In writing and podcasting about habits this month, I’ve been thinking a lot about the difference between what the world sees as success, and our internal motivation for writing.
The Dream of Being A Writer
153 – Skillz
Here at the end of January, I take a mini look back at the first month of the decade and talk about writing habits, reading habits, Alexa skills, Medium and more.
[1:20] My Short Story Reading Challenge, The Bradbury Method, my method.
[9:30] Good luck to the NYC Midnight contestants
[10:00] New ways to access StoryADay content – Medium & Alexa
[10:55] 10th Anniversary
[11:46] The StoryADay Podcast
[14:00] February’s theme at StoryADay and what’s special about Leap Day
Links:
If you want to know more about Alexa skills, contact Raphael Schaad on LinkedIn
Here’s a list of my favorite stories from January 2020
Short Stories I’ve Enjoyed in January 2020
I’m planning to read a story for every day of this year. In this new series, I share my favorite short stories from the month. I hope it’ll help you find some new inspiration, some new authors to follow, and some new places to share your work.
January 2020’s Faves
Remedies – Kali Fajardo-Anstine
Accident – Agatha Christie
Meat and Salt and Sparks – Rich Larsen – The Hugo Longlist Anthology 2019
Leak – Sam Ruddick
When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis – Annalee Newitz
More Tomorrow – Premee Mohamed
Always Let Your Dragon Fly First Class – Wendy Nikel
If you’d like more analysis of short stories, check out the Reading Room series.
What have you read this month? Why not share a story in the comments?
Write On Wednesday – Poetic Inspiration
This week is the anniversary of the birth of Scotland’s national poet, Robert Burns. While I’m cooking up some haggis and pouring a whisky in his immortal memory, I have a writing prompt for you that celebrates not just Robert Burns, but all poets.
The Prompt
Write a story inspired by a poem
Tips
Continue reading “Write On Wednesday – Poetic Inspiration”152 – Reboot Your Writing Resolutions
It’s not a character flaw. If your resolutions have slipped and you haven’t kept up all those big plans you made for this year (already!), it’s not that you’re a loser. It might just be that you haven’t built the behaviors into your day in the best way.
This week I apply the Fogg Behavioral Method to real writers’ problems and help them troubleshoot (and fix!) the most common sticking points.
Free downloads:
https://stada.me/openingsreport
https://stada.me/creativitybundle
Write on Wednesday – Divided Languages
This week on the podcast, I interviewed Seumas MacDonald about the importance of culture in the development of language, and about ConLangs (or constructed languages) in fiction.
The Prompt
Write a story where two or more characters come from different cultures and have difficulties understanding each other
Tips
Continue reading “Write on Wednesday – Divided Languages”151 – ConLangs (Constructed Languages) and Culture with Seumas MacDonald
Languages evolve from the cultures that produce them, which offers a fertile world for writers to explore, whether you are writing contemporary, realistic fiction or futuristic and fantasy worlds.
This week I talk with Seumas MacDonald a linguist and ConLang (constructed languages) expert, about language, culture and how you might think about using linguistics in your fictional worlds.
[LINKS]
Do you already think about spoken language in your writing? What was your ‘aha moment’ from this podcast? Join the discussion:
https://stada.me/151
Write On Wednesday – Conflicting Habits
The Prompt
Two characters with very different habits and routines come into contact
Tips
Continue reading “Write On Wednesday – Conflicting Habits”150 – Habits, Writing, and the Fogg Behavioral Method
Tiny Wins (a combination of Tiny Habits and Epic Wins) and how you can use them to reinforce your good habits, along with an explanation of Stanford University researcher BJ Fogg’s Behavioral Method — a framework that explains why we do what we do (and sometimes don’t!)
The Fogg Behavioral Method
SWAGr for January 2020
This is it! This is the first post of the tenth anniversary year for StoryADay! Expect big things for the anniversary this May!!
In the meantime, post your goals for this month and let us know how you got on with last month’s goals.
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.
(It doesn’t have to be fiction. Feel free to use this group to push you in whatever creative direction you need.)
Did you live up to your commitment from last month? Don’t remember what you promised to do? Check out the comments from last month.
And don’t forget to celebrate with/encourage your fellow SWAGr-ers on their progress!
Download your SWAGr Tracking Sheet now, to keep track of your commitments this month
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Examples of Goals Set By SWAGr-ers in previous months
- Write a story a day in May – everyone!
