Category Archives: Story notes

Where Do You Get Your Ideas? – Part 1 of X

Today I am writing a short story because a couple of days ago, when our writing group met, I made a smart-arse comment about tenses and now I have to back it up. Never underestimate the motivational power of backing … Continue reading

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The Longhand Experiment

Writing is hard, per my frequent reprise. Sometimes it helps to mix up the process. I do most of my writing on the desktop PC in my study. Picture me there with headphones blocking out everything but a playlist of … Continue reading

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On not writing angry

It’s not easy to write when you’re angry. Rather, it’s easy to write furious, frustrated-with-everything, stay-outta-my-way-or-I’ll-cut-you anger. Which is great if that’s what you want to write. If I were to guess, I’d say the demand for scathing political satire … Continue reading

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Dandelions and the futility of planning

One of the complaints you might hear about being a “plotter” – which is to say a writer who carefully plans a piece and then writes from an outline – is that it sucks all the creativity out of the … Continue reading

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What’s my voice again?

Here’s a new one on me – at an editor’s request, I’m rewriting the ending of a story. The details aren’t that important: they felt that the story jumped off the rails at one point, and gave me a conditional … Continue reading

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