Listen to internet radio with WriteSpa Oasis for Writers on Blog Talk Radio This week on WriteSpa’s weekly BlogTalkRadio show I feature the brilliant, funny, and sweet writer Claude Bouchard. Everyone knows Claude Bouchard, so he needs no introduction! He’s like the Pied Piper of readers and authors alike. He hails from Montreal, Canada, and Read more about Great Dialog – Part 2 – Winslow on BlogTalkRadio[…]
Listen to internet radio with WriteSpa Oasis for Writers on Blog Talk Radio This week I welcome the thrilling AND thriller writer duo: CK Webb and DJ Weaver, authors of Cruelty to Innocents and Collecting Innocents. We’ll talk about how to write great dialog and welcome YOUR examples – give us a call! We talk Read more about Great Dialog – Part 1 – Winslow on BlogTalkRadio[…]
On this week’s WriteSpa’s BlogTalkRadio show, I’ll be chatting about great dialog, including how-to and examples of great dialog, with the thrilling AND thriller writer duo: CK Webb and DJ Weaver. Join us – callers welcome! Every Thursday, 6 pm EST.
Since spring is almost here, I’m offering “Writing through the year – Winter” as a free gift till March 21. Let me know if you’d like a copy – I’ll send you a SW coupon or the mobi file for your kindle.
Here’s what it’s about: […]
WriteSpa – An Oasis for Writers
Just as in life itself, there are three key components to every story, no matter how short or long, or simple or complex: People. Space. Time. In other words, characters, situations, events. For a story to work well, all three of these have to connect with each other in a relevant way. If you include an event that has nothing to do with the story, it is obviously disposable. The same with dialog: Wherever you include dialog, it has to be relevant to the unfolding of the story. If it’s not relevant, cut it out.
WriteSpa – An Oasis for Writers
Last week you listened, you eavesdropped – you were surprised by nuance, misunderstanding, flow, pitch, tone… Now it’s time to write purposeful dialog. By ‘purposeful’ I mean dialog that
How?
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WriteSpa – An Oasis for Writers
Scientists have discovered something new! Sitting is deadly. Spending most of your days with most of your weight resting on your delicate lower spine is dangerous, even if you regularly exercise.
WriteSpa – An Oasis for Writers
It always amazes how little we know about each other. When I lived in New York City, I remember looking up at the hundreds of windows in a random apartment building and imagining the real live stories going on within each apartment. Or watching my fellow subway travelers and wondering where they came from and where they were going. Who were they going to meet? Why did that young man wear a secret smile? How did that old woman feel when she had to push through the crowd to emerge onto the platform? Where were those dressed-up teenagers headed and what were they whispering about? […]
WriteSpa – An Oasis for Writers
For many years, every morning I write down three phrases that I call my ‘daily happinesses.’ These are simple – usually appealing – images that help me peek into another, more objective, reality.
In a way, they are also writing prompts. Each one of these little phrases conjures a vignette, a mood, a story, a person. For example: “Planning for a garden of rare and wild roses.” “Penguins diving into the sea.” “The silence before applause.” […]
WriteSpa – An Oasis for Writers
A long time ago someone (a man) read a book I wrote and was startled into saying, “Wow! You write like a man!”
He meant it as a compliment. […]
In a recent essay on Writers Block and other Urban Legends (http://dosomedamage.blogspot.com/2009/08/writers-block-and-other-urban-legends.html#comments), Jay Stringer defines (and dismisses) the affliction that he says is erroneously labeled as writer’s block. At first, having suffered painfully from this alleged ‘affliction,’ I read his piece with a certain amount of resentment. But then he wrote this:
From The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupery The next planet was inhabited by a tippler. This was a very short visit, but it plunged the little prince into deep dejection. “What are you doing there?” he said to the tippler, whom he found settled down in silence before a collection of empty bottles and Read more about Favorite Dialogues – 1[…]
From Sleeping Fires, by George Gissing
In this passage, middle-aged Langley seeks permission from eighteen-year-old Louis’s guardian, Lady Revill, to take the boy under his wing and help guide him through the shoals of youthful adventuring. Lady Revill is a former lover of Langley with whom he has only recently reconnected, after a twenty-year separation. She knows of Langley’s true relationship with young Louis, that Langley is his father – a fact of which Langley has not yet been apprised. Here’s the dialogue: […]
It helps to think of dialogue as just ordinary conversation – that has a purpose. Monologue is a conversation one has with oneself. Dialogue is a conversation one has with someone else. There are always at leat two people involved in a dialogue. Your task as a writer is, through the voices having the conversation, Read more about Writing Dialogue[…]