Category: Lessons Learned About Writing

Tuesday Tremors

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 9 Comments

Yesterday, talking with a friend, she mentioned how my book has a similar feel and pacing to the TV show Nero Wolfe. That started rolling around in my head. Imagine a gentler pin ball, bouncing off all my insecurities and issues.

And then I saw how hard I was getting flamed on another blog I participate in. And I started to think, wow, I can’t even make myself understood here.

And then this morning I read a post about how sad it is when writers think they are great, that they have awesome talent, and really it’s so bad you can barely follow their line of thought in the blog ranting about how great they are.

I am a copy cat, with no talent, and no ability to form logical trains of thought.

All of this, has led to a triple word score of I suck today. I sit here looking at my nanonovel from 2015 wanting to add more words to it. Needing to add more words to it, hello I have a class to teach in a little over a month and I need a nano novel to demonstrate on. But I can’t write a word.

I have suckitis. And who am I to think I have anything worth saying to a class full of Nano publishing hopefuls.

What do you do when a case of suckitis rears up and takes over your creative brain? Surely, this happens to others? Help me out here.

Or maybe I just suck and should quit while I am ahead.

Tuesday, all my troubles seemed so far away…

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back when I was on that cruise, hitting yoga every day, three massages, a facial, ionithermie for those flappy bits….Kids camp for the kiddo. Time alone. Time with hubby alone. Someone else cooking and cleaning. Books to read. Sun to soak up. We took the kiddo snorkeling, boogie boarding, and tubing for the first time. He loved all three. We loved all three.

and then we came home to five new leaks in the roof of our house including one that was spewing out an electrical socket. Bleep, Bleep, Explicative, Bleep.

We so should have had the roof repaired while we were gone but the hubby was concerned about announcing our home would be empty to a bunch of strangers who would know where we live. As opposed to you all who don’t know where we live. LOL

so while the hubby works from home to deal with that today, I am back on the normal schedule of kiddo to coop, blog work, and grocery shopping.

Thinking back on that amazing vacation, I must say I actually stopped thinking about book sales and blog posts and my virtual book tour. I barely thought about Nano which is right around the corner. I gave a little time to the niggling little nightmare that maybe, just maybe, I don’t have another book percolating in my brain. oh god, did I really write that out loud?

I’ll even shout it.

WHAT THE HELL AM I GOING TO DO IF I DON’T HAVE ANOTHER BOOK IN ME?

gulp. ok, so I said it. It’s out there. And I have to wonder, do other people feel that way? Come on, tell me I’m not alone in this. Or tell me I’m a freak. I’m a big girl I can handle it. LOL

Weekend Workshop Sunday Edition

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We have reached the last chapter in Everyday Editing by Jeff Anderson. And here is it, the good stuff, dialogue.

-Dialogue moves the narrative along and/or reveals something about a character. (I think I’ve heard that before.) Use a distinctive voice.

-We indent every time a new person speaks. The end punctuation should go inside the quotation mark.

-Dialogue can help us show rather than tell.

-Said is NOT dead. (hrm….)

“Good dialogue encompasses both what is said and not said.” – Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

Writers are selective, they choose to write about what is important and they edit that which does not move the story along.

Anderson makes a long an impassioned arguement in favor of “said”. He firmly believes that “said” fades into the background, it’s a nonentity in the world of dialogue tags but other words that could be substituted for “said” stand out. And you don’t want every tag to stand out. Tags should be utilitarian not art. He suggests dialogue packets- stimulus, internalization, and response, to add detail and movement and possibly leave off the tag altogether.

It’s a good arguement. One I will certainly consider at some point, possibly while I am flying home today.

Weekend Workshop Saturday Edition

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Do we have chemistry? No, not me and you. Jeff Anderson from Everyday Editing, is asking about compound sentences in Chapter 9.

-Compound sentences are made when two or more sentences are combined with a comma and a coordinating conjunction. Coordinating conjunctions can be remembered with the mnemonic FANBOYS: for and nor but or yet so. You can skip the coordinating conjunction if you use a semicolon (;).

Further information about the FANBOYS with a myriad of examples from Anderson and things I am currently reading.

For: connects a solution with a problem.

The dark scares us, for we don’t know what is waiting in the dark. – Alvin Schwartz, Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones

And: connects two ideas that go together.

