The Inner Struggle: Guides for Using Inner Conflict That Make Sense. By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy I sat in on an amazing workshop while I was at RWA that made something typically vague very clear and applicable. Michael Hague's Using Inner Conflict to Create Powerful Love Stories. It was one of those workshops that discussed what I already knew, but Hague presented it in such a way that I clearly saw a super easy way to apply inner journeys to my stories. While the workshop was about romance specifically, the pieces of Hague’s inner conflict really work for any character journey. He calls the overall arc the “journey from living in fear to living courageously.” Let's take a peek at Hauge's basic inner conflict arc: Longing or Need: The thing the character longs for or needs in the story.
If this doesn’t say “inner goal” I don’t know what does. (More on goals here) Wound: A past wound or hurt that is a current unhealed source of pain. The wound might be some deep dark secret, or it can be how the character grew up. (More on backstory here) Creating Stunning Character Arcs, Pt. 1: Can You Structure Characters? What if there were a sure-fire secret to creating stunning character arcs? Would you be interested in discovering it? If you care about connecting with readers, grabbing hold of their emotions, and creating stories that will resonate with them on a level deeper than mere entertainment, then the answer has to be a resounding yes! But here’s the thing about character arcs: they’re way too easy to take for granted. On the surface, character arcs seem to boil down to nothing more than a simple three-step process: 1. 2. 3.
That’s character arc in a nutshell. Turns out: a lot. (Featured in the Structuring Your Novel Workbook.) The Link Between Character Arcs and Story Structure Too often, character and plot are viewed as separate entities—to the point that we often pit them against each other, trying to determine which is more important. We often think of plot as being about structure, but our notions of character and character arc tend toward the more airy-fairy.
Surely, right? Wrong, actually. Character Flaw Index. To make characters realistic and relatable they are given flaws, because if there is anything a writer can be sure of it is that no one in their audience will be perfect. Flaws are character traits that have a negative impact in the narrative, unless they are simply informed. They can also be exploited. See Good Flaws, Bad Flaws for a scale of flaw acceptability. Compare Seven Deadly Sins, Ego Tropes. Abusive Parents: Habitually violent and cruel to their own children, often because that's how they themselves were raised. Creating Characters. 35 Beautiful and Insightful Quotes about Short Stories | Aerogramme Writers' Studio35 Beautiful and Insightful Quotes about Short Stories.
“In a rough way the short story writer is to the novelist as a cabinetmaker is to a house carpenter.” – Annie Proulx “A good short story crosses the borders of our nations and our prejudices and our beliefs. A good short story asks a question that can’t be answered in simple terms. And even if we come up with some understanding, years later, while glancing out of a window, the story still has the potential to return, to alter right there in our mind and change everything.” ― Walter Mosley “Find the key emotion; this may be all you need know to find your short story.”– F. Scott Fitzgerald “It’s possible, in a poem or short story, to write about commonplace things and objects using commonplace but precise language, and to endow those things – a chair, a window curtain, a fork, a stone, a woman’s earring – with immense, even startling power.” – Raymond Carver “Short stories consume you faster.
“I would also suggest that any aspiring writer begin with short stories. 5 brainstorming plotting ideas. 7 Essential Elements of Scene + Scene Structure Exercise. Today’s post is excerpted from The Plot Whisperer Workbook (Adams Media, 2012) by Martha Alderson. Two lucky commenters were chosen to receive a free copy of the book: Tanette Smith and Mindy Halleck. Congratulations! In a scene, a character acts and reacts to people, places, and events. In this respect, scenes are the basic building blocks of your story. But, as with any structure, if you have the wrong scenes or if they’re assembled incorrectly, your story can—unexpectedly—collapse. As a pre-writing exercise, it’s helpful to generate and analyze scenes for your story. If you have no scene ideas, consider what your character wants and then visualize the steps the character will take to get what she wants. When generating a scene list, do not concern yourself with the specific elements in each scene.
It’s also helpful if you give a very brief title to each scene—no more than one line. The trick to this exercise is not to see how many scenes you can list. Pulling the Plug on English Departments. The armies of soft philistinism are on the march and eager to ditch traditional literature instruction in favor of more utilitarian approaches. To the barricades! It is easy to observe the sad and sickly decline of American intellectual life, through the cultural and institutional lowering of standards, when prestigious publications promote the defense, if not the celebration, of lower standards. Writing recently in The New Republic on the seemingly inevitable death of the college English department, James Pulizzi represents the shortsighted techno-boosterism and foolish progressivism that is rendering American culture increasingly superficial and frivolous.
