Showing posts with label craft of writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label craft of writing. Show all posts

Thursday, February 22, 2024

Hooking Without Overwhelming

One of my publishers hosts weekly author chats. I recently read the transcript of a chat that warned against "overwhelming" the reader. Specifically, it discussed the hazard of overwhelming the reader in the opening scene of a book or story.

We know the importance of quickly hooking the agent, editor, or reader. We've heard that an agent or editor has to be reeled in with the first page or sometimes the first paragraph (depending on the giver of the advice) to avoid rejection. What pitfalls loom in that first look? By "overwhelming," the editors in the above-mentioned chat referred to inundating the reader with either unnecessary details or too many characters, especially named characters, right off the bat. The reader needs to know the setting (place and time), important details that "move the story along," and maybe a selection of secondary characters. Above all, the protagonist must be introduced in a way to make the reader care about her.

Another caution mentioned was not to plunge into an "action" scene right away. We need a reason to care what happens to the protagonist before seeing him or her in a crisis or life-threatening situation. A violent fight scene doesn't mean much if we don't know the participants or the stakes involved. The same principle applies to starting with a sex scene, unless writing erotica or erotic romance, and even then the scene will appear pointless if it doesn't reveal character and advance the story.

Before the inciting event, the big change in the protagonist's life, occurs, there should be a glimpse of her normal life, even if very brief. Especially if it's a violent or otherwise shocking event. I have slight reservations about this guideline. We could think of successful novels that deviate from it. One that leaps to mind for me is MISERY.

King's novel starts with the protagonist already injured from a car accident, waking to consciousness in the home of his "number one fan."

A big pitfall to avoid: Starting with backstory. The early pages should always move forward. Frontloading backstory is a besetting authorial sin of my own. I've read books by prominent authors that violate this one, too. A brief opening shows the hero in some dire plight. Then they answer the rhetorical question, "How did I get here?" with several chapters of backstory. Techniques like this probably shouldn't be tried until the author has attained a similar level of expertise and popularity.

One of my favorites of my own works, FROM THE DARK PLACES, originally started with the heroine's gazing at a photo of her late husband and immediately falling into a reverie that leads into a whole chapter about their meeting, their marriage, the birth of their daughter, and the husband's untimely death. Fortunately, I received and followed the advice, "Don't do that!" The book as published begins with present-day action and gradually weaves in, when appropriate, the only parts of the backstory the reader needs to know, the crisis birth and the husband's death.

My husband and I violated the "don't plunge straight into action" guideline in the second volume of our "Wild Sorceress" series by starting in the middle of a battle. In this case, I believe the problem is slightly mitigated by the fact that this is a sequel to a book any reader who buys the sequel has probably read. In the first volume, we transgressed a no-no the chat doesn't mention, starting with a dream sequence. In our defense, it's clearly a dream, not a bait-and-switch, and it has an immediate, clear bearing on what the character is now facing in real life. Still, I would probably resist doing it that way today. It also commits another alleged fault that many editors and readers detest, starting with a character waking up and preparing for her day.

One of my favorite bestselling fantasy authors begins a novel published a few years ago with a life-threatening battle that turns out to be a simulation! I'm astonished that the publisher let her get away with that blatant bait-and-switch!

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt

Thursday, September 21, 2023

Character Brainstorming with AI

Here's a WRITER'S DIGEST article about how an author might use ChatGPT as an aid to composition without actually having the program do the writing:

Using AI to Develop Characters

The author, Laura Picklesimer, describes her experiment in workshopping character ideas with the help of generative AI. She began by asking the program how it might be able to help in character creation, and it generated a list of ten quite reasonable although not particularly exciting possibilities. She then implemented one of the suggestions by requesting ideas for characters in a thriller set in 1940s Los Angeles. The result consisted of "a host of rather stereotypical characters." When she asked the AI to suggest ways to subvert those characters, she was more impressed with the answers. Reading that list, I agree something like it might actually be useful in sparking story ideas. Her advice to writers who consider using such a program includes being "as specific as possible with your prompts, making use of key words and specifying how long ChatGPT’s response should be." She also points out, "It may take multiple versions of a prompt to arrive at a helpful response."

I was intrigued to learn that a program called Character.AI can be set up to allow a writer to carry on a conversation with a fictional character, either from literature or one of her own creations. The article shows a couple of examples.

Picklesimer also cautions potential users against the limitations of systems such as ChatGPT, including their proneness to "hallucinations." When she asked the AI about its own limitations, it answered honestly and in detail. Most importantly for creative writers, in my opinion, it can easily perpetuate stereotypes, cliches, and over-familiar tropes. It also lacks the capacity for emotional depth and comlexity, of course. If an author keeps these cautions in mind, though, I think experimenting with such programs a brainstorming tools could be fun and potentially productive -- just as a search in a thesaurus might not turn up the word you're looking for but might surprise you with a better idea.

It's worth noting, however, that this essay links to another one titled "Why We Must Not Cede Writing to the Machines" -- which Picklesimer, of course, doesn't advocate doing.

Do Not Go Gentle

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Thursday, September 07, 2023

SF Terminology Goofs

I've started watching the second season of MY DAD THE BOUNTY HUNTER, a cartoon series on Netflix. Some dialogue passages reminded me of a few of my "pet peeves" concerning language too often found in science fiction print and film stories.

The most annoying and most common: "Intergalactic" for "interstellar." There's no indication in the Netflix series that the characters ever leave this galaxy. Careless writers commit this mistake in far too many works I've read or watched. In J. D. Robb's "In Death" series, "intergalactic" sometimes appears even when "interplanetary" is clearly meant. Maybe those books should be pardoned, however, because they're narrated mainly in the viewpoint of homicide detective Eve Dallas. She seems to take the same attitude toward scientific facts as Sherlock Holmes, who famously says he doesn't know whether the Earth revolves around the Sun or vice versa and doesn't want his brain cluttered with that knowledge.

