Writing Excuses
Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler
300 episodes
Fifteen minutes long, because you're in a hurry, and we're not that smart.
Episodes page 3 of 6
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19.49: Getting to Know You
As we wrap up our Close Reading Series, we’re shifting our focus towards helping you integrate what you’ve learned. For December, we’ll be releasing episodes designed to help you make measurable progress on a writing…
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19.48: Beginning With A Thrill
As we wrap up our Close Reading Series, we’re shifting our focus towards helping you integrate what you’ve learned. For December, we’ll be releasing episodes designed to help you make measurable progress on a writing…
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19.47.5: Interview with Andrew Buckley of the StoryCentric podcast (BONUS EPISODE)
What does it mean to be building a career as an author in this day and age? We talk with author and speaker Andrew Buckley about everything from author brands to conferences while we ask Andrew to give us advice on how…
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19.47: Final Thoughts on Our Close Reading Series
We reminisce on when we were on a writing retreat on a cruise in 2023, planning this close reading series. We have loved how this series grounded our conversations, allowing us to dive into works that were complex in…
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19.46: An Interview on Structure with N.K. Jemisin
We had the pleasure of sitting down with N.K. Jemisin to talk about the structures and processes that helped create The Fifth Season. We talk about outlines, multiple plotlines, and planets as characters. Jemisin lets…
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19.45: A Close Reading on Structure: Tying It All Together
We’ve loved doing our close reading series throughout 2024, and The Fifth Season has been no different. Today, we’re reflecting on what we learned in our episodes focusing on N.K. Jemisin’s incredible work. We reflect…
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19.44: A Close Reading on Structure: Tradition and Innovation
Today we’re zooming out to see where N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season fits into the canon of fantasy literature. How does Jemisin interact with magic, words, and the expectations of the genre? And what expectations do…
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19.43: A Close Reading on Structure: Parallelism and Inversion
The structure of The Fifth Season features both mirroring and inversion. How do these structural shifts interact with the three POVs? On today’s episode, we talk about the parallelism of the perspectives and the…
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19.42: A Close Reading on Structure: Whose Perspective is it Anyways?
Structure and POV (point of view) are often intertwined. In N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season, we see this in the myriad perspective shifts. In this episode, we talk about the importance of these shifts on the structure…
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19.41: A Close Reading on Structure: An Overview and Why Fifth Season
Just a reminder that we will be talking about a lot of spoilers, so if you haven’t read The Fifth Season, go and do so now! As we dive into N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season, we wanted to tell you why we chose this work…
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19.40: An Interview on Tension with P. Djèlí Clark
We sat down with the author of Ring Shout, P. Djèlí Clark, in order to wrap up our close reading of tension. We talked with Clark about his influences, which ranged from Birth of a Nation to Beyonce’s “Formation.” We…
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19.39: A Close Reading on Tension: Tying It All Together
This episode, we’re talking about how important tension is in creating a world where your readers feel fully immersed. We talk about the importance of using tropes and techniques while also using variation in order to…
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19.38: A Close Reading on Tension: Anticipation and Subversion
When you’re subverting your readers’ expectations, do you need to do the exact opposite of what they’re anticipating? Today, we dive into this question, using various examples of books and movies. We then examine how…
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19.37: A Close Reading on Tension: Movement and Resolution
Today, we’re using music as an entry-point for tension. Howard introduces us to the power of the half-step, and other musical metaphors that can help you to incorporate tension in a new way to your writing. And then…
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19.36: A Close Reading on Tension: Narrative vs. Contextual
Today, we’re talking about the tension that is actually happening on the page, and the contextual tension is what the reader is bringing to the table. Ring Shout lives in a place of contextual tension and we are…
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19.35: A Close Reading on Tension: An Overview and Why Ring Shout
Compared to This is How You Lose The Time War, which we read earlier this year, Ring Shout deals with a very real world. This discordance, where authors make their audience uncomfortable by creating things that…
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19.34: Grants and Fellowships
