point of view

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Reworking/Extending an Old Story

by
go back - deposit photos

Today I’m answering a fan question from Joel Arellano… Which of your works would you extend or rewrite? I’ll start with the rewrite one. In general, I don’t like to go back and mess with my finished work too much. But I often do a light-to-heavy rewrite for most of my shorter work when it goes out of print and I re-release it. For instance, Homecoming, one of my earliest published works, got a “smoothing” rewrite, incorporating some of the things I’ve learned since, like not taging every utterance with “he said” and “she said,” and I also added a … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Shouting Into the Void

by
Shouting Into the Void - Deposit Photos

Every author reading this knows what this column will be about, just from reading the title. Well, at least every self-published author. You have done everything right. You have a website, a blog, a facebook profile (and page/group!). You’re on Twitter, the ‘gram, Slack, Zoom, Discord, and a hundred other apps you probably forgot you downloaded. You’ve writen your ass off, paid a professional editor, and have created or commissioned covers that would make the Gods weep. They ought to – they cost you enough. You have Nanowrimo’d, workshopped, critique-grouped and edited your writing to a finely honed skill, and … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Damage

by
Damage - deposit photos

“What’s your damage, Heather?” We all carry damage around with us in some way, shape or form, like an unwanted hitchhiker. Damage from things that were done to us as children. Damage from things we did to others. Damage from the world and society at large. I carry the damage of homophobia. Of being called a faggot and queer and a sissy, damage from the nasty looks straight guys sometimes gave me when I was a teenager. I carry the damage of shattered hopes, dreams, and expectations, and the damage of a few hundred writing rejections that feed my imposter … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Technobabble

by
technobabble mumbo jumbo - Yay Images

One of my friends/fans, Joel Arellano, asked me to talk a bit about technobabble in sci-fi, so here we go. Oxford defines technobablye as “incomprehensible technical jargon.” Basically, in sci-fi, it’s when a writer throws in a bunch of high-tech words to make their story sound all sciencey and shit: Jelyk pulled the thromb-whistle to spin the arkensphere up to speed. Somewhere in the guts of the Hawkthorne, the mighty raction engines powered up, ready to thrust the massive ship into hyperspace. See? I really know my technobabble. I bet you don’t even know what an arkensphere is, but now … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: I Wish I’d Known

by
Joel Arellano

Last week, I asked The Universe for ideas for my future columns, and The Universe, personified in one Joel Arellano on Facebook, replied: “A list of 10 Things you wish you had known before publishing your works.” I’ve been doing this writing thing semi professionally since 2014, so I should be able to come up with ten things to tell my newbie writing self, right? Here it goes: Rejections Happen. Don’t Let Them Stop You. If you give up being a writer because of rejections, you’ve lost the game. You may be an awful writer, or you might be the … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Help Me! I’m Falling!

by
man falling - deposit photos

Each Monday, I wake up and sit down to pen this Point of View column, and the words pour out of me, a writer in his prime, pontificating on the art of the written word, my life, and the world around me. Usually I scribble out a pithy, insightful screed that makes my readers smile and nod, or sometimes grimace and cry. Today, I got nuthin.’ On the rare occasion when such a tragedy occurs, I turn to you, dear reader, to see what you’d like me to talk about. So please tell me in the comments below what you’d … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Stanislavski-ing My Characters

by
man in mirror

Constantin Stanislavski came uo with a theory of acting that I’m loosely going to describe as “become the character” – a method of connecting with the personality of the person you’re playing, and learning how to think and feel like they did. It’s also known as Method Acting, and taken to its extreme, it can mean basically living as the person you are portraying. As folks who regularly read this column know (thanks to both of you!), I’m working on going deep with my characterization. Lately, I’ve found myself thinking about method actors and how they get into the heads … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Breaking Out of the Present

by
ipad - pixabay

Writing the future is hard. We’re embedded in the present. We have all this amazing tech now, but most of it will be gone in fifty years, evolved into something new. Who could have predicted some of these things fifty years ago? Sci-fi writers, that’s who. It’s what we do, but it’s a lot harder than it looks. Think about the world fifty years ago. There were no personal computers, no iphones, no facebook, no floppy disks, no emails, no post-it notes, no tik tok, and no space shuttles. The web wasn’t created until the 90’s, and text messaging started … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Hope

by
hope - pixabay

Covid19 is ravaging the country. Our main business is suffering, especially the travel-related part. Our country has just gone through an attempted insurrection, and more Trump pardons are on the horizon. I should be devastated. And yet… I feel a strange peace. A weird feeling that I’m not entirely comfortable with, as it goes against the rough grain of all that I have experienced these past four years. Hope. It’s been nine days since I last heard the phrase “President Trump tweeted.” I don’t think I’d realized until now what an ongoing psychic abuse I felt every time someone uttered … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Building Compelling, Complex and Charismatic Characters

by
character - deposit photos

Every writer has an achilles heel. Mine is characterization. I’m fantastic at world building – I can create compelling settings that will wrap you up and transport you away from whatever mudane place you find yourself in. I’m also great at plot. Not bragging here. It’s something that just comes naturally to me. The one thing I consistently get dinged for is my characterization, or lack thereof. I’ve worked on it for years, and I’m way better than I used to be, bit alas, there’s still room for improvement. Agents and publishers have a word for this – they call … Read more