No Whine, Just Champagne Writing Discussion #88

I have been working on different techniques to increase the immediacy and concrete imagery in my writing.

I'm trying to work on my sadly neglected novel and finish my collection of short fiction.

Still trying to keep my word count steady during Nano. I started off really strong over the weekend, but with so little free time during the work week I've now fallen off pace. Hopefully, the weekend will again prove productive.

And I did have one major success this week. I sold my short story "Peach-Flavored Kiss" to Woman's World! (yes, the magazine you see while standing in the grocery store check-out aisle). It's to be published in the December 21, 2009 issue. Not only does Woman's World have a circulation of 1.6 million readers *gulp*, the payment for such a short piece of fiction (800 words) is quite generous. And I'm hoping it's gold for adding the publishing credit to queries.

Way cool! Congratulations!

Congrats! That's fantastic!

Yay, Jill! Bustin' my buttons with pride, girlfriend.

I'm so proud of you Jill. I'm going to buy that copy for sure!

You're the woman! Way to go Jill.

This is me...feeling the fatherly pride.

I haven't been writing much lately.
And, I won't be on the chat again tonight.
I'm very sick. And, need some down time.
I truly hope to be here next week.
Sigh.

Take care of yourself. Hope to see you next week.

Hope you feel better soon Angela. I need to write. I really need to write, but there's been so much going on. Today I set up my bookstall at the bazaar and raked leaves. Now the wind's blowing leaves... I really need to write.

Feel better Angela. I will be away from my computer tonite, will try to get back before the end of the chat. Have been busy working all week, no time for writing. Will have some free time after tomorrow and back to re editing and mini rewrite of Echoes.

The NaNo has me writing. I don't necessarily like what I'm writing, but it's fun to glance up at the clock and note that I've been writing without stop for an hour.

So will I be here by myself tonight? Should be interesting.

Nope. I'm here.

Hi, John! Glad to see you!

OK. I guess you might say I’ve taken the first steps toward actually writing a novel. Recalling that several had suggested expanding my short story into a novel, the more I thought about it I decided that’s where I’ll start. I started a character list of 10 characters from that story. So far I’ve thought more about story elements than of a beginning and ending.
I’ll write in 3rd person omniscient. One thing I wonder about is how much explanation I should use. For example, the telephone party line I indirectly explained in action and dialogue rather than narrating explanations.
Also, I’m considering using a fictitious town because in writing about a small town it’s too easy to identify characters with actual people.

A fictitious town is good. That way readers won't be looking for your mistakes. If you have traffic moving north and south on Elm Street, for example, and your readers know that in the real town, Elm Street is one way, they will look for other mistakes. If it's your town, you can do whatever you wish.

I would be afraid that someone might conclude that I was referring to them in one of my characters.

3rd person omniscient -- that means getting inside each character's head in every scene. Hard to do. It's usually easier to do one POV per scene.

And keep the explanation to a minimum. Showing rather than telling is the first commandment of writing. No, it's not! Though shalt not bore thy reader is first.

I like fictitious. I don't even like to name a character the same as someone I know in case they wrongly think you based the character on them. Its a royal pain when you have either come up with wierd names or keep changing them because it is ordinary joes.

Thanks for reinforcing that for me, Pat.

Oh, I would certainly avoid using the name of someone I know.

I guess I misunderstood what 3rd person omniscient is.

The worst part is when you so carefully choose the name, or characteristics, personality, appearance, etc and then find yourself having to change it so someone doesn't think the character is them and possibly be insulted or get the wrong idea.

People seem to have some deep want to have it (whatever it is) be about them. Human nature.

I prefer to write in third person limited. This way, every scene is written through the eyes of only one character, but you don't have to stick with that one character throughout the book. You write your scenes through the eyes of the person who has most at stake, that way you can keep the emotion high.

