8 Ways to Make Your Characters More Relatable
By Robbie Blair
Relatability in your characters will help your work strike a chord with readers. This article explores ways that you can make your heroes, villains, and other characters more relatable.
Ursula K. Le Guin, Master of Realism
Ursula K. Le Guin is best known for her sci-fi and fantasy, but part of what makes her work so remarkable is the deeply realistic way it handles the nuanced intersections of character and culture.
An Abundance of Robin Hoods: How Social Bandits Defy Time and Culture
Whenever a source of authority grows too powerful and begins to usurp the common people, Robin Hood-like characters start to appear in film and literature.
Storyville: Writing a Novel Without Plotting it Out
Tips on how to write a novel without plotting it out.
Better With Age: Giving Elderly Characters the Spotlight
Every living person on the planet has experienced childhood, but the same can’t be said for old age. Older characters have more history, so creating such a person takes considerable imagination.
Storyville: Writing About Taboo Subjects
When writing about taboo subjects, be careful how you do it.
Forget Heroes and Villains, There is Only Point-of-View
You want to make your characters realistic? Think of everybody as the protagonist.
Take Your Characters Out to Lunch: 5 Development Exercises
Like going on a date, character exercises are part of the process of getting to know another person better (in this case, an imaginary person).
Slipping Into Someone Else's Skin
Great characters aren't just words: they're living, breathing people, as real as you or me. But where do they come from? How does one birth a character with depth and soul?
Storyville: Death in Fiction
In:
American Psycho, Character, Death, Jack Ketchum, John Steinbeck, Narrator, Plot, Storyville, Theme
Death in fiction — who, what, when, where and why.
The Archetypes of Hayao Miyazaki
Revered Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki has announced his retirement, but not before years of contribution to the art of storytelling.
Storyville: Putting Your Life in Your Fiction
Some helpful tips for working your life into your fiction.
Storyville: Kill Your Darlings—How 'Game of Thrones' Can Change Your Writing
We can learn some valuable lessons about plotting, characters, and expectations from watching (or reading) 'Game of Thrones.'
Storyville: Three Essential Books On Writing
In:
Character, Craft, Dialogue, Jeff VanderMeer, Plot, Stephen King, Storyville, Structure, Theme, Voice
Three essential books on writing by Stephen King, Donald Maas and Jeff VanderMeer.
Overcoming Object Love: How to Write Female Leads Who Are People
By Robbie Blair
"Object love" is a painfully common writing disease that leads us to write two-dimensional women who are more object than person. This article explores how you can overcome the sickness.
Want To Be A Better Writer? Take Acting Classes
From basic games to complex script analysis, actors have a thing or two to teach writers.
Storyville: Dissecting "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates
In:
Character, Joyce Carol Oates, Literary Devices, Plot, POV, Research, Setting, Short Stories, Storyville, Structure
One of the most talked about, published and taught stories, I dissect "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates.
How Precocious is Too Precocious? Writing Smart but Believable Kids
There’s a fine line that authors tread when writing from a child's perspective. A balance must be found between a voice that is unrealistically adult, and one that is too naive to be engaging.
Storyville: Fiction As Film—Writing Scenes That Are Visual
How can your fiction be as visual and engrossing as a film? Here are some suggestions.
It's Made Of SCIENCE: Multiple Personalities
What you need to know about the dissociative identity disorder, multiple personalities, and SCIENCE.
Write Like a Girl (or Guy)
Let's talk about sex, baby... How do you write characters of the opposite sex who don't sound like a man doing a poor imitation of a woman, or vice versa? What are the real differences in how we talk?
It's Made Of SCIENCE: Writing Characters That Are Smarter Than You
You might consider yourself intelligent, perhaps even enlightened, but nobody can know everything. How can you write characters that know more than you do?
Do or Dialect: 6 Tips for Building a Believable Voice
By Robbie Blair
Six tips on creating a sense of a character's voice and dialect without resorting to painful phonetic representations.
