The Cuckleburr Times » creative writing

How to Improve Your Writing – Constructing Main Plots and Sub Plots

Merrill Heath — Wed, 12 Jan 2011 03:26:19 +0000

Have you ever considered how the plots were constructed in your favorite novels? Do you look for formulas or plot structure in the novels you read? If you’re a writer, do you diagram your plots so you know when to focus on the main plot (MP), character development (CD), or your subplots (SP1, SP2)?

I think most authors say they don’t use a formula or plan their plots out in too much detail. They say things like “It’s too restrictive, limits creativity, even takes the fun out of writing. If it becomes overly structured it’s too much like writing a term paper or a book report instead of a novel.”

Well, this may or may not be true. That probably depends on the writer’s personality, experience, talent, and so forth. One thing is for sure – the authors who churn out one novel after another have a structure they follow. It may be subconscious, but it’s there nonetheless. You can prove this by diagramming a couple of their novels. They follow a pattern that moves from main plot to subplots, back and forth, in such a way that you don’t get lost or forget what’s going on. As I said, the really experienced writers just kind of know to do this and don’t need to keep the structure in mind. But the beginner or novice generally needs help keeping everything running smoothly. The good news is that it’s really easy to do and can even help you avoid getting blocked. Let’s look at some numbers to illustrate the point.

By industry standards, a novel is 50,000 words or more. The word count varies tremendously but most popular fiction runs about 250 pages in print. That computes to roughly a 300 page manuscript. With an average word count of 250 per page in manuscript format this computes to 75,000 words. Obviously, these are rough estimates since these numbers can greatly vary depending on the amount of dialogue, descriptive content, paragraph length, etc. But these are good averages to work with. Plus, the math is easy.

Within all those words the writer has to develop his characters, throw them into some kind of situation or plot, and add some additional material which will be one or more subplots. A good rule of thumb for allocation is 65-25-10. 65% devoted to the main plot (MP). 25% devoted to subplot one (SP1). 10% devoted to subplot two (SP2). If we continue with our math this breaks down to 48,750 words (195 pages) devoted to MP; 18,750 words (75 pages) for SP1; and 7,500 words (30 pages) for SP2. Character development occurs throughout and is generally not included as a separate word/page count.

The key is to concentrate on MP while weaving SP1 and SP2 into the storyline without getting too sidetracked. You don’t want to be away from any of your plots so long that the reader forgets what’s going on. In creating the structure you can actually map it out, chapter by chapter. You want to loop back to your SPs every four or five chapters, depending on how long your chapters are. This not only gives you some direction on what you need to be working on next, it also helps you keep the action connected.

One more point about structure. You can work on each plot separately if that works for you. Then you simply go back and weave them all together. This is a great option if you find yourself with writer’s block. If you’re bogged down with MP, write for a few days on SP1 or SP2. This also helps you come up with twists and turns and foreshadowing and hooks that will keep your reader turning pages.

The next time you read a novel, or watch a movie for that matter, look for the MP and SPs. The MP will be the major conflict that drives the story. One SP will deal with a relationship, usually romantic, in which the main character is involved. The other SP will be a device for character development, typically it involves a little humor and levity, and may not be directly tied into the MP. It will be very evident if you look for it.

Merrill Heath is an author who has a strong desire to “pay it forward” by helping other authors improve their craft. For more information on his novels and current projects visit his blog at: http://merrillheath.wordpress.com

Once you finish writing your story, consider eBook publishing services to distribute your work worldwide.

How to Improve Your Writing – Nobody’s That Perfect

Merrill Heath — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 02:06:44 +0000

Nothing bugs me more than when the hero or heroine in a novel is too perfect. This is a common mistake for novice writers. But it also plagues some writers who should know better. I recently started reading a best-seller by a novelist who has had a bevy of best-sellers and I quit on page 34. That was the point where it became evident that the two main characters were just too perfect. Mind you, these are characters in a series of books, so I must assume this has been going on for some time now. The man was handsome, smart, understanding and romantic, and yet he was a real tough guy who was an expert marksman and a martial arts black belt. The woman was drop-dead gorgeous, in peak physical fitness with the body of a goddess, sexy, sophisticated, brilliant, tough as nails, and also an expert in self-defense. Oh, yeah, and they both were the most ethical and moral people you’ve ever met. It was like the old British TV show The Avengers with Steed and Mrs. Peel. Only it wasn’t tongue-in-cheek like that show. This was a serious novel with main characters that belonged in a comic book.

There are many reasons to avoid making your hero or heroine too perfect but I’ll only touch on a couple – one from the reader’s perspective and one from the writer’s perspective. From the reader’s perspective…they’re boring! A character who has some flaws, is struggling with a personal problem or problems, and has a few wrinkles (both in his psyche as well as his appearance) has more depth, is more realistic, and therefore is much more interesting. We all know people who are too good or too perfect and, even though they may be someone you respect in some ways, I bet they aren’t the people you gravitate toward at a cocktail party. Why would you want to bore your reader with a whole novel about someone like that?

From the writer’s perspective, perfect characters are too restrictive. Why limit yourself? In Robert B. Parker’s series about Jesse Stone, he has a main character who is a recovering alcoholic with a checkered past and a co-dependent relationship with his ex-wife. That gives Parker a couple of ready-made subplots for every novel in this series and a ton of material for character development. You may not be a fan of Parker, but he is a master at character development. He’s able to create interesting characters that can support a series of books without becoming caricatures of themselves. That’s pretty remarkable when you consider he’s written 38 novels in the Spenser series alone.

Think about your favorite characters from the novels you’ve read, the movies you’ve seen, and even the TV shows you watch. I’m quite sure they are not perfect. We all have a tendency to make our main characters above average and someone we can respect and look up to. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Just don’t overdo it. Too much of a good thing is just simply that…too much. I love banana pudding. But if I eat too much I don’t want to go near the stuff again for a while. Don’t create characters that are too perfect or your readers will “pass on dessert” next time.

Writing a Publishable Novel – The Art of Tying up Story Threads

Robert L. Bacon — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 23:05:14 +0000

Story Threads can be a Huge Problem if Not Resolved, and even Some of the Most Respected Writers are Not Sacrosanct

A thread is a plot element, nothing more, nothing less, but a problem for authors if they do not reconcile their threads for the reader. The obvious rationale for an exception is to purposely leave the plot point unresolved to engender interest in reading a sequel to the story. But when the aforementioned is not relevant, the problem can be excruciating for the reader. And some of the most respected writers in literary history have been derelict by not tying up their threads acceptably.

One of the Most Flagrant Examples of Not Tying up a Thread is in INDEPENDENCE DAY

In Richard Ford’s INDEPENDENCE DAY, for which he won a Pulitzer Prize in 1996, he provides great detail in describing the circumstances surrounding the brutal murder of a real estate agent. Then, later in the novel, he brings up her death once more, heightening the reader’s enthusiasm for an answer to who did it. But the thread is never developed and the culprit not identified. The murder therefore has no relevance to the story line, and by not providing a “reveal,” an awkward hole is left, although apparently not egregious enough for the Pulitzer committee to find fault.

WAR AND PEACE and THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE were also Not Immune to Dangling Threads

I call this lack of resolution a dangling thread, and a wonderful bad example (ugh, I know) can be read in the two novels cited in this subtitle.

Anatol is a profound early character in WAR AND PEACE (he’s the guy who ties Pierre to the bear, should anyone have forgotten). Tolstoy relates much later in the tale that Anatol lost a leg in battle, but there is not one single mention of him in any other section of the book.

In THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE, Captain Vye is a fabulous character for which a rich fabric is knitted by Hardy. But after Eustacia meets her end, there is no further reference to Vye–and his feelings–thus leaving the story and the reader with a huge void.

Can there be a Happy Medium?

Perhaps an expedient way to view threads is via Dos Passos’ USA. Eventually he had to leave some threads to their own devices or he’d have been writing ad infinitum because of the type of historical chronicle the story happened to be. However, USA demonstrates in abundant terms how threads can be expanded to reach a satisfactory conclusion in the mind of the reader–yet sans “finality” in each and every scenario.

Shouldn’t the Writer be Cut some Slack

Some can argue, and most justifiably, that it’s not a literary transgression to defer providing a detailed chronology for the life of every character in a book the size of WAR AND PEACE. This is certainly not disputable, but it does beg reconciliation by the author when, in my opinion, a character is prominent enough to drive a significant segment of a story. This is my contention in the Tolstoy example, and for me it’s even more acute in Hardy’s work because the captain is such a viable character in so much of the narrative.

It could be nothing more than an issue of degree, but if readers were to parse stories they didn’t enjoy, there might be a legitimate question as to how often their disappointment was due to dangling threads.

Robert L. Bacon, Founder

The Perfect Write®

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Enjoy that? You can read more of Robert’s articles at The Cuckleburr Times right here.

How to Impress an Editor (And How to Mark Yourself as An Amateur)

Lee Masterson — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 05:11:17 +0000

Okay, I know I’m smashing a popular misconception here but – Editors Really Are People!

Take a deep breath and recover for a moment – it was a shattering revelation, after all. But it is the truth. Editors go home to their families after work. They eat and work and play and do all the things you do, too. They just happen to work for a publishing house, or magazine, in which you would like to see your work published. They have likes and dislikes and they have a job to do.

Publishers are in the business of selling their products (be they books, magazines, e-books or whatever). They rely on their editors to make wise purchasing decisions that will ultimately create profits for their company. That doesn’t make them bad guys – it makes them busy professionals.

And the last thing a busy professional person wants to see land on his or her desk is a vague note from a self-marked amateur that probably won’t make his boss the profit he needs to make in order to pay his wages.

How to Impress an Editor – And How to Mark Yourself as An Amateur

Pro - Study the guidelines carefully, and follow those guidelines to the letter. An editor wants to see a submission that is clear and easy to read. Print your manuscript in a clear, concise serif font, like Times New Roman or Courier, preferably in a 12-point pitch. Use underlining to indicate where you would like italics. For electronic submissions, only submit what is specifically requested.

Amateur - Print out your story on brightly colored, strongly-scented paper in REALLY hard to read font. Format your email/attachment to read exactly like an already published book. That way it’s SURE to stand out from every other submission in the slushpile and the editor will pick it up first. Who cares about the eye-strain the editor has to suffer? And who cares about the hours of re-formatting some poor copy-person must sit through – as long as your story is noticed, right?

Pro - Put yourself in an editor’s shoes. Remember at all times that you are not the only person corresponding or submitting to that editor on that day.

