Recent content by Penpilot

For me, I have an organized idea file. When I have an idea for a story while in the middle of writing another story, I open up a new entry in the idea file and jot down notes, trying to capture the idea for the story and the emotion behind what I want the story to be, so if and when I get back...

Keep kicking that word count's butt and chewing bubblegum.

One other thing to consider is this. Some people point to bad story and attribute predictability as one of the elements that made it bad. But we know there are lots of good stories that are fairly predictable. What's the difference? It's how engaging the story is. If I"m not engaged with a...

If this were true, would unpredictable = good? I mean, I could rewrite Romeo and Juliet where instead of a tragic end, and completely out of the blue, they both discover a time machine, travel to the modern day, return to the past with machine guns, and mow down everyone trying to keep them...

In chapter 7, in the first paragraph, simply remind the reader what name she was using before and that Mielli is her new name that she has chosen, and you should be fine. It doesn't hurt to give readers a quick reminder on certain significant elements when the story has been focusing on other...

Remember the story is filtered through the lens of the main character(s). What they notice and what they feel will influence how the reader will feel. So if the main character notices incongruities in the world/setting, how they feel and react will be passed along to the reader. Now this doesn't...

The reason it's generally not the best idea to edit/revise as you go, at least when you're just starting out, is because what will happen is you will spend hours editing/revising. Then later, you'll realize that chapter or that section you spent hours editing/revising will need to be cut or...

Somewhere out there Stephen King is turning green with envy. :p

I once wrote a short story from the POV of a giant, mutant, potato that would not stop growing.

Be careful about making big changes before you finish the first draft. What may appear to be a good decision in isolation may later be shown to not be so good when taken within context of the story as a whole. You may find things at the end call back and connect to those first two chapters in a...

Would something like Conan the Barbarian fall into this category? In terms of how you can signal to the reader that this is fantasy, just add an element that's fantastical in some way, but isn't magical. It can be someone telling the myth of how the world was formed. It can be the existence of...

I've read books with two main characters told using 1st. You just have to make it clear at the beginning of each section which character the 1st POV is from. I've also read books where they mix 1st and 3rd. They'll use 1st for their primary POV and then use 3rd for their secondary characters...

I use Scrivener. I used to use Word various free programs (yWriter/ Wikipad) to write and organize all my notes. Scrivener let me do all that in one program. Last I checked Scrivener lets you try it for 30 non-continuous days.

I think if you make us root for your character and empathize with their struggles, you've got most of the work done there. Because any obstacle, even if it seems small on the surface, can be huge if it feels huge for her. If you bring the reader into that moment and make them feel the weight of...

This kind of sounds like it could be something like a road movie, where the character travels from place to place meeting interesting people on their way to a destination. Maybe along the way, each stop she faces one of these emotional issues in some form. It challenges/tests her, and she...