Today we have a wildcard episode for you! We are talking about all the different ways you can sustain your writing career. Our host, Erin Roberts, has done an incredible job of applying for grants, fellowships, and…
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19.33: Workshops and Retreats
Today we’re taking a break from our Close Reading Series to discuss writing workshops and retreats! We dive into how to find and prepare to attend a workshop or a retreat and what to think about for organizing your…
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19.32: An Interview on Character with CL Clark
We sat down with CL Clark to talk about character—specifically, how they build different POV characters in the compressed space of a short story. We dive into plot processing (a tool CL Clark has learned from Mary…
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19.31: A Close Reading on Character: Tying it All Together
Today, we’re taking a higher view on the techniques we’ve been talking about over the last four episodes and focusing on how you can use our takeaways in your own writing. We’ll go over our final thoughts on C.L.…
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19.30: A Close Reading on Character: Agency vs. Choices
We have a theory that we want to work through on today’s episode: agency is the ability to take action, whereas choices are more about the interior life of the character. We use Mary Robinette’s talking cat, try-fail…
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19.29: A Close Reading on Character: Barriers vs. Stakes
Our episode today focuses on C.L. Clark’s short story “You Perfect Broken Thing” for how the character's stakes shape the barriers facing her. We use this story to examine how to tell the difference between barriers…
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19.28: A Close Reading on Character: Internal vs External Identity
Today, we’re focusing on C.L. Clark’s “The Cook,” as we explore external and internal expression. We chose this story because it's a remarkably physical and touchable story with myriad sensory details. While the…
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19.27: A Close Reading on Character: An Overview and Why We Chose C.L. Clark's Stories
Today we introduce our next close reading series—we’re focusing on character through the lens of three of C.L. Clark’s short stories: “You Perfect, Broken Thing,” “The Cook,” and “Your Eyes, My Beacon: Being an Account…
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19.26: Bringing Falconry into Writing
Today we are joined by the incredible falconer Krista Hong Edwards. Krista was kind enough to take our hosts out with her falcons, and we had the most amazing time! Krista sat down with us to talk about falcons,…
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19.25: From the Classroom to the Page
Learning is great, but how do you translate it into doing without getting overwhelmed? What is the difference between learning in the classroom and executing when you're on your own? Marshall, our incredible recording…
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19.24: An Interview on Worldbuilding with Arkady Martine
We've spent the last month talking about "A Memory Called Empire, and now, we are so excited to welcome the author, Arkady Martine, to the show! On today's episode, we talk with Arkady about the origins of her novel,…
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19.23: Tying It All Together (A Close Reading on Worldbuilding)
Today, the gang talks about their final thoughts on Martine’s “A Memory Called Empire.” We conclude with some lessons we’ve learned through analyzing her work, and we share our favorite bits! Thing of the Week: Pasión…
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19.22: Technology and Identity (A Close Reading on Worldbuilding)
The imago technology lies at the heart of this novel thematically and narratively. How does this technology create a world, delineate Mahit's culture from Teixcalaan, and ask enormous questions about identity and…
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19.21: Language as a Tool (A Close Reading on Worldbuilding)
What cultural and worldbuilding information is embedded within the smallest of word choices? Today, we dive into three specific sections from throughout Martine’s “A Memory Called Empire”: the word for empire,…
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19.20: How to Make Worlds Feel Big Without Overwhelming the Reader (A Close Reading on Worldbuilding: Focusing on Scale)
How do you use language and scale to focus your writing? Today, we think about scale and movement across vast spaces. What do characters’ movements tell us about empires and also—force? We talk about Martine’s…
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19.19: A Close Reading on Worldbuilding: An Overview and why A Memory Called Empire
Why is worldbuilding is essential in your writing? Today, we answer this question and dive into some working definitions of how we want to talk about it. After the break, we discuss why we chose this book Arkady…
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19.18: How to Build Fictional Economies
Sometimes we know the action and themes of your story, but you don’t know how to build an economy that supports those. Well today, we explain just how to do that! What are some questions you can ask yourself about the…
