nonverbal - facial expressions, body language. Often, it's entirely clear what somebody is thinking and conveying even if they aren't saying a word. How can I portray t...
The trick is to link his internal flaws and deliberations to clear, concrete details. That gives him something to do, something to engage with. It gives him a way to express his character. In this...
You can manage without one, but I'd recommend against it, unless you have a compelling reason. A protagonist without a name is often awkward to write, and certainly awkward to think or speak about...
All the way back to A Wizard of Earthsea, the Names-Have-Power trope usually handles this by giving people nicknames for "public" use. Their real names are closely-guarded secrets. You can definit...
There is no perfect place. No social media platform is going to give you attention just by posting there. The internet is full of Stuff for people to read; they aren't queuing up to read your mater...
Do not try to query with an unfinished manuscript. Dear Query Shark, I have an incomplete fantasy novel here's where I stop reading and send a form rejection letter -- Janet Reid, h...
I think you'll find there's no one "correct" way (or two ways, or three, or ten). Everybody figures out what works for them. There are many ways to balance between outlining and improvising, incl...
I'm not clear on whether you see this is a pitch session (i.e., with the explicit goal of interesting the publisher in your novel), or simply an opportunity for a one-on-one conversation. Either wa...
I've gotten feedback for a complete draft of my WIP fantasy novel. Overall it's looking good, but a couple of friends noticed a significant loophole in the system of magic I use in the book. The bo...
Read and write. Read Innumerable guides and advice exist for outlining and plotting a story. Pick a few and read some! This will help you absorb fundamental concepts, common techniques, and typic...
What happens in your story seems, from your description, to be action/thriller. Where your story is set is an imaginary world, bearing some resemblance to the real world in the 1950-ish era. The ...
