PODCAST · education
Fictionsmith Family
by Ryan Dunlap
Connecting families through storytelling. Invite your child into a meaningful story and reignite your own imagination as we walk you through the cooperative writing process with lessons and activities that helped my children and I publish our own books (and more importantly, spend time together). fictionsmith.substack.com
Episodes
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Summer Writing Project - Act Two Writing: Oh The Places You'll Go
One of the reasons stories are as interesting as they are is because it opens a window to us to places we've never been before. Having new places described to you allows you to be teleported into the shoes of the character, and it lets your imagination soar. I know everyone is different, but I…
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Summer Writing Project - Act Two Writing: Fighting Lulls with Conflict
As you write your story, you may eventually hit points where things feel like they've stopped being interesting. You may have the major events figured out by using your outline so you know how to get from Point A to B to Z, but sometimes when you are at those points, your characters may kind of…
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Writing: Prioritizing Your Time
When I set out to create the Summer Writing Project, I wanted to create something that parents and kids could join together and tell a story. I had no clue how many people would actively keep up with these episodes and how many projects would be written in real time as I send out these lessons.…
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Writing: Remember this is the First Draft
I want to offer a quick reminder as we’re moving forward: This is the First Draft. We are in a magical time when it comes to telling a story. This is a time that belongs to you. Before this, the story existed only in your imagination, but that's not something that can be shared with others. This...
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Writing: The Art of Noticing
One of the things that kicked all of this off and made it possible to do Fictionsmith Family was because of a noticing of a small detail that I had missed after passing it by dozens upon dozens of times. My oldest daughter, who was six at the time, saw a mailbox sitting on an otherwise empty…
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Writing: Balancing the Page
Did you come up with your tense, perspective, and first or third person? I did find it a little funny that all of this is written and recorded in second person since I'm addressing you. Or y'all, which I feel qualified to say based on where I was born and raised. With some of the basics out of…
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Writing: A Tense Person's POV
Welcome to Act Two, the writing phase! We've spent a month and a half getting on the same page and brainstorming ideas to come up with the story that only the two of you can tell together. You might have pictures of awesome scenes dancing around in your mind and when someone asks what your story…
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Summer Writing Project - Act Three Planning: A Complete Story
We have reached the end of the planning phase of your story! I know this has been a lot of information, but I sincerely hope that it has helped get your imaginations going and that you understand what goes into story structure a little more than before. I know when I started writing my first...
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Summer Writing Project - Act Three Planning: Fight to the Finish
It’s showdown time! We've come out of the lowest point of the story as our hero has reached a moment of failure and introspection and learned something about themselves and why they are doing what they're doing...and why they can't give up. There is still a villain out there or an injustice or...
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Summer Writing Project - Act Three Planning: Rally the Troops for the Finale
It's time to rise like a Phoenix! Or at least shake off the broken pieces from the crash our character just went through. Hopefully at this point our hero has discovered their motivation for picking themself back up, whether it is out of selflessness or duty or love or whatever it is they needed…
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Summer Writing Project - Act Three Planning: The Story Rollercoaster
I think we might need a break from the heaviness of hitting the low point in the story. We talked about how to get our character to a low point by having failure hit them and taking away the things they've been relying on to get them this far into the story. Let's look at your story like a...
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Summer Writing Project - Act Two Planning: The Low Point
Were you mean to your hero? Was it hard putting them through a tough time? We spend so much effort to create these characters (and often we put parts of ourselves into them) so it can be especially difficult to see them go through trials and struggles, because it's hard when we go through things...
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Summer Writing Project - Act Two Planning: The Downfall of the Hero
Let's face it. This is not an easy section of the story to plot out and write. We've created these characters, given them hopes and dreams and a quest...and now we have to make their lives more difficult. As much as it pains me to say it, if we skimp over this part, the story won't be very…
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Summer Writing Project - Act Two Planning: Whoa! We're halfway there!
After today, we have hit the halfway point of our outlining proces! Which means... we're at the Midpoint of the story. We've just visited a new location or three and met at least one new B-story character. The story should have ramped up in fun and started to escalate. Our main character should...
