More miscellaneous, so-not profound musings on writing: 4) If you are constantly doubting your work, ask yourself if you trust your own creative process. If the answer is anything but yes, add “TRUST” to your daily mantra. 5) You need a safe–some call it sacred–space to write, where you are free from interruptions and intrusion. That safe place might be your office, your car, the nearest library or cafe. If you write on a computer, you need to know others will not be reading your stories before you are ready to share. 6) You need psychic privacy to write–a sense …
Sarah’s & Cynde’s Blog
December’s Writing Child
3 of 31 miscellaneous, so-not-profound musings on writing: Dec 1, Beware, you can lose your butt in the chair. Dec 2, Dive with your heart as deep as you dare…and then go deeper. Dec 3, Three words to unleash on the page: yearning, relationships, intention.
National Novel Writing Month –NOW!
It’s day four of National Novel Writing Month and if you’re participating you should be 6,666 words into your first draft by the end of today! If you’ve missed the scoop, the goal is to write 50,000 words/175 pages of a first draft in one month–November. The folks at NaNoWriMo say the focus in on output. And I have to remind even very experienced writers that first draft is not about polish, it’s about finding the bones of your story. Good bones. Strong bones. Bones that can keep on through draft two and draft three and carry your story to …
Advice on Writing a Bestseller–Beware Info-Dump
When I work with writers, often the hardest news I have to deliver about their manuscript is “Cut, cut, cut, cut the info-dump.” That’s the term some people in the biz use to describe the excessive use of backstory/exposition. You know it when you see it–paragraphs or pages of information delivered passively to the reader. Information served up on a paper plate. Information that dulls the reader out of the dynamic narrative now. When I say it’s difficult to tell writers they have to cut backstory that’s because they’ve usually spent hours, days, weeks getting those sections just right. They …
Gabriel Garcia Marquez on Imagery, Memory and First Lines
The next time you read a novel, stop after the opening line. What promise is the writer making to the reader? A beautifully crafted novel will begin to work its magic from the first words on the page. Below is a brief excerpt of an interview of Gabriel Garcia Marquez in conversation with Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza in the marvelous book, THE FRAGRANCE OF GUAVA: Which visual image did you use for One Hundred Years of Solitude? An old man taking a child to see some ice which was on show as a circus curiosity. Was it your grandfather, Colonel Marquez? …
Writing Relationships & Einstein
“A human being is part of the whole, called by us The Universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separate from the rest….a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons near us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, …
Fiction According to John Irving: “You might say I back into a novel.”
Fiction according to John Irving: “You might say I back into a novel. All the important discoveries–at the end of a book–these are the things I have to know before I know where to begin.” In his lucid book THE FICTION EDITOR, THE NOVEL, AND THE NOVELIST, editor and author Thomas McCormack quotes Irving to say: “I want to know how a book feels after the main events are over. The authority of the storyteller’s voice–of mine, anyway–comes from knowing how it all comes out before you begin…” This quote comes in the midst of Thomas McCormack’s discussion of what …
Story Form–It’s a jungle out there!
I had a call yesterday from a writer who wasn’t sure if the story she wants to write will best be told as fiction or memoir. We talked about fear of exposure and how fictionalizing a life story does not necessarily do anything to address that issue. We talked about the kinds of books she loves to read. At the end of our brief conversation, she asked if I had an exercise that would guide her along a discovery process to find her story’s form. I have a simple step, I said, to take you in that direction. Sit down …
Writing Advice from Kurt Vonnegut: Be a Sadist
Kurt Vonnegut insisted that each writer be a sadist when it comes to your main characters. Make awful things happen to them so readers can see what they are made of. If you want to absorb 7 more tips from the great KV, enjoy this YouTube wisdom.
While On Vacation
This year’s beach read–Horton Hatches the Egg–inspired by daughter Pearl, reminds me of the value of studying children’s stories for classic structure. Cinderella is the usual choice, but I recommend Horton as a great example of “only trouble is interesting”. Horton undergoes countless trials as he waits for the egg to hatch. In the end, still loyal 100%, Horton emerges a true hero–and a Dad to boot! From the northern California coast, wishing you happy creating.