Writers in the Storm

A blog about writing

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Category: Janice Hardy

Serve Your Story and You Won’t Go Wrong

by Janice Hardy

A novel is about the story, not the technical skills you use to write it.

Fiction is an odd combination of skills. The craft of writing is technical, with rules and techniques that can achieve different results, yet the art of storytelling is visceral, relying on creativity and instinct to pluck the best pieces from our imagination.… Read the post

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Making Clichés Work for You

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Closeup image of a calendar with and fingertips holding the end of pen. One day in the center of the image is filled with cross-hatched lines in light blue and brown with the words "Clichè Day" in the center of it.

Clichés aren’t necessarily bad—they’re just not original.

One of my favorite writing T-shirts says “I avoid clichés like the plague.” But clichés are so ingrained in our day-to-day lives that it’s hard to eliminate them completely from our writing.… Read the post

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Writing from Within: Crafting Internal Narratives

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Internalization breathes life into your characters and allows readers to connect with them on a deeper level.

What sets a novel apart from a movie or play is the ability to see inside the character’s head and understand what makes them tick.… Read the post

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Mundane to Magical: Using Clichés, Metaphors, and Similes

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

magical storytelling - girl reading a book with a fish looking over her shoulder in a library

World building is one of my favorite aspects of writing science fiction and fantasy. It’s a chance to open up the creative floodgates and let the imagination run wild. But world building is more than just the physical and descriptive details of a place.… Read the post

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3 Ways "Show, Don’t Tell" Can Strengthen Your Writing

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The best stories are the ones that come alive in a reader's imagination. They pull the reader into the story world and sweep them away in the struggles and dreams of the characters. For us writers, envisioning our stories is the easy part, and the trick is getting what's in our heads onto the page.… Read the post

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