I don’t want to be a good writer. I want to be an awesome writer. I want to write some ideas that change people for the better; convince them to get up in the morning and do something with their life besides observe passively as it departs.

But good writing doesn’t come without a price. So Paul Barkley and I have decided to conduct an insane-a-thon; 12 shorts in 12 weeks, each focused on the craft and techniques of great writing. Building up our toolbox of awesome.

If you’re a writer, you should come join us! Here is the plan:

• post every Friday on your blog, Google +, wherever
• any length
• focus on one aspect each week (dialog, tension, setting, etc)
• first post is Friday, 9/9
• last post is Friday, 11/25

Brillica actually produced some interesting meta themes when I wordled the whole book. It’s still a bit heavy on names, but the themes do show through.

I was browsing Alex Satin’s blog and ran across this interesting post on word themes. I found Wordle instantly addictive and started posting up bits of my stories, like this one, to see what sort of meta-themes pop out.

Wow did that turn out to be an insightful look into the content of my stories. I hope you find it as useful for your writing! Go try out a couple paragraphs now!

This chapter in Nightshroud turned out to be entirely about names, which gives me some thoughts for my first set of revisions : (