Write Early. Write Often…Write Something!

Character, voice, want?

I've spent most of today working on five hundred words. Yep, the first five hundred are the hardest words EVER! Why? 

I'm a plot person. I love the intricacies of plot. First comes the small obstacle. Then a bigger one. Throw in a red herring and then a HUGE crisis and wow, there's your story. Regardless of how creative and wonderful the plot if the you don't have a main character someone wants to live with for the whole story, well, zilch, nada, zip, nein, nothing, gone, over.

Teen [YA] fiction is written many times in the first person. Sometimes I wonder if that isn't a short cut to getting voice into the story. Sometimes I wonder whose voice, especially when I don't know the author. Trying to get the voice of my MC for my time adventure story is driving me nutty. I've tried dialogue, and I think there's not enough plot. I'm trying talking to the reader and I'm wondering if there's too much setting and not enough of what is to come. 

Okay, so next I try third person limited. I'll let you know. 

 

'Nother Dimension

So. the conference is over. The golf classic is over. My study is clean [pictures at 11, or maybe on the 11th]. It's just me and iBook. Me and pen and paper. Whoa! No excuses. No obstcales! Nothing to stand between me and getting this book written. Ah. But which book.

After listening carefully to all the agents and editors I think I know. Mysteries, my favorite, are different at the MG/YA level. What passes for mystery these days has little to do with plot but are character driven. Can I do that? Maybe.The question is do I want to. Mysteries seem to be the hard sell. I feel like that TNT commerical that was on for a while. TNT We know drama!

I'm not going to get metaphyscial here. The order of the universe will not be upended. I'm leaving the mysteries for a different time, and moving toward the scifi adventure book.

The question is: Can I define Aaron Hartely as a character? Can I make you root for him? Okay, let's see.

 

Character

Character? The World Book Encyclopedia Dictionary describes character first as all qualities or features of anything; kind; sort; nature.

 Character then is a neutral word. Denoting neither good nor bad. Just qualities. Just features. But we don't let words wallow much in the neither nor area. We want it to have properties of good or bad. Sometimes we add a qualifying word. Disreputable or maybe the very plain good and that gives our noun a bit more umph! 

Just finished the last Artemis Fowl. His 'character' has grown, evolved, become different. He was a throughly likable, brilliant Irish boy with a completely disreputable background and going quickly toward amoral although he was bright enough to know the difference. I hope Atlantic Complex is the last AF because he's just not that interesting anymore. Sad. Really 

Narrative Arc

Going to forget about character for a bit. I realized I can't do justice to Tommie until I now how the plot is going down. Yes, yes, I am a 'plot person'.  So. Onto the Narrative Arc.  Think of this as the story path and it's divided into four parts to the book: Exposition, Complication, Climax and Resolution.

 Exposition is the description of the upcoming story, setting the stage. Complication is the problem in the story. Climax is the peak or high point of the story and resolution is the solution, the outcome. 

Layer those four items with dramatic tension that would be the way the complication is solved reaching a climax and then lessening with resolution.

You can add another layer of time. Past, present and future, but I think for a middle grade book I'll spend my time in the present, with just a dab of back story. 

So, my goal for today is to complete the revised narrative arc for MRDR MYSTRI and see how that goes…

Surviving Your Novel

Paul Fleischman wants us to survive the process. And right now I'm thinking this may be a little tricky, much more so than it sounded sitting in the LA Ballroom surrounded by a very friendly crowd. But I'm going to go for it! He said: Organize your work so you can recognize where you've been and where you are going.

 

Even if you are writing fiction--do your research. [This I love, but didn't write down the source--yes, yes bad me!] "Research should be like a slip, it should never show." Whoa! is that now cool!

Listening to the Muses Part Deux

Want to know a secret about series? Well, here it is. Right from Bruce Hale, author of the Chet Gecko Series and the UnderWhere Series. IT'S ALL ABOUT THE FIRST BOOK! Now there's a DUH! Moment. So. Take your time. Create that world. Go deep. As the hard questions about your plot, setting and character.

 Right. Easy peasy.

 

Listening to the Muses Part 1

Amy Koss, author--The Girls, The Cheat, etc. talks about when you get stuck with your MG/YA character, think, "Oh, it's all about me!" The Middle Grade Character is all about drama. Give them angst. It's not about the most ghastly thing to happen to them. It's all about the HUMILIATION!

Okay, I think I can do that! 

Finding A Cure For Reading Blind

For years I read, I mean, I read a lot. It wasn't unusual for me to be working a forty or fifty hour week, traveling, taking care of a house and two kids [yes, Tom, with lots of help I admit], but I would read two maybe three books a week. And I loved it. I was in other worlds, watched other lives, snickered at other's faults. Mostly it was fiction, but not always.

I was reading blind and I didn't even know it.  

Then I started to get an inkling of really seeing when I read when I began working with critique groups. But critique groups are toughies! They can be a gateway to hell for some. For me the initial groups I joined were companionable and helpful but it was limited and in some cases limiting.

Then along came SOUP. Yep. This was different. But not right away. It took time. I read Francine Prose's book, Reading Like a Writer. And, I realized I was reading, comprehending, loving, but not paying attention. I was in a  sort of seeing the forest for the trees perspective.

That's when I knew I was reading blind.

Over time SOUP has become like a partnership. We are involved in each others success in that we work as diligently on our own writing as we do on providing support and criticism for each other.

So what's the cure for reading blind? To really see your work as someone else does! To have critique partners who are willing to criticize your work and not you. But who, and I think this may be the most important part, allow you to criticize their work so that you can clearly see what works and what doesn't. And if you're really smart, you learn.

Finding the cure isn't easy. But it is wonderful.

Sláinte