Browsing all articles in Writers.
Literary Devices: Foreshadowing
It’s every high school English Lit teacher’s first lesson on criticism, it seems. One of those things that’s fairly easy to teach, understand, and look for, foreshadowing is, at its simplest, a literary device where the author gives hints or clues about plot developments that occur later in the story. I think most people who’ve [...]
Literary Devices: Motif
If any of you follow my blog or know me on other social media (especially Facebook), you know that I’m a “yarnie”—that is, I’m addicted to yarn. I’ve had a renewed interest in knitting and crocheting this year, and I’ve been posting pictures on Facebook for months. Apparently, being a spec-fic geek wasn’t nerdy enough [...]
Arsenic and Old Leaves: The Art of Poisoning Your Fantasy Characters – Part 2
If you missed part one of this series, you can check it out here. So… poisoned anyone lately? Based on the comments on Part One, it seems that subtle murder is a well-endorsed method of killing for writers who read Fantasy-Faction. Uh, in the sense that their characters do the killing. Fictionally. *ahem* Now, I [...]
Fantasy-Faction May 2012 Writing Competitions
Hello everyone! I’m a little late with my article this month. I blame April. It didn’t give me adequate notice it was ending until May had already begun. Anyway, lots of things to talk about this month. Firstly a reminder, only two months left to enter the Fantasy-Faction Anthology Writing Contest! We’ve gotten a ton [...]
Literary Devices: Themes
As a fan of fantastic fiction, I’ve heard it all: Fantasy is for kids and nerds. Science fiction is for geeks. Speculative fiction isn’t deep enough—it has none of the qualities of literary fiction. Speculative fiction is too formulaic. It can’t be hard to write—I mean, just throw in a few swords and dragons, right? [...]
Writer’s Den: Plotters vs. Pantsers
There are two types of writers in the world: those who plot out their writing, and those who write by the seat of their pants. Plotters and Pantsers. (Yeah, yeah, I hear you shouting about hybrids, we’ll talk about that later.) But who has it better? Who has an easier time pumping out those novels, [...]