- Revise at least 10 short stories – Iraide
- Write two short stories. – Jami
- Attend one writers’ conference – Julie
- Write fable for WordFactory competition – Sonya
- Re-read the backstory pieces I wrote in May and see if I can use them within my novel – Monique
- Research the market – Jami
- Focus on my serial – Maureen
So, what will you accomplish this month? Leave your comment below (use the drop-down option to subscribe to the comments and receive lovely, encouraging notifications from fellow StADa SWAGr-ers!)
(Next check-in, 1st of the month. Tell your friends!)
149 – Looking Back & Looking Forward
In which I give you a peek into what I’m working on at StoryADay and encourage you to take a clear-eyed look at how far you’ve come, and what’s next for you.
LINKS:
Annual Review Worksheet: https://stada.me/annualreview
When To Abandon A Short Story
I gave up on a story today.
It wasn’t a horribly-written story. In fact, it had amused me and a couple of other people who’d read it. My critique group had given me stunningly insightful feedback on what I needed to do to take it from ‘promising’ to ‘good’.
But instead, I put it away and will probably never look at it again.
How Do You Know When It’s Time To Give Up On A Story?
This is a question that comes up surprisingly often among writers.
Wouldn’t you think we’d KNOW if a story was worth working on, or whether it should be consigned to the darkest recesses of our cloud drives, never to be accessed again?
Continue reading “When To Abandon A Short Story”148 – Terrific Titles or How To Hook Your Reader
A title is the sizzle that sells your story, but too many writers still struggle with this important part of the writing process.
Today’s podcast helps you level up your title game.
LINKS:
Get the free download: https://stada.me/500titles
Get Tobias S. Buckell’s It’s All Just A Draft (clicking this Amazon affiliate link helps support this podcast) https://amzn.to/2PH31Fu
[Write On Wednesday] Picture Prompt
Sometimes it takes a traditional writing prompt to get us writing…and that’s perfectly OK. When you could write about absolutely anything, that’s too much choice, and can be paralyzing.
So this month at StoryADay I’m focused on providing prompts and info to get you to your writing as quickly as possible. Today, it’s a picture prompt.
The Prompt
Write a story inspired by this picture
Tips
Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Picture Prompt”147 – Let The Yeast Do Its Work
This week’s podcast features a clip from an episode from two years ago, in which I talked about the different cycles in a writing life. And I apologize in advance for making you crave some freshly baked bread…
Try this StoryADay Annual Review Worksheet to help you review your year, assess which phase you’re in, and plan for the future.
[Write On Wednesday] The Not-Writing Prompt
Sometimes ‘writing’ doesn’t meant putting words on the page. Today’s prompt is designed to help you get comfortable with this reality of life as a writer.
(For more on this idea, read “Does Thinking Count As Writing?“)
The Prompt
Pick and implement a ‘tiny win’ for today, that doesn’t involve writing new words.
Tips
It’s very important to feel the reality that not everything in a writer’s life is about adding words.
These suggestions are designed to help you carve our time not just for writing, but for ‘writing’ (all the other stuff that goes with it).
Choose from one thing from this list (or make up something similar) and carve out 15-20 minutes to focus on it. Turn off all your notifications and just allow yourself to focus.
Then report back, to let us know what you did, and to celebrate!
- Find a tiny notebook in your stash (you know you have a notebook stash!) and commit to carrying it with you every day for a week, so you can capture ideas. Start by writing down something you can see, hear, taste, touch and smell right where you are, right now.
- Read a story by someone else and write down everything you love and hate about it.
- Go for a walk or get some other kind of exercise that gets your blood pumping. Bonus points for getting out of your usual space. (Your brain is connected to the rest of your body. Take care of them!)
- Write a review of a book you loved and always meant to get around to reviewing. Bonus points: write a letter to the author, if they’re still with us (you can send it to the publisher listed in their books). Connecting to the rest of the writing world builds your commitment to your craft, and reminds you that authors are just people. Hey, you’re a person! Maybe you DO have a right to write, too!
- Ask another writer how they’re doing. This can be someone who seems to be doing “so much better” than you. (Connect on Twitter or some other social media site.) Trust me they’ll appreciate it. And again, building your connections with the greater writing world will help you feel more committed, and stop you from slinking off and saying “I could never be a real writer so I might as well not try”. Of course you can be a writer. And having connections with people in the writing world helps remind you of that.
- Revise a short story or scene that you’ve previously written. Focus on crafting one sentence you really love, somewhere in that piece.
- Rework a story or scene to cut it down by 10% of its word count. Be ruthless (work on a copy if you have to!). What does that do for the story and your prose?
- Set a timer and spend 20 minutes (no more! It’s a rabbit hole!) researching publications you might want to send stories to.
- Doodle or illustrate a story you previously write. You might draw a portrait of a main character, sketch the house they live in, or splash colors on the page to represent their personality.
