April 13, 2026 · 6:00 am

Sometimes I want to write, but words fail me #writing

We all have moments when our creativity fails us.

This happens when I have an idea, but the words won’t come. Or when they do, they feel stilted, awful. It happens to every writer at some point, and we feel alone in that experience. The words are supposed to flow from our fingers, but the well is dry and nary a drop fills our cup.

Some people call this writer’s block, and when I first began writing, I did too.

Now, twenty years on, I know it’s only a temporary, irritating, supremely frustrating lull in my creativity.

I’m experiencing such a moment right now. The world is in a spin, which is worrying enough. But more immediately, my husband has suffered yet another health crisis and has spent most of the last week in the hospital.

I have learned to write my way through these dry spells. Usually, the work I produce in this frame of mind is awful, and I wouldn’t share it with anyone. But I am a professional writer, and writing every day keeps me fit and in the habit of working.

Writing is like participating in sports or playing a musical instrument. I did both, and one thing I learned first is this: we must practice if we want to be good at it.

For me, succeeding at sports, music, or writing requires discipline. I’m a grandma and lost my ability to play hockey many years ago, and am no longer too musically inclined. If I allow it, I will lose momentum and purpose if I stop writing for any reason.

I don’t want to lose that feeling of passion for my work.

Nevertheless, there are times when we come to a place where we can’t think of what to write.

It happens to everyone, and we each handle it differently.

I will share how I deal with lulls in creativity, and believe me, I know it’s not a one-size-fits-all solution.

First, I suggest you save the file you are working on, the one you can’t seem to make headway on. Close it, and delete nothing. You will be able to continue or use this work later, so file it properly.

  • Sometimes, the problem is that your mind is on a different project that wants to be written, and you can’t focus on the job at hand.

If that is the case, work on the project that is on your mind. Let that creative energy flow, and you can reconnect with the first story once the new idea is out of the way.

I have mentioned this before, but for me, writer’s block is not a block per se. It’s an inability to visualize a scene I must write to advance a story. If I can’t picture it, I can’t describe it.

Unfortunately, some people have a different experience, one where they have no words whatsoever. They try, they struggle, and nothing comes to them.

This creates a kind of trauma. Once a person has experienced that moment of complete inability, the fear of being unable to write can magnify the problem until it paralyzes them.

Frustrating, yes. Do I question my choice of profession? Yes. Will I chain myself to my desk until I get it written?

No, but I will make avocado toast and read a cozy mystery until I decide to stop feeling pathetic and do what I know works for me.

So, what do I do when the words don’t come?

Jennifer Lauck is an American fiction and non-fiction author, essayist, speaker, and writing instructor. She offers great seminars on writing, and I have learned a great deal about writing and a writer’s life from her.

What follows is me passing what I have learned from her on to you:

First, I open a new document. At the top of this document, I type “Where I Am Today.”

  • I look around myself and see the room I am in, trying to see it with a stranger’s eyes.
  • I briefly describe what the stranger might see on entering that room.
  • Then I describe how I feel sitting in that place at that moment in time.

I write two or three paragraphs just to prove I can do it.

Next, I go somewhere else and take my notebook or a scrap of paper, just something to write on.

I am the stranger there, so I write three more paragraphs detailing how I fit into that new space and how it makes me feel. You could do this at the mall, a coffee shop, or in the supermarket parking lot. Just go somewhere that is not your usual space and do it.

When I am stuck for words, the most important thing I do is sit somewhere quiet and let my mind wander.

Or not. Sometimes an activity I’ve been avoiding, such as cleaning a bathroom or doing laundry can jar an idea loose. It’s work that allows for creative thinking and I feel incredibly productive at the same time.

The last exercise is my favorite part: Where do I want to be? I visualize it and describe my imaginary scene as if I am looking at it.

I want to walk along the high-tide mark on a foggy beach. I want to hear the gulls and the waves. I want to feel at peace again.

I know it’s a little unusual, but this exercise works for me. Writing about nothing in particular is like doodling. It is a form of mind-wandering, or daydreaming. Random ideas and thoughts can come to you, seemingly from nowhere. With perseverance, you will be able to write your other work again.

Everyone has family, jobs, and demands on their time and energy. Reality intrudes on our writing time, something no one is immune to.

Sometimes the crazy politics and asinine cruelties of this world get in the way of writing.

We might feel unwell or have too many things to accomplish and not enough time to get them all done. Someone you love may be facing a debilitating illness, or worse.

In my real life, all of these things sap my creativity.

But I sit down and get at least 100 words on paper, random ideas written just to prove to myself that I can. This usually leads to a more productive writing session. But if it doesn’t, I don’t beat myself up.

After all, I just wrote 100 words, so I’m still a writer.

In the meantime, here is the picture of an amazing stump that I found in a garden at the local hospital. Perhaps it will inspire a few ideas for you!

Giant Stump © Connie J. Jasperson 2026

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April 10, 2026 · 6:00 am

#FineArtFriday: a second look at “Haying at Jones Inn” by George Henry Durrie 1854

Artist: George Henry Durrie (1820–1863)

Title: English: Haying at Jones Inn

Date: 1854

Medium: oil on canvas

Dimensions: 22″×30″

Location: Private collection

Life has gone a little sideways here at Casa del Jasperson this week. I feel in need of something calm and soothing, a little comfort from the past. The works of George Henry Durrie have always appealed to my imagination and they inspire all the warm feelings we sometimes need in this topsy-turvy world. We first looked at this painting last October.

