Writing Tips and Advice

Do I Really Need an Outline of Some Sort?

/ kellyfbarr / 2 Comments

I have always been the kind of writer who simply sits down and writes.  I have a story idea and I simply write it.  Of course, like any other writer, I then have to edit and do rewrites until it is as good as I believe it can possibly be.

However, as I have been attending a writers’ group and reading some books on writing, I have given this a bit more thought, and now see at least one good reason for some type of outline.  I believe I may have mentioned in my post about our last writers’ group that the guest speaker mentioned that she had created a minor character for one of her stories and hadn’t written down her information about that character, and when the story went to the editor, the editor contacted her and explained that she gave two different physical descriptions of that character in two different scenes.  It is easy to see how that can happen, so I would say that is a very good reason to have at least some kind of outline of your characters.  I also believe there are other good reasons for having an outline.

I will admit, though, that I have never enjoyed creating outlines.  I find them a bit too structured and when I try to use them, I feel my creativity drain away.  Can anyone relate?

Then I read Short Story:  From First Draft to Final Product by Michael Milton (I know I’ve mentioned this ebook before).  In this helpful, little book, I found an outline that encourages creativity instead of stifling it, because you use it while brainstorming!  It is called the “Herringbone” diagram and Michael Milton credited it to David Mitchell.  It was explained as drawing a vertical line on a piece of paper.  This is the “spine”.  Then insert “bones” off this spine which represent the chapters.  Coming off those bones are smaller bones which represent scenes within those chapters, and coming from those can be bits of dialogue, sentences or ideas that will be part of these scenes.  (This is like advanced brainstorming.)  With a few ideas already there for what needs to happen in each section, it should be easy to write during writing time.  I’m looking forward to giving this type of outline a try.

What type of outline do you use and do you find it helpful?

Do You Want to be a Quality Writer?

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What do I mean by the title of this post?  Well, I have been reading some physical books and some ebooks, and it got me thinking.

You see, in addition to being a writer, I am also a photographer, although I choose to keep this as more of a hobby.  I have found since digital photography became the norm, that ANYONE can take a photograph and make it a good photograph, either by deleting and re-shooting, or by using one of the many editing programs that can completely transform a photograph.  I find this a bit frustrating because people who know nothing about photography or what makes up a good photograph are taking pictures and being told they’re wonderful.  The appreciation for the person with the true photographer’s eye, photography knowledge and experience simply doesn’t truly exist anymore.

However, I still believe that a true photographer can take a great picture the first time and not need to do much, if any, editing to deliver a wonderful product.  A true photographer doesn’t just have a photographer’s eye, photography knowledge and experience, but they also have patience — the patience to sit and wait for the shot, and they know when to hit the shutter release button when they see what they have been waiting for.

All that said, let’s now look at writing in a similar manner.  You see, as I have been reading, I can tell you that, yes, I have noted one or two typographical errors in some physical books.  However, I see LOTS of typographical and grammatical errors in MANY ebooks, as well as poorer quality writing.  This has given me over to much thought about the quality of writing.  I have read that there are more writers in this computer technology age than ever before.  My question is, but are they worth reading?

You see, like the thought that ANYONE can take a good photograph with today’s technology, I think it is comparable to ANYONE who THINKS he/she can write, can produce a book.  Self-publishing has become a more utilized venue, and ebooks can be created by anyone with some basic computer knowledge.

I believe to be a quality writer, you must be an avid reader who reads good quality stories that are the type of stories that you want to write.  I also believe you must study the craft of writing, which also has more options than in the past.  Now you don’t have to go to college or take a correspondence course, you can take a course on the computer in your own home, and you can join a writers’ group.  I believe it is important to allow other writers to read your work and offer advice, and I believe it is important to seriously consider the reader(s)’ comments and advice.  We should not be overly sensitive about our writing to a point that we cannot consider improvement.

I believe that reading the classics also helps to improve your writing skills.  After all, would theses stories be classics, being read a hundred or more years after being written, if they weren’t good quality?

