Control What You Can... Let Go of What You Can't

Publishing is a difficult business. Millions of new books are published each year, yet the average book sells only 1,000 copies in its lifetime and fewer than 500 become NYT bestsellers. Traditional publishers account for maybe one million of those books, and still, that's only 1–2% of the projects submitted to them.

The odds of making it rich or even just making a living by writing novels are... not great.

I don't say this to be a downer. I say it because I love data and find it very useful for making plans and managing expectations. I say it because I'm also a writer who wants to be one of those statistics (the good ones, at least), and data helps me understand what I'm getting into.

Here's some slightly more encouraging data:

• More than 95% of books that publishers reject are "poorly written, have a bad or unoriginal premise, or are irrelevant."

They call it the slush pile, but it's entirely avoidable. As you improve your writing, you'll easily rise up above the slush. This is a thing you can control.

• Nearly 67% of sales are in authors' backlists.

The odds of good sales might be bad for one book, but they increase with each book you publish. As you write more, you sell more. This is also a thing you can control.*

* With self-publishing, at least.

In every area of life, there are aspects you can control and aspects you can't. You can't control whether somebody makes you angry, but you can control what you do with that anger. You can't control whether somebody likes you, but you can control whether you like yourself.

In publishing, you cannot control the publishers, the readers, the market, or virality. You cannot control whether people will buy or enjoy your book. You cannot control how much money you make or what people say about you. But there are things you can control.

You control your writing.

You decide what words go on the page and whether there are words at all. You can improve your skill through practice. You alone decide what and how many stories you tell.

You control your schedule.

You decide how many days you write, for how long, how many words. You decide whether you're going to write a ton in one sitting or a little at a time—and both are fine! You alone decide how to balance writing with the rest of your life in a way that brings you joy.

You control whether you keep going.

You decide if you will keep writing, take a break, or stop altogether—again, all are fine decisions so long as they are your decisions designed to fit your life!

If you want to keep writing no matter what, nobody can stop you. The more you do so, the better you'll get. If writing is something you want, then the only way to fail is to give up on it.

It's important to let go of what we can't control so that we can focus our energy on what we can. I'm not saying it's easy—I know from experience it's not!—but it's possible, and it's the only way to find joy in what we do.

Control what you can. Let go of what you can't.

How to Start a Novel

There are lots of great tips out there for how to start a novel. You've probably heard some of these:

• Start in the middle of the plot (in medias res)
• Start with exciting action
• Start with a compelling mystery
• Start with an intriguing first line

These are all great ideas. They're not even mutually exclusive! But I bet you can think of stories that started with these things and were still... kinda dull? Or maybe you can't, because you stopped reading them. I know I have. And some of my favorite stories don't do any of these things!

Here's the thing about writing: There are no rules. You can start the novel however you damn well want—even with fifteen pages of world-building about Hobbits. If the reader is still enjoying themselves, nothing else matters.

The tips above come from stories that did these things and worked, or else stories that didn't do these things and that people felt were boring, but...

They're good ideas, but they can fail you if you don't understand why they work. For example...

Starting in medias res is cool because it skips boring exposition, but it can fail if the reader doesn't understand the current action or why it's happening. They'll feel lost and confused.

Starting with action is fun and exciting! But that excitement can feel bland if the reader doesn't understand the reasons for any of it. They'll get bored quickly.

Starting with a mystery is cool and intriguing. ("Where am I? Who am I?") But it can fall flat if the mystery feels forced ("Oh right, I slept over at my friend's house last night.") or if the mystery is only maintained because details are deliberately held from the reader (like a novel that refuses to name the protagonist for several pages just to be clever). The reader may feel tricked or patronized.

Intriguing first lines are basically always cool but only if you pay out on them. It could feel pretty disappointing to read "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times... and then the murders began." only to find out that the "murders" are just gathering crows or something.

But if you'll look carefully, each of the above tips can fail in the same way: An opening doesn't work if the reader doesn't understand what's going on.

It's not enough to start a novel with the protagonist running for her life through a dark forest. We need to know why they're running? From whom? What happens if they get caught?

Within a page or two, the reader can ideally answer these questions:

• Who is there?
• What do they want?
• Why do they want it?
• What happens if they don't get it?

If an opening has those things, it won't matter whether the novel starts with a literal explosion or inside a quiet coffee house. Either way, you'll have an invested reader.

Characters We Care About: Goals and Motivation

Probably the most important thing a story can do is make the reader care about its characters. There are a number of factors in what makes us care about someone, but today we're going to talk about one of the most important ones: your protagonist's goals and motivations.

1. What does the character want?
2. Why does the character want it?

Readers want to root for your characters, but to do so, they have to know what they're rooting for and why. If you give them that, they'll love your characters forever.

What Does the Character Want?

If the reader doesn't know what a character wants, then very little that character does matters. They're just walking around doing stuff. Think of the beginning of A New Hope. There's a bunch of action, a bunch of people getting shot and dying, a big scary dude in a cape and mask walking onto the ship. The opening crawl covers some basic info, but it's difficult to care* until C-3P0 says, "We'll be destroyed for sure" and "There'll be no escape for the princess this time."

He cares about someone. She's in danger.

So we start to care.

The reader doesn't need this information right away, but the sooner the better. You've only got a few pages to grab most readers, and the first step in doing that is giving the reader something to root for.

*Because infodumps rarely work.

Why Does the Character Want It?

Watch any reality competition or any sports on TV. One of the main things they ask the competitors is, "Why is this win important to you?"

The competitors we care most about are those with the most compelling reasons: "I'm doing it for the folks back home." "This is my chance at a better life." "Everyone said I couldn't do it. I have to prove to myself that I can."

Compelling motivation makes for good television and great storytelling. For example:

• Harry Potter wants to succeed at Hogwarts. If he doesn't, he goes back to his awful life with the Dursley's.
• Luke Skywalker wants to find out what R2-D2's hidden message means. If he does, he'll be able to answer questions he's long held about his father and Ben Kenobi and ultimately himself.
• Katniss Everdeen doesn't just want to win the Hunger Games so she can survive. She wants to get back to her family so they can survive as well.
• Zuko wants to find the avatar, not just to restore his honor but to be allowed to return home and to prove he's worthy to be his father's son.*

*Think about it. When did you start caring about Zuko? For me, it was the episode "The Storm" when his uncle told his men why Zuko was so driven that he hurt the people around him.

It was when we learned his motivation. 

Motivations are sometimes framed as stakes, but the idea is the same. Your protagonist wants to achieve something, and they need a compelling reason to achieve it—one that the reader can stand up and cheer for.

It's one of those things that's not hard and it is at the same time. For those of us who tend to focus on world-building and plot, we can get lost in "what needs to happen" and forget about why it needs to happen. But that "why" is paramount.