What I love about this painting:

George Henry Durrie found beauty in the depictions of ordinary life. He always found a way to fit people into his scenes.

I absolutely love the nostalgia of this scene, and the wealth of information about how a reputable roadside inn worked. It is clear that Durrie was frequent guest at Jones Inn. He traveled widely in the years he worked as a portrait painter, and this particular public house is featured in his work several times from different angles. I like to imagine he painted the inn to provide a little respite from the demands of portraiture.

This scene shows us a day at the end of summer. Laborers are bringing a wagon piled high with hay. Two oxen are hitched behind a horse, the three working together to pull the laden wagon.

Country inns were often working farms. They had to be, as they were feeding staff and laborers as well as guests all year long, and there were no Costco, Sam’s Club, or Wholesale Foods to purchase supplies from.

The stables and the people who cared for the horses were just as important. Providing well for travelers’ horses was as crucial as that of providing the best rooms and food possible for their guests.

The hay piled on this wagon will feed not only the innkeepers’ beasts but will feed the horses ridden by guests as the year progresses. Many more wagons will be required to fill the barn and hayloft.

About the Artist, Via Wikipedia:

George Henry Durrie (June 6, 1820 – October 15, 1863) was an American landscape artist noted especially for his rural winter snow scenes, which became very popular after they were reproduced as lithographic prints by Currier and Ives.

For many years, Durrie made a living primarily as a portrait painter, executing hundreds of commissions. After marriage, he made frequent trips, traveling to New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Virginia, fulfilling commissions and looking for new ones. His diary reveals that he was an enthusiastic railroad traveler, in the early days of the railroads. Durrie also painted what he called “fancy pieces”, whimsical studies of still lives or stage actors, as well as painting scenes on window-shades and fireplace covers. But portrait painting commissions became scarcer when photography came on the scene, offering a cheaper alternative to painted portraits, and, as his account-book shows, Durrie rarely painted a portrait after 1851.

Durrie’s interest shifted to landscape painting, and while on the road, or at home, made frequent sketches of landscape elements that caught his eye. Around 1844 Durrie began painting water and snow scenes, and took a second place medal at the 1845 New Haven State Fair for two winter landscapes. [1]

To learn more about this artist, go to  George Henry Durrie – Wikipedia

Credits and Attributions:

IMAGE: Wikimedia Commons contributors, “File:George Henry Durrie – Haying at Jones Inn.JPG,” Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:George_Henry_Durrie_-_Haying_at_Jones_Inn.JPG&oldid=853995435 (accessed October 22, 2025).

[1] Wikipedia contributors, “George Henry Durrie,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=George_Henry_Durrie&oldid=1282714933 (accessed October 22, 2025).

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April 6, 2026 · 6:00 am

Making a fantasy map #writing

Our modern lives are ruled by the geography of our area. Rivers, mountains, lakes, and ponds impede travel, forcing a road to go around them.

Unfortunately, maps have fallen out of favor thanks to satellite technology and the GPS in our cell phones. Many people don’t know how to read a map.

Authors might want to develop this skill because maps (and the ability to understand them) are a useful tool for authors of any fiction set in any place and time.

Take a look at the geography of your home area. As I mentioned last week, where I live, the shoreline of Puget Sound and the foothills of the mighty Cascade Mountains determine the interstate highway’s path and the locations of cities and towns. Those detours add to the distance we must travel and increase the time it takes to go from one place to another.

My best tool is my storyboard. It is an Excel workbook that is one of the most valuable tools I have to aid me in worldbuilding. This workbook is a warehouse of information about my work-in-progress.

I have talked a lot about storyboards, so for more on how to create one that works for you, go to Worldbuilding – the stylesheet/storyboard.

If you are writing a contemporary novel or historical work set in our real world, this is where you might want to go to Google Earth and find real-world maps that will help your characters navigate their city or countryside.

But maybe you are designing a fantasy world. In that case, you only need a pencil-drawn map such as this one:

But maybe you want to go a little deeper into visualizing the world your characters inhabit. When I am stuck, working on my map helps me visualize what has to happen next in the story. I love adding texture to it, putting the mountains where they belong, and showing where the grassy plains are. Frankly, I like to make art, so it’s a relaxing way to get through a temporary block.

Map of Neveyah © Connie J. Jasperson 2026Maps can show us far more than where mountains and rivers are located. They can show us political or ideological boundaries. Countries’ borders must be accurately shown and regularly updated on modern maps. Like every other professional, mapmakers are proud of their work and want everyone to be able to use and understand their creations.

People have been making maps since the advent of writing systems. The ancient Egyptians were the first civilization to regularly use the cardinal points (north, south, east, and west) for orientation in mapmaking, and your map should too, or only you will understand it.

  • North will be at the top, east to the right, south to the bottom, and west to the left. The points quarter the map at 90-degree intervals in the clockwise direction. This is standard in modern maps.

Even if your story is set in a town, you might want to map it out. The lines and scribbles you add to your map are the information you can use to check for consistency in your narrative.

If, in chapter one, Hero leaves home and follows the river north to the Big City of Smallville, he won’t reach home in time to save his mother if he then races east in chapter ten. He must return south, and your notes on your little map will help you remember this.

