Choosing the right character to narrate this smaller story is critical to its success.

A good romance author will tell you that kissing and even sex are not markers of intimacy.

When adults read YA fiction, or watch YA shows, the teen behavior is suddenly seen as stupid, vapid, unrealistic, or even reprehensible.

They all prevaricate about her, but they all do it in different ways. This is more about the other characters than it is about Robin.

A Darling is a scene, a character, a line, whatever, that you, as the writer, are completely attached to but it doesn’t actually work.

This is the reality of the Manic Pixie characters: they can't really function.

Stereotype characters are often a sign of lazy writing. This episode gives us a good example of when to use shortcuts.

Ted can’t tell a short version of a story to save his life, so this is the principle we’re learning: postponing a reveal.

Lily and Marshall’s wedding is finally here, and since this is a sitcom, you know absolutely everything is going to go wrong.

7 steps to redeeming a villain or antagonist in your writing.

To get a story, you have to dig. Either dig into the past, asking “but why?” or “but how?” or dig into the future by asking “so what?”.

This week, we are talking about Red Herrings and the awesome payoff you get when you execute them well, so we need to start talking about...

Our word of the week is “preface” - as in, the stuff you need to know before you dive in. This episode is a good opportunity to talk...

This week, we “plop” you right into the episode without giving you any backstory. This is a concept that writers refer to as “in media...

The episode begins with Marshall casually looking at Robin’s butt as she walks away, and while Marshall is super embarrassed about it,...

The episode starts with Ted telling his kids that this is all leading up to meeting their mother (it is - dating Robin is actually an...

This episode starts on Marshall as a kid, reading a book about an anthropologist studying gorillas. Then he takes her seminar and she...

Tonight, we’re talking about unlikeable characters. Barney has been a jerk from the beginning, his behavior is almost entirely...