Columns: Tag – Writing
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All About Love Official Blog
Happy Valentine’s Day! Allaboutlove has launched.
Allaboutlove.net is dedicated to good writing and … well, love naturally. The site has been designed in the spirit of fun. We hope it will bring a touch of lightness to all our lives.
We’re dedicated to nurturing and publishing writers. But good writers need the best readers, so we’ve packed the site with features about love and relationships, that we hope you’ll enjoy. We’ll update them regularly. This is a community, so please comment on any or all of them.
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In Search of a Sensitive Man
Allaboutlove is constantly on the look-out for good column material for you, our beloved readers. Our assiduousness in this regard is confirmed yet again by the following correspondence with a world-renowned columnist.
*Please note: his name has been changed since we absolutely refuse to give him the slightest recognition until he has accepted our extremely reasonable conditions.
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What makes a good writing class?
“As for myself,” says Stephen King in his wonderful book On Writing, “I’m doubtful about writing classes, but not entirely against them.” What I want to insist on in this article is that writing classes – or seminars, or workshops, or writing circles, call ‘em what you will – can be
• Inspirational
• Motivational, and
• A spur to action and
that Mr King would do well to approach the subject a tad less sceptically.
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How Journals Help Writers
Oh, I know you kept a diary when you were fourteen. Your awful brother probably picked the lock and read steamy passages to his friends. But even so … a journal kept properly can help your writing in many ways.
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Preparing for the writers life
I sometimes imagine all the unfinished novels in drawers. All the characters who will never finish their journeys; the stories that will never draw to an end. Perhaps that in itself could be the starting point for a story. (Just an idea.) But why is it that so many people start out on their first novel with such enthusiasm, put so much effort and time into it, and then …?
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Writing Romance - Five Tips
Many people think Romance writing is a bit like knitting. There’s a pattern to follow and, even if you’re a bit clumsy at first, you can knock off a finished product in a few afternoons while the kids are out playing.
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Writing Romance - Five More Tips
Good Romance relies on good characters. We need to believe in them. They should be strong and complex enough for us to identify with them.
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Romantic Fiction Writing - How to find ideas
Characters generate their own stories Some writers of romantic fiction regard ideas as the gems on which their fortune will be based. I believe, on the contrary, that ideas are a dime a dozen, available in such profusion that you’re never likely to run short of them. If this proposition sounds ludicrous to you – if ideas, or the lack of them, are the stumbling block in your creative path – then this short series of articles is for you.
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Romantic Fiction Writing - How to find ideas through daydreams
Daydreams as a source of ideas
We’re discussing four different sources of ideas that you, as a writer of romantic fiction, can milk at will. Ideas that, elaborated and complicated, will give you original stories that’ll form the backbones of your novel. In this piece, I’d like to tease out how much of a creative engine room your own day-dreaming can be.
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Writing a novel – how to keep going
No first draft was ever perfect. Most novels need rewriting and extensive editing. But if you never finish writing, it, there’ll be nothing to work on. Writing four published novels, I’ve learnt one or two things about how hard it is – and how to make it easier on yourself.
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Writer’s Block - Managing those pesky writer’s blues
I don’t believe in writer’s block.
Every day I ever sat down to write, I thought I wouldn’t be able to do it. I always sit down sweaty-palmed, wondering if I’ll be able to get a word on paper.
That’s why I believe writer’s block is another way of saying “fear”. And it’s just another excuse for not pushing through it.
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Characters and how to lift them beyond the cardboard cut out
A friend of mine is a fine writer, whose first book was a great success.
His characters were beautifully drawn and tugged us into a poignant memoir. But he had always longed to write a novel. I couldn’t wait to see it.
When he showed me a draft, I couldn’t believe it. The characters were cardboard stereotypes.
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Dialogue is real speech but better
Everyone recognises good dialogue when they see it. But few people can write it. So here’s a quick guide to really good dialogue:
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Writing dynamic dialogue
You’ve written a really crucial dialogue that will end your characters’ marriage. It should be dramatic and poignant, but instead it seems flat, unreal or, worst of all, dreary.
What’s wrong with it? It will change your characters’ lives. Why doesn’t it affect the lives of your readers?
Here are a couple of quick hints that will lift a plain or dreary dialogue and give it dynamism:
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Show, Don’t Tell and how to use detail effectively
His desk was bare, but for a human skull, with a cigar clamped firmly between its grinning teeth.
Immediately, we know a huge amount about this person, without anything having to be explained.
By now, the concept of “showing” rather than “telling” is pretty much accepted. But in numerous writing workshops, it’s become clear that people may accept the concept, but they’re often unsure how to to put it into practice.
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Book research is like make up
Research is like good make-up. It should make you look better, without drawing attention to itself.
As a writer, you have to do far more research than you’ll every use in your book. But once you’ve done it, you’re tempted to show it off. Resist the temptation.
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