Craft and Creativity
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How to Use Tropes in Fiction
Tropes are the storytelling patterns writers return to again and again—the reluctant hero, the love triangle, the mentor who imparts just enough wisdom before disappearing. They’re not plotlines, exactly, but the recognizable shapes a story can take. Tropes are like signposts, guiding readers through familiar terrain. Encountering one can feel like running into an old…
Writing and the Search for Truth
The Truth About Truth To begin with, I encourage you to read “Why Absolute Truth is Still Worth Pursuing In a Narrative-Driven World” by Jay Nicorvo. You can find it here, in LitHub. What Nicorvo writes should be essential reading for everyone, but certainly for nonfiction writers, whose goal is, above all, the pursuit of…
Let Your Poems Be Weird
Poetry Recommendation: “Tomorrow, No, Tomorrower” by Bradley Trumpfheller Screenshotted from Poetry Foundation to preserve formatting. To read the poem’s text, find it here. I adore this poem. It gives me permission to be weird. It is kaleidoscopically uncategorizable, simultaneously provoking and resisting interpretation, finding joy and pleasure and play in…