Captain Andrews Blog

  Slice of Life Writing Part 1: helping to believe the unbelievable     When discussing this “slice of life” genre, it’s easy to think of “coming of age” works, as well as works set in the youth of struggling characters. However, there is more to slice of life than you may realize,  for one, every book will deal with this genre.      It is  defined  by Oxford Languages as:    “ a realistic representation of everyday experience in a movie, play, or book.”   https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/   So, adding some slice of life to any book is a great idea.  Adding some realistic elements (such  as having basic needs, hunger, having to use the washroom, being tired and needing sleep,  etc )   will make your characters more relatable, and will allow your readers to believe your story  and keep them in the story. This means, it will allow your readers to suspend their beliefs (in whatever ...

  A good young adult zombie book should have three genres:     I love a good zombie book. So much so I wrote one myself. So, I know when it comes to a good zombie book there must be a good balance of horror, slice of life and comedy. While zombie books deal with the world ending and, well, the rotting undead, it goes without saying that zombies are scary. Being turned into a vile, rotting and walking corpse is scary. A good zombie book is scary. It’s horror. It should have the reader both disturbed and scared. However, while dealing with this, part of the horror is the world building around it.     This is where the “slice of life” should come in. While the world of zombies is focused on such, it should keep in mind that life goes on. It simply goes on with a new enemy. A zombie apocalypse doesn’t change the cycle of life. Children who survive will still grow, will hit puberty, etc. People will still know happiness, and although they will know fear and...