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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: OH, WHAT DO YOU DO IN THE SUMMERTIME?
I come from a family in which anything is an excuse to spontaneously burst into song. Among the many songs I learned as a child was the...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Aug 12, 20201 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: IT'S ALL IN THE BODY LANGUAGE (LITERALLY)
Last week, I visited my brother "T" and his family in Iowa. "T" and I were rabid Star Wars fans as teenagers, so he was surprised that I...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Aug 5, 20201 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: YOUR SUMMER MEMORIES
This has got to be the weirdest summer I've ever experienced. I'm sure many of you could say the same thing. Little or no swimming,...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jul 29, 20201 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: OH, SNAP (LITERALLY)
For my email subscribers, sorry about the lack of email yesterday. Mailchimp was being a pill and wouldn't let me send anything, so I...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jul 15, 20201 min read
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"A GOOD WRITER IS A VERY SMART THIEF"
In college, I took an introductory creative-writing course one semester (from the professor who gave me the quote in the post title). One...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jul 13, 20202 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: "HOW COULD I BE *THIS BAD* AT KISSING?!"
Screenshot from the hilarious Studio C sketch from which the title quote comes Today's prompt has been floating around in my head for a...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jul 1, 20201 min read
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A WRITER'S SECRET WEAPON
Do you ever feel . . . like a plastic bag? 🎵 Kidding. 😁 But seriously, do you ever feel like the universe is trying to tell you...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jun 19, 20202 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: IF YOU HAD TO EXPLAIN IT TO AN ALIEN ...
I'm a big fan of the "Humans Are Weird" posts that have been on Pinterest lately. They provide short snippets of stories that explore...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jun 17, 20201 min read
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FORMULA FOR A SUPERHERO
I recently saw Avengers: Infinity War (I know, I know, I'm super behind). It reminded me that I have a few other Marvel movies to catch...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jun 11, 20202 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: "BEFORE YOU FREAK OUT ..."
The other night, I was rereading a partial scene from my current WIP. For context, this scene takes place after the final battle, in...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jun 10, 20201 min read
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BREAK ALL THE PHONES!
We've had quite a few heavy subjects in these posts lately, so today, I thought I'd lighten things up. A few years ago, I went to an...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jun 9, 20203 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: OOPS
One of my poor roommates is preparing for her nursing-school finals. I'm half listening to the videos she's watching, and one of them...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Jun 3, 20201 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: COVID-19 AND A WEDDING
Yesterday's email got me thinking about how some experiences transform the rest of a person's life. Maybe losing a job leads the person...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
May 27, 20203 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: A FAKE BOOK AND A REAL QUESTION
A few nights ago, I was watching Secrets of the Dead again. This time, it was an episode called "Galileo's Moon," which—pardon the...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
May 20, 20202 min read
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THE "RULE OF FOUR" FOR WRITERS
I believe I've mentioned in previous posts that I used to be a history teacher. It didn't take me long to definitively realize that...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
May 19, 20203 min read
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WRITING-PROMPT WEDNESDAY: #NATUREFAIL
Remember the total solar eclipse that happened in August 2017? It's proof that great ideas can come from weird places. When I first heard...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
May 13, 20202 min read
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NO SCREEN? NO PROBLEM!
As writers, we do a lot of work on computers. Even if we start by writing things out by hand, we end up using Microsoft Word, Scrivener,...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
May 8, 20203 min read
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"AN EDITOR WHO LIVED IN DENVER . . ."
I just realized that almost nothing rhymes with Denver (#poetprobs), so let me try again: My city must not catch on fire. We're already...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
May 7, 20203 min read
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WHAT'S THE WORD?
Has this kind of thing ever happened to you? https://www.pinterest.com/pin/483433341224769205/ Embarrassing, right? Besides the misused...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Apr 20, 20202 min read
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BLEEDING IS OVERRATED
I won't tell you how late I was up last night working on a crochet pattern for my Etsy shop. (If you'd like to check it out, here's a...
Candice Bellows, The Story Engineer
Apr 7, 20202 min read
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