Amateur – Demand that you be given an answer precisely 24 hours after you submit your work. Call or email three times a day until you do get an answer. Beg until he says yes, if he was stupid enough to reject it.

Pro – Take the time do some homework. Research the publications needs and wants. Read some back issues and familiarize yourself with the editorial style. Find out the name of the current editor, and address your query directly to that person. Learn what the editor likes and dislikes. Send exactly what that editor is looking for.

Amateur – Send your query letter/email to “Dear Editor”. That will show that stupid editor that her publication and her are not so important! Perhaps even try “Dear Sir/Madam”, for that extra personalized feeling. It’s only an anonymous editor, after all.

Pro - Include a Title page and a table of contents (chapters) with your manuscript. Pack the entire story into your manuscript box with either a large paper clip to secure it together, or a large rubber band. Your Cover Letter goes on the top, with your professional business card clipped to it.

Amateur - Bind, glue, staple or tie your manuscript so that no pages escape. Pretty plastic folders with wire-binding are a good idea too – That way the editor won’t mix the pages up with anyone else’s story.

Pro - Keep your submission packet clean, simple and professional. Where possible, do not fold submissions. Email queries and submissions are no different to traditional postal submissions. Don’t be overly friendly – this is a business transaction.

Amateur - Attach pretty stickers, bright labels, and photographs all over your submission packet to draw more attention. Paste Copyright symbols all over your work – we don’t want some smarmy editor “stealing” it, now do we?

Pro – Make sure you have set your text to be double-spaced between lines – even between paragraphs – and leave only single spaces between sentences. Set your margins for approximately 1 1/2 inches on ALL sides of the print. Put your name, address and the title of the story in the top left corner of the FIRST page of the manuscript. Every page after this should have only your name and the book’s title. Number your pages in the upper right corner.

Amateur – Format your story so that every line is even, and neatly justified down both sides of the page. Bind your book like a finished product. This approach should help the editor “see” your book as a finished product. It doesn’t matter that the type-setter will hate you forever – he’s not an editor.

Pro - Briefly describe your work. See if you can keep it to around twenty-five words. No more than a paragraph. Estimate the word count – lots of emphasis on estimate. An editor will not want to see “around 55,437 words” written on your query. Round the number off to the nearest hundred. Keep your letter down to one page in length. Editors are busy people. They will want to know what you are offering as quickly as possible.

Amateur - Tell the editor how much your grandma LOVED your story. Remind him again how good it is, because your best friend said it made her cry. Throw in another reminder of your brilliance and tell him you’re the next Stephen King.

Pro - Double- then triple-check your work for spelling and grammar. Many editors won’t read past the query letter if it already shows signs of bad usage of language.

Amateur - Run your story through the computer spell checker, then send it out to as many people as possible. Someone is bound to buy it then.

Pro – Realize that a rejection letter is not a personal thing. It is simply a statement from the editor that the publication you submitted to is either over-stocked, or may have recently purchased another piece of work similar to yours.

Amateur - Send the rejection letter back to the editor, covered in death-threats and big red scrawls saying “Die, Editor“. Bribery is another great option. Or perhaps send a rude article about the self-serving nastiness of editors who don’t have a clue. And that “Black-list” thing? Why, that’s only a myth, isn’t it? Editors don’t ever talk with other editors, so no one will ever know you were the one who threatened to kidnap his favorite hamster unless he published your masterpiece “I Was a Teenaged Ax-Wielding Homicidal Space-Pirate in Wyoming“.

Remember – A writer should be a professional business person, in the business of selling a product (your writing or your book) to a buyer (the publisher). Treat your words as though they are the foundation of your growing business enterprise, and you really will see the rewards.

Authors note: Recently, after receiving a very well written article from a subscriber, I was unfortunately left to decline his offer to print it in Fiction Factor. The article itself was of a high quality, however did not meet the editorial needs of what we try to offer here at Fiction Factor. Put simply – we felt we already had enough information available on that topic.

This was the sixth submission Tina and I had discussed and rejected that same day, with four more still to read through and sort. Of those submissions, we accepted just one.

Amateur: The author responded to rejection by immediately submitting a derogatory article, questioning our motives for rejection, my motives for producing Fiction Factor, and the motives of the editors of all writing-related magazines as a whole. In normal circumstances, ironically, I would have found the piece interesting enough to publish here, because it is both a) factual and b) true! But it was still a vengeful jab at the staff of Fiction Factor

It also guaranteed rejection.

So – final tip on how to mark yourself as an amateur – don’t be rude to an editor. It makes the normally-difficult task of rejection much easier.

Lee Masterson is a freelance writer from South Australia. She is also the editor of Fiction Factor (http://www.fictionfactor.com)- an online magazine for writers, offering tips and advice on getting published, articles to improve your writing skills, heaps of writer’s resources and much more.

Seven Weapons To Conquer The Giant Procrastination

Earma Brown — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 11:27:41 +0000

Have you been guilty of procrastinating on your book project, lately? Like the author, many writers get hung up with wrong thinking about writing and completing their books. They feel like a loser because they have stopped and started countless of times over the years.

They fail to realize you actually become a winner the minute you start moving toward your worthwhile goal. Instead they continue procrastinating until they give up. A client confessed she thought writing a book was too hard.

Knowledge and know-how can be formed into a weapon that will destroy the power of procrastination. Using the 7 weapons below writers can conquer the giant procrastination and finally realize their book dream.

Weapon #1 Do it Now!

Now is better than later. Remember you become a successful author the minute you start moving toward your worthwhile book goal. I don’t know anyone that regrets they wrote a book. But the author has met plenty of people that regret they didn’t do it sooner.

Weapon #2 Invest time in designing your passion points “top marketing spots” beforehand!

Spend time on developing the passion points designed to sell more before your book is even completed The passion points are the title, cover, thesis, audience, benefits & features, mini sales letter written as introduction and back cover copy of each book. For example, at least half of the book’s success will be on the title you choose.

Weapon #3 Know you don’t have to be an expert with a degree, great writer or do loads of research

Write books you are interested in and want to learn more about. As you look for information, talk to experts and write, you become the expert. Find out what questions your readers will want answered. Organize them into categories which become your table of contents and eventually your chapters. Remember there are interested readers who are waiting for your helpful information.

Weapon #4 Realize your message is significant and deserves your attention, love and time.

Consider what your readers need and want. If your book shares something unique, encouraging, useful, entertaining, it is important enough to be written. Think about your gift? God gave you your gift to share with others. Our gift back to God is what we do with it. The loving care you put into your gift (book) the more rewards await you.

Weapon #5 Recognize your book will sell with your marketing efforts.

It’s true not everyone will want to buy your book. Yet there are plenty of your targeted audiences that will want your entertaining or helpful information. The world awaits your self-help, how-to’s, business, or poetry book. When you take the time to touch their emotions with something that benefits them, they will pull out their credit card or cash and pay the price. Top selling non-fiction topics are self- help, mysteries, parent/children, sex and romance. Remember women
buy 78% of all trade books.

Weapon #6 Realize the journey doesn’t have to be long or difficult.

Invite your friends and family to brainstorm with you as peer editors. Ask for their feedback on the thesis, title and chapters – one at a time. Don’t become isolated in your thinking. Opening your writing process up to others will give you a better feel for what your readers may want. Enroll in a writing and/or publishing class to elevate your thinking. Join a critique group to get feedback. Subscribe to newsletters and read articles on book writing to get tips that will help you on your journey to a successful book.

Weapon #7 Acknowledge publishing has changed and doesn’t have to be too expensive, too long and too difficult anymore.

Technology has advanced the publishing process into new realms. Traditional publishing has normally taken one to two years. With e-Book and Print on Demand (POD) printing technologies, an author can see their quality looking book in print within a few months or less.

Remember if you get to some parts of the project that’s beyond your skill or know-how consider coaching and other professional services that will carry you over anything blocking you from writing, completing and publishing your successful book.

If you have been succumbing to procrastination, take a different strategy use the perspective and 7 weapons above to overcome any giant called procrastination keeping you from fulfilling your book dream.

Earma Brown, 13 year author and business owner helps small business owners and writers who want to write their best book now! Author of “Write Your Best Book Now”. Visit Earma at Inspired Publishing.

Express Yourself Through Creative Writing

Sebastian Marders — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 00:38:26 +0000

A popularly used cliche says that the pen is mightier than the sword. Indeed, writing is a form of an
unlimited expression. It is through writing that a person can express his thoughts without reservations. All of a writer’s emotions, apprehensions and ideals can form into words and therefore convey meaning to the readers. Conventionally though, this type of art is classified into two – the non-creative and creative writing.

A Clear Look at its Definition

You should understand the meaning of these two terms. The non-creative type of writing is on the factual side. It talks about real life scenarios and the objectivity of the information. The writer’s main purpose is to bring forth an informative attack to the readers and educate or inform them of a concept, a product, or a situation. Some of the examples are history books, news articles, and other technical write ups.

On the other hand, creative writing is what is known as inspired writing. It is the variant which comes from within the inner thoughts of the writer. It typically roots from the personality of the author.

His main goal is to shed some new light into the facts on hand and present the composition according to how he perceives it. Someone who creates an artistic masterpiece usually ponders on the things that happen around him and considers the powerful emotions such as fidelity, love, anger, and the likes. Some examples are short stories, poems, novels, and other products of fiction.

The Writer’s Inspiration

The writers who are more geared towards this type of creation haul their inspiration from several factors. Most of these are based on their personal experiences or those that they get from the experiences of the people around them. They are more aware of the situation, the surroundings, as well as the emotions that couple every incident. In short, these authors are very observant.

Tips for You as a Creative Writer

The ideas for your masterpiece can pop up at any time. You never know when to expect them to come rushing to your mind. The funny thing is that even when you are doing your common chores at home or you are driving down a busy street, you will spot something that inspires you to write your composition. Likewise, there is what is termed as writer’s block. Meaning, no matter how you try to squeeze out an idea from your mind, you just can’t think of any. In times like these, here are some helpful tips for you to consider.

Choose a scene. This is the initial step to think about. Try looking outside of the window. Observe the
things and people that you see. Focus on what they are doing. Let yourself absorb the occurrences around you. Sooner or later, ideas can form inside your mind. From a simple scene, you can come up with a beautiful story.

Get inspiration from timeless stories. Literary stories are timeless, so to speak. Hence, you can take a look back at them and inspire your own story from any of them. Even more, you may combine them to be able to generate a more profound and artistic story.

Be creative. Value your opinions and personal ideas. It is very important to use your own judgment to
maintain a thing called originality.

