Isn't It Time to Get Serious About Your Writing?

If you've been want­ing to be more dis­ci­plined and more inspired in your writ­ing, con­sider get­ting a copy of 14 Prompts, free for sub­scribers. Enter your email address to get your copy now.

"14 Prompts does what most writ­ing books don’t—gives you prac­ti­cal advice while also inspir­ing you to want to take it." Andrea Cumbo, andilit.com

Playing with Poetry: Interview with L.L. Barkat

by | 15 Comments
LL Writing

For the last two-and-a-half months, I've been get­ting more and more into the work of L.L. Barkat, the poet and author of four books, includ­ing Rumors of Water: Thoughts on Creativity & Writing and her book of poetry, InsideOut. Rumors of Water is a book writ­ing in the style of Annie Dillard, which instantly makes me start salivating.

L.L. Barkat is a staff writer for The Curator, a cul­ture mag­a­zine based in NYC, and also authors sev­eral blogs. My per­sonal favorite of hers is Seedlings in Stone. You prob­a­bly should subscribe.

I'm so excited to talk to her about cre­ativ­ity, poetry, and how to bal­ance all those projects and dreams we all have. I hope you enjoy the interview!

Keep Reading

The Winner of the Show Off Writing Contest: Dissent Edition

by | 6 Comments
Book Burning

I was so impressed with the qual­ity of sub­mis­sions to our writ­ing con­test this month. Impressed and dis­mayed. The bet­ter the sto­ries, the harder it is to pick just one. I kept think­ing, I want this story and this story and this story in the book. Because, as you know, this isn't just a con­test. Soon […]

Keep Reading

Three Times You Should Use a Comma

by | 7 Comments
When Should You Use a Comma

We've cov­ered when not to use com­mas (and when to use com­mas if you feel like it), but it's just as impor­tant to know when to use com­mas. We can't have run-on sen­tences tak­ing over lit­er­a­ture. So when do you use a comma?

We've already cov­ered the Oxford comma and the need for com­mas in a series or list. There are three other pri­mary times when you need to use a comma. Keep in mind that this is not an exhaus­tive list; just the times when comma use is most common.

Keep Reading

7 Tricks to Write More with Less Willpower

by | 62 Comments
Discipline Writing

You want to write more. Of course you do. That's only nat­ural. You'd like to fin­ish that novel (or those three nov­els!). You'd like to write on your blog more than once a week, and do more guest post­ing. As you get deeper into writ­ing, it seems like there's always more to write.

You get an idea for a new book to write at least once a week.

You want to start a blog. You DO start a blog. Then, you get ideas to start three more!

People hear you're a writer and ask you to write arti­cles, newslet­ters, and blog posts for them.

The prob­lem is after you get done with work or tak­ing care of the kids, writ­ing is the last thing you want to do. You can't even muster the willpower to read a book, let alone write one. So you turn on the TV, put your feet up, and promise your­self, "I'll write tomorrow."

Eventually, you see through your petty promises and won­der, "Maybe this writ­ing thing just isn't for me. Maybe I'm not a writer after all."

Keep Reading

Writing About Family: Interview with Author Jesse Cozean

by | 16 Comments
Jesse Cozean

Yesterday, we had a great post by Jesse Cozean about writ­ing like Kurt Vonnegut. If you haven't read it yet, you might want to swing over there.

Jesse recently pub­lished My Grandfather's War, a book about his rela­tion­ship with his grand­fa­ther and his grandfather's expe­ri­ence in World War II. Today, I've asked him to tell us what it was like to write about a fam­ily mem­ber, par­tic­u­larly one who had expe­ri­enced so much.

If you write mem­oir, or have ever thought about writ­ing it, this should be very inter­est­ing inter­view for you.

Keep Reading

Three Tips to Write Like Kurt Vonnegut

by | 28 Comments
Kurt Vonnegut

Count me as one of those peo­ple who think that the unfor­tu­nately late Kurt Vonnegut is a mod­ern rein­car­na­tion of Mark Twain. His books and short sto­ries are lit­tered with barbed, humor­ous, and wickedly hon­est advice about the process of writ­ing. Perhaps my favorite piece of wis­dom that he bestows is this: Do not use semi­colons. They are trans­ves­tite her­maph­ro­dites rep­re­sent­ing absolutely noth­ing. All they do is show you've been to college.

Of course, then he goes on to use one at the end of that same book, mak­ing the point that Rules only take us so far, even good rules. Without any fur­ther ado, my three favorite rules from Kurt Vonnegut. So it goes.…

Keep Reading

Why You Should Read Peer Fiction

by | 12 Comments
Read Peer Fiction

In my cre­ative writ­ing classes in col­lege, prob­a­bly the most pro­duc­tive exer­cise is when we spent the class read­ing each other's pieces. Reading the work of your peers causes you to ask two very impor­tant questions:

  • How can I write as well as that girl, because I really like her writing?
  • How can I avoid writ­ing like that guy, because I really don't like his writing?

Reading the work of your peers teaches you to write. It shows you what you like about other people's work and what you don't like. You can read pub­lished authors too, you can read the clas­sics, but there's some­thing about read­ing an in process draft of your peers that helps you see behind the veil of writ­ing at the under­ly­ing frame­work beneath.

Keep Reading

7 Steps to Creating Suspense

by | 3 Comments
Suspense Spider

Posing a good dra­matic ques­tion in the minds of your read­ers is the best way to cre­ate sus­pense and keep peo­ple read­ing. In Monday's post, we talked about what the dra­matic ques­tion is. Today we're going to talk about how to use it effectively.

Here are seven steps to cre­ate sus­pense with the dra­matic question:

Keep Reading

When You SHOULD Use Passive Voice

by | 6 Comments
Statue of Liberty Declaration

So we've talked about the pas­sive voice and why we don't use it. And now, we're talk­ing about when it's okay to use.

The first time we chat­ted about the pas­sive voice, I cited the great Thomas Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are cre­ated equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with cer­tain unalien­able Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pur­suit of Happiness.

Good ol' TJ embraced the pas­sive voice. Let's talk about why.

Keep Reading

The Dramatic Question and Suspense in Fiction

by | 32 Comments

The dra­matic ques­tion is prob­a­bly the sin­gle most impor­tant ele­ment in an enter­tain­ing story. Even if you are a ter­ri­ble writer, if you can use the dra­matic ques­tion effec­tively, peo­ple will read your work. The dra­matic ques­tion lies at the heart of sus­pense, and, as my father-in-law told me recently, the rewards for writ­ers who do sus­pense well are dis­pro­por­tion­ate to all other writ­ing skills. The dra­matic ques­tion is why Twilight is sell­ing mil­lions of copies and the aver­age lit­er­ary fic­tion novel is lucky to sell a few thousand.

Keep Reading
« Older Posts
Copyright © 2012 · The Write Practice