If you are in a fairy tale and encounter an Old Woman… never take that meeting lightly. It's usually a test of character: the manner in which you respond to her will be a measure of how kind, decisive, clever, obliging, evil, rude, crass, abusive, or idiotic you are ...

There is a special world where two mysterious, round orbs fly in the sky and a waterfall that pours silver runs freely. It is on this planet where each animal has a special ability. It is another day of exam training for Spiral, a golden canine. One evening, Spiral meets ...

I couldn't have been older than 11 when I read The Flaming Heart of Danko by Maxim Gorky. And boy, did it cut me with the finest of fine glass. Even now thinking about the short story hurts somewhere deep in my soul.

And yet, I love it so ...

Now that's a little TOO scary!

Horror is perfect for metaphor and allegory. In fact, a horror story is often allegorical by default, what with its bizarre landscapes and freaky beasties.

Here are some categories of horror and some thoughts on what they symbolize:

Reality Bites


psycho killer! Qu ...

You have your story, your characters, your outline is looking schmick and you have a good buffer under your belt. Now what do you call all of it? Today I have some tips on how you can come up with the perfect name!

Know your genre
If you’re mentioning ...

In a world with creatures that resemble cute pocket monsters, there is a small, pink Mew-type animal that loves to give advice at a booth (as suggested by the title “Ask Andante”). Andante lives in a world with very similar creatures that also spend time responding and answering random questions ...

I'm not a superfan of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but I read some of them, liked them, and I found a lot of the characters wonderful, and many story elements have stayed with me for many years.

In that series, travelers through the cosmos could run into ...

Last week, I went into the basics of building your fictional worlds. We’re continuing on with our second instalment where we’ll dive a bit deeper into the nitty gritty of world building. Without further ado…

What’s your world’s system of government?
Politics plays a large role ...

A key aspect to creating a story, be it a modern day slice-of-life, an epic space opera or a high fantasy saga, is the world in which the characters inhabit. Now there are lots of aspects to consider when building your story and, this week, we’ll be going into ...

I'm not sure who the first fictional character was that I became attached to. The Cat in the Hat? Superman or Batman? Animal from the Muppets? Oscar the Grouch?

In any case, Jughead Jones was somewhere in that very early group of beloved characters. I liked Archie, and envied ...