Clearly defined goals

Over the next few blogs I’m going to really hone in on clarity. Lingering questions are the key to excellent craft but if you ever want your writing to be published there must be some clarity on a few things.

Today think about your goals. Are they clearly defined? You want to be published? When? Where? What form? What genre? What publication or Which project?
Do you even think about these questions? Do you say “I want to be published next year” or do you say, “I want to have my WIP “Awesome Book” completed and at least three queries out by August 2010”?

Does it seem I am really beating on this right now? It is because in the course of working with authors in my Writing Career Coach program I find that most people are extremely ambivalent. They are afraid of failure and are thus stuck in this persistent “One day” mentality.

So, write a clear goal for each day this week. What is ONE thing you will do each day? It could be research [Read 17 pages on Regency etiquette] or it could be directly writing [write 1,500 words], but whatever your goal determine going in how doing this will help advance your writing career. That will give a real value to your goal and make you more likely to follow through.

The Writing Career Coach blog is moving! After the first of the year we will only be posting to our main website. There you will find the blog, information on my speaking topics, FREE articles to help you with your writing and more. In order to receive or continue to receive these postings by e-mail, subscribe here.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com

Tiffany is a speaker and teacher. Find out about available topics for your group’s next event.

Tiffany is a National Examiner. Read her articles here.
Learn more about Tiffany’s Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany’s award winning manuscript “A Face in the Shadow” on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer’s Rest.

Practice your scenes

Here is an exercise to help you with your craft today. In the comments write the following scene but within your genre. Let the tone, description and pace of this small scene be guided by the time period, mood of the scene, genre of the book, etc.

A man and woman are walking outside. Both are hungry.

How much tension can you make of this prompt? How many problems could you realistically throw at them? Will it even matter at the end of the scene that they were hungry or is that just what brought them to the place of conflict? Or will a new secret be revealed over dinner.

Be creative and tell us the genre and time period you're writing in. Have fun with it. I cannot wait to read what you write.

The Writing Career Coach blog is moving! After the first of the year we will only be posting to our main website: http://www.writingcareercoach.com/. There you will find the blog, information on my speaking topics, FREE articles to help you with your writing and more. In order to receive or continue to receive these postings by e-mail, subscribe here.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at http://www.writingcareercoach.com/
Tiffany is a speaker and teacher. Find out about available topics for your group’s next event.
Tiffany is a National Examiner. Read her articles here.
Learn more about Tiffany’s Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany’s award winning manuscript “A Face in the Shadow” on her fiction blog.She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer’s Rest.

Using what you live to deepen character conflict

"That will end up in a book."

If you spend any time around a writer you will hear that phrase. That is because so much of our writing is drawn from our personal experiences in one way or another. While most of my stories are not autobiographical [I don't stalk women based on a misinterpreted scripture, nor am I a college student in a small town trying to solve a murder], I have to admit that things that I experience do find their way in to my writing in one way or another.

Maybe it is the way I personally reacted to a breakup or disappointment. It could be that one of my characters is afraid of the same thing I am. These are all obvious and easy to do.

Have you ever considered bringing the dual nature of your personality in to your writing?

I am really a dichotomy. On the one hand, I am a successful speaker who really enjoys speaking to large groups. On the other hand, I am a total nerd who gets excited at the idea of doing research and looked forward to every term paper in college. My idea of a dream job would be sitting in a room full of ideas, articles, news reels, historical data, etc. and making sense of it all. Pecking away at a keyboard and discussing the implications with a coworker of similar temperment. Trying to find a pattern and constructing possible scenarios from it.

How do you reconcile the two? One is extremely extroverted, the other introverted. One thrives on feedback and the energy of a crowd, the other the quiet solitude of one's own thoughts.

I guess you become a writer. That's what I did.

Think about the contradictory things in you. Then take time to discover and deepen the contradictory nature of your main characters [including your villain]. Doing that will deepen your writing and create a more relatable story.

