Tag Archives: writing

WRITING FOR THE READER—NOT JUST FOR OTHER WRITERS

Since I joined a couple of writer critique groups back in the early 1990s, I learned a lot of basic guidelines for good writing. The majority of them made a lot of sense to me. And as a reader as well as a writer, I now notice some awkward, clunky writing that miss the following points.

• Stay in point of view—no head-hopping inside a scene.
• Write as much as you can in active voice; don’t be passive.
• Leave out the boring stuff.
• Use modifiers sparingly (some say not at all, but I don’t agree with that—see below).
• Never use a semi-colon in fiction. (I break this one every so often, just because I’m a rebel.)
• Learn and use all the rules of grammar.
• Spell check over and over again.
• Get critiques and edits.

Then there were other rules I had trouble with:

• Show, don’t tell. In my opinion, this can lead to choppy writing and lack of interesting details. Yes, show action, but tell descriptions.
• No prologues. Come on. Sometimes they’re exactly what’s needed. They can pull the reader in and explain some backstory so there’s no “info dump” later on. I agree, though, that they need to be done very well. Many best-selling authors use them. Why shouldn’t the rest of us?
• No epilogs. I have two reasons for using them in my Paula PI books—one is that as a reader myself, I like to know what happens with some of the characters later on. In a mystery in particular, it’s hard to wrap up all the loose character threads during the hopefully action-packed ending. The second reason was simply because it was a senseless rule. (There’s that rebel again).
• Don’t use he said/she said. Have the character do something instead (cough, sigh, drink coffee, drink beer, whatever). Sorry, after a while of reading all these small actions (especially the coffee drinking) it gets old AND intrusive AND boring. He said/she said is invisible to most readers. It doesn’t stop them. So, why not use it? I do both the saids and the small actions, mixing it up.
• Split infinitives are evil. Only if you’re an English teacher who hasn’t kept up with the times. When Latin was in use, this was a necessary rule. It’s not one for those of us who speak English. And sometimes splitting the infinitive makes the sentence much stronger: “to boldly go where no man has gone before’ has a much better cadence than “To go boldly where no man has gone before.” Right? Right. When we were motorhoming I found a great bumper sticker that we promptly put on the couch: “Boldly going nowhere.”

But I digress.

One warning about head hopping:

If you do head hop between scenes, be sure the reader knows right away whose head you’ve hopped into if you’ve changed it since the last scene. The book I’m reading currently has made this mistake several times, and it always make me stop in order to figure out I’m in a different head.

So, the biggest rule is to do what works. What works is smooth writing that doesn’t in any way make your reader stop reading to figure something out. This is okay for non-fiction. Not so much for fiction. Thus the rules about using good grammar and spelling in particular.

LESSONS LEARNED ABOUT DRAFTING A NOVEL

The list below of things to do after writing each chapter of your novel came about because I’ve edited nine novels now, and learned from personal experience that they would all have been easier to edit if I’d done everything on the checklist before continuing to write the next chapter. I’ve gotten timelines mixed up, character names mangled, forgotten whether it was spring, summer, or fall, left out sensory input where it would have worked brilliantly, and used “was,” “a while,” and other pet words way too often. Following the checklist should only take a few minutes and will make your first full run-through edit a lot less painful. See what you think. I only wish I’d done it for all my books, including my latest:

clutteredatticsecrets-08After each chapter is written:

1. Read it over and make minor changes and to refresh your memory.
2. Make a chart (word processing table or spreadsheet) with columns for Chapter Number, Day of Week, Time, Location, and Outline (synopsis).
3. Nail day of week, time of day, and location, put on chart.
4. List all new characters on another chart with first name, last name, and description so you can sort by first/last name to be sure not too many characters have similar names or begin with the same letter. Usually I do a small description of characters as they’re introduced, so I often just copy and paste the description into that column. If later on I mention something else about the character (eye color, make of car, for example), I put those details into that column, too.
5. Have yet a third chart to list names of businesses. My current novel has a made-up museum, funeral parlor, theater, and restaurant. It’s easy to forget many chapters later what I made up. It’s just two columns—name of business, and what it is. It won’t take you much time at all to add anything to it.
6. Check that senses other than sight are included–smell, hearing, touch, taste.
7. Find and replace your frequent words, for example, “was,” “that,” etc.
8. Check for your own personal demons—lack of description, echo words, tags missing making conversations confusing, mixed-up names, character positioning, and so on.
9. Do a final spell check.
10. Save your day’s work on your computer and back it up (I do that on the cloud).
11. Write the outline/synopsis for your chart.
12. In your notes file, (you have a notes file, right? With maps, research, anything else related to your particular project. I put these two charts in that file, always open when I’m writing the novel) list anything you want to cover later on, and any good ideas you have for later action. This is especially important if you are not an outliner, and it can help prevent writer’s block.

