And you’re doing this why?

Although I’m out on the road with Knight and the Prankster Duo visiting Grandma’s House, over the hills and through the snow, I wanted to share a very short blog post with you all.  Plus, I have to let you all know that the awesome Faith Hunter, author of the Jane Yellowrock novels will be visiting us next week, so mark your calendars and come help us welcome her to our lovely and slightly noxious Swamp!

While we traveled over the roads and pathways, I began to ponder some of the reasons behind the “why”s of my fourth of novel. Things in the Kyn world are a bit unsettled at the end of Shadow’s Moon, so now we have to fill in the blanks.  One of the things I’ve learned from the first three books, as the writer you best know the “why”s behind the story.  Why are your characters acting this way, why do they need to address these questions, why are they doing what they’re doing, why, why?

Once you have an idea of the answer, then you can start your story.  I know where I want to start the fourth book, I know who the main characters are, I know what problems they are going to face, I know why they act the way they do, but this time, I need to know what they’re going to do to solve these problems and why.

Character motivation and character evolution is critical to a good story. Your characters, especially in a series, have to continue to grow and evolve. Not just in an emotional sense, but in the challenges they face and how they triumph over said challenges. Sounds easy, right? It’s not.  For me, my characters have become real people, and rarely does a person have just one reason behind why they do something.  There are always a multitude of factors involved no matter how complex or simple our decisions. Getting this across in our writing, that’s true talent.

For the writers out there, how do you figure out your character motivations? Do you do interviews, use worksheets, just know because your crystal ball has fantastic reception? I’d love to hear.

For readers out there, how complex do you like your characters? Do you enjoy it when there are multiple factors playing part in their decisions and actions or do you like things straightforward and simple? Share, please.

Since I have to pay attention to the road as I’m the one in control of the vehicle, I guess I’ll let you go until next week.  Remember, Faith Hunter is coming, so make time and visit with us!

Wicked

Character or plot?

I’m a plotter, I can admit that fully. I like my little road map laid out before I begin writing, even though I know full well that at the end, the book probably won’t look much like my initial outline.

That’s because as I write, my characters take on their own personalities and decide from there on out where they’re damn well going to go.

But being a plotter, I still need to know quite a bit about my characters before I can start that initial outline.

I recently sat down to plot book 5 in my Heart of a Vampire series. I wrote two pages of outline before my heart sank and I showed it to Wicked.

She laughed.

My characters were wimps and the story was going nowhere.

Which is when I finally realized I didn’t know nearly enough about my characters to even begin plotting.

 

So, my Q4U: Writers – how well do you need to know your characters before you begin to write?

Readers – Are you drawn to books with more action oriented plots, or by great characters (or both)?

NANO, Just Writing

The plan for NANO (National Novel Writing Month) is to just write, not edit, not outline, just write.  But how do you just write?  What does that even mean?

When I begin writing, I naturally crave some kind of structure, some kind of guidelines to follow.  Often my characters take me off my decided path, but then, a new path is created based upon what my characters want.  Does that make any sense at all?

BUT, this month I am just writing.  I am creating words on a page, without my usual obsessive compulsive behavior.  I am not going to re-read my work (at least I’ll try not to).  This plan, however, really worries me.  I think I might end up creating more work for myself in the end by doing things in such an unorganized way.  But at the same time, I am really looking forward to trying a different writing process.  Hey, I may even realize I like this way of writing better!

What do you think?  Does writing without a plan simply cause more problems in the long run?

NANO- National Novel Writing Month

November is National Novel Writing Month!  We Evil Dwarves are proud to say we are participating this year (and November is ALMOST here).  I have prepared my blogs ahead of time with a plan, so I can spend November working on the second novel in my new series.  But, I do have some reservations.

First of all, you have to understand my writing process to understand why something like NANO could get me a little stressed, so here it is:

1. Wake from an intriguing dream.  Write it down.  Mull it over.  Write it down again, with some of the weird that doesn’t make sense when you wake up stuff, gone.
2. Start writing.  Understand my character and my world.  Adjust how the character changes what I originally thought.
3. Stop writing.  Create a general outline for the remainder of the book.
4. Start writing again.  Make it to about the halfway point in the book.
5. Stop writing again.  Go back and edit/revise the first portion of the book.
6. Rewrite the outline with more details, adjusting for the changes that have occurred during the writing process.
7. Start writing again.  Write until the end of the book.
8. Finally, the hardcore revising begins.

Okay, so I never claimed my writing process was neat and organized.  What is your process like?  Also, this is why I fear NANO so much.  I am expected to go against my obsessive writing behaviors and just write for an entire month.

I don’t know how successful I will be in this process.  Our expectation is to write 50,000 words in one month, BUT it has taken me three months to write the first 50,000 words of my current novel.

So, wish me luck!  I hope I can proudly say, come the end of November, that I accomplished my goal, but if I end up mumbling something less than 50,000 words as my accomplishment, don’t judge me too harshly.

