Why Genre Matters, by Cathy Yardley
From http://writerunboxed.com/2014/09/30/why-genre-matters I view reading with the same gusto that I view eating. Genres are my “food moods.” Sometimes, I want the comfort of a keeper read, a funny romantic comedy. Sometimes, I want the caffeinated buzz of a twisty thriller. I consume it like a glutton at a buffet: a plate full of women’s fiction with a side of cozy mystery, then a helping of literary fiction nestled next to a… Read More
Legendary, by Donald Maass
From: http://writerunboxed.com/2018/01/03/legendary/#more-51527 Recently, a young agent on my staff requested a really good manuscript. She wanted to represent it. Naturally, so did a number of other sharp-eyed agents and thus my young colleague found herself in a so-called beauty contest, a familiar competitive event in our profession. To back up my young colleague’s bid, I arranged a phone call with the equally young, appallingly talented young writer of the manuscript in question. I told… Read More
25 Things A Great Character Needs, by Chuck Wendig
From: http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2014/01/13/25-things-a-great-character-needs See the original post for the more colorful, uncensored version. 1. A Personality This seems rather obvious, sure — in a way it’s like saying, “What makes a really good tree is that it has an essential treeness” — but just the same, it bears mentioning. Because some characters read like cardboard. They’re like white crayon on white paper. Sure, the characters run around and they do **** and say **** but… Read More
Novel characters: 15 top character creation tips
From: https://www.nownovel.com/blog/novel-characters-15-tips Great novel characters share common features: Distinct, authentic voices, character development, clear goals and motivations, strengths and flaws. Here are 15 of our top character creation tips gathered from some of the best writing blogs and websites: 1: Give your novel characters clear motivations that drive your story Writing characters who spring to life off the page is partly about giving characters clear motivations. Over at Terrible Minds, Chuck Wendig sums this up eloquently:… Read More
The 9 Types Of Unreliable Narrator, by Amanda Patterson
From: https://writerswrite.co.za/9-types-of-unreliable-narrator I was stunned by the success of Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. It was obvious to me that the author was employing the unreliable narrator technique in the story. This came as a shock to many readers and viewers, which is odd when everyone tells you that there are at least two sides to every story. There is a long history of unreliable narrators in fiction. There is an even longer list in… Read More
Truth and lies in fiction—how to write an unreliable narrator, by Arlene Prunkl
From: http://penultimateword.com/book-marketing/how-to-write-unreliable-narrator I’m excited about this blog post. While most of my articles are on common topics that you can find information about all around the Internet, the subject of unreliable narrators doesn’t get a lot of ink. And that’s probably because relatively few fiction writers know about the literary device of unreliable narration, and if they do, they haven’t any notion of how to create it or use it to best effect. Recently,… Read More
8 Tips to Writing Unreliable Narrators, by Deb Caletti
From: http://www.writersdigest.com/online-editor/8-tips-to-writing-unreliable-narrators The unreliable narrator … Ah, don’t you love that unsettling, page-turning, blockbuster-making literary device? An unreliable narrator makes for the bad boy of novels—ensuring a delicious but uneasy read, an on-the-edge wondering of what might happen next. Usually, we feel we’re in good hands with whatever main characters we’re spending time with between the covers. We can count on them, we think, to tell us the truth. But then comes a… Read More
Interior Monologue, by Richard Nordquist
From: https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-an-interior-monologue-1691073, by Richard Nordquist DEFINITION In both fiction and nonfiction, an interior monologue is the expression of a character‘s thoughts, feelings, and impressions in a narrative. An interior monologue may be either direct or indirect: direct, in which the author seems not to exist and the interior self of the character is given directly, as though the reader were overhearing an articulation of the stream of thought and feeling flowing through the character’s mind; indirect, in which the author serves as selector,… Read More
Inner monologue examples: Writing characters’ secret lives
From: https://www.nownovel.com/blog/inner-monologue-examples-in-novels Internal or inner monologue is a useful literary device. Dialogue reveals character relationships, their converging or competing goals. Inner monologue gives readers an x-ray view of characters’ more private feelings and dilemmas. Read examples of inner monologue that illustrate how to use it well, along with tips: First, what is ‘inner monologue’? A ‘monologue’ literally means ‘speaking alone’, if we go back to the word’s roots. In a play, especially in Shakespeare,… Read More
The Complete Guide to Interior Monologue
From: https://www.novel-writing-help.com/interior-monologue.html Interior monologue is the fancy literary term for a character’s thoughts in a novel. In real life, the stream of thoughts we all have running through our heads at any given moment is more often called internal monologue, though the two terms mean precisely the same thing. While we’re dealing with definitions, a couple of closely-related literary terms are… Stream of Consciousness. This is where an entire novel, or at least large chunks… Read More