When I was in grad school, I once participated in a group presentation on Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five. I forget what all the group as a whole wound up saying, but I remember clearly that my first instinct was to focus on that famous first chapter, where the author of the book (Vonnegut himself?) explains why and how he wentContinue reading “Crayons, conflicts, crises, and catastrophes: how I’m outlining my new novel”
Tag Archives: Writing process
How a writing retreat becomes a writing life
Writing is work. And I’ve been working damned hard for a long time to realize that. I mean that verb, realize, in the transitive sense: to bring into being, to make this my reality. So it’s always a bit artificial, really, to go on a “writing retreat,” because that makes it seem that I’m withdrawing from theContinue reading “How a writing retreat becomes a writing life”
A winter writing retreat
I’ve written before about how I don’t typically stick to a rigid daily writing routine. I generally work my writing into a crammed and constantly changing schedule of teaching, editing, committee work, housework, pet care, meditation, errands . . . . But I’ve also written before about how wonderful it is to have the time toContinue reading “A winter writing retreat”
My Writing Process
By now, you’ve probably heard about this whole #MyWritingProcessTour thing, a kind of literary chain-letter meme that’s been making the rounds among writers lately. It’s a fun project, I think, because it gives us all a bit of insight into each other’s writing lives and it helps introduce each other to other writers. In fact,Continue reading “My Writing Process”
Quantity vs. Quality: the purpose of NaNoWriMo
Recently, I got an e-mail from my dad in which he asked a question about the NaNoWriMo word counts. “Didn’t want to ‘disrespect’ your writing thing,” he wrote, “but do want to know….. what’s the point of how many words? In my way of thinking the objective is to get across the point or storyContinue reading “Quantity vs. Quality: the purpose of NaNoWriMo”
Samuel Snoek-Brown 