I recently had one of those nasty little life-episodes that made me sit back and really evaluate things.  Specifically, what it means to be a hero.  Not me personally as a hero (although I hope to grow up to be one someday), but who heros are and what exactly sets them apart from the rest of us.  My conclusion… it’s not what you might think. I mean, you look at some of the heros on television and in movies and you get the big, muscular, hyper-intelligent individual who creates cures for cancer in his/her spare-time.  But are they really heros, or just extraordinary people living up to their potential?  I believe that perhaps the later is the case. To me, a hero […]

We all talk about plots and I think we all know what a plot is.  But how many should we have in a story?  Is the plot the main consideration when writing a story? I’ve struggled with these questions on numerous occassions.  In fact, my first few stories didn’t come from having a great plot spring into my head. The truth is, I had characters, setting and FINALLY plot developed in that order for each story.  For me, the characters define the setting and the characters and setting define the plot. Hardly rocket science, is it? But wait… what about motivation?  Hah!  Tricked you… that’s part of my character definition.  At least, it is for my primary characters.  I usually […]

I have a problem that I suspect many first and even established writers face.  Is my work actually good enough to get a publisher interested?  I know it was fear that kept me writing (and rewriting) the infamous chapter 1 of my book.  I wanted a beginning so compelling that whoever read it would have no choice but to go on with the rest of the story. I have no doubt that there are several vanity publishers that would be happy to take my money and print my book.  Somehow (to me, at least) that’s not an indication of whether it’s good or not.  Only a “real” publisher agreeing to take the project on will do. Naturally, I want to send my best work […]

I’ve decided to take the plunge. “What plunge?” you may ask.  “Is it marriage?  A new job?  How about adopting a puppy?” No, no and no in that order.  Heck, switch the answers around if you like. In this case, the plunge I’m talking about is Nanowrimo 2006.  What is Nanowrimo?  Simply put, it is National Novel Writing Month or to explain it another way, it is a challenge to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. Monumental task? Hell yes!  To put it into perspective (my perspective, naturally), it took me 30 months to crank out a 90,000 word fantasy novel which I am still editing. So what makes me think that I can possibly do such a crazy […]