Finding Time

Wouldn’t it be nice to have an entire day to yourself to work on your latest book? Imagine shuffling out of bed and remaining in your comfy pajamas as you pour a steaming cup of coffee into your favorite mug. Sounds good right? It gets even better as you sit down at your computer and begin typing away, uninterrupted (not even a phone call). This is a dream come true. Sadly for most of us, this scenario will never happen. We are all busy, busy, busy.

So how do you find the time to write? I mean, you have to work, cook, clean, actually communicate with family and friends and then, decide whether to write or plop in bed. 

Of course there has to be a way to maximize your time. Here are a few suggestions, although the scenario out the outset of this post seems more desirable.

The first thing you can do is schedule the time to write. This is a literal scheduling, where you sit down and map out your week and try to squeeze some valuable time to work on your craft. Maybe it means getting up early, or staying up late. Can you squeeze time in on lunch? Maybe on the weekend you can steal a few hours? Get creative and think outside the box.

Tune out from TV and movies. You have your own creating to do. No need in staring at the tube when you could be carving out your story or developing your awesome characters. Realize too that you may have to set down the “word games” and phone calls. If you are disciplined and focused you can do it. It’ll take some work and dedication but once you have your book in your hands it’ll be worth it.

It is a hectic world that we’re living in. It can become tough to juggle life as a person and life as an author. Here’s my final tip. It’s a simple one too. Just don’t give up! We want to read what you’re working on. You have a voice and it’s worth sharing.

Until next time….Happy writing!

RL Taylor is an award-winning fiction author with five novels released to date. His newest writing venture is a series of non-fiction books on style, etiquette and self-improvement for men and women who want to help the men in their life. 

Click here for a free copy of The Gentlemen's Code which Esquire.com featured as recommended reading.

http://www.livelikegentlemen.com

Fiction: http://www.rltayloronline.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/rltheauthor

The Meaty 5 PLANNING YOUR NEXT STORY: PART 4

The Meaty 5   PLANNING YOUR NEXT STORY: PART 4

So far, we’ve discussed your PREMISE, the PLOT POINTS and COMPLICATIONS, and SCENES.

Today let’s talk about determining the meat of the story which will help define what the story is about, who the protagonist is, what he/she wants/needs, who your audience is. Without answers to these questions, your story might be a great idea, but will it develop into a readable story?

These 5 points were the hardest for me to define. I had the most trouble with the THEME. It changed about fifteen times before I realized what it was.

First, let’s look at MOTIVE. This is not your protag’s motive, but that of the story. Here’s mine:

Tell a story set in the far future about how a strong female deals with an oppressive, male-dominated society.

Pretty straightforward. 

Next is DESIRE. This does apply to the protag. What is his/her biggest desire in the story? What must they accomplish or die trying?

Mine: to be left alone to live her own life her way, to meet her birth mother, her twin sister and be with the boy she loves without government interference.

GOAL. Every character in the story must have a goal. Even the antag has a goal. But here we are concerned with the protag’s goal. What drives your character?

Mine:  to get through this horrific experience, required by the government of all girls her age but escape if she sees a chance.

CONFLICT. I know you’ve heard this before, but it bears repeating: You don’t have a story without conflict. There should be LOTS and LOTS of conflict in a good story. We’re talking here about the MAIN conflict of the story and maybe one or two SUB conflicts.

Mine: Shawna’s bullying (jealous); government’s Generational Program which is inflicted on every girl age 12-20; internal conflict about who she is.

THEME. Like I said, this was the hardest for me. I read through list after list of possible themes looking for the one which fit my story. I found several, but they never seemed just right. For example, knowing who you truly are can make you strong enough to deal with adversity. While this is true of my character, it is not the theme of the entire story.  Information can lead to knowledge. Oppression leads to rebellion. By losing everything, sometimes you gain a true sense of self. While all of these held a glimmer of what the story is about, none were complete.

