History That Never Was

Home of Dawn Vogel: Writer, Historian, Geek

Great Writer Advice at Reach Your Apex!

| June 9, 2025

If you’re looking for a bunch of great writer advice, check out the Reach Your Apex blog! They’ve got guest posts from fantastic authors, some of which are in video format, on a variety of writerly topics! Reach Your Apex also offers workshops, and you can subscribe to their newsletter to get information about blog […]

WriteHive 2025 Online Conference Registration is Open!

| June 2, 2025

Registration has just opened for the 2025 WriteHive Online Conference, which will be held July 11-13, 2025. There are a ton of fantastic panels and other events planned for this year, no matter where you are in your writing career. Plus, it’s all online, so you can attend (for FREE) from wherever you are! I’ll […]

Flights of Foundry Panel Video Round-Up

| April 21, 2025

Recently, I’ve been helping out the fine folks at The Dream Foundry to prepare, post, and promote some of the panel videos from the 2023 Flights of Foundry online convention. New content goes up every Wednesday, and most of the videos are available for six months after they’re posted. (Some remain up for an unlimited […]

An (Un)helpful Guide to Writing a Novel Might Be Helpful?

| September 24, 2024

It’s the time of the year when authors, aspiring and otherwise, think about writing a novel. Or, at least, it has been in the past. However, the usual impetus for this, NaNoWriMo, has exploded in a most spectacular fashion (see this blog post by my friend Raven Oak for details of the FIRST part of […]

Filling in the Details

| June 10, 2024

Last week, I talked about writing concisely, which is something I’m pretty good at. This week, I’m talking about the flipside of that, which is also one of my weaknesses as a writer–filling in the details. When I sit down to write, I generally picture the scene I’m writing as I go. In addition to […]

WriteHive 2024 Online Conference Schedule!

| May 27, 2024

The schedule for this year’s WriteHive Online Conference is now available here! The event runs Friday, June 7 through Sunday, June 9. All of the times on the schedule are Eastern, so you may have to calculate your own time zone. I’ll be speaking on two panels and moderating a third panel. On Friday, June […]

Advice for Speculative Fiction Writing

| April 8, 2024

If you’re looking for some helpful advice for speculative fiction writers, check out this article with some great suggestions about how you might refresh your speculative fiction writing! I think the advice presented here is useful for all levels of speculative fiction writers, whether you’re just getting started or whether you want to try something […]

Advice on Writing Fairy Tale Retellings

| March 4, 2024

I’ve been noodling on a fairy tale retelling recently, and I came across this article that gives some good advice on writing such a thing! The one I’m working on may add some additional levels of complexity to this advice, but it’s definitely a good starting point!  

Writing What You Love

| February 12, 2024

A lot of writing advice tells authors to write what you know, but I think it’s more important to write what you love. Chuck Wendig agrees. In his blog post, he talks about writing marketable stuff when the market is fickle, and so much more. So why not just write what you love?  

Weird Writing Advice?

| January 29, 2024

If you’re looking for a source of weird writing advice, may I point you toward Kurt Pankau’s blog? His theme for 2024 is weird writing advice, which he’s calling Your Mileage May Vary. That second link will take you to all of his posts on the topic to date, which means if you’re finding this […]