 DAYS OF NOTHING, DAYS OF SOMETHING
Another fairly rough week, but for seemingly entirely different reasons than the last week *sigh*. I blame the daylight savings time switch and the "atmospheric river" which foiled all my "healthy living" plans. I was faced with a busy weekend November 5-7 and ended up opting not to write the short horror story. I also ended up not getting much writing done at all. Monday at my day-job was busy but I managed to channel a thousand or so words into the book. And then it all fell apart from there. For a time. I also hit a chapter that I didn't love--the second chapter--because it features the main character (MC) struggling with a relative suffering from a disease that I have virtually NO experience with. It's a somewhat pivotal scene and will involve more research than I could muster together while NANOWRIMO-ing, so I started digressing into other character backstory and exposition and then ended the entire chapter with an unsatisfying flourish just to be done with the damn thing. WELL, ACTUALLY Before I finished Chapter Two--I started on Chapter Three of Rosita Ruins the Heist. I was taking a rainy/windy walk about midweek and a particular song lyric struck me. In fact, it inspired a whole new playlist and gave me that little visual window into the entire third chapter. Tennessee whiskey, y'all. THE NEW PACE It became clear, pretty quickly that I wasn't going to succeed in my goal of hammering out 2k words a day. I should have all the time and brain space in the world, but I'm just not there yet. I commend those who are! But that's not me. I have to reset to a more realistic and achievable goal for myself, in order to keep my spirits up and be able to focus on the writing rather than just vomiting out words in a frantic daze which leads to pages of helpful (as backfiller for my brain) but not entirely useful exposition. THAT FRIDAY FEELING I got through some fairly lengthy work and personal life challenges (that SAD started hitting hard, but I decided to hit back this year with daily walks AND Vitamin D supplements) and by Friday, I was feeling able to focus. I decided to do a little extra writing hustle, and managed to move my needle to the point where I was at least back on track to hit my newly revised 30k word goal by the end of the month by logging 1K words a day. I made even more progress on Saturday (hello Chapter Four), but all that was derailed on Sunday when I slept very little, decided to obsess about a current event by absorbing all the available content about it--completely wasting a VALUABLE chunk of writing time where my entire family was gone and I had the house to myself. * yet another weary sigh* It's Day 15 and I'm proud to say that I'm 15k words in. This has not been the year for charting consistent daily progress, but I'm embracing the chaos and my newly revised 30k word goal which feels substantially more achievable and actionable. Let's gooooo (again?)!
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THIS WEEK WAS A WEEK
Fairly early on the week, I distinctly remember remarking to my supervisor at my day job that this has been a "week of Mondays." And boy was it ever. Just, A LOT going on professionally and it definitely hit home on Wednesday night when I crashed out unusually early for me (10pm). Needless to say--I didn't get ALL the writing done on Rosita Ruins the Heist this week that I truly wanted to. I started out strong on Monday with 2k words, decided to rethink and revise some of the opening sequences on Tuesday (1k), logged another 1k words on Wednesday before crashing out early, and then took last night completely off after a raucous and thought-provoking writing group meeting. A TRICK When I had some errands to perform, but wanted to keep the book in my headspace and do a little draft revising--I had Google read the text aloud to me while my hands/body were otherwise busy/occupied. I've done this before and it's actually really helpful to hear the story aloud because you quickly realize what is working and what is definitely NOT working. I'm now fully aware of all the places I want to cut when it's time to second draft. And I'm only one chapter in. I've also just generally had a more difficult time connecting, on an emotional level, to my writing. Specifically, in the last few years. Part of the stories I tell are usually a greater reflection of things that are happening around me, or my projections of the future. As you can guess--the future has been quite uncertain lately, and many of the things I'm feeling aren't necessarily reflected in the worlds I'm attempting to escape into. Much of the emotional weight I'm carrying right now feels heavy and dark and that's somewhat a part of the world I'm writing, but also not really? WRITE SOMETHING ELSE It was suggested last night by a fellow writer that maybe I just needed to give myself permission to write something that would help expel all the negative emotions that are blocking me from truly accessing my imagination and empathy--in a short story horror format. I found the idea intriguing, but just wasn't feeling up to doing much last night except watching a YouTube video series I've recently become obsessed with, and then passing out. I've been toying with the idea of a horror anthology for a while now, and tossing out a short story (which I could include in my word count) just might be the cure to my writerly ails. I'm going to try it today and see how it goes (along with attempting some more writing on the designated Nanowrimo WIP. It's Day 5 and I'm only 4k words in. Let's see what kind of shenanigans I can get up to this weekend. *fingers crossed* It's that time of year again. Nanowrimo time! The time when I take stock of my writing goals for the year and determine how I best want to use the next 30 days of time to piece together at least 50k words of a draft.
