dawn.vogel | March 25, 2019
During ECCC, I ran into one of my friends who I don’t see all that often, and we wound up hanging out for the majority of Saturday. While we were having a late lunch, he mentioned wanting to write but never having time for it, and he asked how I got so much done with […]
dawn.vogel | January 28, 2019
In recent weeks, I’ve had a couple different stories that I’ve started writing, and then realized that I was approaching it the wrong way. Either the plot was going off the rails, or it was too close to something else, or it just wouldn’t really get to the meat of the plot in any sensible […]
dawn.vogel | December 17, 2018
If you search for writing advice on the internet, you’ll find all sorts of suggestions. But many of them aren’t applicable across the board, though they’re treated like they are. “You must write every day.” “You must not use ‘said’ too many times.” “You must only write what you know.” When writing advice is treated […]
dawn.vogel | December 10, 2018
There’s a book of writing advice currently funding on Kickstarter called The Writer’s Book of Doubt. It includes essays by a number of up-and-coming and well-known speculative fiction authors, and it looks like it’s going to be a delightful read. It won’t be out in time for holiday gift giving this year, but it might be […]
dawn.vogel | October 2, 2018
By the numbers: Stories out at the beginning of the month: 32 Acceptances received: 1 Rejections received: 18 Stories withdrawn: 0 Resubmissions: 16 New Submissions: 4 Stories out at the end of the month: 31 While it doesn’t seem like I’ve had a whole lot of submissions this month, part of that is that I’ve […]
dawn.vogel | August 2, 2018
On Sunday, I typed THE END as I finished up the first draft of Brass and Glass 3. There’s still a long way for it to go before it’s ready for the world, but I’m excited to have it drafted! For some fun statistics, the first draft wound up just shy of 50,000 words, which is […]
dawn.vogel | May 21, 2018
Last week, I talked about getting stuck in the middle of a story. A similar, and yet different problem can be when your story takes on a life of its own, and somehow falls off the edge of your map. Many folks who fall into the “pantsers” camp of writing insist that they just let […]
dawn.vogel | May 14, 2018
Last week, I talked about beginnings. Today, I’m thinking about what happens when you get stuck in the middle of the story. Sometimes, my stories grind to a halt around the middle when I’ve been writing for a while. Pinpointing the reason for this isn’t always easy, but for me, at least, I often find […]
dawn.vogel | January 30, 2018
At Rustycon, I was on a couple of panels about historical fiction or using history for writing and gaming ideas. We talked about interesting historical fiction we’d read and written, as well as ways of using history to come up with neat story or gaming ideas. If it wasn’t already apparent from the name of […]
dawn.vogel | January 8, 2018
Soon, I start working on my next novel. It’s always an adventure to start in on a new book, even though I’ve got my outline firmly in hand. But even though my rational brain tells me that whatever I put on paper first doesn’t have to be a super clever opening line, my emotional brain […]
