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Writing Process…
Heinlein’s Rules and Pulp Speed… Had a great (but sad) back-and-forth discussion today with a writer who read my blog last night and said Pulp Speed would never be for him. I had no problem with that. Every writer is different and that’s great. Then this writer reminded me that he wrote rough (and sloppy) first drafts and rewrote three and four times and is lucky to get 100,000 words of fiction a year out, even though he spends three to five hours a day at it. I mentioned Heinlein’s Rules and how his writing method had trapped me for six years before I found Heinlein’s Rules and Bradbury and…
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Pulp Speed Post Once Again…
Just For Fun… I wanted to bring this Pulp Speed post back again just for fun for me to read again as I work to ramp back up. I figured I could use it again as well. (grin) (I wrote this post around 2014, then brought it forward to 2016, then 2017, and just about every year or so since, skipping 2022. Last time here was April. And we do have a classic workshop on how to do it.) Not at all sure why this idea of writing at Pulp Speed sort of hits me right. I think because it flies in the face of all the myths. A writer has…
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Being a Mentor…
Sometimes I Make Writers Angry at Me… In the last three days I have had two writers I am working with as a mentor get angry at me because I was blunt. (Right now my friends who have known we for decades are saying, “No, not Dean…” and then laughing their asses off.) I have promised the writers I work with that I will always be honest with them as best I can. I try not to toss out advice they have not asked for, but if a question is asked, I am blunt and honest. Both writers and I have worked it out. Got a hunch the advice got…
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WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM CLASS STARTED…
FIRST WEEK OF 18 WEEKS NOW UP!!! Here is the first post again that I wrote about these classes back three weeks ago. Feel free to write me with questions. Big New Two-Part Class With Webinar!! We are going there. Right into the teeth of Writer’s Block. Kris and I sat down a couple days ago over lunch and started talking about, and writing down, the types of writer’s blocks we have fought through or seen others fight. We defined the term “writer’s block” as something that causes writers to not write as much fiction as they want, or at slower speeds, or without fun, or in worse cases, not…
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Mystery Novella and Writer’s Block Freedom
Both Start Tuesday (Tomorrow)… Along with the MYSTERY NOVELLA class on www.wmgwriterstore.com and the WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM class on www.wmgwriterstore.com, there is on Teachable the October Regular workshops starting up as well. Writing Into the Dark Teams in Fiction Depth in Writing Advanced Depth Killing the Critical Voice So Regular October workshops are available, but the two large workshops are starting on Tuesday at www.wmgwriterstore.com. MYSTERY NOVELLA CLASS and WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM. And yes, you can take them both at the same time. In fact, you will be writing a mystery novella when the other class is taking a month off. And remember starting the third week of the WRITER’S…
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Lots of Workshops Starting Tuesday!!
October Regular Workshops Start Tuesday… Along with the MYSTERY NOVELLA class on www.wmgwriterstore.com and the WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM class on www.wmgwriterstore.com On Teachable, here are the October Regular workshops that are starting. Writing Into the Dark Teams in Fiction Depth in Writing Advanced Depth Killing the Critical Voice Plus tomorrow I will send out letters to those who took the two Kickstarter Special Workshops in the last Fey Kickstarter. First sessions on those also start on Tuesday, but those who took those have two choices as to when to start. On other workshop news, Kris is reading the Science Fiction Novellas and then will start on the fantasy novellas. I…
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Took Friday Night Off….
Going to Be a Busy Week… So just took the night off, took a nap, watched television. Since I normally am in my office doing stuff seven nights a week, this is rare. Kind of boring, actually, which might be why it is rare. But this post is to keep the stupid daily blog streak active. Nothing more. Otherwise I would have gone straight to bed, but alas, the pressure of not missing for over eleven or twelve years is pretty intense. This is enough… Night…
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Your Writing Method Often Holds You Back…
Sometimes Writer’s Block Is Basic Like Structure… Spring of 1975. I had just sold in the fall of 1974 my first two short stories (and I had also been selling a lot of poetry.) I felt that even though I had just sold two short stories back-to-back, I felt I needed to learn how to write (a good instinct.) So I turned to writers who did not know how to write to teach me, but they seemed like they did. They talked a great game and their answers fit right into the common knowledge. Oops… (Good instinct to keep learning, wrong execution.) My method for writing the first two short…
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One Day Left On Discounts
Early Bird Discounts End Thursday Night at Midnight… Get a pretty major discount for both parts of the WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM classes. Remember, the first session starts on October 1st. That is just next week. Wow. WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM PART 1… October/November (starts October 1st) 9 weeks of classes, 8 assignments, 7 webinars. WRITER’S BLOCK FREEDOM PART 2… January/Feb (starts January 7th ) 9 weeks of classes, 8 assignments, 9 webinars. December off and you must take part one to take part two. (Webinars will be recorded and are not mandatory to attend, so no worries.) Each week will have five or six videos plus an assignment. The assignments are not…
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Oh, Yes We Did…
Kris and I Killed Many a Good Brand… I got two different emails suggesting that it was hard to believe that business-focused writers like us could kill brands. “Must have been pretty minor brands.” Well, we can and we did. And like many writers, we only saw the real value in hindsight. For example, in 1987 I was offered a small press by the name of Axolotl. It was in financial problems and had promised a book and taken money on the book from readers, so we bought the press and got out the book and then we promptly changed the focus of the press to original science fiction novellas,…