The kids in MY DAD THE BOUNTY HUNTER get all excited to discover their mother is not only an alien but an "alien space princess," and she doesn't correct their terminology. Her family lives on a planet. Her parents don't rule a sector of space; they rule part of a planet. She's no more a "space princess" than Queen Elizabeth II was a "space queen." Moreover, there's a tendency for the dialogue to refer to anyone not from Earth as an "alien" even in contexts where that usage makes it sound as if they think of THEMSELVES as aliens.

Although it's not in this series, there's a glaring error I've noticed in some speculative fiction by writers not trained in science, I hope a result of carelessness rather than ignorance, but still: Referring to light-years as a unit of time rather than distance. Even C. S. Lewis does this, in THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS.

Not an error, but an example that strikes me as lazy worldbuilding, is the widespread habit of labeling units of currency "credits." Sure, because it's so commonplace, it's immediately recognizable as a convenient shorthand for money. But don't creators of alien societies have any more imagination than that? Or do they think civilizations on other worlds don't have enough imagination to give their monetary units a non-generic name? Nations on Earth have words for their money grounded in tradition, history, and politics; extraterrestrial societies should follow similar patterns.

The new QUANTUM LEAP series explains how the leaper sort-of-replaces the past-time individual as a function of "quantum entanglement." That hypothesis deals with subatomic particles, however, and has only the most tenuous resemblance, if any, to what the leaper experiences. But I feel justified in giving the QUANTUM LEAP writers a pass on this point, even if they have no idea what they're talking about. Most likely, even if they do, they don't expect more than a tiny fraction of the audience to know what "quantum entanglement" means; they probably just chose a science-y sounding term. Like the STAR TREK "doubletalk generator," as author David Gerrold calls it (as in, "Captain, that last photon torpedo destroyed the doubletalk generator, and the Enterprise will explode in nineteen minutes!"), the phenomenon might as well be labeled "magic."

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Thursday, August 31, 2023

On Character Growth

There's an essay on the WRITER'S DIGEST website called "The Importance of Character Growth in Fiction," by bestselling author Annie Rains:

Importance of Character Growth

She lists and discusses vital elements in showing the transformation of a character over the course of a story: Goal and motivation; backstory and the character's weakness or fatal flaw, arising from features of the backstory; the plot and how its events force the protagonist to struggle, plus the importance of pacing so that growth doesn't "happen in clumpy phases"; the "ah-ha" moment when the character realizes the necessity of taking a different path; importance of showing through action how the character has changed to be able to do "something that they never would have been able to do at the book’s start."

As vital as all these factors are, and as much as I love character-driven fiction myself, I have slight reservations about Rains's opening thesis: "If your character is stagnant, there is no story. . . . Your character should not come out of your plot as the same person they were before their journey began." Doesn't good fiction exist to which this premise doesn't apply? Classic detective series, for example. What about Sherlock Holmes? Hercule Poirot? Miss Marple? What about action-thriller heroes such as James Bond? Through most of the series, Bond survives harrowing adventures that would kill ordinary men many times over, with no discernible change in his essential character. (In the last few books, he does begin to change.) Even in stand-alone novels, as mentioned in the WRITER'S DIGEST essay to which I linked in my blog post on July 20, static characters (as opposed to the negative term "stagnant") have their place. In A TALE OF TWO CITIES, Charles Darnay doesn't change, whereas Sidney Carton does. In THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER, the Russian submarine captain has already made his life-changing decision before the story begins and never veers from his goal. In A CHRISTMAS CAROL, Scrooge transforms, while Bob Cratchit is a static character. So, arguably, is Romeo, who's still the same impulsive, emotion-driven youth at the end of the play as at the beginning, thereby possibly triggering his own tragic end.

I'd maintain that, while Rains is self-evidently correct that a character's circumstances have to change in the course of a narrative, he or she doesn't necessarily have to undergo a transformation, depending on the genre. The character must either attain the plot's stated goal or fail in an interesting, appropriate way. Without a change in his or her situation, whether external, internal, or both, there's no story. But an internal transformation isn't a necessary feature without which "there is no story."

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Thursday, August 17, 2023

Ideal Writing Day

The e-mail list for authors of one of my publishers had a fun discussion thread last week: What would your ideal writing day be like?

I envy the kind of writing day some of those apparently prolific, enthusiastic authors envision. I don't think I've ever experienced an ideal writing day. I'm a very slow, laborious writer, and when I have an uninterrupted day to myself, I'm the sort of person who will suddenly find a usually tedious household chore of compelling interest.

However, on a good day I typically plan two stretches of writing time, a short one in the morning and a longer period in the afternoon. On an ideal day, each of those would last longer than it does in real life. Also, I would start the afternoon writing session earlier instead of falling into the trap of waiting until late afternoon when everything else is done -- because everything never gets done. As a book on housekeeping I own points out, you will never "get it all done" because it is infinite (that is, unlike most "real jobs" one gets paid for, its limits are undefined). So writing time has to be defined and adhered to if one wants to produce words on a consistent basis. If I didn't have the distractions of a house to keep up, a dog to take care of, and a spouse to feed (simple breakfasts and dinners on weekdays), my ideal writing schedule would comprise a couple of hours each in the morning and the afternoon. Without dawdling, each of those time spans would produce at least 500 words.

Marion Zimmer Bradley used to say writing was the perfect job for a stay-at-home houseperson because it can be dropped and picked up for brief stretches of work anytime during the day. My reaction was "speak for yourself, bestselling author." :) In recent years, however, I've gotten better at using those fifteen-minute blocks. Several hundred words can be churned out in that amount of time, if one doesn't let one's mind wander. Preliminary outlining definitely helps in that respect.

Along that line, Mercedes Lackey has stated several times in her Quora posts that if a writer can dash off 500 words of a blog post in a few minutes, he or she should be able to produce a similar volume of words on a story or novel in the same amount of time. But, darn it, nonfiction is much easier to create than readable fiction. Or maybe I feel that way because I spent so many years mainly in academic writing.