Because if you can get the reader to root for your characters, then you will have found something every writer hopes to find: a fan.

On the Importance of Democracy

One of my kids told me they didn't really think they were gonna vote when they turned 18, and I felt like I failed as a father. I know that's a common feeling (am I right, fathers?), but it drove me to action. I don't want to fail them, and I don't want to fail you, so you get to be my temporary children for the next few minutes.

You gotta vote.

I don't mean that in a burdensome obligation kind of way, but in a "Hey, it's actually pretty cool we live in a time and place where our opinion has meaning!" kind of way.

It's a safe bet that you have lived your whole life in a democracy. I know I have. Because of that, it's easy to take it for granted that (1) we can always vote (that's what all countries do, right?) and (2) our vote doesn't feel like it does anything.

But here's the thing. If you live in a country without a democracy (or with a fake/failed democracy, like say Russia), your opinion is worthless—sometimes even dangerous. The people in charge of your country/state/city/school are chosen by other people for reasons you don't even get to know about. The law is whatever those leaders say it is. And there's nothing you can do to change it short of some sort of rebellion, which are notoriously difficult to organize and bad for the health of everyone involved (historically speaking).

Voting's easy though. Among other things, the organizing has been done for you, and most laws ensure a minimum of bloodshed. Most importantly, your voice matters.

Yeah, your voice doesn't make change alone—it's the collective voice of thousands or millions of people—but your voice is part of those millions. Change happens when we speak together.

Despite popular opinion, there are electable representatives who care about people and who will fight for change that serves all people. These candidates aren't always available at the highest levels of government, but guess what! The highest levels of government are not the ones that matter the most!

Sure, it'd be nice if the federal government finally ended Daylight Savings Time, raised the minimum wage, or did literally anything about 70% of the world's mass shootings. But state and local governments can and do make those kinds of changes all the time, and your vote carries orders of magnitude more weight in those elections. And when enough cities and states make a successful change, the federal government eventually just goes along with it.

And while you're there, vote for the highest levels of government too. It's just one extra dot.

Voting isn't the end-all fix to the world—nothing is. But so long as we live in a place where it's an option, voting is one of the easiest, most important ways to help.

I know there's a lot going on in the world right now. Hope is a hard thing to maintain, but hope is absolutely vital to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Voting itself is a kind of hope, and you know what they say....

AI and Why We Write in the First Place

Recently, the organization behind National Novel Writing Month (which challenges writers to write 50,000 words in the month of November) officially condoned the use of generative AI and said anyone who didn't like it was classist and ableist.

People got mad about that.

So, let's talk about AI for a bit, what it can do, what it can't do, and whether it should have any place in the writing process.

What do we mean by "AI"?

As always, let's define terms first. This post is not talking about AI that defines enemy behavior in Pac-Man nor the fictional, self-aware AIs of Terminator and I, Robot. We are specifically talking about generative AI or large language models (LLMs).

In a technical sense, generative AI is closer to Pac-Man than Skynet. In science fiction—including science fiction that I wrote!—AIs are self-aware and sentient, capable of complex and original thought. But that's not how any of our current technology works, not now nor in the foreseeable future.

What we call artificial intelligence today is not, in fact, intelligent. LLMs are very powerful, very structured predictive text generators. They are very good at putting together strings of words that sound good and are grammatically correct (i.e., modeling language), but they have no idea what any of it means. They don't even have a way to know.

This is an important point, and we can't get anywhere in discussing the topic unless we agree on it.

So.

What can AI do?

In an ideal world (not an ethical one—we'll get to that in a sec), generative AI can do a bunch of things for writers in theory, like...

• ...brainstorm a list of ideas.
• ...edit text to be grammatically correct.
• ...write a whole damn story.

And that sounds amazing, which is why the CEOs of the world have been throwing everything they have at this tech.

But there are some inherent and (because of the way LLMs fundamentally work) insurmountable problems.

What AI can't do

Remember that part about AI not understanding what anything means? Turns out, that causes some problems.

AI can't brainstorm a list of original ideas. They might sound original to you, but there is nothing AI can come up with that hasn't been thought of or remixed already. In fact, because LLMs are trained to produce something that sounds good rather than something that is unique, the list you get will be the most mediocre ideas you can pull from a quick Google search. Helpful perhaps, but never ground-breaking.

"But, Adam, didn't you say there are no ideas so original that they are unlike anything that has come before?"

I did! I also said that novelty doesn't come from original ideas but from combining them with your unique life, experience, voice, and story.

An AI doesn't have any of those things.

An AI editor can't ensure the author's voice or intended meaning is maintained. Again, this is because AI has no idea what words mean. It only knows which words statistically appear in a given sequence to be considered "correct" by humans (plus whatever extra guidelines and guardrails its programmers placed on top of it). Your text will sound correct, intelligent even, but it will also sound generic. You will no longer be in it.

(Note that if you are looking for a way to make your text great while maintaining your intended meaning and unique voice, that's exactly what I do.)

AI can write a whole damn story but not a story that's worth a damn. Sure, it'll sound smart. Statistical models (and a soupçon of plagiarism) ensure that. But it won't mean anything. Nothing connects. Nothing has a point, and nothing is being said, because the AI has nothing to say and isn't aware that "saying something" with your story is even a thing.

Should writers use AI at all then?

In a brighter timeline, I believe there are versions of us discussing how AI can be used to help with all the tedious stuff humans have to do so we can have more time to do something that matters—like make art. Or at the very least, we could discuss how AI can enhance our creativity rather than make it worse.

For example, brainstorming mediocre ideas isn't all that bad! I do that all the time with a Google search, helping me trigger new, unique ideas. And helping a poverty-stricken, non-native English speaker edit their story into passable English seems like a good thing. Even writing a whole damn story could be...

Well okay, I don't think that one's any good.

I mean, if I'm just using AI to churn out a story—even if I do the work of revising that story to sound good—at that point, what am I even doing then? I'm not making money. (Statistically speaking, publishing books is a terrible way to make money!) And I'm not even writing. At that point, I'm just editing someone else's mediocre prose at a loss.

In any case, those discussions are for a brighter timeline, one in which AI is 100% free and ethical. In our timeline, AIs have some ethical wrinkles:

• Big LLMs are trained on authors' writing without their permission.
• And they do an excellent job plagiarizing that writing without telling you it's plagiarized... because they have no idea.
• Corporations want LLMs to replace human writers and editors in order to increase profits for the already-rich.
• And as these corporations discover LLMs suck at writing, they try to rehire those human writers and editors to fix the LLMs' work at a fraction of their worth.
• By all accounts, training and using LLMs consumes a lot of power—like way more than it should considering what little we get out of it.

