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All posts for the month July, 2009

Novel writing basics, part two

Posted by george on July 10, 2009
Posted in: Writing. Tagged: , , . 11 comments

s41089cb107780_35_1In the first post of this writing series I covered (albeit lightly) the topics of genre, protagonist, plot and some length guidelines.  I’d like to continue on today with a little discussion about dialogue and foreshadowing.  Both of these techniques are critical to master for any novelist.  Some folks are lucky and their skills are natural in these areas, most of the rest of us need to work on it a bit.

Dialogue

Good dialogue moves a story along.  It provides rich character detail.  It entertains.  It makes us laugh or cry.

Bad dialogue gets you thinking that maybe Bradbury had it right with Fahrenheit 451.

One of the best (and most quoted) pieces of writing advice is to show – not tell.  Dialogue allows us to do this.  Think about this:  Picture someone in your internet community who you follow.  You read their blog and tweet with them on a regular basis.  Do you know them?  Do you have a picture in your mind of who they are, their traits, their qualities?  Did you learn these things by the person telling you or did they show you through their writing and their actions?  Their blog posts and their tweets are their “dialogue” with the world.    Dialogue is your opportunity to let the world learn about your characters.  See how important it is?

Here’s a great big, fat tip:  Minimize your dialogue tags.  In other words, “He shouted angrily” sucks.  Don’t do it.  Use words to demonstrate the feelings.  Said works best.  Remember that.

I just got through slugging my way through a book by Stuart Woods in which almost the entire novel was written using dialogue.  If it wasn’t for the fact that the dialogue rang hollow and was a bit stilted, it would have been a great way to move things forward.

Final tip:  Go find one of your fav books.  Read through it to see how the author handled the dialogue.  Learn what you can from it, emulate it.

Foreshadow

A foreshadow is nothing more than a hint or a tease about something that may happen in the future.  It’s a great technique to build suspense.  Some folks make it more complicated  than it needs to be so don’t get all jacked up about it, okay?

A foreshadow can be in your face, blatant and impossible to miss.  In that case, it creates some suspense that we keep in the back of our mind awating the fruition of events.  We want to see how the author is going to wrap that little thing up.

Other times, the foreshadowing is much more subtle.  In fact, we may not even realize that the technique was used until we reach an “Ahh, that’s why so-and-so said or did such-and-such!” towards the end of the story.

It’s easy to practice foreshadowing.  Take something you’ve written and work a little tease into the beginning of the piece, pointing to a future event.  See how it changes the flavor and flow of the story.

Just like dialogue, some will have the foreshadowing gene and others will have to work the technique a bit.

Final tip:  Pick a novel that you love and know by heart.  Do a quick re-read of the book and highlight any of the passages or sentences that you believe are foreshadowing.  How did the author phrase it?  Where did they place them?  Pay attention to these attributes and you will see patterns emerge that you can use in your own writing.

Oh, and be careful.  If you foreshadow something early on, you had better address it at some point or your readers will hunt  you down and beat you like the dog you are.

Sorry folks.  Too wordy on this post so point of view will be tackled in part three of this series, along with chapter length.

Comment, please.  Is this series too basic?  Is it too “been there done that?”  Anything in particular you’d like to see included?

Writing basics for the first time novelist, part one

Posted by george on July 8, 2009
Posted in: Writing. Tagged: , , . 17 comments

Listen to the Podcast

  jt avatarIf you’re thinking about writing a novel, or maybe you have started the venture and are struggling a bit, there are some basics that you need to know about in order to achieve success.  Writing a novel is not just sitting at a word processor with a good story in your head and tapping it out on the keys.  A lot goes in to the writing of a novel.  Like any worthy project, there are a few things to keep in mind.

Remember that entire books have been written about this subject.  I don ‘t proclaim to have all of the answers, but I hope this series will answer some of your questions, and maybe whet your appetite for more information.

