I like the intimacy of first person. The direct connection with a character, the lack of any barriers between us – this tends to be what sucks me into a book. (It’s even better when the lines between reader and protagonist blur entirely, as in Ulysses or Liu Yichang’s The Drunkard.)…
Show and Tell and Write: Writing Tools not Rules
Showing versus telling is not a matter of right and wrong. Once again, in writing, there are no rules, only tools.
Mind The Gap: How the Uncle Charles Principle and Its Adaptations Can Close the Gap Between Narrator and Reader in Different Narrative Points of View
As writers, we often desire to close the gap between our characters and readers. We want readers to become so engrossed in the characters’ lives that they forget they are reading. This gap between the reader and the text can widen when the author uses an indirect characterization method.…
Let’s Talk About First Lines with Faulkner
Recently, a statement in a BBC article by Hephzibah Anderson about the all-important first line of a novel caught my eye: “We frontload our expectations, insisting that a handful of words must contain the DNA of all that is to come, encapsulating the conflict of a 300-page story.”…
Word Choice: How Karen Russell’s “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves” Can Save Writers from Becoming a “Bunches”
When my son, Nick, was in high school, his English teacher asked the class to write a brief essay about their summer vacations. Reading aloud, one of Nick’s friends ended his paper with, “I had a lot of fun.” His teacher asked the student if he could think of a better word or phrase to express “a lot.”…
Most Books on Writing Suck and Here’s Why
This article was originally going to be a review for a recent craft book I picked up to read that promised to look at writing through a new lens. However, midway through chapter three, I put the book down and didn’t pick it up again.…
Kappa Myths and Manners: Wunderworld Ideas from Ryunosuke Akutagawa
Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s Kappa is a wonderland journey through Kappa Land narrated by Patient No 23, who has found himself in an insane asylum following his adventures. (My copy is translated by Allison Markin Powell & Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda.)
I have wunderworld projects on my mind these days – stories about adventures Elsewhere, in downstairs underworlds peopled by the dead or next-door wonderlands inhabited by curious characters.…
Flannery O’Connor’s Use of Symbolism Makes “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” a Story for the Ages
Let’s See How It Works
As a writer, I’m always keen to dissect a story to see how it works. More than that, I want to pinpoint the difference between a great story and a world-class story, the kind that’s anthologized and taught for generations.…
Writing Tools not Rules: Story Structures = Symmetry
All rules are really just tools. Story structure is mostly about symmetry and balance.
Setting: Take Your Character Reinvention Story Abroad
“La vita e un viaggio. Chi viaggia vive due volte.”
Life is a journey. Those who travel live twice.
Italian proverb
Foreign settings allure and entice. They whisper of things unknown, exotic, and enriching. The Italian saying quoted above proposes a second life for traveling characters.…