Category Archives: The Writing Process

The All-Important “Wait! What was that?”

Authorial Trust Craft & Skills Leigh Galbreath Rewriting The Writing Process 8 Comments

I don’t know about you guys, but I tend to revise my beginnings about ten times more than any other part of my stories. It is, in my opinion, the single most important part of a piece of fiction. It’s the handshake, the introduction, the ever important first impression. It’s the moment when the reader decides in a split second if they want to be friends with your characters and make a prolonged visit to your world.

The overriding wisdom where beginnings are concerned is that you should start late, in the middle of something, where some action is happening. This is all well and good, but how exactly does one put that into effect?

Thus enters the hook.

The best definition of the hook isn’t all that great, in my opinion. It’s something that catches the reader’s attention and makes them have to buy your book to find out what happens next. But I’m a girl who likes specifics. So, I had a look at the first paragraph of a bunch of books to see how the experts do it. What I’ve come up with is that a hook is something expressed that makes the reader stop and say to themselves, “Wait! What was that?”

What really catches the attention is when the author insidiously reaches out to a reader’s inner five-year-old and makes them want to ask, “Why?”

First, let’s start with the most obvious hook – the action hook. A good example of this is Joe Abercrombie’s The Blade Itself, the first of the First Law Trilogy. The first paragraph of this character driven series has Logan, one of the main characters, almost killing himself in his haste to get down a hill. What on Earth is he running from in such a reckless hurry? Read on to find out.

Thomas Harris does this in a less obvious way with The Silence of the Lambs. Clarice Starling is running down stairs to reach the division that deals with serial killers, a part of Quantico that’s “half-buried in the earth” (foreshadowing anyone?). She’s disheveled from racing there from training. We ask why an FBI trainee is running to deal with a serial killer without cleaning herself up first. And thus, we are hooked.

Another obvious hook is the “I should have known” hook. In Glen Cook’s The Black Company, the first paragraph has the narrator stating, in his typical dry humor, that, according to the Company’s wizard, One-Eye, there were “prodigies and portents” that should have warned our heroes of what was coming. What happened to these guys that declares itself with “prodigies and portents?” Nothing good, I tell you.

But what about those less than obvious hooks?

How about the slightly off-kilter reality hook? Jack Linday introduces his serial killer hero in Darkly Dreaming Dexter, by having Dexter wax rhapsodic over the Miami night. Unlike the action hook, it’s Dexter’s point of view that gets us. While it starts out innocuous, by the end of the first paragraph, Lindsay’s word choice turns the world into a dangerous place. The starlight has a “hollow wail” and the moon’s reflection on the water is a “teeth-grinding bellow.” Who is this guy and why does he see the world this way?

My favorite rendition of this type of hook comes from Clive Barker’s Galilee and is the only time I’ve ever bought a book from reading the first page. The first paragraph is just the narrator talking about the house he’s sitting in. Not all that exciting, but the devil is in the details. You see, the narrator’s step-mother hired Thomas Jefferson to build it in a North Caroline swamp facing her homeland of Africa.

Let me just state that this book is set in modern days, so we have at least one character who was alive in the late 1700’s, is from Africa, and built her house in a swamp in North Carolina. What the devil is going on here?

Then, there’s the “I’ve got a secret” hook. Jim Butcher uses this in the first book of the Alera Codex series, The Furies of Calderon. A woman is riding a bull, thinking about how the slave collar she’s wearing chafes and she should wear one more often to prepare herself for her next mission. Why is a woman wearing a slave collar when she doesn’t have to, and what’s this mission she’s on? She knows more than we do, and thus has a secret we want in on.

So, what did all these examples prove? Well, basically that it really doesn’t matter how you start your story, as long as that first paragraph makes your reader stop and ask, “Wait! What was that?”

 

In Praise of the Queen’s English

Craft & Skills First Drafts Narrative Voice The Writing Process 7 Comments

First, a PSA:  Grantville Gazette VI, edited by Eric Flint and published by Baen Books, is on the stands now.  It contains my story Suite for Four Hands, which is part of a series of stories exploring how musicians of the early 17th century might react if the music of the late 20th century was dropped in their laps.  Check it out.

Now, on with today’s post.

What do the following words have in common?

Slept, dreamt, leapt, burnt, dwellt, swept.

They are all representatives of a class of irregular verbs.  Four of them are also examples of a trend by American publishers to ‘regularize’ many irregular verbs in American usage.  You’ve seen it, even though it may not have registered with you.  Dreamed instead of dreamt, burned instead of burnt, dwelled instead of dwellt.  (Slept and swept have somehow managed to avoid being replaced with sleeped and sweeped.)