Then I thought of this one: Sometimes, it’s only by staring into the abyss one finds the courage to jump across.

This fit my story in many ways, which I listed in my notes and was pleased to see how well it fit. So don’t try on just one or two, keep looking for the right idea until you find the one that fits.

Another interesting way of getting the theme across is the use of Symbolism. What are some symbols you can use to establish the theme in the reader’s mind?

Mine: Rayna’s view out the window beside her top bunk is of a narrow street and the front of another tall building. The street is so narrow she imagines getting a running start down the central dorm aisle between the beds and launching herself to freedom across the chasm of the street, landing on the roof of the next building.

In the Exercise Yard, where they all go for one hour every day, Rayna presses so hard against the chainlink fence while staring down her street to freedom, that she become imprinted by the links on her cheeks, forehead, shoulders and hands.

Next month, getting to know your Protagonist.

For an in-depth discussion of these points be sure to read K.M. Weiland's Outlining Your Novel

Rebecca Ryals Russell, a fourth-generation Floridian, was born in Gainesville, grew up in Ft Lauderdale then lived in Orlando and Jacksonville with her Irish husband and four children. Due to the sudden death of Rebecca's mother, they moved to Wellborn, near Lake City, to care for her father, moving into his Victorian home built in 1909. After teaching Middle Graders for fourteen years she retired and began writing the story idea which had been brewing for thirty years.  Within six months she wrote the first three books of each series, YA Seraphym Wars and MG Stardust Warriors. The world she created has generated numerous other story ideas including two current works in progress, SageBorn Chronicles based on various mythologies of the world and aimed at the lower Middle Grade reader and Saving Innocence, another MG series set on Dracwald and involving dragons and Majikals. She is finishing a YA Dystopian Romance which has been a NaNoWriMo project for three years. She loves reading YA Fantasy, Horror and Sci Fi as well as watching movies.  Read more about Rebecca and her WIPs as well as how to buy books in her various series at http://rryalsrussell.com  You may email her at vigorios7@gmail.com

On Book Marketing, Media Kits and Homecoming Queens

I'm including this first person essay in this WritersOnTheMove blog because when I teach marketing classes to authors at UCLA, my students often have trouble wrapping their minds around exactly what the first-person essay that should be included in their media kits is. And that difficulty is exacerbated when I tell them that it helps if the essay is associated with issues that are currently in the news. This one is related to current events at the most basic level--that is, it is a commentary on a news/feature story in a respected newspaper. But the issues are current, too. I hope it helps WritersOntheMove. I've also included the author credit, because that is a vital part of marketing media

Marketing, Continuing Education, and Homecoming Queens

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson

I admit it. A feature story in the New York Times Digest on...ahem...beauty queens struck a chord. On several levels.

The article by Tara Parker-Pope told the story of Heidi Hansen, a forty-two year old mother of teens who has gone back to school to study nursing. And if that weren’t nontraditional enough, she’s running for homecoming queen. Gasp!

Even more amazing she’s marketing her candidacy with the same vigor of her young competitors and she’s doing it without a shred of apology for her untraditional paths or (apparently) without an utterance of the word “shameless” connected with her marketing campaign (which I’ve always contended has a subtext that there is something to be ashamed of).

So, I should back up and tell you I have an agenda. I like to defend my own circuitous path to a degree from the University of Southern California (USC). I was graduated at the ripe old age of thirty-three with two young children, one of whom I once hauled to class with me and let him pretend to catch fish in the fountain outside my class window where I could keep an eye on him. By the time I received that degree on heavy, lineny paper, I had taken at least one class every semester (including summers) since I started seventeen years before. I always considered this approach to education a gigantic plus. One class at a time with plenty of time to focus on required (and optional!) study and research. I figured I was getting more from my education and would retain it longer.

