Rather than write about something I'm good at I thought I write about something I'm struggling with, and my attempts to resolve it. Writing characters with distinct voices.

Comics are usually conversations between characters. Speech bubbles are the preferred way to tell comic stories, as opposed to large ...

Have you ever taken a walk with a young person?

Each morning when I get to work early, I walk down to the bus circle and wait for one little boy's bus to arrive at school. On the good mornings, he walks off the bus grinning from ear-to-ear with ...

I have been feeling inspired lately. It is not to be confused with the same wave of inspiration that usually happens when I listen to Bon Iver while driving down a highway at night (even though that also works). It is the type of inspiration where a story begins to ...

LISTEN!

Tantz Aerine, Banes and Ozoneocean discuss the topic of using and creating weapons in fiction and some of the pitfalls involved- all the things you can easily do wrong and do better! Stuff like using overly specialised weapons in too general a role, like giant swords where they'd ...

Accents, patterns of speech and the like can be a useful tool in introducing characters. In a film or tv show, a character's accent can immediately reveal the character's nationality or social background. And of course, we've all been conditioned by Hollywood movies to identify the bad ...

If you want to decent job of it, creating and using weapons in fiction can be quite tricky. There are a lot of pitfalls that newbies and even long time veterans of creating fiction fall into.

1. Number one is simply copying what others have done without understanding it yourself ...

"May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you're wonderful, and don't forget to make some art – write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And ...

-art by Gunwallace

Take a deep breath. Count to ten. Exhale.

This time of the year can be the most joyous while being the most stressful. There are less hours of work and more places to spend money. It is a time for reuniting with old relatives, eating great food ...

Say My Name

There are titles that fit perfectly with their subject, titles that could fit multiple subjects/contexts, and titles that don't work at all.
Recently I've seen several titles referenced that made me say “I HAVE to see that/read that!”. I'll share those at ...

It had been years since I donned my black cocktail dress to spend an evening listening to one of my favorite writers, and that is exactly what I did on Saturday night. The scene was set in Long Beach at the Carpenter Performing Arts Center and I was excitedly waiting ...