“Within a few decades, contemporary literature departments will be largely extinct,” Pulizzi submits before predicting that “communications, composition, and media studies will take English’s place.” The late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once famously indicted the cultural condition of “defining deviancy down.” How to Successfully Kill a Character: The Checklist. These comments contain spoilers so proceed at your own risk if you haven’t read any of these books. In my latest novel, On Unicorn Wish, the main character is recovering from a horrific accident that could have killed her, and she had setbacks, while at the same time reliving in memory (or is it real?)
A magical time when she was ten. She was invited to Evernow, a place between time and no time where only those with a pure heart go when they die. On her return to her grannie after her adventure , as the child, she is having trouble remembering it. She is to meet someone from there she already knows who will help her forget, and it has been set up he visits her in that world as an adult to help her with her memory. At that point she, as the adult dies, because she was doomed from the beginning, but she returns to Evernow where she is a very special person, so her life goes on a little differently.
My two children’s picture books are the only ones where no one dies.
John Brandon and Daniel James Brown on Writers on Writing. 9 Literary Magazines for New and Unpublished Writers | Aerogramme Writers' Studio9 Literary Magazines for New and Unpublished Writers. “The reason 99% of all stories written are not bought by editors is very simple. Editors never buy manuscripts that are left on the closet shelf at home.”– John Campbell Seeing your work in print for the first time is a unique thrill. But it can feel like a daunting task to submit your writing to a magazine or journal when you nobody other than friends and family has ever read it.
To make the process somewhat less scary, here are 9 literary magazines that welcome submissions from new and never before published writers. Brittle Star For almost fifteen years Brittle Star has been publishing the work of new and early-career writers, many of whom have seen their work in print for the first time. They welcome submissions of literary short fiction (up to 2000 words) and poetry (1 – 4 poems at a time). Brittle Star is published twice a year. The Louisville ReviewThe Louisville Review was founded in 1976 and has proud tradition of fostering the development of new writers.
The Fictionaut Blog. We are pleased to welcome Okla Elliott to this month’s Writers on Craft. Okla is an Illinois Distinguished Fellow at the University of Illinois, where he works in the fields of comparative literature and trauma studies. He also holds an MFA in creative writing from Ohio State University. He is the author of a collection of short fiction, From the Crooked Timber. His poetry collection, The Cartographer’s Ink, is forthcoming from NYQ Books in late 2014, and his novel, The Doors You Mark Are Your Own, co-authored with Raul Clement, will be released in early 2015.
What do you read when you despair at the state of either your work or modern literature—any “go to” texts? It’s different for different genres. All of these writers have one thing in common: massive vision expressed in invigoratingly good language. If you could give just one piece of advice to emerging authors about editing that has served you well, what would it be? You must develop a brutal honesty with yourself. Book marketing | 151 must visit writing websites. While there are some excellent books on writing, the web is also filled with terrific sites on the topic.
Here are 151 of the very best, and they’re organised for you by subject and genre. Structure and PlotScreenwriting Tips for Authors is the blog of screenwriter and novelist Alexandra Sokoloff, and she comprehensively breaks down the three-act structure for writers.The Plot Whisperer blog is all about plotting.Storytech Literary Consulting is a site by the author of The Writer’s Journey. Characterisation FYCD is a blog that focuses on all aspects of character development and answers questions as well.Baby Name Center will help you get the crucial right name for your character.
You can search for names by origin, meaning, number of syllables and more.Character Therapist takes a psychological approach to readers’ questions about character development.Motive Generator offers prompts to give your characters purpose. Researching Agents and Writing Queries and Synopses Publishing and Business.
Story in Literary Fiction. Fiction. How to Write a Novel Using the Snowflake Method. Cure writer's block with writing prompts - writing tips character name generator. Jack Kerouac's Essentials of Spontaneous Prose If possible write "without consciousness" in semi-trance (as Yeats' later "trance writing") allowing subconscious to admit in own uninhibited interesting necessary and so "modern" language... 66 Writing Experiments 5. Tristan Tzara's hat: Everyone in a group writes down a word (alternative: phrase, line) and puts it in a hat.
