Zeinab Alayan's Blog, page 16

Pixar’s Rules of Storytelling

The other day I came across the 22 rules of storytelling, shared by Emma Coats, a storyboard artist at Pixar Studios, on her twitter account. I found them to be truly inspirational and yet at the same time quite simple, and when you think about them and consider Pixar’s great films, you realise that these rules are all you need to create a wonderful, gripping tale. My commentary is in plain text.

1. You admire a character for trying more than for their successes. Does this remind you of Mr....

The Chopping Board

You’ve finished writing a story, you’ve let it sit aside for a day or a week or maybe even a month, ignoring the dust accumulating on it, trying to distract yourself with new ideas and reading that pile of books you’ve left sitting on your desk for the last few months. But you know you’re going to have to come back to your story eventually. You know you’re going to have to place it on the chopping board.

You need to arm yourself with a few things – a red pen or a computer, a trusty beta-reader...

Reading and Writing Positions

Picture this: you’re quite engrossed in a book you’re reading, you’re getting to an exciting part when suddenly, out of nowhere, you get a cramp or else start to feel really uncomfortable with the way you’re sitting, and you have to settle in a more comfortable position before you can continue.

I find that I have to do that often when I’m reading a book. For example, I can’t lay down on my stomach with my face propped up on my elbows because eventually my hands start to hurt. I can’t read whil...

Me? Obsessed with stats? Surely you jest!

Statistics have always been there. Whether they are honest or not is a different story, but they’ve existed and slowly fed a little something I like to call stats addiction. Whether you’re a blogger, a published writer, a business owner, a gamer … stats addiction comes with the territory. There’s something mesmerizing about watching these numbers rise and fall. When you notice an increase you feel happy, but your spirits sink when there’s a decrease.

Bloggers are always anxious about increasin...

I always knew chocolate would get me somewhere.

I was getting ready for bed last night when I get an email notification from WordPress. I click it open, thinking it must be a comment or a reply, but to my immense joy (and shock, mind you) it was an email telling me this post got Freshly Pressed! I couldn’t believe it actually, and I had to read the email twice for the message to register.

Then I squealed so loudly I nearly woke everyone up.The sleepiness was completely gone, and I admit it took me some to be able to sleep after all the exci...

The Life and Death of a Chocolate Bar

I see her prowling the aisles, trying to decide what her pick of the day. She comes in here three or four times a week for a sugar fix, usually after she returns from her job. She looks tired, but her eyes gleam as they run over the shiny wrappers. She takes her sweet time deciding what to buy. You can almost see her calculating and weighing the options in her head.

“Pick me! Look at me!”

“No, pick me! I’m nougat and caramel and peanuts!”

“Pft. Who likes peanuts? She wants walnuts and raisins!”

“...

Grow up.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard that. I’m turning 24 in less than two months, and by the standards of the place where I live (or at least the elderly people who know me), I’m supposed to have already settled down with a good husband and gave birth to a kid or two. I’m supposed to know how to cook and clean and pay the bills. I’m supposed to know how to interact properly in all situations, and woe betide me if I forget what to say at a funeral or a wedding. I’m supposed to be a gr...

So much to do, so little time.

I think this is the longest I’ve gone without updating this blog. It feels kinda weird. The truth is, work is keeping me so busy I barely have time to do anything else. I’m so tired I’ve gone delusional. This morning I was feeling incredibly dizzy so I sent a text to one of my coworkers telling her I won’t be coming in. Or I thought I did. Apparently, it was all in my head. I had imagined that I sent her the text, just as I had imagined that she had replied and told me to get better. It was a...

I’m scared to read my own book!

As writers, we like to think our books are perfect and completely error-free, but deep in our hearts and in the dark corners of our minds, there is a niggling worry that, somewhere, the typo/spelling mistake/punctuation mistake/grammar mistake of doom is lurking, waiting to annoy our unsuspecting readers.

In a recent post about pet peeves, some readers commented on how much spelling mistakes and typos bother them when reading, and I totally understand that. I too feel a bit irked when I’m read...

I’ve been getting kinda forgetful.

I noticed that I’ve been forgetting things lately. For example, two weeks ago I was making a purchase at a store and for some reason I was required to enter my card’s pin code. “Sure, no problem,” I said before blanking altogether. I had forgotten my pin code. The pin code I so confidently punch in every time I use the ATM had been completely erased from my memory and, try as I might, I could not remember it. Thankfully, the store manager was very nice and told me to just come back and pay to...