Your future self will thank you later for doing all this. So will your editor. Anyone have any tips to add to the list?

BAD WRITING COSTS THE WRITER MONEY

Grammarly, the grammar checkers, did a study, which was posted on Huffington Post not too long ago.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/05/grammar-infographic_n_5767902.html

Grammarly proofread 400+ freelancer profiles from all eight categories of the Elance platform for grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors. To adjust for quality of work, they only selected freelancers with an average rating of four stars or above. Then they looked at correlation between earnings and number of mistakes. They hope the direction of the data spurs some thought and conversation about the importance of good writing. Their goal is to raise awareness for the importance of good writing. Here’s the chart with their findings:

grammar infographic

Here’s the link to the Grammarly site in case you’d like to check some of your own writing for errors: It couldn’t hurt!

http://www.grammarly.com/grammarcheck

Here’s to good writing!

P. D. JAMES

I woke up to the news today that P.D. James, at age 94, has passed away. I was very sad to read this since she is on my personal list of top ten writers, so unless they pull some older works from a drawer or trunk, I won’t be able to read anything new by her ever again.

What made her stand out for me was that she delved deeply into her characters’ lives, especially their psychological lives. Then there was the mystery, of course, always extremely well plotted. If you haven’t read anything by her, I strongly suggest you do.

Here are some links to learn more about this amazing woman and writer.

Her official webpage (check out the library tab for a list of all her books):

http://www.randomhouse.com/features/pdjames/

The Wikipedia entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._D._James

Her Amazon author page (in case you didn’t realize this, most authors have a separate page on Amazon that lists their books, a bio, and other info about them and their work—yes, including me):

http://www.amazon.com/P.-D.-James/e/B000AP5NPM

Interviews:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/authorinterviews/7894385/PD-James-interview-I-have-lived-a-very-happy-and-fulfilled-life.html

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1627/the-art-of-fiction-no-141-p-d-james

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/jul/15/pd-james-author-interview-readers

Fabulous quotes with many pictures of the author:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/danieldalton/9-pd-james-quotes-every-writer-needs-to-read

And sadly, a few obituaries:

http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30232569

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/nov/27/pd-james

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/nov/27/pd-james

Anyone else have a great link to share? Rest in peace, Phyllis.

CREATIVITY AND TIME MANAGEMENT

Not many people have an old-fashioned wife anymore. I’m talking about the one who managed the household without any help from a spouse and who was also totally supportive of that spouse’s work, to the determent, often, of her own creativity and desires.

Not only that, but the world of communication has gone crazy. We are plugged in to everyone and everything. If we allow it, there are constant interruptions from phones, email, regular mail, other people, pets, and the lure of electronic entertainment on televisions and computers/tablets.

So the creative person has to struggle to manage it all. Without a plan, and without some basic organizational skills, we will either go nuts or just never finish anything we’ve started. Or at least it will take us twice as long and be twice as stressful as it has to be.

The basic life plan for a creative is to find the best time of day for work and make it sacrosanct. That means no interruptions from anything, unless there’s “fire or blood.” (I don’t know who said that first, but I love it.)

This means the creative is in a room with the door shut and without access to phone, email, the internet or any other potential interruptions because they are either turned off or the person has enormous willpower when in the zone.

The creative has to have a regular life, of course, both for mental health and to feed the creative mind. It won’t produce in a vacuum. Therefore, it’s also best to figure out just how much time can be devoted each day to creative endeavors, and unless there’s fire or blood, do so.

To further this goal, the creative also should set up systems so that tools are at hand and no time is lost in setting up. Best to clear everything up at the end of the session to be ready for the next day.