Creative writing often stirs the emotions of the readers. Take note of these tips and boost your talent to a higher level.

Sebastian Marders loves writing about a variety of things and sharing the website that inspires each piece with his readers. If you are interested in creative writing then please visit Write On Blast.

How to write a bad detective series

Jackie Speel — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 02:34:09 +0000

Some of these points will occur in most series. It is the manner and context which determines whether the point is well handled, neutral or indicative of a bad series. (See the introduction to the Grand List of Science Fiction Clichés for further comments.)

The only crime worth investigating is murder. Any petty (or other) crimes that occur will link up somehow with the murder(s) committed. No other crime, however complex/ingenious in constructing or resolving, is worth developing or investigating.

Motives for committing the crime will be banal or involve non-rational motives.

The murder will be committed as messily/unpleasantly as possible. Nobody will Suffer Beautifully.

Crimes and their investigations will occur one at a time, rather than overlapping/concurrently.

There will be no reference to other crimes in previous stories (to allow for varying sequences of presentation) whether loosely connected to the particular episode or indicating a story arc. Nor will there be any reference to current events in reality (to keep the shelf life going).

Private individuals who investigate the crimes which regularly and repeatedly occur around them are never considered as possible candidates for serial murder.

These private individuals can solve murders without having any formal training in the relevant fields/apparently having appropriate knowledge. They can resolve the crime without having access to the resources of the police/investigating unit, just by using ‘common sense.’

A regular character’s actual skills will be ignored or used only intermittently, and there will never be a ‘puzzle’/crime within their field.

In an official investigating organisation of whatever nature, the lead figure is regularly in conflict with the head of the unit/their immediate superior/immediate inferiors. There will also be tensions within the department, whether sexual or otherwise, and everybody is able to switch to the latest investigation, however important their own work.

Many of the people involved will have fractured personal lives, which will be given significant coverage.

No matter how ancient the crime (relative to the timeframe of the series), there will always be someone around who was on the case/knows something vital, and/or was not contacted despite being an obvious source of information.

The files for ancient cases will always be available, while modern ones will get misplaced. Files and other records will never be linked/boxed up with unrelated cases.

When there is insufficient plot to fill the time/space available, fill the gaps with gratuitous sex/violence/discordant music (if TV) and other ‘plot-fillers not related to the storyline.’

Two murders/several crimes will be interlinked far more frequently than is statistically likely in Real Life.

Provincial towns and villages will have far more murders than would seem likely for the area: the geography of the surrounding area is somewhat compressed and all roads lead outwards to only one destination, rather than crisscrossing. Nor, given the relatively high rate of murders is there either a mass exodus of people fearing for their lives or an influx of media or conspiracy theorists trying to observe the phenomenon.

Historical and other research will be displayed in full detail: things obvious then but unfamiliar now will be explained in detail, however much those in the series would regard it as ‘stating the #### obvious’ unless to be used as a rabbit out of the hat solution.

Modern English rather than that contemporary to the setting will be used not only to make it easier to understand the dialogue, but to an extent that “feels wrong” to the reader/viewer. Alternatively twee and quaint language is used to an extent that renders the dialogue difficult to comprehend if not annoying, and in contexts where it would not have been used.

The reader/viewer wants a complete surprise – provide many red herrings and false trails, rather than clues for them to work out who might have committed the crime and why.

Plot holes can be ignored.

Historical murders will involve psychologically implausible for the time motives and mindsets.

Science fiction detective stories will rely on excessive use of gizmos, which do not have a backstory.

About The Author: Jackie Speel enjoys researching obscure history.

Common Mistakes New Writers Make and How to Avoid Them

Lucia Zimmitti — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 19:51:12 +0000

Writing is like any other skill in that you have to do a lot of it to get better. There isn’t any way around that, but you can identify mistakes common to new writers and learn to stop making them before they become habit.

Here are the most common mistakes new writers make:

Trying to sound really, really smart at the expense of clarity.

Writing for publication is extremely competitive (some say as competitive as Hollywood). Which means that writers are often anxious about how others perceive them. But using archaic, complicated words and convoluted sentence structures won’t make you sound intelligent; it will make you sound out of touch, or worse — it will confuse and frustrate the reader, convincing him/her to put down your article or book. Say what you mean as directly, honestly, and clearly as you can.

Saying too much.

This falls under the sage advice to trust your reader. Don’t insult your audience’s intelligence by including every shred of minutiae when it’s not needed.

For example, if the crux of a scene is going to be a big blow-up at the breakfast table between a teen and her parents, you don’t need to show the girl waking up to the alarm clock, brushing her teeth, getting dressed, putting on her makeup, stuffing her backpack, etc., before you get us to the kitchen table. The reader will fill in the blanks and understand that the girl had things to do before she headed downstairs.

When details don’t contribute to character development or move the story along, skip them. Also, resist the urge to “oversay” (bludgeon the readers with unnecessary repetition because you assume they must have forgotten things).

Saying too little.

This falls under the sage advice to be specific.

Although readers fill in the blanks all the time (as we saw in the above example), sometimes new writers assume that readers can fill in crucial gaps on their own. Because we often have a vivid, detailed picture of our subject in our heads as we write, we get wrapped up in that picture and forget that it needs to be equally vivid and detailed on the page. If you leave huge gaps that even the most attentive reader can’t possibly leap over alone, you aren’t saying enough.

Be sure there’s enough on the page for the readers to make meaningful connections and draw informed conclusions. Include relevant, interesting details in your writing. Make things specific so that your writing is memorable. Remember: seasoned is always better than bland.

Abandoning the promise you made the reader at the beginning of the piece.

If you’ve written anything that really mattered to you from start to finish, you know how the act of writing stimulates new thoughts and therefore you might end up in an unexpected place when you finish. New writers sometimes forget that ending up somewhere else means that you have to change the starting point.

For example, if your novel opens with unexplained murders and then introduces an armchair sleuth, you’re setting the reader up for a mystery. If you change the premise mid-way and shape the work into a romance involving a minor character (and ultimately leave the crimes unsolved), you’re breaking the promise you implicitly made your reader. Or maybe your article starts off promising a look at Cleopatra’s final days and ultimately ends up with anecdotes about modern-day travel in Egypt.

Forgetting that readers want to be entertained.

Because the story you’re working on is so compelling to you, it’s easy to forget that others need to be convinced that it’s fabulous (especially if it’s book-length and you want them to stick with you till the end). This advice applies to fiction and non-fiction writers alike. Unless your book is required reading on a college syllabus, you have to make it worth the reader’s while. Since there are so many entertainment choices out there, people won’t slog through something that they don’t enjoy.

How to avoid these mistakes:

Be aware of them.

You shouldn’t cramp your style when you write your first drafts (because you’ll get the richest material if your self-edit feature is “OFF”). But click it on when you revise, and look for places you need to correct the above errors in subsequent drafts.

Ask a trusted reader for feedback.

Keep in mind that a trusted reader isn’t the person who always tells you how brilliant you are and that your work is perfect (that’s “Mom”), but the person who is willing to give you honest feedback, even when it may be hard to hear. Ask that person for very specific feedback. Ask your trusted readers to note places in your work where they felt confused or bored or frustrated.

Read as much as your brain can hold. And then go back for more.

Read loads and loads in the genre you’re writing, as well as other areas that interest you. But don’t just read for the sake of reading — read like a writer: reread things that really worked for you. Locate patterns, identify structures, look at the ways experienced writers you admire have avoided the most common mistakes and try to consciously apply that to your own work.

But don’t just stop at books you love. When you come across books or articles that make you say, “I could have done this way better,” note where the author lost you and think of how you would fix it if you had the chance.

Keep a writing journal.

And the more specific you are, the better. Keep detailed track of your progress, including the things you’re reading and what you’re learning from them. Describe the steps you’re taking in revision. Keep track of how you’re faring overall with addressing and avoiding the most common pitfalls new writers face.

To discover more ways to avoid common writing mistakes, visit ManuscriptRx and sign up for “Write Through It,” a free, monthly e-newsletter that offers tips on writing more creatively, clearly and effectively.

Lucia Zimmitti, a writing coach and independent editor, is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and the Editorial Freelancers Association. Her fiction and poetry have been published in various national literary journals, and she has taught writing at the high school and college levels.

How to Develop Your Book’s Structure

Melinda Copp — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 04:30:58 +0000

A man came to me last week because he needed help writing his book. He told me that he’s had this project on his to-do list for years, but he just couldn’t seem to get started. He’s literally been staring at the task-start writing my book-almost every day, and when he came to me, he still hadn’t done it.

But who can blame him-if I woke up every day and saw “write a book” scratched on daily to-do list, I’d never bother with it. Why? Because the point of the to-do list is to get things done, and there’s no way I could write a book in a day. However, I could write a chapter.

Breaking down the task of writing your book into a series of smaller jobs and assigning a topic to each section is often a more effective way to begin than trying to figure out the whole book at once-it breaks the process into specific tasks.

Break the Whole into Pieces
Whether the book is fictional, informative, or biographical, you can see the steps necessary to complete it much easier if you break the overall structure into shorter pieces. Think of your book like a cake: eating the whole thing at once is impossible, but taken piece by piece you can make real progress and devour that cake relatively quickly.

Switching to a healthier example, if you’re writing a book about the origins of citrus fruits, you can devote one section to oranges, another to lemons, and another to grapefruits. Even this simple breakdown helps give the project a plan. We are no longer dealing with citrus fruits as a whole, but three separate categories of citrus fruits we can deal with one at a time.

Work One Piece at a Time
With the chapters of your book separated, you can proceed to outline what you want to include in each one. Especially for instructional works, it can help to think about your book as just a series of shorter articles. Use the first paragraph or two to introduce the key phrases or topics and draw the reader into your material.

Back to the book about citrus fruits, we might divide the chapter about oranges into a history of oranges, how to grow oranges, and the nutritional value of oranges. Once the outline for the chapter is planned, you can add sub-categories as well as specifics and examples. The history of oranges could be divided into Asian and North American oranges. Not only will these sub-divisions make the work more manageable, it will also help to keep your ideas organized.

With a narrative work, especially fiction, the process is slightly different, but still involves a breakdown of topics. Instead of beginning in the planning phase, writing the first chapter or scene right away can set the tone and set up the story. After you make a few decisions about the characters, setting, and situation, you can proceed to outline how the rest of the story will happen. What will happen in each chapter? When will the problem become apparent? How will it be resolved? What is the role of each main character?

