10 Mistakes I’ve Made in My Writing

Firsts in Fiction 10 Mistakes I’ve Made in My Writing: (Aaron) Writing with a thesaurus. My first draft of The Bargain was a very showy affair, a real, “look what I can do!” type of a novel. This kind of flashing neon light pointing to the author is distracting and...

FROM THE VAULTS: WEEK 3, ACT 3

For obvious reasons, I won’t be referencing The Hand of Adonai and the Book of Things to Come for this post. The final installment of our look at the three act structure will be a bit shorter. Why? Because Act III is generally the shortest. If you recall, Act I...

GROSS ANATOMY OF A NOVEL: DIALOG

Firsts in Fiction Gross Anatomy of a Novel: Dialog What is dialog? “Dialogue is not a break in the action. It’s an intensification of the action. Here’s something else dialogue is not: It’s not the way we speak. Dialogue must appear realistic without being realistic....

FROM THE VAULTS: WEEK 2, ACT 2

Last week, I began a three-week series on the three act structure. Most commonly used for screenplays, novelists have long borrowed the basic structure to help outline novels. Bottom line, the three-act structure is a proven story-telling technique. This week, we’ll...