For example -- suppose a child is kidnapped. You can write a scene from the point of view of the kidnappers. You can write the scene from the viewpoint of the parents who discover that the child is missing. You can write the scene from the viewpoint of the neighbor who goes next door to find out what's going on. If you write from all these points of view at once, that's the omniscient point of view, and is the least emotionally charged because the reader doesn't know who to root for or to care for. Also, in the case of the kidnapped child, the person who has least at stake is the next door neighbor, so you wouldn't show the scene through her eyes unless it turns out that she's the real mother.

I'm not formally nanowriting, but just to get into the spirit of things I've set my own (much reduced) nano-nano goal. (Sorry, couldn't help that little Mork & Mindy thing. Every time I 'hear' the term nano-writing or whatever I can't help but picture Mork doing his famous greeting.)

Progress so far? Nanopathetic. Life, time, and best laid plans and all. But both kids are in school tomorrow, and not volunteering at school tomorrow - so hopefully between laundry, cleaning, etc and taking the kids to their first skating lesson I might be able to knock off a few words (or a few make believe victims - after all this antagonist is averaging one per chapter).

Knocking off people is one of the perks of writing. Legend has it the Sue Grafton starting writing so she could knock off her ex-husband.

Well, when you can't show him your love in real life, might as well go novel with it.

I participated in an interesting discussion on one of my facebook groups. A thriller writer wanted to know if romance was necessary in a thriller. My response was yes, because if the main character has no one to care that he's undergoing, then why should the reader. The point is, I'd more or less been planning on doing a sequel to Daughter Am I sometime, but now, thinking about it in that way, I'm not sure I ever could. There would be no romance!

I remember that discussion well - a very anti-romance type.

There is always a way to find romance when romance wants to find you. I'm sure you won't have trouble setting up your girl for a whirlwind ride that will include a bit of romance.

My novel won't be a mystery (most likely) but there are a few romantic couplings.

I'm Nano-ing up a storm. Almost at 10,000 words in five days. Not bad. I should really be able to get ahead this weekend. Though I'll never get caught up with my writing buddy who is almost at 18,000 already. Isn't that obscene?

Oh and that little thing of getting a five book contract from an honest to John publisher under my pen name. Off to write. I've got deadlines now. And advance checks. Woot! I'll devulge more specifics as it goes public. The deal will be in Publisher's Marketplace some time this week.

So yeah, a very good couple weeks for me! Finally!

Toodles.

Good for you, Jamie. I'm impressed! Let us know as soon as it hits the stands.

That's great!

Also, I'm not writing from the beginning. I'm writing scenes and plan to link them as I home in on the beginning and ending. This way I get started getting words down sooner and can build the story from there.

Very good!! It really is the best way to write. That way you are always writing something that you are enthusiastic about. I always wanted to do that, but my linear mind won't let me.

I could have started with the beginning of my short story, but again I'm undecided on where the book should start.

Actually, that's good. Too often people start out at the beginning and throw in everything they think readers are going to need to know, and in the end, that chapter has to be thrown out because it's so very tedious.

Lori, but what if she just found romance? I don't want to be like those old-fashioned mystery writers who ended every book with a love interest, and got rid of them at the beginning of the next book in the series. Serial romance isn't romance.

Twist. If she finds romance late in the book, then it's still a new romance with all its wonder, trials, doubts and unwanted baggage.

Throw some curve balls (or slush balls packed with rocks if you like snow) at the couple. Things beyond their control that puts the entire relationship in question, but in the end only serves to strengthen it.

Do your characters like you, Lori? :)

I agree - the idea of serial romances where the protagonist has to find a new love every time around just seems flighty and unromantic.

The Mummy movies - they come together by the end of the first movie, have a few issues with marital boredom in the second, but come together in the throws of the moment (fighting monsters) to show how unbreakable the relationship is. Yes, bad movie, but I like Brendan Frasier despite his acting.

John, probably not.

I did smush one between trees. That must have hurt.

How did you smush them between trees?

I threw a tree at him.

Too bad, I kinda liked him. But the scene just called for it to show the brutality of the moment.

Lori, that's a possibility. She could find out something about her new love that she didn't know, and that puts a crimp in their relationship.

