Against Loneliness

Like dying, we ultimately write alone.

I have recently joined a writer’s web site that I trust because I’ve found the writer’s craft book on which it’s based to be so helpful to me that I wanted to continue the resulting conversation not only in my head, certainly, but with others as well.

The book is Discovering the Soul of Your Story.  It’s nothing to do with religion, but substitute words like “core” or “structure” just don’t convey the heart this book has, a book, if there ever was one, genuinely about distilling a story’s essence.

The book and site are the creation of Roger Rueff, who is a brilliantly busy, highly accomplished writer, a master storyteller.

You can read the book, and you can visit the site and see articles written in the spirit of the book and post comments.  For a fee, you can become a full member as I am proud to be, which I encourage if the site speaks to you and you want to belong to a forum where writers do respond to each other.  It also has the benefit of being designed around the methods of the book, which lends the posts and comments cohesion.  My membership is working for me, so I’m happy to recommend the site to you.

soulofyourstory.org

If you like the site, check out the book.  It’s concise and insightful.  I don’t believe there’s a writer’s craft book available that more clearly expresses how a story is created, and I’ve read many.

We all still die alone, but along the way we can have some company.

A Potential Problem

I have a lot of potential, and so do you. It's a real problem, isn't it? It is for me.

I have no problem writing, but I always need to be writing more, and I need more readers as well. I was talking to an acquaintance, telling him how I admired his writing career, that I was not satisfied with my own. He advised me he wasn't too please with himself, that the writers he admired were far more accomplished. Assuming there may be someone at the top of this heap, that person is perhaps satisfied with himself.

The rest of us aren't.