Also, does anyone else plan to participate this year?

Prepping for NaNo…

Welcome back, Swamp visitors!  I hope you enjoyed last week’s jaunt into the wonderful world of new writers.  I hope you found something wickedly cool to add to your reading lists! 

In honor of the looming presence of NaNo, I thought I’d share a bit of my prep experience for this year with you.  Yes, I know, a pantser who preps? What an oxymoron.  Except I’m finding it necessary before I dive head long into the roaring abyss of NaNo next week. 

Writing by the seat of your pants is not only a creative whirlwind, but it’s terrifying.  Here’s why:  when you get stuck, you get stuck and sometimes you can’t tell up from down and start digging deeper into the mire of fragmented concepts and useless plot points. I call myself a pantser, but in actuality, I cheat because I do plot out the major plot points.  You know the ones, this happens in the first third to start the ball rolling, this happens in the second third because this is where everything is going to change for the characters, and this has to happen in the last third because now that my characters have a new reality, this is how it will solve the problem.

Since I’m stuck just past the first third of Shadow’s Moon, I have been paying attention to various blogs about structure and plot and planning.  I know, I know, I can hear the screams of denial from my fellow pantsers–but really, what else can you do if you want your story to work?

As I continue to write and improve my craft, I’m discovering that the OCD that rules my life in every other aspect, is starting to bleed over.  Not as much as it can, but enough so that yes, I am preparing for NaNo to make sure I can get unstuck and tuck Shadow’s Moon under the “completed” section of my writing checklist.   I am going back to make sure that I have down my characters’ motivations, what’s driving my protagonist and why, where is the central conflict (romance or mystery?), what other conflict layers are there (and there are more than one!), what are my three major turning point that change my characters’ goals/motivations, drive their darkest moments, and then enable them to beat the bad guy. 

Do you see how the picture is starting to form.  Not really an outline per se, but more of road map.  I’m hoping it will allow me to keep my pantser identity, but I have a feeling no successful writer is really a true pantser, because at some point we all have to plot.

Because I’ll be swimming with the NaNo sharks all of November, my blogs will just be a word count with maybe one or two sentences (if I can form them) on what’s happening.  Keep your fingers crossed I survive NaNo and bring forth some awesome habits and new writing skills! 

Now onto NaNo!

PS: If you want to add me to your NaNo buddy list, feel free! I’m at NaNo Wrimo under Jami Gray!

–Wicked

My Evil Plot

Okay, it’s probably not evil, but for me plotting is evil. I am a panster at heart and I find it very difficult to force myself to have a cohesive plan. But after last week’s revelation I decided I needed to try something different. Now that I have Scrivener (plotters personal holy grail) I have no reason not to give it a go. For those of you not familiar with Scriviner it has a side bar where you can can put various chapters/scenes/notes/research all in a cohesive manner. This is difficult to explain so I highly recommend checking out a Youtube video or going to http://www.literatureandlatte.com/ to browse a bit. 

I also decided I needed to analyze my characters more and decided to see what the web had to offer me. I found this character worksheet http://jodyhedlund.blogspot.com/p/character-worksheet.html and have begun the process of psychoanalyzing my characters which is both fun and tedious. I have to admit I am learning a lot about my characters. For instance I had no idea that Peg’s favorite color was orange or that she was a big Stephen King fan. She also collects tea cups (fun fact for all of you). 

So far this journey has been fun and I have to admit my favorite part is finding all of these wonderful tools online. Writer’s are truly fortunate these days because we have so much information at our finger tips. That is if we have access to the internet (I’m going to assume that you do if your reading my post). I have found a lot of things this past week that I believe will make my novel rock my socks off and hopefully one day a larger audience. 

Let’s Try This Again

Okay, fair warning, don’t eat while you read this blog because for some reason analogies of festering wounds have been coming to me regarding this topic. Well, this week I had an epiphany: I realized that whereas I liked the general storyline of my WIP, there were certain elements that I no longer felt were a good idea. Also, I realized that I had some of those pesky little holes in my overall plot. The other evil dwarves don’t seem to think “it just does” is a good answer when they question the dynamics of my world building. 

I know that everything is fixable, but at the same time after being with the group for a few months, I realize there are certain things I would like to add to the story, and that my setting isn’t working for me. Plus those lovely dwarves have also been helping me with formatting (my current formatting skills are lacking). So with all of these various items weighing on my mind, it became a bit overwhelming. Cue the epiphany.

Time for a rewrite. This WIP is one of those I have gone back and forth to over the years because while I loved the story idea, I wasn’t 100% sure where it was going. In retrospect, after joining a critique group, I know why I wasn’t sure, because the story has issues. So as not to disappoint those who set aside their lunch: a good story is like a wound. The initial idea is when the injury first occurs and the closing of said wound is when all of a writer’s plotting comes together perfectly. If a writer has a deep enough connection with a reader,  a nice scar may be left behind, and the reader will never forget your story. On the other hand, sometimes stories don’t close up well and they start to fester. You ignore them until you realize you can no longer deal with the infection,and at this point you can amputate (give up on the story if you’re sure nothing else you do can fix it), or you can tear off the scab, clean the wound, and start over. I’m choosing the latter.

