Writing Excuses

Writing Excuses 8.24: Project in Depth–Kiss Me Twice

Writing Excuses — Sun, 16 Jun 2013 22:00:37 +0000

Mary’s story “Kiss Me Twice,” is a murder mystery featuring an artificial intelligence using Mae West as an avatar. It appeared on the ballot for the 2012 Hugo Awards in the Best Novella category (our early discussion to the contrary, we totally did NOT air this episode in time for 2012 Hugo voting. Yes, we recorded this episode a full year prior to airing it.)

Mary walks us through the process of creating the story, and then cutting it down from novel-length to the novella-length at which it currently appears, as well as a bunch of the work that went into creating a compelling, character-driven mystery with an A.I. as a critical character. We also get a fun “what-if” argument as the cast talks about what we liked best about the story, and how we’d change it if it got bigger.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: Empire State, by Adam Christopher, narrated by Phil Gigante

Writing Prompt: Pick your favorite actor or actress, gather your favorite quotes from them in their films, and string them together in a single character’s voice in a new context.

Public Service Announcement: Voting is now open for the 2013 Hugos. The ballot can be seen here. If you purchase, or have already purchased, a membership to LoneStarCon 3, you are eligible to vote on the 2013 Hugos, and will have access to the entire Hugo Voting Packet — a collection of all nominated works. Voting closes on July 31st. (Obligatory disclaimer: Brandon and Howard are on the ballot in the Novella and Graphic Story categories, respectively, and Writing Excuses Season 7 is on the ballot in the Best Related Work category.)

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Writing Excuses 8.23: Microcasting

Writing Excuses — Sun, 09 Jun 2013 22:00:38 +0000

Microcasting! It’s what we’ve taken to calling a Q&A. Eric Patten joins us for this one. Here are the questions:

What’s your first step in the rewriting process?
How do you write Artificial Intelligences as characters?
Tactful promotion: how do you get nominated for a Hugo or Nebula?
How do you decide whether or not to take an offer from a publisher?
Do you use a writing notebook? How, and for what?
What methods do you use to test the “coolness” and/or viability of a story idea?
What genre or style do you read that is outside of the one(s) in which you write?

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: Red Storm Rising, by Tom Clancy, narrated by Michael Prichard

Writing Prompt: Two words: “Flying Caldecott.”

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Writing Excuses 8.22: Pre-writing with E.J. Patten

Writing Excuses — Sun, 02 Jun 2013 23:20:09 +0000

E.J. “Eric” Patten joins us for a discussion of pre-writing. His first book, Return to Exile, came out in 2011, and The Legend Thief released in March of 2013.

What is pre-writing? Eric walks us through his process for developing a story, beginning with the high-concept world-building inspired by the phrase “Cthulhu for kids.” He talks about the importance of getting the characters right, and how this process precedes plot development. Each of us handles this a little differently, and we talk about how that goes.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: E.J. Patten’s books aren’t available on Audible, but if you’re looking for Cthulhu that isn’t for kids, H.P. Lovecraft’s classics “Call of Cthulhu” and “Reanimator” can be found in H.P. Lovecraft, Volume 2, narrated by Garrick Hogan.

Writing Prompt: Kids get magical powers from their Halloween costumes…

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Writing Excuses 8.21: What the Avengers did Right

Writing Excuses — Sun, 26 May 2013 14:56:07 +0000

We here at Writing Excuses enjoyed Marvel’s The Avengers. This isn’t a movie review, though. This is a discussion of what the movie did right from a writer’s standpoint. The things we focus on?

Dialog and character voice
Balanced handling of an ensemble of main characters
Scenes that serve more than one function
Pacing

Obviously there will be some spoilers here. The film is available for rental now, so you might consider watching it again with this podcast and these points in mind. And generally speaking, it’s a good exercise for writers to look at movies (or books, or comics, or whatever) that they enjoy, and then attempt to identify the reasons those things were enjoyable.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, by Michael Chabon, narrated by David Colacci.

Writing Prompt: Take an ensemble cast, and have them fighting each other as a prelude to fighting what needs to be fought. Alternatively? “Hulk smash.”

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Writing Excuses 8.20: The Short Story, with Mary Robinette Kowal

Writing Excuses — Sun, 19 May 2013 21:47:58 +0000

The number one request we got when we asked you what you’d like us to talk about? Short story writing. Mary is our resident expert, and if she weren’t already a member of the cast, she’d our go-to expert for an interview. Convenient!

We begin by addressing the popular notion that writing short stories is a good way to practice for writing novels, and selling short stories is a way to break in and sell novels. We then return to the M.I.C.E. quotient (first addressed by us in 6.10) and discuss how the quotient (or model, or formula) helps you understand what to cut from the telling of a story to make it a short story.