THE PAST IS IN THE PAST The last few years I have used this time for editing/finishing pre-existing drafts of the Metal Heart trilogy. This year I'm returning to form and committing to drafting a new book titled Rosita Ruins the Heist. I wish I could say that I was giving this time over to Astrid vs. the Asteroid and completing the final two chapters of that book but I just...I can't do it. I've had a mental block for months and decided the best way to shake things up is to concentrate on my latest passion project: Rosita. ROSITA RUINS THE HEIST I've made Pinterest boards. I've made playlists. I've even done something entirely brand new for a pantser/plantser like myself and drafted a whole freaking OUTLINE. Not just any old outline either. I've got TWENTY freaking pages of character sheets and three-act structure plot breakdowns and chapter breakdowns, along with copious brainstorming notes I took when the story was sliding all over the place and going in numerous different directions. The end result is that I have a main character who absolutely knows what she wants as well as side characters with interesting backstory. AND HEISTS. The entire book is devoted to heists. There are three main heists that drive the story. But also technology and romance and intrigue! GOALS, GOALS, GOALS My goal is 2,000 words a day, but I'm willing to settle on 1,600 (the bare freaking minimum). I have carved out space from 9-11pm every "school night," along with at least two full days devoted to writing on Nov. 14 and Nov. 28. The trickiest days will be Friday and Saturday, as both are usually reserved for socializing/family time. But I'm not feeling too daunted yet, as I *might* have already started drafting one scene, which means I'll be starting out a little bit ahead of the curve. And some of the scenes are caught-in-4k clear in my brain, so it will be a simple means of transposing. I'm also tempted to write out of sequence since I already have a chapter outline/breakdown, in order to work through the inevitable road-blocks that will present themselves. *fingers crossed* Here goes something!  We've all been there. You're about halfway through the first draft of your current novel. Or maybe you've even finished the rough draft and you're sitting down to revise and you're just... a little lost. You're not sure what to tackle first and you're not even sure who your characters really are.
Maybe this isn't as much of an issue for the Plotters out there, but for us Plantser/Pantser set, it can be a little more challenging when trying to tame an unruly first draft or whip a second draft into shape. Here is one tried and true strategy that I've leaned on in the past, and has helped tremendously in rekindling inspiration, or just better understanding who I've created on the page. What is a non-canon scene? It's a scene that has nothing to do with your plot. You know, the kind of scenes you end up trimming from a first draft during revision or editing. Sure, you like it. Hell, maybe you even LOVE it, but it doesn't fit in with the current theme or arc of the story and you trimmed it. You gently, but decisively decided to copy/edit/pasted it into a separate word document and it lives there now, forever in your memory as a beloved treasure meant only for you and maybe your beta readers, never to see the actual light of day. If you don't already have one of those scenes, then it's your lucky day my friends, because it's time to WRITE THAT SCENE. I dashed one of those off because the idea and the imagery arrived fully in my brain one day and it would not let me go. It didn't work with the story structure at the time, but I wanted to get to know one character in particular, a little bit better, so I cracked my knuckles and hammered it out. And now it's chapter 2 of Metal Heart. It felt like, at the time, it had literally nothing to do with the story and it was pure fan-service for myself. And then I was like, OK, but I like this character interaction. For some time, it lived in a different section of the book and now it's chapter 2 and it does everything I've asked of it. And I didn't even know at the time that I needed it for the story. I just knew I needed to write it. And once it was typed out, I l fell in love and was like... "this needs to go somewhere." It inspired me to find a home for it in the book, but most of all, to keep WRITING the rest of the book so it had a place to live and flourish. Why should you write a non-canon scene? First of all, because it's fun. What's better than no-pressure, zero-expectation, responsibility free writing? What's better than a scene with characters that you already love, doing something wild or inane, that has no actual bearing on or consequences for the rest of your story? I promise you, you're not going to break the back of your book with this scene. There's nothing riding on this moment. It's just for you and the characters. You're taking a little breather. You're trying something new and invigorating. In essence, it's a bit like writing a little fanfiction of your own book. And who doesn't love fanfiction? It will put you