This post continues my series on story structure. Here are links to the earlier posts: Dan Wells' Seven Point Story Structure: ...

Today I'm going to talk about focal characters . I'm doing this because I want to examine how a focal character can be used to ...

One of my favorite books on writing is Dwight V. Swain's Techniques of the Selling Writer because there he discusses, in depth, how ...

This post continues the series on Dan Well's 7-Point Story Structure ( Introduction , The End & The Beginning ). You see a ...

This post continues my series on Lester Dent's Master Fiction Formula . The First 1,500 Words 1a. Introduce your characters...

Lester Dent's Formula For Writing A 6,000 Word Short Story Lester Dent writes: "This is a formula, a master plot, fo...

This continues my post from Friday on how to create vivid characters . How does your hero fulfill his/her need? What's his/her ...

Chuck Wendig has outdone himself this time.  I know I've said this before--often--but this is one of the best posts on character de...

Last month, as I thought about the writing sprint that is NaNoWriMo, I thought about Dan Wells' seven point system for story creati...

In this article I explore several plot wheels and examine how they can be used to generate ideas during NaNoWriMo (or anytime!). But, f...