Learn how to get readers to pick you and your story by following these links:
Getting readers to pick you
How readers decide what to read
Presenting yourself well
Getting noticed by readers
Going on the hunt

The Writing Career Coach blog is moving! In order to offer you more services and a central location for all information I am moving this blog to our main website: http://www.writingcareercoach.com/ There you will find the blog, information on my speaking topics, FREE articles to help you with your writing and more.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at http://www.writingcareercoach.com/

Tiffany is a speaker and teacher. Find out about available topics for your group’s next event.

Tiffany is a National Examiner. Read her articles here.

Learn more about Tiffany’s Marketing techniques on her main blog.

Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.

Read Tiffany’s award winning manuscript “A Face in the Shadow” on her fiction blog.

She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer’s Rest.

Under promise, over deliver

This weekend I took some time to listen to the teachings of a man [Dan Stratton] who formerly held a seat on the New York Mercantile exchange and grew from humble Midwest roots to going to Yale and earning a seven figure income. While that may be impressive, what impresses me most about him is his ability to not allow the cut-throat nature of the pits on Wall Street to make him cut corners or cheat.

In the discussion I was listening to he was focusing on integrity in our business dealings. He said at one point, and I’m paraphrasing, under promise and over deliver.

This struck me because a writer’s group I’m a part of had recently spent some time commenting on the lackluster performance of some books. This led to a rousing conversation on the strengths and weaknesses of certain books. It makes you cringe as an author. You wonder, “Is that what someone will say about my writing?”

I think these disappointments are even more prominent when expectations are raised beyond an author’s ability to deliver. There is a tendency to try to make our writing stand out, but it is done using compelling language that whets the appetite [good] and raises the expectations of a work artificially high [not good].

While I always encourage you to write the best possible hook, [see def. below] I don’t want you to become so obsessed that your hook over promises your craft. The hook should be the same flavor of the book and set the tone for the story.

Likewise, in your business, make sure that you can do what it is that you promise. Don’t get in over your head. All of us have unforeseen circumstances [the fact that my 6 year old daughter was up at 5:15am today with a very high temperature is the one in my life], but we should always plan them in to our work schedule. I set every Thursday as a “catch-up” day. I schedule little or nothing on that day in terms of work. If I am behind in projects, I can catch up. If I am caught up I can do Friday’s work [and get a 3 day weekend…unlikely] or spend time on my own projects [more likely].

By only promising what you can reasonably accomplish you will build a reputation of integrity and a happy clientele/ readership.

Hook=a short sentence or couple of sentences meant to grab the attention of a reader, editor or agent. You will also sometimes see this in reference to the opening of a book to. Ex. “The book opened with a strong hook.”

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Tiffany is a speaker and teacher. Find out about available topics for your group's next event.
Tiffany is a National Examiner. Read her articles here.
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website. [www.TheBalancedLife.com]
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.[http://writersrest.blogspot.com]

Craft: Stage Direction

When I'm editing I will occasionally throw out terms to clients. This weekend I was editing and I said they were using Stage Direction.

So what is Stage Direction?

In this posting I'll give a quick example of Stage Direction and an idea for how to correct it. Think about what this really is. It is infusing emotion in to your story. It is causing your character to interact with the scene.

It is simply where you tell where they're walking around or what they're doing on the stage. Like in a play. the Stage Direction tells us where the character will be on the set at any given moment.

Compare:


He walked to the table and picked up the phone. He dialed the phone. No one answered. He hung it up. He walked to the kitchen and got a glass of milk.

vs.

He walked to the table and clicked on the light. The room was suddenly thrown from complete darkness to murky light covered in shadows. They sent an eerie chill through him. As if at any moment one of the shadows could come alive to stop him from calling Sally. He gently lifted the phones receiver and brought it to his ear. The hum of the dial tone grew louder as he held it against his head. A sound behind him made him stop. He pulled the phone away and watched around the room. But no monster awaited. No shadow had morphed to reveal a ghoul. He held the phone away as he pushed in the seven numbers. The phone droned out a distant ring.

rrring. One. He watched. His back to the wall, eyes patrolling the darkness. Ears alert to unusual sounds.

rrring. Two.

