point of view – Page 10 – J. Scott Coatsworth

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Point of View: The Future is Now (And It Kinda Sucks)

December 5, 2022 by scott

We all grow up in a world we think we know. Not just that, but we assume it’s always been like this. That’s natural – we have no other personal frame of reference, other than old TV shows and movies (and of course books) that offer us a two-dimensional look at life the way it used to be. But times change, and with them, almost everything we take for granted does too. When I was in high school, back in the early-to-mid eighties, World War II was in the way far distant past. So far back that films were in … Read more

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Point of View: Diving Into Your Characters

November 28, 2022 by scott

Writing fascinating, well-rounded characters comes easily to some people. Character traits, past histories, and quirky, unique personalities seem to just flow out of their fingers and onto the page, and every book is a new adventure filled with a fascinating new cast. I am not one of those people. Are you? If you are, you can stop reading here. 🙂 I grew up devouring science fiction and fantasy, and I was hooked on the Big Concept. Dragons are real and can travel between in the blink of an eye? OMG, give me that book. Living space ships will carry humanity … Read more

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Point of View: It’s Halloween!

October 31, 2022October 31, 2022 by scott

I’m not much of a cosplayer. When I attend conventions, I never manage to think of a good costume concept for the inevitable Saturday night party, let alone actually pull one together. But when I was a kid, I loved getting dressed up for Halloween. The photo above was taken probably in 1979 or 1980, in front of my Grandpa John’s church – he was a pastor for the Disciples of Christ denomination – for the annual Halloween party there. Back then, we had community parties like this, as they do today, but the actual Halloween night house-to-house get-as-much-candy-as-you-can thing … Read more

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Point of View: The Writer’s Garden

October 10, 2022October 10, 2022 by scott

Regular readers know how much pleasure I take in my vegetable garden. In many ways it’s like writing – you carefully nurture each sprout until it grows into a beautiful plant which bears delicious fruit. Well, this year my garden has been an apt metaphor for my writing life. It started out promisingly enough. I planted some pepper and tomato seeds in the garage in February. They sprouted, and they grew and grew as it got warmer, stretching their leaves toward the sunny window. Then about a week before it was time to plant them, something in the garage – … Read more

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Point of View: When an Urse is Not a Horse

September 5, 2022September 5, 2022 by scott

I’ve been reading fantasy and sci-fi since I was in second grade – for those counting, that’s forty-six years. I always loved escaping into a different world through a good book, somewhere utterly unlike the place I knew growing up. I came by this desire honestly. My mother was (and still is) a voracious SFF reader, and was a card-carrying member of the Science Fiction Book Club. I worked my way through her shelf of other worlds one by one as a kid. I especially loved sci-fi that was set on another world, one that was full of strange ideas … Read more

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Point of View: That %$&*! Characterization Thing Again

August 29, 2022August 29, 2022 by scott

Every year or two, I circle back to my Achilles heel as a writer. I can build worlds with the best of them, and my intertwined plots are legendary. But I’ve always had more difficulty with characterization. I’m working through beta reads on book two of the Tharassas Cycle, and have been dinged by a couple readers for being inconsistent with a couple characters and drawing one too shallowly to support what comes later in the trilogy. And so I thought it would be fun to go back to my previous posts on the subject and see what I had … Read more

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Point of View: Laying the “Foundation” (Spoilers)

August 8, 2022August 8, 2022 by scott

Note: this column contains spoilers about the Foundation TV series. If you’ve not watched it yet you may want to wait until you do to read it. Because of my broken arm and surgery, I am still limited in what I can do. I can type to a certain extent, but my reach is not very far, mostly do self one-handed (insert jokes here) or via voice to text, which can create some interesting errors. Because of this, I am currently working from the couch, where it’s a lot more comfortable to use the keyboard on my laptop than the … Read more

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Point of View: Void Syndrome

August 1, 2022August 1, 2022 by scott

If you’ve been writing for any length of time, you’ve probably heard of “Imposter Syndrome.” It’s something that affects many writers, even really successful ones – that nagging feeling that you aren’t good enough, that you are just fooling everyone, and sooner or later someone will call your bluff. But there’s another thing that happens to writers that can be just as devastating and difficult to deal with – let’s call it “Void Syndrome.” It used to be enough to write a decent book, and then send it off to your publisher, letting them take care of everything publication and … Read more

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POINT OF VIEW: When Life Throws You a Curve Ball – Part Two

July 11, 2022 by scott

A few years ago, we had to decamp unexpectedly to Tucson for a family emergency. It threw everything into chaos, including my writing. Then life settled down to a pleasing predictability, and I was happily enjoying boring old normal life when BOOM! Our lives were turned on their heads in an instant. One moment I was speeding down the street on my bike, following Mark to Starbucks to meet a friend. And the next… BAM! I slammed into the sidewalk, hard, on my right arm, ribs and knee. I screamed and managed to turn over on my back, but I … Read more