WRITING TIPS!
These tip articles were written by me or my writer friends. I will post more as time permits. Some of these articles were written when I first began writing. It helped me to remember the things I learned when I wrote them down for others to use. Use my advice at your own risk! No guarantees apply, either implied, suggested or stated. — Jade.
Note: For permission to reprint, email writerjadetaylor@comcast.net
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SHOW — DON’T TELL
1. Use sense data whenever you can. Show action in terms of one of the five senses.
EXAMPLE: Frightening situation.
NOT: Gretel saw something frightening. (She is telling!)
USE: Gretel saw something move. The shadow growled. Claws scraped on the floor.
2. Avoid Abstract Language. Establish context and give detail necessary to make your words mean what they say.
EXAMPLE: The character was evil.
Evil according to what measure? This is abstract.
USE: The character’s hair was dirty, his clothes ripped and torn. He kicked the cat as he walked past it and casually flipped the goldfish out of its bowl onto the floor. He took a long knife and made tiny cuts in the baby’s flesh and poured the concoction of pepper and vinegar into its wounds. He was an evil bastard.
3. Use interpretations — tell — only to hint at, label or punctuate how a character feels. Always use as much sense data as possible to put in context.
BAD EXAMPLE: She was nice.
USE: Janey’s mother smelled of lemon cookies. Her blonde hair had red highlights and her dress was a soft pink color. Her comforting voice kept telling Janey not to worry about spilling the milk. Janey thought her mother was the nicest mother in the whole world.
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HOW I GET PAST REJECTION
How many times do I get back up so some bully can knock me down again? Well, that depends. Do I like the feel of gravel digging into my back? Do the sounds of the crowd gathered round and yelling for the bully to hit me again, make me mad? Or does it hurt my feelings? That’s what I have to decide. Hurt feelings or anger. Everybody makes that decision for themselves and I’m sure there are many who might think ANGER is not a good reaction to rejection. I disagree. If you focus your anger and let it drive you to prove the crowd and the bully wrong, then it can be a very good thing. Any emotion is just that. A feeling. Feelings don’t hurt people. People hurt people. (That was just to rip off the gun sellers motto. It really doesn’t mean anything.) [grin] Emotions / feelings can be used to drive actions. I decided early in my career that I was never going to give up before I sold a romance book to a publisher. Once I’d made that decision, I had to figure out what to do with the hurt and sadness that the inevitable rejections caused. I decided to get mad at the stupid editor who couldn’t recognize genius when she saw it. I would barrel straight from the mailbox to the computer, pausing just long enough to throw the rejected manuscript onto the pile where I keep all the other rejections. Then I’d start another book. |
In the meantime, while that book was being written, I made sure that I gave every one of my babies a chance to succeed in the cold world of New York editors. I sent every book I wrote (six, I think, before selling) to at least twenty publishers. You might think all those rejection letters would make ANYONE give up. No. Not when you read the letters carefully. Every so often, a publisher or agent would throw out a brief note. — Good writing. I liked your plot. The characters just weren’t speaking to me, but I’ll look at anything else you have ready. Yeah. Like I hadn’t just sent them the greatest book I’d ever written which made all the others look like real dogs. Which of the dogs should I send? None of them. I’d already recognized their faults from the 20 previous rejections letters for each one. It does sink in after 20 people tell you the same thing. Of course, I still loved them, anyway. Believe me, if I hadn’t already learned how badly written those books were, I would gladly have sent them out again, even though it would have been a waste of postage. You really do need an “I’ll show them!” attitude. Them is really you. Show yourself that you have what it takes to keep writing, to keep your butt in the chair and your hands on the keyboard. Show yourself that you can write a great book. Get mad at yourself. Give yourself a good scolding for wasting too much time on TV and spending too little time learning to write. It will pay off. I know. |
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THE CONFLICT ISN'T STRONG ENOUGH
The conflict isn’t strong enough. Now, where have I heard those words before? Only in 10,000 rejection letters from various editors. All those wonderful characters with well-developed goals and beautifully-plotted stories have struck out as many times as the Minnesota Twins have. (Excepting the 1987 and 1991 World Series Winning Twins, of course.) If you’re a Twins fan, don’t hit me. (grin) It’s the truth and though I’ve struggled to conquer this problem, I still haven’t mastered it. I have learned a few things along the way. Maybe on the next book, huh? In the meantime, I’d like to share what I’ve learned with the caveat that I’m not there, yet, so, if you find what I have to say of some interest, take my words as guides, not rules. Conflict is what happens when your hero and your heroine have opposing goals. Goals are what they WANT. Motivation is WHY they want to achieve their goals. CONFLICT arises when these two would-be lovers find themselves on opposite sides. For instance, my heroine, Cass, wants to be a studio photographer. My hero, Sam, is a detective trying to locate a kidnap victim. These external goals don’t clash. Ah-ha, you say. THAT’S why the editors didn’t want your book. Well, that’s part of it, but not nearly all. Conflicts take time to clash. The story has to develop before there’s a conflict between Sam’s job and Cass’s career. There are two types of goals, and more than one for each character. External goals, such as being a studio photographer, and internal goals should mesh and complement each other. What’s an external goal? Debra Dixon, in her book GOAL, MOTIVATION AND CONFLICT, says that if you can touch it, taste it, see it, hear it, or smell it, then it’s external, like Cass’s dream of being a studio photographer. What’s an internal goal? It’s something inside you that may defy logic and reason. You can’t touch it, taste it, see it, hear it, or smell it. In other words, it’s emotion, feeling, those things that reside in the brain. Or, as we in the romance industry like to say, in the heart. Because I wanted my story to be multi-layered, I decided on more than one conflict. Using a conflict to cause dissension and uncertainty is the way we hook our readers, so the more conflicts, the better. Right? Not necessarily. You need enough conflict to drive the plot, but not so much that the hero and heroine bicker and snarl like a starving alley cat and a junkyard dog both going for the same half-eaten MacDonald’s hamburger somebody tossed over the fence.
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Ideally, you should have the hero and heroine conflicted about something important. What you don’t want as your major source of conflict is whether or not blue is prettier than red, or Chinese food is better than Mexican. Give them something real to disagree about. Forget the small stuff. If it ain’t big, nobody cares. Have your heroine in desperate need of a man who will make a strong commitment, and your hero vowing to never commit to another woman. That’s conflict of the internal kind. My hero Sam, wants to catch a kidnapper, remember? That’s his job. He’s a detective. His conflict arises when he has to decide if his job is worth putting Cass in danger. Who does he save? Cass or the kidnapper’s victim. That’s conflict. My heroine Cass, wants to be a studio photographer, but the small town she lives in doesn’t offer much chance for that career. Minneapolis, the big city, does. She’s already put off her dream to care for her ill mother, and again to stay in Mayville so she can be near her high school sweetheart. When she leaves Mayville, she vows she’ll put her career ahead of love. Then she meets Sam. That’s conflict. Other circumstances in the story require her to choose between continuing her pursuit of her chosen career and going back to her small town. Of course, leaving Minneapolis means abandoning her career goals and leaving the man she’s come to love. That’s conflict. Why did the editor say I didn’t have enough of the nasty “C” word in my story? Some part of that conflict was still in my head when I mailed the manuscript out. We have to put it on paper for the editor to see it. So, remember these points. 1. Important goals have to clash. Happy writing!
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