The phone continued it's waiting but by the tenth ring he silenced it with a clang.

He walked from the room without cutting off the light. If someone were watching the house they'd assume he was up there. That would give him precious moments to make his escape.

He tiptoed from the room and down the steps. The thudding of his heart outpaced the ticking of the grandfather clock by two. tick--thud, thud--tock. He stepped in the kitchen and pulled down a glass. Suddenly he craved a glass of milk and the comfort it had always given him as a boy.

Okay, I'm sure you see a clear difference. One just tells you what he is doing. The other gives you a sense of his motivation and reaction to his environment. The first, we don't know what the person is thinking or feeling. Nor do we know why. In the second we experience the scene.

Hope that helps.




Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Why Should You Care?

What differentiates your writing from that of others? What is it that makes your craft more exciting than that of other writers.

Do you have a unique angle?

While it isn't always necessary to have a specific thing, like Koontz has Dogs, it is necessary to know what it is that distinguishes your writing from that of other writers.

Many times as part of our marketing we do a comparative analysis. We look at similar books. The purpose of this is to say that the READERS of those books will likely be among the people who would also enjoy your book.

However, you must always be aware of what it is that makes you unique. Build on it. Integrate it in your marketing. Make it a part of your website. Use it in giveaways.

Begin to determine what is unique about you, your writing and your stories.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Perception is Truth

I know, I'm being a bit philosophical for a Monday, but let me explain. I am currently reading three business books. One of them is on presentation skills. In this book, the name currently escapes me, the author makes the assertion that our marketing is skewed because we think that the facts will win out.

That was startling to me...of course the facts will win out.

He went on to say that rather than the facts, a customer will purchase based on perception.

And I realized he is right.

Imagine I cracked two eggs in a bowl. Which would you perceive to be the healthier, the one with a pale yellow yolk or the one with a deep yellow yolk?

What if I presented you with two apples, one is shiny and red the other is dull yellow and pink with a bit of green. Which would you determine to be the best to eat?

What if two men walked in for an interview, one with a scruffy beard, the other clean shaved.

Do you perceive your brand of toothpaste to be the best?

I started thinking about this idea and I realized how much we are driven by our perceptions rather than facts. It is actually a bit scary!

However, armed with this information we can design a marketing strategy for our books and stories that will reach to our target reader. That is why knowing your reader is so important [look at last weeks blog for more on that.]

Look at the websites of other writers and see which appeal to you and which do not. What do you want a reader to feel when they read your books? They should feel that when they visit your site.

Their perception of you will be shaped by their contacts with you. Most of their contact will be through your website and your books.

It doesn't matter who you are or what your writing actually is. The perception a potential reader has of you will determine whether they give you a shot. Then their perception of your writing will determine their opinion of you overall.

And no matter what writing contests, experts or facts say...the perception of the readers IS the truth.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Getting back to the story

As authors we have so many different things we need to do. We need to be marketers, writers, business people...not to mention our personal lives. Today I want to talk a bit about getting back to the story.

What do I mean by that?

I'm talking about what we do when we've spent a great deal of time working on the business side of our business and not as much on the actual creative writing. I find that I go in cycles where I'll write a few thousand words a week, then I can go a week or two without working on my fiction. During that time I've written articles, countless blogs, emails, content for clients and proposals for projects...but not fiction.

So how to we get back in to that mode?

I've heard a few different tips that have worked for me with varying degrees of success. See what helps you get back in to your story. I do have ONE word of caution-try to resist the urge to do too much editing!! I find that many times, especially if I choose the first option, that many times I'll end up spending so much time editing what I've done that I get no meaningful writing done. Avoid this temptation.

