In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Every Novel Writes Differently * It All Depends… * Of Interest * The Numbers Quotes of the Day “I’ve also been doing a ‘how I wrote these’ history of each [of six short stories and a few novelettes] on my website. Start here. [Scroll down.] It’ll lead you to the others.” Kristine Kathryn Rusch (See Of Interest) If you’d like to see how Kris came to write some of the stories featured in her current Kickstarter, click the link above. “When I stand before God at the end of my life, … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * No, But I Saw the Movie * A Few Notes * Of Interest * The Numbers No, But I Saw the Movie This is a guest post by Michaele Lockhart. If it looks familiar, it was first posted in the old Pro Writers Writing (PWW) website for which Michaele was a weekly contributor. Ah, the movies…. Our lives brim with audio-visual cues. Movies and television shows and even YouTube videos clamor for our attention. We’re conditioned to experiencing the world accompanied by moving images and sound. Does this mean that writing … Read more

In today’s Journal * Personal Responsibility and Generative AI * A New Novel (or Series) * Of Interest * The Numbers Personal Responsibility and Generative AI Recently I was glad to see that Amazon now requires publishers (writers) to verify, by ticking a radio box, whether any part of the story or novel they’re publishing was the result of generative AI. Why? Because it goes to personal responsibility. Ticking the first box amounts to an admission that yes, the writer created the work at least in part using generative AI. Ticking the second box verifies that no generative AI was … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Bradbury Challenge Writers Reporting * Live from the Hovel… Wasn’t * Classic Country Music Radio * Of Interest * The Numbers Quote of the Day “To understand a concept and to do it in real life are two different things. I knew about cycling and I knew how to do it, but this time I did it for real. Practice is really the key.” Balázs Jámbor, fiction writer The Bradbury Challenge Writers Reporting Rules of the Challenge The challenge is to write at least one short story per week (or add … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Thought of the Day * Reminder * Hint: Enhance, Not Advance * The Novel Wrapped * Of Interest * The Numbers Quotes of the Day “The greatest advance of the digital era has been the rebranding of narcissism as sharing.” Cartoonist P. Byrnes in a captio of one of his cartoons that displays humans taking ‘selfies’ with smart phones “Every story or novel you write has value, not only in short-term sales, but in long term branding.” Dean Wesley Smith (See Of Interest) Thought of the Day I’ve never understood why … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * Chekov’s Gun * A New Short Story * Compiling a Novel * Of Interest * The Numbers Quote of the Day “There are at least 2 or 3 more short stories in this bunch and then it will be a novel.” KC Riggs Chekov’s Gun Thanks to the few who reminded me after yesterday’s post it’s “Chekov’s Gun” and has nothing to do with the Stanislavski Technique, which has to do with “Method Acting.” A New Short Story “Blackwell Ops: Sam Thurston” went live yesterday on my Stanbrough Writes Substack. To … Read more

In today’s Journal * Setting Matters. And Detail Matters. * Of Interest * The Numbers Setting Matters. And Detail Matters. When you say or write a noun, you put a static picture in the listener’s or reader’s mind. That’s important to remember. It isn’t theory, it’s fact. (Then if you add an action verb, the picture moves. But in this lesson, forget the verb.) You want that picture to be there. It is what draws the reader into a scene. There’s a popular and widely misundertood belief that ANY description of setting you put into a scene MUST advance the … Read more

In today’s Journal * A New Podcast * End Matter Revised * Of Interest * The Numbers Correction In Numbers for the past couple of days, I reported writing 4,884,024 words since October 1. C’mon, even I ain’t that fast. My finger stuck on the 8. The correct number was 484,024. The number is correct today. A New Podcast Okay, on Sunday afternoon (March 17), I’ll go Live from the Hovel at 1 p.m. Arizona time with the first of what I expect will be a weekly podcast. I expect each will last a half-hour or less. You can join … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Yesterday * Appearance Postponed * Flash Sale * Of Interest * The Numbers Yesterday I put off the novel for one more day. Today, if the day goes to plan, will be mostlywriting. In addition to publishing (soon) the Blackwell Ops Soleada Garcia Subseries, I also wanted to re-order the original series to reflect the chronological sequence of the overall series. That meant “unpublishing” all 7 novels, renaming and redesigning all 7 covers, tweaking the title, metadata (front matter and end matter) in all 7 manuscripts, and resubmitting every manuscript as … Read more

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * A Great Analogy * Of Interest * The Numbers A Great Analogy I was talking with a friend via email a few days ago. He’s both an interim pastor and a fiction writer. Like so many, he likes the idea of writing into the dark, but hasn’t quite been able to pull the trigger on it yet. During our conversation, he handed me maybe the best analogy I’ve ever heard. He wrote, “My best sermons come when I set aside the critical mind. I can really tell the difference.” Here’s my … Read more