in a different mindset or mood. It will let you be creative, and still live in the world of your story, with the people who populate it, without feeling like you're going to mess everything up if you write the wrong words or have them do the wrong things. It's the writer equivalent of a sandbox, where you can build a beautiful castle and "destroy it" without worrying about the effects it has on the structure of the story, or the canon progression of the characters. How to write a non-canon scene. The two biggest tips here are to pick either some outrageous scenario like fighting a dragon or something super mundane like cooking a dinner together. You could also have them do something canonically in-world, but still not story-canon. For my non-canon scene, I chose an activity that I imagine Eleni Garza would have done on an annual basis. I didn't even know that Rabbit Santiago would interrupt her until he showed up and then I was like, "of course he would." He would also be the kind of guy who would go to confession or to pray on a quiet Tuesday because he was guilted into it by his mom. You want to keep some of your character quirks and motivations. The point isn't to write them so completely off-base or off-character that you don't recognize them. The idea is to place them in a different scenario, completely different to the scene or plot hole you're stuck in, and let them do their thing. Be creative and write. I promise it's a whole hell of a lot easier when you take away the anxiety of thinking that it will one day be spit-polished for public consumption. Final Thoughts You write because you love to write. But when you're writing a book and trying to get published, you often find yourself writing for someone else. For an audience. For your ideal reader. For fame and fortune. It's helpful to have a little tool like this in your belt. Take it out when you need to, dust it off, and don't let anyone else's expectations determine what you create. This scene and moment is purely for you, for your process, and for no one else. And hell, if it's good enough, maybe it DOES become canon. But that's not the goal. The goal is to make it. Get it out of your system. And in the process, see what kind of new understandings of your characters and of your world unfolds. Other Writer's Block Strategies  We've all been there. You're about halfway through the first draft of your current novel. Or maybe you've even finished the rough draft and you're sitting down to revise and you're just... a little lost. You're not sure what to tackle first and you're not even sure who your characters really are.
Maybe this isn't as much of an issue for the Plotters out there, but for us Plantser/Pantser set, it can be a little more challenging when trying to tame an unruly first draft or whip a second draft into shape. Here is one tried and true strategy that I've leaned on in the past, and has helped tremendously in rekindling inspiration, or just better understanding who I've created on the page. What is a mood board? A mood board is a collection of quotes or images that remind you of or reflect either the characters or the world that you're building in your latest creative endeavor. Sounds simple enough, right? Pinterest boards and mood boards come in all shapes and sizes and varieties and they are either manifested in digital or physical form. Mine are all digital -- the wily world of Pinterest is where I do all of my world and character building via mood board. Why make a mood board? For me, personally, it's an integral part of the character, story, and world building process, and it usually starts somewhere between the inception of the idea, putting a very loose paragraph outline down on paper, and the actual act of writing or building out a plot outline. For instance: the idea of Rosita Ruins the Heist has been kicking around in my brain for at least a year or two. I wrote out a short plot outline/summary a few years ago, and in that time I have been slowly adding quotes and visuals to a mood board whenever the inspiration strikes me. Check out my Rosita mood board. It has definitely evolved over time and you can see the visual pivot shortly after it was created. I also like Pinterest, because it allows me not only to load up inspirational quotes and images, but it's also helpful to have in the process of actually writing the book. For instance: while writing the first draft of Astrid vs. the Asteroid, I needed to do a TON of research. Having a Pinterest board made it easy to store all the research in one location. The end result is a board that's a mix of scientific/space facts, dresses, character images, inspirational quotes, and ethereal images that map to the emotional mood of the story. Check out the Astrid mood board. How to make a mood board. If you already have a Pinterest account, just hop on and load up a brand new board. The easiest place to start is with the images you have in your head for what your characters look like. The nice thing about Pinterest is once it sees you adding/liking one kind of image, it likes to feed you a bunch of that same thing, so