So, set a minimum amount of time at a certain time of day and have a place where you won’t be interrupted. When done for the day, do everything needed to get a good start the next day. For example, if you’re a writer, do a quick spell check, back up your work, write a few notes about what you did that day and/or want to do the next, put in a little research. A painter, it should go without saying, needs to clean brushes, take care of the medium she’s using, etc. A crafter should put tools and supplies away for easy access the next day, and clean up any mess. And so on.

Put away that knife!

I know some people say they can live in chaos and create. They are probably in the genius class. Since most of us (me included) are not, it helps tremendously to be organized. Actually, even the genius would probably benefit, as well.

Do you have a set time of day and a place where you do your creative work? If you do, please share in the comments.

IN THE BEGINNING

Starting a new story can be exciting, exhilarating, scary, and daunting. And there’s all kinds of advice out there about doing it. But my advice is to never, ever worry about where you start, especially if you’re a beginning writer. Just get the engine going and write! When you edit, you may find you haven’t started in the best place, that it may be further into the story or earlier.  That’s when you consider these points about where the finished piece will start.

It’s usually much better to start with more than one character, instead of one character musing, thinking, especially in bed. Unless you can show the character’s mood instead of telling the reader about it. In other words, the single character has to do something physical–throw something, for example. Or be attacked by someone or something in that bed.

Some famous writers have started a great story or novel with the weather. They’re usually men, who love to discuss the weather ad nauseam, I’ve noticed. I wouldn’t recommend this, especially in today’s world. Unless it’s clear to the reader that the weather plays a huge part in the story. Even then, I’d be more inclined to write about the main character instead.

Another ho-hum way to start is with a description of something. Anything. Person, place or thing. There’s no reference yet. The best descriptions are usually done from your characters’ points of view. Therefore, you need to introduce the character, then tell us what he or she is thinking about when looking at what you want to describe.

Background is often necessary, but it’s a lot more interesting when seeded into the story as it unfolds instead of thrown in a big lump at the reader. This is frequently called an “info dump” by critiquers. Pretty descriptive.

If I were a beginning writer, I would avoid any story that needs a prologue. Personally, I’m fine with prologues, and sometimes use them. But many agents and editors hate them. The agents and editors also often claim that readers hate them, too. I think this might be because editors and agents have seen a lot of very bad prologues. But by the time actual readers read a book, if there is a prologue, it’s been polished and most readers will like it and not object. All that said, avoid them if you can. Again, it’s usually best to take bits and pieces from the prologue and stick them into the on-going story.

As for how to start instead of how not to, here’s a good article from Writer’s Digest about that, including some great and famous first lines:

http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/famous-first-lines-learn-how-to-start-a-novel

HOW TO SAVE TIME WHEN YOU WRITE

It’s a fact: you can save a lot of time by becoming better at what you do. In general, I believe this applies as much to writing as to most other things.

Think about it—you’ve probably spent a few years writing a shopping list, no? Aren’t you a bit faster than you were when you wrote your very first one? I bet so.

I’ll give you some examples for writing.

Learning from others:

1.     When I first joined a writer’s group after writing a full-length novel and a few short stories, they quickly pointed out three ways I could improve. One was no head-hopping in scenes—stay in point of view. Next up was learn to use active voice instead of passive voice. I began searching for “wases” like crazy. And third, search and destroy most (some say all) modifiers. If I hadn’t joined the group, who knows how long I would have gone on making those same mistakes?

2.     I have also read quite a few books about writing and the writing life. I can’t list all the things I’ve learned from them, but I know it’s stored in my brain and peeks out to help me when needed lots of times.

3.     Reading other people’s work, both fiction and nonfiction (since I write both). How does he do such great descriptions? How does she make her points so succinctly? Things like that.

Learned by myself:

Then there’s the actual writing. This is the best way to learn, of course. Almost everyone will get better as they write. I hope I’m better after having written probably around a million words than I was when I first put pencil to paper.

1.     How to write on a schedule. Seat in chair, brain on fire. Same time every day works best for me, and for lots of other writers I know.