Angeline would reveal no secrets now, and Damiana would reveal no secrets later. -Sharon Shinn, The Safe-Keeper’s Secret

I think that is from a children’s book but I don’t care. I am totally intrigued and will be looking that up in the library.

Nor: negative form of or.

He left and I never saw him again, nor did I regret it. – Dictionary.com example

But: connects two ideas that go against each other.

He tried to stare into her fiery gaze, but he couldn’t stop looking at the purple vein bulging in her forehead. – Brian Meehl, Out of Patience

Or: connects two choices.

Either the killer had been too exhausted to carry the third victim all the way to the water, or he had been spooked by someone approaching and dropped his burden. – Ann Rule, Green River, Running Red

Yet: connects two ideas that go against each other.

The path was dark, yet I slowly found my way. – google search on yet

So: connects a problem with a result.

Ray Bradbury said it best: “Your intuition knows what it wants to write, so get out of the way.” – Chris Baty, No Plot? No Problem!

Like all chemistry, compounding mixes two substances(sentences) for a result which is greater than the starting. Compound away.

Weekend Workshop Sunday Edition

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The title of Chapter 8 from Everyday Editing by Jeff Anderson is awesome. “Give me a break.” Yep and I’m taking one right now in St. Kitts.

But Anderson had another topic in mind. Paragraphs.

-Paragraphs help readers and writers chunk information together and separate it as well.

-Paragraphs may have any number of sentences. There is no rule.

-Paragraphs tend to focus on one main idea (unity), and its parts should be related (coherence).

I love this quote by Isaac Babel from Reading Like a Writer. “A new paragraph is a wonderful thing. It lets you quietly change the rhythm, and it can be a flash of lightning that shows the same landscape from a different aspect.”

I have no desire to type entire sections from novels I am currently reading to discuss why they broke things into paragraphs the way they did and I’m guessing you have no desire to read that. So let’s just say toodles here…

Weekend Workshop Saturday Edition

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Greetings from the Caribbean. Today I am snorkeling with my hubby and kiddo. Which works because when I saw the title of Chapter Seven from Everyday Editing by Jeff Anderson, I was totally under water. What in the world is an appositive?

-Appositives add information to sentences by renaming nouns. The appositive should be next to the noun it is renaming. Appositives need commas or dashes to offset them from the sentence.

huh? So what is it? I think I need some examples.

Catherine the Great, my Russian grandma, is already awake. – Cari Best, Three Cheers for Catherine the Great!

ohhhhhh. I get it. Appositives relay information pertaining to the noun they apposite. Information is good.

Some further examples from Anderson, using his patented recombination method :

I watched her playing ladushky with Mimmo so he wouldn’t cry.

Ladushky is a clapping song.

The clapping song is Russian.

Combined into: I watched her playing ladushky, a Russian clapping song, with Mimmo so he wouldn’t cry.

The words become more active and the flow tighter by using the appositive. Per Anderson the description an appositive describes sharpens the image, amplifying it with new information and clarifying the meaning for the reader.

Examples from things I am currently reading….

Her mother, Nancy McIntyre, knew that Sand-e was selling herself to make enough money for that, but she couldn’t stop her. – Ann Rule, Green River, Running Red

The event grew larger still-five thousand participants the third year-and I continues to work as both director and participant. – Chris Baty, No Plot? No Problem!

Weekend Workshop Sunday Edition and Virtual Book Tour Stop #4

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As I explained yesterday, I will now be covering two chapters from Everyday Editing by Jeff Anderson each weekend so that we finish book before Nanowrimo starts. Chapter Six, to be or not to be, in other words verb choice.

Verbs of being are: is, are, was, were, be, been, and am. You can avoid using a verb of being with the -ing form of a verb to strengthen your writing. Active voice creates cleaner, tighter writing. Verbs add action and movement to our writing. Often the main verb will pack more punch if it stands alone.

Examples from Anderson:

Writing is weakened by the passive voice.

vs. The passive voice weakens writing.

The first is passive, the second active.

Further examples:

Fred, Sam, and I stood in front of strange trees and giant ferns. A rocky cliff rose behind us. A volcano smoked ahead of us. – Jon Scieszka, Your Mother Was a Neanderthal

vs. Fred, Sam, and I were standing in front of strange trees and giant ferns. A rocky cliff was rising behind us. A volcano was smoking ahead of us. -Adjusted by Anderson to make a point.

