When I first arrived from Iowa to my new home state, Oklahoma, I wondered if we even spoke the same language. At the filling station,…
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When I first arrived from Iowa to my new home state, Oklahoma, I wondered if we even spoke the same language. At the filling station,…
What is a scene? In The Art of Fiction, John Gardner writes that a scene is …an unbroken flow of action from one incident in time…
Samuel Beckett’s masterpiece, Waiting for Godot, accomplishes an improbable and amazing artistic feat. At first glance, it’s a two act play in which nothing happens. …
We’ve all got names. Most of us are stuck with the ones our parents gave us. Some of us decide to change our names. I…
Stephen J. Cannel wrote that, “Every great movie, book or play that has stood the test of time has a solid Three-Act structure.” He also…
Authors build fictional worlds. This is more obvious in some genres than others, science fiction and fantasy being the two most obvious. But even a…
We all have stories to tell. I have a story for you. My…
Once in a while, psychologists do interesting things. Bear with me, as I have a point to make about writing fiction. The Gambling Task The…
Ray Bradbury once said, “I don’t tell anyone how to write and no one tells me.” Yet, when pressed, he produced eight rules for successful…
Back when I wore a younger man’s clothes and was just learning the basics of writing fiction, I remember writing something like this: “Aha,” she…