This is apparently an American movement.  The rest of the English-speaking world seems to be doing fine being irregular with irregular verbs.  Now, I am not particularly an Anglophile.  (But I’m not an Anglophobe, either.)  Outside of Charles Dickens, C.S. Lewis, and J.R.R. Tolkien, I’m not especially fond of English writers per se.  (And I’m not sure why I like Dickens-I just do.)  Most of the ‘classics’ of English Literature leave me in a state of vast ennui.  I will even admit to having successfully managed to avoid reading Shakespeare throughout my high school and college careers.

That said, I must stand up and shout against this trend in American publishing.  Author C. J. Cherryh probably described the background and circumstances better than I can in a post a number of years ago.  But regardless of the whys and wherefores of the trend, the fact remains that by removing the usage of these irregular verbs, publishers and copy-editors are removing tools from our writers’ tool chests.  They are removing richness and flavor from our writing.  They are, in fact, reducing our ability to write in distinctive styles.  And I find that deplorable.

When I write, I quite frequently use particular words to create specific effects in the reader; ‘aural’ effects, for lack of a better term.  In my mind, and to my ear, ‘dreamed’ has a different effect than ‘dreamt’.  And I’m not rigidly locked in to one form or the other, although I have noticed that I tend to use ‘dreamed’ forms more in science fiction and ‘dreamt’ forms more in fantasy.  But regardless of the genre, if I use one over the other, it’s because I want the effect of that specific word in the passage at hand.

I guess I’m funny that way.  People can criticize my plots or my characterizations and I’ll listen with an open mind.  And most of the time I’ll take criticism of my narrative and dialogue without getting particularly upset.  But for some reason, if after due consideration I choose a specific word to create a particular effect, to have someone object to the use of that word really rubs my fur the wrong way.  Of course, as a new author, the state of my fur may not be the copy-editor’s highest priority. Which, while probably appropriate from the consideration of publishing as a business, is unfortunate from the consideration of the craft and art of writing.

But today, the rise of e-publishing and the freedom it provides for self-publishing is creating changes in the traditional publishing models, and some of these arbitrary rules may not be a factor much longer.  One can only hope.

So I sing the praise of irregular verbs!  Join the chorus when it comes around.

The Meaning of Words – Editing Tips

Craft & Skills Nancy Greene Rewriting Writing Tools 4 Comments

The beautiful part of writing is that you don’t have to get it right the first time, unlike, say, a brain surgeon. You can always do it better, find the exact word, the apt phrase, the leaping simile.
– Robert Cormier

Writing is story telling. Writers, regardless of our discipline, need to pick not a correct word but the best possible one. In the legal profession, there’s a growing trend calling for plain writing. Courts have held that the word “solicit” is ambiguous because it has more than one meaning. “Exclusive” can mean “concurrent.” No wonder the English language is so hard. My writing must express what I mean clearly and effectively regardless of who reads it. Making my meaning clear is part of the editing process.

So how does the word “shall” end up meaning “may”? Context. When a sentence read as a whole expresses an option rather than a directive, “shall” means “may”. What does this quirk of the courts have to do with editing? Everything. Word choices matter.

When talking about writing and editing, Lisa Scottoline,, says to give yourself permission to write a crappy first draft. Do this. It’s easier to finish a story if you’re not worrying about “perfect.” Errors are fixed when you finish the first draft. Editing transforms that crappy first draft into a polished project. So how do I edit to take a diamond in the rough to a polished gem? I usually follow this line-editing procedure:

(1) Spell check

An obvious step, but people forget to do this.

(2) Search for :

a. common homonyms to ensure I used the proper word;

b. the verb “to be” in all its forms and passive voice;

Passive voice is when the subject of the sentence is acted upon rather than acting. Passive voice will often use a “to be” verb. Examples:

The ball was thrown – passive voice with a “to be” verb
Pete threw the ball – active voice

c. words ending in “-ly”.

I don’t have any objection to “-ly” words, but often a stronger word can be used. “He slunk around the corner” is a stronger sentence than “he walked stealthily around the corner.”

d. pronouns to ensure who or what they refer to is clear;

Be careful with pronouns. Writing clearly means ensuring the reader knows what each pronoun refers to. When two same-gendered characters. or characters with unisex names interact, you will need to be mindful that your pronouns refer to the character you intend them to.

(3) similes.

A common writing “rule” is to avoid similes or clichés. There’s nothing wrong with a good simile. But good is the key word. Entrenched similes become clichés. “In for a penny, in for a pound” is one.

