Friday, February 04, 2011

Robert Silverberg on "The Plot Genie"

Be sure to read the whole column because there's a writing contest revealed at the end.

3 comments:

Jerry House said...

Erle Stanley Gardner used a version of this and nev er seemed to be short of plot ideas.

Cap'n Bob said...

I have the Mystery version of this, dated 1933. I heard there were mystery, s-f, and Western genies. I'd love to see the Western.

Rich Harvey said...

Bold Venture Press has been reprinting the PLOT GENIE series. They have finished most of them. Does it help authors to write stories? Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. Hugh B. Cave would pick random horse names out of The Daily Racing Form to generate ideas. Like anything, it might start the ball rolling, but it's still up to the author to perform the actual story construction. And the books are a legendary part of pulp fiction lore.
(www.boldventurepress.com)