Finally, I would like to suggest that if you want to be a good quality writer, don’t rush into self-publishing or creating an ebook.  Be sure to re-read and revise/edit your story more than once before you consider it finished.  When you feel that your story is finished, put it away for three to six months, and don’t look at it at all during that time.  During that time, continue to write other things.  Then, after three to six months, take that story out again, and you will see it with fresh eyes.  You may find some more need for editing or even some changes that would make the story even better.  (This tip of letting your story sit for months and then reading it with fresh eyes, was something I read in Short Story:  From First Draft to Final Product by Michael Milton), and I think it’s a very good tip.

Think about it, do you want to produce good quality writing or do you just want to publish your writing?  Having the patience to put in the time for revisions and waiting and reading again later could mean the difference between a dozen or even a couple of hundred people reading your book today, or tens of thousands of people reading your classic story a hundred years from now.

My Writers’ Group Update

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This past Saturday, I attended my second Christian Writers’ Club meeting.  The guest speaker was Michele Chynoweth, who has written and published two novels and has a third one currently in publishing.

          

She explained that she writes modern Bible stories and that The Faithful One is based on the Book of Job and The Peace Maker is based on the story of Abigail.  I purchased both books and she autographed them for me.

She spoke about building character in our stories.  She talked about how important our characters are because they are what connects the reader to your story.  They make the reader feel.

Ms. Chynoweth encouraged us to allow the reader to make his/her own judgments rather than stating character traits directly, which, she explained, is part of the “show, don’t tell” mantra.

At the end she gave us a handout that includes 85 Character Development Questions for Writers.  I won’t post them here, but I will give you the acrostic she gave us:

Communication:  How does your character talk and sound?

History:  Where does your character come from?

Appearance:  What does your character look like?

Relationships:  What kind of family and friends does your character have?

Ambition:  What is your character’s passion, goals, needs?

Character defect:  Flaws make your character real.

Thoughts:  How does your character thnk?

Everyman-ness:  Your character needs to be relatable and believable.

Restrictions:  Your character has to deal with a challenge, weakness, handicap

Those are some of the things to consider when creating your characters in your writing.

I have never been fond of writing outlines, but Michele Chynoweth shared how important it is to be able to keep track of your characters so that you are consistent and don’t make errors.  She told of how she had once created a minor character and hadn’t made a note about him and one place had written about his dark hair and later said “he ran his hand through his sandy blonde hair”.  So, she said, even the little guys are important.  Therefore, I will at least keep a notebook about all of my characters, even if I don’t do an actual outline.

Point of View: Yours, His, Hers or Theirs?

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How do you decide whose point of view to tell your story from?  Do you simply choose the point of view that is easiest for you to write from?

Since my last short story, Out of the Pit, I have given this a lot of thought.  Should I become the main character and tell my story from the first person point of view?  This really limits what your main character can know, because they can not tell anything about the story that they are not knowledgeable of.  They can’t tell you what happened in a place they weren’t at.  They can’t tell you what happened to a character they weren’t with.  It might make it easier to keep your story focused and not stray from your story line.  I know at least one writing teacher who stresses that their students tell their first novel from the first person point of view.

Do I create a main character, male or female, and tell the story from their point of view, but not becoming them.  In other words, third person?  And, of course, if I write in third person, it should be limited to keep from abrupt changes that would lose my reader.  That means that I tell the story from my main character’s point of view, but use “he” or “she” pronouns instead of “I”.  That allows me more freedom to offer details to my reader that my main character may not know about places he/she hasn’t been.  If you choose to write in third person and use two main characters, it is important to make clean breaks between whose point of view is being used when.  In other words, after the part that is told from the first character’s perspective, use a page break, like extra space between paragraphs, a line between the last paragraph and the new section, or change your chapter, to make it clear to your reader that the next part of the story is being told from the second character’s point of view.