Caffeine and/or alcohol (in moderation) can help the words flow. Of course, they'd need editing later, but so does everything to some extent. However, indulging in those substances as writing aids on a regular basis would eventually become routine and therefore undermine their effectiveness as a stimulus.

What does your ideal writing day look like?

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Thursday, August 10, 2023

He, She, It , or They Said

Nowadays a widely accepted piece of advice about writing fiction sternly rebukes any use of dialogue tags other than the simple, almost invisible word "said." No alternative verb choices such as "muttered," "snarled," "cried," "screamed," etc., and definitely no adverbs. Nothing like, "We must flee," Tom said swiftly. Resorting to dialogue tags to convey the tone of a character's speech is a sign of weakness, the fiction mavens insist. A skillful writer can accomplish this goal by other methods. But sometimes you can't, I protest, at least not so concisely. Can't your hero "whisper" or "shout" occasionally?

Anthony Ambrogio's "Grumpy Grammarian" column in the August newsletter of the Horror Writers Association rages against this alleged rule. In this columnist's view, the constant repetition of "said" makes a fiction writer's prose tedious and flat. He particularly dislikes the use of "said" with questions. The verb "asked" belongs there, he insists, and on this point I completely agree. I also advocate a whisper, shout, murmur, or mutter in the appropriate places. Ambrogio disparages the current fashion as "the unfortunate less-is-more, bare-bones approach to dialogue where everything is 'said' and writers don’t ever vary their descriptions of characters’ remarks." He concludes the essay with the exhortation, "You’re a writer. You have imagination. You have language. Use both (he demanded boldly)." To some extent, I agree with him. Sure, a beginning author may wander into a thicket of purple prose by becoming too enamored of flamboyant dialogue tags and unnecessary -ly adverbs. But potential abuse of a technique doesn't justify forbidding its legitimate use.

Of course, variation can be introduced by avoiding dialogue tags altogether and identifying the speaker through his or her actions. However, that device, too, can become tediously repetitious if overused. Sometimes, moreover, we just need to know that the character whispered a line instead of screaming it. I once did some editing on a novel that included a conversation where two women were drinking tea or coffee or whatever. The text repeatedly identified each speaker by having her fiddle with her cup, spoon, etc., often in almost identical words.

One stylistic choice I strongly dislike consists of line after line of quoted speech with no attribution at all, like reading the script of a play but without the characters' names. Supposedly, in well-written dialogue each character has such a distinctive voice that you can immediately recognize which one is speaking. Well, sometimes you can't. It breaks the flow of the story when the reader has to count back up the lines to the last mention of a name to figure out who said what. It's even worse if the author ignores the "one speaker per paragraph" rule, as some do.

In short, writers have access to many methods of distinguishing speakers in fictional dialogue and describing their manner of speech. Each one can be elegantly deployed or clumsily misused. Or, in the words of Rudyard Kipling, "There are nine and sixty ways of constructing tribal lays, And every single one of them is right!"

Margaret L. Carter

Please explore love among the monsters at Carter's Crypt.

Thursday, April 06, 2023

Must Fiction Have Conflict?

I recently read FANTASY: HOW IT WORKS, by Brian Attebery, a distinguished scholar of fantasy and science fiction. In addition to the solid content, he has a highly readable style. While I can't unreservedly recommend this book to every fan, given the price (but still very reasonable for a product of a university press), anybody who enjoys in-depth analysis of fantasy in all its dimensions would probably find it more than worth the cost. Some topics include realism and fantasy, myths and fantasy, gender and fantasy (mostly focusing on male characters), and the politics of fantasy. Of particular interest to me is the chapter titled, "If Not Conflict, Then What?"

Advice to writers almost always maintains that a story can't exist without conflict. Attebery is the first critic I've encountered who casts doubt on that alleged truism. In fact, he flatly states, "This may be good advice for getting published, but it isn't true." Conflict, he points out, is simply a single metaphor, implying combat. Among other metaphors he suggests are dissonance, friction, and dance. He maintains there's only one "essential requirement for narrative," which is "motivated change over time."

This discussion intrigued and reassured me, since the necessity for goal-motivation-conflict in a properly structured story is usually taken for granted. Reflecting on examples of my own work, I realize some of my fiction contains what could be called "conflict" only by stretching the term almost out of recognition. Suppose we subsitute "goal-motivation-obstacles"? Marion Zimmer Bradley, after all, summarized the universal plot as, roughly, "Johnny gets his behind caught in a bear trap and how he gets out." Elsewhere, I've seen the essence of story encapsulated as: The protagonist wants something. What's keeping them from getting it?

For example, my contemporary fantasy, "Bunny Hunt" (to be published as an e-book on April 10), features a protagonist whose long-range goal is to have a baby, a wish gaining new urgency because she and her husband are over thirty. Her problem is that they've been trying for a while with no result. The impediment, her possible infertility, might fall under one of the classic types of "conflict," person versus nature—if we count her own body as part of "nature." But that interpretation seems to strain the definition of "conflict." The short-term goal, to help a rabbit woman through a potentially fatal childbirth (no more details, sorry—spoilers!), involves problems that might possibly be labeled "person versus nature," but again that reading feels like a stretch.

For me, I believe thinking in terms of the more general formula "goal-motivation-obstacles" will make plotting future fiction projects easier.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Thursday, February 23, 2023

AI Sermons?

To follow up the topic of "creative" artificial intelligence programs, here are some clergy-persons' thoughts about sermons composed by chatbots:

Sermons Written by ChatGPT

Not surprisingly, the consensus from representatives of several different faith traditions is that AI-composed sermons have no "soul." This is one genre in which the personal, human element remains essential. A rabbi in New York comments, “Maybe ChatGPT is really great at appearing intelligent, but the question is, can it be empathetic? And that, right now at least, it can’t.” A pastor in Minneapolis writes about the program's attempt to compose an essay on maintaining one's mental health during the stress of the holiday season, “Although the facts are correct, there is something profound missing. . . . AI can’t understand community and inclusivity and how important those things are in building a church.”