it's incredibly easy to build up a board rather quickly once you've indicated what sort of content you're searching for. For the more crafty among us who like tangible objects vs. digital ones, there's always an IRL mood board. That involves designating an actual board, or a section of wall in a room or an office and tacking up physical images or items to fully expand on the aesthetic. The great thing about mood boards is they can be anything you want or need in order to keep you inspired or help you better create your story. For instance: my Metal Heart mood board primarily started out as a way for me to visualize the main characters, after I'd already written a few drafts and knew who they were. It wasn't about character building so much as seeing the characters I'd already brought to life on the page. I mean, who doesn't want to cast their own stories with beautiful people in Hollywood? And then it picked up steam with images of cybernetic implants and really took off as I was building the character of Alpha, an artificial intelligence. It's a delightful mish mash of many different elements of the series. Check out the Metal Heart mood board. Final Thoughts You can and should approach mood boards in whatever way makes the most sense to you. Having one board per character perhaps? Maybe one board for the setting? One board that's research based? The sky is really the limit and it's up to you to determine how best to use this tool and resource to your advantage. Other Writer's Block Strategies  Every writer has a trick. A secret short cut to hack their brains and tap into the creative juices that help their fingers fly across the keyboard or their pen scratch across the page and frees the characters and stories into the real world.
Mine just happens to be music. PERSONAL BACKGROUND I've always loved telling stories through different mediums, and a well cultivated and structured playlist is a way to do just that. I took a lot of notes from High Fidelity when it comes to creating the perfect playlist, and I like to think that I use that power for good, and not evil, when it comes to structuring stories and fleshing out characters. During the initial phases of story planning, even before the first word is tapped out on the screen -- I usually have already made a full book playlist. Certain songs are the soundtracks to certain scenes. Certain bands or artists just have the right "voice" to match with a character. And there's always that one instrumental track that carries the emotional heart of the manuscript. The process of musical playlist storytelling often means applying the principles of the basic three act plot structure to your song choice. Don't believe me? THE THREE ACT STRUCTURE: IN SONG FORM Things start out good -- you've got groovy, feel-good music playing. You're setting the scene. Maybe there's a little romance, maybe something a little dramatic or upbeat. It's all intriguing and filled with hooks and rhythm. And then the darkness descends. The struggle, the conflict -- the music turns a little eerie and twisted. There's conflict and struggle. And when it finally seems as if all hope is lost -- the HOPE TRACK EMERGES. Something REALLY emotionally punchy and inspirational. And then you hit 'em with some smooshy love jams, dotted with more inspirational tracks. A few weird or quirky bits because you're coming to the finale. Finally, FINALLY you tack on the banger/bad-ass track to the end -- the one that wraps up the whole emotional journey in a neat little bow and carries your listeners out with a sense of comfort and ease. Life is tricky baby, but it will all be OK in the end. HOW TO MAKE IT HAPPEN This process evolved over time with the writing of the three books for the Metal Heart trilogy. The first draft of Metal Heart came before the official playlist, but Radiohead was ALWAYS lurking in the background. And with Radiohead serving as the emotional lynchpin, everything sprang out from there. As I *hopefully* got better at writing books, I also evolved in my ability to map out the music that inspires them. 1. Pick your instrumental/emotional track This is going to be the bedrock foundation of not only your playlist, but of the whole damn story itself. Every time you push play on this track, the entire heart of the story should unfurl before you and you should FEEL THAT SURGE OF EMOTION. The passion and drive to tell this story is buried deep in the music and lyrics and it should inspire you to write. This track is your lighthouse in the storm, the true north of your story. Love and cherish it and listen to it as often as you need to in order to feeling inspired and emotionally connected to your writing.
2. Pick your scenes This *might* require you to know just what those scenes are -- this is best done when you have some semblance of an outline or at least a one page synopsis of your story and know the general direction of where it's going. For Rosita -- I know I needed music to heist to. I knew the crew would be stealing money so the early version of the playlist featured that theme -- money, stealing, robbing -- quite heavily.
