Samuel Fleming's Blog, page 10

What makes a Writer? Part 2

In a previous post I talked about my feelings on what it takes to be a writer:  You need to write every day.  No one writes a novel in a day or a weekend or even a week.  I have a few points to add to that.

Running a marathon is an apt analogy for writing.  Running a marathon is a grueling, arduous event that boils down to putting one foot in front of the other a few thousand times until you cross the finish line.  Writing a book is similar because it’s just writing word after word until ...

Training to Become a Better Writer, Part 2

I mentioned the Specificity Principle in an earlier post. Whatever you want to get better at, you need to do it and do it often. Want to get better at writing? Write. Want to get better at running? Run. And so on.

Another powerful principle that goes hand in hand with that is Cross-Training. In sports, this is training in a different sport other than the one the athlete competes in. Not only that, the training is complementary to the primary sport: It might train muscles that lack attenti...

My Favorite Metaphor for Writing

There are many analogies for writing. Construction is frequently used. Writing is akin to the walls and floors, structure and outline are akin to the foundation, figurative language akin to the furnishing. My favorite analogy for writing compares it to excavating a fossil, and is one that I read for the first time in Stephen King’s book “On Writing”.

In his book (pg 160 on the paperback I have), King mostly talks about the metaphor in reference to plotting out a novel and as an argument a...

What makes a Writer? Part 1

Everyone writes, but not everyone calls themselves a writer.  We all wrote papers in high school and college.  We write Emails and text messages and social media posts.  Some of us even write for a living (copywriting, technical writing, social media).  They are certainly writers, arent they?

Lets narrow down the question:  What makes someone a fiction writer?

Well, the easy answer is writing the story and the slightly longer answer is writing the story every day.  

Why do I think that?  Two...

What makes a Writer?

Everyone writes, but not everyone calls themselves a writer.  We all wrote papers in high school and college.  We write Emails and text messages and social media posts.  Some of us even write for a living (copywriting, technical writing, social media).  They are certainly writers, aren’t they?

Let’s narrow down the question:  What makes someone a fiction writer?

Well, the easy answer is writing the story and the slightly longer answer is writing the story every day.  

Why do I think...

What do I Have to Say?

It’s a simple enough question, really. It’s also the simple questions that philosophers like to muse about ’till the end of time.

“What do I have to say?”

I ask this question to the artists, the authors, the bloggers, the playwrights, poets, actors, musicians, and anyone else hoping to make a piece of art that will stand alone in the great arena of time. Because that’s what it really comes down to, that simple question: “What do I have to say?”

Will you lecture your audience on global warming? ...

Training to Become a Better Writer, Part 1

Do you want to get better at something?  Then I have a term for you.  

Do you want to get better at writing?  Awesome.  Keep Reading.    

The Specificity Principle is a term that originated in the fitness industry.  It simply states that to improve at a task, one must practice that task.  If you want to do more pull-ups, you need to make pull-ups a part of your workout routine.  If you want to get better at writing, then you need to write.  Sounds like that old saying practice makes perfect....

Training to Become a Better Writer

Do you want to get better at something?  Then I have a term for you.  

Do you want to get better at writing?  Awesome.  Keep Reading.    

The Specificity Principle is a term that originated in the fitness industry.  It simply states that to improve at a task, one must practice that task.  If you want to do more pull-ups, you need to make pull-ups a part of your workout routine.  If you want to get better at writing, then you need to write.  Sounds like that old saying “practice makes perfect.” ...

Reviving the Blog

I’ve been writing as long as I can remember.  All throughout my school years I used to daydream during swim practice, write stories in my notebooks and in my TI-83 calculator.  In middle school I had 30,000 words of a superhero novel written on our family computer–at least until it crashed and I had to rewrite it.  

Never stopped writing–couldn’t stop.  I don’t swim as much anymore, but I still daydream and write.  I did switch the TI-83 calculator out for a laptop; it’s much easier to type on ...