Q: Can an author make a living from royalties?
The general population is slowly getting the message that things are really hard for traditionally published authors right now, in ways it was not hard twenty or even five years…
The Creativity Fallacy
What does it mean to be a creator at a time when creativity is completely commodified? In this episode, we talk about the status of the author, and how audiences…
How To Write About Violence (with Fonda Lee and Lauren Beukes)
Battles and smackdowns are a key part of many science fiction and fantasy stories — but how do you do them right? Do you have an obligation to show the…
How to build a planet
We’re going to tackle a few very small questions in this episode, like how to build a planet from scratch – and then, how to build governments on that planet.…
What Makes a Story Feel “Fast” Or “Slow”?
People talk about “pacing” all the time when it comes to storytelling — but what does “pacing” mean? How do you make a story feel like it’s moving faster or…
Jem Calder | Notes on Craft
I hated my job, and the longer I remained at that workplace, the more I could feel my identity becoming warped by it; the edges of my personality being steadily…
I’m an Award-Winning Short Story Writer and I Don’t Know What I’m Doing Either
What I’d forgotten: the way I could hold a short story in my head for the entire composition of it, how the first mysterious intimations — a sentence, an image, an exchange…
Interview: Meg Elison on “Big Girl”
““Big Girl” came to me as a reaction to the fact that women are always the wrong size, no matter where they are in life. There is no way to…
The Dangerous Lure of Writing For White Readers in an MFA
So I will end this by asking some questions of the white, American readers toward whom, for better or worse, I have been orienting my writing for so long: What…
Ray Bradbury’s Practical and Inspiring Writing Advice
Bradbury was full of wit and wisdom when it came to dishing out practical writing advice. His 1990 book Zen in the Art of Writing: Essays on Creativity is a…