Which one sounds better to you? I know which one I like.

On the other hand sometimes you need verbs of being.

Xavier is dying.

Changing it to Xavier dies or died, would very much change the meaning. Use the voice and the verb that give you the message you want to convey to the reader.

Be sure to stop by Sheri J. Kennedy Riverside today to read another excerpt from Scripting the Truth and to laugh at further interview fun.

Weekend Workshop Saturday Edition

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Toiling on with Everyday Editing by Jeff Anderson, today I bring you Chapter 5: Simple Sentences. In an effort to finish this book before Nanowrimo starts I need to start covering two chapters per weekend so the chapter summary and the exercise suggestions will be covered in one post.

So Simple Sentences. They need a subject and verb. Did you know that a starting it with a Capitol Letter and finishing with a period does not a sentence make? laughing.

We write in sentences all day every day. I think I do anyway. But Word frequently informs me I am wrong about that and sometime I ignore Word and leave it as a style choice.

Some examples from Anderson:

My hair wakes up stupid. – Tony Johnston, Any Small Goodness

Is that a sentence? (Yep. Subject:hair, verb:wakes)

Another corpse. – Scott Smith, The Ruins

Is this one? (Nope. Subject:corpse, verb: MIA)

Let’s make our own two words sentences.

She writes.

She edits.

She designs.

She publishes.

Sounds good to me. But it’s a subject close to my heart. I think the point of simple sentences is to use the most powerful verbs you can get your hands on. Here are some from my current reading.

The universe loves novelists. – Chris Baty, No Plot? No Problem!

I hope they will not meet at all. – Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

It was unlikely that she had drowned accidentally. – Ann Rule, Green River, Running Red

As usual my reading is somewhat disjointed. LOL. Be sure to check in tomorrow, both here for another Chapter from Everyday Editing and at Sheri J. Kennedy Riverside for my next blog stop on my virtual book tour.

Weekend Workshop Saturday Edition

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Apostrophes. Where do you stick it? LOL. No naughty comments from the peanut gallery. Continuing with Everyday Editing from Jeff Anderson, I bring you possession and contraction. Both done with that little ‘ mark.

-An apostrophe (‘) s added to a singular noun shows possession.

-An apostrophe (‘) after the s in a plural word shows possession.

-Apostrophes also show where letters are removed. Words shortened with an apostrophe are called contractions.

Three short rules. Should be easy right?

But take the word it. You know where I am going with this right?

It’s. Contraction for it it.

It’s. Possession. It owns.

Its’. Multiple its own something.

Super simple yeah.

Some examples from Anderson:

-A great scar in the earth’s crust runs for almost 600 miles along the coast of California. Andrew Langley, Hurricanes, Tsunamis, and Other Natural Disasters

-Locals say if you go up to “Jacob’s Hill,” stop on a bridge, put your car in neutral, and turn everything off, your car will roll across the bridge. – Wesley Treat, Heather Shad, and Rob Riggs, Weird Texas

And finally one that combines everything and provides a fun example of specificity.

-Don’t even get me started about my aunt Rose’s Christmas tree. First of all, it’s aluminum. Second of all, it’s pink. I mean, like the color of Pepto-Bismol, which makes sense, because I get sick to my stomach just looking at it. -Neal Shusterman, The Schwa Was Here

Plain version: I don’t like her Christmas tree at all.

Here’s to pink Christmas trees, coming soon to a holiday near you.

Weekend Workshop Sunday Edition

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I realize capitalization is pretty easy but it does tie nicely into the idea of specificity in your writing. So for the exercises, let’s a very specific sentence/paragraph and then remove all the specifics.

The Greenes had move to Manteo in November. The weather was fine throughout winter and spring, but when school let out in June, the heat wrapped Roanoke Island in the shroud of perpetual humidity. The only relief came between five and eight o’clock in the morning, when an Atlantic breeze blew in from the Outer Banks. -Roland Smith, Jack’s Run

Without the specifics:

They moved to the town in the fall. The weather was fine for a while, but then it got hot and humid. The only relief came early in the morning and late at night when a breeze came in from the ocean.

What a change. Do you even care about the story anymore? I certainly don’t. Putting that book down and giving it a one ℘ review for the blog.