That explains my personal interest in the late-bloomer aspect of this NY Times story. But I find Hansen’s proclivity for marketing just as satisfying. Not only did she decide to run for homecoming queen because“…it’s a continuing process of being engaged in the world around me, and right now a big part of my world is my life on campus,” but she isn’t dodging the issue of being, shall we say, a bit older than the other candidates even though the photograph in the Times looks to me as if she could easily pass. No. Her campaign slogan to attract votes is,“I’m not your mother, but I could be.”

Now, you should know that I began a lifelong interest in public relations very early when I worked in New York as a publicist and when I worked in several jobs as a journalist and writer. But it didn’t really congeal until my last semester at USC when I studied public relations under the head of the PR department, a former President of Western Airlines who believed that the way to find the best and brightest students for his department was to teach entry level classes and teach them as if he were teaching seasoned pros. And my awareness of the importance of marketing in all our lives only became more intense when I became a published novelist, poet, and author of how-to books on—you guessed it—marketing!

So you can imagine how I rooted for Ms. Hansen when I read that she enlisted the help of every demographic she had access to (other than her children who seem to be. . . well, oblivious to their mother’s schmaltziness). She found fellow students (not necessarily students in her age range) to contribute their skills—one writing a musical campaign ditty, another for producing a video. I call this cross-promotionin my Frugal Book Promoter, a how-to book on marketing for writers. Mr. Hansen's videographer and musician friends are both getting their share of marketing exposure by being part of her campaign. I mean, a mention in the New York Times? I sure hope these students use that information (and the example set by Ms. Hansen) in their resumes as they learn more and more that nontraditional paths and tried-and-true marketing work for everyone.

Regardless of their age.

Carolyn Howard-Johnson is a senior (not in the collegiate sense) who has always used her marketing skills in her professional life and found they gave her a special boost when she took on a new award-winning career in publishing at the age most are considering retirement. Learn more about her at http://howtodoitfrugally.com.  Find her how-to book on marketing at http://budurl.com/FrugalBkPromo

Memories of my father

Stephen Leacock (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

One of the things about my father that always impressed me was his ability to pick out good restaurants. He would look around, sniff a few times, take a look at the menu and make a decision. I don’t ever remember having a bad meal when we ate together.

We lived in Manhattan and though we ate out quite a lot on Sunday nights it was always at the same few restaurants. One of them was Tony’s Italian Kitchen on West 79th street. It was owned by the chef and the maitre d’, I learned later, and according to my father this was one of the secrets of its success. In any case, they had one of the best antipastos I have ever eaten in any Italian restaurant. It had marinated peppers, mushrooms, olives, Italian salami and provolone and much more. I was floored when, after coming to Boston, I order antipasto and was served what was basically a large salad.

It was on a summer trip through England and France, however, when this ability came to the fore. We were in Paris and were walking around Montmartre when supper time rolled around. As we strolled down the hill, my father pointed La Mere Catherine. “Let’s try that one,” he suggested. I never did find out why he picked
it. I had coq au vin for supper. It is now many, many years later and I still remember the meal. It was one of the best I have ever had. I later looked the restaurant up in the famous Guide Michelin and discovered that it had one star, which is a big deal. The thing is, though, that my father picked it out without consulting the guide book.

Later that same trip I stumbled across what I remember as one of my first experiences of culture shock. We were in a restaurant in the French countryside ordering lunch, in French, which we all spoke. I was ordering a croque monsieur, a grilled ham and cheese sandwich. The conversation, which for convenience I’ll render mostly in English, went something like this:

“And what kind of cheese would you like?” the waitress asked.

“Fromage Suisse” (Swiss cheese) I replied.

“And what kind of Swiss cheese?” she responded.


I was floored. I never knew there was more than one. Ever on the ball, however, I came back with “what kinds do you have?”

They had emmental and gruyere. I picked gruyere, mostly because it sounded familiar.
In case you ever face this dilemma, however, I’ll add that our imported Swiss cheese is in fact emmental. Gruyere is more like domestic Swiss.