3. Pick your characters Once you have the main book playlist sussed out, you can start to use individual playlists to explore the emotional interiority of your characters. I usually character build and create character playlists in tandem. I start to sketch out who the character is on paper and then I find songs to match their moods. This process of weeding through character-related songs also helps me find the one true artist whose music reflects the soul of that character.
Once you have selected all the elements of a solid playlist: your "theme song," your pivotal "scenes," and your "main characters" -- you should be well on your way to constructing an instant mood/brain shifter/booster that can help you immerse yourself in the music of the story that you've either yet to craft, already crafted, or are in the middle of re-crafting. For me, and likely a lot of you, writing is an emotional process that can be tricky to turn on and off, even though I'm often required to do so because of my various life responsibilities. Having these songs playing in the background helps bypass that transitional phase and quickly delve right back into the interior of the story. It's not a trick guaranteed to work for everyone. But for those of us who utilize this trick? It's so, so important to the process. And guess what? You can check out many of my book related playlists on my Spotify profile. What do you think? Does music help or hinder your writing process? Why or why not? Other Writer's Block Strategies  After decades of only having a vague idea of a story and then diving in to the novel writing process with little to no planning on my part -- I've evolved into a more refined writing creature. Somewhat. Not even really by choice. Heh.
I've had the bones of a new WIP rattling around in my head for the last few months and decided this week to sit down and actually structure it before a single "word" ever hit the page. I might have had about ten pages of notes already written. Maybe. Mostly because this book features heists and heists require planning. So writing a heist book naturally ALSO requires much more planning than I'm used to. To that end, I dusted off my copy of Save the Cat! Writes a Novel and created two writing tools that have been incredibly helpful in outlining my next book. THREE ACT BEAT SHEET One of them is a Three Act Beat Sheet (in table form) complete with demarcations for each section and descriptions of what should be included. It works for my brain, and hopefully it will be useful for yours! I should mention that Jessica Brody also has beat sheets available on her website as well. CHARACTER SHEET The most important aspect of any main character is what they want and how their desires and actions effect the story. That hasn't always come easily to me (I usually come up with the concept before the character want), so in plotting out my current manuscript, it felt really important to fully know and understand who my main character is and how their flaws and desires will wreak havoc on everything and everyone around them. You know, the good stuff. So I created another Character Sheet (in table form). It's primarily for the main character, but any good story features more than one character with their own unique motivations, so it's a good tool for understanding any character you're writing. Now fill these tables out and get to writing! ;)  We've all been there. You're about halfway through the first draft of your current novel. Or maybe you've even finished the rough draft and you're sitting down to revise and you're just... a little lost. You're not sure what to tackle first and you're not even sure who your characters really are.
Maybe this isn't as much of an issue for the Plotters out there, but for us Plantser/Pantser set, it can be a little more challenging when trying to tame an unruly first draft or whip a second draft into shape. Here is one tried and true strategy that I've leaned on in the past, and has helped tremendously in rekindling inspiration, or just better understanding who I've created on the page. What are character sheets? Character sheets aren't a new concept, and many folks might even sketch these out before they ever put a metaphorical or literal pen to page. But again, for those of us who start with a vague outline, but then tend to wander wherever the creative winds blow, this can be a handy tool for steering back onto a smoother course. This particular exercise is best to do AFTER you've already completed one draft, or perhaps if -- like me -- you're stuck about three-quarters of the way through a first draft and have had a bit of hiatus from the work and are now struggling to reconnect with characters who suddenly don't seem so crystal clear anymore. It's a simple series of basic questions, derived from the writing craft book What If? Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers. I love the concept of writers knowing more about their characters than they perhaps need to know. Is all of this information necessary for the book? Likely, not at all. Is it important for authors to know it? Maybe. And even if it isn't essential information, it's allowing you to play with your imagination and approach your creative work in a different way, to view your characters through a different lens. Experimenting with your characters and learning more about them simply cannot be a bad thing. Here's the basic character sheet that I would suggest writers work up for each one of their important/named characters. The Basic Questions: Who Are You? 1. Character Name: 2. Character Nickname(s): 3. Gender: 4. Sexual Preference: 5. Appearance: 6. Education: 7. Vocation/Occupation: 8. Social Status and Money: 9. Relationship/Marital Status: 10. Family, Ethnicity: 11. Diction, accent, etc.: 12. Relationships: 13. Places (home, office, car, etc.): 14. Possessions: 15. Recreation, hobbies: 16. Obsessions: 17. Beliefs: 18. Politics: 19. Sexual History: 20. Ambitions: 21. Religion: 22. Superstitions: 23. Fears: 24. Attitudes: 25. Character Flaws: 26. Character Strengths: 27. Pets: 28. Taste in books, music, etc.: 29. Journal entries: 30. Correspondence: 31. Food Preference: 32. Talents: Of course -- you'll probably have more to add to this list! After all, you know your characters best and you know what specific plot points might generate more of these biographical questions. So, you know a bit more about who your characters are -- and now to answer the big question: What do they want? Not knowing the answers to the following questions is very likely why you're stuck where you are. Discovering what each one of your individual characters really wants to achieve in this exciting new world you've created, can help you whip plot bunnies into shape or spackle over plot holes or maybe shift your book in an entirely new direction. The Tough Questions: What do you want?