For memoir, you can try plotting key events from your life along a timeline, choosing key events that show your story. Then as you’re writing them, you can play around with the order for dramatic effect.

Put it All Together
Writing a book can seem like an intimidating task to undertake-and diving into the project without knowing where to start can be very unproductive. But if you break the project down into smaller, more manageable parts, you can make the work faster and enhance your end result.

Melinda Copp is a freelance editor, writer, and author of the e-book The WRITE Way to Author a Profitable Book, a resource for entrepreneurial writers who want to create a marketable informational product that sells. For more information about Melinda and her services, visit her online at MelindaWrites. If you have any questions about how Melinda can help you, send her an email at info@melindawrites.com.

Write About Something That Will Change Your Life!

Suzanne Harrison — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 00:44:29 +0000

It’s been said that you should “write about what you know”. It’s also been said that doing that condemns you to a life of boredom as you’ll never grow beyond your current limitations. Not very helpful, is it?

It’s also been said that you should write about what you’re passionate about, interested in or otherwise taken by, as you’ll spend so much time researching it, writing it and rewriting it, that it had better light your fire, or it will drive you insane. And then again, others say don’t tackle a topic you know nothing about, you should write what you know….

And so we go around in ever decreasing circles.

I actually subscribe to the “write what you know” line of thought, but with a bit of a twist. I encourage writers to write about what they know on an emotional level.

Try writing a story that heals YOU. Emotions are the universal language. We all feel the same feelings, we may just experience them in different ways. We all recognize joy, love, peace, anger, resentment, jealousy and fear and when you tap into this universal language with your stories, you speak to the hearts of all readers. As you and your characters go on the roller coaster ride, your readers will go with you, and as you and your characters heal, so too will your readers see a way out for themselves.

Have you ever read a novel that’s changed your way of looking at the world? I certainly have. Try this simple tip, and you’ll soon be writing stories that change lives as well, including your own.

Write about something that will change your life.

Now by this I don’t mean sitting back and thinking, “What would change my life? I know! Divorcing my wife/leaving my job/selling my business and trekking across Africa/buying a ski lodge in Switzerland/running for President”. That’s not the type of change I’m talking about.

I’m talking about real change – the type of change that starts on the inside and works its way out. And while it may eventually manifest in divorce, resignation, liquidation, traveling, new businesses or political aspirations, it is not the way the change looks on the outside that matters as much as how it looks on the inside. And once you get the inside right, the outside takes care of itself.

As writers of fiction we are constantly living inside our own imaginations, aren’t we? True creativity occurs when experience meets imagination. The best way to write stories that resonate with others, that capture them from the first page and don’t let them go until the last, is for you, as the writer, to delve into your own basement of emotional experience and retrieve images of universal resonance to deliver to your readers.

JK Rowling said that the Dementors were definitely born of her own depression. The mirror of Erised was her own desperate desire to spend just five more minutes with her own mother, who passed away as she wrote Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Harry’s search for a family of his own was paralleled by Jo Rowling’s desire for the very same thing in her own life.

You need courage to be a fiction writer. Courage to expose your own wounds, courage to go to the places you haven’t been before to heal them, and courage to decide you have the strength to go on the journey in the first place.

We have all had our ups and downs in life. And saved somewhere in our unconscious databases, are all the emotions, all the traumas, all the joys and all the images of our lives. As you access these buried emotions, a curious thing will happen. You won’t necessarily relive the actual events that happened to you. By drawing on the emotion, and allowing it to be your guide, your imagination will fill in the missing bits, and you’ll find yourself retrieving images, scenes and situations that may be very different to your own actual experience. Writing a memoir or autobiography is not the goal. Writing a story with emotional resonance that others will want to read is.

Try this simple exercise: Sit with your feet flat on the floor, hands resting on your thighs, your eyes closed. Take 3 to 5 deep breaths. Now in your mind’s eye, see a spotlight shining on a brightly lit stage. Step into the spotlight. Take a few seconds to grow accustomed to the shift in perspective. Now I want you to feel real anger. Feel the heat of it coursing through your body. How dare they? What right do they have? Ask yourself these questions over and over in your mind until you have worked yourself up into a white heat of fury. Now in your mind’s eye, allow an image to form around you, the source of your anger. What’s happening? Who is there? What can you hear? Coming up with a first sentence, write for 10 minutes on what happens next.

When you’ve completed this exercise, take a break, or come back tomorrow and try this next exercise. Following exactly the same process, feel forgiveness instead of anger. Allow the sense of true forgiveness to envelope you. Then when you are ready, allow an image to rise in your mind’s eye, and coming up with a first sentence, write for 10 minutes.

Did these two pieces of writing connect at all? Did the forgiveness relate to the anger, or vice versa? Don’t worry if they didn’t. Just know that as you utilize this process when writing a story, you will write a progressive story of great emotional resonance, and in so doing, you will be unconsciously training yourself to experience this journey in your own life.

This is a simple exercise to show you the power of accessing your unconscious through emotion. Once you become accustomed to using this method, you will find all kinds of magical thing occurring to your writing, and all kinds of wonderful healing occurring in your own life.

Writers of non-fiction are bound to an extent by the limitations of science and provable fact. They can speculate, philosophize and hypothesize, but until someone can come up with “proof in a test tube”, it is essentially speculation.

When you write a story, with a character confronting their issues, overcoming their obstacles, facing their demons and changing their lives, you are unconsciously writing a guidebook that shows others how to make those changes too. Fiction writers offer real solutions. Real emotional solutions. We may not show you how to fly to the moon, or how to crack the property market and walk off with millions, or how to build a successful e-commerce business from home, but we can show you how to really live your life, how to relate to others, how to relate to yourself, how to heal relationships and how to lead more blissful lives.

And that’s pretty terrific, don’t you think?

Suzanne Harrison is the Director of Writers Central and author of four creative writing, short story and novel courses. Her vibrant online courses and community provide members with a forum to connect, learn and grow, plus competitions, reviews and 24/7 feedback. Writers Central.

How to Write . . . Anything

Jeff Brown — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 13:24:22 +0000

Now, I did say by reading this that you would learn how to write “anything,” right? That’s a tall order. So you’re thinking, “Yeah, right.” Well, I’ll tell you right now why you should not only read this article but print it out and refer to it often for all the writing you’ll ever do. That’s right. Ever.

Read on.

When being instructed or informed through an article, you’re mostly reading about what someone has read or what someone has done. Of course, if you want to know how to get rich, you’ll read the rich person’s articles before reading those by someone who has merely read the how-to-get-rich books.

So in order to see why you must keep reading this article, let me tell you what I’ve “done.”

I have read and critiqued more than 100,000 pages from the well over 100 writing classes I’ve taught. The majority of those classes are at the college level: developmental and transfer composition, critical thinking, critical thinking through literature, technical writing (business memos, letters, etc.) and introduction to literature. I have also written and published hundreds of articles and essays; numerous poems; two books with three in the works (fiction, non-fiction, children); hundreds of jokes for myself and other professional performers, and so forth.

Now you’re thinking “La de da. Big deal, Mr. Big Time. Whatever.” But hey, I didn’t write this to brag . . . OK, I did, but that’s an insecurity issue I need to get into with my therapist. The main reason I tell you all the above is to show you that I’m not just some guy giving you recycled material. I’ve been there, done that.

OK, with that out of the way, let’s get into how to write “anything.”

In order to write well, you need to start at the top. What does that mean? You need to learn how to write at the most formal level using all the standard rules for grammar, sentence structure, proper pronoun usage, subject / verb agreement, the mechanical, and so on. But that’s not all. That’s just the technical stuff.

In order to write and write well, you have to read the masters. Who are they? The people who not only write well but, preferably, those you admire.

Don’t have any? I’ll give you a few suggestions.

Poetry
Charles Simic
Mark Strand
Adrienne Rich
Louise Gluck
Lucille Clifton
Maya Angelou
Robert Frost
Edgar Allen Poe
Russell Edson
Wislawa Szymborska
Molana Jalal-eDin Runi

Fiction
Douglas Adams
Tom Robbins
Isaac Asimov
Hans Christen Anderson
Dr. Suess
C.S. Lewis
Martin Luther King
Homer
Henry James
Jack Kerouc
Norman Mailer
Stephen King
George Orwell
Saki
J. D. Salinger
Jonathan Swift
Mark Twain
Gore Vidal
Kurt Vonnegut
Tom Wolfe
Oscar Wilde
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Isabel Allende
Ayn Rand

Of course these aren’t exhaustive lists, and they aren’t presented to give you the “top authors of all time” list, but rather a few of the best that I have read. If you desire, you may drop by and give me a list of your favorites, as well.

Nevertheless, what do you do with all this reading? Simply sit there with a good cup of jo or tea, relax and enjoy? Nope. Sorry, you’re here to do some work to improve your writing. So what specifically do you do?

Read on.

I suggest that you read a poem or a chapter noticing style, rhythm, diction (word choice), syntax (word arrangement), pacing, where paragraphs break, punctuation use, figures of speech (metaphor, simile, personification), and so on.

As you read, notice how the author begins, maintains the theme, and concludes. What is he or she doing to get from point to point. More technically, you can look at the paragraphs to see how the author transitions from one sentence to the next, paragraph to paragraph, section to section. Notice how the author keeps the paragraphs together, keeps them unified: all sentences maintaining the main idea of that group of sentences. Also, take a real close look at how the words are arranged or ordered. Is the author using simple, complex, or compound sentences? Meaning, is she like Hemingway who used mostly simple sentences? Or like many other authors who combine sentences with an occasional coordinating conjunction or subordinate clause. Are the sentences passive or active? And so on.

Now, at this point, many are wondering, what’s he saying?

That’s a lot of information, so here’s a few examples to help clarify.

Passive sentence

The barn was struck by the lightning.

Active sentence The lightning struck the barn.

These two simple sentences are different in that one is more emphatic, gets to the point quicker, and does a better job of keeping the reader’s attention. That’s right, the active sentence.

To see why you need to use simple, complex, and compound sentences, read the following example.

I woke up. I got out of bed. I took a shower. The water was real hot. I went down stairs and ate breakfast. My mom was late for work.

OK, wake up!

You can see why you not only need to combine sentences and add an occasional phrase and clause here and there but also the need for transitions to keep your paragraphs coherent. Here’s the paragraph again.

When I woke that morning, I got out of bed but moved quite slow as I was tired. Jumping in the shower half asleep, it was some time before I noticed the water was quite hot. But it didn’t matter because I didn’t have time to linger. I was late for work. So I went downstairs for breakfast, which was simply grabbing a banana as I ran out the door. I waved to my mom who was late for work too.

