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Story Structure: New Situation And Extrapolated Ending
The ‘New Situation’ describes the part of a story also known as the ‘denouement’. The audience is left with a sense of what the main character’s life will be like from now on. This comes right after the anagnorisis (realisation) sequence. The main character has undergone a change (unless it’s a comedy) and their life…
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A Glossary of Genre and Story Types
The purpose of fiction genre is to help readers find the stories they want. For a full list of Fiction Genres you can’t go past the Wikipedia article. These are my own notes on genre, incomplete, but with a different spin.ga Children’s literature is broken down into genres, just as adults’ stories are. But critics…
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Jack and the Baked Beanstalk by Colin Stimpson (2012) Analysis
As you can see from the cover art, this picture book has been illustrated by someone with a lot of experience in digital art — as a coffee table book of illustrations this stands alone as an exhibition of beautiful colour, wonderfully composed perspective drawings and interesting character design. The O.G. Jack And The Beanstalk…
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Pyrrhic Victories and Tragic Dilemmas In Fiction
In the ultimate pyrrhic victory, the main character has achieved what needs doing but is dead by the end of the story.
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The Trickster Archetype In Storytelling
Tricksters are characters who make secret plans to get away with stuff and to get what they want. Most characters in children’s literature have an element of trickster about them, but this archetype is found frequently across the history of storytelling. In any negotiation, the one who lays out their position first usually loses because…
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Stage and Cinematic Perspective In Art and Picture Books
The Stage Perspective books look almost as if we are looking at a story acted out on a stage. Cinematic picture books are influenced by film, and make use of various camera angles: high angle, low angle, worm’s eye view, establishing shot and so on.
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Teach With Picturebooks
What’s true of short stories is true of picture books: You should read short stories because each one will give you the full narrative hit—beginning, middle and end—in double-quick time. You’ll get all—well, most of—the satisfaction of a novel, in one small package that might use up 15–20 minutes of your time. Short Stories and…
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Millie by John Marsden and Sally Rippin Analysis
Young readers love to hear about naughty children. If this were a story by Roald Dahl or Edward Gorey, the naughty Millie would definitely have met a nasty end, but this particular naughty child remains the apple of her parents’ eyes. Since all children have bad thoughts sometimes, this story is a comfort-read, and would…
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Picturebooks: Where to place words on the page?
Where to put the text in a picture book? How do the eyes of readers move across the page? What is the age of your reader? This will affect the decision.
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Wolf Comes To Town by Denis Manton Analysis
Wolf Comes To Town by Denis Manton must be one of the most underrated children’s book on the Internet. I was genuinely astonished to check out what others have said about this picture book on Amazon and Goodreads. Both sites show a 1.5 star average rating at time of writing. Can you guess what reviewers don’t like…
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Differences Between Writing For Children and Adults
1. What can I expect of children whose understanding of language is not yet nearly as well developed as my own adult linguistic skills, without asking too much of them? 2. What ought I to expect of children without contravening educational, psychological, moral and aesthetic requirements, particularly since it is not always easy to bring…
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Disgust
Why would a storyteller or artist want to elicit disgust in their work? And if they want to do it, how do they typically do it?
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Writing Consumer Book Reviews
What is the function of consumer reviews? Should we feel bad for posting negative takes on other people’s books? Do consumer reviews have a real impact on sales? To what extent? Is a review a work of art in its own right?
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Clever and Beautiful Word Art On Book Covers
Let’s talk about typography as standalone artwork. Below are a collection of favourite typographical book covers.