Using a cliché can help you if you turn the saying on its head. Instead of saying that “every cloud has a silver lining,” you could say, “every cloud has a lightning bolt with my name on it.” By changing the meaning of this tired expression, I’ve added interest to the writing.

(4) Read for description enhancement by word choice, and context to ensure I haven’t inadvertently changed meaning.

The sentence “Pete walked into the room” conveys a different image than “Pete stumbled into the boardroom.”

Specifics matter. The first example – Pete walked – gives the reader no additional information. The sentence paints with just a pencil.

“Pete stumbled into the boardroom,” on the other hand, triggers associations. It’s painting with oils. He stumbles and the reader wonders if Pete’s drunk, injured or been pushed. By placing Pete in a “boardroom”, I can see Pete in his a suit, and imagine the large mahogany table surrounded by a dozen black chairs and dark paneling on the walls. I can add a twist by changing the ordinary images the words convey. I can grab the reader’s attention if Pete is wearing rags when he stumbles into the boardroom. Similarly, if the room is a “board room” full of surf boards, the words convey different images. The subtle differences in meaning we can convey with the right word is why writers are always told to “show, not tell.”

(5) Grammar check.

I know it seems like a lot of work, and it is, but the finished product will be better for the effort. Once I’ve line-edited, I can strengthen the story by context editing for plot holes, character inconsistencies, tension and other craft issues.
Plain writing doesn’t mean boring. It means using each word to its maximum advantage to produce clean, clear and professional prose.

Starting Over: A Most Exquisite Agony

Craft & Skills Evan Braun Rewriting The Writing Life 6 Comments

Just about everyone who has ever used a computer knows the gut-wrenching pain of having to cope with lost data. Ever had your computer crash in the final stretch of writing an essay, and then discover that the file is unrecoverable? Ever spend hours on a piece of work and forget to save it before disaster strikes?

Of course you have.

But this post isn’t about data recovery, a subject on which I know very little (frankly, I would be well-advised to learn more). No, today’s post is about the exquisite agony of starting over.

Over the course of the last few years, fantasy wunderkind Brandon Sanderson has released chapters on his blog from his early unpublished manuscripts. On the one hand, this is an encouraging development, since it demonstrates so well the gradual accumulation of skill as time wears on. I find myself able to identify with Sanderson’s early writings. Hopefully, given more time, I, too, can become a writer of his caliber.

But the most interesting thing to me is the way that Sanderson openly talks about rewriting, and even re-rewriting, some of his manuscripts. In other words, he wrote it once-it wasn’t good enough. So he waited a while, then wrote it again-it still wasn’t good enough. He waited some more… then wrote it again! Finally, it was ready to see the light of day.

This kind of persistence is remarkable. As far as I can tell, it’s a necessary quality if one is to become a best-selling author.

In my editing career, I frequently come into contact with books that just aren’t good enough. It’s not that they’re outright bad (well, sometimes they are), but rather that editing alone isn’t enough to elevate them to “ready” status. The unfortunate reality is that the writer probably just doesn’t have chops to pull off the story-yet. My suggestion might be to give it some time, work on other projects, then come back a few years down the road and attempt the unthinkable: a page-one rewrite.

In other words, write the entire novel over again. From scratch.

If you’ve ever spent months-honestly, probably years-on your pet project, then the notion of starting over is truly daunting. Exhausting.

In my case, I have a 175,000-word novel sitting on my shelf. I wrote it the first time back when I was in high school-well, I wrote the first half before giving up. At the tender age of sixteen, I knew I wasn’t up to the challenge.

A few years later, I resurrected the project and tried turning it into a series of teleplays (television scripts). I wrote more than ten of them! But this format was impractical in the long run, so the project fizzled out. And almost stayed fizzled.

Then, after a long break, I jumped back into the fray last year and wrote the complete novel, which took nine months. In the spring, I trimmed it down some, bringing me to that polished 175,000-word version.

Except it’s not polished. Not really.

I’ve grown tremendously over the last few years. I was able to accomplish things in my most recent draft that my high school self would never have believed possible. But after receiving a lot of honest and well-intentioned feedback, I was forced to come to an uncomfortable conclusion: it’s still not ready. And in fact, like those editing clients I mentioned, editing still isn’t enough to get it where it needs to be to really come alive.

Indeed, I’ll have to start over. One more time.

But there’s no point in attempting another rewrite so quickly. Brandon Sanderson turned some of his flawed early works into best-selling gems, but they had to percolate for years.

So, just how long will I need to wait? Unfortunately, there’s no hard and fast rule, but I do know one thing: I will accumulate more skills and grow faster as a writer if I keep producing new work.

And there’s the rub. It’s not about waiting at all… it’s about pressing on.