On the other hand, New Testament scholar Todd Brewer asked ChatGPT to write a Christmas sermon based on the Nativity story in Luke's gospel, "with quotes from Karl Barth, Martin Luther, Irenaeus of Lyons, and Barack Obama." He was taken aback when the resulting composition was “better than many Christmas sermons I’ve heard over the years.” However, judging from the listed criteria, the requested product sounds more like an article than a sermon. Brewer himself, again not surprisingly, said it lacked "human warmth." Given that reservation, can the AI really be said to "understand what makes the birth of Jesus really good news"? Not to mention the unlikelihood that artificial intelligence in its present stage of development can literally "understand" anything -- raising a whole other complex question, whether intelligence can exist without consciousness.

From reports on ChatGPT from people who've tried it, I get the impression that it can produce creditable essays on factual topics, if fed enough sufficiently specific data, although they tend to be "bland." In more creative endeavors, as might be expected, the program falls short. And it wouldn't be ethical to present the program's raw output as one's original work anyway.

Since I'm a slow writer and first-draft composing is my least favorite phase of the writing process, I've often wished that a word-processing program existed that would take my detailed outline—such as those I've constructed according to the plan in Karen Wiesner's excellent FIRST DRAFT IN THIRTY DAYS—and expand it into a fleshed-out draft of a novella or novel in my own style. I could take it from there with editing and revision. While it's possible to instruct ChapGPT to create a writing sample "in the style of" a particular author, I strongly doubt that procedure would work for fiction anytime soon. So for the time being I'll just have to continue tackling the laborious stage between outlining (which I enjoy) and revising (which I don't mind, up to a point) the hard way.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Friday, November 04, 2022

Karen S. Wiesner: Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 6 Conclusion

Writer's Craft Article

Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 6

Conclusion

by Karen S. Wiesner

Based on Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2: 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

In this three month, in-depth series, we went over what could be considered the grunge work in building a cohesive story. Revising, editing, and polishing require a little or a lot of writing elbow grease to finish the job and bring forth a strong and beautiful book.

In Part 5 of this series, we went over editing and polishing tricks and tips. Let's conclude this series with one last thing to consider. 

The revision layer of a story involves the finishing touches to make your story shine. With these elements, you'll create an extremely strong layer--something that will allow you to send your novel out with confidence to the people who can publish it. However, I do like to add one additional step to the revision process, and this is one I consider mandatory.

The final read-through

Following all the grueling revision we've been doing, many authors may feel ready to send the story out, either to a publisher who’s waiting to release it, or in a submission to find a publisher or agent for the book. A couple situations prompted me to add one last read-through of the story before I considered it done. I think even savvy, confident authors might want to complete this before submitting. We'll go over the whys and wherefores of doing this soon, but first, a couple of side-tracks here.

1. I strongly believe a final read-through needs to take place on a hard copy of the book--in whatever form, a printed version. Yes, I know we live in a digital world. Everything is done on the computer. But the very real and inescapable fact is that human eyes are fallible. They aren't capable of seeing everything on a computer (or something similar to this) screen and, frequently, what you see on the screen isn't necessarily what's in the hard copy--spacing, formatting, and other issues may crop up from one medium to the other. We need the hard copy to truly catch everything that demands our attention (like typos and "Track Changes" errors) in the final draft of a manuscript. Our eyes can only see some of these things on the printed version of the book. This is essential, and I guarantee if you're not getting this hard copy (from your own printer of the final proof after edits, directly from you publisher or from another means like the one I'll describe in a second), you're missing a tremendous amount of issues that readers are going to catch. Do yourself a favor. Get a hard copy to do your final read-through from.

2. Second, the current state of the industry--exploding with indie publishers and self-published authors--requires another stage in which to find the errors that seem to creep into our stories like lice. The fact is, there are very few legitimately professional editors and/or copyeditors working at publishing houses these days, especially at smaller publishers, and authors who are self-publishing their own works may even skip the professional-editor-input altogether. For that reason, it’s even more crucial to have a stage where the writer sees his book in this final form (and this is true even if the book is only released as an ebook without a paper component), where he can catch (probably not all but most) typos. While you can always print a copy from your own printer, I highly recommend utilizing a publishing service like Amazon, Lulu, or any other you like to set up an inexpensive hard copy of your book to serve as an advanced reading copy. In this form, you'll see your book in a state that's close to what readers will see it in after it's published (if a print edition will be made available). That's valuable. This is really just for your own use so try to find a cheap way to do this. You don't need cover art for this copy, but you're there so there's no reason not to, since you might want to access how that comes out as well. I'll also add that I don't recommend buying actually "proofreading" copies from most printers, like Amazon. Those copies can ruin the actual book so you can't see parts of it that you need to evaluate because the printer adds huge banners over portions of the wraparound around cover, covering up the text, etc. below. How ridiculous! I recommend purchasing a regular paperback copy of the book, just like readers will get if they buy it, that's not specifically for what these services deem proofreading copies.

3. If for no other reason, providing yourself with this final read-through is your very last chance before your editor sees it to make changes. You want her to find the finished product almost perfect, right? 

Back to the whys and wherefores of doing a final read-through of a book before it's considered done. During this final read through of the book, you shouldn't need to do much beyond exterminating typos and formatting errors, and doing that is a great case for adding this step to the process. But the final read-through serves another valuable benefit: It's a neat way of putting yourself in the position of being the first reader for the book. Naturally, this means you want to put as much time as you can afford into staying away from the book and not reading a word of it until you're ready to complete the final read-through (i.e., if you're sick to death of the story, you can't see it objectively). As much as possible, ignore the fact that you have a very personal affiliation with the book and simply read it--both in a critical and savoring mind-frame. Take your time reading to evaluate how the story goes over for you in this state. Do you love the story and your characters? Are you wrapped up totally in their worlds? How are you emotionally while you're reading it--removed and unsympathetic or invested wholly? Have you captured everything authentically? Or do you think you might need to do more work anywhere? Keep a tablet handy during this time so you write any notes you might need for fixing issues.

