First off, I just love the song. It’s not actually repeating. It’s definitely rhyming. This should be familiar: When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands that have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equalContinue reading “History Repeating”
Tag Archives: Writing
How Does Magic Work?
This comes up in the context of a fight scene in Industrial Mage. Our intrepid hero casts a tornado-ish air shield around himself and it moves with him. Instead of a fireball, he creates a fire-whip, which behaves mostly like an actual whip. He casts water bullets at the bad spider creature, targeting the joints,Continue reading “How Does Magic Work?”
Learning 2 Write – XII
Scope Continuing the post on Endings – the irony of which does not escape me – I had a thought: It’s not (usually) that I get tired of a series, it’s that the series changes out from under me. Many stories (not just LitRPG) start with the struggles of our intrepid hero. As he overcomesContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – XII”
Learning 2 Write – IX
Paragraphs Already at nine? I see VIII, but I don’t see VII. Anyway… I’m reading Book V of Matter Destructor. It has very (very, very) short paragraphs. For example: When Hunter said it, the noise didn’t just dip. It died. Like someone had cut a cord. Heads snapped toward him in a wave, and forContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – IX”
Learning 2 Write
Continuous Chapter Numbers I found one: The Matter Destructor. I just downloaded books three and four. I’ve read book three, but I don’t remember any details, so I wanted to re-read it before reading book four. The book opened on Chapter 62. It’s nice that Amazon remembers my place – especially when it doesn’t tellContinue reading “Learning 2 Write”
Learning 2 Write – VI
Pacing I had a miniphany that I want to get down. “Do you have your pack?” I swung it off my back and held it up in answer. I had gotten into the habit of grabbing it whenever things got busy since I’d gotten here. “I” is the latest intrepid hero. This takes place inContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – VI”
Ablative of Means
When did “by” change? In Latin, “by” is known as the ablative of means (because the following noun uses the ablative case; “by” is “ab”, fwiw). In English, it used to be the same thing. “He was rescued by [means of] an ATV.” “The ship was sunk by [means of] an iceberg.” The active voiceContinue reading “Ablative of Means”
Learning 2 Write – VIII
Repercussions This is a short one. A note to myself more than anything. I just ran across this: [He] knew from his limited reading on the subject that because of their longevity elves had built a society with a massive emphasis on conflict resolution. Something that made sense when he thought about it. For whenContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – VIII”
Learning 2 Write – VII
Names It may not be possible to win when it comes to names. I just (as in “last week”) found out that Rhys is pronounced Reese. This broke both Torchwood and the Deryni series, for opposite reasons. With Torchwood being TV, I only heard the name “Reese” and assumed the spelling. With Deryni being print,Continue reading “Learning 2 Write – VII”
Learning 2 Write – V
Time This may be the hardest part about writing a novel – other than actually typing it out. Authors get this wrong a LOT. Time in novels must be “stretchy” simply due to the medium. As a counter example, movie scenes must run in real-time because we’re watching people do things – including talk toContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – V”
Marked Up 