2.     How to write to length. Tell me to write a 50-word story, and I can do it almost at once, give or take a word or two. Then I can fix it so I hit it exactly. Tell me you want between 2,000 and 5,000 words, I can hit that even better, without going under or over. Give me a novel length, again, I can hit it. This did not happen in the beginning. It took a while, and an awareness of word counts. It probably helped that I wrote a lot of short stories—for a few years I was writing one or two a month of different lengths.

3.     How to handle different aspects of writing—do better descriptions, for example. I still don’t think I’m great with descriptions, but I have learned a few tricks to make it easier for me to write them. You may have a different weakness that with time and effort will lessen.

Bottom line? You get better and faster the more you write. So, to save time later on, write a lot now. The more you write every day, the quicker you’ll improve.

WRITING FIRST DRAFTS

The first draft is for you, the writer. You put in everything that comes into your head. Throw it in there. You never know where it might lead. Describe everything. Talk boringly about the weather. Have your characters move from point A to point B to point C in excruciating detail. All this helps you see in your mind what’s going on and helps you make sure that things are possible

Draft Business Stamp 1 by Merlin2525 - A slanted solid orange business stamp, with the words,

When working on the second draft, it’s time to think about your reader. She doesn’t want to know every detail, every play-by-play, or read paragraphs about the weather. Or what roads your character took to get from home to his favorite restaurant (a favorite peeve of mine).  Sure, leave in the weather if it pertains to the story–the bad weather is making it hard for your protag to do something she desperately wants to do. Sure, leave in some play-by-play to up the tension in an action scene and to enable the reader to “see” it happening. Leave in a main road in a major city that everyone’s heard of–it helps the reader “be” there with the character.

Yes, it’s a fine line. And some readers like more description than others. If you’re writing a historical romance, you can leave in more than if you’re writing a hardboiled detective story. But you may still have to take out some in that historical romance so the reader isn’t bogged down in the details. And you will want to leave some in that hardboiled story to ground the reader, to help him see what’s going on.

Be sure to save your first draft in several places such as a thumb drive, CD, “off-site,” and/or in the cloud away from where you write. Then save it as a second draft and whittle away. Then if you think you’ve cut something you should have kept, you still have it. Do the same for the next draft, and the next.

Nothing is more exciting or more excruciating sometimes than writing a first draft. But the sense of satisfaction when you type “the end” is always exhilarating, too. Go for it! Now, I’m off to work on my first draft for the second in my series about Tina, the professional organizer. She’s having a time of it, and so am I.

DO WRITERS STILL NEED PRINOUTS?

In the age of the computer, do we still need to print stuff out? Well, maybe. If you have a good memory and back up often, maybe not. However, if your memory is iffy and you go for months without backing up, probably.

Two things I always print out and keep on my computer, too: contracts and anything to do with finances.

Contracts because even those of us with good memories may forget where the heck we stored a particular contract on our computers. I don’t have many contracts, so I simply have a file folder labeled, you guessed it, “contracts.” On the computer, though, I store the contract with everything else I have about the story or book, such as the actual document in different formats, a notes file, etc. Also with contracts, I like to read them over in printed form and mark them up.

Financial records because I keep them by year in a folder. I make copies for my accountant at tax time, and they are available if Uncle Sam ever comes calling. So, this is a convenience. And of course, some stuff still just comes in snail mail format, so it’s not on the computer to begin with.

Manuscripts, I  used to print them all out and had a physical file for each one. When we moved to the motorhome, with several 80,000-word manuscripts and about eighty short stories written, having everything in print simply took up too much room. What I had already printed out, I put in our storage unit. But I had a laptop with plenty of memory, so I stopped most of the printing and physical filing and worked out a good system on the computer.

transfer cabinet by johnny_automatic - clip art, clipart, externalsource, file, file, furniture, furniture, image, media, office, office, paper, paper, png, public domain, storage, storage, svg,

Notes and Research are also now kept on the computer.

Submission Trackers used to be kept in two different places. One submission tracker was in each physical file folder for the work. And a notebook had printed-out submission guidelines in alphabetical order with a tracker of what was sent to that publication. At the front of the notebook I had a form for each story sent out, date, and response. Now all this info is kept in my computer.

Are you still printing everything out? Some things out; some not? Do you have good systems in place or just wing it?