  • Genre – You should make the decision early on about which genre is best suited to your idea.  Genre is just a fancy writing word for category.  Most authors are loathe to put their idea into a slot, but as a first time novelist, if you can’t succinctly define a single genre then you may never get out of the slush pile.  So, work on whittling down your horror/fantasy/romantic self help book to just a single arena.  It’s not a bad thing, really.  It forces you to keep the project tight and focused.
  • Protagonist – The hero or heroine of the story.  Your main character.  He or she should be richly defined.  Make them human, make them flawed.  Give them a bad habit or two.  Your reader needs to relate to them so don’t make them a saint.  Make them someone the reader wants to root for, someone whom the reader will miss when they turn the final page.
  • Plot – Plot is story.  More accurately, it is the events and action that is the framework through which the story is told.  It’s that simple.  Lots and lots have been written about plot, the best advice is to worry about it not.  If you have a good story, and every word moves that story forward, then you are plotting along and life is good.
  • Length – Here are some industry norms to help you determine what your project is, based on word count:
    • Up to 1000 words: flash fiction, short story
    • 1000 to 6000 words:  Short Story
    • 6000 to 15000 words: long story or novelette
    • 15000 to 45000 words: novella
    • 45000 to 120,000 words: novel

In the next part of this series, I’ll tackle the all important point of view along with foreshadowing techniques and dialogue.

I think the Editor was asleep

Posted by george on July 7, 2009
Posted in: Writing. Tagged: , , , , , . 19 comments

I pulled this up from the archives today because there is some relevance and new info to discuss.  When I wrote this post back in October of last year, I blamed the editor.  I’ve learned a lot and after painfully working through yet another poorly written book, I’ve decided the blame does not belong to the editor.  Well, okay.  Maybe they have some of the ownership, but I think the whole darn publishing system is to blame – including the writer.

The book that prompted this latest rant was written by a relatively known writer with more than 30 novels under his belt.  I’ve not read anything else by the author so this one may be the exception, but somehow I don’t think so.  here’s the scoop:

  • He moves the entire story along though dialogue almost exclusively.  I don’t have a problem with that necessarily but I think a balance of narrative and dialogue works best.
  • His dialogue rings hollow and seems stilted and untrue.  I could overlook moving the story with just dialogue if the conversations had some kind of substance.  Part of the problem is that it makes any foreshadowing stick out like a sore thumb.

With that said, I’ll let you folks get back to the original post:

As a writer, I also read.  That’s what writers do.  I mean, besides the whole writing thing

I ordered up some books from the Mystery Guild Book Club to replenish my reading material for what should prove to be a long, cold, dark winter.  I chose the books based on little more than the one or two paragraph description.  I wasn’t familiar with most of the authors but I figured that was ok.  After a week or two, the ubiquitous pale orange parcel slip from my friends at the Post Office was hanging out in the ol’ mailbox.

I love books.  I’m always excited to see a new batch arrive.  I got this bunch home and spent a little bit of time reviewing the jackets and the first few pages, trying to decide which to delve into first.

With my first selection in hand, I cozied up in the chair and prepared my self for a good reading session.  At least, I thought it would be good.  I ground through the first dozen pages.  The story line was ok, but the writing style, well it sucked.  Much of the dialogue was done in sentence fragments.  Now, I think for dialogue that’s ok, because that’s how a lot of folks talk.  The problem is that it was peppered throughout the narrative as well.  And I don’t mean a light peppering either.  Darn near every paragraph had a non-sensicle fragment.

That’s cute and effective if used a few times throughout the book, but it was apparent in this case that it was part of the style.  Frankly, it did more than just irritate me.  It pissed me off.  How could an editor believe for an instant that this was acceptable for publication?  The style is so distracting that the story line is lost.

I’ve put the book up on the shelf and I have no intention of opening it again.

That got me thinking about social norms and book reading.  How many of you have slugged your way through the first chapter of a book and then just walked away?  I’ll bet most of you have.  Library books don’t count because you’ve no vested interest.    Now, how many of you have ever walked out of a movie theater ’cause it was terrible.  I’ll bet if you looked at the ratio, you’ve suffered through a lot more movies then you have books.

Why is that, I wonder?  Is it because it’s considered rude to walk out of a movie theater?  Maybe.  After all, ditching a book can be done under the cover of night, when no one is watching.