So by adding a variety of sentences (a phrase here and a clause there before and after), some transitions, and a little more detail, you have yourself a pretty well-written paragraph.

But notice the rhythm. The pacing. There are a lot of options, so notice where the phrases are placed, clauses, simple sentences, complex sentences, and so on. Generally, after the writer gets the idea down and covers her bases, so to speak, it comes down to actually looking at words, phrases, clauses, sentences, even punctuation. Some writers will replace a comma with a period. Put it back. Add a phrase. Take it out. Put it back. Combine sentences. Take them apart. And so on. I read about one author who looks at every page TWENTY TIMES! Excessive you say? Sure. But to write well, it takes time and work and dedication.

Bottom line, the best thing you can do is read, read often, and read a variety of writers in a variety of genres. As you read and write, you will begin to notice connections that will aid you in a greater understanding of what you are doing. And the more you understand and are able to adapt what other authors have done to your writing, you will begin to write with greater clarity and power.

But what if you’re writing memos for work, articles for article directories, screen plays, emails, essays, and so on. Well, as I said before, you need to know the basics, but that doesn’t mean you need to become a grammar scholar. A good place to start is a writer’s handbook titled The Everyday Writer (Bedford St. Martins). It contains a section called the “20 Most Common Errors,” or errors that will likely give you the most trouble.

Once you get these down, the next step is to read some of the best and get a feel for how they do what they do. You obviously won’t be writing like a poet or master of letters all the time, but if you are able to handle the writing basics, how to turn a phrase, pacing, diction, vocabulary, and so on, you will then be able to pull from your pallet what you need for any occasion.

Good luck and good writing.

Jeff is a Motivation, Self-Improvement, and Success expert and can be found at SelfGrowth.com. He has written 100’s of essays and articles; over 50 poems; and several books: At Amazon.com, you can find Black Body Radiation and the Ultraviolet Catastrophe, a novel to inspire young adults and the young at heart. For more inspiration, get his collection of poems, To Die at the Age of Man at Lulu dot com. Coming soon: Give and Grow Yourself Rich (July, 2008); Education is a Waste of Time, (early 2009); and a children’s novella The Search for Adriana (late 2008). Currently, he teaches writing and owns Inner Projection, a self-improvement business.

The 7 Habits Of Highly Successful Authors

Suzanne Harrison — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:02:08 +0000

The more I read how the successful authors do it, the more I realise that, like successful people in all walks of life, they all do things in common that contribute enormously to their success. So how can we learn from successful authors to ensure our own success in 2008 and beyond?

We can start by adopting what I call “The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Authors”. Adopt these 7 habits and you just may find that 2008 is the year you break through your own writing barriers!

1. Write about something you care about.

Whether you are writing fiction or non fiction, it is imperative you write about something you care about. The successful authors have some emotional connection to their content or story. If you are writing fiction, then write from a place of emotional familiarity. Your genuine experience will come through in your writing and your readers will connect with that. If you are writing a non fiction piece, choose a topic you are passionate or enthusiastic about. After all, if you are going to invest your precious time in what you are writing, you owe it to yourself to write with passion, feeling and enthusiasm.

2. Take risks

Don’t be afraid to put your head, or your hands, on the chopping block when you write. In the world of fiction, you will have no doubt heard about creating characters that are “larger than life”. That doesn’t mean they are giants, it means they go above and beyond and take risks and make decisions that we would not have the courage to take in our own lives. After all, it’s not about what we would do when we are tethered by the restrictions of polite behaviour, it’s what we would do in our wildest imaginations that make our readers sit up and take notice.

For the non fiction writer, it’s time for you to take a stand. Take a view and stick with it, presenting your case with conviction and vigour. No one listens to someone who writes meekly, or with a wishy washy hand. Stick your neck out, and don’t be afraid to get it chopped off. All the greatest journalists are the ones who are not afraid to speak their minds. Get into that habit and you’re well on your way to being that next great journalist.

3. Plan

This is definitely the most ignored but equally the most important phase of the writing process. Planning is essential to the success of any undertaking and writing is no different. J.K. Rowling spent 5 years planning the entire Harry Potter series before she put pen to paper on a single word that appeared in the books. If you are writing a short story, novel or screenplay, planning the story before you begin writing is as essential to your success as ink in your pen or power to your laptop. There are some writers who claim to just start with an image or a sentence and then the whole thing just unfolds before them, but the writers who can do this with any degree of success are few and far between. Take the time to plan out your story, at the very least know where your beginning, middle and end are. The more planning you do, the more enjoyable the writing process and the less rewriting and editing you will have to do. The same goes for non fiction pieces, where it’s always advisable to have an outline in place before you write your article or book.

4. Write every day

Joyce Carol Oates said that she would write, even when her soul felt as thin as a playing card, because somehow the act of writing would set it aright. There are going to be times when you just “don’t feel like it”, but like any other job or activity that is important to you, you must still, somehow, sit down every day and write. It has been said that it is by sitting down every day to write that one becomes a writer. Stephen King writes every day, including Christmas Day. Whether you are working on a book, story, article or nothing, still sit down and write something every single day. Even if you only write one page every day, that’s 365 pages in a year and that’s a whole book, isn’t it? When you are a writer, you cannot not write, and writing is like breathing. You have an urge to put things down in print, so to keep that fresh and alive, you need to turn that tap on every day. It’s more than practice. It’s life.

5. Be prepared to work hard

I read somewhere once that John Grisham worked for 4 hours per day and made $20 million per year. Whether that is true or not (about the hours worked or the money he makes) doesn’t matter. It is far more common to hear tales today of the world’s most popular commercial authors working their proverbial butts off to keep up with deadlines, promotional commitments and the ins and outs of their everyday lives. Janet Evanovich gets up and writes every morning at 5am so she can get a full day’s writing in before she has to answer mail, emails and deal with her other affairs of business, Jodi Picoult has a wonderful stay-at-home husband who allows her the luxury of writing through school pick ups and travelling for long periods to do research for her novels. J.K. Rowling also said she (misguidedly) thought that life as an author would be a Jane Austen-type of affair, sitting in a room overlooking a field and writing in anonymity. Of course her life is a whirlwind of book launches, movie premieres, media commitments, school commitments, and of course she has a family with three children. And while we all no doubt wish we had her “problems” it is very obvious that in the early part of the 21st century, the life of an author, successful or not, is a hard-working life. We are either working hard to get noticed, working hard to stay noticed, or working hard to avoid being noticed. Any way you look at it, if you have an aversion to hard work, you need to look elsewhere. Successful authors work hard. Period.

6. Persistence

It is said that persistence outstrips all other virtues. I have a card propped up on my desk that says, “Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go”. Almost every successful author I have studied has said that their success is due, at least in some part, to pure persistence and determination. If your manuscript or article is rejected, rewrite it and submit it again. Or submit it to someone else. The first Harry Potter novel was rejected by every major publishing house before Bloomsbury picked it up for a song. Even so called “overnight successes” have a story behind them about how many times they were rejected, or how many novels or articles they’ve written that have no value other than as fire kindling. The authors that succeed are the ones who don’t stop until they do. It’s that simple. Never give up. Winners never quit, and quitters never win.

7. Let it go

And finally when you have written your article, book or screenplay and have submitted it for publication or approval, let it go. If you’ve done the best you can with it, let it go and trust that it will make its way to where it needs to be. And start something else straight away. Regardless of whether what you have submitted is accepted or rejected, you are a writer and a writer writes. Once you finish one manuscript start immediately on another. If the one you’ve sent is picked up, they’ll be happy that you’ve got something new already, and if not you’re well on your way to finishing your next manuscript.

So those are the 7 Habits of Highly Successful Authors. Adopt these habits yourself, and before you know it, you too will join their ranks!

Suzanne Harrison is the Director and Founder of Writers Central, an innovative online creative writing school and community, offering creative writing, short story, novel and screenplay courses, news, reviews, articles, professional services, competitions and tips for writers. She can be found at Writers Central.

Suzanne is also a popular and inspirational speaker and workshop leader, renowned for her motivational style and her passion for story. Suzanne believes that the everyone who can speak and think can write, and she is committed to helping you write at your best every time. She begins her unique process by helping you to hitch your writing arm to your unconscious mind, then guiding you through the basics of story structure before taking you step by step through a process to write award-winning short stories, then onto the ultimate, planning and writing a novel or screenplay that sells.

Minor Characters. Are They Really Necessary?

Mervyn Love — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 23:39:34 +0000

The vast majority of fiction writers write short stories, whether they write for their own pleasure, for the writing circle they belong to, a competition or whether they aim to get them published. The temptation to bring in lots of exciting characters can be irresistible. But are they necessary?

In a short story you have between 800 and 3,000 words, on average, in which to tell your tale. You can’t afford to populate it with a cast of thousands. They simply won’t fit in.

So what must you do, what principles must you abide by to get the balance right? Let’s look at one or two examples.

Principle 1 – Whenever possible wield the axe.

Your main character is John and you write: ‘John opened the door. It was Reg Bigley, the postman, with a parcel.’

Giving the postman a name makes him a ‘Character’ and, as a result, in the minds of your readers he has assumed a visual reality. Your readers will picture Reg, even if only vaguely, in a form that the name ‘Reg Bigley’ conjures up in their minds. It will differ from reader to reader of course, but giving a character a name will have that effect.

If you write: ‘John opened the door. It was the postman with a parcel’ then we just have a nebulous ‘postman’ with no connotations for building a persona out of.

In this scenario I am assuming the parcel is the significant factor, and if you can get away without the actual appearance of the postman, so much the better.

So you could write: ‘John was in a quandary. The postman had brought the parcel that morning, but the contents were decidedly not what he was expecting’

Lesson: Don’t give minor ‘walk on’ characters names, and if you can do without them altogether, do so.

Principle 2 – Do they have a significant role?

Let’s develop John and the postman again. This time you write:

‘John opened the door. It was Reg Bigley the postman with a parcel.

“Hello Reg, what is it this time?”

“Another for your DVD collection I reckon, John.”

“You could be right. Got time for a cup of tea?”

“Ta very much.” ‘

Now you are giving Reg more than a ‘walk on’ role, plus we have the beginnings of a personality. This poses some questions. Does Reg have anything to do with the actual plot? Does he have some knowledge about the parcel that will have a bearing on the plot? Is he going to appear more than once? How many cups of tea will he drink?

If the parcel is significant, as we have assumed, but Reg only appears once and is then forgotten, keep him simply as the postman with no name. If Reg will contribute to the plot in some way, or if his conversation with John will bring something pertinent to light, then giving him a name and a personality will work so long as you don’t overdo it.

