Browsing all articles in Writers.
In Defence of the Chosen One
One of fantasy’s most commonly mocked tropes is the chosen one. This makes sense; it’s also one of fantasy’s most recurring tropes, and there are a lot of very good reasons why it can feel like a clichéd or even lazy feature. However, I don’t think the chosen one narrative is always negative; in fact, […]
Worldbuilding: Using The Creation Story To Help Design A Belief System
Is a faith system vital to any fantasy story? Definitely. Even in a fictional setting, people need a raison d’être and comforting explanations for the mysteries of life. Religion is an excellent way to enrich a world. It provides it with clerics, shamans, priestesses, temples, oracles and prophesies. Religion is one of five main components […]
Writing Is Like LEGO and It’s Awesome
Somewhere out there, in the aether of time and space, is a scientific report waiting to be written about the links between writers and LEGO. Just about every writer I know loves LEGO, many rewarding themselves for new book deals with those huge expensive sets (I’m looking enviously at you, Adam Christopher, and your Star […]
Winner of the December 2013 Writing Contest
We’ve been getting such good feedback for the short stories our members have submitted in our Monthly Short Story Competition that we have decided to post them on the main site at a rate of about one a fortnight. Today we will be looking at the winner from our December 2013 contest. Your challenge this […]
Winner of the November 2013 Writing Contest
We’ve been getting such good feedback for the short stories our members have submitted in our Monthly Short Story Competition that we have decided to post them on the main sit at a rate of about one a fortnight. Today we will be looking at the winner from our November 2013 contest. Doors are portals […]
Short Story Markets and Why They Are Important
There seems to be an opinion that, other than a few yearly anthologies, the SFF Short Story market died out in the 1960′s. However, although it is not as prevalent or as well-paid as it once was, there are still plenty of magazines/websites that want your work and are willing to pay for it, publish it […]
Elements of Structure
The Hero’s Journey or ‘Monomyth’ is one of the most pervasive and well known formulas in fiction, yet many writers have never even heard of it. The Hero’s Journey is essentially a collection of common structural elements that recur in stories, and they have been used to create a formula for the narrative of a […]
Winner of the October 2013 Writing Contest
We’ve been getting such good feedback for the short stories our members have submitted in our Monthly Short Story Competition that we have decided to post them on the main sit at a rate of about one a fortnight. We will begin with a tale that was entered last year as part of October 2013′s competition. […]
The Initial Steps of Worldbuilding: Architect, Gardener, Tourist
Listening to the news in the real world – that horrid place where dragons are small and kept in vivaria and pixie is just a kind of haircut – it is very apparent that life is a very complicated place. Anything from the politics between two warring countries, down to a neighbourly dispute on a […]
Writing Multi-Layered Narratives
Ideas Are Easy There’s a joke about writers: never ask them where they get their ideas from. The question might be met with a roll of the eyes, and the answers you get are often tongue-in-cheek (a PO Box in Poughkeepsie is a classic). The reason for this is pretty straightforward – it’s exactly the […]
10 Ways To Up Your Word Count
Writing takes time, and in the case of novels, a lot of time. I don’t think there’s a writer out there who doesn’t wish they could write quicker. If you’ve ever attempted to write a novel you’ll know just what a huge investment it is. Personally, as much as I love writing, there are times […]
Archetypes vs Stereotypes
What is the difference between a great character and a placeholder? Why is one warrior or wizard better than the other? They might serve exactly the same purpose in the novel, but one is clearly superior. Your grey-bearded magic user with the impractical hat just can’t compare with the scarred conjuror addicted to demon blood. […]
