Scene & Structure

ChatGPT, Write me my Novel

Think ChatGPT can finish your creative writing exercises? Let’s find out! In this episode we’re testing the cutting-edge artificial intelligence on some old school writing prompts. We dug out...

Play Episode

Bend It Like Bickham (the scene, that is)

We’re on our penultimate episode for our reading of Jack Bickham’s Scene & Structure. So, what does the bullet point Meister have to squeeze into an end of a...

Play Episode

Dramatic Principals & Devices FTW

Every composition teacher will draw out a rising action graph on the board (yes, we’re old school). But how do you translate that diagram into the sentences and...

Play Episode

Common Scene Errors

Today we tackle Jack Bickham’s Common Scene Errors, and boy, are there a lot of them, 14 to be precise. According to Scene and Sequel, these simple problems will...

Play Episode

Dispatches from a DIY Writing Retreat

What writer hasn’t dreamed of leaving behind the stress and obligations of their day-to-day lives for a quiet, secluded space where they can just write? This past October, we...

Play Episode

The One Where We Go on a Writing Retreat

In this episode, Kim interviews award winning science fiction author, Charlie Jane Anders about her recently published craft book, Never Say You Can’t Survive! After the interview, we take...

Play Episode

Getting Wild with Scene and Sequels

After 70 pages of Jack Bickham’s Scene and Structure we feel we’ve got a pretty good handle on how to break our stories down into action-packed, disaster-ending scenes and...

Play Episode

Speeding Up and Slowing Down your Novel

Chapter 8 – Scene & Structure Subscribe to our Newsletter How do you take a ponderous story into a page turner? How do you take a Michael Bay paced...

Play Episode