I've always thought my fourth novel, the one that will be published next year should be a trilogy. If I do that, I want the hero of the second book to be a new character, with the characters from the first book as minor characters. That way I can do a brand-new romance.

I never planned on my one book (the one I actually finished save for editing) would be more than one book. The idea was actually a set of completely different books tied together by being set in the same land with some of the same characters making appearances.

For example, one of them (a prequel of sorts) was to be about someone who is deceased and his grown sons are part of this book. Unfortunately, this one story ended up too long for a single novel.

Threw a tree? Verrrry interesting.

Especially the horse that is still standing there, but the guy holding its reins is gone. Poor horse was a little skittish after.

Hi all. I've been doing some editing as I move parts of my second novel into my computer. Though I've moved more leaves than words lately. Also just got back from a 3 day offsite meeting for work.

That darned work (and other irl stuff) always seems to get in the way of what we really want to be doing.

It seems so weird to live in a world where leaves are a trash product. I just leave mine on the ground to rot. Makes new soil. Of course, I have no lawn to ruin.

Speaking of leaves, I was looking at all of them the other day, and thinking how they came from nothing but soil and sun and water. Sort of something coming from nothing. The thought seemed profound at the time, though not now.

Pat, if I left mine to rot, the yard would turn into a compost heap.

Hi. Just showing my face -- er, icon -- here. Nothing to add.

What are you working on, Laurie?

My Nano, which is hovering right around 7,000 words. I tend to shoot myself in the foot by overediting before I get to the end, so it's interesting to push through without thinking about editing on the first pass.

I am impressed by anyone who can find that many words.

Gotta go. Hope to be able to report more than 588 words down next time!

588 words is more than I've done! Thank you for stopping by. Hope to see you next week.

I'm thinking I should write a story about a very delicate and overly emotional six year old who doesn't want to do anything but live in her own little world and thinks everyone is out to get her when they try to make her do stuff like bath, eat, and all those other pesky life necessities.

Kind of a Carrie razes the world thing. (but not based on the Carrie book or character).

I wonder who your model is for that character? Hmmm.

Hey I'm here. Ta Da! LOL I feel like I need to make an entrance.

I just heard about Ft. Hood. Shocking.

I started Nano and I'm making some progress. I haven't updated my numbers yet but thinigs are progressing.

Ok, now to read the thread. ;o)

Hey, Wanda!! Glad to see you!

Saw some vague reference on facebook earlier but no idea what it was about.

It just came on the news now (now that I finally got Spongebob's psychotic giggle off the t.v. and out of my head).

It couldn't possibly be MY six year old (who is convinced I hate her because I fight with her every day to make her do stuff like go to school and eat healthy).

That's what I thought.

She's very emotional lately. I think the sixteen year old mental hormones have come early.

Ouch. She seems very precocious. Teach her to write. See what she comes up with.

She's already on the way. Unfortunately it's all about princesses finding love.

She's coming home telling me she has a story she needs to write.

This is her story - I just helped with the details and wording:
http://lvgwriting.wordpress.com/2009/10/23/the-princesses-and-the-pirates-childrens-story/

I thought it would just be the four year old (who describes how if I can't find her or hear her she is "falling softly to the ground" - and searches for hidden keys and doors to other lands in the pea gravel at the park.) - but the six year old is getting into it now.

Nothing wrong with priincesses finding love. We've all grown up on that fodder. I think that's pretty sweet.

I'm off to work on my Nano. I've got to get some words down. I can't keep up with the big hitters but I gotta keep trying.

Good luck, Wanda. Thank you for stopping by.

I am writing at a pace of about 100 words a week. Glacial! At this rate, I'll be done...never!

It seems as if we are competing for the role of slowest wombat writer. BTW, I loved the comment you left on the facebook discussion.

"Yes."

Pithy. To the point. Even wise.

I thought you might enjoy my direct answer to the question.

Thank you all for stopping by tonight. A joy, as always.