Poem is made according to the order in which it is randomly pulled from hat... William S. The cutup is a mechanical method of juxtaposition in which Burroughs literally cuts up passages of prose by himself and other writers and then pastes them back together at random... General Fiction. Getting Around... Career Essentials Getting Started Queries & Manuscripts Market Research Classes & Conferences Critiquing Crafting Your Work Grammar Guides Research/Interviewing Writing Contests The Writing Business Income & Expenses Selling Reprints Collaboration Pseudonyms Negotiating Contracts Setting Fees/Getting Paid Rights & Copyright Tech Tools The Writing Life The Writing Life Rejection/Writer's Block Health & Safety Time ManagementColumn: Ramblings on the Writing Life Fiction Writing - General General Techniques Characters & Viewpoint Dialogue Setting & DescriptionColumn: Crafting Fabulous Fiction Fiction Writing - Genres Children's Writing Mystery Writing Romance Writing SF, Fantasy & Horror Flash Fiction & More Nonfiction Writing General Freelancing Columns & Syndication Newspapers/Journalism Topical Markets Travel Writing Photography Creative Nonfiction Memoirs/Biography International Freelancing Business/Tech Writing Other Topics Poetry & Greeting Cards Screenwriting.
10 Ridiculously Simple Tips for Writing a Book. A Simple Novel Outline – 9 questions for 25 chapters « H.E. Roulo. Just as every tree is different but still recognizably a tree, every story is different but contains elements that make it a story. By defining those before you begin you clarify the scope of your work, identify your themes, and create the story you meant to write. At Norwescon 2011 I sat in on a session called Outline Your Novel in 90-minutes led by Mark Teppo. I’ll give you the brief, readable, synthesized version.
Answer 9 questions and create 25 chapter titles and you’re there. Here are the 9 questions to create a novel: 1.) 2.) 3.) 4.) 5.) 6.) 7.) 8.) 9.) Now, with those 9 questions answered to your satisfaction, try to fill in a 25 chapter, 75,000 word outline. Chapters 7-18 are the middle of your book. Chapters 19-25 depict the heroic act to victory. Wasn’t that easy? Okay, sure, the work isn’t done yet. Using the idea that there are 25 chapters, I outlined my current work in progress. I hope that was helpful. Tell me what works for you. Related 6 Steps to Masterful Writing Critiques. Short Stories: 10 Tips for Creative Writers. Five Open Source Apps For Writers and Authors. By Lisa Hoover - Jul. 17, 2009Comments (9) Even if you have the perfect idea for the next Great American Novel, getting it down on paper is never easy. While you could always use standard word processors like OpenOffice Write or AbiWord, they don't have the bells and whistles that make writing books, manuals, and theses as easy as possible.
Fortunately, there are a few open source applications that help budding authors get stories out of their heads and into the hands of readers. Kabikaboo - This recursive writing assistant is perfect for managing large documents, technical manuals, and long novels. It arranges data in tree-form so parent modules, their children, and their grandchildren can be easily moved around and rearranged.
Storybook - Any author or novelist will tell you writing a book is a complicated affair. Celtx - Many scriptwriters swear by Celtx, and with good reason. Creative Thinking Tools. Phrase Thesaurus - ideas generator for writers | online thesaurus. People. Writing Career. Writing World April 17, 2014.
The Center for Fiction. How To Write A Novel: The Short Version by Gabriel Roth Gabriel Roth's workshop at The Center, "The Novel," begins on March 25. Here, his method for getting your opus out of your head and onto the page: You start by thinking about all the things a novel should do: tell a compelling story, create vivid characters and reveal them in all their particularity, illuminate the human condition in general, reveal ordinary experience with a vividness that enables us to see the familiar world anew, open fresh possibilities for language... you can easily spend a whole afternoon just listing the requirements, and you should.
Then you divide the list into three categories. Category One is “Things I Can Do.”Category Two is “Things I Can Maybe Do Without.”Category Three is “Things I Need to Learn.”And then you go down the Category Three list and set yourself assignments: Describe with startling freshness three things that happened to you today.