After President Lincoln was killed, the government shut down Ford’s Theatre and imprisoned owner John T. Ford for over a month. By the time he was released, arsonists had tried at least twice to burn the building down. When Ford announced plans to reopen the theater, he received so many threats that the government took… Continue reading Ford’s Theatre After Lincoln’s Assassination
Category: Resources and Events for Writers
Science and the Afterlife
I've experienced a series of losses this year, which have me thinking about what happens to our loved ones when they die and will I ever see them again? Greg Taylor's "Stop Worrying! There Probably is an Afterlife" is an attempt to examine the scientific evidence that consciousness survives death, and it's a refreshing approach… Continue reading Science and the Afterlife
What We Talk About When We Talk About Plot
E.M. Forster defined the difference between story and plot this way: “The king died and then the queen died is a story. The king died and then the queen died of grief is a plot.” Some writers visualize their plots as suspension bridges, with the towers representing key turning points. Photo by abarndweller. Plot is… Continue reading What We Talk About When We Talk About Plot
Rewriting: How to Begin
Once you've written a complete draft of your story or book, you're ready for the next stage of the process: rewriting. The complexity of the revision process mainly hinges on whether you're the sort of writer who creates a detailed outline before you begin or someone who makes it up as you go along, by… Continue reading Rewriting: How to Begin
My Kingdom for a Horse
It’s impossible to imagine the Old West without horses. Impossible to imagine cowboys, outlaws or lawmen making their way across the plains without them. I recently volunteered to help with a 30- and 50-mile endurance riding event to learn more about the sport, and in the process, I learned a lot about horses, which naturally… Continue reading My Kingdom for a Horse
The Civil War in one spectacular chart
Lest you think complex infographics are a modern invention, numerous websites have resurrected a century-old chart with a mind-boggling amount of information on the Civil War. Click on the image for a closer look. The Comparative Synoptical Chart Company submitted its creation to the Library of Congress back in 1897. You can still see the… Continue reading The Civil War in one spectacular chart
The science behind writer’s block
We’ve all experienced it, that feeling of dread in the pit of your stomach when you sit down to write. When all the negative feedback you’ve ever gotten and the prospect of the hard work ahead of you is overwhelming to the point that you’d rather do anything — vacuum, alphabetize your book collection, clean… Continue reading The science behind writer’s block
Screenwriting for novelists
I was familiar with many of the concepts and terms Larry Brooks uses from having studied Syd Field’s “Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting.” I wound up turning to Field—and his book is a fantastic resource—when I couldn’t find the nuts-and-bolts guidelines I needed to whip a novel into shape. And it’s often much easier to… Continue reading Screenwriting for novelists
Circus tents and story structure
Larry Brooks The snapshot of my “treadmill” journal in my previous post has a reference to “circus tent plots.” That’s worth explaining. I took a Writer’s Digest webinar in March led by Larry Brooks. The webinar focused on making sure you have a compelling premise for your book, but Brooks also talked briefly about a… Continue reading Circus tents and story structure
A.X. Ahmad: The life of a debut novelist
This is slightly off-topic, but I just have to give a shout-out to a fantastic writing instructor and one of the hardest-working writers I know. A.X. Ahmad’s debut novel “The Caretaker”—the first in a trio of literary thrillers—came out this week and he’s getting some terrific press. Here is the description from Tom Nolan’s review… Continue reading A.X. Ahmad: The life of a debut novelist
Terri J. Huck 