Tag Archives: writing

Why The Nine Greek Muses Are Better Than Prometheus

If you know anything about Greek mythology, you probably know some part of the story of Prometheus, the hero who stole fire from the sun and gave it to the fledgling human race. You probably also know how Zeus punished … Continue reading

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My marketing experiments: and what I think the first job of a writer should be.

Recently, I spent $100 advertising my novels on Facebook for two weeks. Here’s the results so far: 13,600 impressions. 151 clicks. 18 sales of the Kindle editions. 3 sales of the paperback editions. 0 sales of the Kobo editions. More … Continue reading

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Fictive Metaphysics, The Neverending Story, and The Nothing

Science fiction and fantasy, two distinct genres of storytelling, have at least this in common: fictive metaphysics. That is: there’s some regular feature of reality described in such stories which clearly doesn’t exist in our world, or which could not … Continue reading

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Is this what success looks like for an indie writer?

Suppose I took a narrow, economic view of what success looks like for a writer who, like me, doesn’t write full-time, but has a day-job (which, let it be stated for the record, I do enjoy). The advantage of an … Continue reading

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Writing is not mysticism

For me, the whole process of writing is inevitably wrapped up in the discovery, invention, and revelation of knowledge. Writing calls something out of the darkness and into the light, and gives it a name. Writing, one might be tempted … Continue reading

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Self published books have (almost) no quality control. Here’s something we can do about it.

Here’s a reason to support my Kickstarter campaign to hire an editor for my novels, which has nothing to do with me or my books. It’s that a lot of self published books, perhaps most of them, have almost no … Continue reading

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Bren’s Guide to Writing

My first advice is that you should fall in love with words, languages, and storytelling. Your language both limits and liberates you. Know how it works. Be a serious student of words, sentences, paragraphs, catchphrases, proverbs, tropes, neologisms, alliteration, rhyme, … Continue reading

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A Straight White Male Writer Grapples With His Privilege

There are a lot of fantasy and sci-fi writers in my FB and Twitter feeds. And a lot of those writers are feminists, of one degree or another. So, I’ve been seeing a lot of discussion about white male privilege … Continue reading

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JK Rowling does care about writing, and that’s why she should keep doing it.

In the last day or so, I’ve been seeing a lot of this op/ed piece on The Huffington Post: If JK Rowling Cares About Writing, She Should Stop Doing It, by Lynn Shepherd. A brief summary of Shepherd’s thesis might … Continue reading

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The Future of The Fellwater Tales

If I had to choose between reading a long, complex, and intricately detailed story, and reading a complete story, I would prefer to read the complete story. Some stories (in novels, television, film, etc.) are pushed to continue as long … Continue reading

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