It is very rare that a writer writes from multiple characters’ points of view, and it is very difficult to pull off successfully.  Often, a story told this way is choppy and difficult for the reader to follow.  Also, there isn’t a protagonist for the reader to really get to know and care about, which causes the reader to dislike the story or maybe, stop reading the story.  Readers like to get lost in the story.  They want to feel like they are the main character or that they know the main character personally.  If there are too many main characters, the story will lose this ability and may turn the reader off.

My opinion:  write in either first person or third person from just one character’s point of view.  This keeps it fairly simple to write, and because you become so in tune with that one, main character, that character becomes richer and more realistic to your reader, and your reader will be able to relate to that character, like that character, and care about that character.  It allows you to create the kind of character that a reader wants to read about again (they hate to see the story end because they feel as though they are losing a friend).  You can create other rich characters in the story as well, but it is your main character or protagonist that will capture your readers’ hearts.

Where Do You Like to be When You are Writing?

/ kellyfbarr / 2 Comments

You might think this is a silly question.  You might have a den or office in your home where you like to write.  I do not have that luxury.  As a homeschool mom of three busy boys, I have nowhere in my home that I can write without interruption, unless the youngest child is in bed, then I write at the dining room table.  If I am able to sneak away to the family room earlier in the day, I like to write there.

But, my favorite places to write are sitting at a picnic table in a park or in the food court or center of the mall.  You may be thinking that’s crazy.  You may ask, “how in the world can you write in a place like that with all of the noise and distractions?”  But, you see, I don’t see those places as being noisy and distracting.  As a person who enjoys people watching, (it’s a great way to get ideas for characters for stories), I enjoy those busy places, and I don’t find them distracting because none of the people there are my children nor are they with me.  Therefore, though many people may be around and may be talking, I don’t have to focus on them or be concerned about supplying their needs.  I can fully concentrate on my writing because I am alone in a sea of people, and I can pause and watch people, for more ideas, whenever I choose.  I would also enjoy writing as I sit in a coffee/tea shop or a cafe area in a bookstore.

Where do you like to be when you are writing?

Let’s Talk About My Writing/Stories

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If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you may have read my novella and short story that I posted here.  These were sort of experiments for me for several reasons:  1)  I never wrote mystery/suspense stories before, though those are my favorite types of stories to read; 2) I never posted stories online before; 3) I wrote these stories on my blog right off the top of my head, and the only editing I did was to read back over what I had written to correct spelling, grammar and maybe some wording here or there, right after writing, before hitting the “Publish Post” button; 4) I wanted to see if I could attract readers.

I thoroughly enjoyed these two exercises and attracted quite a few readers.  I had a couple of friends and relatives absolutely glued to my novella, anxiously looking for a new post each and every day.  That made writing it, so much more fun.  I didn’t seem to have that same response with my short story, though I still attracted a fair amount of readers.

Now, let’s talk about what I think is right and what I think is wrong with these two pieces of writing.  Let’s start with the novella, Dangerous Secrets.  I enjoyed writing this story and receiving everyone’s encouragement to keep going, but in the end, I was more disappointed with this story than I was with the short story I posted later.  Here’s why:  I could have continued the story into a full-length novel with the number of characters I introduced and the situations I put them in.  The good thing about this story, is that I did a good job at holding my readers’ attention and seemed to always leave them wanting more at the end of a day’s post.  But, in the end, I had both a friend and a relative tell me that I could have done so much more with the story, and I was well aware of that, but I did not want to put a full-length novel on the blog for everyone to read for free.  (If I am going to write a full-length novel, I hope to have it published or put it in an E-Book and earn some money from it.  I don’t think that’s selfish.  I think it’s realistic, and writing a full-length novel is a lot of hard work.)  Because of all of this, I ended the story too soon.  Yes, I tied up the loose ends and I believe the ending gave closure, but it definitely has the potential for me to re-visit it and turn it into a full-length novel someday, if I choose to.

