Writers Helping Writers^®

Characters

Complex Characters and the Power of Contradiction

May 9, 2017

Complex Characters and the Power of Contradiction

May 9, 2017

You’ve likely seen countless posts and resources related to creating great characters, but almost all of them seem to be lacking in one aspect I’ve found to be perhaps the…

Angela’s Fantastic Finds for Writers

April 27, 2017

Angela’s Fantastic Finds for Writers

April 27, 2017

People who follow me in social spaces know I curate A LOT of content–enough to supply 3 twitter accounts, 3 facebook pages, one personal FB profile and then of course,…

Planning the Perfect Love Triangle

April 11, 2017

Planning the Perfect Love Triangle

April 11, 2017

Love triangles are potent story devices, even if the triangle isn’t the story’s main concern. When I work with authors, one of the most common issues is underdeveloped plot situations,…

Want to Write Romance? Layer Your Scenes for Success

April 4, 2017

Want to Write Romance? Layer Your Scenes for Success

April 4, 2017

When I began considering writing a romance novel, I asked some of my romance author friends about the layer of structure. I had no idea that romance novels, across the…

What Does It Mean To “Raise the Stakes”?

March 14, 2017

What Does It Mean To “Raise the Stakes”?

March 14, 2017

Last time I visited, we discussed how understanding the interconnectedness of our story elements can help us with revisions, and today we’re going to dig deeper into one of those…

Mystery Writing: Making the Reader a Participator

February 14, 2017

Mystery Writing: Making the Reader a Participator

February 14, 2017

A lot of great stories have a mystery in them. The mystery may not be the primary focus; it might be the secondary, or the mystery might be so minor…

How To Accurately Write About a Character’s Pain

February 9, 2017

How To Accurately Write About a Character’s Pain

February 9, 2017

The best thing about this online world of ours is you never know who you are going to meet. I don’t know about you, but one of the areas I…

Does Your Character Description Create A Powerful Image?

February 7, 2017

Does Your Character Description Create A Powerful Image?

February 7, 2017

Your job as a storyteller is to create IMAGES. This is true not just for screenwriters, but for anyone presenting a story to a reader or an audience. Whenever we…

Your Character’s Appearance: Make Each Detail Count

February 2, 2017

Your Character’s Appearance: Make Each Detail Count

February 2, 2017

Describing a character’s physical appearance is a tough job. Most writers either get into it and share every dimple, curl, and laugh line, or they sprinkle in just a few…

Lesser-Known Story Character Archetypes

January 24, 2017

Lesser-Known Story Character Archetypes

January 24, 2017

Jonathan Vars is sharing some of the lesser-known character archetypes or tropes you could use to set it apart from other works. Read on! Every story contains certain character archetypes—custom molds,…