Though I never figured out all of how my father did it, I did learn at least one of his secrets one day when I met him for dinner. He had spent the day at the courthouse in lower Manhattan, so we decided to go to Chinatown for dinner. We were standing in line at the place he picked out when I asked rather plaintively, “why not that place over there? There’s no line.”


“Exactly,” he replied.


Dinner was delicious.

Stephen Leacock was my father's favorite writer. I never read any of his work while my father was alive, but after he died, I did. He's a hoot, and eminently quotable.

"Writing is no trouble: you just jot down ideas as they occur to you. The jotting is simplicity itself - it is the occurring which is difficult."
Stephen Leacock

Here is the beginning of Dad's favorite story:

It was a wild and stormy night on the West Coast of
Scotland. This, however, is immaterial to the present
story, as the scene is not laid in the West of Scotland.
For the matter of that the weather was just as bad on
the East coast of Ireland.
--Stephen Butler Leacock (1869—1944)
Canadian humorist.
Opening lines of "Gertrude the Governess; Or
Simple Seventeen" in _Nonsense Novels_ [1911].

Margaret Fieland is the author of "Relocated," recently released by MuseItUp Publishing http://tinyurl.com/Muserelocated and of the companion book of poems , "Sand in the Desert," http://tinyurl.com/SandPoetryPrint or http://tinyurl.com/SandPoetry. She is one of six Poetic Museling. Their poetry anthology, "Lifelines," was released by Inkspotter Publications last November http://tinyurl.com/LifelinesPoetry. She is presently at work on two more novels set in the universe of "Relocated." You may visit her website, http://www.margaretfieland.com or http://poetic-muselings.net/ You can find her on Twitter as @madcapmaggie and on Facebook as madcapmaggie.

Writing Tip: Critiques are Essential

Having been a moderator of a children's writing critique group and a reviewer for multiple genre as well as an editor and ghostwriter, I read a number of manuscripts and books. Reading both well written books and books that lack polish, it's easy to tell which authors haven't bothered to have their work critiqued or edited.

Seeing the unnecessary and unprofessional mistakes of writers publishing unpolished work, I always stress the importance of belonging to a critique group. Even experienced authors depend on the unique perspective and extra eyes that each critique member provides.

The critique group can catch a number of potential problems with your manuscript, such as:

1. Grammatical errors
2. Holes in your story
3. Unclear sentences, paragraphs, or dialogue
4. The forward movement of the story
5. Overuse of a particular word, adjectives, and adverbs
6. Unnecessary words to eliminate for a tight story
7. Unnecessary or excessive scenes that should be eliminated to ensure a tight story
8. Character continuity
9. Manuscript formatting
10. Head hopping

The list goes on and on. And, there are even more potential problems to be watched out for when writing for children. It's near impossible for even an experienced writer to catch all of his or her own errors.

Your critique partners will also provide suggestions and guidance. Note here, it is up to you whether to heed those suggestion and comments, but if all the members of your group suggest you rewrite a particular sentence for clarity, hopefully a light will go off and you'll pay attention.

Along with having those extras sets of eyes to help you along, you will begin to see your own writing improve. You will also be able to find your own errors and those of others much quicker. This will help you become a better and more confident writer.

Now, while the critique group does not take the place of an editor, they do help you get to the point where you think you're ready for submission. At this point, it is always advisable to seek an editor to catch what you and your critique group missed. And, believe me, there will be something in your manuscript that wasn't picked up on.

When looking into joining a critique group, be sure the group has both new and experienced writers. The experienced writers will help you hone your craft through their critiques of your work.

If you haven’t already, join a critique group today.

Karen Cioffi is an award-winning children’s author and children's ghostwriter. She is also an author/writer online platform instructor with WOW! Women on Writing.

