Fifteen minutes long, because you're in a hurry, and we're not that smart.
Your Hosts: Dan, Howard, Mahtab, and Brandon We’re often taught that the best critique group feedback is reactions to the writing, rather than advice for fixing it. But prescriptive feedback—critiques that include suggestions for you how to might rewrite something—is an important part of the process. In this episode we…
Your Hosts: Brandon, Victoria, Dan, and Howard Our listeners have asked about how we handle managing a large cast of characters. This is something we’ve all struggled with, and sometimes we’ve failed at it pretty spectacularly. In this episode we talk about how we turned our failures into learning, and…
Your Hosts: Dan, Howard, Mahtab, and Brandon This episode comes from a question we’re often asked: “how do you stay excited about a story you’re working on?” We talk about how we maintain our passion for the stories we’re working on, and how that’s not the same as being super…
Your Hosts: Dan, Mahtab, Howard, and Brandon We’ve talked about deliberately making our readers uncomfortable. In this episode we discuss writing things that make us uncomfortable. Maybe it’s writing strong language, or sex scenes. Perhaps it’s a personal narrative that is painful to relive. Whatever it might be, as writers…
Your Hosts: Mary Robinette, Piper, and Howard, with Cory Doctorow Worldbuilding is something you do to some degree in everything you write. Cory Doctorow writes (among many other things) near-future SF, and he joins us for a discussion of extrapolative worldbuilding. Credits: This episode was recorded by Bert Grimm, and mastered…
Your Hosts: Dan, Mary Robinette, and Howard, with Patrick Rothfuss Pat joins us for a discussion of worldbuilding, in which we field a couple of challenging questions from readers. Here are the questions! How do you create timeless urban fantasy? How do you create a compelling secondary world fantasy without…
Your Hosts: Dan, DongWon, Mary Robinette, and Howard What do you do when some of the key foundations of your authorial (or otherwise creative) livelihood are kicked away? How do you go about repairing, rebuilding, or rebooting your career? Credits: This episode was recorded by Bert Grimm, and mastered by…
Your Hosts: Brandon, Dan, Mary Robinette, and Howard, with special guest Bruce D Richardson Bruce D Richardson, who is often credited as BDR, or BD Richardson, is a voice-over actor and audiobook narrator. He joins us for a discussion of reading out loud for an audience, including some mic techniques…
Your Hosts: Brandon, Victoria, Dan, and Howard What’s it like to write under a deadline which has been set for your project by someone else? What strategies might help you bring the writing in under the deadline? Can you train yourself to be ready for this? Those are all good…
Your Hosts: Brandon, Victoria, Dan, and Howard Many Writing Excuses listeners have asked us how we muscle through writing second acts, those big, chonky “middles” of our stories. In this episode we attempt to provide answers. Credits: This episode was recorded by Dan Thompson, and mastered by Alex Jackson. The…