Or perhaps Hero lives in a city and wants coffee at the shop two blocks north of his apartment. He will have to return past the same shops and buildings he passed on the way. If some of the action occurs in those buildings, you want to have your map out and update it as needed.

Use a pencil, so you can easily note whatever changes occur during revisions. Your map doesn’t have to be fancy. Lay it out like a standard map with north at the top, east on the right, south at the bottom, and west on the left.

In my experience, the first draft of a map is never beautiful. And things will evolve as you make revisions to your manuscript. This is how my maps look after I’m done with the first draft:

Original Map of Neveyah from 2008 © Connie J. Jasperson

Original Map of Neveyah from 2008 © Connie J. Jasperson

You may need to note where rivers and forests are situated relative to towns, or in the case of towns, what streets and cross streets our Heroes must travel.

Many towns are situated on rivers. Water rarely flows uphill. While it may do so if pushed by the force of wave action or siphoning, water is a slave to gravity and chooses to flow downhill.

A river may emerge from a mountain spring or a glacier, but it will flow downhill to a valley where it will either continue on to the ocean or will pool and form lakes and ponds. Farms are usually situated near water sources. When making your map, locate rivers between mountains and hills.

On your fantasy map, geography makes travel difficult, forcing a road or trail to go around the various obstacles. This creates opportunities for plot points, because the struggle is the story. Those detours add to the distance and increase the time it takes to travel using the common mode of transportation.

In my part of the world, the native forest trees I see in the world around me are mostly Douglas firs, western red cedars, hemlocks, big-leaf maples, alders, cottonwood, and ash. Because I am familiar with them, these are the trees I visualize when I set a story in a forest.

What makes up your written world? How does your environment affect the way your characters live? Remember, the world is shown through the three senses: sight, sound, and smell. What one sees, smells, and hears in the wilderness is very different from what they experience in the city.

Cities have as complex a geography as a wilderness does. It is created by the terrain on which the city was built and its architecture.

The largest city in Washington State is Seattle. It lies between the salty waters of Puget Sound and the fresh waters of Lake Washington, the largest natural lake in western Washington. This geography affects our modern society by limiting where highways can be built and by determining the best places to build tall buildings or create suburban neighborhoods.

Humans have always created communities where resources are plentiful. Villages arise along rivers, forests, and lakes. These geographical places provide resources that allow people to thrive.

Humans prefer valleys for farming and also alter the visible landscape to suit their needs.

Satellite View of Puget Sound by Sentinel 2

We cut trees from the forests to build homes and create farmlands. We redirect rivers to provide irrigation or (in modern times) power. We build canals for easier travel and to enable faster shipping commerce.

Your narrative will describe the various terrains and obstacles your characters must face. A little map drawn on notepaper will help you keep things on track.

Maybe you aren’t artistic, but you think you will want a nice map later. In that case, a little scribbled map and a few indications of distances and obstacles will enable a map artist to provide you with a beautiful and accurate product. An artist can give you a map containing the information readers need to enjoy your book.

If you choose to include a map in your book, you will make readers (like me) happy.

Credits and Attributions:

IMAGE: Map of Neveyah © Connie J. Jasperson 2026

IMAGE: Original Map of Neveyah from 2008 © Connie J. Jasperson

IMAGE: Satellite View of Puget Sound, Wikimedia Commons contributors, “File:Puget Sound by Sentinel-2, 2018-09-28 (small version).jpg,”Wikimedia Commons,https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Puget_Sound_by_Sentinel-2,_2018-09-28_(small_version).jpg&oldid=1114501049(accessed April 5, 2026).

 

 

 

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April 3, 2026 · 6:00 am

#FineArtFriday: Kaaterskill Landscape by Asher Brown Durand 1850

Artist: Asher Brown Durand (1796–1886)

Title: Kaaterskill Landscape

Date: 1850

Medium: oil on canvas

Dimensions: height: 54 cm (21.2 in); width: 44 cm (17.3 in)

Collection: Princeton Art Museum

What I love about this painting:

Wow! Where to start …. First, let me just say that Asher Brown Durand’s lifetime spent painting the forests, mountains, and brooks of his native New England is amazing. He climbed the Catskills, hiked the valleys and meadow, and left us a record of pristine wilderness in a time gone by.

His work outdoors inspired the artists who collectively became known as the Hudson River School.

This painting shows us the culmination of what must have been a real hike. I might have begun the trek, but I wouldn’t have finished. Kaaterskill Falls – Wikipedia

His early career as an engraver (see his list of accomplishments below) is clear in the detail he puts into every aspect of the scene.

Via Wikipedia: Asher’s engravings on bank notes were used as the portraits for America’s first postage stamps, the 1847 series. Along with his brother Cyrus he also engraved some of the succeeding 1851 issues. Contemporary art historian William Dunlap dubbed Durand America’s first engraver [1]

In this painting, the rocks come alive, and you can almost hear the wildlife going about their business in the forest.

I love it. If your are doing any worldbuilding that involves a forested wilderness, Asher Brown Durand’s work should give you ample inspiration.

