It’s almost axiomatic that religious things are different from secular ones. Over and over again, we see the dichotomy of the sacred and the profane cropping up in human societies. But what needs to be sanctified? And how is this state achieved?
“How would you define scene development and what is the key to making it consistently good throughout a novel?” This was a question asked of me by a ghostwriting client. Scene craft is something that has become organic enough for me through years of experience that I’ve ceased to think about what goes into it. …
New Writers Ask: What is Scene Craft and Why Should I Care? Read More »
The last time we had a theory essay, I talked about thinking through the logical results of one’s worldbuilding. Closely related, but not quite the same, are the unfortunate implications that worldbuilding can sometimes have. By this I mean, not the practical effects on the world — the easy ways to make a kingdom richer …
New Worlds Theory Post: Unfortunate Implications Read More »
We’re nearly done with our discussion of mental health because I’m nearly at the limits of what I can talk about with any kind of confidence. But before that concludes, there’s one specific condition I’d like to look at more closely . . . because arguably, it’s one more of our characters should be suffering …
When it comes to looking at the treatment of mental illness and disability throughout history, all too often, the simple answer is “there was none.”
To the modern, western, medical mind, intellectual disabilities are generally distinct from mental illnesses. But as we’ve already discussed, other frameworks for understanding such problems attribute them to different causes, and as such, don’t necessarily differentiate the one from the other. In particular, the responses to them were often the same, so before we turn …
In a prior ”confession,” I talked about the qualities of a hero in context with a book I was writing for a client I code-named Murphy. My pointing out that a master of strong and intelligent followers would be more impressive than a master of weak, incompetent ones prompted Murphy to tell me that toning …
Confessions of a Ghostwriter: A Dish Best Served Cool Read More »
In some of these Patreon essays, I encourage writers to explore different beliefs about the world and make them the literal, metaphysical reality of the story: what if the world really were flat? What if you really did have to sing a certain song to make the crops grow? What if diseases really were caused …
For our final essay of the month, we’re going to step a bit sideways from the previous topic and look at a very different kind of organized, collective labor: the sort that may not be voluntary at all.
A ghostwriting client (hereafter, ”Murphy”) hired me to write a coming-of-age fantasy. He’d written a proposed opening scene in which the reader meets a heroic character Murphy described as a combination of Gandalf the Grey and Obi-Wan Kenobi, both of which were appropriate to the role he was to play in the book—wise mentor to …
As the Writers Guild strike continues into its fourth month, it’s time for us to talk about not just what guilds, unions, and the like can do for their members, but how they do it.
Given the historic strikes pending or going on right now in a variety of organizations, my patrons have given me permission to temporarily delay our usual topic poll results and talk about certain labor practices instead. We’ll get to unions next week, but first I want to talk about their older cousin — a cousin …