So I bought Scrivener as I believe it will help help me with at least a general outline (I’m a bit of a panster) and organizing my research. So today is to new beginnings. I’ve got a fresh band aid so let’s close this one up.

 

Series Issues

 

Recently, I read a series that came very highly recommended, as well as, part of another series.  I enjoyed both series, but was intrigued by the different ways these two authors created them.

The first author wrote a series that felt almost like a few separate books, with one central character, rather than a series.  As I continued reading books in this series, I realized that every book could stand entirely by itself, which was good in a lot of ways.  But, there was nothing in these books that made me compelled to read the next book.  Once I started reading a book, I always wanted to continue reading it, but I didn’t mind taking long gaps between reading one book and the next.  Still, I felt that creating a series this way would make it difficult to retain readers, unless they were extremely devoted.

The second author wrote a book FILLED with tons of characters and intricate subplots.  I am only a few short pages from finishing this book, but I found the number of characters confusing, and even though I got the sense that a lot of them will be important in the future, many of them seemed to make no real difference in this book.  So, why was I even introduced to them?

I have to believe these characters will be important in future books, but I wonder why I simply wasn’t introduced to them in these books.  Or, at the very least, I wish I hadn’t spent so many pages reading about characters that disappeared in the rest of the book.  But, I did feel compelled to read this book, and I am very excited to read the other books in the series.  I imagine this series has absolutely no problem retaining its readers, because you really want to know what will happen next.  The author does an excellent job creating a lot of questions that leave the reader wanting more.

So, what are your thoughts?  Is it better to introduce multiple characters that leave your readers curious about future books, or save those characters for when they really matter?

Plot, Character and Story

What should we write about?

There’s a very simple answer to this. Whatever advances the story. What does this mean, though? What is the story?

One thing for sure – it’s not merely the plot. Most stories have a plot which could be summarized in a few lines.

It’s also not a matter of telling us more about the characters. If we’re telling the reader stuff about the characters which doesn’t matter, it doesn’t work.

This is the mystery of writing. The point of the characters is to advance the plot. The point of the plot is to reveal, by torture, what the characters are like. Take your favourite story, and you’ll find the plot and characters inextricably entangled.

How do we summarise a story? Well, if we can summarise a story in fewer words – without losing anything – then the story is too long, and has something in there that doesn’t belong. A story should consist of exactly what it takes to tell the story.

This doesn’t necessarily mean a taut, brief Hemingwayesque style. If the story needs endless diversions and distractions, then they should be provided. If very little happens in the plot, the meandering thoughts of the protagonists may still be enthralling. What happens in Joyce’s Ulysses? Very little.

There are plenty of writers’ guides that will say that characters should change in the story, or be in jeopardy, or learn important lessons. That something important should be at stake. This might be so, but there are plenty of stories where nothing changes, where nobody learns anything, nothing is at stake, and everything ends up exactly where it started. Indeed, that’s almost a specification for a typical sitcom. A story doesn’t have to go anywhere.

How do we know what our story is? This might seem obvious. However, it’s easy to be caught out. I submitted a story for evaluation thinking I knew what it was about. I found out that my main character was unsympathetic. I couldn’t understand this at first. I knew what a nice guy he really was. However, I had forgotten to show it. I’d concentrated on the plot, and forgotten what the story was. The kind of person he was, the relationships he had – they were at the heart of the story. I’d told the reader everything that happened, but I hadn’t told them the story at all. Is this an easy determination to make? Almost never.

 

Manipulation or Creativity?

I’m struggling along with Book 3, manipulating plots and running my characters through various emotional/physical guantlets because, hey, I’m a writer. Being a Master of Pain (physcial, emotional, slight or devasting) is in our DNA. So here’s my question for the week…as writers or creators (depending on your POV) are you manipulating your characters to get what you want or are the manipulating you? And is manipulation the right word or is it another aspect of creativity?

I’ve mentioned it before, but I’m a complete pantser–I shuddered at the concept of an outline, but I do have to have major plot points like massive “You are going in the right direction” signposts. Here’s the probelm…the journey between signposts can be a well delinated path or a big black hole of chaos. I’ve found over the years that I’m a character driven writer–they are the ones who direct the story, drive the plots and are the basis for the horrific twists and turns they encounter.

My characters do not always like me and I’m pretty sure both Raine and Xander have a photo of me somwhere where in they practice various throwing skills with lethally sharp implements. I’m okay with that (most of the time) but sometimes I think they get their own back by jerking me around on a creative leash. I shouldn’t complain, because I love writing my stories. But some days it makes me want to pull out my hair and chase them down with my own sharp pointy weapon (a huge fountain pen dipped in red!).

My point to ponder this week: who’s manipulating who in the creative process and is it really such a bad thing?’

Wicked