Author Jean Davis

Wednesday, April 25, 2018

A to Z - All Things Writing : Vague

Welcome to the Blogging A to Z Challenge, where, this month, I'll be focusing on all things writing. This may be a random jumping around of topics within my theme, but hopefully something somewhere will be useful to someone. (V is for vague - see that last sentence.) Check out all the participants here . Now, lets get on with today's letter.

V is for Vague

One of the problems we have as writers is not adequately describing things. By things I mean setting, emotion, clothing, food, action, etc. We can see it all in our head, but it's difficult to use enough words to get all that on the page. So we tend to be vague. In some cases, the reader will fill in the gaps but in others, what is missing can mean the difference between a scene that a reader skims through and one they an highly engaged in.

Watch for:

• Leaning on adverbs. They often don't give us a clear image of the action and would be better served as a stronger verb instead.

• Words like 'a few' 'some' 'very' 'a couple' 'often' 'sometimes'. These all have appropriate uses, but ask yourself if a more definite description would be better suited to convey what you are trying to show.

• Rooms/places and people without anything to distinguish them. It's hard for a reader to get a visual to attach them to the scene if all we have is Sue running into the living room.

• Not committing to the full emotion of a scene. You're going for a tone or mood, but is it conveyed clear enough that the reader feels it too?

• A character has big feelings about something but do we have enough background and description at to why? The same for their motivations. "Because I said so" doesn't work well between writers and readers. These are things we need to show in the context of the story.

All of these are good points to ask your critique partners and beta readers to watch for because some of them are hard to spot yourself. You know your story too well.

Are there any particular aspects of writing that you find yourself being too vague about?

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Prefer paperback? The print book is now live on Amazon. Reviews are always appreciated.

Tuesday, April 24, 2018

A to Z - All Things Writing : Understanding what to keep and what to let go

U is for Understanding what to keep and what to let go

Getting all that feedback from editors, beta readers and critique partners can be overwhelming. So how do you know what to take into account and what to ignore and everything in between?

• Did more than one person point out the same issue? That's a good sign that it's not just a subjective opinion and is something you should take a deeper look at.

• Thinking of that person's comments overall, do they seem to have a good understanding of your book/characters/plot? If so, that's a good indication that this comment is something to give thought to.

• If the feedback is 90% praise, read that and enjoy it, but focus on the other 10% more. The issues they did pause to point out might be major ones.

• Does the comment feel harsh or hit hard on a sensitive issue? You don't have to agree with it 100%, but it may be something you should let digest and work on with a clear head another day.

• Remember all feedback is subjective. It's someone's opinion. It might not be right. It might not be right for your particular story. But just because someone disagrees with an aspect of your story, doesn't mean they're wrong either. Give it some thought and time and move forward as appropriate.

• Should you make all the changes everyone suggests? Goodness no! What a frankennovel that would make. Use what your gut tells you should be used. You're the one writing your story.

• Don't be afraid to make changes, even big changes, but only when your heart is in it. It's too easy to get bogged down in trying to make everyone happy and that can suck the life out of you as a writer.

• Some people like to offer suggestions, and that can be very helpful to illustrate what they mean in the context of their comment. Use caution when adopting these suggestions word for word because they're not in your voice can stand out like a sore thumb. Try rewriting that line/section in your own words using the suggestion as a guideline instead.

Keep in mind, that through it all, you have that back up copy of your original work. You can rewrite edit your heart out because your precious words are always safe, gathering dust in a folder on your hard drive. No one can take those away from you - even though you'll probably never ever go back to them.

How do you decide what to keep and what to let go?

Prefer paperback? The print book is now live on Amazon. Reviews are always appreciated.

Monday, April 23, 2018

A to Z - All Things Writing: Talking About Your Novel

T is for Talking About Your Novel

Maybe you like telling people what you're writing about or maybe you dread it, but either way, it's good practice.

While you're writing, telling a few trusted people that you're writing a book can be great accountability. They will likely keep asking you how it's going. This will hopefully guilt you to stay relatively on task. If you don't have friends or family members who can fill this role for you, because not everyone is always supportive, find a writing group, either online or in person.

No one likes to talk about their book while it's in submission. That's a long, nail-biting process that is full of speculation and despair. Write something else while you're submitting. It will give you something more pleasant to talk about.

Once you have your book in your hand, you're going to have to start telling people about it or it will only ever be in your hands. Use that synopsis, your blurb and your logline and tell everyone about your book. Don't spam everyone at every turn, but do mention it when the opportunity arises. The more practice you get talking about your book, the easier it becomes. After a few times, those couple sentences about your book will just roll of your tongue and sound natural instead of forced by sheer panic.

