20.01: Welcome to 2025!

20.01: Welcome to 2025!

Author: Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler January 5, 2025 Duration: 23:18

For our 20th season, we are focusing on your toolbox. We’re going to be thinking about tools in terms of the lenses that we use to approach a story. We’re going to focus on the four lenses of: who, where, when, and why (don’t worry– what and how will be looked at in a later season, since they’re more about execution and less about lenses.) Our hosts talk about the lenses they’re adopting as they look towards 2025. 


At the end of this season, we’re going to take all these lenses and apply them to one work: All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders


A note: we will now only have “thing of the week” occasionally, and not regularly! 


Homework: Make a list of the tools you already have in your toolbox. Now, as an intention, think of an area that you want a tool for. Over the course of this year, we’re going to try to help you find that tool. 


Sign up for our newsletter

Credits: Your hosts for this episode were Mary Robinette Kowal, Dan Wells, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, and Howard Tayler. It was produced by Emma Reynolds, recorded by Marshall Carr, Jr., and mastered by Alex Jackson.

Join Our Writing Community! 

Patreon

Instagram

Threads

Bluesky

TikTok

YouTube



Our Sponsors:
* Check out HomeServe and use my code homeserve.com/excuses for a great deal: https://www.homeserve.com
* Check out Talkiatry and use my code Talkiatry.com/WX for a great deal: https://www.talkiatry.com


Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/writing-excuses2130/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It’s a common piece of advice: if you want to be a writer, you should write. But what happens when you’re staring at the blank page, or when the business side of publishing feels like a maze? That’s where Writing Excuses comes in. Each week, hosts Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler gather not just to talk about writing, but to dissect it. They move quickly, respecting your time while packing episodes with actionable discussions on technique, from character voice to plot structure. But this podcast understands that a writing life isn’t just about craft-it’s also a career. So conversations naturally pivot to the practicalities of the business, navigating careers, and sustaining creativity in a demanding field. You’ll hear five distinct professional perspectives blending into a single, focused conversation designed to get you past excuses and back to your work. It’s like a regular, invigorating workshop session delivered directly to you, meant to equip you with tools for both your manuscript and your professional path.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 500

Writing Excuses
Podcast Episodes
18.12: The Long Shadow of Unanswered Questions [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:03
Our continuing exploration of tension has taken us to a favorite technique: unanswered questions. Sure, this obviously applies to mysteries, but consider the question posed in romances: “will they get together?” In its s…
18.11: Turning Up the Contrast With Juxtaposition [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:51
Our deconstruction and categorization of tension continues this week with an exploration of Juxtaposition, which is a contrast between two elements that supplies tension by allowing the reader to insert themselves. Credi…
18.10: Anticipation is More Than Just Making Us Wait [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 18:16
Last week we talked about tension, and promised that we'd be breaking it down into more pieces. This week we're discussing one of those pieces: Anticipation. We sub-divided it as follows: * Surprise * Suspense * Humor *…
18.09: Unpacking the Tension [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:41
For the next several episodes we'll be talking about tension. That may seem like a lot of time to spend on just one word, but as we unpack that word we see that there's plenty of material to work with, and there's a gene…
18.08: Building a Mystery [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 23:13
After last week's deep dive into The Spare Man we're ready to talk more generally about mysteries, and the tools we use to write them. Obviously we can't cover all of that in just one episode, but don't worry. In upcomin…
18.07: Deep Dive into THE SPARE MAN [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:18
Spoiler Alert! This week is our deep dive into Mary Robinette Kowal's The Spare Man. It's a sci-fi mystery novel often described as "The Thin Man in space." Deep dive episodes are necessarily full of spoilers because we…
18.06: An Interview With Howard Tayler [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:02
Your Hosts: Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler In this episode we interview Howard Tayler, one of the founding members of the podcast, and the creator of Schlock Mercenary. The…
18.05: An Interview with Mary Robinette Kowal [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:44
Your Hosts: Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler In this episode Howard Tayler conducts our interview with Mary Robinette Kowal, leading with a wide-open question: "Where did you…
18.04: An Interview With Dan Wells [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:48
Your Hosts: Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler In this episode Erin Roberts very enthusiastically launches our interview with "OG" Dan Wells with a delightfully difficult quest…
18.03: An Interview With Erin Roberts [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 17:52
Your Hosts: Mary Robinette Kowal, DongWon Song, Erin Roberts, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler As we announced in the first episode of the year (and in this press release), DongWon Song and Erin Roberts are joining us as per…