If we could get around those problems—if AI had consent for all the data it was trained on, if corporations used it to make creative lives better, if training and using one didn't consume as much electricity as a single Icelandic citizen uses in a year—then sure, maybe, AI might be useful for things like brainstorming or grammar checking.

But those are real problems, and personally, I can't get past them. (And AI's are only mediocre at brainstorming and grammar checking anyway.)

I've heard folks say the tech will get better, these problems are fixable, etc., etc. But coming from the computer science field myself and having studied LLMs back in the 20th century (GOOD GOD!), I'm unconvinced. The technology hasn't changed very much in that time, only the amount of data and server power available (and the billions of investment dollars to make it look like things are better).

So, I won't be using AI for the foreseeable future. Writing is hard, but not because humans are bad it. We're actually the only beings on Earth that are any good it! Making a computer write for me (and not very well) just makes me wonder: What am I buying with that time, when instead, I could be making something new?

That's me. I'm curious your thoughts (but do be kind in the comments if you want them to stay there).

Grounding the Reader in the Scene

In a first draft, we often write things as they occur to us. Maybe some dialogue first, an occasional gesture or action by one of the characters, throw in an emotion or two. The result might be something like this (for the purpose of illustration, I have hacked this passage from Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld):

"How long can we last without parts, Klopp?" Alek asked.

"Until someone lands a shell on us, young master."

"Until something breaks, you mean," Volger said.

Klopp shrugged. "A Cyklop Stormwalker is meant to be part of an army. We have no supply train, no tankers, no repair team."

Alek shifted the cans of kerosene in his grip. He felt like some vagabond carrying everything he owned.

A functional scene, but confusing for anyone other than the author. The reader only knows what you tell them, and the lines above don't say much by themselves.

Grounding a scene means imagining that you are painting a picture in the reader's head (because you basically are). Without any additional context, the reader has nothing in their mind, a white space with only the characters and objects you place in it as you name them.

By the end of the first line above, the reader knows there are two characters: Klopp and Alek. They might know something about these characters from previous scenes, but they don't know where the characters are or what they're doing now. All they have to imagine are two characters they know standing in empty space.

The third line adds another character: Volger. The reader now has to reimagine the scene, possibly even replaying the first two lines in their head to imagine Volger also being present. This slows the reader down as they have to rethink what they thought they knew.

The fourth line mentions a Cyklop Stormwalker, some kind of vehicle. Are they in this vehicle? Are they repairing it? Who knows? Not the reader, but they have to revise their mental image again. Finally, in the last paragraph, we get some visual. We know that Alek is carrying cans of kerosene, so maybe they're carrying these back to the Stormwalker, but where are they now? The author might know, but the reader doesn't

The most straightforward way to fix this is to ground the reader in the scene. Start the scene with a description that answers the questions: Who is here? Where is here? What are they doing?

For example in the passage above, we could add the following paragraph before the dialogue:

Alek, Klopp, and Volger trudged along the streambed, the kerosene sloshing with every step, its fumes burning Alek's lungs. With each of them carrying two heavy cans, the trip back to the Stormwalker already seemed much farther than the walk to town this morning.

With just a couple of sentences, we now know who is in the scene (Alek, Klopp, and Volger), where the scene is (along a streambed), and what they are doing (carrying kerosene back to the Stormwalker). This simple addition makes it far easier for the reader to visualize the scene, and they don't have to revise that mental image with each new line of dialogue.

But what if the reader stopped reading at the last chapter and hasn't picked the book back up in months? Or what if they were distracted when reading the last chapter? Or what if they just don't remember the details—or at least the important details—of what happened in the previous scene? It is often useful to drop a hint of where this scene occurs in the plot as well as in time and space, something like this:

And yet, thanks to Alek, they'd left behind most of what they needed.

This serves as a quick, clean reminder without needing to do a full recap. The reader knows something bad happened, and the line above will be enough to remind most readers what that thing was.

It also has the added benefit of implying what Alek feels in this scene, which is in some ways even more important.

Let's put it all together and add a little bit more of Alek's emotions to the scene (i.e., let me show you the full passage that I hacked apart for illustration):

Alek, Klopp, and Volger trudged along the streambed, the kerosene sloshing with every step, its fumes burning Alek's lungs. With each of them carrying two heavy cans, the trip back to the Stormwalker already seemed much farther than the walk to town this morning.

And yet, thanks to Alek, they'd left behind most of what they needed.

"How long can we last without parts, Klopp?" he asked.

"Until someone lands a shell on us, young master."

"Until something breaks, you mean," Volger said.

Klopp shrugged. "A Cyklop Stormwalker is meant to be part of an army. We have no supply train, no tankers, no repair team."

"Horses would have been better," Volger muttered.

Alek shifted the burden in his grip, the smell of kerosene mixing with the smoked sausages that hung around his neck. His pockets were stuffed with newspapers and fresh fruit. He felt like some vagabond carrying everything he owned.

"Master Klopp?" he said. "While the walker's still in fighting prime, why don't we take what we need?"

Now we have a scene that can be easily visualized, that doesn't require mental revision as the reader reads each new line, that reminds us what the characters are trying to accomplish, and that shows the character's emotions. In other words, we have a well-grounded scene.

Should this be what was written in the first draft? I mean, only if you already have a clear, clear idea of the scene from the start. For most of us, the first draft is essentially our pencil sketch of the story. Revision is where we make it read well, like I've done above.

I can't say that this is how Scott Westerfeld actually put this scene together, but it's how most of my scenes get put together and probably most of yours. Write what comes to mind first, then go back and make it look like you knew what you were doing all along.

And if you still need help, well, that's what editors are for.

Writing for the Market

A common question writers wrestle with is whether they should write what they love or write what will sell. This is an important question! But before I try to answer it, I need to drop an important truth:

Nobody knows what will sell.

I mean, we all make our guesses (and agents and editors are in a better position to gauge these winds than most of us), but it's not like Rowling sat down and decided that a story about a wizarding school was a gap in the market that would definitely be a hit. Heck, even publishers didn't know—the first Harry Potter book was rejected 12 times!

Trying to write a bestseller is like hitting a moving target with a paper airplane on a breezy day. It can probably be done? But it's easier if you can just throw a thousand airplanes.

I don't know about you, but I don't have that kind of time.

Here's what you can do though:

(1) Know your market. Read books that target the same audience you want to target. Learn what's out there. Try to understand why it works.

(2) Enjoy your market. The number of authors who can find success writing for a genre they don't like are very, very few. Most of us write what we write because we were readers first—because we like our genre!

You don't have to enjoy everything in your target market of course, but the books you don't like are selling for a reason. You may not agree with it, but it will help you immensely to try and understand what your audience sees in them.

