Pro Writing Tips: The Sentence Level

Pro Writing Tips: The Sentence Level

Working as a professional writer and editor these past years has not only taught me a lot about writing; it's shown me much that I didn't even suspect I didn't know. Since I always try to have one hand reaching down the ladder to help folks below me up while…
November 23, 201813 Comments

Not a Visual Medium

Writing is not a visual medium. There's an old saying in comics that writers can't draw, and artists can't write. That's an overgeneralization. Sometimes you do get a John Byrne or a Frank Miller, but there is a kernel of truth to the cliche. Because an artist is trained to…
September 24, 201816 Comments
A Detailed Road Map

A Detailed Road Map

A reader writes: Say Mr. Niemeier, when you write a multi-book saga like say the Soul Cycle, do you just write it out book by book or do you have a detailed kind of road-map before you put pen to paper? I answer: I outline extensively. For the Soul Cycle…
August 9, 20188 Comments
Kishōtenketsu

Kishōtenketsu

Lately I've been getting questions about Kishōtenketsu, the four-part story structure of classical Chinese, Japanese, and Korean literature. My Twitter friends sent along a useful post explaining the concept. Let’s start with the word itself. It’s made up of the names of the four different acts of the structure: Ki…
July 16, 20184 Comments
Chuck Dixon’s 10 Comic Commandments

Chuck Dixon’s 10 Comic Commandments

Longtime A list comic book writer Chuck Dixon reveals his Ten Commandments of Comic Book Scripting. 1. OPEN STRONG.Get your story off and running. 2. ONLY ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE.Just the talking you need to put the point across. 3. AT LEAST THREE PIECES OF ACTION PER STORY.They can be mixed major…
July 3, 201810 Comments
To See or Not to See

To See or Not to See

An anonymous reader poses a timely and vitally important question for anyone who is torn between not giving money to people who hate him and supporting innocent creatives who might be harmed by a boycott. Diversity and Comics and others have argued that we should support the few unconverged titles…
June 30, 201822 Comments
Overcome or Succumb

Overcome or Succumb

Background: Artist. Foreground: "Artiste". Forget everything you've been force-fed by the literati about artists being special snowflakes exempted from the laws of supply and demand because they serve only the whims of the muse. To succeed, novelists must be no less market-facing than plumbers or lawyers. Friend of the blog…
June 26, 201812 Comments
How to Argue with SJWs

How to Argue with SJWs

Experience shows that the best advice on how to argue with SJWs is that you shouldn't. You should mock them relentlessly instead. A relatively recent demonstration from Twitter: Lesson 1: Do not answer SJWs' questions. Make them answer yours. As you can see, I set a trap designed to be…
June 20, 201810 Comments
21st Century Publishing

21st Century Publishing

Red Pill Religion put on quite a show last night. It was my honor to join new pub all-stars Nick Cole, John C. Wright, and Russell Newquist for a rousing and informative discussion of 21st century publishing strategies. It comes as a surprise to me that some aspiring authors haven't…
June 18, 20184 Comments
Fire Your Agent

Fire Your Agent

Galaxy's Edge co-author Nick Cole forwards a dire warning to authors from Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Here's KKR: The news broke publicly over the holiday weekend. If you blinked, you missed it. The bookkeeper for a prestigious New York literary agency pled guilty to embezzling millions from the agency, leaving the agency…
June 1, 201812 Comments