About the Artist, via Wikipedia:

Durand’s main interest changed from engraving to oil painting about 1830 with the encouragement of his patron, Luman Reed. In 1837, he accompanied his friend Thomas Cole on a sketching expedition to Schroon Lake in the Adirondacks Mountains, and soon after he began to concentrate on landscape painting. He spent summers sketching in the Catskills, Adirondacks, and the White Mountains of New Hampshire, making hundreds of drawings and oil sketches that were later incorporated into finished academy pieces which helped to define the Hudson River School.

Durand is remembered particularly for his detailed portrayals of trees, rocks, and foliage. He was an advocate for drawing directly from nature with as much realism as possible. Durand wrote, “Let [the artist] scrupulously accept whatever [nature] presents him until he shall, in a degree, have become intimate with her infinity…never let him profane her sacredness by a willful departure from truth.” [1]

For ore about this amazing artist, go to: Asher Brown Durand – Wikipedia

Credits and Attributions:

IMAGE: File:1850, Durand, Asher Brown, Kaaterskill Landscape.jpg – Wikipedia

[1] Wikipedia contributors, “Asher Brown Durand,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Asher_Brown_Durand&oldid=1335400422 (accessed April 2, 2026).

 

 

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March 30, 2026 · 6:00 am

Foundations of Worldbuilding: maps #writing

The town I grew up in bears little resemblance today to the place it was ten years ago. New subdivisions have arisen along what used to be country roads. New shopping centers now exist in areas where few people once lived. The local municipalities have replaced stop lights with roundabouts at intersections that see heavy traffic.

Traffic along the I5 corridor has become unmanageable. Why is this so? All one has to do is look at a map.

The Puget Sound Basin is a narrow, winding corridor of valleys that run between the Cascade Mountains and the Salish Sea. This lowland stretch of valleys and rivers has been the trail from the Columbia River in the south to British Columbia since before Europeans arrived here. Indigenous people used this route as the main trading trail for thousands of years.

Unfortunately, Mother Nature didn’t plan for eight-lane freeways, and adding more lanes to I5 is not feasible.

We on the West Coast live in an active earthquake zone, so a double-decker highway isn’t a popular idea with those of us who must travel it. Their danger here was made apparent in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake – Wikipedia.

Cities grow where there is access to fresh water and sufficient food to supply their population. In the lowlands of Western Washington State, food from both land and sea and fresh water are plentiful.

So how does this long-winded discussion of the history of my local terrain relate to worldbuilding?

No matter what genre you are writing in, maps are excellent multipurpose tools.

Maps show you the world. If you are writing a contemporary story set in your town, printing out a Google map keeps you from forgetting how long it takes to get from one point to another. I live in Olympia. Seattle is seventy miles north and Portland is around 112 miles to the south.

If my characters need to go to either city, it will take all day to go there, meet the appointment, and return to Olympia. They might even plan to stay overnight rather than drive home in the dark and pouring rain.

I write fantasy. In my world, people travel on foot and on horseback, but if they must go somewhere far away, they won’t push themselves to go more than twenty miles a day, unless there is a valid reason.

That distance is doable, assuming the weather is good, the road is fairly decent, and the characters are healthy. Small villages will crop up at intervals of five to ten miles apart, places where travelers might purchase food, or maybe even find shelter for the night.

Otherwise, they will be camping.

I love maps. My own maps start out in a rudimentary form, just a way to keep my work straight.  I use pencil and graph paper at this stage, because as the rough draft evolves, sometimes towns must be renamed. They may have to be moved to more logical places. Whole mountain ranges may have to be moved or reshaped so that forests and savannas will appear where they are supposed to be in the story.

Perhaps you think you don’t need a map, and maybe you don’t.

However, if your characters are traveling and you are writing about their travels, you probably should make a rudimentary map. All you need is a few lines scribbled to indicate a trail or road, an indication of where mountains and water lie in relation to the trail, and a few marks indicating where the towns are.

I always make a map because, if am not really on top of it, the spelling of town names might accidentally evolve over the course of the first draft. Maudy will become Maury (this did happen), and distances will become too mushy even for me. The map is my indispensable tool for keeping my story straight.

What should go on a map? When your characters are traveling great distances, they may pass through villages on their way, and if these places figure in the events of the book, they should be noted on the map. This prevents you from:

  • Accidentally naming a second village the same name later in the manuscript.
  • Misspelling the town’s name later in the narrative.
  • Forgetting where the characters were in chapter four.

Events and confrontations might impede your characters. Make a note of where they occurred.

If they are pertinent to the story, you will want to note these locations on your map so that you don’t contradict yourself if your party must return the way they came:

  • rivers
  • swamps
  • mountains
  • hills
  • towns
  • forests
  • oceans

If your work is sci-fi, consider making a map of the space station or ship. Billy Ninefingers, is set in a wayside inn. I made a drawing of the floorplan and little map of the village because the inn is the world in which the story takes place. As far as distances in space go, I am not qualified to explain what is possible or not. For that, you need to do some research and look at current theories.

If you are writing fantasy, I suggest you keep the actual distances mushy because some readers will nitpick the details, no matter how accurate you are. Yes, you wrote it, but they don’t see it the way you do. This is because their perception of a league may be three miles while yours might be one and a half.

Historically, a league was the distance one could walk in an hour. Even though a league has no finite length, some readers will become so annoyed by this that they will give your book a three-star review, simply because they disagree with the length of time your character took to travel a certain distance. 

