CRAFT – Page 2

Do You Have a Story Concept, or Just a Cool Idea?

February 1, 2019 By Cathy Yardley 6 Comments

I do a lot of brainstorming with writing clients. (At the risk of sounding immodest, I am a champion brainstormer. If there were an Olympic event, I would medal. I adore brainstorming.)

Let’s say I have two clients, who have both emailed me that they want help with their next projects.

The first says:

“My next book is going to be about a girl who was cloned from a holy relic.”

The other client says:

“My next book is going to be about a woman who contacts her college ex, who is now a powerful attorney, for his help because she’s being framed for murder… only he’s starting to think she might somehow be involved, and that she’s developed this Count of Monte Cristo plan to get revenge on him.”

Now, if you look at both of these statements, you’ll see that there’s a fatal flaw in the first one. It’s not a story premise. It’s just a cool idea.

People pop up with cool ideas constantly. (If you’ve ever been approached by a non-writer at a party or family function, they often say: “I have this cool idea for a book – you write it, and we’ll split the profits!” As the idea spews forth, we usually realize that one, it’s not a cool idea – and it’s really not a story. And two, there’s no way in hell you’re going to write this.)

But a cool idea is just a wisp of a concept. It’s not even the seed of a story. It can involve an intriguing character: a hitman who quits and becomes a KonMari Organizer. It can involve a compelling setting: an ensemble story about people who all live in a farm cult in Wyoming who believe in UFOs. It can involve a twist: a woman who discovers our mirror reflections are actually real and different people.

These all may have interesting elements. (Personally, I want to find out about a hitman who helps people “spark joy” and whose experience with cleaners probably has a different context.) But they’re not actual story ideas. They don’t stand up to scrutiny. It’s like saying you want to build a house, and when pressed for a blueprint, you say “it will have stained glass windows!” That’s a nice detail. Love me some stained glass. But what is holding the house up? [Read more…]

10+

My Ongoing Feud with Billy Joel

January 25, 2019 By Keith Cronin 21 Comments

In the course of my lengthy career as a professional musician, I’ve been fortunate enough to meet – and sometimes perform with – a number of rock stars and celebrities. Most of them have been wonderful to work with. Some of them, significantly less wonderful. And then there’s Billy Joel. He and I… well, let’s […]

Tools of the Trade: Whiteboard Wonders

January 23, 2019 By Sonja Yoerg 20 Comments

At bare minimum, all you need to write is either paper and ink, or a computer. Somehow that does not stop writers from coveting additional physical tools of the trade. Indeed, I’ve yet to meet a writer who doesn’t drool over office supplies. Can’t write without gel pens or stickies or a classic Moleskin? I […]

Author Up Close Series: Learning From Successful Authors

January 22, 2019 By Grace Wynter 23 Comments

Though you may not know it by the prevalence of clickbait headlines sounding the death knell about author careers, successful authors are out there. Lots of them. And I’m not just talking about the ones who top the bestseller lists week after week. I’m talking about the authors whose names you may have never heard, who […]

The Hack’s Guide to Killing Your Darlings

January 19, 2019 By Bill Ferris 4 Comments

Warning: Hacks for Hacks tips may have harmful side effects on your writing career, and should not be used by minors, adults, writers, poets, scribes, scriveners, journalists, or anybody. Every critique session since the 1930s has included someone saying the phrase, “Kill Your Darlings,” and it must continue ever after, like those chain letters you […]

Hiding Your Eyes From Edits?

January 18, 2019 By Porter Anderson (@Porter_Anderson) 6 Comments

‘Don’t Open Your Eyes’ While I confess that I’ve been tempted to wear my #BirdBoxChallenge blindfold when editing other people’s copy, I was wide-eyed when Josh Malerman told me that he’d had absolutely no problem turning over Bird Box to the film’s producers and to Eric Heisserer who wrote the screenplay. (No spoilers here whatever, […]

The Editor’s Clinic: The Limits of Editing

January 15, 2019 By Dave King 12 Comments

One of the comments in last month’s Editor’s Clinic suggested that the piece I worked on should have been rewritten once or twice before the editing commenced. (Incidentally, I’d encourage you to go back to that discussion. At the time it went up, I was working to get ready for Christmas – a […]

Writing What You Don’t Believe

January 11, 2019 By David Corbett 26 Comments

No, this isn’t about writing dishonestly. Quite the contrary. I’m returning to a topic I’ve touched on before, but with a different slant this time around. Please bear with me. We live in an era of such extreme social and political division that if often seems tensions cannot resolve without matters coming to blows—or blood. […]

Seeking Truth in Fiction

January 10, 2019 By Kathryn Craft 19 Comments

A few weeks after my first husband’s suicide, when I was able to think again, one thought pulled me forward through the difficult years of recovery to come: I was meant to write about this. But how? Back in the late 90s, the memoir revolution had not yet gained purchase. People would read books about […]

The Different Types of Editing Explained

January 8, 2019 By Jim Dempsey 15 Comments

My last article, on the pitfalls of self-editing, provoked some discussion about the different types of editing. There’s certainly a lot of confusion around, and it’s not surprising. There’s line editing, copy-editing, developmental editing, structural editing, substantive editing, and then proofreading. Editors can hardly agree on exactly what’s involved in each type, and that’s because […]