So that’s my query to you.  Do you book ditch?  If so, what makes you give up?

Oh, and I don’t want to slam the book I just tromped all over in public, but if you’d like the author/title then just comment or shoot the moose an email.  (I can’t believe I just wrote, “shoot the moose”)

10,000 words in a day

Posted by george on July 6, 2009
Posted in: Writing. 37 comments

wordsLast month I connected with a really neat lady named Milli Thornton.  She sent me a very nice email after I commented on a blog post.  As it turns out, Milli and I have a great deal in common in terms of inspiring writers and helping them to get over their fear of writing.  In fact, Milli has a book out called “Fear of Writing: For Writers & Closet Writers“.  From what Milli describes, it may be very similar to “The Writing Experience” .  Milli let me know that she had just completed the 10k challenge- A once a month challenge to write 10,000 words in a day.

Well, I was immediately intrigued.  I was thinking about partaking in the NaNoWriMo last year, but I just wasn’t able to dedicate an entire month at that point in my life.  Setting aside a single day for 10k?  Now that’s a different story.

I’ve got two partially finished novels and frankly, I need a kick to my backside to get going again.  They’re good stories and it kills me that they are left to languish in the nether regions of my Open Office archives.

July 16 is the next 10k Challenge day

I’ve already decided I’m going to take part this month.  I’m working everything around that day this month.  10,000 words is roughly twenty pages further along in my novel.  I’m excited.

Here are the rules, as listed on her blog:

1. No editing or rewriting.

2. No looking back over what you’ve written during the 10K Day.

3. No rummaging—either in notebooks or in your computer files—for writing you did some other time.

4. No research. Make it up.

5. Don’t fuss about the rules of writing. Just write.

6. Don’t fuss with structure. You can format, add chapter headings (or whatever) some other time.

7. No struggling. (“Allow yourself to be crappy.” — J.R. Turner)

8. Take a 15-minute break every two hours. Use this break to refresh your body, brain and spirit.

9. Report to your writing companions during your break. These “check-ins” should be kept brief.

10. No agonizing over your word count. Yes, the goal is 10,000 words, but not at the cost of your peace of mind. This is not a competition—not even with yourself!   Have fun instead.

With those kinds of rules, how could you not participate and have a grand old time?

There is a great support system in place including a forum and a place to post your ongoing wordcounts through the day.  Go spend some time poking around at Milli’s and we’ll see you at the challenge!

Tell me:  Do you think you will accept the challenge?  Why or Why not?

Listen to the Podcast

 

Inspired Writing for any Writing Project

Posted by george on July 4, 2009
Posted in: Writing. Tagged: , , . 1 comment

s41089cb107780_23Well, you’ve finally made it to Tumblemoose Writing Services.  I appreciate you coming by.  Chances are you are here because you need a professional writer for a project.  I know there are a lot of choices out there when it comes to choosing a writer, so…

Give me a moment to sell you on Tumblemoose

There are several key attributes you want in a writer for hire:

  • Solid Writing Skills – Of course!  You need someone with a keen grasp of the language.  Someone who can relay your message exactly as you intended.  Your writer needs to have a unique voice – one that sets the writing apart from all the other writing voices in a virtual sea of writers.
  • A Good Listener – Someone who will take the time to understand your unique project so that the end result is exactly what you expect and want.
  • Flexibility – You need a writer who can change things up when a new path appears to be a better option for a project.  Rigidity kills good writing.

If you are serious about having a professional writer move your project forward then please, take a few minutes to look around the site.  When you read the blog posts that I write to inspire other writers, you will see a unique style that is conversational and informative.  Go ahead and read the comments on the posts to get a sense of how I interact with the other professionals in my field.

And now, a word about rates

Your perceived value will be the key to the rate charged.   Rates can be on a per word basis, per project basis, or on a ongoing project basis. Email with your intended project and let’s get started.

Tumblemoose Writing Services offers a wide and ever expanding range of services for virtually all of your writing needs.

If you are in need of a project that is not listed here then please contact me.

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