I would argue that a writer’s goal is not just to tell a story but to tell an impactful story. We want the reader to keep thinking about the story after they’ve finished reading. There are a lot of ways to do this but one way is with description. We want the reader to be…
Tag: Muse on Monday
Muse on Monday – April 18, 2022
People are fascinating. On one hand we are all the same: we all need the same things and follow the same patterns, but on the other hand we are each unique. Every person has their own story or collections of stories. Some we know, others we can only guess. For example, I am currently looking…
Muse on Monday – April 11, 2022
One great thing about reading is the chance to travel to different places and situations without leaving your home. Reading doesn’t open a new world, it opens up a million new worlds. Writing is the same way but we get to make the choices. If you want to go somewhere, all you need to do…
Muse on Monday – April 4, 2022
Personally, I love the idea of doors, tunnels, and portals. They lead somewhere else, either to an actual magical other world, like Narnia, or maybe just to a whole new experience. They are a great inspiration for stories since stories are all about moving from one state to another: leaving here and going there, whatever…
Muse on Monday – March 28, 2022
Stories are built on conflict and a lot of the conflict in life is built on either a lack of information or having the wrong information. Arguably, having the wrong information and thinking it is right is worse and so provides more conflict. Think about a love story where a misunderstanding drives the two love…
Muse on Monday – March 21, 2022
Don’t you just love the word “why”? It can be one of the most difficult questions to answer but the answers to it can also drive a story. Sure, we want to see who the murderer is, but also why they did it. If you see a person crying at a table in a restaurant,…
Muse on Monday – March 14, 2022
Writing fiction deals a lot with making connections: connections between the characters, connections between the characters and the setting or with themselves, not to mention connections between the writer and the reader. This is a picture I took near my house and it made me think about all the connections, often invisible, in life and…
Muse on Monday – March 7, 2022
We love stories with heroes. Heroes don’t have to be perfect but they have something in them that we want to see in ourselves, whether it is intelligence, bravery, tenacity, or so forth. That’s why we cheer for them. The best heroes are often unlikely heroes because we can relate to them. Think of Bilbo…
Muse on Monday – February 28, 2022
Happy Monday on this last day of February. I hope you had a good weekend. One fun part of writing from a prompt is thinking of how you can take it in an unexpected direction. For example, the prompt on January 10, 2022 was “The world ended on a Friday, which was a surprise.” The…
Muse on Monday – February 21, 2022
Happy Monday, everyone. I’m so glad you are here and I hope your week goes as well as you hope it might. I don’t know about you, but I listen to music whenever I write. It helps me to focus. Music can also be one of the best inspirations for writing because it has such…
The Green-Walled Treehouse 