What a Transition Day…
Amazing Numbers of Things Ended and Started…
First off, today was the last morning for the In-Person Romance/Spies class, and last night I put up the last videos for the Study Along part of that class.
Really a fun one in my opinion and Kris and the gang here seemed to enjoy it as well. I had a quick dinner with them last night which was fun.
And then today Kris gave me the assignment for the Add-On novella Romance/Spies Class. You had to take the In-Person or Study Along to take this one. Not a lot of videos, but Kris gave the assignment and she will read every novella that is turned in.
(I am still reading some of the short stories turned into the Study Along. Give me a few days. Having only one eye really slows me down these days.)
Also this evening the Pulphouse Fiction Magazine Subscription Drive 2022 Kickstarter ended. It did really well for the time of the year and with the Great Pandemic Exodus going on. We are all pleased. We should be getting surveys out by early next week, so watch your spam filters. And next week I will be contacting people for the workshops.
Kris and I both noticed in the reading of the stories for the Romance/Spies class is that a lot of great writers sometimes just flat got busy with the plot and forgot depth. The stories were supposed to be both romance and spy stories, so walking and chewing gum at the same time sort of got writers to forget basics like depth. So Kris and I got talking about that and came up with a brand new six-week workshop to start in September that we think might make a dent in that problem.
We are calling it Applied Depth. Techniques on how to get depth in your stories while doing something else. Historical, fantasy, mystery, and even more difficult science fiction. And more than one genre stories.
You will have had to have taken Depth to take Applied Depth class. Should be really, really fun. And great learning. Again, will start in September.
August workshops will be up tomorrow. September workshops a week or so after that.
Also the Advanced Writing into the Dark class will post in a day or so as well.
7 Comments
Aniket Gore
Hi Dean,
Applied Depth sounds great. Well, I went over the depth again after listening to your study mystery openings Pop-up(A fantastic pop-up, and goes perfect with the depth class, and it’s useful for all genres and not only for mystry.) and many new things opened up for me.
I was thinking about the different genres and not sure if this was already covered anywhere, or fits into the new class applied depth, but I would like to know how to put depth in fantasy settings where more than 60% things are made up from imagination(Even a pop-up on Studying Fantasy Openings would be great.)
Thanks
dwsmith
Yes, that will be covered in the Applied Depth class. Just like in science fiction, extremely difficult to do well, but looks so simple when done right.
Thanks!
Cheryl
You can never have too many reminders to include Depth, can you?
Brings stories alive. Like black and white vs. Technicholor.
Excited about the new class.
Keith West
So many workshop, so little time. I definitely want to take Applied Depth, but I have already signed up for collection classes starting in September. And I still need Advanced Depth, and Teams, and… 🙂
Steve Lewis
I know a while back you had mentioned doing an Extreme Depth class, would this be the same or is this something different? Just asking because I love anything to do with depth.
dwsmith
Different. This is because so many writers start into a certain setting in a certain genre and just forget depth, or use fake details and think it is enough. Each genre has tricks and techniques to help with depth and openings. That is what this is.
Extreme depth is another thing.
And you know what happens if you go too extreme and too far over the top with depth? You move your genre to literature. Literature genre is mostly depth with very little plot. Think about it.(grin)
Not going to teach that. But we will do an extreme depth at some point.
Steve Lewis
“And you know what happens if you go too extreme and too far over the top with depth? You move your genre to literature. Literature genre is mostly depth with very little plot. Think about it.(grin)”
Well, that just melted my brain, but definitely makes sense. I feel like this actually explains some things for me. I need to mull this over some more.