Posts from the ‘Writing’ Category
Suppose someone were to tell you that you could become a better writer in a single week — would you believe it? Me neither. And yet that’s precisely what I’m about to do. And more: I’m about to make a believer out of you. I tried this on a bet — and lost. Here is how you […]
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Have you ever heard of Lester Dent, nom-de-plume Kenneth Robeson? He was born in 1904, in La Plata, Missouri, and died fifty-four years later. His writing career spanned a total of thirty years — during which time he managed to crank out an astonishing 175 novels, or more. Still, despite such spectacular fecundity, the names […]
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“If you’re just starting out as a writer, you could do worse than strip your television’s electric plug wire, wrap a spike around it, and then stick it back into the wall. See what blows, and how far.” –Stephen King, On Writing I admit it: Stephen King has never been my cup of tea, and […]
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The novelist Hanif Kureishi — who teaches creative writing at Kingston University, and whom I’d frankly never heard of before I saw this article — has recently come under some fire for remarks he made to The Guardian newspaper: “A lot of my students just can’t tell a story. They can write sentences but they […]
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In an interview Truman Capote once gave, he said the following about becoming a writer: “The last thing in the world I would do was waste my time going to college, because I knew what I wanted to do. The only reason to go to college is if you want to be a doctor, a […]
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Actually, there are many reasons — many more than five — that I’ll keep reading your story, but there are also at least as many reasons I won’t. Like this seemingly infinite and jesting snore in the next room, which is most annoying to the insomniac that I am: (For example: He had nothing in […]
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“Do not start a story with the protagonist waking up,” says Joe Konrath. But with him here — as with so many other things — I must demur. Konrath’s peevish list of proscriptions came to my attention recently via Radical Roz Morris, who wrote about another preposterous notion Mr. Konrath (along with many others) has: […]
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Margaret Atwood: Hold the reader’s attention. (This is likely to work better if you can hold your own.) But you don’t know who the reader is, so it’s like shooting fish with a slingshot in the dark. What fascinates A will bore the pants off B. Writing is work. It’s also gambling. You don’t get […]
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There’s a game that certain writers like to play — and in answer to your next question, it’s not called Hide-The-Salami (although that one is popular with certain writers as well, myself perhaps foremost among them), but “Eavesdropping.” Here’s how you play: Sit in a public place. Sit near people who look interesting. Have something […]
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There’s a dirty little secret about writing talent which editors and publishers don’t usually speak of, but which I’d like to share. That dirty little secret is this: Writing talent doesn’t really exist. As a matter of fact, there’s no such thing as innate writing talent, and the most important trait a writer can possess […]
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(c)Ray Harvey 2011