Darius Jones's Blog: A Writer Begins, page 25

The Craft: Poe’s Unity of Effect

[This is part of a continuing series on the art of writing fiction.]

[SPOILER ALERT: This post contains plot details from Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado.”]

My commitment to shorter pieces is pulling me in new directions, whether I like it or not. You see, I love to write long. If you can say it in 1,000 words why not say it in 10,000? My short stories become novellas. My novellas tend to become novels. I love to write, to create and my first drafts tend to grow and grow and grow.

It’s something...

My Historical Novella is Free Today

My historical fiction novella, The Man Who Ran from God, is free today (Jan. 11) in the Kindle store. It’s a fictional retelling of the Jonah tale from the Bible from a non-religious perspective.

Drop by and download it for free today!

That’s all for now,

DJ

The Craft: What I Learned about Writing from TECMO Bowl

[This is part of a continuing series on the art of writing fiction.]

I’ve written before about the importance of taking lessons learned elsewhere in life and applying them to writing. Woodworking and playing video games are just two areas where I learned things that I later applied to my writing. Today, I’m adding one more video game that, retrospectively, taught me something about the craft. It’s more like an extended metaphor, but I think it’s a point worth making.

Way, way back I used to hav...

Writing Resolutions for 2014: Do Less

I didn’t want to do something totally cliché, but here I am doing it. Earlier, I thought to myself: wouldn’t it be great if I did one of those “Writing Resolutions for Next Year” posts? At first, I thought it would be lame and verge on click-baiting my loyal blog readers. But then, I started to think of all those things I DO want to do differently in my writing life next year and I thought, “Yeah! That would make an awesome post!”

So here I am.

The main theme for this post came from a (sigh) P...

A Year in Writing: A Look Back at 2013

And I’m back. Thanks for your patience. It allowed me to finish the first draft of a novella I’ve been working on.

So…it’s been a crazy year. Crazy busy and good. I’m pretty happy with the progress I’ve made in fiction writing this year. I want to share what I think were my biggest achievements this year in this post. Then, next week I want to put down my plans for 2014.

In true blog fashion, I want to do a countdown of my biggest writing achievements for this year. I’m putting just five down...

Back in a Moment

All, I’m jamming on a manuscript right now, no time to blog.

But the blog will be back next weekend with a substantial post, looking back at my year in writing for 2013. Until then…

Keep reading, keep writing,

DJ

A Giveaway and Musings on Pym

[SPOILER ALERT: This post contains spoilers and plot elements from Poe’s “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket.”]

First, my historical novella, “The Man Who Ran from God” is free today in the Kindle store. So, download it while you can. It’s a good way for you guys to check out my writing style. OK, enough self-promotion.

In other news, I finally finished reading The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. I started reading it way back in October as part of my reading list. Thr...

‘A Writer Begins’ Passes 1,000 Views

Great news. This blog just passed 1,000 views.

Thanks to everybody for viewing, reading and commenting. It’s been a great journey so far and I’ve already learned a lot just by writing a post each week. More importantly, you guys have helped motivate me and kept me focused on my dream of writing fiction.

Stay tuned, there’s lots more to come.

DJ

The Craft: It’s a Great Idea, but Does It Have a Plot?

Man, have I been busy. Life has really been creeping into my writing and blog time. Since I last posted, I’ve moved house, been best man at my brother’s wedding and now I’m prepping beets and onions for the Thanksgiving feast with some Dutch friends. So, today, I’m going to give you a small treat instead of a full meal.

Before we dive into the meat of today’s post, a quick overview of a what a plot is. You’ve probably seen this before, if you’ve ever tried to write fiction. It’s what I like t...

Grab bag: Giveaway, October Reading List Update and More

Time for another edition of Grab Bag. This is one of those posts I write when everything stacks up and I have to take on a whole bunch of things at once. So, reach on in and let’s see what we’ve got.

Giveaway

First, there is a giveaway today and tomorrow (Nov. 15 and Nov. 16) of my historical novella called “The Man Who Ran from God.” The story is set in 800 B.C. in the Assyrian empire and Judea. Stop by the Kindle store and get it for free while you can.

October Reading List Update
Damn, I’...