You Have to Commit

You Have to Commit

Commenter anonme offers a valuable addendum to the Culture War Field Manual. Going to agree with all the points, and chip in my two cents.  >1. Stop Giving Money to People Who Hate You You have to commit to this one. No you can't just ignore them and they'll go…
April 20, 201818 Comments
Culture War Field Manual

Culture War Field Manual

Reader Heian-kyo Dreams comments: I don't watch much tv, but probably end up using some of the products with distasteful ads. I don't buy many Trad pub books, but I do buy a ton of indie authors (like you.) I'm not sure how else to contribute to declowing the world other…
April 19, 201815 Comments
Heckling vs Criticism

Heckling vs Criticism

Jimfear138 shares his thoughts concerning a recent dustup within the Pulp Revolution. [Caution: NSFW language.] So what I'm talking about is this whole Groffin shit. For the uninitiated, and I only know the story so far back, apparently Groffin is an internet commentator who got into a slapfight with Jeffro…
March 20, 20189 Comments
How to Avoid the River Plot

How to Avoid the River Plot

Best selling author Jonathan Moeller offers his expert advice on how to write a long-running fantasy series without falling into any of the genre's common pitfalls. First, I figure out the overall arc for the entire series. What is the central conflict and the main antagonist? Then I decided on…
March 16, 20189 Comments
Casablanca’s Lessons for Writers

Casablanca’s Lessons for Writers

Over at Amatopia, the Daytime Renegade discovers the invaluable lessons that the classic film Casablanca has to teach writers. My wife and I watched the 1942 classic Casablanca few nights ago. It had been over a dozen years since I had seen it, and it was the first time for my wife.…
March 13, 20187 Comments
Reader Mail: Sith-Jedi Theology

Reader Mail: Sith-Jedi Theology

Reader Durandel writes: In conversations with my friends and family, many who are conservative and Catholic, whenever the topic of conversation comes up about fighting back against the Left, someone in the group gets very upset at the idea of being uncivil. And if you point out that it is…
March 9, 201820 Comments
Outlining for Pantsers

Outlining for Pantsers

In response to L. Jagi Lamplighter's advice against outlining novels, commenter roughcoat asks the following: Funny that she gave the advice about not outlining. Not over-outlining, really. I've been struggling with exactly that recently. I'm a very inconsistent writer (productivity-wise) and I've been trying to nail down a process that…
February 28, 201811 Comments
Where Do Ideas Come From?

Where Do Ideas Come From?

"Where do you get your ideas?" Writers get this question often. It doesn't lend itself to a simple yes/no answer, so I'm gonna go in-depth with this one. Where ideas come from: Some are lifted from books, movies, TV, etc. and I file the serial numbers off and recombine them.…
February 22, 20185 Comments
Reason #1,000,001

Reason #1,000,001

The following FaceBook post found its way into my feed yesterday. Names and faces are concealed to protect the innocent. Anon is right on the money. Body positivity/#HealthyAtAnySize is pure rhetorical snake oil for all the reasons listed. Furthermore, it's downright evil for ulterior reasons not-so-subtly hidden in this comment…
February 13, 201814 Comments
Amazon Ghettos

Amazon Ghettos

Following my recent posts about how the fundamental realities of publishing have changed in the new Amazon/indie-dominated landscape, a reader passed along a number of eye-opening revelations about how authors and publishers are unintentionally consigning their books to "Amazon Ghettos". The Amazon sleuth explains: Amazon’s algorithm is set up to…
December 13, 201714 Comments