Living a Creative Life with Hannah Deurloo, Author
I've been wrestling with a new picture book story that I want to write. I've got nothing on paper, yet. It's just bubbling in the back of my mind. The story elements are all there, plot, structure, information, character options. What I can't wrap my mind around is the point of view. WHO is going… Continue reading How to Pick A Point of View
My grocery list is typically all groceries with a few extra items here and there. But those extra items and the groceries themselves tell a story. The whole list tells about my life. It tells my tastes, my eating habits, my faults, my milestones and my successes. I tend to write characters that don't feel… Continue reading Groceries & Characters
We've all heard about plotting vs pantsing but what gets overlooked is those of us who either start with a plot/world and those of us who start with character. Several of my writing friends always starts with character. I always start with a question that unravels into a plot and world. There are pros and… Continue reading Troubleshooting Stories
I've talked about character before but I'm going deeper this time. Have you ever thought about giving a character like arc to things that technically are not characters? Did I just lose you? What I'm getting at is that characters are not the only ones that change within a story. At least they shouldn't be… Continue reading Using Arc Beyond Characters
Characters are one of the hardest parts of a story to put together, for me at least. I tend to make them all the same base and just sprinkle them with different emotional toppings. But like ice cream there are so many versions of people it's endless. So let's dig into building character a bit.… Continue reading Ice Cream Characters
My toddler has her favorite parts of movies (cue Let It Go) and I find it fascinating how movies effortlessly transition- just like a story scene should. I study these transitions to improve my writing. Next time you're staring down the barrel of another Disney movie try this! Go to the scene selection menu on… Continue reading Disney’s Frozen as a Case Study in Scene
I recently read a Twitter post stating they were changing there main character's appearance to "average" to make her more "relatable" for female readers. This is the moment I wish for an unlike button. It's not that book characters shouldn't be average looking, by all means I'd appreciate it if more books were realistic. However,… Continue reading Book Looks: Why Character Looks Matter
After getting my first fully edited book done and out there I've started working on something new. I will not be writing the same way this time. This time I will be intentional about all of it. This time I started with a question, something I needed to create an answer to in the form… Continue reading Starting Fresh- A new book journey
Somehow ancient sculptors are able to translate a person's face, expression, life, into each piece of marble. Yet, somehow, when we write we limit ourselves to eyes, hair and height. A person is so much more. Real people have a soul and getting that onto your pages and into your characters is one of the… Continue reading Capturing Ancient Faces: Character Desctiptions for Writers
Description should be like tasty nuggets of information readers cherry pick out of the pages before them. Not a nutritional paragraph of data they must swallow. This post is all about revising your words to get the more ‘show’ and less ‘tell’ in your character descriptions. For Secondary Characters: Too much description gets boring. The classic… Continue reading ‘Showing’ Character Description
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