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CRIME WRITER SG WONG ON HELPING YOUR CHARACTERS MAKE BAD CHOICES (MF GALAXY 181)
So you want to write mystery fiction, crime fiction, or detective fiction, but your characters don’t crackle, your plots don’t pop, and your mysteries don’t sizzle. What should you do? How’re you going make readers keep turning those pages?
You need to listen to mystery writer S.G. Wong.
Oh, there are other writers, right here in E-Town, who are admirable. We’ve got them in every form and genre, and they do amazing work. But there’s only a handful of people I know who are a combo of outstanding craft, outstanding teaching, and outstanding organising for the writing community. And standing tall inside that select group is S.G. Wong, the creator of the Lola Starke mystery novels featuring a hard-boiled but beautiful detective, a carefully-constructed alternate Earth in which the Chinese colonised what we know as Los Angeles to build Crescent City, and a crackling mixture of magic and ghosts.
Such imagination has gotten SG Wong shortlisted for the Arthur Ellis Awards in the Best First Novel and Best Short Story categories. Maybe speaking four languages is an asset to thinking widely and wildly. Wong is a member of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta and Sisters in Crime (National), and Past President of the Sisters in Crime—Canada West chapter. She’s organised numerous writer events, and taught and spoken more places than I can mention.
Recently SG Wong taught a Canadian Authors Association (Alberta Branch) workshop on crime fiction; she taught plotting, while EC Bell taught researching, and Jane Bernard taught creating voice. Wong and I spoke by web video on October 22, 2018, and we discussed:
- How to make better plots by building better characters
- Why your characters must make choices that you as the writer totally disagree with
- The one question that can totally fix contrived characterisation
- How to make your story-world a place where readers want to visit and stay, and
- Why she loathes the phrase “strong female protagonist”
SG Wong.com
Lola Starke series of novels and of the Crescent City short stories
SUPPORT MF GALAXY ON PATREON
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON iTUNES
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON iHEARTRADIO
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON PLAYER FM
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON STITCHER
FOR MORE INFORMATION + LINKS
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By Minister FaustSo you want to write mystery fiction, crime fiction, or detective fiction, but your characters don’t crackle, your plots don’t pop, and your mysteries don’t sizzle. What should you do? How’re you going make readers keep turning those pages?
You need to listen to mystery writer S.G. Wong.
Oh, there are other writers, right here in E-Town, who are admirable. We’ve got them in every form and genre, and they do amazing work. But there’s only a handful of people I know who are a combo of outstanding craft, outstanding teaching, and outstanding organising for the writing community. And standing tall inside that select group is S.G. Wong, the creator of the Lola Starke mystery novels featuring a hard-boiled but beautiful detective, a carefully-constructed alternate Earth in which the Chinese colonised what we know as Los Angeles to build Crescent City, and a crackling mixture of magic and ghosts.
Such imagination has gotten SG Wong shortlisted for the Arthur Ellis Awards in the Best First Novel and Best Short Story categories. Maybe speaking four languages is an asset to thinking widely and wildly. Wong is a member of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta and Sisters in Crime (National), and Past President of the Sisters in Crime—Canada West chapter. She’s organised numerous writer events, and taught and spoken more places than I can mention.
Recently SG Wong taught a Canadian Authors Association (Alberta Branch) workshop on crime fiction; she taught plotting, while EC Bell taught researching, and Jane Bernard taught creating voice. Wong and I spoke by web video on October 22, 2018, and we discussed:
- How to make better plots by building better characters
- Why your characters must make choices that you as the writer totally disagree with
- The one question that can totally fix contrived characterisation
- How to make your story-world a place where readers want to visit and stay, and
- Why she loathes the phrase “strong female protagonist”
SG Wong.com
Lola Starke series of novels and of the Crescent City short stories
SUPPORT MF GALAXY ON PATREON
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON iTUNES
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON iHEARTRADIO
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON PLAYER FM
SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON STITCHER
FOR MORE INFORMATION + LINKS