I would argue, that knowing what your characters want is the single most important aspect of writing a book. Not only do you need to know WHAT they want, but WHY they want it. And, of course, is that the thing they really need? A character can want more than one thing of course, and often the thing they want is layered. For instance -- my current work in progress (WIP) Astrid vs. the Asteroid has a first person narrator -- Astrid Moore -- who truly wants people to believe in the visions and predictions she makes about the future. But the underlying theme is that of acceptance. She truly wants acceptance from her parents and her peers for what she perceives as her differences. And a tertiary want is to find a home and family where she can feel safe. She wants to protect the world, but she also wants to find a place to feel protected. It's OK for your character to want more than one thing, and in this example, I've attached those wants to PLOT A and PLOT B. Astrid wants to save the world by sharing her visions of the asteroid (PLOT A), but she wants to save herself within her circle of family and friends by being BELIEVED (PLOT B). Layers! Writers and readers love 'em. Final thoughts. I like to answer these two series of questions together in a single character sheet, because not only do I get a stronger sense of who the character is, but combined with their true motivations in the story -- a fully formed person begins to emerge on the page. This is especially exciting if they were being unruly in a current draft. This is an individual with their own hopes, dreams, and beliefs and they WANT something. This truly helps with "side characters" with whom you might be struggling to understand their role in the story. In Metal Heart, in my first few drafts I wasn't really sure who Rabbit Santiago was and what he really wanted for himself -- aside from a budding relationship with the main character, Eleni Garza. Until I sat down with his character sheet. Every single character in your story WANTS something, and often times that is different from what your main character wants. That's where exciting conflict comes in! That's where story and plot and character interactions really get interesting. Now, get out there and flesh out your lovely, amazing, unique, and engaging characters. And then see what happens. Other Writer's Block Strategies  FIRST STEP: OWN YOUR MISTAKE
Not every writer or author is forged with the basics of the English language. We all grow up learning the rigors of grammar, but sometimes, our training falls to the wayside. We read books, we write, we talk, we listen to the patterns of normal human speech, we read more books, and we pick up bad habits along the way. I sure did. But it turns out, at least when it comes to book publishing, mechanics and grammar still matter. Quite a lot. If you want to sell a manuscript or become a pro copyeditor, the best way to achieve either objective is to get back to the basics. Sentence structure is one of those key basics. And one of my most common sentence structure errors was the dreaded comma splice. At some point along the way I picked up this nasty habit. In my writing brain, the one rushing to get all the words down on paper, it just sounds right. It sounds better and makes the most sense coming from my fingertips. But what sounds correct in our heads, isn't always what reads well on the page. So I'm here to confess to my comma splicing ways and help everyone else guilty of comma splicing to learn the error of their ways before it's too late. Just kidding. It's never too late to learn something new or re-learn something old. SECOND STEP: RECOGNIZE AND REPAIR A comma splice is the result of a writer using a comma to connect two independent clauses. A clause is a group of words that includes a subject and a finite verb, and an independent clause is a clause that can stand as a complete sentence. This means comma splicing is piecing together two separate sentences using only a comma. It's not the end of the world, but it is bad grammar. Even with all that description a nasty habit can be hard to recognize at first. It needs to be seen for what it is. EXAMPLE: This is a comma splice, it can be hard to recognize if you aren't looking for it. Now, how does something like this get fixed? As with most writing faux pas, there are usually several solutions to revise.