Huw the Bard  is a good example of that. In the novel, Huw, (pronounced Hugh) takes two months to travel between the city of Ludwellyn and the village of Clythe. In his story, Huw Owyn is walking through fields, woods, and along several winding rivers for the first half of his journey. Somedays, he is unable to travel at all.

He must backtrack as frequently as he goes forward in an effort to sneak around those who are hunting him. It’s only safe for him to walk on the main road once he makes it to Maury, weeks after fleeing Ludwellyn.

©connie j jasperson 2014 – 2026

It is a stretch of road that he could have done in two weeks if he had been able to stay on the main road. But that inability to make progress creates opportunities for tension and mayhem.

Many readers (like me) love finding fantasy novels that include maps. If you are writing fantasy but feel your hand-drawn map isn’t good enough to include in the finished product, consider hiring an artist to make your map from your notes. Because I am an artist, my pencil-drawn map always evolves into artwork for the book.

Your mind is the medium through which the idea for a novel or story is filtered, and words are how it is made real. The key to making both fiction and non-fiction real for the reader is subtle but crucial: worldbuilding. Maps, no matter how rudimentary, are the foundation of worldbuilding in my writing process.

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March 27, 2026 · 6:00 am

#FineArtFriday: a closer look at “Spring in Giverny” by Claude Monet 1890

Monet_-Spring_in_GivernyArtist: Claude Monet  (1840–1926)

Title: Spring in Giverny

Date: 1890

Medium: oil on canvas

Dimensions: height: 64.8 cm (25.5 in); width: 81 cm (31.8 in)

Inscriptions: Signature and date bottom left: Claude Monet 90

I first posted this painting in March of 2024. It’s such a counterpoint to the monotonous gray and constant rain of March in the part of the world where I live.

The flowering plum trees along the streets and in front gardens are covered in flowers in shades of purplish pink.  The weather remains cold but even so, fruit trees are beginning to flower here.

All along the streets, in back yards, and public areas, apple, cherry, and plum trees are covered in buds, their branches faintly tinted with shades of pink and white. Lawns have turned that shade of green that one only sees this time of year unless one has a good sprinkler system.

In many older gardens here, yellow forsythia is blooming, and dogwood brightens each neighborhood. The Pacific Northwest is on the verge of bursting into color.

Monet’s sky is the same shade of glorious blue that the skies are here after a heavy rain has passed. Barely visible, a white farmhouse stands behind and under the trees. The leaves just beginning to burst out on the trees show us his ability to portray nature the way it is. The flowers in the grass make me happy too.

We need the color, need the sunshine. Thank you, Claude Monet, for sharing this moment in time with us.

About the Artist, via Wikipedia:

Oscar-Claude Monet 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During his long career, he was the most consistent and prolific practitioner of impressionism’s philosophy of expressing one’s perceptions of nature, especially as applied to plein air (outdoor) landscape painting.  The term “Impressionism” is derived from the title of his painting Impression, soleil levant, exhibited in 1874 (the “exhibition of rejects”) initiated by Monet and his associates as an alternative to the Salon. [1]

Read the rest of the article at Claude Monet – Wikipedia

Credits and Attributions:

IMAGE: Wikimedia Commons contributors, “File:Monet – Frühling in Giverny.jpg,” Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Monet_-_Fr%C3%BChling_in_Giverny.jpg&oldid=654964112 (accessed March 21, 2024).

[1] Wikipedia contributors, “Claude Monet,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Claude_Monet&oldid=1213738859 (accessed March 21, 2024).

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March 23, 2026 · 6:00 am

Worldbuilding – Calendars and Maps #writing

I discovered early on that creating a calendar and a map for each novel gives me a realistic view of my plot arc. A mushy timeline stands out. I don’t want my readers wondering how my characters managed to cram a week’s worth of running around into only two days.

Writing craft, creating the world.Think about it. Errands take time. Shopping for groceries takes time. If I go to a friend’s house, chat for an hour, and drive back home, I have spent at least two hours, possibly more.

The weather and time of year affect how long errands take. Walking in rain and wind vs. a mild sunny day will take longer and feel worse.

No matter the genre of your novel, it helps to know which season your events take place in. Foliage changes with the seasons, and weather is a part of worldbuilding.

And there are other reasons for making a calendar of events for your novel, whether you are writing romance, sci-fi, fantasy, military thrillers, etc. Time should not be fluid UNLESS a core plot point of your novel is the ability to alter the flow of time, such as Harry Potter’s Time Turner device.

The Gregorian calendar is the modern calendar in use today, via Wikipedia.The calendar is a visual reference that helps with pacing and consistency. In conjunction with a map, a calendar keeps the events moving along the story arc. It ensures you allow enough time to reasonably accomplish large tasks, enabling a reader to suspend their disbelief.

They ensure you don’t inadvertently jump from season to season when describing the scenery surrounding the characters.

So, why worry about calendars in your fantasy worldbuilding? It’s just fantasy so anything goes, right?

No.

Fantasy must look and feel like reality, and fantastic elements must be organic and natural to that world. Inconsistency and mushy elements discourage readers. Springtime, summertime, winter, or fall, each season (or lack thereof) has to be consistent within itself, even if the plants and scenery are otherworldly.

image showing the timeline of Neveyah by bookAs you are writing a story, you might need to know what day of the week it is. Some things do take time, such as walking from one town to another. If you aren’t on top of things, you could have people breaking the sound barrier in their mad dash to the village forty miles away.

