by Stephanie Morrill | Mar 25, 2019 | Mailbag, Plot
Today’s fantastic question comes from Fiona, who says: I’ve gotten some feedback that some events in my novel are too big of a coincidence and that the plot feels unnaturally lucky or unlucky to have happened to a character. That made me wonder: what makes...
by Stephanie Morrill | Jan 28, 2019 | Editing, Getting Feedback On Your Writing, Getting Published, Plot, Story Structure, Writing, Writing Life
Looking for the earlier posts? Click here for part one and click here for part two. The last couple weeks we’ve been addressing the question, “How do you know if your book works as a whole?” Links for parts one and two are up above, but as a very...
by Stephanie Morrill | Jan 21, 2019 | Antagonists, Brainstorming, Characters, Plot, The Craft of Writing, Writing
(Did you miss part one? You can find it here.) This second part of this series is what I believe is the most critical component of if a story works or not: Character Motivation. Do you have plot holes? A theme that isn’t resonating? Flat characters? My guess is...
by Stephanie Morrill | Jan 14, 2019 | Brainstorming, First Drafts, Getting Feedback On Your Writing, Plot, Writing Life
It’s funny to me that sometimes I start a blog post thinking, “I’ve learned this cool thing, and I want to tell others!” And other times, like today, I start a blog post thinking, “I wonder what I have to say about this.” As it...
by Jill Williamson | Dec 12, 2018 | Plot, Scenes and Scene Structure
Congratulations! You’ve finished your novel. It’s not perfect, but it’s done. Unfortunately, there are a few holes here and there that you’re not quite sure how to fix. You need more story. The problem is, you’re all out of ideas....
by Jill Williamson | Dec 5, 2018 | Denouement, Plot, Story Endings, Story Structure
Since I talked about the “Break into three” concept last time, what would fit perfectly here is a post on Blake Snyder’s Five-Step Finale. I wrote a post on that subject back in April, however, when I was plotting out my book Onyx Eyes, so I decided...