1. Reread the previous scene to see where you were in the story and get a feel for the character voices.
2. Look through your outline and notes you've made.
3. Listen to a few of the songs that are "theme music" for either the character or the manuscript. I tend to listen to 80s love ballads [Air Supply, Journey] when I'm working on the romantic elements of a story. I listen to 80s/90s metal when I'm working on intense scenes or the bad guy. When I'm working on tying up the loose ends of a story in the concluding chapters I love to listen to Natalie Grant and Nicole Nordeman.
4. Spend the 24 hours leading up to the writing playing scenes from your story in your mind. Let the characters chat with each other. Imagine them in various predicaments and see how you can make them WORSE...then how they can escape.
5. Think about a great book you read recently and try to think of ONE thing that really impacted you.
6. Read the opening of 5-6 books [or chapter openings of a few books] and see what it was about the verbiage that grabbed you.

Maybe you have other things that help-share them with us. If not, use some of these. I usually use each of these at various stages of each book. They help me get focused on the creativity needed to have great craft.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

An example to illustrate...

One of my coaching students emailed me last week to do an edit. I gave her a very detailed critique on her opening paragraph. I then thought that what I shared might help other writers so I asked her permission to share it with you.

I have kept her anonymous to protect the innocent [and if she is entering Genesis she will want to STAY anonymous] but, if she chooses to reveal herself in the comments, I hope she'll tell you some of how she applied all of this to her full WIP. Please pay particular attention to the ways to construct questions in the reader's mind. It is not the only way, but it is one way. The key is understanding WHY you want to do that and how it will help you improve your writing.

For those of you who have wondered about my editing and coaching, this is a sample of what you get. I hope it will help all of you.

Her opening read:

I gripped the steering wheel as Nikko slept in his kennel in the back of the jeep. The phone call that interrupted dinner was from Sheriff Logan, telling me a six year old girl went missing. The longer the child is missing the more difficult to pick up the scent. So far, they have not been successful.
Before leaving Boones Creek, I drove through McDonalds at the edge of town for a cup of strong coffee. Nikko had water in his kennel, besides he sleeps while I’m driving.
***

This is what I said to her:

I really see that you've improved.

As I started the first paragraph I started some changes [suggestions] to you. Look below-

You gripping the steering wheel and Nikko sleeping aren’t related. It is better to say something like.

I gripped the steering wheel and tried to process everything Sheriff Logan had said. Behind me Nikko slept soundly in his kennel. His near silent breathing the only noise besides the thundering of my heart. Another girl missing, a six year old, and Nikko and I were needed. Every second that ticked past would make the scent harder for Nikko to pick up. How long had she been missing? How old was the scent?

Nikko let out a muffled whimper from his slumber. Was he dreaming of chasing a rabbit through the woods or was he running to escape the nightmares like I do?
***

I want to tell you what it is I was doing here and why. Gripped is a GREAT verb but we need more. Therefore I have her gripping the steering wheel PROCESSING what the Sheriff said. Immediately the reader starts to wonder what the sheriff said, what her relationship with the sheriff is, what we are going to find out next. She could have heard a loved one was dead. Maybe she is under suspicion for a crime. We don't know. So the reader will keep reading to find out the answer.

You had the dog sleeping in the kennel but it seemed like a distraction before BUT by HEARING the breathing it engages more of our senses and we start to experience the scene a bit more. Now we are in a car, there is a dog sleeping behind her and we can hear it breathe. "But what did the sheriff say and what does this DOG have to do with anything?" The reader still wonders.

Her heart is thundering. She is gripping the steering wheel. Both indicate stress or fear...hmmm, the reader wonders why.

Next, a girl is missing. And the heroine is needed with the dog. Okay, he is a service dog. A blood hound? A cadaver dog? No, the next sentence indicates that the scent could grow cold. That means we hope the girl is still alive. So the reader keeps reading because we still have the unanswered question of why the narrator is so upset? Then we learn of the time constraint. We want to yell to her "Stop sitting there!!! Go find the girl !!!"

