Melanie Anne Phillips

Teresa is making bread from scratch again tonight.  She usually makes at least a couple of loaves each week.  She's quite a gourmet cook.  In fact, while making bread, she's cooking up a peruvian rotisserie chicken in our convection oven.  Over on the side of the counter are stainless steel measuring scoops filled with white wine and wild rice in preparation for dinner. Spending the day paying bills, working on a consulting job, answering old email and posting entries to my various blogs and web sites.

I've always kept a composer's "sketch book."  Here's a scratchy old recording of a riff I liked enough to put on a cassette about 40 years ago... http://melanieannephillips.com/music/dave/Track%201-2.mp3

Here's the ungarnished truth about tannins and tannin sensitivity. As you probably know, tannins are astringent polymers that naturally occur in coffee, tea, red wine and chocolate (among the most popular dietary sources). Effects of Tannins: Tannins may cause migraines, joint pain that mimics artheritis, tiredness, depression, bowel problems, problems with vision when focussing, digestion problems, thin brittle skin, perhaps hair loss and slow hair growth, and myriad other symptoms, both subtle and severe. For years I suffered a series of symptoms that I had pinned on coffee, uncertain about tea, and pretty sure were tied to red wine - no problem with chocolate. These symptoms were such diverse elements as - lethargy, tiredness, depression, joint pain in hips, shoulders and fingers, thin brittle skin, hair loss, slowed hair growth, slowed metabolism and even acid reflux and heartburn and diminished ability to focus closely, requiring reading glasses. I tried experim...

Taken last weekend during our expedition to Eastern Oregon.

Taken last week during our first sunny day in quite a while.

Shot this a few weeks ago and just transferred the video. There's something about this place that ties into lost childhood emotional memories or dreams of feelings. Not sure it translates to video at all, but here it is, part for me and part for you.

What's "Ability" have to do with story structure? If you look in Dramatica's "Periodic Table of Story Elements" chart (you can download a free PDF of the chart at http://storymind.com/free-downloads/ddomain.pdf  ) you'll find the "ability" in one of the little squares.  Look in the "Physics" class in the upper left-hand corner.  You'll find it in a "quad" of four items, "Knowledge, Thought, Ability and Desire". In this article I'm going to talk about how Dramatica uses the term "ability" and how it applies not only to story structure and characters but to real people, real life and psychology as well. To begin with, a brief word about the Dramatica chart itself.  The chart is sort of like a Rubik's Cube.  It holds all the elements which must appear in every complete story to avoide holes.  Conceptually, you can twist it and turn it, just like a Rubik's Cube, and when you do, it is li...

"Look Before You Leap "- mp3 of a song about suicide I wrote in the 1970's. (Forgive the scratchy recording; it was made on a cassette tape more than a third of a century ago!) http://melanieannephillips.com/music/dave/Track%201-1.mp3

From the class I teach on Story Strucutre and Dramatica: You "spin" a tale and "weave" a story.  A tale is like a thread, a story is like a tapestry.

Took these while on an exploration road trip yesterday:

Raw footage from our expedition to explore semi-carbonized trees burried beneath an ancient volcanic ash flow.

Raw footage from our expedition to explore semi-carbonized trees burried beneath an ancient volcanic ash flow.

Raw footage from our exploration of carbonized trees burried under an ancient ash flow near Salem, Oregon.

Last Summer in Minto Brown Island Park

From the class I teach on story structure and Dramatica: Every story has a mind of its own.  The structure builds its psychology; the storytelling determines its personality.

An author asks: Dear Melanie, I began my stories with several characters, which I develop as the story moves forward. Using the Dream Kit I'm at a loss about a substantial development of each of your characters, and therefore return to the character description and develop each as the story moves along. Do you have any advise at beginning with a fully developed cast. Thank you, Roger. My reply: Hi, Roger. The problem you are having is exactly the reason why I created StoryWeaver after co-creating Dramatica. StoryWeaver is a story development tool whereas Dramatica is a story structuring tool. In StoryWeaver you develop people before they become characters, events before they become plot. Many authors use StoryWeaver first to work out their story's world, who's in it, and what happens to them, THEN use Dramatica to ensure there are no structural holes or inconsitencies. Melanie

Dramatica Basics Audio Program Part 8 - Direction of Character Growth Download mp3

Dramatica Basics Audio Program Part 7 - Character Growth Download mp3

Dramatica Basics Audio Program Part 6 - James Bond and Character Change Download mp3

Dramatica Basics Audio Program Part 5 - The Obstacle Character Download mp3

Dramatica Basics Audio Program Part 4 - 12 Essential Questions Every Writer Should Answer Download mp3

Dramatica Basics Audio Program Volume One - Part 3 Story Perspectives Download mp3