You can't edit a blank page!

On this week's episode of our creative writing podcast, The Crü return to a Spooky Season favorite: Betrayal at the House on the Hill. Without stretching too far, our prompt, Sacrificial Dagger, leads us to discuss the process of drafting. There process of drafting can help overcome writer's block, earn experience in self-editing, and, ultimately, give you the experience you need to write better first drafts.

And then we get into the good stuff: spooky stories that match our crisp October weather. Those begin around the 12:15 mark.

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

Few have done more to create community than Dolly Parton. This week, the Crü lament her loss by singing (not literally; you're welcome) her praises. We explore what inspired Dolly's songwriting, her philanthropy, and her enduring commitment to children's literacy. Then we try our own hand at creative writing and flash fiction inspired by her songs.

Our writing prompts include 9 to 5, Love Is Like a Butterfly, Two Doors Down, Wildflowers, and Blue Smoke. Song links are included if you're interested (and you should be interested).

Inspired by Dolly's work promoting children's literacy, some of us even try writing stories for children. SOME of us didn't get the memo (cough Murph cough and also PC).

The original stories begin around 21:40.

Whether you're a Dolly Parton fan, or someone who's about to be a Dolly fan but maybe doesn't know it yet, we have something for you here.

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

To close out Season 5 (that's five, Murph!) The Crü each returned to a different story or poem they wrote throughout the season. We talk about the revision process (and how it changes for prose vs poetry); what we've learned over the course of the season and our different experiments (WebEater's outlining, PC and Murph's long-form pieces broken up by prompts); and, of course, where we're going next.

And, as always, we share and discuss our own work.

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

This week, Spud leads The Crü down the winding rabbit hole of Roland Barthes' famous essay, The Death of the Author. We delve into a healthy debate over whether or not authorial intent actually matters, and how that answer changes if it's a reader asking it vs. a literary critic. Who decides what a story means, and can that meaning change over time?

Then, of course, we share our own stories based around the week's prompt, and promptly (no pun intended) discuss the author's intent, leading to a weird Hegelian dialectic on the topic. From Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable: Spondulicks. A slang term for money, dating from the mid-19th century. Its origins are uncertain: one suggestion is Greek spondulikos, the name of a type of shell used as an early form of money.

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

What makes Anthony Bourdain's writing style so magnetic? That's what the Crü aims to discover this week by shamelessly adopting his style as our own. Our author spotlight covers everything from Kitchen Confidential to gonzo journalism. Along the way we discuss how to take nonfiction memoirs and write them to be immersive narratives by figuring out your own, authentic writing voice.

And of course, we share our own works focused around a prompt that definitely has so much to do with Anthony Bourdain, and nothing to do with an strange strange piece of history. From Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable: Jenkins's Ear. The name given to an incident that helped largely to bring about the war between England and Spain in 1739 that eventually developed into the War of the Austrian Succession. Captain Robert Jenkins, skipper of the brig Rebecca, was homeward bound from the West Indies when he was attacked by a Spanish guarda costa off Havana on 9th April, 1731. The Spaniards plundered his ship and ended by cutting off one of Jenkins's ears. On reaching London Jenkins carried his complaint (and his severed ear in a leather case!!! [emphasis added]) to the king and demanded reparation. At the time little notice was taken of the incident, but some years later, in 1738, the matter was brought up again, Jenkins and his ear were examined by a committee of the House of Commons and his case became an added grievance to the many others that culminated in war.

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

Should writers use profanity in fiction? Does it weaken the story, or add a li'l spice of realism to character dialogue? That's what the Crü explores in this week's workshop on creative writing.

Like anything in the toolbox, profanity can wind up being used as a crutch or a shortcut. We discuss how to avoid it if you'd prefer not to use it; sprinkle it in like smoked sea salt on a good chocolate chip cookie; or invent in-universe swears to snag the best of both worlds (think the holy mother-forking shirtballs of The Good Place or fraking in Firefly).

And, of course, we share our own stories based around our prompt from Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable: Limehouse. In Britain in the early part of the 20th century, a verb meaning 'to use coarse abusive language, especially in a political speech'. The usage arose from a notably acerbic speech which the LIBERAL Politician David Lloyd George made in Limehouse (then a particularly rough part of East London) on 30 July 1909, in which he attacked the aristocracy, financial magnates, etc.

And, as promised, here's Wanda Sykes as Harriet Tubman (nsfw dialogue).

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

It's Part 2 of our little microseries on the Four Horsemen. Last episode featured listener-submitted stories to our writing prompt; now, you get to hear from the Cru! We discuss draft revision an writing experiments, particularly Murph's challenge (to himself) of writing the same scene five times from different perspectives. There's a difference between rewriting and editing, and we tease out the benefits of each. There's also benefits to writing by hand, but...writing to read it on the air may not be one of them. XD

Sit back and enjoy!

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.

This episode is all about community submissions! We’re showcasing the creative work of emerging writers, first-time authors, and grizzled veterans of the trade, all responding to the same epic prompt: The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Featuring stories and poems from Alec Billings, J.W. Surface, KN Fitzwater, Maggie Lardie, Nick Smith, YYC Typewriter, and the mysterious Mrs. Greenleaf. From biblical terror to modern collapse, these writers interpret conquest, war, famine, and death in wildly different ways, all stemming from the same prompt.

If you love creative writing, indie fiction, writing prompts, and discovering emerging voices, this is the episode for you.

Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!

Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do.

Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.