The distance a person can walk in a day varies depending on their health, terrain, and weather. A healthy person could travel from two to thirty miles. I would say that, on average, in varied terrain, a walk of forty miles might take a healthy person two days.

They should be prepared to spend one night camping alongside the road or hope to fine a roadside inn.

Much of my output is fantasy, and one might think a fantasy calendar with fantasy names for everything would lend a foreign atmosphere to the worldbuilding.

Not necessarily so.

When it comes to calendars, I suggest you stick with what is familiar, and here is why.

While creating my first world in 2008, a special calendar seemed like a good thing. The storyline and world of Mountains of the Moon were originally conceived for an anime-style RPG that was never built. When the project was scrapped, I still had the rights to my storyline, maps, and calendars.

My calendar for that world was (and unfortunately must remain) a hot mess.

In the game as we envisioned it, the calendar wouldn’t have been a problem, as the days of the week were only mentioned in terms of when a shop was open. In stories set in the world of Neveyah … it’s a problem for me as a writer.

In Neveyah, a year has thirteen months, each with twenty-eight days. That’s doable, no problem. Thirteen months are easy to work with because they are on paper. The extra month at the end of the year is called Holy Month.

Yes, a 365-day year and standard twelve months would be less confusing. Please have pity. A newbie author invented this, unaware that one little story would evolve into a series. It seemed so “fantasy” at the time.

Unfortunately, the months are named after astrological signs. Capricas, Aquis, Piscus, etc. This is a problem because few people know which time of year Taurus or Capricorn is, unless they occasionally read their horoscopes or know their own sun sign.

I added one extra day at the end of the year, which ends on the Winter solstice. (Sure, whatever. No problem.)

The winter solstice is called Holy Day, belongs to no month, and marks the beginning of the new year. Every four years, they have a two-day holiday and a big party. (Sounds fun, so no problem.)

The names I assigned to the dates and months were exceedingly uncreative and awkward: Lunaday, Tyrsday, Odensday, Torsday, Frosday, Sunnaday, and Restday. (Oh, you noticed it too! Sunnaday is the sixth day of the week, which lends itself to serious confusion.) Restday is fairly explanatory, but why OH why didn’t I give the other names a bit more thought?

Every story I write set in that universe has its own calendar of events, and each is labeled with the year number that the story is set in. They feature different characters and skip around in the timeline. I update that calendar as I write to make sure no one is walking at the speed of light.

I create the calendar in Excel, but you can use anything to make your calendar. There are plenty of blank templates for creating 365-day calendars out there, and they cost nothing. I just like fiddling with mine when I’m stuck, as it usually helps me figure out how to move things along.

In 2008, I had no idea just how awful the Neveyah calendar would turn out to be. And now, eighteen years later, I’m stuck with it. Please, take my advice and keep it simple.

Just sayin’. This is why ALL my other books are plotted using the modern Gregorian calendar.

But what’s this about maps? Next week, we will explore maps and why they are important during the writing stage.

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March 16, 2026 · 6:00 am

Planning a series #writing

I’m a fan of book series. I’m like every other avid reader in that I hate to see the story end. Also, if it’s a really compelling series, I will wonder how it all started.

Most authors don’t plan for their novel-in-progress to become a series, but by the time they reach the conclusion of the story, they discover that it isn’t really the end, that the characters have so much more to say. Most cozy mystery, fantasy, and sci-fi series begin this way.

Sometimes, a first novel finds its niche. Readers love the engaging characters, and the plot moves along to a satisfying conclusion. Readers say they want more, and so the series begins.

However, there are times when an author knows at the outset that the story is too big for one book. They know it will take two or more novels to tell that story.

Regardless of whether or not you plan for your novel to become a series, the novel that opens the series must have a complete story arc, a finite, satisfying ending, and be able to stand alone.

I say this because writing a novel takes time. Readers nowadays are impatient and vocal about it on social media, often heaping criticism on the offending author.

Yet they don’t want AI slop. They just want YOU to spew it forth in as little time as possible.

Very few of us are able to write two to four novels a year, as Stephen King does.

First, you must remember that a projected series is a universe unto itself, even if it is set in the real world. It is the story of that universe, explored across several books.

Speaking as a reader, if you are writing a series, you should think about the overall structure well in advance. Every book in the series needs its own plot and must end in a way that doesn’t leave the reader wondering what the hell just happened. They like a satisfying ending and HATE cliff-hangers.

There are two kinds of series, episodic and continuing, or as I like to think of them, finite and infinite.

The episodic series is like a television series. Each novel features an established set of characters, and each episode is a new adventure. There may be a lingering mystery in the background that unites them and is resolved in a later book, but each episode must resolve the problem at hand.

In some ways, an episodic series is the easiest to write because each book features established characters in an established world and society. (Sorry about the repetition there.) Many cozy mysteries and fantasy series are episodic. They feature standalone stories that bring us closer to the protagonist, and I love them all.

In another type of series, the installments might jump around between characters or to widely different eras in that universe’s historical timeline. Think Terry Pratchett’s Discworld or L.E. Modesitt Jr.’s Saga of Recluce series.

Some installments in an episodic series may introduce a new protagonist, or even explore the other side of the story from a less antagonistic point of view. It may show that the opposition is not intrinsically evil, that both sides are striving for the same thing but with radically differing methods.