- Make a Pinterest board of interesting characters and places you can use in stories (thanks to MoniqueAC for this suggestion!). Again, set a timer, because this is meant to be a tiny win, not a new lifetime project!
- Go on–or book–what Julia Cameron calls an Artist’s Date. What inspires you? For me it’s often music. For you, it might be art. Can you book an outing now, to an art museum, a live music concert, a play? Can you put a time on your calendar to walk in your favorite park, or call your funniest friend?
What other tiny wins can you think of? What did you try and how did it go? Leave a comment and share your ideas!
SWAGr for December 2019
Post your goals for this month and let us know how you got on with last month’s goals.
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.
(It doesn’t have to be fiction. Feel free to use this group to push you in whatever creative direction you need.)
Did you live up to your commitment from last month? Don’t remember what you promised to do? Check out the comments from last month.
And don’t forget to celebrate with/encourage your fellow SWAGr-ers on their progress!
Download your SWAGr Tracking Sheet now, to keep track of your commitments this month
****
Examples of Goals Set By SWAGr-ers in previous months
- Write a story a day in May – everyone!
- Revise at least 10 short stories – Iraide
- Write two short stories. – Jami
- Attend one writers’ conference – Julie
- Write fable for WordFactory competition – Sonya
- Re-read the backstory pieces I wrote in May and see if I can use them within my novel – Monique
- Research the market – Jami
- Focus on my serial – Maureen
So, what will you accomplish this month? Leave your comment below (use the drop-down option to subscribe to the comments and receive lovely, encouraging notifications from fellow StADa SWAGr-ers!)
(Next check-in, 1st of the month. Tell your friends!)
146 – Voice Assistants with Raphael Schaad
Today I talk with Raphael Schaad about audio and voice assistants and all the opportunities (and pitfalls) for authors.
Raphael, who works with innovative entrepreneurs who are interested in tapping the power of voice-interaction, talks with me about how writers can take advantage of these powerful new technologies.
Continue reading “146 – Voice Assistants with Raphael Schaad”[Write On Wednesday] A New Angle
In this month of stealing worlds, characters and ideas (from yourself and others), this prompt encourages you to take another look, from a new angle.
The Prompt
Tell a story in someone else’s universe, from the perspective of a secondary, overlooked, or unnamed character
Tips
Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] A New Angle”Episode 145 – Ending Strong
It can be hard to write endings (So many logistics! So tired from writing the whole story!), but the ending is the thing that sends your reader off into the world feeling good about your story…or deflated because you let them down.
In this week’s episode I talk about the importance of endings, and a powerful way for you to think about them so you can delight your reader.
Also: I talk about StoryADay’s writing prompts for November and my impressions of the 2019 edition of the Best American Short Stories anthology, edited by Anthony Doerr.
LINKS:
Penny For The Guy Writing Prompt
A writing prompts about openings & endings
[Write on Wednesday] Mirror Mirror
This month’s theme for prompts at StoryADay is: playing in other people’s sandbox, or in other words: writing fiction based in somebody else’s universe.
The Prompt
Take a universe you love and write story where the values are reversed: the good guys are bad and the bad guys are evil
Tips
Continue reading “[Write on Wednesday] Mirror Mirror”144 – Mastering The Middle
Last week in the podcast, I shared five tips for a successful NaNoWriMo. Lots of people have told me it helped get them through the first week so: yay!
In this week’s episode I talk about the difficulties of reaching the middle of creativity challenge at the exact same moment you reach the midpoint of the novel.
(Short story writers, stay with me because a lot of what I’m going to talk about applies to you too!)
You are not imagining things: this is hard. The middle of a novel is the notoriously hard, and the middle of the challenge is hard for different reasons.
The Midpoint of the Challenge
The midpoint of the challenge is tough because you’re tired. The novelty has worn off. You’ve started to question why are you ever decided to put in all this work. And you may feel that your story isn’t worth the effort.
Allow me to help.
Continue reading “144 – Mastering The Middle”[Write On Wednesday] Penny for the Guy?
This month’s theme at StoryADay is the idea of alternative stories: writing new stories in other people’s universes. This can mean fan fiction or it can mean taking folk tales, history, or myth and writing in that. Perhaps you and a writing buddy swap universes for a day and you write about their characters for a change.
Stay tuned each Wednesday this month for more ways to play in other people’s sandboxes.