When I get to this stage in the process, I usually find very little is required and I may not add more than a thousand words during this time, which is still a nice, "gilding" layer. The story is brimming with life and there’s almost nothing left to stumble over or smooth out. Most importantly, though, in nearly every case I come out loving the story more than I ever have before. It exceeds the expectations I had for it when it was little more than the spark that incited me to write the story. Truthfully, I don't consider that conceit. I'd worry if I didn't have that reaction. If you don't love your own work, don't become immersed in the worlds and characters and conflicts contained in your stories, how can you expect readers to?

In the past few months, we've talked in-depth about the "grunge work" involved in completing a book. Each of the stages add a layer of your story--very strong layers that, for career authors, should be the necessary steps in ensuring multidimensional writing. Each time you add something new during these stages, you're creating another vital layer that makes the whole story stronger, richer, and more three-dimensional. Doing so also allows us to see another perspective of our story and can fuse in more and more details to forge three-dimensionality. Don't neglect the crucial elbow work involved in "decorating" your book since it's what makes your story not only a thing of beauty but a source of personal pride.

Happy writing!

Karen S. Wiesner is the author of Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2 of the 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

http://www.writers-exchange.com/3d-fiction-fundamentals-series/

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/writing-reference-titles.html

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Friday, October 21, 2022

Karen S. Wiesner: Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D General Revision Choices, concluded

Writer's Craft Article

Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D

General Revision Choices, concluded

by Karen S. Wiesner

Based on Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2: 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

In this three month, in-depth series, we're going to go over what could be considered the grunge work in building a cohesive story. Revising, editing, and polishing require a little or a lot of writing elbow grease to finish the job and bring forth a strong and beautiful book.

In the previous part of this series, we went over general revision choices. Let's finish that.

Tip Sheet: Effective Revision Choices

Don't make me repeat myself--avoid careless repetition. Watch for repeated words. If you have a noun or verb in the first paragraph of a page, then that same word again at the end of the same page, it literally jumps out at the reader. The same can be true if you repeat a word for no other reason except that you couldn't think of a better, similar, more effective one. Look carefully at the first paragraph in the example below, rife with repetition that jumps out with its overuse, then notice the differences in the published version:

It was daylight. Mortal time of day, not his, and I felt the need to see what the men had done to his once beautiful home, to see if I could indeed walk the exorcized grounds or sleep in the wooden boxes defiled by holy hosts and holy water.

I searched the wall until I found a low wooden door hanging partway open, open enough that I could squeeze my body through.

On the opposite side, the once beautiful gardens were overgrown with weeds and scrubby bushes. The abbey church that had undoubtedly once been beautiful was overgrown with scrubby bushes and weeds that surrounded the vaulted stone frames empty of their holy glass.

What had happened to the holy order that had once lived here? Did their ghosts still walk these quiet grounds, broken, desolate souls among broken dreams?

Did the vampire's soul walk with their broken, desolate souls?

***

It was daylight. Mortal time, not his, and I felt the need to see what the men had done to his home, to see if I could indeed walk the exorcized grounds or sleep in the boxes defiled by hosts and holy water.

I searched the wall until I found a low wooden door hanging partway open, enough that I could squeeze my body through.

On the opposite side, the once beautiful gardens were overgrown with weeds and scrubby bushes. The abbey church that had undoubtedly once been beautiful was covered with dead ivy that surrounded the vaulted stone frames empty of their holy glass.

What had happened to the order that had once lived here? Did their ghosts still walk these quiet grounds, desolate souls among broken dreams?

Did the vampire's soul walk with theirs?

--Mina, by Marie Kiraly

Fixing this kind of problem is an editing and polishing job that really requires a lot of uninterrupted focus.

Then again, all repetition isn't bad. Save repetition for places where it drives the impact deeper in, rather than annoying the reader or calling attention to your words:

Nothing was enough. Sitting still wasn't enough. Getting his hands on her wasn't enough. He wanted to devour her whole.

--Falling Star, by Karen Wiesner

A thesaurus is not always a writer's best friend. Another thing I feel I must mention is that newer writers tend to overuse their thesaurus. While variety is good, you don't want to sound like you've been using a thesaurus. For instance, in this sentence, I've clearly used my thesaurus way too often:

The redolent perfume of gingerbread accosted her the moment she strode into her ignoble tenement.

 However, this type of "thesaurus talk" is perfectly acceptable if you use it as a character tag in dialogue. I remember a character in the TV series thirtysomething who spoke like a human thesaurus. He was one of the most intriguing people on the show. I can hear Miles Drentell quite distinctly saying:

"Ah! The redolent perfume of gingerbread accosted me the moment I strode into your ignoble tenement."

As with all guidelines, none of these suggestions are hard and fast rules. You'll know it's written the way it's meant to be when it won't be cut, replaced, or reworked in any other way. Only then will your editing and polishing be complete.

Next week, we'll conclude this series on the grunge work involved in completing a story.

Happy writing!

Karen S. Wiesner is the author of Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2 of the 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

http://www.writers-exchange.com/3d-fiction-fundamentals-series/

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/writing-reference-titles.html

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Friday, October 14, 2022

Karen S. Wiesner: Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D General Revision Choices, continued


Writer's Craft Article

Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D

General Revision Choices, continued

by Karen S. Wiesner

Based on Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2: 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

In this three month, in-depth series, we're going to go over what could be considered the grunge work in building a cohesive story. Revising, editing, and polishing require a little or a lot of writing elbow grease to finish the job and bring forth a strong and beautiful book.