THIRD STEP: RESOURCES In the hot heat of writing, especially in the rush to meet a deadline, it can still be challenging to find those pesky comma splices hiding among the shining pearls of those otherwise perfectly formed sentences. And maybe, like with me, those are the grammatical issues you are most blind to -- the sort of natural error that your editorial or revising eye just glazes right over. Luckily, there are resources to help hone that editorial eye. There are the obvious ones like The Copyeditor's Handbook and The Chicago Manual of Style to relearn all those pesky sentence structure rules and refine them. Once the studying is complete, then it's time to move on to testing. There are several online quizzes that satisfy the requirements, but the best of the bunch were created by: Other options include online and digital grammar checkers like: IN CONCLUSION Being guilty of using comma splices doesn't make you a bad writer. But knowing how to recognize and revise them, especially before an editor gets ahold of a manuscript and points them out anyway, will definitely make you a better writer. This was written for and originally appeared on the Ooligan Press blog.  As a springboard from a previous blog post on writing "show AND tell," I'm in the midst of the arduous process of surgically editing the language in the Iron Curtain manuscript. Yes, I'm to the point where the major plot elements are locked in, and now I'm cleaning up and refining all the over-used phrases and terms to make the words sing off the page in order to evoke emotion and empathy in the reader. Gotta paint those mind pictures!
This the part where more of my "telling" becomes "showing." Nearly every writer has this stage of the process where they're taking a serious stock of the language level issues in their own writing and figuring out how to make it better. Or maybe that's just me? Whatever the case, do your thing, writers! Find Your Weaknesses By far, the biggest issues for me are touch-related sensory elements. I spend way too much time on lingering glances and hands/fingers DOING THINGS. But I didn't initially know that. It's a leftover from taking two terms of screenwriting and TV scriptwriting. There's a lot more "stage direction" involved in that writing style and once mired in it, the bad habits were hard to shake when it came to novel writing. It took some poking, prodding, and carefully analysis of words/terms in my manuscripts before I realized just what my biggest crutches were. You've got to spend time with your manuscript. I suggest printing out a paper copy, busting out a red pen and highlighting, underlining, or circling words that you know are "weak" or that you see popping up over and over again. It also might help to "listen" to your manuscript read by someone else or out loud to yourself or with the aid of technology. The cringe phrases will start to pile up. Right them down, make a note or a list, and vow to return for another pass. How To 'Fix' Filler Words Once you know what your filler words are, you then have to spend some time figuring out how to fix them. I started with honing in on repeated words/phrases and using the "search/find" function in my word processor to spit back a tally, and then I'd determine what seemed like a more appropriate number (let's shoot for 50 instead of 100). After that, it was just a matter of clicking through each use, analyzing it in the context, and creating better phrasing. And once you start to see the tally decrease, knowing that you're swapping in more creative descriptions and phrasing in their stead, it gives you a better overall feeling about the manuscript itself. You've got solid plot and characterization and setting and pacing and structure... and now you have THE WORDS to match the beautiful, amazing, wonderful story you've put your heart and soul into crafting. I'll also often look at the "spread" of the words too. Readers are INCREDIBLY SENSITIVE to overused words, terms, and phrases and they'll become especially attuned to them if they're used close together. You absolutely MUST mind your gaps. Unless there are reasonable/extenuating circumstances, try to separate at least two or three pages between each instance and see how that feels. So, what phrases and terms should you be on the lookout for when you're getting down to the third or fourth revision pass on your manuscript and you're ready to put on the spit-polish? Common Words To Lose
Everyone has their different and unique writing quirks, so my specific language edit lists tend to be longer and filled with more of my usual suspects (eye, heart, hand, mouth, face, lip, smile -- I love you guys!). I told you. Stage direction is my weakness and my first love and it takes an actual effort and labor of love to reel it back in. |
AuthorMelinda Jasmine Crouchley, YA science fiction author and professional editor. Archives
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