In the Final Hours
I had written twenty, maybe thirty, pages of my first draft when I had the idea of setting the climax at a theme party. I thought it would be fun to put my characters into costumes and get them in…
Category: Character
Taking a Lesson from Moonlight
A few weeks ago, when I walked out of the theater after seeing Moonlight, I experienced a feeling akin to what I felt three days ago when I closed the cover of Zadie Smith’s Swing Time and sat back and…
Writers’ Original Sin: Control
We all know that exhilarating feeling of banging out a first draft when the ideas are flowing, the characters are talking and pages are filling of our their own volition as we put our vision into words. There’s no better…
What are Your Intentions?
Just as the road to Hell is paved with good intentions, the path to my recycle bin is littered with fuzzy intentions. One of these scenarios tells a complete story. The other is just a pile of garbage.
For the Not-so-Brave Girls
When I was a girl, my literary idols were Anne Shirley, Jo March, and Lyra Belacqua. They were imaginative. They flouted convention. They were lovably outspoken. They always stood up for what they believed in, even when their convictions were…
Taxi cab confessions: A likely driver of your characters’ motivation
Recently, a cab driver was driving me home from the airport. After hearing I’d just come from Dallas, he gazed in the mirror back at me and loudly and, completely unsolicited, declared: “Everywhere you’ve been, darling, I’ve been. Everything you’ve…