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PitMad: Comment or retweet?

PitMad: Comment or retweet?

A lot of people recently have been hearing that retweets won’t make any difference for PitMad visibility, and that perhaps they should comment instead. Twitter is a very complicated platform, and how agents interact with it is somewhat unpredictable, so giving...
The unusual joy of discovery

The unusual joy of discovery

Magic. Adventure. Mayhem. Ferrets. How did the ferrets get involved? Allow me to explain the planning process—or lack thereof—that resulted in the strangeness of The Great Wish for a Good Spice Tea. The testing of the scenes Every time I write a new book, I start with...
The phenomenal thrill of speed

The phenomenal thrill of speed

In today’s fast-paced lifestyle of short attention spans and even shorter patience, readers expect instant gratification. They want fun. They want adventure. They want humor and emotion and plot twists and surprises. But most of all, they want it fast. All of my...
The incredible power of voice

The incredible power of voice

Voice is everything. As a writer, you’ve probably been told this at every turn. It’s more applicable to literary fiction, but it matters in genre fiction as well. Voice is everything, and sometimes the right choice is to not have a voice. Sometimes you...
The impossible magic system

The impossible magic system

When I set out to write The Great Wish for a Good Spice Tea, I gave myself one goal: to create a compelling story using a magic system that should not work. At all. And I may have even succeeded. The idea is simple. Take the concept of deus ex machina—gods from the...
The beauty of fractal arcs

The beauty of fractal arcs

My epic fantasy series, The Prime Saga, originally consisted of three books at about 250k words each. (That’s pretty long.) This is the story of how I split them in half (and added three more), ending up with nine 80-130k word books. I invented a term for it...
Story development

Story development

Ah, process. Some people live by it. But most writers I meet, especially amateur writers, hate process. I’m a software engineer by trade—and I approach writing very professionally—so process is a very important part of things for me. Here, we’ll explore my...
Revision! Every author’s [least] favorite thing

Revision! Every author’s [least] favorite thing

This past year I’ve done a lot of writing, but I’ve also been heavily focused on revision. I hate revision, but it’s a necessary evil in this business. So I thought it might be interesting to talk about some of the techniques I’ve developed....
In praise of thriller pacing

In praise of thriller pacing

John picked up the gun and checked the chamber—full, of course. Anna hadn’t had time to get a shot off. But what had happened? His head was whirling. He couldn’t make sense of anything. So he did the only thing he could do: he headed for the door at the...