(3) Write what you want to read. There are multiple reasons for this. One is because if you don't enjoy it, neither will your readers, but another is because you're gonna be reading this book a lot.

(4) Put yourself in your work. There are no ideas so original that they are unlike anything that has ever come before, but there is no one else in the world with your life, your experience, your voice, or your story. The one thing every breakout hit has in common is novelty, and nobody can write you but you. Use that.

(5) Don't give up. Not everyone is going to be a success, but failure doesn't exist. If something doesn't work, examine why and try again.

Nobody knows what will go viral (and if you do, please explain this to me), but there are elements within your control. You just have to try stuff and see what works. Know your market, take risks, and be yourself. It's the best any of us can do.

Question for you: Is there a novel that you think shouldn't be popular but is? What do you think draws readers to it?

Sample Edits

Finding an editor for your work can be really hard. "How do I know whom to trust? What if they don't understand my work and what I'm trying to do? Do I really want to pay so much money for someone to judge my soul?"

I can't answer that last question for you, but I can help with the rest. Here are a few things to hopefully make the decision of whether to hire me less scary:

Services and rates are clearly listed. You don't have to contact me for a quote or do any guesswork. Just look at my rates, do your own calculations and comparisons, and decide if it's worth the judging of your human soul.

I offer a free sample edit. This is the best way to see whether you click with my work (or I click with yours). I'll edit your first 1,000 words for free, and you can see whether my edit sparks joy (professionally speaking). All you have to do is reach out.

And what if you don't want to reach out just yet? What if you want to know what an edit from me looks like without risking your soul? Well, I got you. Below, you can see what one of my edits looks like: a sample edit on 1,000 words of a novel (used with the author's permission).

First is an example of my Deep Edit service, where I provide developmental editing and line editing in the same package. (Alternatively, you can hire me for just a Developmental Edit [in-depth comments on how you can improve your text at a macro level] or a Line Edit [tracked changes and comments to improve your text at the sentence and paragraph level].)

Here is a quick screenshot of the sample edit, and you can view the entire Deep Edit here.

Second is an example editorial letter, which comes with most of my services. This letter provides an overview of the strengths and weaknesses of your work. My editorial letters are fairly detailed (even on short documents like this sample). If you want fast, cheap, but good feedback, you can even get the editorial letter by itself as one of my services.

Here is a quick screenshot of the sample edit, and you can view the entire editorial letter here.

I hope that providing these samples can help ease your mind as you look for someone to edit your work, whether it's me, someone else, or no one at all. Only you can decide what will best serve you and your goals, and if you think that might be me, e-mail me at adamheine@gmail.com to get started.

Using Dialogue Tags (or "He Said She Said")

A very common issue I come across while editing is overuse of "fancy" dialogue tags like these:

He exclaimed

She cried out

They pleaded

He growled

She retorted

They taunted

These dialogue tags all have one thing in common: they stick out.

Does that make them super bad? Of course not! Used once in a while, these dialogue tags can punctuate an emotional moment very effectively. They become an issue, however, when they are overused.

Usually, the reason they get overused is when writers follow the otherwise excellent advice to avoid repetition. If you say your protagonist has "hair as black as the dark behind the stars," that's pretty cool! But it loses its impact the second time you say it, and by the third and fourth time, many readers will be bored or annoyed.

Fancy dialogue tags are the same. Even if you manage to use a different one with each dialogue (no easy feat), readers will notice—and start to become annoyed—when you use them every single time a character speaks.

So, you don't want to repeat words, but you also don't want to use fancy dialogue tags. What can you do? Fortunately, there's a loophole:

"Said" is invisible.

           ("Replied" and "asked" are mostly invisible too.)

It sounds like magic, but it's true. These tags are so common that most readers learn early on to ignore them. They don't even realize they're doing it! It's the same way we don't notice the repetition of words like "the" or "and." They're utility words that serve their purpose and are quickly ignored.

I mean, yes, the reader will notice it if you tag every single spoken line with "said" (more on that in a future post), but you can get away with far more saids than any other dialogue tag without your reader even batting an eye.

And you can save the fancy tags for the most specialist special moments so they can do their work.

How to Approach Writer's Block

I wrote about writer's block way back in the beforebeforetimes, but wouldn't you know I actually learned new things in the fourteen years since? Not just about writing but also about myself.

In this post, I'm going to talk about some common causes of writer's block and what you can do about it.

But first, let's define terms.

What is writer's block?

Writer's block is when you are trying to write but can't.

Maybe you're staring at a blinking cursor and waiting for words that won't come. Maybe you're writing and deleting the same sentence over and over and over again. Or maybe you're scrolling Instagram or washing dishes or doing something else that, sure, maybe you want to do, but it's not what you're supposed be doing right now.

Writer's block can look like a lot of different things, but it often has common causes. The solutions below might not be easy (if they were, you wouldn't need this post!), but hopefully they can help you trust your process. And trusting yourself is the real way out.

So, what's the reason for your block? I know of three big ones:

1. You don't know what happens next.
2. You're afraid that what you write won't be good enough.
3. There is a legit physical or mental reason you can't write.

Let's take a quick look at each of these.

Reason #1: You don't know what happens next

You might think you do. You might know what happens two or three scenes—or even just two or three paragraphs—from now, but you don't know how to get from here to there. Or maybe you wrote yourself into a corner and you literally don't know where to go from here.

First off, know that this is perfectly normal. We've all heard of authors who sit down to write and the words come flowing out of them, but that's far from typical. (I'm not even sure it exists.) Every writer I know has had to, at some point, stop and figure out what happens next.

SOLUTION: Brainstorm. What this looks like depends on your story and your process, but here are some of the things I do:

• Make a list of whatever ideas pop into my head. I don't judge them. I just add them to the list.
• Outline the next chapter/scene/paragraph.
• Take a long walk or a shower or something similar. Let my mind wander.
• Imagine my story is a D&D game and my characters are the players. What crazy things would my players try next?
• Write down what each character in the scene wants. Sometimes I discover that I don't actually know!

What works one time might not work the next, so try different things and see what sticks.

But what if you do know what happens next? What if you just don't know how to write it?

Reason #2: You're afraid that what you write won't be good enough

Sometimes, you can't think of the right words. Or maybe you can't stop thinking how hard this will be to revise later. Or maybe you're worried that the story isn't what you hoped or is a waste of time to begin with.

Again, these are perfectly normal things to feel. Even the most experienced authors struggle with these feelings (while writing books that later become bestsellers). They'll often tell you the same things.

SOLUTION: Give yourself permission to write garbage. Because there are two important truths to remember here:

1. You cannot be objective about what is good or bad while you're writing it.
2. Anything you write can be made better later. Anything.