Then we HEAR the dog again [see, how we have touch and hearing weaving through this scene]. Anyone familiar with a dog knows what this sounds like, but we add a sinister twist to it. The heroine wonders if the dog is dreaming happily or if it is tortured LIKE SHE IS!!

This question of her internal struggle is "BRIDGING CONFLICT". Go look at it in "Writing the Breakout Novel" and you'll see it's function. This is a lingering question you don't want to answer too quickly. This is ALL just the opening paragraph. The FIRST paragraph of your story. Compare this to what you wrote and you'll see that I simply added some unspoken questions to the readers mind as they read. You see some I introduced and then quickly answered. Others I introduced and left unanswered.

The big thing is add more senses. You have a great framework to do this with. You had the dog sleeping, I introduced the sound of his snores...

So read through and start to think of places you an include sensory details [the five senses]...and try to associate many of them with an emotion as well. "The comforting smell of pine pulled her back to grandma's house and the pine trees that bristled outside her window at night. It was her safe place and the one she always imagined escaping to when life at home became too terrifying." Do you see how you've learned a bit about the character, her relationship with her grandma and her childhood all because of a smell?

So, look over your MS and see how you can add those things [we don't want to over do it. Descriptions are like salt. =) ]

I hope this helps.

***
So, if you've ever wondered what I do when I coach and offer edits, now you know. I hope all of you will see a nugget in here that will help you in your writing. If you have any questions you can contact me through my website www.WritingCareerCoach.com or www.TheBalancedLife.com

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Doing Research

If you write non-fiction or articles you understand how important research is. Every detail must be checked and rechecked for accuracy and relevance.

In fiction research is also important. Here are a few reasons:

1. Because other people know the truth.

Yes, there are people out there who will know when you're fudging it. This is bad because it will jerk that reader out of the story world. Sloppy research, like sloppy writing, can quickly turn off readers. These may not be HUGE details [like the year a war started] but can be more subtle. Saying someone headed the wrong way down a one-way. Maybe in your historical you don't know the correct day of the week that May 5th landed on in 1847. These are important details that add depth to your stories.

2. They create a more convincing story world

People read fiction to visit other lands. When you have details you make your stories more authentic. If you'd like to see an author with rich details that transport you to another time and place visit Linore Rose Burkard. She is a master at wonderful details.

3. They are useful in marketing.

As I've said before, articles are a great way to build your platform and create readership. Don't let all these wonderful details go to waste once you find them.

Research can be an exciting way to get creative juices flowing. Take a little extra time to dig deeper in the time, setting, profession or background of your characters. Then find ways to share this information.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Common-sense money management is free at The Balanced Life website.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Make your reader feel appreciated

I had something really neat happen to me recently. I was contacted by a reader and told that I was recognized on their website. Here is a portion of the email:

Hi Tiffany,
We just posted an article, "The 50 Best Career Coach Blogs" (http://www.universityreviewsonline.com/2005/10/the-50-best-career-coach-blogs.html). I thought I'd bring it to your attention in case you think your readers would find it interesting.
I am happy to let you know that your site has been included in this list.
***
It felt good to be recognized and appreciated for the countless hours I put in to my blog and website.

Everyone enjoys being recognized, including your target market. That is why contests are so popular. We like it because for that moment we feel we’re adding value. We feel like we have excelled and distinguished ourselves in a particular area.

How can you give your reader that same feeling?

I don’t necessarily have an answer for this. It is still a question that is sloshing around in my mind. One thing I am going to do is share a great blog I discovered.

I’ll talk about that on Monday. In the meantime, tell someone you know about what they’ve meant to you. Thank them for helping you. Recognize extra effort.

And go check out the “50 Best Career Coach Blogs”. See what else they have over there.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Craft: Enough Said

Have you ever read a book that you wanted to read but had an annoying "tick"?

