Screenplay – Leif J. Erickson

Author, Books, Hero's Journey, Inspiration, Motivation, Novel, Outlining, Protagonist, Screenplay, Story Formula, Story Telling, Writing

Outlining

Think about a time you went on a vacation. You didn’t go to the airport and just hop on whatever plane had a seat open. You didn’t randomly drive to a town and start looking for a hotel with an open room. Like most people, you took time, planned how you were traveling, where you were staying, and looked at all the different options of what you could do. You compared places to go and things to do. You searched for the best rates and the packages that had the best deals. In short, you outlined your trip before you took it.

A New Year Upon Us

As we dive into the New Year I can’t help but look back at last year as being a success for my writing. I set a goal to have six books published and up for sale in that year’s span and while four of them were up for sale, the final two were finished and if it hadn’t been for a vendor issue, they would have been published on time. Both should be on my website, www.leifericksonwriting.com sometime in early January. With six books online already, what does 2015 hold for Leif Erickson Writing?

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Hero's Journey, Motivation, Novel, Screenplay, Story Telling, Writing

The Art of Storytelling

When I first started writing I read as much as I could about how to tell a good story. It’s amazing how just very simple changes in the words that are used can change the entire makeup of a phrase even though they say the exact same things. Depending on the situation, sometimes you are forced into using a certain form or style of writing, but when you tell a good story you can let it flow freely.

Characters vs Settings

I was thinking of how to describe a scene for my latest book. It’s a nature scene set in a different world. I couldn’t get the words to match the area I had in my mind. I wrote and rewrote the narrative a number of times but no matter what I tried I couldn’t get the area to flow properly from the page. After a number of rewrites I grabbed a book from a college history course. The class was about the history and times of the North American Great Plains. It was a class that I loved with an instructor who was very passionate and knowledgeable about the Great Plains.

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Nature, Novel, Screenplay, Writing

Inspirations for Writing

As I started my career as a writer I would often try to force an idea to come to me. I would sit at the computer, staring at the white of the screen, and try to force the idea to come. Whether I needed a plot devise, a new character, or a twist, no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t force the ideas to form.

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Motivation, Novel, Screenplay, Writing

Motivations for Writing

When I began writing I started reading a lot of books about the writing process, how to format novels, the hero’s journey, and other aspects of writing. The one thing that all the book pretty much agreed on was the fact that if a person wants to be a writer, they need to write every day. It doesn’t matter what they write; a chapter of a book, a short story, a poem, an article, or a blog post, it’s just that they have to write something every day.