Tuesday's Writer's Tip - The five story elements in use #MFRWAuthor #Writing #story elements

Before you write the book you need to organise your five story elements into a statement and question. Many thanks to Dwight V. Swain for this little trick. I'm still learning how to mke this work completely but it really shows you where the story is going. Since the book I'm working on now is a romance, I do two of these since that helps me put the characters into focus.

I'll do Caleb's since I believe he has the most to gain.

Character Caleb Winstone MD.
Situation - He's returned home to begin his practice as a pediatrician.
Objective To avoid his family's decision that he should marry Regina Bishop.
Opponent Suzanna Rollins the woman he hurt and angered.
Disaster She has also arrived in town to begin as the nurse manager of the Pediatric Unit

So now what
When Caleb Winstone MD returns to his hometown to begin his practice as a pediatrician he finds his wealthy parents have chosen his bride, Regina Bishop, a woman he doesn't like and also the woman he wanted Suzanna Rollins, is the new nurse manager of the Pediatric Unit.

How can he fight his parents mechanizations, Regina's willingness and convince Suzanna he was a fool and she is the woman he wants in his life?

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Feelings #MFRWauthor #writing #feelings

Another quote from Dwight V. Swain's Techniques of the Selling Author. "A story is a succession of motivations and reactions."

Emotions or feelings are what you need in your stories to pull the reader from page one to the end. There is a need to build this from the first word you write. What you need to know is how to build these feelings to make a story. Some writers have this ability as a natural thing but others have to learn the steps.

The first step is about events that happen in the story and how to see if they are good or bad. Take a car accident. Generally thought of as bad but if this brings people together this can be considered good.

You need to look at all aspects of this event and tailor it to the story you are taking. This must be done in a specific way, not in a general way. This must mean something to the characters in your story. How they react is valuable.

The decision is yours so carefully examine every facet of the event.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - What is a story? #MFRWauthor #Story #Swain

For the next few weeks I'll be using Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain to share some tips. This was the first book on writing I discovered many years ago when I decided to write novels. This book made sense to me.

Mr. Swain says, "A story is experience translated into the literary process."

But learning how to do this is a process. Mr. Swain believes you can learn to write and sell stories. Will you make the big time? Maybe or Maybe not.

I agree and what you need to learn first are the techniques of writing a story. But will they make you a best-seller. That takes a special talent. Things like intelligence, passion, determination and how you can manipulate the language. Also how you put your feelings into the work. Those rules you've learned while studying to become a writer are subject to interpretation, Yours.

Twenty writers could be given the same situation and the same characters and in the end there would be twenty different stories.

What really helps you learn what a story is , is to practice, practice. Slowly the elements will make sense and suddenly you have a story. Maybe not a great one but the next one will be better. So learn the elements of a story and then practice employing them.

Tuesday's Inspiration - A Story Is... #MFRWauthor

"A story is words strung onto paper." Dwight V. Swain   Or in this cast, the computer. Being a writer means loving words and the way they fit together to form a picture. Sometimes when searching for words a writer hast to look them up. Some writers turn to Roget's wonderful listings and others turn to etymology to find the just right word to make the story come alive.

There's a problem with loving words and looking up new ones and that's when a writer choose a new and strange word that puzzles a reader. If the meaning of the word can't be shown by the content around this word, the reader will be pulled from the story to a dictionary to find the meaning. They may never return to the story.

Another problem when finding the right word is finding a lot of words to create the picture one is striving for. Words, especially adjectives can run in strings that so overwhelm the reader in pictures the reader feels lost in a sea of words. Finding the just right word that cascades the reader to think I recognize that place, person or thing.

So choosing the right words to string onto the paper can be great fun. Making sure those words create the picture the reader will understand can be hard work. But writers love words and fitting them together.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Characters Coming Into Being

After looking at the structure of a novel using Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain the pieces have been gathered. The next thing to develop is the characters. Now separating the two isn't usual, at least for me. The plot and structure of the story and the characters usually come together but what I'm looking at here is how to make those characters ones the reader will love or hate, as in the case of the villain.

Mr. Swain talks about five questions a writer should ask when developing a character. The first one is "How does a character come into being?" Are the characters in your story real? In a way yes, and in another way no. Real people have dozens and maybe even hundreds of nooks and crannies. A fictional character is hones so their nooks and crannies are just a few. Making the character too complicated can be confusing. What needs to be done is to select a few traits to develop and give the fictional person life within boundaries. What the character needs is just enough stuff to fit into the development of the story.