Turn off the internet and stare at the page. Make yourself write one word—any single word. Then write one more—just one. Keep going like that until you have a sentence. Then do it again. Don't delete them! You can do that tomorrow!

You might also trick yourself with "temp text"—words that you know won't be in the final draft but that convey enough of the story to move forward. [I like to put mine in square brackets. It tricks my anxiety brain into not editing it, and it's easy to search for later.]

But what if the reason you can't write goes beyond "I don't know what to say" and into "I literally cannot make myself write"?

Reason #3: There is a legit physical or mental reason you can't write

Sometimes writer's block isn't about writing. Sometimes it's caused by a physical need, like you're hungry or tired. Or there might be an emotional need instead. Even if you have no fear of bad words and know exactly what happens next in the story, depression, anxiety, and burnout (among other things) can make it impossible to write.

Whether the block is physical, emotional, or something else, the solution is the same.

SOLUTION: Take care of yourself. Eat a snack. Take a nap. Meditate. Exercise. Listen to your body and give it what it needs. And if your body's needs are ongoing—like, something a simple snack won't fix—take stronger measures:

• Change your writing schedule to a better time for your body or mind.
• Readjust your writing goals to put less pressure on yourself.
• Seek professional help.

That last item is for me, because my fear is far beyond "My words aren't good enough." It often becomes "If my words aren't good enough, then my story won't be good enough, and then I won't be good enough, and then every bad thing I believe about myself will be true."

Of course, I didn't know that until I sought counseling (not for writing, but my writing fears came up). Sometimes, we need help, and that's okay. I still struggle to make myself write, but at least now, I'm more aware of the actual problems I need to address.

Whatever the cause of your writer's block, and whatever emotions you might feel, know that those feelings are normal and okay to have. They don't make you any less of a writer.

If anything, they prove you are one.

Blogging Again in 2024? Heck yeah.

This is not a drill, folks. I hear tell blogging died a long time ago. Well, guess what? Necromancy is a thing! I have need of this space, and I refuse to let the algorithms determine my internet experience. (And anyway, if social media is meant to be a replacement, I'd like to file some complaints.)

Here's the deal. After several years of freelancing in gamedev, my long-term contracts have wrapped up, so I'm returning the thing I love the most: helping writers get better at this word-writey thing we do.

I'm gonna offer that in two forms:

1. Free tips here on the blog
2. Professional editing for hire

That's right, you can hire me for editing again! Or spread the word to your writer friends! Because rebooting a freelance business is sketchy, and I appreciate all the help I can get. (Plus, I'm really good at editing. Ask anyone.)

So I'm dusting this thing off (and BOY was it dusty!) and plugging myself back in. If you wanna be here to see what comes next, subscribe or find my socials in the sidebar.

And if you'd like to hire me for editing, you can start that process right here.

I'm glad to be back on this thing. Change is scary, but I love editing and I love helping people. I'm excited about where this is going, and I hope you'll join me.

NOTE: If you were subscribed to my blog in the beforetimes, then hi! Welcome back! How have you been?

You're probably still subscribed, but if things look different from what you remember, it's because my old subscription service is dead and I had to find a Feedburner alternative. Thankfully, some parts of the internet still do things for those of us who were here when it began—even if they tack ads onto everything.

Finding What Works for You

Hey, look! A post!

Let's talk a bit about online presence—how writers and other creatives are told (or expected) to have one whether they like it or not. You gotta be on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and blogging (well, maybe not blogging anymore, but I will! Sometimes! Screw you, conventional wisdom!).

So the two of you who pay attention know that I've been streaming on Sunday nights for *checks calendar* about a year now. I started because it looked like fun, because I thought it would be a good way to play games I couldn't play around my kids, and because I saw people gathering an audience and I thought, "Hey, maybe I could do that."

Understand, I know how hard it is to build an audience, and I know nothing makes that happen overnight. I never expected to have hundreds of viewers who would all run to buy my books. I figured I'd just build something small—like I did here and on Twitter and Facebook—and maybe, maybe when I had something to sell or to say, that would be another platform for it. And I'd get to play games in the meantime.

Anyway, it turned out not to be as fun as I thought.*

* For me. Other people have fun with it, and that's awesome, but it just wasn't meshing with my schedule or personality.

I am no longer streaming. Could I have built an audience? Sure. But I realized I was no longer looking forward to it, and the idea of not streaming felt like... relief.

And that's my point. When you're looking at ways to build an audience or online presence, you have to HAVE TO evaluate what works for you—what do you enjoy, what comes naturally, what do you look forward to (at least most of the time)? Because otherwise... it just won't work no matter how hard you bang your head on it.

And besides, streaming (and blogging and tweeting and instagraming and... tumbling?) doesn't sell books. Books sell books. And now I have a little bit more time to do that.

So anyway, there's your conventional wisdom for today. Also your general update: I'm still working on stuff for you to enjoy, but I've got nothing finished or announced yet.

I do have a progress chart for the mobile gamebook though (I post updates for this on Twitter and Facebook occasionally). Here's where I am:

I hope to have this thing turned in by early July. We'll see.

So what are you working on?

Editing Tip: Consistency, Consistency, Consistency

I know it's been a while. I've been ridiculously busy, but as promised, here's a quick editing tip on something I always wished I had known and now I do.

So, I'm a very meticulous human being (most of the time). I like precision, accuracy, and the difference between the two. I like knowing the right way to do things, and I very much like doing things that way.

Which is why the English language drives me absolutely nutty.

One space after a period or two? Leaped or leapt? Jesus' or Jesus's? God damn it, God dammit, or gorramit? How the hell do you pronounce gif? Lots of people have opinions on these things, and many will tell you there is a right answer to them. And there is a right answer, but it's much more wibbly-wobbly than we want to hear:

The correct choice for most spelling, punctuation, and style questions is the choice that is used consistently.

Really.

Really, really.

It honestly doesn't matter whether you use one space or two after a period so long as you do one or the other consistently. How you spell "damn it" doesn't matter so long as you do so consistently. Whether you italicize foreign words or not doesn't matter so long as you do so consistently.

"Hold on," you say. "Does that mean I could choose not to capitalize any words at all, and that would be correct so long as I'm consistent? Isn't that objectively bad grammar?"

There is surprisingly little that is objective when it comes to language. But yes, that is usually considered bad grammar...

And yes, you can do it so long as you're consistent. E. E Cummings was famous for doing exactly that as well as screwing with punctuation and word order in general. And lest you think "Well, that's poetry," R. J. Palacio did the same thing for some chapters of the wonderful Wonder, even eschewing basic punctuation like periods and quotation marks.

So even grammar is just like the other "rules" of writing—you can break them so long as you do so intentionally and consistently.

