Herewith, the obsessive-compulsive POV breakdown I promised last month. My aim here is to provide an organized and thorough description of the viewpoints available to you as a fiction writer, along with their variations. As I pointed out last month, different...
In fiction, point of view is defined as the perspective from which the story is narrated—in other words, the viewpoint in which we, as readers, experience the unfolding of events. Whose eyes are we seeing them through? Whose thoughts are we experiencing? Whose...
Fiction writers play God in many ways, not the least of which is the creation of human beings to people our stories. Our characters’ personalities, goals, and motivations are extraordinarily important because of the intimate way in which plot and character are linked...
My favorite bon mot about writing (this week) is this frequently quoted little gem from W. Somerset Maugham: "There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are." Talking about writing methods is like talking about religion and...
One night some years ago, my husband rented the movie Hard Target. Never having been a huge Jean-Claude Van Damme fan, I was disgruntled but resigned; after all, he—my husband, not Jean-Claude—had been pretty cool about Sense and Sensibility. You've been there. Then...
I can save you a whole lot of time and effort here if I just repeat the famous advice of Lawrence Block from his book, Writing the Novel: "If you want to write fiction, the best thing you can do is take two aspirins, lie down in a dark room, and wait for the feeling...
In a blunt and deliciously ruthless article in the August 2001 issue of the Atlantic Monthly, literary critic and professor B.R. Myers recounted comments made by Oprah Winfrey at the 1999 National Book Award ceremony. Ms. Winfrey spoke of having told Toni Morrison...
If you've ever taught creative writing, or even just sat around with your pals chatting about books, two questions inevitably arise. #1: What, exactly, is the difference between literary fiction and the various genres? And #2: Is literary really better? Question #1:...
There's a great New Yorker cartoon that I love so much, I had it printed on a bunch of T-shirts to give to writer friends: An editor, who happens to be a cat, is sitting behind his desk telling the author, a dog, "I can see it going even more feline." Critiquing...
Authors wear two hats, that of the artist and that of the business person. Most of us don't like that second hat one little bit. We don't like the look or feel of it. It never seems to fit quite right. Most of all, it's just so freakin tacky. Tacky and scary. Dollar...