Writing Excuses 10.22: Project-In-Depth – Of Noble Family

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Writing Excuses 10.22: Project-In-Depth – Of Noble Family

From http://www.writingexcuses.com/2015/05/31/writing-excuses-10-22-project-in-depth-of-noble-family/

Key points: Do your research! Antigua in 1818? Slavery or not? Great Britain? What really was happening? Write what you know, write what you made up... but when you write what other people know, that means research. Sometimes you will need an expert. Think about how you are going to handle translation, if any. Give your reader permission to not understand! Research may change your plot. Don't be afraid to use a new situation or conflict to re-examine aspects of your world. Go ahead and explore your world in other ways, too. Don't just change the labels, try having it work differently. Focus on your story first, and use the social issues and conflicts to stress your characters, show them reacting to illuminate the issues. 
( Plenty of words, keep reading... )

[Brandon] Not really, but we wished we were. But Dan, you have some homework for us.
[Dan] Yes. Your homework today is to do kind of a version of what Mary did with this story. We want you to take something common that... An activity or an object that you are familiar with, and then have a character describe it to someone with a completely different frame of reference. Whether that person is from another culture or from another planet, whatever it is, so that they have to describe it without using the common words that we all fall back on.
[Brandon] This has been Writing Excuses. You're out of excuses, now go write.