It may sound weird to think about bringing up your book with people in your daily life, but you never know what people like to read. Toss the information out there and see what happens. The biggest trick to remember is to know when to expound on your couple sentences and when to stop there and move on in the conversation if they don't seem interested. Aiming for the hard sell isn't going to gain you sales, it's only going to annoy people.

Do you enjoy talking about your writing or do you avoid it?

Prefer paperback? The print book goes live on April 20. Reviews are always appreciated.

Saturday, April 21, 2018

A to Z - All Things Writing: Synopsis

S is for Synopsis

Did you write an outline for your novel? If you didn't start with one, go write one now. Yes, post-novel. It will make writing your synopsis so much easier.

You know what happens in your novel, but now that you're ready to publish or submit your novel for publication, you're going to have to start telling other people what your novel is about. Coherently. The way to do that is to boil down that whole novel into a few pages. If you've never done this before, it might sound impossible. It's not. I promise.

With that outline in hand, write two to three sentences about each chapter. What important steps to does your main character take and why? What will happen if they don't succeed? If big things happen to supporting characters, mention that too. Try to be as conscience as possible. It doesn't have to be super pretty. This stage is only for you. You've just created a synopsis for each chapter. That wasn't so hard, was it?

Now, take those pages and read them through. Consider how to tell your story in brief to someone who hasn't read it yet, using the map you've written for yourself. You have a main character who has a goal. There is some opposing force. There are stakes. There may be secondary characters or multiple main characters who have important roles in the main plot or big subplots. Don't try to get into detail, but you do need to cover the highlights from beginning to end and make it sound engaging. Aim for three pages maximum.

Got the novel down to three pages? Groovy. Now make it one page.

Take that one page and that's what you can work from to create your query letter or back cover blurb. Both of these should not contain the end or the whole plot, but do need to have some of the information you have in your hand and they also need to be engaging. We'll cover those more on X day.

Congratulations, you made it through the step man writers dread. Once you've done this a time or two, it gets easier and involves far less hair pulling and slamming of your head against the desk.

Do you like or dread writing your synopsis?

Prefer paperback? The print book goes live on April 20. Reviews are always appreciated.

Friday, April 20, 2018

A to Z - All Thing Writing: Rewriting

R is for Rewriting

This is the stage where the magic happens. You've written the end on your first draft. You've read it over and made some notes. Maybe you've done that post-draft outline I mentioned earlier this month or you have your original outline to refer to. Now its time to hit the ground running and clean up this mess.

Rewriting is crucial step if you've picked up an old draft with the intent to finish it or have added a bunch of scenes to a previously 'finished' piece.

My favorite method of rewriting works like this:

1. Save a copy of the first draft as draft two. This preserves all your precious original words for posterity. While I do this to make myself feel better, like I have a safety net if I screw something up along the way, I've never resorted to going back to the first draft again. Nevertheless, it frees up your conscience for rewriting.

2. If the draft doesn't totally suck, (like this is your fifth or sixth novel and you've got this writing thing down somewhat AND the first draft wasn't a bear to write), you might choose to carefully read over every line scene by scene, consider what needs to be changed while consulting your notes and outline and proceed through the book.

2A. Or, as is often the case for me, there are a lot of changes that need to be made. To prevent writing a frankennovel (created when too many bits and pieces are frantically sewn together) I rewrite the entire thing. Yes, every word. Starting at the top of the document, paragraph one, I write the new paragraph one below it, delete the old on and proceed to the next paragraph. You're probably thinking this sounds like a hell of a lot of work. Really, it's not. You're not having to think so much about putting a whole draft together now. It's about making what you already have, better.

What should you be looking for while rewriting?

• Word choice - can you say things clearer or without so many words?

• Voice - the frame of mind in which you started the book and where it ended are probably different. Now that you know the ending and all the leads up to it, you can go through make it cohesive.

• Description - if you didn't add much of that the first time around, now's the time. There's also the possibility that you only discovered what some of the setting, characters, and gizmos were in the middle or end of the book and they need to be added into the beginning.

• Plot fixes - this includes adding scenes to properly foreshadow events or introduce characters, ironing out scenes, cutting subplots that didn't end up being needed, etc.

Keep in mind that this isn't a pass where you should be super focused on typos and micro edits. This step is about getting the story itself into shape. Edits after this stage will add polish.

Do you rewrite or skip right to editing?