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A Mystery to Me
Do you love reading mysteries? Ever think of writing one? The genre was invented by Edgar Allan Poe and popularized by Arthur Conan Doyle in his Sherlock Holmes stories. It remains a popular genre...
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Change the Past in 5 Steps
Some time ago I blogged about historical fiction, but today I thought I’d discuss Alternate History fiction, or AH. In this genre, the author supposes some historical event turned out differently and...
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The Modular Author
I’ve written before about the conflict between the way readers want authors to be, and the way authors’ muses want them to be. Now I’ll carry those thoughts forward to conclusion. As a reminder,...
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Romancing the Short Story
Bet you didn’t expect me to write a blog entry on writing romance short stories, did you? Well, for one thing, if you desire to become an author, you should learn to write about anything, even topics...
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Blog Hop – The Next Big Thing
Many thanks to Charlotte Holley who tagged me to participate in The Next Big Thing blog hop. I didn’t know what a blog hop was but it seems like fun. In this one, authors answer questions about their...
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Meet the Punk Family
If you’re into science fiction, particularly alternate history or speculative fiction, there are some interesting sub-genres to be aware of. They all have -punk in their name: cyberpunk, clockpunk,...
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The 7 Types of Genre Writers
Some time ago I stated there were two types of great writers—pioneers and giants. What about all the writers who aren’t great? Today I’ll expand on my pioneer/giant idea and discuss seven types of...
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Formula for Success
Have you ever written formula fiction? Is it good or bad to do so? What is it, exactly? If your story re-uses the plot, plot devices, and stock characters of other stories, then you’ve written formula...
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Fiction Elements by Genre
In earlier posts I’ve blogged about the various elements of fiction (Character, Plot, Setting, Theme, and Style). I’ve also blogged a bit about the various genres of fiction. Here I thought I’d explore...
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Your Writing Voice
We call it laryngitis when you lose your voice, but what if you never found it in the first place? To be clear, I’m not writing about a medical condition of the larynx, but rather about your writing...
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What a Disaster!
Today I’m exploring the world of disaster fiction. There are many, many stories dealing with disasters, from local misadventures to world-wide calamities. I’ll discuss frequently occurring themes in...
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Secrets of the Past
Is it possible that some amazing things happened in historical times, but never made it in the history books? Today I’ll discuss the subgenre of fiction known as secret histories. Wikipedia’s entry...
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Genre Switching for Profit
It’s just not working. Try as you might, you’ve been writing like mad but not seeing any success. You’re seeing either lackluster sales or none at all. This isn’t how you imagined writing would be....
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