You can check out Karen’s e-classes through WOW! at:
http://www.articlewritingdoctor.com/content-marketing-tools/

And, be sure to connect with Karen at:

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MORE ON WRITING AND MARKETING

8 Tips to Dynamic Dialogue
The Power of Video in Its Simplest Form
Lazy Ways to Keep a Reader Hooked

Nouns Need to be Concrete and Appear More than Once

 

Part two in this series of notes from the Highlights Foundation Workshop, Books that Rise Above, features points made by Patricia Lee Gauch and Linda Sue Park on the use of nouns.


Patricia Lee Gauch: Concrete Nouns

Patti says we want to write in profound simplicity to keep our writing unclogged, such as the opening paragraph in chapter 11 of Linda Sue Park's, A Single Shard:

         The path to the Rock of the Falling Flowers was steep, and Tree-ear leaned forward,
         sometimes on all fours, as he climbed. Just before he reached the top, he stopped by the
         side of the path and took the jiggeh off his back. He drank from the gourd and poured a
         little water on his hands to splash on his sweaty face.
         Thus refreshed, he felt ready to give his full attention to the sight of the rock.

To write with simplicity we must use concrete words; concrete nouns. In Patti's own Easy Reader Tanya series, she showcases lovely French dance terms, such as pas de chat, arabesque, and sur pointes. She points out the embellished concrete nouns and beautiful verbs in Karen Cushman's The Midwife's Apprentice: . . . the cat lay still in the dung heap, The merchant's booth . . . filled with other wares for wondering at . . . shiny brass needles, ribbons of red and lavender, copper spoons and brass knives . . ., she insulted and encouraged, pushed and poked, brewed and stewed and remedied.

Linda Sue Park: Nouns Need to Appear More than Once

Linda stresses the importance of analyzing each and every word. Every word has to work hard. Toward this end, she contends that in order to create wholeness of the world you have created, in order to buttress that world, all nouns have to appear more than once. Nouns that appear only once don't serve the story. A noun that appears in the first part of the book is not a force unless it is repeated at the end. Especially look at the nouns in the last chapter. Especially.

Repeated words refer to the subject, the container, in this excerpt from Chapter 1 of Linda's book, A Long Walk to Water, which is based on a true story, on the long, lone trek Nya must make every day in 2008 to a pond in southern Sudan to fetch water:

     Going was easy.
     Going, the big plastic container held only air. Tall for her eleven years, Nya could switch
     the handle from one hand to the other, swing the container by her side, or cradle it in both
     arms. She could even drag it behind her, bumping it against the ground . . .
     There was little weight, going . . .  

Repeated references to Nya's quest for water a year later in 2009 appear in the last chapter:

      Then [Nya's uncle] began moving the mouth of the pump.
      Nya held her bottle underneath the pump mouth. The bottle filled up quickly.
      She stepped aside to the let the next person fill a bottle. Then she drank.
      The water was delicious. It wasn't warm or muddy, like the water from the pond. It was
      cool and clear.
      Nya stopped drinking and held up the bottle . . .
      She drank a few more sips . . .
      Everyone had a bottle or a cup. They were drinking that lovely water . . .

Parting thoughts: Patti: Be specific. Use words wisely. Understand what particular means. Objects have great value, such as a woman wearing the same hat.  Linda: Be intimate. Write for personal therapy. Try writing in first person then switch it. Me: Before this workshop I edited the sentence. Now I edit every word.

 

Linda Wilson, a former elementary teacher and ICL graduate, has published over 40 articles for children and adults, six stories for children, and is in the final editing stages of her first book, a mystery story for 7-10 year olds. Follow Linda on Facebook.

For past posts in this series, please visit:

Part One: Two Ways to Hook and Keep Your Reader

Next month: Tent Pole Construction

In future posts: Watch for workshop presenters' biosketches. A link to the complete list of "Books that Rise Above" will appear at the end.

Labels: Parts of speech, children's writing workshop, Highlights Foundation, writing, writing tips