for thinking people
December 9, 2018
This article is a part of a series of blog entries, which I refer to as “Authors Talk”. You can think of it as an author interview and, indeed, that is the name of the blog category. However, I prefer to see it as a friendly chat between fellow authors. Today I’m having this virtual chat with Scott Peters, author of – among others – adventure stories set in ancient Egypt. A detailed list of useful links to Scott Peters’s work can be found at the end of this article.
December 3, 2018
As a fiction writer, you create worlds. You create a different reality, populating it with characters and meaning. In essence, the role of writing as art is to inspire affect – that is, an emotion, a thought, or a state of mind. And learning how to manipulate readers can be an integral part of this endeavor.
At first, the idea of an author manipulating readers might sound controversial. This is probably a result of the connotations the word “manipulation” contains. But, as with so many other things, the controversy stops once you realize what manipulating an audience really refers to in this context.
Manipulating your readers creatively has nothing to do with writing gimmicks. The former is a legitimate literary device; the latter has nothing to do with the art.
In today’s article I’ll show you:
October 29, 2018
Long-time readers of the blog might already know my attitude toward social media. If not, take a look at this article on Facebook, or my thoughts on Instagram. If you want the short version, here it is: I hate them. Now, the fact that I hate social media isn’t useful to anyone of you. But why I hate them might be. Today I want to tell you why writers and Twitter is a bad combination.
