Blog Archives

Do You Need to World Build

Posted on Sunday, August 29, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

World building is the process of assembling a place for your fiction to happen. How much of it you need to do depends on what your plot requires. The world building needs of science fiction are different from those of…

A Few Words Of Advice

Posted on Sunday, August 15, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

The first bit of advice people always give writers is “write what you know”. That’s still good advice, but there are other things you should do as well. The first is research. Research lets you know more about what you…

Tagged with: reading aloud, Research, revision, writing, writing advice, Writing Techniques
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Meditation

Posted on Sunday, August 8, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Sometimes you need to sharpen your focus when you are writing. Meditation helps with that. It’s especially helpful if you are working through a troublesome scene. Meditation is easy. It has few rules that you need to adhere to. The…

Tagged with: Focus, meditation, Writer's Block, writing, Writing Techniques, writinig tools
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Research

Posted on Sunday, July 25, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Even if you are writing fiction, you may find you need to do research. You wouldn’t want to have Fifth Avenue in Manhattan running north and south. Your readers would call you on it. It’s more accurate to say it…

Tagged with: characters jobs, Research, settings, writing, Writing Techniques
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Brainstorming

Posted on Sunday, July 18, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Brainstorming is the process we use to come up with ideas. We can then use those ideas to write about or to come up with the solutions to problems. You can do it in teams or solo. That’s what’s nice…

Mystery Plotting Aids

Posted on Sunday, July 11, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

If you write mysteries, you need to have a victim, a killer, and some red herring suspects. You also need witnesses. When I started writing cozy mysteries, I had a hard time until I came up with the idea of…

Tagged with: fiction, fiction mystery, fiction writing, mysteries, mystery plotting, mystery plotting tools, plots, plotting tools, writing
Posted in Writing Techniques

Why Complete Character Charts?

Posted on Sunday, June 27, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Character charts are lists of questions that a fiction author must answer. It’s a good way to get to know their characters. The charts are the best way for an author to get to know the character and what makes…

Timelines and Plots

Posted on Sunday, June 20, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Time lines are useful things. They can help you keep the timing of your story going. I’ve used them to plot the story in broad terms. This is something like saying this happens then this happens and so on. It…

Tagged with: plot flow, plots, plotting, timelines, writing
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques

Using A Project Control Document

Posted on Sunday, June 13, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Project Control It is important to keep your writing organized. I use a Word document to let me know what part of the project I have finished and what I still need to do. I have sections in the document.…

Word Choice

Posted on Sunday, May 30, 2021 by pebblepup — Leave a comment

Have you ever read a book or story and wondered why the author chose the words they did? If you have, then the author failed. You popped out of the story because of questionable word choices. I once read a…

Tagged with: casual, casual writing, formal, formal writing, word choice, words, writing, Writing Techniques
Posted in General Opinion, Writing Techniques