Archive for July 17th, 2008

Jul 17 2008

Writing Tip of the Day: Help the Reader Suspend His Disbelief

Published by under Writing Articles

I provide advice about how to write novels, comic books and graphic novels. Most of my content applies to fiction-writing in general, but I also provide articles specifically about superhero stories.

I read a story today that started with the sentence “This story has to begin with a small lesson in geography.”  First, starting a story with a geography lesson will earn you an instant rejection (see question #8 under the fantasy subheading).  But I was almost as annoyed by the self-referential “this story.”  When you remind the reader he’s reading a book, it’s harder for him to immerse himself in the fantasy.

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Jul 17 2008

Your Title is Bad, but You Can Fix It (Part 2)

Published by under Common Mistakes of First Time Authors,Titles,Writing Articles

Cadet Davis reviews and revises the titles of 30 manuscripts submitted to a writing workshop. This will help you evaluate and improve your titles.

Above Average

  1. The Merchant of Venison. This title does a remarkably good job of identifying the story as a Shakespeare parody. Also, it was the only title this week to get me to chuckle.
  2. Dogs in Clogs. This was a real head-scratcher and failed to foreshadow the plot in any meaningful way, but was invitingly weird.
  3. Creeping Death. It foreshadows the story and tone well. If I were rewriting it, I’d make it more subtle and less cliché.

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