In the previous part of this series, we went over general revision choices. Let's continue.

Tip Sheet: Effective Revision Choices

As a general rule, avoid long sentences. While it's true that a dramatic scene should have longer sentences than an action scene, be careful not to have too many. Overuse of long sentences makes the style of writing clunkier than it needs to (and should) be. Take this example, for instance:

It was too terrible to close his eyes, and they burned with an internal pressure while his mouth was locked open in a scream that never came--at least he still recognized the shapes around him as hallucinations.

Now the panting confusion of this sentence might seem extreme, but I see sentences like this all the time as a contest judge and critic. Sentences can't be readily comprehended, let alone absorbed, in this form. Most readers can digest a single action or idea, perhaps two, in a single sentence. Any more than that, and they start to get confused and can't follow the action.

Think about each portion of a sentence as one action/idea that needs to be comprehended by the reader. For instance, one action/idea could be that the hero can't close his eyes. Next, he's realizing that he can at least still recognize the shapes as hallucinations. Then his mouth is locking open in a scream. You get the picture. Now let's look at this example as it was published in its more digestible, pleasing format in Thunderhead, by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child:

It was too terrible. He could not close his eyes, and they burned with an internal pressure. His mouth was locked open in a scream that never came. At least he still recognized the shapes around him as hallucinations.

Imagine if every single sentence in your book was made up of three or four actions/ideas. It would read like you were plodding one mucky step after the other through a swamp.

Breaking up long sentences into two or more, as seen in the examples below, makes them much more immediate, and allows the reader to absorb what she's reading more easily.

Collet wheeled, his anger brimming as he thought, They lured us upstairs with the intercom! Searching the other side of the bar, he found a long line of horse stalls but no horses. Apparently the owner preferred a different kind of horsepower; the stalls had been converted into an impressive automotive parking facility, and the collection was astounding, including a black Ferrari, a pristine Rolls-Royce, an antique Astin Martin sports coupe, a vintage Porsche 356.

***

Collet wheeled, anger brimming. They lured us upstairs with the intercom! Searching the other side of the bar, he found a long line of horse stalls. No horses. Apparently the owner preferred a different kind of horsepower; the stalls had been converted into an impressive automotive parking facility. The collection was astounding--a black Ferrari, a pristine Rolls-Royce, an antique Astin Martin sports coupe, a vintage Porsche 356.

--The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown

In the revised version, we get rid of as, realized, and that, and the result has a smoother rhythm and more impact. You'll also notice that the revised version just reads smoother, more like the music flow we're striving for as composing writers. Break your sentences up so readers can readily digest them.

The editing and polishing stage is the perfect time to be on the lookout for those overly long sentences. If you have to take a highlighter to each one so you're focused on fixing this problem, know that the end result will be well worth your effort.

Unassuming it. I'm guilty of assuming that everyone will understand what I mean when I use the word it. Most writers do have some guilt in this regard. This happens most often in a first draft, but during editing and polishing, pay special attention to this little word to make sure you're not assuming your reader will know what you mean with its use. The word it, especially when used near the beginning of a sentence, loses focus and therefore impact on the reader. Don't let it sit there, assuming a role that hasn't been defined, explained, or adequately described. Try to make it more specific in your sentences, for instance:

It had taken a heavy toll on him, but he didn't appreciate seeing proof in the mirror.

This sentence begs a myriad of questions. What took a heavy toll? A death, an accusation, a sledge hammer? Any one of these and a million more could work. Luckily, this author didn't allow an it to assume itself to the reader.

The past year had taken a heavy toll on him, but he didn't appreciate seeing proof in the mirror.

--The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown

Next week, we'll conclude the general revision choices.

Happy writing!

Karen S. Wiesner is the author of Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2 of the 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

http://www.writers-exchange.com/3d-fiction-fundamentals-series/

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/writing-reference-titles.html

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Thursday, October 13, 2022

Putting the Fact in Fantasy

I've just finished reading an essay anthology titled PUTTING THE FACT IN FANTASY, edited by Dan Koboldt. The contents, contributed by over thirty different specialists, explore a wide range of subjects writers of fantasy may need to know about in order to make their fictional settings feel authentic. The foreword emphasizes the importance of getting the mundane background right. Readers will accept the wildest flights of fantasy if they're grounded in a world that functions believably. Conversely, if errors appear in details supposedly faithful to how things function in the real world, the audience won't trust the author enough to suspend disbelief in the fantastic elements. As a famous line from THE MIKADO puts it, we need those realistic background features "to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative." The introduction, titled “How to Ask an Expert,” contains practical advice on getting help from people with firsthand knowledge and experience.

Regardless of the depth and breadth of an author's research, flawless accuracy is seldom if ever attainable; minor goofs will inevitably crop up. Thus, the foreword bears the title "The Point Is to Screw Up Better." This book aims to help authors avoid errors in portrayal of environments, social structures, animals, weapons, etc. that might jar the reader out of the imaginary world. The anthology is divided into six parts, covering the broad areas of actual history as inspiration, languages and culture, world-building (e.g., money, food and drink, plants, ecology, politics, among other topics), weapons and warfare, horses, and wilderness adventure. Each category includes a wide range of sub-topics (aside from the horse section, which is more tightly focused). Entertaining as well as useful, the book could be picked up and dipped into in any order. The contents tend to consist of short, quick reads.

Therein lies its one drawback. Most of the essays comprise broad introductions to their topics. Some contain suggestions for further reading, but many don't. On the other end of the scale, some contributions list highly specific content such as popular myths about horses, fascinating material but touching on only one aspect of a wide field. Still, PUTTING THE FACT IN FANTASY, although subtitled "Expert advice to bring authenticity to your fantasy writing," includes information that could benefit authors in almost any genre. If nothing else, it's a fun read that may spark ideas for adding depth to the physical and social environment of your story.

