Recent content by cupiscent

When I start busting out the five-star ratings on GoodReads for a novel, it's because the author's satisfied me in two very different ways: intellectually and emotionally. I've enjoyed engaging with a story that's interesting, that matters, that has something to say or something to explore about...

I prefer to plan a lot. The novel I've just finished polishing and am starting to shop around had a rough plan, but that still led to lots of false starts, which led to some chapters taking a couple of weeks to write. The rough draft took me something like two years. And then when I came to...

I found the Wired.com write-up really interesting: Who won science fiction's Hugo Awards, and why it matters Personally, I voted on merit. But that decision led to me No-Awarding several categories, because frankly if that was the best of the year, then it was a terrible year. (I don't believe...

Indeed, I was replying to the discussion here, not the article - I've always viewed the point of that article as being to beware critique that isn't about helping to tell your story (indeed, as you point out, fundamentally missing the point of your story) but about changing it into some other...

Comparing classics - of any era - to modern books isn't comparing apples with apples. What about all the other books that were being published at the same time as Jane Austen that we've never heard of, because they haven't survived? You're taking the enduring, loved, arguably "best of" an era...

This popped up on my blog feed today so I'm adding it to the resource pile: some pointers from a lit agent about synopses.

I would advise thinking long and hard about whether this is something you really want to do, and what steps you can explicitly take to stay as far away from White Saviour territory as possible. My first novel had a white protagonist in a black (but advanced) society that she had been born into -...

Susan Dennard's advice, complete with Star Wars example, is a great way of thinking about it. Even if your novel is more complicated than a movie or YA novel (which are shorter, with cleaner plotlines, than an epic fantasy can be) I found it a great start to thinking about streamlining and...

I readily admit I'm not up to speed on firearms - my only concern is if the gun is muzzle-loading, would the ball falling out be a problem, depending on how it's carried? (If breech-loading, I assume not an issue.)

Which is fair enough. There is SO much popular fantasy out there at the moment that is just Not My Thing. But I love Scott Lynch's work. It's so vicious and gleeful, imaginative and realistic in a combination I find simply delicious. Plus the pacing of the first book is, to my mind, impeccable...

Like Woohoman says: your world, your rules. The way human societies think and talk about gender and sexuality has varied wildly over history and geography, so as long as you have your own system and what terms you use make sense within that, then you're in clover. NK Jemisin posted her slides...

I've just been revising a novel with three POVs, and I had a big chronology knot in the middle of it, where my beta-readers noted that they were confused about when things were happening in relation to each other. That said, those events were all happening around the same time, and in the same...

For my money, you should start immediately with character or conflict. Dialogue or worldbuilding can tangle themselves along behind, but there should be character, conflict or both from the first paragraph. First sentence, if you can manage it, but a little bit of context makes things more...

I've been distracted by musing on the comparison between lawyers and writers. I think it's a stronger link than might be immediately apparent. After all, if you're the greatest legal brain of your time, but terrible with clients and no one wants to work with you, how many cases are you really...

Of course you can choose to set your story wherever you like, including in scenarios where diversity is impossible. But that is a choice you are making. And I prefer to read stories there the author has chosen to include diversity.