John Brunner

Plot Summary:
In the not too distant future the earth has started to plunge into environmental disaster. Based on the lives of over a dozen characters, Brunner follows as Americans come to realize they are on the verge of ...

5 ways to know if you have passive voice and fix it

Objects are acted upon
Limited Dialogue
Look for Was
A feeling of being in the past
The Answers
This article is a follow up on some of the topics I discusses in LWA V, but yet it deals with a type of voice that many beginning writers stumble into, and not by choice.

OBJECTS ARE ACTED UPON

Passive voice, unlike the more excited active voice, gives writing a sense of going no where. The bad thing is that most writers don’t even know their writing in the passive voice until it’s too late...when they finally relax and read their work. In passive voice everything just happens, and objects are acted upon. What do I mean by that? Look ...

"Separate But Equal."

There’s a slogan which most people associate with the propaganda against the civil rights movement of the 1960’s. Separation is just a step away from disadvantage and stereotype, which is a step away from oppression. For this reason, I have trouble accepting the notion that "men are from Mars and women are from Venus." We are all human, and gender crossovers do exist. ...

The five things that creates a better manuscript

Pace
Closeness to reality
Clarity
Enjoyment
Great Characters
When writing a manuscript, you have a lot of topics to consider. This section of Lucid Writing Advice will touch upon these topics, and hopefully steer you in the right direction.

PACE

Everywhere you look in a bookstore you see books of all shapes and sizes. Tall ones, small ones, thick ones, and slim ones. If you are an avid reader, the size of the book is directly equivalent to your span of interest. To the writer, the size of the book has to do with the pacing.

Seldom do you find the ending at the beginning or vice versa. The pace ...

The first story that ever really scared me was "The Monkey's Paw" by W. W. Jacobs. In it, an old woman uses a magic talisman in the form of a mummified monkey's paw to wish her dead son alive again. The horror arrives in the form of a knock at the door, her son, returned from the grave.

I read "The Monkey's Paw" in school, junior high school I think. I suppose it was ...