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Summer Writing Project - Act Two Planning: Oh, the Places You'll Go
Now that we are out of Act One and have a mission in mind of what our hero needs to accomplish…what now? We leave the world of the familiar. Let's see what that looks like. We will set out to get where we know we need to go, and maybe initially our character has an idea of what they need to do…
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Planning: Am I Good Enough?
When the world is shaken up, what will your main character do? Hopefully you've gone through some fun options about what your inciting incident will be, so the next question is...are they going to feel ready? They probably shouldn't. Or, if they do, they need to be mistaken about something. We're...
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Planning: Turning the World Upside Down
A lot of stories start off just trying to get the reader or viewer comfortable with the world they've entered into by using the main character as the eyes and ears (and nose and tongue and, you get the point) to experience the story. Some stories are easy to get the hang of because they’re so...
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Planning: Saving Kittens for Likability
We have our starting line, hopefully we have at least a name and general idea of our main character and how they start off the story... now, let's make them likable! As I've said before, there is a fantastic screenwriting book called Save The Cat that I am drawing pretty heavily from here, which...
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Summer Writing Project - Act One Planning: Let's Outline Our Story!
We’ve made it out of the prologue, and here we are in Act One, Chapter One, Page One. It's okay to be nervous or excited, and it's also okay to make mistakes and realize you have to change things later. A lot of times when I had an idea I loved, I got a little ways down the road and realized that...
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Summer Writing Project - Prologue: The End of the Beginning
I can't believe we're already at the end of the prologue! Two weeks in, and I'm proud of you both for sticking with this. I know it's a lot of time to invest in a project, but it's going to be worth it. I hope the ideas you came up with has gotten your minds spinning with characters, places…
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Summer Writing Project - Prologue: How Big is this Story?
I hope you had a fantastic movie night and came up with some ideas for your story and what kind of character you might want to write about. Did you figure out what they wanted, what was stopping them, and how they realized what it was they really needed? Now, interesting characters are great, but...
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Summer Writing Project - Prologue: Character Wants and Needs
Welcome to the weekend, or whenever you’re watching this video through the magic of time travel! Now, the way I’m structuring this is that there are two lessons and activities during the weekdays are shorter to account for any work days or school or extracurricular activities. But the weekend…
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Summer Writing Project - Prologue: Combining the Unexpected
Welcome back! Hopefully you’re starting this up having spent some time together learning about each other’s favorite stories... and maybe learned a little bit about each other. Let's see what common ground the favorite stories share. Adventure? Humor? A really cool world where the story unfolds?…
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Summer Writing Project - Prologue: Your Favorite Stories
I hope the bracket exercise was as fun for you as it has been for my family and that there weren't too many arguments along the way. But if there were arguments, or any of you felt particularly strongly about one character over another, I want you to pay attention to why you cared so deeply.…
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Summer Writing Project - Prologue: Time Traveling Together
Welcome to the Summer Writing Project, or as I like to call it The Society of Time Travelers! I am genuinely so excited that you've joined us on this storytelling journey. I know it can be hard to find time in your day to do things like this. First off, why am I calling this The Society of Time...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Connecting families through storytelling. Invite your child into a meaningful story and reignite your own imagination as we walk you through the cooperative writing process with lessons and activities that helped my children and I publish our own books (and more importantly, spend time together).
fictionsmith.substack.com
HOSTED BY
Ryan Dunlap
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Fictionsmith Family have?
Fictionsmith Family currently has 25 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Fictionsmith Family about?
Connecting families through storytelling. Invite your child into a meaningful story and reignite your own imagination as we walk you through the cooperative writing process with lessons and activities that helped my children and I publish our own books (and more importantly, spend time together)....
How often does Fictionsmith Family release new episodes?
Fictionsmith Family has 25 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Fictionsmith Family?
You can listen to Fictionsmith Family on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Fictionsmith Family?
Fictionsmith Family is created and hosted by Ryan Dunlap.
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