Everyone loves a genius! The character that has the answers, or makes the deductions, or solves the puzzles for the team. The guy (or gal) that will have a gift for noticing what nobody else does, sees the connections that elude everyone else. Even in stories that aren't of ...

A breaking point for a character is when they hit their lowest point in the story. It’s purpose is to upset the reader, either making them angry and/or devastated the main character or they’ll be angry/devastated at the main character. Every story, in every genre has ...

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The nature of online communities and making connections with people you meet in them is quite different from what happens with “social media”. The connections are ...

In the late nineties, mTV answered the call for the need of a high school student that was not centered around the cheerleading squad or the football jocks with Daria. Luckily, I was in junior high, living in the Southern California suburbs around the debut of the series, which meant ...

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The process of adaptation is quite interesting. Stories go through all sorts of changes when they're transferred from one medium to another. A lot of the ...

Sitting back on a Friday evening, remote control in hand, I decided to watch one of the latest Pixar Animated short films. To me a short film is the perfect length of time (six to nine minutes) to tell a story with an exposition, rising action, climax, and resolution. They ...

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 ...

We begin with Trigger Warning, a story about Nathan Wood, prisoner of the mysterious Institution. This mild mannered man seems prone to horrific acts of violence… But why, and who is keeping him imprisoned?
Then we dive straight into our second tale, They were Wolves. In a small armed village ...

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What happens to characters after the big action scene or climactic moment? This could be anywhere in the story but it's usually close to the end ...

The suspension of disbelief happens automatically in readers and audiences if a story does its job.

Audiences WANT to believe in a story when they start reading or watching it.

I mean, you can' t count on everyone. I remember going to see the Benjamin Button movie and my friend ...