The continuing series requires some advance planning. It is a finite multi-volume series of books covering one group’s efforts to achieve a single epic goal. While each book may be set in an established world, it might feature an entirely different set of characters and their storyline.

The story usually has a strong theme that unites the series. It might be the hero’s journey or coming-of-age. Or it might follow the life of one main character and their sidekicks as they struggle to complete an arduous quest. Robert Jordan’s (and Brandon Sanderson’s) The Wheel of Time series is a prime example of the continuing series.

An episodic series is easier to plan, as each quest is resolved in a single novel. The worldbuilding was accomplished in the first novel, so all one has to do is build on it in the later novels. Each installment should leave no loose ends. If the author stops writing in that series, nothing is left hanging.

A continuing series must have a complete plot arc for each book. PLUS, it must add to the series’ overarching plot arc. Each novel is only a section or chapter of the larger story, all with the goal of meeting at the end for the final battle. Speaking as a reader, please keep track of the subplots via an outline. I say this so you don’t leave loose ends, but also to ensure the subplots come together at the final battle.

  • Sequels happen when an author is in love with their characters, and those characters and their stories resonate with readers. Sequels are how trilogies become series.
  • Companion novels occur simultaneously alongside the main story but feature side characters doing their own thing.
  • Prequels are one of my favorite kinds of novels. I am always curious as to how the whole thing started.
  • Spin-offs might feature side characters or the protagonist’s descendants.

How does an author manage the character arc for one group over the course of a series? I suggest storyboarding. I do my storyboards in Excel, but you can make them any way that works for you. A notebook, sticky notes, Scrivener, it’s all good. Feel free to find your own happy place.

Then,

  • Write a synopsis of what you think the Big Picture is, the entire story.
  • Write it out, even if that synopsis goes for 5,000 to 10,000 words.
Screenshot of author's storyboard.

Sample Storyboard.

If that storyboard alerts you to the fact that the story is too large for one book, separate the sections into however many novels of reasonable length it will take, and plan how to end each installment in a way that won’t make readers quit the series.

Outlines help me decide on the structure of the larger story. By making one, I have a better idea of how each plot will unfold.

Once you have figured out the entire arc of the series, make an outline of book one. This allows your creative mind to insert foreshadowing. This will happen through clues and literary Easter eggs that surface as the series progresses.

What if you are writing your first novel, but you suddenly realize the characters still have adventures waiting for them, I suggest waiting to outline the next book until after book one is finished and ready for the final edit. Plots constantly evolve as we write. Book one is the foundation novel of the series, so it must be completed before you begin building the rest of the story.

Maps and calendars are essential tools for the author, no matter what genre you are writing in. Regardless of how you create your stylesheet/storyboard, I suggest you include these elements:

  1. A GLOSSARY is especially important. I suggest you keep a list of names and invented words as they arise, all spelled the way you want them.
  2. MAPS are good, but don’t have to be fancy. All you need is something rudimentary to show you the world’s layout.
  3. A CALENDAR of events is especially important.

Outlining the next novel should be simpler if you keep a record of all the changes that evolve when writing the first novel.

  • A stylesheet/storyboard is a good tool for fantasy authors because we invent entire worlds, religions, and magic systems.
  • We often invent names and don’t want to contradict ourselves or have our characters’ names change halfway through the book.

Next week, we will look at creating a calendar for stories set in a speculative fiction world. We will look at some of my failures and see why simpler is usually better.

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March 13, 2026 · 6:00 am

#FineArtFriday: Revisiting “In the Harbor” by Adolf Kaufmann

Adolf_Kaufmann_-_In_the_HarbourArtist: Adolf Kaufmann (1848–1916)

Adolf Kaufmann: In the Harbor

Date: by 1916

Medium: oil on canvas

Dimensions: Height: 75 cm (29.5 in); Width: 102 cm (40.1 in)

What I love about this painting:

This image first appeared here in 2021. It shows us the working harbor in a fishing village, with men and women unloading the catch and selling it on the docks. The day is gray, as days by the sea often are, but it’s warm enough for the workers to labor without coats. This was, and still is, dirty, smelly work, but a good catch meant food on the table and coins in their pockets.

The colors are muted, with rusts and browns predominant. It’s a messy scene, with sails and nets piled everywhere and teeming with people.

This is how harbors really were and, in many places, still are.

About the artist, via Wikipedia:

Adolph Kaufmann (15 May 1848, in Troppau – 25 November 1916, in Vienna) was an Austrian landscape and marine artist. In 1890, he decided to settle in Vienna and opened a studio in the Wieden district. In 1900, together with Carl von Merode [de] and Heinrich Lefler, he opened an “Art School for Ladies.” He continued to visit Paris frequently and, when he painted there, signed his works with the pseudonym “A. Guyot”. Other names he signed with include “A. Papouschek”, “G. Salvi”, “A. Jarptmann”, “R. Neiber”, “J. Rollin” and “M. Bandouch”. Why he did this is unclear, although his choice of signature often reflects stylistic differences.

His landscapes were influenced by the Barbizon school and the style known as “paysage intime” (French for “familiar landscape”), both of which he was exposed to in France during the 1870s.

He was a frequent exhibitor and won numerous awards; notably at the Exposition Universelle (1900). From 1890 to 1913, he was a member of the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts; representing them at exhibitions at the Glaspalast in Munich and the Große Berliner Kunstausstellung. He became a full member of the Vienna Künstlerhaus in 1909. His travels continued until they were cut short by the beginning of World War I.