Will it work? Well, that depends on what you're doing and how difficult it is for the reader. But there's nothing that says you can't try.


"Okay, wait. My editor told me I have to put one space after every period, regardless of what my typing teacher taught me. Why can't I do it my way like you're saying so long as I'm consistent?"

That's because your editor is following what's called a style guide—a list of rules they follow to make sure that everything they work on is consistent not just within each work but across every work they publish. Style guides are lovely because they do tell you what is right and wrong (kind of), allowing you to have that feeling of being Right (usually).

Most publishers have their own style guides, which are likely (but not necessarily) based on the Chicago Manual of Style. They are also probably using a specific dictionary (and a specific edition of that dictionary) to determine how words should be spelled to be consistent.

For example, the CMoS recommends one space after a period, serial commas in lists of items, and capitalizing words the way you learned in elementary school. If you're talking about what's "objectively" correct, the CMoS (along with other, similar style guides) is the closest thing you're going to get.

But even the CMoS only "recommends" certain things, stopping just shy of laying down the law. I hope to write more of these posts, exploring some of what the CMoS says about certain rules (rules I always wondered about but have become much more clear on lately), but in the meantime, you can find the answers to a lot of rules' questions with a little Googling, the full content of the 16th edition of the CMoS, or if you're really hardcore, a subscription to CMoS 17.

Or ask me! What questions have you always had about what is objectively right or wrong? If I don't already know the answer, I probably should (given my current, primary means of business), and I am more than happy to research it.

[UPDATE: I am a horrible person because for some reason I had typed that CMoS recommends two spaces after a period when I know, I know it does not. This has been corrected, and I have been self-flogged severely as a result.]

March Update

I've got a writing tips post for you next week, but here's where things stand with me now:

• I'm writing dialogue for a game I can't announce yet (but will as soon as I'm allowed). There should be a reveal trailer soon, though I don't expect the actual game to be done for several months or more.
• I'm writing a gamebook-as-mobile-app (I'm doing the writing and choice design; the publisher is doing the systems design and actual functionality). So far, I've turned in three chapters out of ten. I hope to have it all done within two to three months, at which point... we'll see.
• I recently finished a crapload of big editing projects (hence the silence here), which is kind of nice because I feel like I don't have to worry about money for a few weeks. Some of them are exciting too, like a major RPG rulebook and a couple of tie-in novellas to a major MMORPG.
• I've been streaming Cuphead (stream is here, archived videos here). This is a ridiculously hard game, folks, but it's fun to be forced to work my way through it in public. I've also recently streamed Portal 1 and 2 with my parents alongside me and River City Ransom: Underground with my family and friends.
• My brother roped me in to Sea of Thieves, and although I don't have a lot of time for it, I'm awfully glad he did. I love everything about it so far, but nothing more than concertinas and hurdy-gurdies.

I know there are a lot of vagueries in those earlier bullet points, but that's because there are a lot of NDAs in those bullet points. I have a feeling I'll be announcing a lot of things all at once one of these days. Until then, vagueries are what you get.

So how are things with you?

Brief Work Notice

My last, large editing project has come in, and I have a new game design gig starting on Monday. Consequently, I will (probably) be too busy to post here until the editing project is done sometime in March. You know, for the two of you who care about such things.

When I do post, I have some writing/editing tips for you—things I always wish I had known and now I do.

Books I Loved in 2017

Late, I know, but meh. Here were some books I read and enjoyed in 2017. As with my games post, I'm mostly leaning toward books you are, perhaps, less likely to have heard of.


HAMMERS ON BONE by Cassandra Khaw

John Persons is a private investigator hired by a ten-year-old to kill the kid's stepdad. But he finds that something much worse is wrong with the stepdad . . . and the town. Fortunately, John Persons is a bit more than a, uh, person, and therefore qualified to handle creepy night horrors.

I am so glad to have learned of this author this year. She twirls words around her like a gymnast's ribbon. Hammers on Bone is a delicious combination of noir, cthulhu-style horror, and beautiful prose, and I can't wait to read more of Khaw's work.


BACK OFF, I'M A NINJA by Natalie Whipple

This is the final book in Natalie's Relax, I'm a Ninja trilogy about a Japanese-American teen ninja named Tosh, who discovers he's one half of an awesome, demon-hunting duo. I won't spoil the third one if you haven't read any yet, because you should really read all of them.

Tosh manages to be cool and geeky at the same time, and in the last two books in particular, I loved his relationship with Amy. Honestly, Tosh and Amy make me want to be a better husband, which is a weird thing to say about a young adult book about ninjas and demons. I love the Japanese mythology used throughout the trilogy, too. These books are just tons of fun.


THE NIGHT CLAVE by Monte Cook and Shanna Germain

Set in the world of Numenera, a group of friends make a desperate attempt to rescue their people from a mind-controlling tyrant. (Full disclosure: I proofread this book.)

Aside from the Numenera world (which is so much weird and fun), I really enjoyed the relationships between the characters. The heist aspect was great, but the relationship and banter between the two main characters just made me so happy.


ON THE EDGE OF GONE by Corinne Duyvis

A comet is scheduled to hit the Earth. This is the story of a young girl named Denise and her struggle to survive—and find her sister—both during and after impact.

What I love most about this book is how Corinne makes an impact apocalypse in Amsterdam feel just as real as Denise's autism. I really enjoyed experiencing both.


THE CITY STAINED RED by Sam Sykes

An awesome, classic, fantasy adventure starring an unlikely group of adventurers trapped in a city about to be wiped out by feuding gangs and ancient demons. This is such a fun world, and the story feels like a D&D campaign gone very, very wrong in all the best ways.

Even though the novel screams D&D, the story rests heavily on the characters and their personal struggles, and so it doesn't fall into any of the classic RPG traps. So it's a novel screaming D&D (which I love) while telling an awesome story about conflicted characters (which I love). So yeah, awesome.



Next up, I hope to finish Garth Nix's Abhorsen trilogy. What are you reading these days?

On Being Late to the Party (and a Quick Update)

So far, my months of too much work are going well. I've finished editing one novel and one novella, and the other projects have been sufficiently late in coming that I've had time to do so. I guess I made a good decision saying yes to too much!

Also, the gamebook is definitely going to be a thing now (meaning I've signed a contract). It's going to be several months coming, but it will come. So that's something to look forward to.

The other day, I had a mini-rant on Twitter about being late to the party. Let's all agree to stop using this phrase and just enjoy things, yeah?

I would be okay never again hearing someone apologize that they're "late to the party" when talking about something they love. 1/4

— Adam Heine (@adamheine) January 19, 2018

We can't all consume stuff right when it comes out, nor should we be expected to. You do you, man. Enjoy whatever, whenever. 2/4

— Adam Heine (@adamheine) January 19, 2018

Also—and it hurts that I have to say this—don't shame someone for not consuming a thing when it came out. Seriously, who are you? 3/4

— Adam Heine (@adamheine) January 19, 2018

As a creator, I LOVE it when someone discovers a thing I made years ago.

