Kingdoms, nations, planetary empires, city-states -- they're a key part of your story's background. Learn how to create realistic ones & incorporate them into your story in compelling ways.
From alternate realities to lands beyond the veil, learn to use other planes & dimensions to enrich your story, rather than just as a source of weird monsters & villains.
Making non-humans convincingly different but easy for the reader to understand, is a difficult task. Learn how to overcome these challenges in ways that make your story even better.
The setting for a story often takes on a life of its own. Learn to create your own Arrakis or Middle Earth, where the world becomes a character in its own right.
History's the most compelling story ever, but too much fictitious history can drag a narrative down. Learn how & when to use your created history to help, rather than hurt, your story.
Intended for new writers, this panel teaches you about basic issues & skills pertaining to writing, including plotting, point of view, & character development. Audience questions encouraged!
Intended for new writers, this panel teaches you about basic issues & skills pertaining to writing, including plotting, point of view, & character development. Audience questions encouraged!
New York Times Bestselling author Michael A. Stackpole presents his three week program for preparing yourself to write a novel.
Description:
New York Times Bestselling author Michael A. Stackpole presents his three week program for preparing yourself to write a novel. This set of 21 exercises is broken down to give you everything from character creation to world building, practical plotting devices, dialogue development and character voice creation tools. This program is a practical, kick-in-the-pants place to start your career.
Writer's Craft: 25 Steps to Writing Your First Sex Scene
Summary:
Let's talk about sex, baby. In particular, how to write realistic physical encounters for various genres that add to your plot, character development, and tension while titillating the reader.
Description:
Writing your first sex scene can be a lot like losing your virginity: awkward, embarrassing, overdone, undersatisfying, and fairly messy. When I wrote my first one, I was 32 and had to drink half a bottle of wine before I could bring myself to type the word "nipple". This presentation breaks down the down and dirty into 25 humpalicious steps that went viral when premiered on Chuck Wendig's Terrible Minds blog. I'll talk about how to approach the scene, how to make it matter, thing to remember, things to avoid, how and when to edit it, and how to never use the word "moist". Ask me anything in the Q&A, and I'll do my best not to blush while answering.