I’ve spent much of my life jealous of those around me who were naturally talented at things. I’ve always wished I had something resembling talent in visual arts; I have never been able to draw, and it’s a talent I greatly admire.
by Caren Gussoff
We’re on the front lines of the changing publishing industry, and for all the insecurities that encompasses, we have a growing number of tools that help reach out and sell directly to fans. Of these tools, perhaps the one most successful has been the online crowd funding platforms.
by Nancy Fulda
Villains are challenging to write. Make them too heartless, and no one will find them believable. Make them too empathetic, and the audience will end up rooting for the wrong team. It can be difficult to create an antagonist with enough human virtue to be interesting and enough human foibles to be, well, villainous.
by Alethea Kontis
Luckily, there are many other outlets for writers to alternately channel their particular brand of creativity: Blogging, podcasting, memes, fan fiction…in this day and age, the possibilities are endless.
by William Ledbetter
The email was short and straightforward. I identified myself as a science fiction writer who was curious about one aspect of their paper.
by Matthew Kressel
It’s become a cliché, the tortured writer beset by periods of crippling self-doubt. But things become clichés simply because they have been true for so many. Writing, for most people I know, is an experience of few victories and many small defeats.
by Barbara A. Barnett
So my takeaway from all this babbling is this: how you write isn’t always about getting words down. Sometimes it’s about looking at other aspects of your life and figuring out if there are changes you can make that will improve your ability to get those words down.
by Juliette Wade
I love to use non-English languages in a story. To me, a foreign language behaves like a form of music – it creates mood and atmosphere for the readers who don’t understand it, and it further creates a layer of meaning for those readers who do understand it.
Cascade Writers Workshop (July 17-20, 2014) is a 4-day event in Kent, WA, just south of Seattle, specializing in science fiction and fantasy writing. Guest speakers include editor Beth Meacham, agents Bree Ogden and Lisa Rodgers, publisher Patrick Swenson, authors Tina Connolly and Mark Teppo, Alma Alexander, K.c. Ball, David Levine, Mark Henry, Camille Alexa, Randy Henderson, Spencer Ellsworth, and more.
I absolutely adore the Internet, but there’s no doubt it has made us more distracted than ever.I can see this in myself, and in watching everyone else around me: constant use of laptops, switching between browser tabs, checking things on iPhones, typing in a message here and there … we all do it.
Four sorcerers—a former courtesan, a duelist, a metalsmith, and an illiterate youth—hire out their extraordinary talents to Cantagna’s Shadow Lord for missions of intrigue that ungifted spies would find impossible. They call themselves the Chimera.
Deborah J. Ross is a former SFWA Secretary and member of Book View Cafe. Recent work includes THUNDERLORD, Lambda Finalist COLLABORATORS, and THE SEVEN-PETALED SHIELD trilogy, and stories in F & SF, Asimov’s, and Star Wars: Tales from Jabba’s Palace.
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