
Five Common Story Fragmentations and How to Consolidate Them
Space Sweepers Shows Us What Excellent Messaging Is

Space Sweepers, the new Korean blockbuster on Netflix, is not a flawless movie. Some portions are incredibly confusing, plot twists come out of nowhere, its pace becomes exhausting, and jarring tone changes make important events feel contrived. But along with a strong set of heroes … read more »
Load-Bearing Boss

Civil engineers hotly debate how many tons each boss can support. Read more »
What Exactly Is a Scene?

I guess this is a noob Q, but what IS a scene? And how do you know when it ends? – Taliah Read more »
316 – Prescriptivism

The term “prescriptivism” gets thrown around a lot, often to describe some pretty bad behavior, but what does it really mean? That’s what we’re investigating this week, because we don’t want to be prescriptivist about it. We discuss how language changes depending on context, what … read more »
Ten Justifications for Oppressed Mages and Why They Fail

The oppressed mages trope is a personal bugbear of mine, as longtime readers of this site can no doubt attest. The trope is incredibly popular, even though it makes no sense. As with most popular things that don’t make sense, people come up with all … read more »
I Tried to Praise The Eye of Argon and Ended Up With These Lousy Writing Lessons

Originally published in a 1970 fanzine, The Eye of Argon by Jim Theis is known as the worst story ever written. The Eye of Argon readings are a favorite at conventions, where readers compete to read the story without laughing. Since it’s already been torn … read more »
Personal Destiny

Got a plot hole? Destiny has you covered. Read more »
How Do I Portray Cosmic Horrors in the Open?

Hi, I’m Josem from Spain. I am and write in Spanish but found your site a trove of information for any aspiring writer in any language. That said, my apologies if my English is a little rusty. My question is about setting, or rather the … read more »
315 – Flat Characters

We’ve all called a character flat before, usually when we didn’t like them. “Ugh, this villain is only doing evil for evil’s sake, how flat!” But what is a flat character, really? Where did the term come from, and is it always bad? Today, we’re … read more »