Articles about writing.
The rate at which your plot moves forwards is referred to as the “pace” of your story. If your story has too slow a pace, it can be boring, whereas if the pace is too fast then it’s unclear what’s happening and why. You need to find a balance between moving forwards at the right pace, whilst still taking time to explain what is happening and why.
The stories that stick with you, make you think long and hard after they’re over, will often blur those lines between good and evil, and show the rich complexity of life. I’ll be explaining how and why we blur those lines in stories.
Writing prompts are a great resource, and I regularly give them on my Creative Writing For Kids videos on YouTube because of it. A writing prompt can be used to grow your story from a tiny seed into a full grown tree, as long as you know how to use them well.
To write interesting characters is one of the most important parts of story craft, and one of the ways to do this is to make sure they grow and change through the course of your story. I’ll be explaining why it matters, and how to do it.
Your Protagonist, the main character, of your story usually need to be likeable. I say usually, because having a Protagonist who is unlikeable happens occasionally and it can work, but it makes it harder for your audience to connect to their journey. A likeable Protagonist will draw your audience into following their story, and make them invest more easily.
I love to read, and now I’m in the privileged position that my job is to write. I love everything about it. My career started with blogs and articles, then I moved into finally releasing the book I’d been working on for a decade, and now I’m finally making a movie. I’ve been asked if, now making more films is a potential for my future, would I ever want to go back to writing books?
Show don’t tell is a piece of writing advice that is regularly given to writers, but without development it can be hard to understand. I previously wrote about showing not telling your character’s environment and actions, but for this I’ll be focusing on what show don’t tell means in relation to your characters emotions and feelings.
One of the key ingredients to a successful story is for your characters to be well motivated. Your Protagonist, your main character, wants something and is motivated enough to after it, and you write that journey. But the conflict lock is what turns it from some random events into a real story.
Your story “continuity” is making sure that from one scene to another, nothing changes about the people or the environment they’re in, that wasn’t intended to change and tracked by the writer. In film and TV errors, continuity errors can happen due to wardrobes changing suddenly, placement of props on the set, or weather, but I’ll be focusing specifically on the written word because as a writer the story continuity is your responsibility to control.
When you’re writing a story, usually you use with first or third person. First person refers to the Protagonist as I, and third person refers to the Protagonist as He or She. I’m going to be explaining the use of a POV (Point Of View) Character in third person, and how you can use them for connecting your reader to the other characters in the scene and the setting they’re in, without overloading your audience with unnecessary detail.