Mary then walks us through her process for turning an idea into a story concept, and then distilling that concept into a short story. She also invites us to explore her 950-word short, “Evil Robot Monkey,” free of charge!

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: The Language of Moths, by Christopher Barzak, narrated by Paul Michael Garcia

Writing Prompt: Being “bi-textual” is a controversial lifestyle choice…

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Writing Excuses 8.19: Writing and Convention Culture

Writing Excuses — Sun, 12 May 2013 23:25:47 +0000

There are numerous local cultures surrounding writers, writing groups, and the conventions that writers attend. These cultural peculiarities influence the writing that emerges from those areas.

As writers, it’s important to be aware that this is happening. As a podcast crew, we’re aware that it’s happening around us, and in many cases because of us. We talk about some of the cultures we’ve been embedded in, how they’ve influenced us, and how we have, in some cases reacted against those cultures.

We also talk about how we can conduct ourselves when participating at conventions, again, with care taken to assess the nature of the cultures in which we’re stepping into.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: White Sands, Red Menace, by Ellen Klages, narrated by Julie Dretzin

Writing Prompt: Neil Gaiman is the Mentor character in your Hero’s Journey.

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Writing Excuses 8.18: Blocking

Writing Excuses — Mon, 06 May 2013 00:00:52 +0000

Blocking! What is it, why is it important, and how can you do it well?

We begin with a definition (blocking is the part of the narrative that tells the reader where the characters are, where the scenery is, and how these things are interacting) and then talk about why it’s important, especially how it applies to “show, don’t tell,” and how the needs of the story will dictate what actually needs to be shown.

Finally, we discuss how to block scenes effectively, and how each of us do it.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: Monster Hunter Alpha, by Larry Correia, narrated by Oliver Wyman

Writing Prompt: Write a fight scene. Bonus points if it’s got four people in it. We don’t know what you’ll spend those points on.

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Writing Excuses 8.17: Microcasting

Writing Excuses — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 23:31:32 +0000

You love ‘em, we love ‘em, and there’s never a shortage of questions so here’s another another fast-paced Q&A. Here are the questions that we field in this episode:

How do you prepare to write?
How do you write stories that are important without being heavy-handed?
Magical realism vs. Fantasy — what’s the difference?
Do you have recommendations or techniques for serving as a beta reader? (Here’s the promised liner-note bit from Mary.)
Is it possible to do a serial with short stories and novellas all in the same setting?
Why do publishers say they want crossed-genre books, but they’re not publishing crossed-genre books?
Picture books and books for beginning readers: can you ‘cast on this for us? (Answer: not until we’ve got an expert guest in that field. If you want that info, go to SCBWI.org)
Can you do a ‘cast on reading aloud? (Answer: yes. This is not that ‘cast.)
What is the primary thing you’ve learned from reading Literary Fiction that has informed your Genre Fiction writing?

Writing Prompt: “Kittenpunk.”

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Writing Excuses 8.16: Brainstorming with Brandon Again

Writing Excuses — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 05:03:58 +0000

We’re going to try brainstorming with Brandon again, because that last story didn’t grab him. There’s a lesson there, but let’s move on…

Our story seed is “psychic birds.” Brandon asks us to start with plotting, but we have to do a little world-building first, locking down some of the bird abilities, and their scope. Then we wrestle with conflict, and the need for a good ending.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. LeGuin, narrated by Rob Inglis

Writing Prompt: Come up with an animal that both swims and flies. But not a duck.

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Writing Excuses 8.15: Narrative Rhythm

Writing Excuses — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 00:58:25 +0000

We begin with an audio glitch and a jumbling of our usual intro. Why? Because it breaks rhythm, and sometimes you may actually want to do that.

Narrative rhythm is the pattern of story elements and associated structures that help drive the reader’s pace through a book. Consciously managed, narrative rhythm is a a critical pacing tool, but can also be used to point up important information, increase the impact of certain scenes, and even encourage the reader to take a breather.

We talk about examples from film (it’s not the same thing, but it’s easy to make the point this way), as well as examples from our own work. Scenes and sequels, chapter breaks, cliffhangers, and more all come in to play here. And of course you, fair listener, want to know how to manage narrative rhythm, and we cover some tips and tricks for that, too.

Audiobook Pick-of-the-Week: The Book of Three: The Prydain Chronicles, Volume 1, by Lloyd Alexander

Writing Prompt: Re-write a classic fairy-tale, first with nothing but rising action, and then with the addition of some falling action.

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