You are reading along, a scene ends a new one begins and… Wait… Where am I? Who am I with? WHAT IS HAPPENING? I’m lost… Have you ever had this experience? If so, that writer was guilty of not setting the scene in their story or as I sometimes call it, not grounding the reader. … [Read more…]
Beats in Fiction Writing? Honestly, beats isn’t a term I use a lot, but it is a term I hear a lot, so I thought it would be good to define what beats in fiction are and why they matter. Beats in Fiction Writing Defined According to Sandra Scofield in her book, The Scene Book, … [Read more…]
So far in our discussion of how to write a scene, we’ve talked about what scene is, both as many think of it and as Dwight Swain defines it in Techniques of the Selling Writer. We’ve also gone over the importance of sequel and showing your characters motivation. Today we’ll discuss what some may get … [Read more…]
When I stumbled through my first manuscript eleven years ago, I didn’t know much about scenes. I didn’t know how to write a scene. I didn’t know much about writing a book, come to think of it, but the best way to learn is to just do it. (And, of course, read up on the … [Read more…]
Transition words and phrases. As writers, we spend a lot of time talking about plot, character, setting, and description. We learn how to put all of those together into scenes and how to show character motivation with sequel. But then when it comes time to stitch it all together we often stutter… uh… okay… and … [Read more…]