Margaret L. Carter

Carter's Crypt

Friday, October 07, 2022

Karen S. Wiesner: Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D General Revision Choices, continued


Writer's Craft Article

Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D

General Revision Choices, continued

by Karen S. Wiesner

Based on Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2: 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

In this three month, in-depth series, we're going to go over what could be considered the grunge work in building a cohesive story. Revising, editing, and polishing require a little or a lot of writing elbow grease to finish the job and bring forth a strong and beautiful book.

In the previous part of this series, we went over general revision choices. Let's continue.

Tip Sheet: Effective Revision Choices

Watch adverb usage. Go over your story with a highlighter, picking out all the adverbs that end with -ly. You can't and won't--and contrary to what most experts will tell you--you shouldn't get rid of all of them. Adverbs have their place, just as adjectives do, so don't go crazy on this point and turn out an adverb-free story as if you'll win an award just for managing this feat. That said, it is very true that adverb-overwhelmed narrative tends to bog a story down. There's usually a better (less boring) way of writing these words that so easily pepper a first draft, such as in this example:

Guilt ran thickly through Jacquelyn's blood.

***

Jacquelyn's blood ran thick with guilt.

--A Time to Mend, by Angela Hunt

A lot is conveyed in the second version that wasn’t in the first, so the change involved more than simply cleaning up an adverb. In the second version (the published one), the delivery of the sentence itself is action-packed and to the point. You can almost feel shame, a violent and dirty emotion, polluting the character's veins. You want images like this to come through as you’re editing and polishing, so watch for opportunities to refine them.

Avoid overused words. Was/wasn't, were/weren't, did/didn't, have/haven't, is/isn't, are/aren't, to be/been are some the most common culprits. Using a different color highlighter or your computer search function, highlight these words to see how often you're using them, then try to find viable substitutes for them. When I critique someone else's work or judge a contest entry, I usually find hundreds of these within just a few pages. While you can't and shouldn't get rid of all of them, make sure you're using as much active voice as possible.

To give you an example of what a difference it makes to clean up these words, below you'll see basically the same sentence, but written without overused words in the second example:

He'd have known it anyway. Fury was something he felt like pure energy coming from it in waves. It was hot and powerful, rolling toward him like heat from a house fire.

***

He'd have known it anyway--he could feel fury as pure energy coming from it in waves, like heat from a house fire.

--Constantine, by John Shirley

Both of these examples say about the same thing. The difference is that the first is written in an unimaginative, overwhelming, passive voice, the second in an active, impacting one that's extremely effective. It's just tighter and clearer to read.

Remove the clutter of unnecessary words as much as possible in your editing and polishing. Do the same for a whole host of careless choices in sentence structure. One culprit that crops up inevitably is the little phrase was going to. In a sentence like "She was going to be strong and independent," the was going to can easily be replaced with would. Or better yet, She'd. The outcome, "She'd be strong and independent," is right to the point without unnecessary words to clutter it up.

Overused "idea stringers". Replace words like when, as, realized, wondered, occurred, felt, seem, appear, look. These are some of the most overused words in existence because they string ideas together so easily. But if you see them more than once per page, they start to call attention to themselves. As with adverbs, you can't get rid of them all, but you can reword or vary them. One way to handle this situation is to replace these words with more effective words or phrases:

She was greeted by the scent of gingerbread when she stepped into her apartment.

***

The scent of gingerbread greeted her the instant she stepped into her apartment.

We also get rid of that dreaded was in this revision. When can also be replaced with while, once, before/after, as, etc. Another good way to deal with these worn words is to take them out completely, dividing the sentence into two or more sentences instead:

She realized she could have called out to him only after he walked away and turned the corner.

***

He walked away. She watched him in mute shock. Only after he turned the corner did the word "Wait!" fill her throat with violent need.

While the first example is succinct, it reads very slowly and is a bit unfocused. The second version has a lot more impact, putting the reader both in the scene and in the character's viewpoint, as well as eliminating overused words.

Start with a bang. Avoid sentences that begin with There was/were, It was, They were, He was. They tend to slow things down, and risk putting your reader to sleep. An example of passive construction, and suggested revision follow:

There was no evidence that he had heard her.

***

If he heard her, he gave no indication.

This one is another example of the reader looking through a glass pane at your character versus being with the character. You truly do want your reader with your characters.

Wilt thou use contractions, or continue to live in the past? I honestly don't know why contractions are an issue, but I've lost count of how many contemporary contest entries and books I've read in which the writer refuses to use contractions (and, yes, that emphasis is important to note because a writer who refuses to use contractions is one who refuses to allow her characters to decide how they will or won't speak). We live in the twenty-first century. Everyone uses contractions in verbal speech, and our written words should reflect that.

Remember that the words you use have an impact on the reader's perceptions of the characters. A character who never uses contractions will come off as stuffy, uptight, and snooty. Besides, using contractions will give your sentences more immediate impact. So please do use contractive forms of had, have, will, etc. as much as you can if you're writing a contemporary story. Check out these examples, with the better ones coming from The Ocean Between Us, by Susan Wiggs:

She had said all those things many times before.

***

She'd said all those things many times before.

She still could not believe she had gone through with it.

***

She still couldn't believe she'd gone through with it.

While editing and polishing, you can easily use a highlighter or the search function of your word-processing program to make sure you don't inadvertently leave a cannot or have not in there. Save contractions for when someone is speaking in dialogue and making a point (possibly in anger) by not using a contraction instead.

Next week, we'll continue with the general revision choices.

Happy writing!

Karen S. Wiesner is the author of Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2 of the 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

http://www.writers-exchange.com/3d-fiction-fundamentals-series/

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/writing-reference-titles.html

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor

Friday, September 30, 2022

Karen S. Wiesner: Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D General Revision Choices

Writer's Craft Article

Fiction Fundamentals: Writing Elbow Grease, Part 5D

General Revision Choices

by Karen S. Wiesner

Based on Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2: 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

In this three month, in-depth series, we're going to go over what could be considered the grunge work in building a cohesive story. Revising, editing, and polishing require a little or a lot of writing elbow grease to finish the job and bring forth a strong and beautiful book.

