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Book Title Generator: A JavaScript Program with a Creative Lesson

August 15, 2022

book title, creativity, fiction, literature, programming, writing

One morning, I was staring at the screen a bit bored, trying to find something productive to do. Browsing through the blog, I saw an old post on how to select a title for your novel. I immediately had a flash of inspiration: What I should make is a book title generator!

The truth is, I wasn’t super serious about it, it was mostly meant as something productive to pass the time with. I mean, as I explain in the post linked above, picking a title for your novel cannot be a random process. More still, it cannot be a spur-of-the-moment thing, either. Conversely, it has to be a result of deliberation. It involves patience.

So, how does a book title generator fit in all that?

Honestly, I didn’t trouble myself with it. I just began coding – as I said, for the fun of it. But I was thoroughly surprised with the result, as it revealed to me several important things about creativity, including in terms of coming up with book titles. The book title generator… generated ideas.

In this post I’ll offer you all the details of my thought process behind making this JavaScript book title generator. I’ll also offer you the code and the program to try for free. However, above all, I’ll talk about the important lessons on creativity this silly little program had to offer.

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Put Some Heart in your Writing

August 8, 2022

Writing

guest post, Igor Livramento, literature, writing

Today’s post – “Put Some Heart in Your Writing” – is authored by Igor da Silva Livramento. He’s a fellow academic from UFSC, fellow author, fellow creative-writing advisor, and overall a great fellow. He’s also a composer, music theorist, and producer. Check out his papers on Academia.edu, his music on Bandcamp, and his personal musings on his blog – in Portuguese, Spanish/Castilian, and English. You can also find him on LinkedIn.

Despite the title, I am not talking about the organ that pumps blood through the body. It is a metaphor. I am talking about injecting blood in your text – again I commit a metaphor. It is about writing something captivating, moving, instigating. “Captivating” is another metaphor – a literary text is not a kidnapper to hold someone captive.

Although language brings these metaphors to which the metaphorical status we remain deaf (call this forgetting catachresis), do not think that writing literature is all about making clever metaphors.

heart writing — Putting some heart in your writing isn’t as simple as it might initially appear. It involves paradoxes and conflicts with much of what people (naively) call “writing”

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Behind the Scenes of Writing a Short Story

July 25, 2022

Criticism, Writing

creativity, criticism, fiction, literature, writing

With this post, I’ll do something pretty different. I’ll offer you a “behind the scenes” look, focusing on the intricacies behind writing a short story. But there’s more: In order to do that, I will use one of my short stories – indeed, one that I’ve posted on the blog before.

I’m of course referring to “1992”, which I shared with you some time ago – here are part I and part II. I’m offering this look into “what goes on in an author’s mind” from the unique perspective of being the author as well as someone with the academic expertise to use it as teaching material.

How did I come up with the idea? What does it mean on a personal level? Who is the protagonist? Why? What? How? Plenty of literary lessons awaiting!

Short stories are often minimalist. The behind the scenes, then, of writing a short story is about revealing some details that are **inherently** not to be disclosed – I’m doing it for teaching purposes, obviously

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