8 Comments

It's a relief to know that we don't need to do more new thing just dig deeper into what we are doing, right? I loved your article about How the Magic Happens! Describing how we get to all the places we do is difficult in the creative process.

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This article was so interesting! As someone who DNF’d Fourth Wing because of the heavy language this was a really fascinating read for me. I read the first 3 chapters of the book and really liked it because those first 3 chapters set up the book really well and made a lot of promises to the reader that really entranced me and this article explains why: the tropes! Thank you! I really love that you’re doing guest posts now, Russell.

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It was a lot of fun to study why this book has been so popular. I think the author did a great job of the “begin as you mean to go” idea. The last pages of the book tied back around to the first pages. I like that too. Thanks for reading!

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Yay! Im glad. I feel similarly but I ducked out bc of the angsty sex and lusting stuff that took me rifht out of the book. I dont need to have somebodys rippling abs described during a fight scene. I love the fantasy. I was fine with the romance, but they just ratcheted it up to a level that took me out of the story.

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Such an interesting read! I don’t write fantasy, but there are still so many transferable expectations that readers have of contemporary fiction too. The time-measurable goal is one I always use in my books as a way to keep myself in check when it comes to pacing.

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Yes, I love time measurable goals because they work in every genre. They keep us from going too far off the rails too with creating tension. Thanks for reading!

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Good to know that I've been doing this all along—that is, including a few tropes at the start of my novels, and weaving the backstory into the fabric of the writing.

Recently I posted an article about my own writing process, offering credibility to those of us fiction writers who don't/can't work from an outline (How the Magic Happens, https://andnowthis.substack.com/p/how-the-magic-happens if you're curious).

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Cool!

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