Characters develop gradually and they change and in changing the story may change or deepen. A fellow writer told me on her current WIP suddenly she learned things about her hero that didn't change him exactly but added to his reasons for acting the way he has chosen to act. This bit of information brought more life to a character who started out as hero and then the layers build. So all the parts of the character begin to coalesce and to the writer, the character becomes a person facing a particular situation with particular actions, reactions and motivations. Thus the fictional character becomes real to the writer. The more real to the writer, the more real to the reader.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Villains' Rewards

Still using Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain and this time I'm looking at rewarding the villain. Sounds easy to say they just up and die, go to jail, don't gain their goal. But when doing this their character must be taken into consideration. Just failing to reach their goal may not be enough. Seeing them punished by the law may not be enough. Having them go out in a way with the hero or heroine choosing the bad guy's reward may be enough especially if it comes as a surprise to the reader and give them that satisfying ending to the story.

Stories don't necessarily have to end with happily ever after but they should end with a way that satisfies the reader.

In the end, the bad guy must be shown to be unworthy of receiving the reward he desires. Readers like to see the guilty punished and the good rewarded. To give the bad guy the reward he seeks confuses the reader. Confusing the reader isn't a good thing. There is one place where it can seem like the bad guy seems to receive what he wants and that is when writing a series with the same character.

When I was writing the Affinities series, at the end of each of the stories, the villain remained to trouble the four children in the next book. Now here's the buy. In the first story, he appeared to be winning what he wanted. To know where the children were. What I did was let him know they were alive but were on the move and though it looks like he has a tie to one of the four. This is severed early in the second book but then his evilness finds another way but once again at the end of the second book, he knows they are alive and that he may reach his goal. This continues to the end of the fourth book when he receives his due and that is destruction.

So remember to give the bad guy what he's do but make it clear to your reader that receiving what he deserves is based on his character, not by the duex machine,

Wednesday's Writing Tip - On emotions

Still gleaning tips from Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain and this time it's on emotions. Building emotions into the story is important. Emotions are what draws the reader to continue to read on. We all have emotional reactions to things that happen in everyday life. So do the characters in our stories. Someone says or does something to the focus character of the story or of a particular scene, The main character sees something that is our of place in his or her orderly world. They react with emotions. Maybe they don't react as you would or your neighbor or friend or even a stranger reacts. The character must react in a way that is true to his or her nature.

As the writer, you can't just say. He or she saw the body and felt sick. That's telling the reader and not showing the reader what happened. How does the character react to this event. Does he or she laugh, cry, scream. There are many ways but the reaction must be true to the character.

In real life these emotional responses happen in a clump but trying to do this in a story can confuse the reader so the reactions must be spaced in a sequential patters. The same goes for bit action scenes. Jumping from one character to another can bring confusion. So the big action is shown through just the focus character's eyes with him or her taking the feature role. Theirs are the emotions that should matter to the reader because the focus character is the one they want to care about and to see either win or lose in the story.

So when you're writing decising what emotions a main character will feel must remain true to the character you have chosen to portray. Sometimes their actions won't be what you would do. While writing this bit I thought of Katherine Miller in Murder and Mint Tea and her discovery of the body or her nasty tenant and how she reacts and then what action she takes. Not what I would do but because of her protective nature, it's exactly what she would do.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Conflict and Change #MFRWriter

Interesting how sometimes what you're reading fits together. Yesterday I wrote about how your characters have to be changed by the end of the story. Then reading more of Techniques Of The Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain, the segment was on conflict and how that led to change.

Every character should face two kinds of conflict. Inner conflict belongs to his nature and his emotions. Outer conflict comes from the world around him or her and also involves emotion. If a character can't feel anything there is no reason for them to be part of a story.

All stories focus on some kind of change. But change isn't enough to make a story come alive. The focus character and other characters as well need to come to a different place in their lives. Without conflict in his or her life, there can be no change. A character being pulled in more than one direction be an internal struggle or being battered by events outside himself is more interesting that a character whose life goes smoothly.

External events have meaning and touch on a character's emotions. No matter what he or she sees in the external world can show a side of the character you want to reveal. A rainstorm, seeing an elderly couple holding hands, a magnificent castle. Any of these can show and reveal a character's emotions and nature.

Relating what each moment of a story reflects on a character makes the story stronger. So delve into the conflicts and use both inner and outer events to show your character.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Story World

When reading the next little section of Techniques of a Selling Writer, I learned how some things stick in your mind. My copy iof Swight V. Swain's book had been loaned out and never returned. I was doing a talk at NJRW about World Building For All Genres. I really remembered all the points in this book when it had been five or six years since I'd had a copy of the book in hand. So look at what these are.

Unfamiliar world. Whether you write contemporary, historical, paranormal, fantasy or science fiction, the reader doesn't know your world. As the writer, you need to draw them into the world. That was his first point. So you really need to know your world to draw the reader inside.

How does one do this? Through the senses is the second point Mr. Swain made. This is something I need to go back and remind myself of so many times. When I write about a hospital, how do I bring the chaos this world seems to the reader into focus. Sight, sound, smell, taste and touch are essential to making the world become one the reader can enter.

For a time, while re-reading this section, the third point puzzled me.  The world you're creating is subjective. Finally I realized what this meant. The focus character must interact with the setting and his or her actions and reactions to the world are what makes a reader believe in the story world you've created.

