The arts and academia; or, I did a thing; OR, wow brain still fuzzy ow

There's this thing people talk about after conventions: "con crud." You get home, you're exhausted, sleep-deprived, hollowed out, your skull is full of snot and regrets, there's a high-pitched eeeeee where sound should be and somehow despite every sign and portent of the vast universe conspiring to signal that you ought to crawl into a deep dark crevasse and become one with the light-shunning lichen until both God and man forget your previous life among the mortals-- *you still have to go to work.*

a long, long kiss

– a kiss of youth and love. (Oh, Byron, you are so dreamy.) (originally posted in 2010 on annakatherine.com, and reposted in 2013 on the Anna Katherine co-tumblr) I often think that the kiss, rather than the sex scene, is the primary romantic force of the romance novel. For me, a sex scene is emotional, sure, but for the most... Continue Reading →

A brief note on description

(Reposting a 2013 post from the Anna Katherine co-tumblr) Some free writing advice, for what it’s worth: Don’t worry about writing a clever description – just describe. She had fine eyes tells you a hell of a lot more than like a Gucci at a half-off sale, she was pressed for service OR WHATEVER.

Nuts and Bolts: Thoughts on Plotting

(Reposting a 2013 post from the Anna Katherine co-tumblr) Here, have some really straightforward, practical thoughts about plots and plotting. Of which I have way too many, btw. (Previous nuts and bolts caveats apply, naturally. Assume I have so many thoughts about this stuff because I’ve fucked it up pretty often.) :::: 1. A short story is... Continue Reading →

Nuts and Bolts: Jump-Starting Stories

(Reposting a 2013 post from the Anna Katherine co-tumblr) Because I just did this, here you go: Some simple ways to start a story, particularly if you don’t know what you want to write about, but you know you need to write something. (For money, for practice, for mental health, for whatever.) Standard caveats apply. 1. The... Continue Reading →

Nuts and Bolts: Some Writing Advice

(Reposting a 2013 post from the Anna Katherine co-tumblr) A friend of mine awhile back asked the aether for some practical, straightforward writing advice, which I assumed meant nuts and bolts stuff. This is what I ended up writing to her. (Caveat emptor: 1. The reason advice looks contradictory is because it literally is different for... Continue Reading →

Writing funny

It is sometimes said that you can't teach someone how to write comedy. I think that's a bit silly, though -- I think it's more accurate that you can't teach someone how to write something universally funny, because humor is tied so closely to our hindbrain animal limbic system electrical zoomies that what each of... Continue Reading →

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