Recent content by Penpilot

In the writing sphere you're going to run into all sorts of personalities with something to say about you or about something you created. Some will be worth listening to. Others will not be worth the air spent to tell them to sit on a bag of dick-shaped tacks. Some can be tough, but fair. Some...

I was just reading through the new post in this thread, and it triggered a memory of a phrase I heard used during a sports broadcast, which I though was pretty cool, when a player had a bit of a brain fart. That phrase was "mental vapor lock" derived from engine vapor lock. Engine vapor lock is...

I have a CompSci degree, (but it's been a long time since I used it) and my initial reaction is their brain crashed, and there's no getting out of it until they do a hard reboot. To me, it's not a momentary pause. To me, what you describe is akin to bottle-necking.

For me, it depends. I think something like that best fits stories with a lighthearted slant or instances where a lighthearted tone is being conveyed. It's hard for me to imagine it being used in a dramatic scene, because seeing something like that on the page reminds me of comicbooks and...

That's pretty much how things unfolded for me, though, I did buy an old-old Mac for $150, and used that for a year or so just for Scrivener until the Windows version became a reality.

I use Scrivener. It basically it can ball up the story text and all the different notes and odds and ends into one project. I also keep an Idea's Project in Scrivener, where I jot down my story ideas for safekeeping and organization. Before Scrivener, I used this free program called yWriter for...

I usually boil thing down to this. The start of a story is simply someone with a problem, and a compelling reason to solve said problem. The story is them struggling to overcome the obstacle or many obstacles standing in the way of them solving said problem. A lot of times when we're stuck...

IMHO, your initial instincts about it are correct. When you boil it down, magically directing someone's emotions to make them do something they wouldn't otherwise do is robbing them of their ability to choose. You're basically asking how do you make forcing someone to do something they don't...

IMHO, you're overthinking. Write what you want to write, book A. Let's say the results end up being a disaster. You can always try again. The idea for that story isn't a one use only item. You can keep trying and trying until you get it right. My first novel was hot garbage in execution, but...

This is a quote that I always try to keep in mind. "Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." I've never regretted asking a girl out, even when I went down in flames. All my regrets are when I did nothing. Burns heal, but the...

What doesn't get mentioned here is passion for a project. If you don't have a passion for a project, that's going to hinder execution. Also familiarity with a genre will affect execution. Did Tolkien have a passion for writing mysteries? Did he have familiarity with the genre and expectations of...

There are lots of different approaches you can take depending on the type of story you're telling and the tone you want. You can play with things, subvert them, or straight up lean into them. Like with most things, it's about execution. Look at Snape. He's used as a red-herring and a...

That's great. Keep on truckin'

I play hockey. I've been on skates since I was 6. I'm considerably older than 6 now. I've never played at a high level. Never will. But I have a passion of for it that pushes me to improve because all the worries of the world fade away when I'm on the ice. When I watch professionals play and...

When I edit, I make passes, moving from big picture down to medium picture and finally to the minutia. The big picture is plot and character arcs. The minutia is the polish, the word choices and rhythm/flow of the prose and dialogue. I know it's done when I can make a polishing pass and...