The Prompt
Yesterday, people in the UK celebrated Guy Fawkes’ Day, a family friendly festival celebrating the gruesome end of a would-be revolutionary. Write a story inspired by that of Guy Fawkes
Tips
Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Penny for the Guy?”[Reading Room] The Third Tower by Deborah Eisenberg
This story was featured in The Best American Short Stories 2019, edited by Anthony Doerr
The Opening
Therese
Julia found it in a pile of old stuff. She didn’t want it so she said she would give it to Therese.
I love this as an example of starting in medias res. We dont know what it is of who they are, but THEY do.
In medias res means in the middle of things but it doesn’t necessarily mean a car chase or a fight. In the middle of a conversation where the participants know their world better than we do, counts too.
Continue reading “[Reading Room] The Third Tower by Deborah Eisenberg”5 Tips for A Successful NaNoWriMo
It is November and you know what that means? The whole writing world has been taken over by NaNoWriMo.
As someone who has been participating in and leading creative challenges for over a decade, I have some tips to help you make the most of this month of extreme creativity.
Continue reading “5 Tips for A Successful NaNoWriMo”143 – NaNoWriMo Survival Tips
Whether you’re taking part in NaNoWriMo this month or simply trying to keep your rating on track, I have five tips from the trenches of the extreme creativity challenge world.
Recommended:
The Nature Fix by Florence Williams
Bright Line Eating by Susan Pierce Thompson
No Plot, Not Problem by Chris Baty
Save The Cat Writes A Novel by Jessica Brody
Power Nap by Andrew Johnson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXBG1-1zI_E
SWAGr for November 2019
Post your goals for this month and let us know how you got on with last month’s goals.
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.
(It doesn’t have to be fiction. Feel free to use this group to push you in whatever creative direction you need.)
Did you live up to your commitment from last month? Don’t remember what you promised to do? Check out the comments from last month.
And don’t forget to celebrate with/encourage your fellow SWAGr-ers on their progress!
Download your SWAGr Tracking Sheet now, to keep track of your commitments this month
****
Examples of Goals Set By SWAGr-ers in previous months
- Write a story a day in May – everyone!
- Revise at least 10 short stories – Iraide
- Write two short stories. – Jami
- Attend one writers’ conference – Julie
- Write fable for WordFactory competition – Sonya
- Re-read the backstory pieces I wrote in May and see if I can use them within my novel – Monique
- Research the market – Jami
- Focus on my serial – Maureen
So, what will you accomplish this month? Leave your comment below (use the drop-down option to subscribe to the comments and receive lovely, encouraging notifications from fellow StADa SWAGr-ers!)
(Next check-in, 1st of the month. Tell your friends!)
[WoW] Party Time
On Wednesdays, I provide a writing prompt aimed at sparking a short story, with tips and advice included. Want them in your inbox? Subscribe now!
The Prompt
Write a story in which your characters go to a party
Tips
Continue reading “[WoW] Party Time”[Reading Room] No More Than A Bubble by Jamel Brinkley
This story was featured in The Best American Short Stories 2019, edited by Anthony Doerr
The Reading Room is a series of posts where I review short stories with a writers’ eye.
The opening
“It was back in those days. Claudius Van Clyde and I stood on the edge of the dancing crowd, each of us already three bottles into one brand of magic brew, blasted by the music throbbing from the speakers. But we weren’t listening to the songs. I’d been speaking into the open shell of his ears since we’ve gotten to the party, shouting a bunch of mopey stuff about my father. Sometime around the witching hour, he stopped his perfunctory nodding and pointed towards the staircase of the house. “Check out these biddies,” he said. Past the heads of the dancers and would-be seducers I too saw the two girls he meant.”
So what do we know from these opening lines?
Continue reading “[Reading Room] No More Than A Bubble by Jamel Brinkley”On Revision by Tony Conaway
This post came as a response to a question I posed about revision: how you approach it and how you feel about it. This answer was so good, I asked Tony if I could repost it here. Thanks Tony!
I have no trouble revising my work. I usually want it to be as good as possible.
I have no problem revising my fiction. My problem is deciding when to STOP tweaking it.
I revise to catch errors, of course.
I revise to catch overused works and sentence structure. (No semi-colons allowed, and few colons.)
I revise to even out the pacing. (One scene may resolve too quickly. Another may get more space than the scene deserves.)
Continue reading “On Revision by Tony Conaway”[WoW] What We Remember, What Has Been Lost
Today’s Write On Wednesday prompt was inspired by reading Wendell Berry’s story The Great Interruption: The Story of a Famous Story of Old Port William and How It Ceased To Be Told (1935-1978) in this year’s Best American Short Stories. (Read my review here.)
The Prompt
Write a story from your childhood memories, keeping in mind your audience and what changes there have been since the time of your story
Tips
Continue reading “[WoW] What We Remember, What Has Been Lost”