Now, about the short story, Out of the Pit.  I didn’t get as much feedback from friends and relatives on this story, but I really liked this story.  I was pleased to keep my cast of characters at a number that was very workable in a short story, so by the time I ended the story, it felt more like the story was over and not like I could do a lot more with it.  I liked my characters in this story better, felt that I had developed them better and that I knew them better.  So, where did I go wrong with this story?  In the “point-of-view”.  I have never written a story in the first-person.  It isn’t comfortable for me.  I find it too confining.  However, I stretched the third-person point-of-view beyond the limits in Out of the Pit.  You see, it is best to write third-person “limited”, which means stick to telling the story from the main character’s point-of-view, or at the most, from your main character’s and one other important character’s points-of-view, by using a page-break or writing every other chapter from the other character’s point-of-view.  What did I do wrong?  I wrote from many characters’ points-of-view.  I let them share their thoughts, and this caused the story to jump or bounce around too much.  It gave the readers a jolt each time a change in point-of-view came, and this can cause readers to not get as involved because they don’t get to really know and care about the main character or two main characters, because they are getting too much information from minor characters.  I may go back and edit this story sometime, because I still really like it.

So, be aware of whose point-of-view you are telling your story from.  Limit whose thoughts and feelings you choose to share and be sure to create characters that your readers will really care about.

I learned of my point-of-view problem from a publishing consultant, who was gracious enough to look at my short story and offer me feedback.  So, I would like to take a minute here and let you know that WinePress Publishing has a great opportunity for writers.  You can work with a professional writer or editor for six months, and they will help you write a novel, and then you can publish your completed novel with WinePress Publishing.   It is a self-publishing publishing company.  Visit their website for more information at:  http://www.winepresspublishing.com/.

You may also be interested in The Story Cartel Writing Course.  Visit:  http://course.storycartel.com/.

What is Your Worldview and How Does it Affect Your Writing?

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What is your worldview?  Your worldview consists of five major items:  1) Your concept of the most real thing in existence (your notion of God or of ultimate reality); 2) Your view of the essential nature of the external world (ordered or chaotic, material or spiritual); 3) Your idea of who we and others really are (your concept of human nature); this includes your idea of how you know and your notion of what happens to us after we die; 4) Your understanding of the good (ethics); and 5) Your understanding of the meaning of humanity’s sojourn on earth (the meaning of history).

Your worldview is like a map in that it may fit what is really there or it may be grossly misleading.  The map isn’t of the world itself, only an image of it, more or less accurate in some places, distorted in others.

*Note:  the information in the above two paragraphs come from How to Read Slowly by James Sire, part of the Starting Points world view study.

How does your world view affect your writing?  Some people will say they can write a story without a specific message, to which I would respond that you may not consciously intend to include a message in your writing, but whatever your belief system is, it will show in your writing.  You cannot turn off your belief system to write, or to do anything else.  Your belief system is part of who you are and you can change it, and, therefore, change the message that comes through your writing, but you cannot be void of a belief system.  Even if you say you believe in nothing, that is your belief system, and it will show through your writing.  You cannot completely separate yourself from your characters or your story.

Therefore it is important to know what your belief system is.  As a Christian, I do not believe that every story I write has to have a message of salvation that is blatant and loud and clear.  A story may have a need for that, but I believe most stories will be more appealing if the message is subtle and not in-your-face.  I do not sit down and decide what message to put into a story before I begin to write.  As a matter of fact, most times I do not think about the message at all.  I concentrate on my characters.  I want to create characters that create emotions within the reader; characters that the reader can identify with, relate to, sympathize or empathize with.  At some point, I stop being the creator of the characters and the characters begin to tell me the story.  They let me know their thoughts, feelings, emotions, desires and the things they are going to do and say and where they are going to go.  And, there is always a message:  a message about relationships or about a character realizing who they really are or what they are meant to do, a message of hope or of despair or of love or of family or community, or loss, etc.

Your world view comes out in the words you choose to use to tell the story and in the actions, thoughts and dialogue of your characters.