I just finished a book that did. While the plot line was intriguing and kept me guessing, and the characters were fun to listen to [you all know I 'read' most of my books on tape, right?] there was an annoying habit the author had that made me insane!!

"I'm cold." I said.
"Turn on the heat." He said.
"I can't reach it." I said.
"It is right behind you." He said.
"Oh, there it is." I said.
"I told you." He said.
"You were right." I said.

AHHHH, I screamed at my tape player "ENOUGH SAID!!"

I really try to learn something from everything I read-no matter what. From this book I learned that we always need to take the time to listen to our stories. There are text-to-speech software options. They help you recognize stilted dialog and annoying words [like 'said'] that show up constantly.

I started to wonder if this author was trying to hit word count or something and padded their manuscript with the word "said".

There was another book I 'read' last spring that had the word 'Sardonic' so much that my HUSBAND actually started to hate it...and he didn't hear the whole book [but he did get to hear my rants about the thing.]

Both of these authors have sold more than two dozen titles. Both have climbed [and stayed on] the best sellers lists.

The reason they did was because they made an incredible story with compelling characters and an engaging plot. Make sure that you are doing that too.

And try to avoid the pet phrases....

Enough said.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.
She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer's Rest.

Close the door

In my dogged ear copy of "On Writing" by Stephen King I have marked up countless nuggets of sheer genius. I have never forgotten where he says writing is telepathy [and then goes on to demonstrate it] nor where he tells readers they must master the basics.

Overall, I think I'd like Stephen King, if we were to meet. Not because he is a famous writer but his sense of humor resonates with me. It is more witty than howling funny. He also is "twisty" [like Ted Dekker] and I love trying to braid plot twists in to my stories whenever possible. Sometimes I even get knots.

But today I'm not talking about the genius of craft on deeper levels. I'm talking about those first drafts. While Stephen King's term "door shut writing" is fine I prefer to call it vomiting on paper.

Why would you vomit on paper?

When I vomit on paper I'm throwing the entire story as I see it. A sculptor mushes the clay in to a general shape before getting out the fine tools and pushing and mushing it in to a piece of art. The same is true with our writing.

For those of us finishing NaNo the brilliant piece you just completed is door shut writing. I always discourage ANYONE from showing their writing at that stage. Every single time I break this rule I am sorry. There are times where I think it is simply AWESOME and I have to share my genius or I'll burst.

The only thing that gets bursted is my bubble.

When you are free to simply write whatever falls in your brain [even though I'm a heavy outliner] you are able to crank out word count [throw mounds of clay on the table] and see some general shape.

Then set the MS aside. I usually try not to go back to it at all until I've completed another MS. That gives me time to fall in love with the genius of my writing in another novel [she said with a snicker] and then return to face MS one.

The problem with leaving the door open all the time is you'll constantly edit. Editing is critical. Editing-when done at the wrong time-stifles creativity.

As those of you who have completed the 50K of Nano can attest, when you put your head down and simply WRITE 50K is nothing.

So if a writer like Stephen King has to write a first draft out of the glare of spotlight-I think there's something in it for the rest of us.

Close the door-and see how much more productive you become.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving and I'll see you next week.

Your Coach for the Journey, Tiffany Colter

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at www.WritingCareerCoach.com
Learn more about Tiffany's Marketing techniques on her main blog.
Read Tiffany's award winning manuscript "A Face in the Shadow" on her fiction blog.

Click the delete button

I've been engrossed in edits at the same time I'm working on my NaNoWriMo novel. One thing I've learned as an author is that we cannot be afraid to click the delete button. One of my biggest time wasters has been me trying to get a scene to fit in a novel-when it REALLY needs to be deleted.

On this current novel I've deleted more than 20,000 words in the last month but the manuscript is within a few hundred words of where I started. That is because my liberal use of the delete button has allowed me the freedom to work in new scenes that strengthen my writing rather than trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.