If you are bringing Reg back later in the story with an important contribution to make, then OK. Just don’t give him a wife, three kids and a pet hamster.

Lesson: A character must add significantly to the plot to make them worth the precious word count they’re going to take up in the story. If they don’t, keep him or her low key and anonymous at most.

Keep your minor characters under control and you will have a sharper and more focused story for your readers to enjoy.

Mervyn Love offers advice, resources, competition listing, markets and much more on his website, WritersReign . Subscribe to his free Article Writing Course here.

The Long and Short of The Short Story

Suzanne Harrison — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 20:15:47 +0000

Congratulations! You’ve plucked up the courage to enter a short story competition. You’ve had a go at a few short stories in the past and you’ve been wanting to tackle a novel for ages, but the idea was way too daunting so you’ve just shoved that to the bottom of your life’s “To Do” list. A short story is a much better idea, isn’t it? It’s just like writing a novel only shorter. Right?

Not exactly!

It’s been said that it’s not that a short story is long, it’s that it takes a long time to make it short. The idea that a short story is just a mini novel is an idea that will mean certain death to the success of your short story, before you’ve even written the first sentence.

There is an art, and a process to writing a short story, just like there’s an art and a process to writing a novel, a non-fiction book or an essay. Success is a matter of knowing the basic principles, and then applying these to write the best short story you’re capable of.

The question is, do you have the stamina to make your story short?

That question is easily answered by walking step by step through the writing process.

1. Planning

No matter what you are writing, you need to have a plan. Would you attempt to build a house without plans? Or would you set sail on the high seas without a map and compass? Writing stories is exactly the same. Set out without a plan and you will undoubtedly become lost in a forest of your own words.

Some simple questions to ask yourself at this early stage include:

* Who is your main character and what is their predicament?

* What do they want? How can they get out of their predicament?

* Who or what is stopping them getting what they want?

* How can you apply pressure to your character to force them into making tough choices in pursuit of their goal?

* What will your character learn over the course of the story?

Answering these few questions at the start will help you know who your character is, what they want, and how they will go about getting it.

2. Writing

Once you have a plan for your story you are ready to write it. When you are writing, you are just writing. You are not editing and you are not planning, you are writing. This specifically means that you don’t stop to wonder if “this way sounds better than that way”. When you are writing you are capturing the essence of the action in your story. You are writing a draft, not a finished product. At this stage don’t even think about your word limit. Just write the entire story as you have planned it. We’ll take care of the word limit in the editing and rewriting stages.

The writing stage is similar to mining a diamond. When a diamond is mined it is a chunk of rock, with a few glimmers to show it is actually a diamond. You don’t mine a beautifully cut and polished diamond straight from the side of a mountain, do you? No, you have an amazing piece of raw material, which you then take to a jeweller who will cut and polish it to show its beauty to its greatest advantage. In the writing process, the jeweller is the editor.

3. Rewriting

Once you have completed the first draft, the very best thing you can do is walk away. It can be difficult to get any distance from your own work, but it is virtually impossible if you try to plan, write, rewrite and edit your story in one sitting. If possible don’t look at it again for at least another day. This allows your story time to rest and “breathe”, and when you return to it you will see it in a fresh light.

When you are ready, re-read it straight through once without stopping, and without making any changes or marks in the margins. Once you’ve finished the first read, ask yourself one question: did I write the story that I set out to write? If the answer is no, don’t panic. It’s amazing how the real story you are meant to write comes out in the writing. At this stage your main focus is to ensure that the intention of the story equals the result. In other words, the story has to make sense, and must flow from beginning to end, with all questions raised at the beginning being answered by the end. It is quite common to do comprehensive rewrites of the first few scenes, as the story you really wanted to write didn’t surface until after you’d really got cracking. That’s ok. Just go back and rewrite any scenes you need to, to make the story flow from beginning to end.

Some other important questions to ask at this stage are:

* Are there any great leaps in time or place? It is generally best to keep these leaps to a minimum in a short story.

* How many characters do you have? It’s never a great idea to have more than three major characters at the most, and I’ve read great short stories where there is only one. Save the huge cast for your novel.

* Does the story continually move forward? It’s very easy to have two or maybe even three scenes showing the same thing about your character. A scene is a unit of change – if a scene doesn’t move the story forward, it needs to be cut or rewritten.

So rewriting is re-seeing and re-sculpting. The main purpose of this stage of the process is to make sure the story makes sense. There is a logic to story, and if there are any great leaps in time or place, you may need to add some small linking phrases. Once you are happy that the story flows in sequence you are ready to move to the final phase: editing.

4. Editing

You now need to step entirely out of your creative right brain and into your logical and analytical left brain, to refine and polish your story.

Firstly, look at your word count. Are you way over, way under, or pretty close to the mark? Never submit a story that is over the word limit. Respect the requirements of the competition and keep within the word limit.

Now read your story again, this time with your red marker in hand and a critical eye on the page. Some questions you need to ask at this stage are:

* When does the action begin? This is where your story begins. It’s tempting to “set the scene” and “show character” but the reality is, you don’t need to. The story always begins where the action begins. If there is anything that needs to be explained you haven’t written your action properly.

* Is all the action on the “spine” of the story? Edit out any superfluous material. Again, save it for your novel.

* Show don’t tell. This means, don’t tell us about someone, show us their character by putting them into difficult situations and let us discern their character by the choices they make.

* Edit out all explanation. As a general rule, ask yourself, “is it an image?” If it’s not it’s probably explanation and needs to be cut.

* Is there a “solution” to the story? Does the story deliver what it promised?

* Now is the time to ask, “is this the best way to say this?” If not, write it again, and say it better.

You may find yourself rewriting, editing, rewriting, editing over and over. This is completely normal! Most good short story authors do at least 15 drafts of their short stories before they are happy with the result.

So, you’ve made it through the process and you’re ready to send your story off to the competition. Make sure you double space it, that the font size is big enough to read easily and that you’ve put enough postage on the envelope!

And good luck!

Creative Techniques That Make Business Writing Stand Out

Melinda Copp — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 18:48:31 +0000

When most writers think about marketing materials, press releases, and how-to writing projects, they assume creativity is a waste of time and energy. Why not give it to them straight-right? But business writing doesn’t have to all business. Business writers can borrow several techniques from their creative writing counterparts to make their marketing materials fresh and unique.

1. Allusion
One of the first techniques that any writer should master is called allusion. Simply put the allusion is a great way to describe something by calling attention to something well-known. For example, you can draw an allusion between a slow lumbering business and the white whale in Moby Dick. This is the type of allusion that will draw a parallel in a reader’s mind and give them a mental image of what you are trying to say. But you need to remember that the allusion will fail if the reader doesn’t make the connection between the two things-so test it on a colleague to make sure your intended meaning is clear.

2. Personification
As the name suggests, personification is a useful tool whereby an author can attach human characteristics to nonhuman things. Although the idea might sound a little lofty, personifications are quite common. Who hasn’t ever read about someone being slapped by the high prices or kissed by the sea? The use of personification is an excellent opportunity for you to make clear in your reader’s mind an action that is important to your message.

3. Symbolism
If you were awake during high school English, you probably remember symbolism-another important part of any writer’s arsenal. Symbolism is often stumbled upon accidentally by writers, especially in the literary world, so experts suggest that you don’t give it too much concern-generally incorporating symbols in your work is a byproduct of good writing and not something that most writer’s set out to do specifically. But in business writing, the rules are a little more flexible. Look for symbolic ways to communicate your value to your clients and prospects.

4. Sentence and Paragraph Length
Choosing sentence and paragraph lengths for effect is another creative technique. Professionals suggest that you pay as much attention to the structure of your sentences as to the length. Short sentences can emphasize a key point, and longer ones have a more wandering effect. The same advice applies to paragraphs. Readers generally get weary of long paragraphs and short paragraphs when they are used repeatedly and that’s one of the reasons that length variation is considered beneficial.

Novel to Screenplay: The Challenges of Adaptation

Lynne Pembroke — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 22:16:21 +0000

ADAPTATION 101

Brimming with confidence, you’ve just signed the check purchasing the rights to adapt John Doe’s fabulous, but little known novel, Lawrence of Monrovia, to screenplay form. Suddenly, panic sets in. “What was I thinking? How the devil am I going to convert this 400-page novel to a 110-page screenplay?”

The answer is: “The same way you transport six elephants in a Hyundai… three in the front seat and three in the back!”

Old and very bad jokes aside, how does one pour ten gallons of story into a one-gallon jug?

In this article, we’ll take a look at this challenge and a few others that a writer may encounter when adapting a novel to screenplay form.

CHALLENGE NUMBER ONE – LENGTH

Screenplays rarely run longer than 120 pages. Figuring one page of a screenplay equals one minute of film, a 120-page screenplay translates into a two-hour motion picture. Much longer than that and exhibitors lose a showing, which translates to fewer six-cent boxes of popcorn sold for $5.99 at the refreshment stand. It took the author of your source material 400 pages to tell the story. How can you possibly tell the same story in 110 pages, the ideal length for a screenplay by today’s industry standards?

And the answer to this question is no joke. “You can’t! Don’t even try!”

Instead, look to capture the essence and spirit of the story. Determine the through-line and major sub-plot of the story and viciously cut everything else.

By “through-line” I mean, WHO (protagonist) wants WHAT (goal), and WHO (antagonist) or WHAT (some other force) opposes him or her? It helps to pose the through-line as a question.

“Will Dorothy find her way back to Kansas despite the evil Wicked Witch of the West’s efforts to stop her?”

The same needs to be done for the major sub-plot.

“Will Dorothy’s allies achieve their goals despite the danger they face as a result of their alliance?”

One workable technique is to read the book, set it aside for a few weeks, and then see what you still remember of the story’s through-line. After all, your goal is to excerpt the most memorable parts of the novel, and what you remember best certainly meets that criterion.

In most cases, everything off the through-line or not essential to the major sub-plot has to go. Develop your outline, treatment or “beat sheet” accordingly.

CHALLENGE NUMBER TWO – VOICE

Many novels are written in the first person. The temptation to adapt such, using tons of voiceovers, should be resisted. While limited voiceovers can be effective when properly done, remember that audiences pay the price of admission to watch a MOTION (things moving about) PICTURE (stuff you can SEE). If they wanted to HEAR a story they’d visit their Uncle Elmer who drones on for hour upon hour about the adventures of slogging through the snow, uphill, both ways, to get to and from school when he was a kid, or perhaps they’d buy a book on tape.

