I recently posted about listening to music while you write. In Words & Music I said that music can inspire your writing, “Poetic stories told with captivating music are not only inspiring but magical in many ways.” In that piece I mentioned some American songwriters; Bruce Springsteen and Ronnie James Dio. I also covered British bassist, songwriter and founder of Iron Maiden, Steve Harris—who I will also cover again in this post—he’s just that good.
Today I want to cover how you can improve your writing by following how lyricists write. …

Dancing With the Muse – An Introduction to the Six Core Competencies of Successful Storytelling
We are inundated with writing wisdom. It cascades around us like political fallout, right and left, plotter and pantser, light and dark, first person and third, commercial and literary, nuanced and smack in your face.
How to unblock. How to craft compelling characters (an alliterative gem in its own right). How to write scenes. How to write genre fiction. How to not make your English teacher turn over in her grave. …

Do you listen to music while you write? Not everyone can. It’s only been recently that I started playing music while I write. Now I can’t start my work day without it. I have very specific music I listen to, which I will share later and the reasons for my choices.
I want to start by sharing a few quotes from the movie Eddie and the Cruisers. If you aren’t familiar with the movie—Eddie Wilson wants to be remembered for great music and songs that mean something. The band meets a …

If you don’t know, how can you write compelling characters? All our characters, in a sense, wear a mask. Some wear many masks and until we can “see” behind those masks, we don’t know who they are. Sure, you can give them a past and all the other “typical” information that goes with creating a character, but you have to step into their shoes, slip into their skin and get inside their head—almost literally.
“Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he …

If you arrived here through Blogging Tips to see how often I update this poor little blog. . .Welcome to my World.
Was it a ploy to get you here through trickery? Not really, it was more sinister than that. It was actually a ploy to make me update the thing.
If you arrived here by other means, Welcome to my World.
At the time of this writing, I have no title for this post or even a clue what this post will be about. A blog post should be specific and cover …

Wednesday Writing Sprint:
Each Wednesday a small group of writers devote the day to writing. It’s not a massive spree like the 10K Day, this is just about setting time aside each week to devote to your craft.
The time can be spent outlining characters, plots, scenes, etc. or it can be spent using it for a writing marathon. The focus is to simply devote more time to your writing.
It’s often difficult to schedule a chunk of time each day for personal writing. We keep making plans to do it, keep telling …