Guest Post: Martin Bolton on Co-Writing a Novel

Guest Post, Writing
Today I'd like to welcome Martin Bolton, my second guest poster here at Dianna's Writing Den. I hope you'll find this post as interesting as I did. On Co-Writing a Novel When my good friend, David Pilling, and I decided to write a novel together we had no idea where to start. We had both written plenty of stuff individually, but how do you coordinate a dual effort? Before we could think of the actual story, we had to decide how we would both contribute to a book without it being disjointed and difficult to read. After a few decent ales and a good chat, we came up with the idea of a story with two main protagonists who are born on opposite sides of a world, have never met,…
Read More

Editing a Short Story in Five Steps

Short Fiction, Uncategorized, Writing
Over the last week of December and the first week of January, we worked on fairly long short stories. Now it's time to talk about editing. Editing a short story is a much less painful process than editing a novel. It's a shorter process, and if you go through each of these steps you can make it a lot easier for yourself. I recommend taking a day or two away from your short story before you start editing it. You don't want to stay away a long time. Particularly if your end goal is to make money, it's a good idea to have several of these on the market at one time. When I edit a short story, I usually follow these steps: 1. Proofread on the computer. Sure, you…
Read More

Fiction Prompt January 20th

Prompts, Short Fiction
While I am hoping to use several of these prompts to create standalone flash fiction, writing responses to these prompts from the PoV of one of my novel characters is a really good way to build character. Today I've got not only a prompt for you, but a small response to it that I wrote from the PoV (point of view, for those of you who don't know) of Riana, the main character in Moonshadow's Guardian. Today's prompt: Guilt My response: It's been thousands of years since I protected Eternia, but I will never forgive myself for failing her. She was just a little girl the first time we met. I remember her cute smile, her little head all covered in long black hair like a curtain. I remember her…
Read More

A Prompt for the New Year

Inspirational, Prompts, Short Fiction, Writing
The new year has just begun. This first week is a great time to set the tone for the rest of 2012. We all have our own goals, both writing related goals and completely separate goals, for the new year. If we take the first steps towards those goals now, we're ahead. Don't tell yourself you can wait to start working on something because you have the whole year. Start working on it now. Right now I'm finishing up Birth of a Vampire, a short-ish story that will probably end up a little less than 10K. I'm also formulating a plan to edit my novel. As part of my plan to write and submit twelve pieces of fiction this year, I'm going to be writing an actually short story that…
Read More

Working on a Longer Short Story

Inspirational, Short Fiction, Writing
Last week I challenged you to work on a longer short story. I'm going to spend 2012 working on writing stories shorter than anything I've written before--under 2, 500 words--but there's a short story that I wrote in the summer which I think will be better if I don't try to restrict its length. I'm working on a full rewrite of it now and considering extending the plot. A longer short story in this context is between 10, 000 and 15, 000 words. The word count allows you to cover a bit more ground without going into a complete novel. With the rise of ebooks, works of this length are becoming more and more viable. For me, whose short stories generally cover the span of a few days, aiming for…
Read More

Three Dares

Inspirational, Nanowrimo, Novels, Writing, Writing: The Process
Today I'm sitting at 35, 000 words with a lofty goal of 50, 000 by midnight (although I won't put myself down if I don't make it tonight) and I'm rather tired, so my post is just a couple of dares, one of which I've already posted on the Toronto regional forum. Dare Number One: I dare you to include a squirrel eating a packet of ketchup in your novel. *Bonus points if the squirrel finishes the ketchup, disappears, and returns at some point with yet another packet of ketchup. **Double bonus points if this happens at a very crucial moment in your novel. Dare Number Two: Have all the plants in your world suddenly turn purple. *Bonus points if everyone except the main character thinks this is absolutely normal.…
Read More

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Goal setting, Inspirational, Novels, Writing, Writing: The Process
Staples Business Depot would like us to believe that August and September make up the most wonderful time of the year. Most people seem to believe that Christmas is the most wonderful time of year. And then there are a few hundred, maybe even a few thousand strange people that are convinced that October and November, especially November, are the best time of the year. Why is that? Well, it's simple. November is National Novel Writing Month. Each year in November, thousands of people gather both on the interwebs and in real life, all with the same goal: to write 50, 000 words or a first draft of a novel. They gather on forums and in chat rooms. There are local Nanowrimo groups in hundreds of cities around the world…
Read More

Never Give Up

Novels, Short Fiction, Writing
As writers, we are all equals. Now, I'm not saying that one writer cannot be better than another. What I'm saying is that we all have equal opportunity to become writers. It doesn't matter if you've always wanted to be a writer or if you had a lightbulb moment in your thirties. It doesn't matter if you're a boy or a girl. It doesn't matter if you're black, white, or blue. Your height, weight, eye colour, hair colour--none of these things make you more or less likely to reach success. What does make you more likely to reach success as a writer? Hard work, determination, an ability to give and receive feedback, and more hard work. Talent's nice to have, but passion is the most important thing. You have to…
Read More

Studying History For Inspiration

Novels, Short Fiction, Writing: The Process
A few weeks ago, I wrote a short story entitled Birth of a Vampire. It takes place in Scotland, around 700 A.D., as the last of Paganism was fading from the country. It's the first of several stories meant to travel with the vampire-Thomas-around the world and through the ages. This series of short stories is going to be my most research-heavy project yet. I'm not dreading all the legwork though-I'm excited, and I'm getting new inspiration every couple of pages. I believe that everyone should study history, especially writers. History is a study of humanity, showing our patterns and our ways of thinking. More than the names and dates, the people and the places, it says a lot about humanity as a whole. And basic human nature hasn't changed…
Read More

Starting Different Projects

Editing: The Hard Part, Novels, Writing
My writing has hit a low point over the last couple of weeks. It would seem that it took a blow after I finished Moonshadow's Guardian. The story had me completely entranced, and I'm already eager to begin the first rewrite. Currently I am playing the waiting game-with plenty of school work to distract me in the meantime-because I know that you should never start editing right away. However, rewrites are going to begin sooner than I originally planned; I need to rewrite this story, to make some very specific changes to it, to get it out of my system. Some Secrets Should Never Be Known, as much as I love the story, will have to take the backburner for now. I know that I cannot currently give it the…
Read More