We’re constantly updating our articles to bring you the best advice on writing, editing, publishing, and marketing your book. This article was originally published on May 13th, 2014. By its nature, fiction is imaginary. It may comment on the real world, feel true to life, and even invite strong emotions, but it’s still fiction. Accordingly, few writers expect their readers to truly believe, …
All of our articles on Characters and Characterization
Writing good characters and using characterization properly can be hard. Here are all of our articles on the topic.
How To Write Characters Who Actually Like Each Other
In fiction, any kind of relationship is possible. There are stories of forbidden love, undying vengeance, infernal temptation, and life-affirming rivalry. Each studies part of the human condition, finding truth and insight in the way we interact with those around us, but what about when people just… like each other? It’s something we encounter every day, but that doesn’t make it easy to write, …
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Can You Really Tell A Compelling Story Without Conflict?
Ask most authors for their advice on storytelling and, sooner or later, they’re likely to get to the subject of conflict. To many writers, conflict is the basic unit of story – the thing that turns a series of events into an actual narrative – often more important than setting, characters, and even narrative cohesion. After all, you can lose all of those features and still write something that …
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What You Need To Know About John Yorke’s Theory of Fractal Storytelling
If you’ve searched for advice on how to structure a story, it’s a good bet that you’ve heard the name John Yorke. A writer, script editor, and television producer, Yorke’s Into the Woods is a treatise on how to tell great stories, applying Yorke’s own experience and research to the tenets of storytelling laid out in Joseph Campbell’s seminal The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Whether you’re writing …
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How To Master Similes And Metaphors In Your Writing – Part 2
In part 1 of this article (available here), I talked about what similes and metaphors are, how they differ, and how to choose between them in your writing. In this, part 2, we’ll be discussing how to really master these examples of figurative language; how to write better similes and metaphors, how to adopt figurative language into your writing style, and how to avoid the pitfalls that come with …
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How To Master Similes And Metaphors In Your Writing – Part 1
When it comes to improving your craft, a mastery of imagery is key. Being able to present the world outside the literal truth opens up a vista of possibilities that are otherwise closed off. Suddenly, characters, locations, and events can be anything, if only for a moment, vastly enhancing your ability to write unique, emotive prose. To that end, today I’ll be talking about similes …
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