You're not late to the party. You ARE the party. 4/4 pic.twitter.com/wgK1Q4xY1P

— Adam Heine (@adamheine) January 19, 2018

When Things Fall Through

I got some hard news this week. The editor who was looking at Sea of Souls decided to pass. I still have a lot of good things going on, but this one just . . .

So that was a hard day. But to my surprise, it was only a day. Maybe it's because I still have other things on the horizon or because I've been focusing on being thankful and redefining success, but this loss didn't kill me like it would have years ago—maybe even a year ago.

When I lost the Nexon gig last summer, I scrambled to find work, e-mailing everyone I knew and following every thread. And one thing I learned is that like 80% of those threads—even the ones that came with promising words at the start—also fall through, but it doesn't matter so long as one or two of them sticks.

Heck, even my surfeit of work is not a sure thing until I have projects in hand. But that's okay; the whole reason I take on so much is so I don't have to freak out when some of it disintegrates.

So yeah, I'm thinking maybe I don't (yet) have what the Big 5 publishers are looking for (yet), but I have what Broken Eye Books, Scribendi, [redacted game company], and a few other clients are looking for—and I have an amazing family with enough money to feed them for a while yet. So things ain't so bad. I even briefly imagined life without any writing at all, and you know what? It was still a pretty good life.

(Don't worry. I'm still going to write.)

A part of me (a very, very small part) is even glad Sea of Souls dropped, because now I have more time for other projects people do want. And, man, if there's one thing I need, it's more time.

If those fall through, too? Well, I'll figure that out later. Until then, I'll keep enjoying what's in front of me.

A Look at 2017 and the Alleged 2018

2017 was . . . an interesting year. Aside from the dumpster fire, I went from four years of reliable, steady work to juggling chainsaws.

Don't misunderstand me. Before Torment, I had no work at all, and our enormous family was slowly hemorrhaging money. Torment was literally (in the literal definition of literally) a Godsend, and although freelancing has been bumpy as hell this year, the connections I've made in the last five years are the only thing that has made any of it possible.

So! Looking back at 2017:

1) Torment was released. Not unlike the first one, sales have been unimpressive (so I hear; it's not like I see any financial reports), but the critics love it as do most of the people who have played it.

If history is any indicator, we can expect its successor to be the next crowd-funded success in another fifteen years.

2) I worked for Nexon . . . and now I don't. I realize now I didn't talk about this much on the blog, but yeah, I was doing game writing (and a little design) for a prototype for Nexon which the high-ups ultimately passed on. They not only passed on the prototype, but also the whole team, which unfortunately included me. But hey, I got paid for several months and had time to write on the side, so I ain't complaining.

3) I became a professional editor. I have begun editing for both private clients as well as the online editing firm Scribendi. The combination of these has made for steady work (private clients aren't always there, but they pay great and are super fun; Scribendi is always there).

When I started, I was somewhat hesitant about my editing abilities. I knew I had great attention to detail and a lot of experience with plotting and world-building, but I felt like there was a lot I didn't know about the editing world. Now, thanks in part to Scribendi's training courses, I super know what I'm doing. I edit. I'm an editor. And I love it.

4) I started streaming. Thanks to the magic of the internet, I've been able to play games I've been meaning to play, hang out with my family, and meet other gamers all at the same time. Streaming is a lot of fun, and I expect to keep doing it for a while. (I wish I could do it more, but making money on streaming is a lot more work than advertised.) If you'd like to join us, I stream most Sundays here or you can catch up on previous streams here.


As wacky as this year has been, I'm pretty happy with the state of my life. Torment was fun and amazing and I regret almost none of it, but I also essentially ignored my family for four years with a single credit to show for it. As a result, I learned important things about freelancing that have resulted in me making more money (or "enough" money, which really is better) with less time.

With that, here's a quick look at what 2018 might look like:

It starts with a lot of work. Like too much. But it's all awesome work, and some of it might lead to more work, and most importantly it means I don't have to worry about money for a while, which is always nice.

Cunning Folk. I've been talking with publishing folks about a book that long-time readers will recognize. I recently read my first draft and . . . yeah, I definitely wrote it a long time ago. There's a lot of dust to blow off it, and a lot of pieces that need a writer more experienced than past-Adam was, but there's also a definite possibility to publish some version of this book. I'm looking forward to that.

Blogging. Perceptive readers will notice that I've posted regularly for six weeks in a row now. Will this return to the glory days continue? Stay tuned to find out!

Streaming with my parents. My parents come to visit us a few weeks every year. This year, I'm going to see about introducing them (and myself) to a little game called Portal, and you can watch the fun.

Sea of Souls? The outline's on the editor's desk. We'll see.

Post-Apoc Ninjas? Also on editors' desks, but keep in mind it's been there for a while.

Gamebook? There are some unknowns here, so I can't say much about it. More news when there is news. (But, man, is it fun to write!)


So how are you all? Highlights from 2017? What are you looking forward to in 2018?

Freelancing (and Mini Work Update)

Based on a true story. (And my apologies to Alex Norris whose schtick I have borrowed.)

If all goes according to plan, I will have a novel, two novellas, and a large RPG rulebook to edit, plus I may have a new part-time game design gig. I realize this is a good problem to have, but I'm looking at where I'm going to fit everything in the next 2–3 months.

I can fit everything. It's just a question of how much my unpaid projects suffer—I suspect quite a lot.

Also, this is exactly the time of year my parents are coming to visit.

Oh no.

I'm grateful though, for real. Among other things, I feel less guilty about taking a week off for the holidays. It's been a long time since I've taken a guilt-free vacation. I'd almost forgotten that was a thing people did.

So! How are your holidays going?

Games I Loved in 2017

Here are a few games I absolutely loved this year. You should check them out.

As with previous posts in this vein, these are just games I played in 2017. I don't have enough time or money to decide the best games published this year. Also note that this list is intentionally skewed toward games you might not have heard of. Mostly.

MAGES OF MYSTRALIA
A Zelda-like action adventure where you play a young mage living in a kingdom where magic has been outlawed. The art style is sweet, and the world and story are lovely (created by Ed Greenwood of Forgotten Realms fame), but what really makes this game awesome is the core mechanic of programming your own spells with the rune system.

I mean, it's not full programming, and there are definitely some runes that are more gimmicky than useful, but there's a lot of depth and exploration to the system, and I never got tired of playing around with it.

OVERCOOKED
A fast-paced couch co-op in which you and up to three friends try to serve up as many orders as possible. This game is no good single-player, but it's one of the most fun and chaotic party games I've ever played.

