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One thing I’m consistently guilty of in my fiction drafts is “White Room Syndrome.” I’ll have pages and pages of dialogue with nothing to give it color or movement or sense of place. My scenes lack sensory details, leaving my characters floating in some sterile void.
If this challenge resonates with you, here are four revision strategies for eliminating white room syndrome and grounding your characters (and your readers) in space and time.
Read moreAs you build your novel’s world, do you consider what certain symbols, colors, or images might mean to or about the characters and their society?
Read moreNo matter how fantastical or how realistic, every fictional world has its own set of rules characters must follow.
Read moreBuilding a world starts with clearly identifying what the story is about.
Read moreMore than just a fantastic holiday story, A Christmas Carol actually provides great examples for authors of some of the most common advice we hear about writing.
Read moreThis is a world where nobody ever drinks anything besides wine and beer. Where the only dishes are metal and the only paper are the scrolls used to send messages via raven. There are no stores, no restaurants, no coffee meetings to discuss battle strategies. Caffeine, disposable dishware, to-go food and drink? Nonexistent.
Read moreAs a kid, I loved poring through the dictionary, revisiting worlds I’d been to and worlds I hadn’t. Today, I like to reference it when I’m helping authors develop their own magical places.
Read moreYou’ve spent hours building the perfect world for your characters to move through. It’s got every imaginative element you’ve ever wanted, and it’s got the rules and the structure it needs to remain believable in all its fantasy and magic. But now you’re up against another challenge: How do you introduce the audience to your world without overwhelming them with exposition?
Read morethe thing about magical worlds is, no matter how far removed they are from reality, they have laws, too. There’s status, governance, basic infrastructure. There are rules — both political and metaphysical — governing the use of magic.
Read more| Austin, TX | sarah@inkdroplit.com |
Member: Editorial Freelancers Association, Writers’ League of Texas