In the previous part of this series, we discussed editing and polishing introspection tips. This time we'll go over general revision choices, and we'll continue that for the three weeks. 

Tip Sheet: Effective Revision Choices

Sentence structures and lengths need to be varied. Like good music needs to have long and short notes, high and low, varying beginnings and endings, a good writer should never allow every sentence to start or flow in exactly the same way. Take the example below:

She needed to make a loaf of bread. She went to the store to make her purchases. She bought bread ingredients. She took her purchases home.

Sounds terrible, doesn't it? I wish I could tell you I don't see this very often, but the horrifying truth is that I see this careless sort of writing from both new and experienced writers. Vary sentence structures and lengths so the lines flow into the ear like music, as in this revised version:

She slammed the cupboard with a grimace.

I'm Old Mother Hubbard. No flour, no yeast. How do you make homemade bread with an empty cupboard?

Sighing, she grabbed her keys. At least the store was just around the corner. And she could get her dog some biscuits while she was at it.

A world better, isn't it? Pay special attention to the way every sentence begins here. There are a million different ways to start a sentence without a pronoun of some kind. Look at the variations in each sentence above, the variety of sentence lengths. When you're editing and polishing, these are exactly the kinds of things you want to fix.

Does passive voice = boring; active voice = exciting? Most writers will tell you, yes, those equations are absolutely correct. But what exactly are these passive and active voices everyone involved in writing talks about endlessly? In Conflict, Action & Suspense, author William Noble says that "active voice with its direct and straightforward verb use rivets our attention....The passive voice works best to change the pace, to stretch and extend narrative, or to diminish emphasis on action and suspense." Therefore, both passive and active voices are viable, depending on what kind of scene you're writing. An action scene requires an active voice, while a dramatic, emotional scene may call for a passive voice.

What has most authors, publishers, and agents in an uproar concerns the actual words used--are the words active or passive? The most instant form of action is what propels a sentence. Learning to write in an active voice is important to the overall appeal and impact of your story. For instance, here's a paragraph from my romantic comedy novella, "Silver Bells, Wedding Bell," written in the most passive manner possible:

She was racing across the distance between her and the open phone kiosk. Luggage was being knocked over, small children were hurtled in her rush. The men and women who glared at her were side-stepped.

This was revised before publication so it had a much more active voice:

She raced across the distance between her and the open phone kiosk, knocking over luggage, hurtling small children, side-stepping glaring men and women.

How many times did you stumble over the passive use of the words was and were in the first version? Like music, words very much have sounds as a reader reads. The words can flow easily, or they can cause a sort of clumsiness as they're read. That first example above "sounds" very plodding, almost thoughtful, and the reader is really watching the action from a distance--none of conveyed what I hope. The second example reads fast, smooth, but with a punch, and the reader feels the rush and tumble along with the character.

Your editing and polishing needs to weed out these passively, plodding sentences, to be replaced with tight active sentences.

We'll talk about cleaning up the overuse of words like "was" and "were" soon.

Never tell, always show? Another point that's harped on in writing circles is the necessity of showing, not telling. Showing is very much about creating an immediate scene. The characters are there, and the reader moves along with them. Telling is merely a secondhand report of what happened to the characters in play. While there are certain uses for telling versus showing (i.e., you don't want to write an entire scene to convey a single, small point), you really do have to consider that a story told is very much like a newspaper article--it contains all the facts, none of the emotions. It's dry and often monotonous. Therefore, a story told is one that has nowhere near the compelling, immediate action of a story shown. While I'm not sure if it affected the impact The Friday Night Knitting Club made on readers around the world, since the book turned into an instant bestseller, take a look at the writing style. A lot of the book is told rather than shown, it's almost like short newspaper articles fill most of the scenes. This is a literary fiction leeway that few other genres are allowed.

Unlike books, movies can't tell anything at all--they have to show. Books should be presented in much the same way because each reader forms a "movie" of the story in her head as she's reading. Your choice of active showing is what puts the movie in her head. It's unlikely that a told story will achieve the same effect. Here's an example of telling:

I went upstairs and laid him down on our pallet. I lay down beside him. For a time, his pulse beat fast, his heart pounding. But toward midnight, both faded away. I fell asleep with my baby in my arms for the last time.

While this is a perfectly acceptable means of conveying information if it's necessary to avoid writing a whole scene, the poignant way this scene was shown in Geraldine Brooks's Year of Wonders brought out every bit of heartache and anguish felt by this young, grieving mother who loses her child to the plague:

I crooned to him as I climbed the stairs and laid him down upon our pallet. He lay just as I placed him, his arms splayed limply. I lay down beside him and drew him close. I pretended to myself that he would wake in the wee hours with his usual lusty cry for milk. For a time his little pulse beat fast, his tiny heart pounding. But toward midnight the rhythms became broken and weak and finally fluttered and faded away. I told him I loved him and would never forget him, and then I folded my body around my dead baby and wept until finally, for the last time, I fell asleep with him in my arms.

The first time I read this in context with the rest of the book, I cried. I doubt many would have the same reaction to the told version preceding it.

While editing and polishing, you'll have your final opportunity to change these instances of telling instead of showing. Pump your story full of everything and anything that will get the movie rolling in your reader's mind as he reads.

Next week, we'll continue with the general revision choices.

Happy writing!

Karen S. Wiesner is the author of Cohesive Story Building, Volume 2 of the 3D Fiction Fundamentals Collection

http://www.writers-exchange.com/3d-fiction-fundamentals-series/

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/writing-reference-titles.html

Karen Wiesner is an award-winning, multi-genre author of over 150 titles and 16 series.

https://karenwiesner.weebly.com/

http://www.facebook.com/KarenWiesnerAuthor