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19.17: Novellas- the Goldilocks of Publishing
How do you find the right size for your story? And speaking of size, what do novellas do differently than both short stories and novels? What even is the difference between a novel and a novella? How many characters do…
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19.16: An Interview with Max Gladstone and Amal El-Mohtar
Today we get to talk to the inimitable Max Gladstone and Amal El-Mohtar. Amal and Max are on the podcast to tell us about how they wrote a book together (hint: they didn’t write it together in the form of one voice.)…
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19.15: A Close Reading on Voice: Tying It All Together
As we conclude our first deep dive of our close reading series, we want to explore how the evolution of voice helped carry readers throughout "This Is How You Lose The Time War." We also talk about the relationship…
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19.14: A Close Reading on Voice- Epistolary Storytelling Through Voice
What's epistolary writing? Well, it's writing through letters. But it's also a lot more than that. As we continue to dive into the concept of Voice, we want to explore the importance and power of the letters that Blue…
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19.13: A Close Reading on Voice: Blue's Perspective - Confidence and Vulnerability
On our third episode diving into Voice through the novella “This Is How You Lose The Time War,” we begin to explore the different voices that make up the two main characters in the story. Last episode we dove into…
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19.12: A Close Reading on Voice - Red's Perspective - Muscular Prose
Today, we are doing a very close read of Red's opening narration and how Red’s voice communicates both character and world in an effective and efficient way. We read several sections aloud and dive into what each…
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19.11: A Close Reading on Voice- An Overview, and Why Time War
The book that became a New York Times Bestseller because of a tweet. Well, it won LOTS of awards when it came out, but it was rediscovered by a Twitter account with a large following. So-- let's get into it! On our…
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19.10: Introducing Our Close Readings Series
You’ve probably seen us posting about our Close Reading Series, and in his episode, we finally officially introduce it! For most of the remainder of 2024, we’ll be diving into five core elements of writing by focusing…
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19.09: LIVE Recording - Rituals, Rites, and Traditions
Hosts Erin and DongWon are joined by Fonda Lee and Mahtab Narsimhan for a special episode about creating traditions in your fictional writing. In this episode, we'll explore some of the following: -How do you build…
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19.08: NaNoWriMo Revision with Ali Fisher: Working with an Editor
An agent, an editor, and a writer walk into a Zoom room and record a podcast... but really... that's (part of) what this episode is! First off, a reminder that your agent, your editor, and you are all on the same…
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19.07: NaNoWriMo Revision with Ali Fisher: Intention
For our second episode in this three-part series on revising your NaNoWriMo novel—or any other larger project you have—we are diving into intentions with Tor editor Ali Fisher. We asked her how she helps writers figure…
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19.06: NaNoWriMo Revision with Ali Fisher: Length
Ali Fisher, editor at Tor Books and member of the podcast Rude Tales of Magic, joins us for a three-part series on editing. First up: length! How do you edit your work—whether it's a book or a short story or a…
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19.05: LIVE Recording - Revisions with Mahtab Narsimhan
Some writers love revisions and some would rather scrub the toilet than revise their writing. On this episode, we are joined by author Mahtab Narsimhan, who many will recognize as a host from past seasons! Mahtab talks…
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19.04: LIVE Recording - Pacing with Guest Fonda Lee
Pacing is one of the most subjective and difficult aspects of storytelling to get right. What is pacing? How do you know what the right pace is for a story, and what techniques can you use to speed up or slow down your…
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19.03: Behind The Scenes with our Producer and Recording Engineer
A few months ago, we were on a cruise ship in Alaska recording podcast episodes for 2024! This live recording features a Q&A with cruise attendees, who were given the opportunity to ask questions to Marshall Carr, our…
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19.02: Q&A Episode with WX Core Cast
We have a LIVE podcast recording from September 2023, when we were hosting one of our writing retreats on a cruise ship in Alaska! (To learn about our next WX Retreats, check out: https://writingexcuses.com/retreats/…
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19.01: Interview with Abraham Verghese
In our first episode of 2024, we interviewed author and physician Abraham Verghese, who most recently published "The Covenant of Water." We talked with Verghese about how to convey technical information in fiction.…
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