If in exploring the Itch you meet a link which leads to Typepad’s ‘closed’ sign, don’t despair: most posts have been migrated over here to Substack. We’re still working our way through the massive job of updating thousands of links in hundreds of posts, but meanwhile just use the ‘search’ facility to find the Substack version of the post you’re looking for - and feel free to message us if you get stuck!
PLOT vs. STORY : what's the difference and why does that mean for your writing?
THE BASIC UNIT OF STORYTELLING : making your characters act
NARRATORS: AN ITCH OF WRITING GUIDE : and why choosing your narrative setup is so much more than ‘first person or third person?’ (£)
NARRATIVE SETUP : How the big decisions about narrator, structure, point of view and psychic distance interact, with examples from my novel The Bruegel Boy.
NARRATIVE DRIVE : how to get your story moving, and your reader turning the pages
WHERE DO YOU START YOUR STORY? : thinking about the how/when/where/why of openings
THE WAKING-UP OPENING : why some editors don't like it, and what's really going on
ENDING THE NOVEL : how to make the quietest finish as big as it should be; how to end on a bang, not a whimper.
FORTUNATELY-UNFORTUNATELY : how stopping your characters from staying on the same track powers the story-engine and keeps your reader reading
THE NOVEL-PLANNING GRID: one way (my way) of planning out your novel : with a downloadable grid which you can then bend to your own purposes.
MAKING A SCENE : what is a scene, should each chapter only have one, and other questions.
WRITING A SCENE : when to Show/Evoke/Dramatise, when to Tell/Inform/Summarise, and how to work with both to control how your reader experiences the scene.
WRITING SEX: ten top tips : writing sex is notoriously difficult, but this should help.
TEN ***S ABOUT WRITING S*X : drawing everything together
GETTING FROM ONE SCENE TO THE NEXT : jump-cut or narrated slide? Doof-d00f-doof ending then crash landing, or taking the reader there in stages?
DISRUPTIONS AND DISRUPTORS: and why writers find aunts and gunpersons coming through the door so useful
THINKING AND INTROSPECTION : how to keep the reader reading when there's no physical action
WHEN ONE CHARACTER NEEDS TO TELL ANOTHER LOTS OF STUFF : how to avoid it being clunky or tedious
USING DOCUMENTS IN FICTION : Using letters, diaries, newspapers, texts, emails and other standalone texts as part of the storytelling
NON-LINEAR NARRATIVES : what they are, whether to use one, and how to make it work
TEN QUESTIONS TO ASK YOUR DUAL- OR PARALLEL NARRATIVE NOVEL : how to make sure your non-linear novel is more than worth the reader’s time and effort
FLASHBACKS AND BACKSTORY : how to handle the stuff from Before The Story Starts.
PROLOGUES : why you probably shouldn't, why occasionally you should. And if you've read this but still think you do want a prologue, read this post.
CREATE THE READER YOU NEED : you can make the novel work however you want, as long as you get the reader to read it the way you need them too
YOUR BOOK, YOUR RULES, BUT MAKE SOME : more on how to make sure your book works in a consistent way - and save yourself some effort too
MAKE ME BELIEVE: why ‘write what you know’ may be the worst possible advice.
HANDLING YOUR MATERIAL : how to work with what you know or research so it becomes true fiction. The post also known as "Yours to Remember and Mine to Forget"
WRITING ETHICALLY WITHOUT CLIPPING YOUR CREATIVE WINGS : how to build stories on other ethnicities, genders, cultures, sexualities, classes, religions, (dis)ablements, ages, histories, countries, nationalities, than your own, without censoring yourself or treading on toes
‘CAN I CHANGE ...?’ : deciding what real life facts - geography, history, dates, news, whatever - you can ignore or adapt, and what you must stick to.
STICK, TWIST, FUDGE OR CHANGE? : more thinking about this crucial question
EIGHTEEN QUESTIONS TO ASK YOUR NOVEL : before, during or after you write it.