The old screenwriting adage, “Show, don’t tell!” applies more than ever when writing an adaptation.

CHALLENGE NUMBER THREE – “LONG-THINKING”

Some tribes of American Indians had a word to describe those of their brethren who sat around thinking deep thoughts. Literally the word translated to, “THE DISEASE OF LONG-THINKING”. Quite often, lead characters in novels suffer from this disease.

“Mike knew in his heart that Judith was no good. Yet she caused such a stirring in his loins, he could think of nothing else. He feared someday he would give in to this temptation named Judith, and his surrender would surely bring about the end of his marriage!”

If adapted directly, how on Earth would a director film the above? All we would SEE is Mike sitting there, “long-thinking”. That is not very exciting to say the least. And as mentioned previously, voiceovers are rarely the best solution.

When essential plot information is presented only in a character’s thought or in the character’s internal world, one solution is to give this character a sounding board, another character, to which his thoughts can be voiced aloud. Either adapt an existing character from the novel or create a new one. Of course as always, you should avoid overly obvious exposition by cloaking such dialogue in conflict, or through some other technique. Even better, figure out a way to express the character’s dilemma or internal world through action in the external world.

CHALLENGE NUMBER FOUR – WHAT STORY?

Mark Twain is quoted as saying about Oakland, California, “There’s no there, there”. Similarly, some novels, even successful ones, are very shy on story and rely for the most part on style and character to create an effect. Some prose writers are so good at what they do, that their artful command of the language alone is enough to maintain reader interest. Such is never the case in screenwriting.

Successfully adapting a “no-story-there” novel to screenplay form is a daunting task. One approach is to move away from direct adaptation toward, “story based upon”. Use the brilliant background and characters created by the original author as a platform from which to launch a screen story. In fact, if for any reason a screenplay doesn’t lend itself to screenplay form, consider moving toward a “based upon” approach, rather than attempting a direct adaptation.

Congratulations! You’re now an expert on adapting novels to screenplay form! Well maybe not an expert, but hopefully you have a better understanding of how to approach the subject than you did ten minutes ago. And if the subject still seems too daunting, you can always get professional help as outlined on our web page http://www.coverscript.com/adaptation.html

Lynne Pembroke is a writer, poet, screenwriter and owner of Coverscript, with over 18 years of experience in screenwriting and screenplay analysis helping individual writers, screenwriting competitions, agents, studios, producers and script consulting companies. Services include screenplay, TV script and treatment analysis, ghostwriting, rewriting and adaptation of novel to screenplay. Visit Coverscript for more details.

How To Form and Promote a Writing Group

Sheri McConnell — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 17:12:01 +0000

Writers must network with other writers in order to learn and grow. My local writing group serves as a passion support mechanism for my writing. It is invaluable to me because it is the sacred place where I share my experiences, triumphs, and struggles as a writer.

To form and promote a writing group in your local area, follow the steps below–before long you will have an energetic passion support mechanism for your own words. Good Luck and Have Fun!

Vision and Purpose

Have in mind a vision and general purpose for your local writing group. Your vision and purpose should be created based on the needs of your members. This can be a bulleted list of the reasons your group exists. At your first meeting, openly brainstorm with the new members by passing out a questionnaire. After your meeting, it is very easy to type up the purpose and vision of your new writing group from reading your participants’ responses.

For instance, the purpose of our local writing group is to:

Support Each Other In Our Writing
Share Information Pertaining To Our Writing
Edit Our Writing
Critique Our Writing

I also asked a question on my questionnaire about what each new member wrote. This helped me to understand their writing needs and allowed me to create a description of what we write as a group. This information is also useful to share with potential future members.

Organizational Suggestions

The following organizational techniques might be helpful as you start and form your own local writing group.

Keep a notepad by the telephone to record names, addresses, and phone numbers of people as they call for more information about your group and meeting place. At the meetings:
- Use name tags.
- Use a sign-in sheet to record names, address, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses.
- Share your favorite writing books/magazines in a display formation for new writers.
- Have plenty of flyers, brochures, and questionnaires to distribute.
- Consider a donation jar to cover cost of printing flyers, meeting place, etc.
- If you choose to offer refreshments, keep it simple.

Where to Find Writers

The best places to pass out information are:

writing conferences
workshops
women’s clubs
libraries
bookstores
post offices
churches
schools or colleges
news stands
office buildings
local newspapers
community centers
coffeehouses
poetry readings
literary lectures
concerts
hair salons
gyms
health food stores
gift stores
museums
art schools
art stores
New-Age stores
YMCAs
and online discussion groups

In addition to the above, you can spread the NEWS about your local writing group by circulating flyers/brochures in the following ways:

giving to therapists for distribution to their clients
leaving in motel rooms when traveling
sending to magazines and/or organizations you feel have similar interests
sending to local radio and television personalities

Where to Hold Your Meetings

homes of members
libraries
bookstores
churches
schools or colleges
community centers
coffeehouses
restaurants
art schools
and YMCAs

Tips for Structure in Your Meetings

Introductions: To get the creative juices flowing for the participants, ask them to write a short paragraph about their interests, their writing, their hopes and dreams.

Let your meetings be a group or team function. Try not to be in charge after the first meeting.
In the beginning, you will need to provide guidance to get the group going…it really depends on the personality types of the various members.

Ask members when they would like to meet and set your regular meeting schedule.
Do not forget to ask your members about the type of structure they are looking for in a writing group. (See below for Writing/Sharing Structure Suggestions)
Remember to publicize this structure in your brochures/flyers after you are meeting on a continual basis. This allows new members to make an informed decision as to the appropriateness of the group for their needs.

Writing/Sharing Structure Suggestions

You can write together and share without critiques.
You can critique each other’s work.
You can do a combination of sharing and critiquing.
You can start the meetings with writing news such as:
- Personal writing achievements
- Professional news (conferences, markets, and contests) and then share and critique, etc.

Promoting Your Local Writer’s Group

Tell everyone: word-of-mouth is the best way to spread the NEWS about your new writing group and you might be surprised at the contacts you will make along the way. When I told the local Barnes & Noble bookstore about our local writing group, they donated FREE gift certificates.
Post and pass out flyers/brochures (see above for locations)
Issue press releases
Give writing workshops/seminars (this will also promote your writing!)
Organize reading events
Produce publications/newsletters
Fundraising: Writing groups can put together professional collections of holiday short stories, cookbooks, or how-to articles. Be creative and professional with the products you produce.

Sheri McConnell is the President of the National Association of Women Writers. She helps women writers and entrepreneurs discover, create, and profit from their intellectual knowledge! Free reports for writers available with subscription to NAWW Weekly. Sheri lives in San Antonio, Texas with her husband Seth and their four children. Contact her at naww@onebox.com or her toll free number at 866-821-5829.

Tackle A Trilogy And Triple Your Profits

Suzanne Harrison — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 18:58:37 +0000

Are you a writer with big ideas? Are you always imagining epics, sweeping stories, great tales of human struggle and sacrifice, interlaced with personal stories of love, sadness and triumph? If so, you ought to consider turning your book or story idea into a trilogy.

Why a trilogy? Believe it or not, there are deep psychological reasons that we do things in threes. The holy trinity is the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and the Triple Goddess is Maiden, Mother, Crone, detailing the feminine journey through life. How many times have you heard the phrase “third time lucky”, or given someone “three guesses” or “three chances”? And of course in baseball it’s “three strikes and you’re out!”

You will have no doubt heard of the traditional “three act play”. Almost all big Hollywood screenplays are based on this structure and it’s certainly a tried and true form of storytelling that captures viewers and keeps them going back to the cinema in droves. And the world of fantasy writing is packed with trilogies: The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant (that’s two trilogies in fact), and any story by Sara Douglass, Robin Hobb, Trudi Canavan or pretty much any fantasy writer in the world today is told across at least one, if not more, trilogies.

Add to that the success of such popular movie franchises as Star Wars, Pirates Of The Caribbean and the Bourne movies, and you will see that a well planned and executed trilogy is a one way ticket to success.

So how do you do it? Do you just take an idea and spin it out over three stories? Or do you just come up with a great character and three great premises and you’re home and hosed?

Neither actually!

The success of the trilogy is based on the traditional three act play, where book or movie one is act one, book or movie two is act two, and book or movie three is act three. The only ingredients you need are one great big story running behind three stories compelling enough to carry a movie or book on their own, and you’ve got the basic ingredients you need to succeed.

So if you are the type of writer who thinks big, if your scope is broad and your plots complex and intertwined, and your characters are people on a life’s journey, then trying to squash that all into one book may be too many chocolate chips in the cookie. Giving yourself the room to think, plan and write a larger journey over three books will make each one a better book in its own right, and if you do get it right, you’ve got a guaranteed audience for books two and three. And publishers love that!

The most important element to grasp as you embark on the trilogy adventure is that you are dealing with a multi layered project. Unlike the acts of a play, the individual stories in a trilogy need to stand up on their own, in addition to playing a part in a larger drama.

So let’s take a look at how you can go about turning your dreams of epic tales into the reality of a trilogy.

How To Build Your Trilogy

1. Decide on your over-arcing or larger story.

This is definitely the most important first step by far. Without it you don’t have any story, let alone a trilogy.

Some examples of great larger stories are:

a) a leper passes out on the floor of his lounge room and wakes to find himself in a strange land. There, instead of being treated as an outcast, he is considered a saviour and the question is asked, will Thomas Covenant accept his destiny and save The Land? The larger story: will Lord Foul prevail or will Covenant save The Land?

b) a farm boy dreams of becoming a fighter pilot. He meets a Jedi Knight and trains in the ancient art. The question is asked, will Luke Skywalker become a Jedi, save the Rebels and bring freedom to the Galaxy, or will he turn to the Dark Side like his father? The larger story: who will prevail, light or dark, good or evil, The Rebels or The Empire?

c) a man is found floating off the coast of Marseilles. He has no idea who he is. As he attempts to find out, will he learn his true identity, or will Jason Bourne wish he’d never asked? The larger story: it is one man against the world, as Jason Bourne challenges the might of the CIA, and who will prevail?

These are just a few examples of the initial questions asked, the initial journeys laid out before the heroes and the ultimate possibilities open to the creator of a great trilogy. Nail your larger story, and backdrop it against anything from war to a love story and you’ll have a great basis to work from.

2. Each book in the trilogy is roughly the equivalent to an act in a screenplay.

In the three act play, Act One is “The Set Up” or “Decision To Act”, Act Two is “The Confrontation” or “The Action” and Act Three is “The Resolution” or “The Result Of The Action”.