But I don't advocate simply dumping these scenes! For every novel [or other MS] that I write I have a "deleted scenes" file. So rather than delete I actually cut and paste the scene from one novel and paste it in the deleted scenes file. There have been 2 or 3 times in this current novel where I've realized that a 'deleted' scene could be used in the book with tweaking. These scenes actually strengthened my book by moving their location. Imagine if I'd insisted on making them work where they originally were!

On that same topic I keep books that just "don't work out". 2 years ago during NaNoWriMo I tried to write a piece of women's fiction based on a character from a suspense I'd written. I got 25,000 words in to the book before I realized that I simply was not gifted to write Women's Fiction.

Well, when I was deepening the characters in the MS I'm editing now I realized a scene from that "women's fiction" book would add to my current MS. Glad I didn't delete it.

So, look at your stories like a puzzle. When you pick up a piece that doesn't fit you don't throw it in the trash, you don't cut the edges to force it in to place and you don't give up. You put the pieces back in the box until you find the right fit!

The same can be said of your entire writing career. You can't keep working on the same MS trying to get it it fit. Work on something else and put the manuscript with 200 rejections on the shelf. The day MAY come when it is ready to dust off but, in the meantime, focus on other projects to build your writing career.

Your coach for the journey, Tiffany Colter

Read A Face in the Shadow on my other blog.

Engage your reader by relating to your reader

Have you ever read a book and screamed to the character "No, don't do that!!" Why did you do that? It's because you were so pulled in to the book that you cared for the reader.

Not only that you had experience from life that told you they were making a mistake.

As you know from reading my blogs on movies, I learn about craft from some non-writing sources. That is true for today's blog.

I heard a song when I was surfing through stations recently and was intrigued. It is "Because of you" by Kelly Clarkson. Many of my characters have been hurt and thus have a very difficult time relating emotionally to people. They throw up emotional walls.

But how do we convey that in a book?

That is what we have to learn as writers. I'd like you to go to this youtube video of Kelly's for the song "Because of you" and really look at what the story is about. You hear the words. You feel the emotion. You see the package.

In less than 30 seconds...actually more like 5...I immediately relate to the characters. Go watch the video now. I'll wait. We'll discuss it here below.

Spoiler:
Okay, how did you feel about that poor little girl? [The younger 'Kelly Clarkson"] My heart hurt for her. What in the pictures did you see that showed you that her dad was preoccupied with his own issues?

What about the mom?

How do we see that she was trying to smooth things over between her parents?

How did we see that there were problems in her parent's marriage?

How did we see her parents divorced?

How did we see that "Kelly" was determined NOT to make that same mistake?

Now watch the video again but this time mute your computer. You have no words but yet the entire message is being communicated to you RIGHT!

THAT is showing rather than telling.

Now turn the music back on. The words don't coincide with all that is happing but rather summarizes. Like interior monologue. We get the emotional reaction to the physical events.

That is what you need to do in your writing. You need to let the reader SEE what is happening and then react to it emotionally by the POV character's reaction to it.

So does that clear up Showing vs. Telling?

I'll see you later this week. I hope you all have gone over to read A Face in the Shadow. It is 100% free with no sign ups.

Building the layers in your writing

A recent email from someone has inspired me to begin sharing a bit more on building craft on this blog. Typically I try to focus on marketing writing and reflections on the writer's life, but this person's comment took me back to my early writing days.

I remembered when I couldn't seem to get the hang of creating a scene. It felt flat without any real interaction between the place, the character and the reader. Then I read a book where the exact same moment was lived through the eyes of three different characters. In that instant I realized the power of POV to develop the location of the story as a character. In the book I read there was a hero, heroine and bad guy all approaching a clearing in a woods. This may seem cliche but try creating it in your mind.

Think about the different fears, expectations, goals, and 'baggage' that will influence each person's perception of what is happening there. I'm going to paste below the example I shared with my new friend. We now join the email, already in progress:[laugh]

...give a physical reaction to an emotional one. Imagine a lady is walking in to a dark cabin after getting lost at sunset in a woods.

