Tag Archives: Mike Reeves-McMillan

Aug 12

Interesting for a number of reasons: for biography affecting literary output, for the questions it raises about…

Posted on by

Interesting for a number of reasons: for biography affecting literary output, for the questions it raises about “writing the Other,” and for its reminder of shifting societal norms.

http://www.momentmag.com/curious-case-dorothy-l-sayers-jew-wasnt/
Aug 11

Although it doesn’t use the term “Universal Basic Income,” this article describes a possible mechanism (and…

Posted on by

Although it doesn’t use the term “Universal Basic Income,” this article describes a possible mechanism (and justification) for it: corporations profit from free use of resources that belong to all of us in common. If that use is no longer free, but costs money which flows to everyone equally, you have a flow of money to the people who will be most likely to spend it (on, yes, goods which now cost more, but the money keeps on going round).

http://evonomics.com/dont-ditch-capitalism-tax-extractive-side-effects-fuel-growth-barnes/

Aug 11

I generally end up adding material when I revise (I draft bare-bones and bulk it up afterwards), but I know I’m…

Posted on by

I generally end up adding material when I revise (I draft bare-bones and bulk it up afterwards), but I know I’m unusual in this, and this article’s advice is good regardless. Basically: Outline what you’ve already written, and it will show you what’s unnecessary and what doesn’t fit.

I’m part of an online community where we critique each other’s work, and the critique I find myself offering most often is that the story lacks clarity. Outlining so you can figure out what the story actually is will help you to solve this problem.

(I have a technique I call the “rich outline,” which isn’t just about plot events, but any aspect of the story you want to work on: imagery, language, character, setting, emotional beats. It’s a general fix for a number of story ailments.)

http://io9.gizmodo.com/one-weird-trick-for-cutting-down-your-novel-1595465118
Aug 08

I happen to enjoy cooking shows, which is why I read this article on one chef’s theory of food.

Posted on by

I happen to enjoy cooking shows, which is why I read this article on one chef’s theory of food. But I ended up wondering if it could be applied to writing.

Basically, he’s saying: find the underlying “formal pattern” of a dish and translate it into different ingredients. Classic dishes are classic because they work reliably. Take a classic and deconstruct it; what are its parts? Now, what can you substitute for those parts?

I’ve heard Brandon Sanderson remark on the Writing Excuses podcast that a buddy-cop movie has essentially the same underlying structure as a romance. He often refers to stories that have no overt reference to sports as “underdog sports” stories: outsider joins group of losers, they learn to accept the outsider and are inspired to win.

So, could I write a heist novel where the project isn’t a heist, but an engineering challenge? Or a mystery novel where the mystery isn’t a murder, but a scientific (or historical, or archaeological) puzzle? (I’m sure that’s been done.) What other ways could we use classic structures with new ingredients?

http://www.wired.com/2016/07/chef-david-chang-on-deliciousness/
Aug 08

Very thought-provoking if, like me, you sometimes write about postscarcity societies.

Posted on by

Very thought-provoking if, like me, you sometimes write about postscarcity societies.

Originally shared by Yonatan Zunger

This article is part of my continued attempt to think through the changes in our modern economy. It was prompted by this plot from a 2014 article, showing how the prices of different things had changed over the previous decade: some things (like TV’s and computers) getting much cheaper, other things (child care, education) getting much more expensive.

The key thing that got me started on this was noticing that the things which got cheaper all had in common that new technologies created better economies of scale for them, while the things which got more expensive all had in common that they didn’t. This leads to some thinking about exactly what happens when a technology suddenly shifts the price of a good: when a “Magic Box” appears on the market that can make something virtually for free.

The answer appears to be a combination of three effects: one which makes everybody richer (because the good is itself cheaper; those with the most need benefit most from this stage), and two smaller “zero-sum” shifts: a shift of money away from people whose jobs were based on making the good that’s now cheap, and a shift of money towards industries which weren’t affected, essentially because more money is available to buy their goods and so they see price inflation. (Importantly, the second effect touches both workers and companies, but the third effect in many circumstances doesn’t directly affect workers – see the article for why)

This is all still relatively preliminary thinking, but I think there are some directions in here which could prove useful for understanding what’s going on in our economy and why.

https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/what-costs-more-what-costs-less-magic-boxes-and-the-modern-economy-a8ed3fdfac6d#.e7ke22iuf