The Protective Bubble of the Story

When you write for any length of time, you’ll come across some very common thoughts. Patterns, if you will. How hard this all is. How mentally taxing. How frustrating. Everything is frustrating. Editing is frustrating. Marketing is frustrating. Seeing other authors get attention, when you don’t–no matter how much you logically try to tell yourself their …

Sometimes Writing Is Like Throwing a Ball Down a Field and Hoping You Can Run Fast Enough to Catch It

I like making elaborate metaphors when it distracts me from actually having to write anything. Announcing my daily writing progress is my way of making myself stick to it. It’s a brain hack. Because writing is very hard, but I don’t like breaking promises. So I stick to it, even if it means writing way …

Character Discussions: The Cocky Anti-Hero

One of my most controversial characters is Pablo from Birthplace. I’ve talked about this before: how I try not to create likable characters, and instead write them as honest as I can make them. I’ve also written a few “anti-heroes” so to speak: Enosh Tar’elian coming to mind. This is the sort of character who is …