Write Pack Radio

In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explores the grim dark.

What is grim dark?

Are we living in the Grim Dark era?

Where is grim dark appearing? Is it only in the reboots of Batman, Superman, Battlestar Galactica, and so forth or does it appear in all genres? Is that over saturation?

Is the grim dark a child of Noir? Is it the child of the Western?

Is the grim dark a response 9/11?

What makes grim dark stand out from just dark?

Is grim dark on the way out?

How does fiction reflect the events society is going through?

Forgettable Characters

 

In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explore the forgettable character.

 

Are forgettable characters evidence of lazy writing?

Why do forgettable characters exist and are they important to the story?

What makes a character forgettable and how can you avoid that happening?

Should there be throwaway characters in a story?

What can you do with forgettable characters that you can’t do with your important characters?

How do you make forgettable characters still flushed out characters or do you need to?

 

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In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explores the 10 rules of writing according to the late great author Elmore Leonard:

Never open a book with weather.

What are some better ways to open a story?

How should weather be used?

Do stories explore and define humanity?

Avoid prologues.

Do prologues distance your readers?

 What are some other ways to get the “prologue information” into the story?

What about the exceptions like Dune and the Lord of the Rings trilogy?

Do readers skip reading the prologues? Do readers really need them?

Should you never have a prologue?

Never use a verb other than “said” to carry dialogue.

Why?

Does using other things sound like writing?

What about the ones that show action?

Never use an adverb to modify the verb “said”

Why should adverbs be left out?

Can they distract and interrupt?

Are there just words that should never be used?

Keep your exclamation points under control.

Why?

How many should you use them?

Do they lose their power when they are over used?

Never use the words “suddenly” or “all hell broke loose.”

Is it self-explanatory?

Use regional dialect, patois, sparingly.

Do they make it more confusing?

How can you use it?

Avoid detailed descriptions of characters.

How do you use details then?

Don’t go into great detail describing places and things.

What does the reader need to know?

Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip.

The most important rule

And the rule that binds them all: If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.

Story Length: Does Size Matter?

In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explores what the lengths of the different kinds of writing are and why it matters.

What are the lengths of flash fiction, short story, novels, etc?Does it change with the age of the audience?Does it change between fiction and non-fiction?Does it change with the genre of fiction?What about screenplays?Can you break the rules?Are books shrinking?

 

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In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explores the questions around points of view.

When we sit down to write a story, there is always the question of what point of view should it be told in? Are there points of view that lend themselves better to different genres? Are their unique points of view? Cab you write from a point of view from something that you are not?

What are the different points of view?

Can a point of view become boring?

Can you change points of view in the story?

Does taste for a particular point of view change?

How do you choose your point of view and narrator?

How much does video games and movies effect the point of view we pick in modern writing?

Can you break the rules of the genre and write from a different point of view?

In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explores how twists and surprises in fiction.

All twists and surprises need to be surprising, but inevitable.

What makes a good twist?

How does the twist apply to the surprise?

Can you see the twist coming when you reread or re-watch the story?

Are we trained in watching the twist? What do you remember about the twist?

What is the difference between a twist and a twest (a bad twist)?

We spend a lot of time working on our beginnings, because that is what the agents and publishers see first. How much time do we spend on the endings where the surprise is at?

What kind of endings are there?

Can the twist destroy your plot?

Are there any locations for surprises and twists than the ending?

Can surprises and twists in the middle keep the middle of the book from being boring?

What about twists in premises?

How do you show the twist and the hidden clues without making them obvious?

What are the beats in the twist?

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In this episode of Write Pack Radio, the Write Pack explores the nature of book reviews, television reviews, and movie reviews. With the push in the writing industry to join Goodreads and to get people to review books, and so forth on Amazon or Barnes and Noble, but how reliable are they and what is important to make a useful well written review.

What is at the heart of a review?

What are the kinds of different reviews out there?

How have reviews changed? (Expert vs. Joe Public)

Can you trust a review, regardless of who gives the review?

Are star ratings important?

What separates a good reviewer from a bad reviewer?

 

Find all of our episodes on iTunes and Blog Talk Radio.

The opening episode of season 2 of Write Pack Radio explores the “writing toys of tomorrow” as well as all of the other toys we have been promised by science fiction, science, or . . . the wackos who promise and never deliver.

Examples include: Google cars, better voice recognition software, flying cars, brain wave recognition software. Holographic books, interactive holo-novels, better archiving software for handwritten and drawn art, transcription software, wearable computers, thought reading software to transcribe the story, dream transcription.

Toys that have come: Internet, Laptops, current voice recognition software, spell check, grammar check, word processing software, page scanners, scanning wands, electronic drawing tablets.

What are the dangers of some of these toys? Example: The internet has made research so much easier, but it has also let the false information spread across the wealth of knowledge like the Black Death. Could some of the toys enrich or destroy the imagination. Would you want books with theme music and scents?

(Meet) The Write Pack Part 3

In this season finale of the first season of Write Pack Radio, we explore who are all these people on our weekly panels? What are their backgrounds and where are they in their writing career? What have they over come? What have they learned as a writer about themselves, the craft of writing, and the publishing industry?

This is part 3 of an in-depth look into the Write Pack.

In this episode we talk to Jennifer Stolzer, Meredith Tate, and David Alan Lucas.

 

All episodes available at:

   -  iTunes

   -  Blog Talk Radio

   -  TuneIn

   -  And other platforms

New episodes every Sunday

(Meet) The Write Pack Part 2

As Write Pack Radio brings its first season to a close, we explore who are all these people on our weekly panels? What are their backgrounds and where are they in their writing career? What have they over come? What have they learned as a writer about themselves, the craft of writing, and the publishing industry?

 

How did the Write Pack begin? What generated the idea of Write Pack Radio? This is part 2 of an in-depth look into the Write Pack.

 

In this episode we talk to Brad R. Cook, Melanie Koleini, Matt McGraw and tell about an incident at a write-in we had at a bar . . . maybe a certain patron will show up in multiple stories. 

 

All episodes available at:

   -  iTunes

   -  Blog Talk Radio

   -  TuneIn

   -  And other platforms

New episodes every Sunday