When you are planning out your larger story (which you will do first) this breakdown will help you form the basis of each of the books in your trilogy. In Book One, you will cover the elements of the larger story that take that story through the set up phase and onto the threshold of another world, or some different action. Book Two will follow with the result of what was decided in Book One, as the story moves forward through the crisis/ordeal/midpoint and traditionally ends on a dark note. This leaves Book Three open to rescue the heroes from the jaws of defeat as the larger story reaches its climax and all the initial questions are answered. Planning this out in the earliest stages will give you very strong guidelines as to where to go with each individual book’s plot, structure and characters.

3. Each book must stand alone as a complete story in itself.

This is where you need to be very aware of the layered aspect of this process. You have a larger story you are telling in the style of the three act play. Now you need to plan, structure and write three stores within that structure that fulfill all the criteria of successful books in their own right. So take “The Set Up” phase and construct a story showing how you would set up your larger story. It’s very common here to have a reluctant hero, who hears the call to adventure and refuses. Thomas Covenant is a good example of this. Thus the entire first book can be the process of the hero trying to escape the call. In a different scenario, you may have a willing hero, like Luke Skywalker or Frodo for instance and the first book may be a complete hero’s journey in itself, showing how the hero is embracing the quest or task, but still leaves the greater part of the task to be completed.

Possibly the most important thing to remember is to hold information or events back as long as you can. It’s tempting when you’re writing a trilogy to put too much in up front, but doing that is a mistake. Give your readers some credit for intelligence and imagination, and don’t tell them everything up front. Trilogies are a great tool for holding back secrets and springing surprises on your readers to keep them guessing. Good examples of this are Darth Vader revealing he is Luke’s father at the end of the second episode in that trilogy, the interesting faux “love story” between Elizabeth and Captain Jack Sparrow in the Pirates of the Carribean and the scene at the end of the second Bourne film which is repeated right near the climax of the third film. You are in a great position to lead your readers wherever you want them to go so use it!

4. Your characters must have “legs”.

There is nothing worse than flat, lifeless characters and there is definitely nothing worse than trying to hold our attention with these flat and lifeless characters for three whole books. Make sure you do your homework on your characters just as you would with any other book you write. Put their flaws and universal needs right there up front for us to see, you still need to grab your reader’s attention from page 1. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that because you have three books you have more time and space to develop your story and characters. Wrong! If anything you are under more pressure to hook us straight away, because we’re not going to keep reading if we’re not interested, as we know that the story doesn’t actually finish until the end of the third book.

5. Your “golden thread” must run throughout all the three books.

This is where the intricate weaving of story on story and the skill of balancing the separate elements becomes critical. Your golden thread could be a war, a family saga over generations, a love story or a ring quest, but regardless of what it is, remember that THIS IS THE STORY YOU ARE ULTIMATELY TELLING. Star Wars is ultimately about the battle between the Rebels and the Empire, the Bourne movies are the story of one man against the CIA, the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant are about a leper who becomes a savior in a different world, and The Lord Of The Rings is the war of Middle-Earth. While there are countless subplots, character journeys, love stories and red herrings in all these tales, they all still have their own individual “golden threads” and ultimately the telling of the story is to serve this golden thread.

If you are prone to larger ideas, give this system a go. It may be just the breakthrough you need to get yourself on the publisher’s lists.

Researching Your Memoir- How To Mine the Material of Your Life.

Melinda Copp — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:05:18 +0000

Life is the raw material from which all writers work. Personal experiences and relationships with people often stir the urge to create and inspire the stories we put on the page. Whether you’re working on a memoir or a work of fiction based on your life experiences, the first place you will probably look for material is inside your mind, within your own memories.

But memories tend to blur and fade, making writing about your past difficult to do without research. Research can reveal details and eliminate inaccuracies that you may not remember correctly. Plus research helps you develop your material from a one-sided account into a multidimensional story so it resonates with people besides yourself and your family.

If you’re working on a memoir, or a story based on your life, consider looking in the following four places for information that will not only help shape your story, but also give it depth and dimension beyond what you can remember.

1. Personal Journals

As a kid, I was so worried that someone might find and read my journals that I often destroyed them. The thought of someone discovering my innermost feelings horrified me-after all, sixth grade can be pretty traumatizing. But now that I’m a writer struggling to know myself and my stories, there’s nothing I regret more than throwing my precious material into the garbage.

When assembling a memoir or other work based on your life, personal journals are often the most valuable resource you can have. So if you don’t already, start keeping a journal. Although you may not think you have anything significant to write about each day, just jotting down the date and a few notes about what you did will prove to be helpful for determining dates and timelines of events when you start writing your memoir.

If you have journals from your past, or even from your family members, you should haul them out of your attic and read them cover to cover. For writers, journals are like goldmines. They can help you recall events and your personal feelings and thoughts from that time in your life. A journal can even help you determine what your story is really about by revealing themes, potential story lines, and other important details about you and your life that you may not remember at first.

2. Photo Albums

Family photos are another invaluable resource for memoirists, so dig yours out and start looking. Photos help writers on several levels. First, they can help you remember people and events from your past. They can also be used to put faces with names, which can be used in descriptions. Photos can reveal personalities and clues about people and places that you may have forgotten or overlooked at the time.

For example, you might notice that your uncle isn’t smiling in any pictures. What does that tell you about his character? Is that consistent with your memories of him? You may also be able to mine valuable details about the locations where your life story unfolded, such as your childhood home, your backyard, or your college dorm. All these details will be captured in the backgrounds of your old photos.

Organizing photos can be a big job in itself and every person’s photo collections are likely in different states of order, so do your best to work with what you have and what’s applicable to your project. You may also have to contact family members and friends to put names with some of the faces and identify locations that appear in your collection of old photos.

3. Newspaper Archives

When researching family histories and personal stories, many writers look for obituaries and wedding announcements in their hometown newspapers. But newspaper archives can offer a writer much more than obits. If you’re looking for information about a specific event, newspaper archives are often the best place to look for a local perspective. And just leafing through the old pages-or microfilm reels-can stir old memories and ideas about your personal history.

You can use newspaper archives to help create accurate pictures of your life story’s setting by looking at what and who were making news at that time in your life. Clippings can jog memories of people and events that may have played a role in the story you want to write. Newspapers can even reveal interesting stories that deepen and expand your personal history.

Your hometown’s library should have a complete archive of the local newspaper, most likely preserved on microfilm or microfiche. The newspaper, if it’s still in operation, may also have a comprehensive archive. Many newspapers offer their archives online, but the available dates may be limited and the search functions may not be as extensive as you need. You may have to contact the newspaper for information about using their archives. If you no longer live in your hometown, consider visiting for research purposes because some newspaper archives aren’t available any other way.

4. Interview Family and Friends

Even though you may be writing your own life history, getting your friends’ and family members’ perspectives on the events you write about will help you create a story with more depth and breadth. It will help ensure the events you recreate on the page are accurate beyond your own memories, which tend to shift and blur over time. And your story will be less one-sided with insight from other people who witnessed the events of your life.

Start by talking to your family and friends about the events you’re writing about, and see what they remember. Parents and grandparents, as long as they’re still around and able, will be able to provide invaluable insight on events of the past. Even old friends and neighbors, if you can track them down, are great resources when you’re writing a personal or family history. They may even be able to refer other helpful people and resources, such as diaries or family photos that you may not have known about.

When you approach friends and family members for information, think like a reporter and create a list of questions to give your interviews some structure. Talk about what they remember, and cover everything from conversations that took place to weather that day. But let your interviewees go off on tangents that seem interesting or important. And make sure you take good notes or record your interviews so you can transcribe them later.

Telling Your Stories

Everyone is interesting, and everyone has a story to tell. But telling an interesting personal story means looking beyond your memory of what happened in your life and finding deeper meaning and different perspectives through research.

As you write your memoir or novel based on your life, search beyond what you remember and look for material that will round out your narrative beyond what parts stuck with you. Your research may reveal story lines, themes, and details that you may have overlooked. Research takes work, but the results will pay off with a story that resonates with larger audiences and reflects the events of your life with greater accuracy.

Melinda Copp is a freelance editor, writer, and author of the e-book The WRITE Way to Author a Profitable Book, a resource for entrepreneurial writers who want to create a marketable informational product that sells. For more information about Melinda and her services, visit her online at MelindaWrites. If you have any questions about how Melinda can help you, send her an email at info@melindawrites.com.

To Love A Writer

Angela Swanlund — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 04:06:46 +0000

I’ve been a full time freelance writer for a little over two years now, and part time before this for going on ten. I honestly think I could do this for the next twenty years and my family still would be unable to describe what it is I do. When asked, they generally say one of the following:

1. She writes stuff.
2. She sells stories on the internet.
3. She’s like a writer, I guess, but not books.

For some time my genre was true crime and it was nothing for me to have autopsy photographs and crime scene reports scattered about the kitchen table, under our bowls of Cheerio’s. The family grew accustomed to random Post-It notes with murder details stuck to the oddest places – including the coffee maker. I spent a brief stint helping a website with their content needs on early punk rock music. At almost 40 I was feeling “Raw Power” with Iggy and the Stooges, and learning to imitate the infamous Pogo with the Sex Pistols.

With Hunter S. Thompson as a hero, it only stands to reason that my behavior may tend to sway toward the absurd and excessive. Yet when I informed the husband I needed to purchase a pig’s head for theory testing, he had the audacity to want an explanation! Swine skin and bone is the most like our human skin and bone. I needed to see if a particular tool could render a certain type of wound. Morbid, perhaps. But I can’t present a theory unless I have supporting research to back it up!

In time the family learned the tell tale signs that I was “working”, as opposed to playing on MySpace. If I’m playing, they get a muttered “uh huh” and complimentary nod of my head in response to their questions. If I’m working, they get shot the look of death, and a wave of my hand to dismiss them. The husband learned to tolerate late nights without me, and cranky mornings with me. The children adapted to microwave foods and paper plates.

When one of my written works sells, and the occasional accolade comes my way, I may appear overly humble in accepting it. The reason isn’t because I feel my work unworthy. The reason is because the true accolade is owed to the ones who love me enough to humor me on this crazy career I’ve chosen! Behind every successful writer is someone who has always loved them and thought they were the greatest – long before they ever became published.

Angela Swanlund is the owner of Rural Family Living, LLC and the Creator of The Written Word Blog. You can view Angela’s on-line portfolio at: http://www.stonecastwoman.com.