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The Sense of an Ending
House of Cards, for example—the title says it all. The collapse of the protagonist’s empire is not a matter of if but when. Ambition is tragedy’s ally. Desire is a set-up. The world is a trap laid...
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My Fantastic Story of Freedom
I’m going to tell you a story about a piano player. I told it recently on The Artist’s Road in support of a discussion about “perseverance.” The blog’s author, Patrick Ross, replied to my comment:...
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My Mother’s Secret Life
My mother is turning 100. We’ll have a big party, of course, although not as big as she might think, since all her friends are dead. Doesn’t she know that? In any event, she wants me to make a speech....
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My Writing Process Blog Tour
“How fiction really works”—that’s pretty much the focus of my blog. Last week I risked wandering off topic with a post about my mother’s 100th birthday. And this week I’m buying into a game of “blog...
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I’ll Go Anywhere as Long as It Is Forward
I’m mucking around south-central Africa in the year 1873. I’m navigating my way through the heart of a story that started out as a faux-memoir about a journey into the “heart of darkness.” Just when I...
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Email from the Black Hole
While mucking around Africa in my last post, I ran into Dr. David Livingstone. He was dying as he lived, by the motto: “I’ll go anywhere as long as it is forward.” The mail poured in. Readers often...
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Who in their Right Mind Would Be a Writer?
A writer buddy of mine phones up and tells me to meet him on the first tee in 45 minutes. Say no more. I love hanging out with writers. I love their lack of common sense, their desperation, their...
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The Case of the Missing Website
Beloved Subscribers… You probably haven’t noticed but my website vanished into the e-ether for ten days. On the fifth anniversary of my blog! My brother has been working hard to track it down, talk it...
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I Didn’t See it Coming
I didn’t hear it coming. For an opening line I think it works. What do you think? See what coming? Exactly! The reader is going keep reading to find out, and isn’t that the overarching purpose of the...
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Every Story Is an Escape Story
Here’s a story theory of mine worth checking out: http://writetodone.com/facts-of-fiction/ …published today on the Write to Done website. I mean it when I say, “Check it out.” The next film you see or...
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The Best Way to Meet Angels
It’s a mega-watt moon shining down on western Tanzania. That ragged ribbon of moonlight you see is a rough-and-tumble highway known in south-central Africa as the Hell Run. From Dar es Salaam on the...
View Article“The HEART doesn’t show up as a structural element in most fiction formulas”...
The fact that the Heart doesn’t show up in most fiction formulas is meant to alarm writers. One reader must have become alarmed after reading it in my new article: THE HEART OF THE STORY: What Is it,...
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Deep Travel: Have you ever gone too far?
From Africa I flew to India. I would return home through Asia, circumnavigate the globe, prove the world was round, see it with my own two eyes. Bombay. Wow! The smells. The crush of humanity! A beggar...
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Deep Travel: How Far Can You Run on Empty?
People do die. We die of heat exhaustion on the train from Bombay to Delhi. We die in a taxi cab short of making it to a hotel where we die of despair. We die of a broken heart. Betrayed. By ourselves....
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The Joy of Sadness
A friend just died and so of course I’m very sad. A little girl cries over her scoop of pistachio ice cream melting on the sidewalk. How sad is that empty cone? And look at those tears. She hasn’t...
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How to Write from the Heart and Win Readers
A good story is often inspired by a powerful experience. One that changed the author’s mind, their very way of looking at the world. A great story may change the reader’s life as well. I’m stealing...
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The Virus that Ate my Brain
Every writer should be so lucky as to have an idea virus eat their brain. Here’s how it happens: First you catch it. Then you get it. Once you’ve got it, you can kiss your old self goodbye. This is the...
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How (un)Smart Should a Writer Be?
If you’ve been reading my deep travel tales, you’ll know how un-smart I am. Count the times I’ve been run down on the road less traveled! I was barely home from my travels in Africa and Asia when the...
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Mother Love & Laughter
When is it not okay to laugh at old people? My 101-year-old mother, for instance. Should I get serious and tell her she’s slipping away? That she only weighs about 80 lbs. And when would I tell her? On...
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What Makes a Book Worth Reading
What makes a book worth reading? A Theory of Expanded Love, for instance. This coming-of-age novel by Caitlin Hicks plays out in the months between two famous deaths—Pope John XXIII and President...
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