Try Not To Tell, Show, But If You Show, Don’t Show Everything…

It has taken me a long time to be able to articulate my thoughts on the common debate on the show, don’t tell advice that is frequently handed down to young writers. And yes, I do believe that such a debate exists the longer you stay in this craft. Le Guin had an article about why …

When Everything You Write Is Shit: Why Young Writers Should Not Give Up

A while back, I posted a link to fanfiction I wrote when I was 14. I’m not going to do it again; I’d like to spare you from further eye-gouging opportunities, especially in the likely scenario that you’ve never read any of my stuff before. I’ve improved, I swear. I think people have this image …

Writers: Can’t We All Just Get Along?

Fellow writers are some of our worst enemies. I remember way back when I decided I was going to stop writing Watership Down fanfiction, over 13 years ago. I wrote a 150,000 monstrosity that I later had the misfortune pleasure of turning into Jaeth’s Eye. I had not written original fiction for years leading up …

My Workplace

I talked about my dream writing space before, and then the room that we call the library another time. That workspace is almost ready. There is still a lot to do–paint to cover up, floor to clean  up, and a desk to bolt. But this is where I’m going to be spending much of my time …

The Making of a Novel

Not that anyone’s counting (well–except me), but I have now, to date, “finished” over eight manuscripts (of mostly crap). That is–eight full-length novels, numbering at least 50,000 words each. Most are closer to or over 100,000 words. Note that I am also not counting manuscripts I haven’t officially ‘ended’–I have a few more of those …