Alex Rushmer's Blog

The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is the story of a rich man pursuing the woman he has loved since his youth. Jay Gatsby, extravagant and disillusioned by World War I, dreams of recovering desires from his past and employs the help of Nick Carraway, his next door neighbor. However, while the novel appears to be a romantic tragedy, it is packed with a plethora of hidden meanings and symbolism. Matthew Bruccoli suggests The Great Gatsby is about American history, and I believe that, in...

Well, I know that this is late, since the Star Wars movie came out weeks and weeks ago. Life happens, though, and I felt like I wanted to mull over the story in my head for a while.

To be perfectly honest...(please don't shoot me) I am not a big fan of Star Wars. I thought that the other movies had poor writers and poor acting. Between those two issues, plus the special affects that were definitely wanting, I just don't enjoy them all that much. The only reason that I wanted to go see the new...

You wake up to hear a pounding on the door. When you answer it, nothing is there...except for a letter with a black wax seal. The letter is addressed to you.

Here is a great post on the Teen Writers website about using a physical description to convey who a character is. She uses the story, Little Women, as an example of this and gives you the opportunity to try it yourself. This is a definite must read! Enjoy!

Go Teen Writers: A Characterization Study on Little Women: Jill Williamson is a chocolate loving, daydreaming, creator of kingdoms. She writes weird books for teens in lots of weird genres like, fan...

I haven't written a review for a movie before, but I thought I'd give it a go! My friend and I went to the new "Fantastic Four" movie this evening. Here are my thoughts on it.

This is a review for people who don't want spoilers! Farther down, I will write another that delves deeper and will contain spoilers. Don't say I didn't warn you.

This is a great movie for people who love super heroes. Each character has their own motivation and agenda, adding something to the story itself. Mankind wants...

You wake up in a small, concrete room that is filling up with water. Your only tools are a screwdriver, a cell phone with no batteries, and an assault rifle. How do you proceed?

Some stories, in order to hold a reader's attention, will be made up of intense event followed by battle scene followed by action. Bam! Bam! Bam! In this society, it is hard to get someone to stop and listen for any length of time. Writers in general often struggle to hold their reader's attention for any length of time. Some solve that problem by having constant suspense. However, that is not always realistic, and some storylines simply won't allow for it. So how do we keep the reader engage...

You're all alone on a Saturday night. You walk up to your bedroom and find a hooded man browsing over your journal. He looks up and says, "We've been waiting for you."

Great post about editing by Stephanie Morrill. Check it out!



Go Teen Writers: Editing in Layers: Drawing out Emotion and Tension...: by Stephanie Morrill Stephanie writes young adult contemporary novels and is the creator of GoTeenWriters.com. Her novels include The Re...

This, in my opinion, is one of the hardest things for a writer to learn. And yet, self-editing is one of the most crucial part of an author's career since so much time is spent editing. More time is spent working on the second and third draft than on the first draft. The first draft is just getting something on paper whereas editing is crafting and creating. It can be fun...and a pain. But editing sure does take the pressure off your first draft, if you know what I mean.



 I just got done...