I admit it. I haven’t paid nearly enough attention to this site for far too long. The reasons for that are many and varied, but a concerted effort will be made to correct that. A part of that effort is the following announcement. I have written a novel. It is a Young Adult Fiction novel …
Category: Writing Diary
Writing Diary – Remembering the Importance of the Outline
I’ve had this script idea hanging around in my head for over a decade. It’s based on true events, and true events rarely fit into a nice 4-Act structure (or 3-Act structure if that’s what you believe in). I’ve tried tackling it at various timed over the past few years, but I always hit a …
Taking My Own Advice; Loving a Scene Enough to Cut It
Anyone who follows this blog with any regularity knows that I have advised in the past that you need to love your work enough to completely change it. If you have a character that is great but does nothing for the overall story, you need to cut it. If you have a scene that has …
The Seven Deadly Sins: Screenwriting Edition
I was having a hard time getting out of bed this morning to write, and I was trying to tell myself not to be lazy. Having been raised catholic, that got me thinking about sloth, which many know is one of the seven deadly sins. That got me to thinking about how sloth is not …
First Draft is Done! Now What?
I took my own advice and I got back to work. My perseverance was rewarded by the completion of the the first draft of my latest writing effort this past Friday. I’m actually very pleased with the draft, and personally feel that it’s the strongest first draft that I’ve ever written. I feel like a …
Looking For An Invite To The Best Party In Town
As aspiring screenwriters, we’d all be satisfied just to make that first sale, get that first option, obtain that illusive first steady writing job. But deep down inside, we all see ourselves on the stage of the Dolby Theater in our best tuxedo or gown accepting the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Admit it. If …
Five Things I Do To Awaken My Muse
Do you have a Muse? Does anyone have a Muse? I suppose it depends on your feelings on mythology, however as writers and creative people, we all have that creative spark that allows us to come up with the stories that we write. You can call it a Muse or whatever you like, but in …
Writing Diary: Sharpening My Machete
I started cutting last week, and it proved to be a little more difficult than I anticipated it would be. My original draft of the script came in at a whopping 150 pages, and with all of the dialogue that I had in it, I figured that cutting out 30 pages would be …
Writing Diary: Plowing Ahead
I have been totally neglecting the blog this week, but… It’s due to the fact that I’ve been focused like a laser on writing the script. I’m happy to say that the focus has paid off because I now have completed the draft. That’s the good news. The bad news is that I have a …
Writing Diary: Forward Progress
So maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing that I didn’t write for three days, because I worked on the script for two and a half hours this morning before going to my day job and I wrote 10 pages. I need to go back and read them at some point, but my initial feeling …