Introduction Dear fellow fiction writers: are we supposed to be consciously leveraging theme or not? Or are deeper stories that address what we find meaningful just supposed to magically emerge out of pure subconscious magic? Is there even a learning process for that? How do we develop meaningful stories, if obsessively planning them out kills […]
Assholes warp reality. People who are afraid of upsetting assholes also warp reality. Assholes, by our definition here, are missing an awareness of anything beyond themselves in the present moment. Anything that threatens an asshole’s sense of who they are or their sense of being in control causes them to split off unacceptable, flawed, or
Asshole Mitigation Plan, Part 16: The Dream, or assholes warp reality Read More »
This post is part of a series on time travel and alternate history fiction — and why we reach for it when the present gets loud. Right now, these books are all available together in the Escape from 2026 Storybundle, through June 25, 2026. What if the real reason to travel through time isn’t the
Douglas Smith’s Time Travel Stories: Into the Time Slip Read More »
What if…what we think of as escapism isn’t limited to entertainment that doesn’t have deep underpinnings? What if…science fiction is particularly suited to asking deep questions that enhance the fun of how escapist the story is? Time travel and alternate history fiction might be the best examples of that. Escapist fiction: fiction which helps the
You’re in a hallway. The walls are yellow trim with panels of patterned gold wallpaper; the carpet has a green, gold, and scarlet pattern. The carpet pattern is interrupted once by a single green patterned square on the floor, as if to mark a turn toward another hallway or perhaps the elevator, but you can’t
Liminal Spaces in Fiction: Empty Rooms, Interminable Passages, and Strange Perspectives Read More »
So you’ve written a book and now it’s time to say something nice about yourself. Quelle horreur!!! Most people have been taught not to say good things about themselves (because it’s socially considered self-centered bragging) or have been trained to actively say bad things about themselves (because of emotional abuse). If you’re neurodivergent, trying to
After the last section, I spent some time writing and rewriting what I wanted to say next about assholes. What are assholes…why are assholes…and then I wanted to write about how assholes do what they do. But the more I wrote, the more I realized that it’s probably too soon to write about the overall
Not every writer needs to write the same kind of story. Yet a lot of advice points writers toward using the same structures in their stories. Mostly, I think the advice is meant to be one writer pointing out what works for them and why. But sometimes writers get caught up in teaching structures as
Story Structure as Prelude and Fugue: Underpinnings in Music and Fiction Read More »
The Wee Beasties Storybundle I’ve joined a new StoryBundle, and this one has teeth. The Wee Beasties StoryBundle, curated by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, is all about creatures that look small and harmless…right up until they don’t. Fairies, pixies, halflings, cats, mice, corgis, ghosts, orcs playing baseball, elves playing baseball, bats, rats, and other assorted critters
Wee Beasties StoryBundle: Defenders of Dream and Other Animal Fantasy Adventures Read More »
So hear me out: I think that modern Gothic fiction depends on not just rehashing old Gothic tropes, but including elements from the modern Goth subculture. Reviewing recent novels that are labeled strictly as Gothic leads to a certain paucity of choices, a sense of the same stories being told over and over out of