What I'm saying is often just a few pages you've read stick with you and soom become an automatic writing response.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Feelings #amlearning

I've always connected feelings to emotions. Is this true or false? Are there layers to Feelings I haven't explored. While re-reading Techniques of a Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain, one of the best books on writing I've ever read, I came across this bit about Feelings. "Feeling is a thing you build through manipulation of motivation and reaction." Mr. Swain says there are a number of steps to building feelings in a story. I've found them of much interest.

The writer has to decide what is good and what is bad. This took me a lot of thinking and I thought about mysteries I've written where death plays a large role. Death can be good or bad. Death brings feelings among the created characters. An expected death when a person has been suffering could be a good death. In some stories I've read, a character has sacrificed theit life for another. This could be considered a good death. Murder on the other hand can be considered a bad death. Or is it?

How does one decide? What about the facts? Are they things we read in books? Yes. Are they things we have been taught that others around us believe? Generally. So what doe facts have to do with feelings? Much depends on the person viewing the facts and this is where character creating comes into play. Using a character's reaction to a fact can deepen his character. While the character might not react to the fact the same way as the writer has, the writer must stay true to what the created person would believe and act. This can be difficult since it means the writer must put themselves into the character's shoes. That becomes the second stage of showing Feelings or emotions.

Wednesday's Writer's Tips - Words Glorious Words

A bit of a take off on a sonb but words are the food of the writer. I'm re-reading Techniques of The Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain and he devotes an entire chapter on words, choosing the right words, making the words vivid. This is something as a writer you should pay attention to. Without words there can be no story. Whether printed on paper, uploaded into an ereader, or spoken by a story teller, words are what creates the world and what the reader experiences. The words invite the reader to share the world.

How are these words used? To create characters, to show the setting and to advance the plot. Sometimes finding the right word is hard. When first starting a story, the words seem to flow rapidly or slowly depending in the writer's habits of writing. Often the first words put on the paper aren't the right words. They're almost right. My take on this is not to fret over every word but to get the ideas on paper. Finding the right word, the vivid word, the invitation word is better left to the revision phase.

Once I have the rough draft down and know where the story is going, I begin to look at particular areas. Dialogue. By now I know my characters since I have lived with them for a time. Dialogue is often written over three or four times. In the description areas of the story, choosing the words can bring the setting, the character to life. Becoming specific instead of generic is a good ited. What's the difference in the reader's mind between he drove a battered crate of undetermined origin or he drove the sleek silver power car destined to show his importance. Makes the hero a different person in each case.

Too many words can bog the reader down. I've read descriptions of a setting that detail every nook and cranny of a room. What I'm not sure of is what the writer wants me to notice. A few details allows the readerto fill in the blanks. This gives the reader a chance to engage their imaginations and enter the story as a silent participant.

So choose your words with care. Revise to find the exact right one. Revise to find the vivid one. Revise to bring the reader into the story.

Wednesday's Writer's Tip - Reasons people don't try

Hard to believe I've been a published writer since 1968, I began writing seriously before then and wish I'd been able to drive more than two hours to take classes in writing. Wasn't possible at the time but I did the next best thing. I purchased a copy of Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V. Swain and read this over and over again. When I went to my bookshelves to find my weathered copy to use to find inspiration for the Wednesday's Writer's Tip, I realized I had loaned the book to a budding writer perhaps five years ago and the book hadn't been returned. For Christmas I received some gift cards and used one of then to buy a new copy so I'll be using this to provide writer's tips for the next few weeks and maybe even months.

This book starts with reasons people don't think they can write. I do believe I suffered from them all when I began. So let's start on those reasons.

Reality checks. I didn't really think I could learn to write fiction since most of my time had been spent with non-fiction. But I began and learned I could. First efforts weren't great but there was the spark. Of course like all beginning writers I started looking for someone to wave a wand and by magic I'd turn into a writer. Wrong. What happened was with each draft the story became better. Learned there was no easy or hard way to learn how to craft stories. I did spend time analyzing other people's stories and that became boring because I learned they weren't me. One of the hardest things I found was putting emotions into stories. Still have this problem at times. Have learned to think about how I felt and try to put my feelings into the character's thoughts and words. Then I came upon rules. In school I'd had a firm grounding in the rules of grammar. My first efforts played by those rules I'd learned. Then I noticed that I wanted to break the rules. Use partial sentences. Start sentences with And of But. Omit commas or add them. One problem remains from my days of breaking the rules. I forget question marks. Fortunately most of the time the spell check on the computer finds them. Not all though. Another area I had to look at was fact finding. Those long boring passages that read like non-fiction and bogged the story down. Pages of description about a person, place or thing. I had to learn to scatter rather than disgorge. Actually what I really learned was the more you write, hopefully the better writer you become. And that is what I did but finding Mr. Swain's book really set me on the road to becoming published.

How about you? Have you discovered the same things I have?