Now Write!

This week is actually our co-contributor, Shirley Harkins week to blog, however, she has been diagnosed with cancer. Would you mind stopping right now and pray for her healing?

Today, I want to recommend to you, Now Write edited by Sherry Ellis. Here is the blurb from the back of the book:

What's the secret behind the successful and prolific careers of critically acclaimed novelists and short story writers Amy Bloom, Steve Almond, Jayne Anne Phillips, Alison Lurie, and others? Divine assistance? Otherworldly talent? An unsettlingly close relationship with the Muse? While the rest of us are staring at blank sheets of paper, struggling to come up with a first sentence, these writers are busy polishing off story after story and novel after novel. Despite producing work that may seem effortless, all of them have a simple technique for fending off writer's block: the writing exercise. In Now Write!, Sherry Ellis collects the personal writing exercises of today's best writers and lays bare the secret to their success.

I have noticed when I cold write my prose isn't half as good as when I've taken the opportunity to warm-up. What better way to get those brain juices flowing than to exercise? I know, exercise is a nasty word, however everyone truly benefits from it.

I was telling someone the other day you can read many books on the subject of point of view and learn from it, but when you apply what you've learned to paper and pencil...that's when it sinks in. Which is why I'm recommending this book.

From cover to cover, it is one exercise after another in many different subjects. For example take a look at these topics: Get Writing, Point of View, Character Development, Dialogue, Plot and Pacing, Setting and Description, Craft, and Revision. Each chapter is filled with published author's insights and an exercise to help get you motivated and warmed-up to write.

On your mark...get set...Now Write!

Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell

James Scott Bell is the best-selling author of Breach of Promise, Deadlock, A Greater Glory, and several other thrillers. He is a winner of the Christy Award for Excellence in inspirational fiction, and is a columnist for Writer's Digest. A former trial lawyer, Jim now writes and speaks full time. You can visit him on-line at http://www.jamesscottbell.com/.

At least that is what Writer's Digest says about him in the front matter of the book. What it doesn't say and what I would add is that Plot & Structure should be on the shelf of every serious fiction writer. It is without a doubt a staple among how-to books. (My goal with my portion of this blog is to recommend the best staple writing books.)

Mr. Bell begins this book with some fundamentals on plot. He then breaks down a device he has seen in hundreds of plots, called the LOCK system.

L is for lead

O is for objective

C is for confrontation

K is for knockout

He says this system can be coupled with many varieties of plot patterns. For example, the Quest is the oldest form of plot.

Rudiments of the Quest

*The Lead is someone who is incomplete in his ordinary world

*The thing searched for must be of vital importance.

*There must be huge obstacles preventing the Lead from gaining it.

*The quest should result in the Lead becoming a different (usually better) person at the end; a fruitless quest, however, may end in tragedy for the lead.

Other examples of plot patterns that he expounds on, are love, revenge, adventure, chase, one against, one apart, power, and allegory. There are different variations of these patterns and you can make them your own or combine any of them.

There were three things, which made me love this book: one, his voice is easy to understand. Mr. Bell's instructional writing doesn't have that uppity-professor-you-need-a-dictionary-to-understand-me type of writing. His book reads just as I heard him speak. Two, through out the book I got the feeling he was my champion, pushing me toward the prize of publication. Three, I love the exercises at the end of each chapter and the checklist at the end of the book. If you don't know how to construct a blurb or a pitch...read page 230, the last page of the book.

On a five star system of rating, I'd give this book a solid five stars. I look forward to reading any other how-to books by this author, which I understand isn't too far off. His website shows Writer's Digest is publishing another book by him entitled, Revision & Self-Editing. I'll let you know what I think in the coming months.

Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseinin

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini , New York Times Bestseller and Major Motion Picture, which is not a book about the Christian faith, is a great study for Point of View (POV).

The book is about a young boy who has an idyllic childhood in Afghanistan. Things change as he matures through government turmoil until he and his father are forced to flee to America. He finishes school, marries, and is awaiting the birth of his first child, when an old family friend contacts him and begs him to come to Pakistan for an important farewell.

The book is interesting on several levels. First, it shares the culture of another country I knew nothing about. Second, it shows how political unrest can steal all the good things in life that we all take for granted. Third, it shows how a strong character can change and survive.

I was looking over my notes about POV that I wrote at different workshops. Two ideas stuck out as I read. Mary DeMuth told us at last year's ACFW Conference, we should pretend we were looking through a pirate's spy glass to understand the concept we could only write what the character could see through the spy glass. Karen Kelley stated she becomes the character as she writes the book.

I became Amir as I read the book. I saw the changes in Afghanistan through his eyes in a deep and personal way the nightly news can never capture.

An expected delight in the book was the author's use of parallelism. Seemingly, unimportant information at the beginning of the story ended the book with great importance with A-Ha moments.

I appreciated how the story challenged my reasoning and opened my emotions. The narrative is so closely limited to the character, reading it you would assume it was an autobiography.

I have two recommendations. Read The Kite Runner, which will lead you to reading A Thousand Splendid Suns, and putting your name on the reserve list for the movie, The Kite Runner. Secondly, as you read books, notice what the author does to make it work for you. As many have said, "If you want to be a writer, you must first be a reader."

Moonine Sue Watson

Don't Murder Your Mystery by Chris Roerden

I recommend this book of 24 fiction-writing problems that makes your work "dead on arrival" to the publisher or agent. Whether you write mysteries or romance, the principles are the same. Roerden's ideas open your eyes to spots needing correcting, and does it in a humorous, straight-to-the-point way.
The one I'd like to address on this blog is the "Clue #14 - Slow Death". As a new writer I many times fall in love with my own words. That, according to Chris Roerden, is the slow death of your manuscript. Research demands a large role in contemporary fiction and a hefty one in historicals. The fact that we have pages of notes on our subjects tempts us to dump it all in three pages. Not good. We might write only a sentence of it in the whole manuscript. When you read over your words, if there is a word, sentence, paragraph or entire scene you can't cut, it's the one your might have to cut.
Another helpful idea came from Clue #12 Unsettling Settings. Pacing your setting to match your tension or conflict strengthens your writing. To begin, the setting could take up a paragraph, but three pages later could include only a phrase. Always connect the action (tension, conflict) to your setting. If it doesn't have relevance later, leave it out.
I'd suggest buying this book. I discovered help in all 24 clues. I recommend it with relish.
Happy writing,
Janet K. Brown