Flashbacks in fiction are one of those gizmos in your utility drawer that can give you grief. It’s like Gorilla Glue or razor blades....

I’m back on it again, the subject of heart. I seem to blog a lot about finding the emotional core of story. Maybe because so many stories...

No, the topic isn’t: the last thing we do before we die. But it’s akin to it. By bad last acts, I mean Act 3 of a lot of novels. For the...

In the midst of all the things we’re supposed to do as writers, sometimes we blow past the most basic. We work and rework our plot,...

I hope you’re following the new BBC Sherlock Holmes series. There is so much to learn from this marvelous mash-up of the Arthur Conan...

The weekend of May 18th I’m helping out with my favorite local writing conference. If you live in the Pacific Northwest, you really...