"She stopped just inside the door of the old cabin. Cobwebs crackled as she pulled them down with a stick and twisted them around and around like the cotton candy man of her childhood. Only this place wasn't a carnival and the white strands balling up on her stick were flavored with dread."

Physical=hearing the crackle of cobwebs.
Emotional= contrasting this terrifying moment with something from childhood.
Physical=flavor of cotton candy
emotional=flavored with fear.

This is not a perfect example but rather a rough draft. I want you guys to try to build off of this. Let's have fun. Take the scene and build on it. Give us more sensory detail. Why is she in the woods? Escaping a bad guy? Broken down car? Because she's mad at her husband and she's run to the cabin of her childhood to think?

If you have your own blog and want to build on this then tell us in the comments [with a link] so we can all come see it and comment. If you don't want to do that, then edit this piece and put it in the comments of this blog so we can all see the creativity of each other. Don't be shy!! Let's have fun!!

Tomorrow [Tuesday Oct. 14th] Tiffany Colter Fiction launches with the first chapter of my Daphne du Maurier award winning Manuscript "A Face in the Shadow". I hope you all will subscribe to have each chapter sent to you, that you'll spread the word about it and that you'll enjoy reading it.

So, I'm off. I'm teaching at the Midwest Dreams writing conference Saturday, Oct. 18th. I hope to see many of you there!!

Your Coach for the Journey, Tiffany Colter

Is your Writing Stale?

As writers we are big on ideas but we can sometimes be small on execution. This is because we start to grow tired of a story before we get to the end. Many of you know the term "sagging middle". This describes the idea that the story starts to run out of steam shortly before the climatic final scene(s).

Another way it can start to get boring is going through endless edits. Believe me, I know what this can be like. I have a book that has been reworked 6 times. This same manuscript has been sent to a professional editor twice.

And still I edit on it. But I'm almost there. :-)

So how do you spice up your writing?

I've done three things to really get past staleness in my writing. I talked about the writing exercise I do in a previous post. You can see that post here.

Second, I go through the "Writing the Breakout Novel" book and workbook on each manuscript both in prewriting phase and after the first draft is done. I find by doing this twice I'm able to relax as I write that first draft. I know that I'll catch it in rewrites and the 'sagging middle' will get cleaned up as well. Both of these books are on my suggested reading list which you can find here. They have a link to Amazon where you can order yourself a copy.

The third thing I do is ask "But Why?" I actually learned this last year at a writer's conference. I was in a class on writing suspense and I gave the premise of my story and a bit about my main character. The writer teaching the class kept asking me "but why?".

I was very proud of myself because I was able to answer the first two "but why" questions. Then we got to the third, fourth and fifth. Suddenly I realized that I hadn't gone deep enough in to my story to really pull out the motivation of the characters...and my writing suffered because of it.

So if you're working on rewrites, first drafts, sagging middles or even a polish-take these steps to strengthen your writing.

Next time we'll look at ways to strengthen your Marketing.

Your Coach for the Journey!!

An exercize in improving your craft

For today's blog I'm going to teach you something that I've been doing to improve my craft. I have been reading many top selling/well written books and I'll take an opening paragraph or a particular scene and write one of my characters in to the scene. I try to keep as near as possible to the tone and feel of the scene without stealing the exact wording.

What this does is forces me to try to write as well as some of these top authors. It really gets me thinking about the way the scene is put together, the purpose of each word and the mood that is conveyed with those words.

Think about when you were in school and you had to write a limerick in English class. You were being introduced to a new style of writing. It is the same concept here. Take three or four really great openings to novels and see how they make you feel, how do they suck you in to the story and how can you do that with your own characters.

Of course, I'm not telling you to share this anywhere or to pass the writing off as your own, but rather, look at this as an exercise. It truly is. I have grown substantially as a writer simply by doing this with the intro of every book I read.

Your Coach for the Journey, Tiffany Colter