Damyanti Biswas hosts an intriguing post on the science of story structure. Takeaway: Structuring your book can help you not make a mess, but feel free to play around with it.
I'm learning to use the structuring features of Scrivener and yWriter5, in place of big sheets of paper with grids drawn on them. Although the grid worked peachy, I suspect a program will prove more useful.
Megan Morgan lays down the basics on point-of-view, for those who don't know what "first person" and "second person" mean. Hey, everybody learns about everything for the first time sometime, amIright?
I like writing first person, because then I can crawl into somebody's head and inhabit it. On the other hand, I also like third person, because then I don't have to crawl into one person's head and inhabit it. Second person? You don't really want to write in second person, do you?
The fabulous Katina French reminded me of some thoughts she posted about writing metaphor/theme/allegory into your fiction.
I don't entirely agree that subtext works better if it grows rather than if it's intentional, any more than a dress is better if you make it by cutting material and sewing it together and then discovering that the stripes go the same way on both sides of the garment. Not that I sew. The last time I sewed anything was.... Well, it wasn't pretty.
ANYWAY, I think you can weave meaning into your story and layer resonance with your deliberate detail and word choice.
I do, however, absolutely agree that, "They work better as questions you raise in the reader’s mind than they do as answers you try to force-feed them." Trying to force-feed your reader is just Bad Writing.
Good Writing is like this:
Fantasies, mysteries, comedies, recipes
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