Credits and Attributions:

IMAGE: Wikimedia Commons contributors, “File:Adolf Kaufmann – In the Harbour.jpg,” Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Adolf_Kaufmann_-_In_the_Harbour.jpg&oldid=1034365316 (accessed March 12, 2026).

Wikipedia contributors, “Adolf Kaufmann,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Adolf_Kaufmann&oldid=1339412024 (accessed March 12, 2026).

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March 9, 2026 · 6:00 am

Successful revisions #writing

I always think that in some ways, books are like machines. They’re comprised of many essential components, and if one element fails, the book won’t work the way the author envisions it.

My writing life.So, what are these parts?

Prose, plot, transitions, pacing, theme, characterization, dialogue, and mechanics (grammar/punctuation).

As an editor, I’ve seen every kind of mistake you can imagine, and I have written some travesties myself. I need my writing group, people with a critical eye who see my work first and give me good advice when I’ve gone astray.

I don’t want to waste my editor’s time, so once I have completed the revisions suggested by my beta readers, I begin a self-edit.

I use Microsoft Word, but most word processing programs have a read-aloud function. I place the cursor where I want to begin and open the Review Tab. Then, I click on Read Aloud and begin reading along with the mechanical voice. Yes, the AI voice can be annoying and doesn’t always pronounce things right, but this first tool shows me a wide variety of places that need rewriting.

screenshot of the read aloud functionI habitually type ‘though’ when I mean ‘through,’ and ‘lighting’ when I mean ‘lightning.’ These are two widely different words but are only one letter apart. Most misspelled words will leap out when you hear them read aloud.

  1. Run-on sentences stand out.
  2. Inadvertent repetitions also stand out.
  3. Hokey phrasing doesn’t sound as good as you thought it was.
  4. You notice where words like “the” or “a” before a noun were skipped.

This process involves a lot of stopping and starting, taking me a week to get through the entire 90,000-word manuscript. At the end, I will have trimmed about 3,000 words.

image of scissorsThe next phase of this process is where I find and correct punctuation and find more places that need improvement. Sometimes I trim away entire sections, riffs on ideas that have already been presented. Often, they are outright repetitions that don’t leap out on the computer screen. (Those are often cut-and-paste errors.)

Open your manuscript. Break it into separate chapters, and make sure each is clearly and consistently labeled. Make certain the chapter numbers are in the proper sequence and that they don’t skip a number. For a work in progress, Baron’s Hollow, I would title the chapter files this way:

  • BH_ch_1
  • BH_ch_2
  • and so on until the end.

Print out the first chapter. Everything looks different printed out, and you will see many things you don’t notice on the computer screen or hear when the AI voice reads it aloud.

  1. Turn to the last page. Cover the page with another sheet of paper, leaving only the last paragraph visible.
  2. Starting with the last paragraph on the last page, begin reading, working your way forward.
  3. Use a yellow highlighter to mark each place that needs correction.
  4. Put the corrected chapter on a recipe stand next to your computer. Open your document and begin making revisions as noted on your hard copy.

Repeat this process with each chapter.

This is the phase where I look for what I think of as code words. I look at words like “went.” In my personal writing habits, “went” is a code word that tells me when a scene ends and transitions to another stage. The characters or their circumstances are undergoing a change. One scene is ending, and another is beginning.

weak versus strong words. We try to move is weak. We move is strong.Clunky phrasing and info dumps are signals that tell me what I intend the scene to be. In the rewrite, I must expand on those ideas and ensure the prose is active. I must cut some of the info and allow the reader to use their imagination.

Let’s look at the word “went.” When I see it, I immediately know someone is going somewhere.

But in many contexts, “went” is a telling word and can lead to passive phrasing.

Passive phrasing does the job with little effort on the author’s part, which is why the first drafts of my work are littered with it. Active phrasing takes more effort because it involves visualizing a scene and showing it to the reader.

I ask myself, “How do they go?” Went can always be shown as a brief, one-sentence scene. James opened the door and strode out.

Confusing passages stand out when you see them printed. Maybe it’s the opposite of an info dump. Maybe the lead-up to the scene wasn’t shown well enough and leaves the reader wondering how such a thing happened.

The most confusing places are often sections where I cut a sentence or paragraph and moved it to a different place. These really stand out if they create a garbled scene.

image of a stop lightHINT: If your eye wants to skip over a section of the printout, STOP. Read that section aloud and discover why your mind wants to skip it. Was it too wordy? Was it muddled? Something made your eye want to skip it and you need to discover why.

By the end of phase two, I will have trimmed about 3,000 more words from my manuscript.

At this point, the manuscript might look finished, but it has only just begun the journey. Now it is as ready as I can make it, and it goes to my editor, Irene, who gives it the final polish.

Context is everything. I am wary of relying on Grammarly or ProWriting Aid for anything other than alerting you to possible comma and spelling malfunctions.

If you don’t know anything about punctuation, don’t feel alone. Most of us don’t when we’re first starting out, but we learn by looking things up and practicing.

If you are looking for a simple guide to commas that will cost you nothing, check out my post, Fundamentals of Grammar: 7 basic rules of punctuation, published here July 7, 2021.

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