My only complaint is that managing a kitchen full of my own children is indistinguishable from managing them in real life.

ABZU
This is what the kids call a walking simulator (swimming simulator, actually). You start the game floating off the shore of a coral reef, uncertain who you are or why you're there. As you swim through the game's levels, you begin to learn about the civilization that fell and your part in it.

There's not a lot of game here other than exploration, but everything about it is gorgeous: the graphics, the world, the visual storytelling, the music. If you play games as a break, and Overcooked sounds stressful, then try Abzu for a super-relaxing, wonderful time.

MR. SHIFTY
A fast beat-em-up game in which you play a teleporting thief—basically Nightcrawler without the blue skin. You are infiltrating a high security corporate tower that very quickly becomes alerted to your presence. You have no tools except for super strength and the ability to teleport a few feet at a time.

This is one of the most fun, visceral games I've played in a long time. Everything about the game feels awesome, from taking out ten armed men in two seconds to Mr. Shifty's cool, slow walk as he leaves a scene. Even the elevator music between levels somehow serves to make you feel more like a badass.

THE WITNESS
This is the most engrossing, challenging, and satisfying puzzle game I've played since Myst—better than Myst, really. You start the game in a dark tunnel beneath a mysterious island, and for a long time that's literally all the information you get about what's going on. The game teaches you nothing directly, asking you to figure everything out on your own a piece at a time. I spent over 50 hours on this island ferreting out every secret I could, and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Warning: This is not a story game. The Witness is very much about the journey, not the destination. As a direct consequence, you don't want to use a walkthrough on it; you will only disappoint yourself.


So what did you play this year? Anything I just have to try?

Difficulty Curves and Mega Man

Those of you who have been following me on Facebook or Twitter might know that I've been making my way through the Mega Man Legacy Collections.

When you think all the fictional names you come up with are crap, remember there is a character in Mega Man named Bombombomb. pic.twitter.com/0W6qAyvkna

— Adam Heine (@adamheine) October 20, 2017

These games are not easy, and it's made me think about game difficulty curves and why I like Mega Man so much, despite the fact that Mega Man's difficulty curve is super weird.

Before this is going to make any sense, we need to talk about what a difficulty curve is. The standard curve looks like this:

Here's how it works. A game starts out super easy, allowing the player to learn the controls and rules. It gradually gets harder until the first checkpoint, like a boss or increasingly strong monsters before a new experience level. When the player has overcome this obstacle, the game is a little easier for a time while the player learns the rules of the next level or their new abilities. This rise-and-fall continues, growing gradually more difficult overall, until the player reaches the final, most difficult boss/puzzle/whatever and wins the game.

This curve provides a balance between too easy and too hard, giving the player a healthy mix of facing difficult challenges and feeling super awesome about themselves. As such, this difficulty curve is used in most modern games.

Mega Man's weird, though.

Every Mega Man game follows the same basic formula. The player is initially faced with a set of bosses that can be defeated in any order. Upon defeating each boss, the player gains a new weapon, and over time they discover that each boss is weak to a specific weapon of another boss.

After the initial set of bosses, the player must make their way through Dr. Wily's (or sometimes a different Dr.'s) castle. The castle levels are designed knowing that the player has access to every special weapon, meaning the player will be called upon to use most weapons at some point. At the end, the player faces the initial bosses again, all at once, before facing a final boss (spoiler: it's always Dr. Wily).

This means every Mega Man game is difficult from the start, when the player has no special weapons, and gets gradually easier as they defeat each boss. The easiest time in the game is the final boss before the castle, when the player has nearly all the special weapons and can deduce which will defeat the boss. Then the castle levels get increasingly difficult again, leading up to Dr. Wily.

Mega Man is one of the most popular game franchises in history, spawning over 50 games and selling over thirty million copies worldwide. But the originals were freaking hard! My son sat down to play Mega Man 1 for the first time and got his butt kicked. He has yet to beat a single boss.

Why the heck does this work? Because Mega Man knew exactly where it fit in the gaming world. Not only was the original released in a time when difficult video games were the norm, but look at Mega Man's difficulty curve when we put it up against the normal one:

Mega Man's difficulty curve does not exist in isolation. For people new to the run-and-gun genre, Mega Man was rough, but for people who had played games like Contra, Rush'n Attack, Castlevania, and Metroid, Mega Man was just a different point in a curve they were already familiar with.

I suspect this is why ridiculously difficult games like Dark Souls and Cuphead are as popular as they are, too. They aren't targeting the casual gamer; they're targeting people who have traversed the curve so many times that they don't mind jumping ahead to the hard bit (plus bragging rights are pretty cool, too).

Thoughts on this? Reminiscences about how awesome Mega Man was? What other games have weird difficulty curves? To the comments!

Success You Can Control

When we start writing, a lot of us do it, at least in part, to be "successful" (maybe just me, but I'll assume a lot of us because it makes me feel better). By successful, I mean like famous, best-selling, award-winning, rich, amazing whatever. And we know, we KNOW we can't control it, but it so feels like we can. Shoot, I've been writing professionally for almost a decade and have been rejected more times than the 45th US president has lied on record, and I still feel like I can control it.

(Sad that this had to get political? Me too, man. *heavy sigh* Me too.)

It's not just writing either. This is true in basically every creative industry and probably a fair number of non-creative ones as well. But what do you do when success doesn't come? Like, for years and years and years and . . . nothing?

There are lots of ways to deal with it, but I think they all boil down to these two: either give up or redefine success.

Now, when I say "redefine success," I don't mean give up on your big goal-dream of making it big; that's just giving up. I mean redefine your goals to be something in your control so that you're not just pulling yourself out of bed each morning, but rather you're jumping out of bed because you have another successful day ahead of you.

This is what I've been doing lately. I've still got big dreams, and I'm working hard toward them: I have a novel outline in the hands of a Big 5 editor. I have a mobile gamebook in the works. I hope to carve time to write some more novellas. But my happiness isn't resting on those things. They're way too far out, and too much of it is out of my hands. Saying my book has to sell or my game has to hit it big is just begging for depression.

So where is my happiness? Partially, I'm still trying to make myself truly believe these things, but here's where I want it to lie:

• In making enough money each day to feed my family well and maybe take them to a movie every once in a while.
• In spending time with my family.
• In having time and purpose to create something that I love.
• In having time to play a game or watch Netflix every so often.

I have so many freaking projects that if I put my happiness in any one of them -- or all of them all at once -- I'd end up working 28-hour days only to have the project flop while simultaneously missing out on what makes these projects worth doing at all.

So I'm trying to take things slow, one day at a time and enjoying my family at each step. How about you? What does success look like for you?