Counter Craft

The View from Inside: On Adding Interiority to Your Fiction

Plus, five years of Counter Craft and a subscription incentive

Mar 5 • Lincoln Michel

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February 2026

What Not Reading Does to Your Writing

More thoughts on "TV brain prose" and why reading is, yes, useful for your writing.

Feb 22 • Lincoln Michel

857

153

181

Surf's Up in Slop City

How should authors navigate a world with disappearing books coverage and a rising flood of AI slop books?

Feb 10 • Lincoln Michel

221

64

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Why Literature Needs a Punk Rock Mindset

The Washington Post shutting down its books coverage is a reminder that we have to do it ourselves

Feb 5 • Lincoln Michel

437

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153

January 2026

Why "Plot" Isn't a Four-Letter Word

On teaching yourself plotting and part one of an attempt to describe my "Principles of Plotting"

Jan 30 • Lincoln Michel

201

46

40

Don't Draft Shakespeare into Your Genre Wars

Plus asshole autofiction and a history book recommendation to understand the chaos of the news

Jan 16 • Lincoln Michel

84

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Why You Should Read Gene Wolfe (and Where to Start)

On the science fiction author that even literary snobs will love

Jan 8 • Lincoln Michel

128

70

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December 2025

Thoughts on Publishing a Novel in 2025

Plus, the Counter Craft Year-End Round-Up

Dec 23, 2025 • Lincoln Michel

133

26

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Processing: How Brandon Taylor Wrote Minor Black Figures

The author on embodied characters, writing process, and how “a novel should show people fighting and striving against and with and for and alongside…

Dec 20, 2025 • Lincoln Michel

116

8

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The Best Books I Read in 2025 (That Weren't Published in 2025)

On Homer, Iris Murdoch, Jun’ichiro Tanizaki, and other authors I loved reading this year.

Dec 12, 2025 • Lincoln Michel

113

30

6

Books as Art Projects

On books you want to hold in your hand or slip in your pocket

Dec 5, 2025 • Lincoln Michel

74

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9

November 2025

Literary Philosophy and Philosophical Literature

On philosophers who wrote novels and novelists inspired by philosophy

Nov 25, 2025 • Lincoln Michel

116

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