Editing for POV

Point of view is one of the most subtle and powerful tools in the writer's toolbox. It's also one of the most troublesome.

I would guess 90% of the work I read from my peers and clients has at least some POV issues. Whether it's an unclear POV, too much narrative distance, or unwelcome POV shifts, most writers struggle to master POV. I myself, have yet to master it, but I've found it helpful to draw some very clear borders between POV types. I've already written a lengthy article on the subject, but let me go over it again.

I distinguish between two main types of POV, each with their own sub-types:

• First Person - "I"
• Third Person/Omniscient - "He", "She"

[Note: In the aforementioned article, I discuss Second Person as well. It plays a role in other POVs, but I do not consider it a viable option for an entire work of serious fiction]

With first person, you have two main subtypes:

• Present tense, where the POV character narrates events as they happen
• Past tense, where the POV character is recalling events that have already happened to them.

When I'm working in first person past, I always decide on some definite period of time between the events happening to the narrator, and the narrator relating those events. It helps me decide how much perspective to provide. If the narrator has just finished living through the events, they won't have as much perspective as they would if they were separated from the events by several years. The narrator's feelings on the events will color the prose, and that color deals with a concept I call Narrative Mood (see this article for more on the subject).

Another first person subtype related to mood is the conversational style. But conversational first person isn't as simple as you'd think. When considering any POV, you need to ask yourself whether the narrator is aware that he or she is narrating, and in turn, if he or she is aware of who they are narrating to. It might also be helpful to ask if the narrator is aware of the medium in which the story is delivered, or if the narrative is a transcript of some other means of delivery.

For example, does the narrator know their words are being read as a book, or are they speaking the whole story aloud to a fictional audience? In an epistolary novel like Dracula, the narrative may well be in first person, and the narrator may well be speaking to an audience, but the narrator is not necessarily aware of the reader, nor that his or her narration is being read as part of a story. Additional dimensions like the epistolary technique can enhance a story's sense of realism, but they also require an extra degree of care on the author's part.

I view third person as a sliding scale, with narrative intimacy on one side, and narrative distance on the other. A story written in an intimate third person will read very similar to first person, just with different pronouns. All events will be filtered through a single POV character at a time. You can have multiple POV characters, but in every case, the POV character is distinct from the narrator (more on that in a moment). A story written in omniscient sacrifices almost all of its intimacy in the name of perspective. Omniscient provides more facts about the story, but less emotion, and less character. It has its uses, but it's difficult and risky, because it's often less engaging to the reader.

In most forms of third person, the narrator is a faceless, nameless non-being--a camera, essentially--who exists for the sole purpose of conveying the story. This camera can be zoomed in or out as needed, and that is the true strength of third person narrative. But it's important to understand what the camera can and can't see, and to know when the camera should be turned on and off.

It is also possible for a third person narrator to have a personality, and this can be particularly effective in omniscient. It has been done to great effect by the likes of Charles Dickens and Douglas Adams. A third person narrator might also be a non-central character in the story, like Ishmael in Moby Dick.

The main thing in all this is to take time to carefully consider who or what your narrative voice is, what spatial and temporal relationship they have with the events of the story, and what feelings, if any, they have about the events.

These decisions are best made during the plotting phase of your story, because it's a lot of effort to change your POV after the fact. But that doesn't mean there's no POV work to do during the editing phase.

In most cases, a POV change in the editing phase will necessitate rewriting the story entirely, or close to it. But there are very good reasons to do it. First off, you should always choose the right POV for the story, not just whichever suits you best. It's better to change your writing to serve the story than vice-versa. (Like this quote? Click here to tweet it!). Second, even if you're an obsessive plotter like me, you won't always know exactly where your story is going. You might go on a detour that changes the essential nature of your story, or makes one character more important than originally intended. When this happens, sometimes it's necessary to change the POV to suit the new story.

Say you started off in a fact-laden omniscient, but as the plot developed, you found yourself falling in love with a particular character, and following them more than others. It's probably worthwhile to consider rewriting the whole story through that character's POV, either by making them a first person narrator, or by developing an intimate third person relationship with them.

If you're happy with your original POV choice, that still doesn't mean there's no POV work in the editing phase. Even if you're skilled in this area, you need to read your manuscript with a keen eye, to make sure you haven't written any accidental POV shifts.

Third person allows you to throttle the narrative distance up and down, but the transition needs to be smooth. It works just like zooming a camera lens in and out. Professional film makers modulate the distance of each shot, and zooms are a common technique, but it's rare to see a fast zoom in or out because it's jarring to the eye. The same is true in novels; rapid, careless modulations of POV are jarring to the mind.

It's also important to make sure POV modulations are warranted. If most of your novel is written with a fair amount of distance, but you have one important, steamy love scene, or an important, heated battle scene, it's probably worth it to zoom in on the character, and temporarily close that narrative gap. But if the scene isn't that important or intense, leave the distance where it's at.

...

Editing for POV is tough. There's no two ways about it. But like most tough things, it's worth doing. A well-controlled POV will distinguish you as a professional.

Be Forewarned

Simultaneous original creation is one of the surest signs that there's nothing new under the sun. For example, the first novel I ever wrote was a sprawling, experimental mish-mash about several people from different points in human history being magically transported to a supernatural realm, taking part in a handful of strange trials, and ultimately providing the impetus for the apocalypse. I quiver with embarrassment at how juvenile my writing was back then. I, like many first time authors, was so intoxicated by the act of creation that I never paused to consider my story's inherent flaws, or how my writing might be improved.

Then one day, I bought a copy of Into The Electric Castle by the Dutch band Ayreon. It was an extended prog-rock opera that told the story of several people from different points in human history being magically transported to a supernatural realm, taking part in a handful of strange trials, and ultimately providing the impetus for the apocalypse.

And it was absolute garbage. (Listen to Ayreon's prodigious excess on Youtube)

Don't get me wrong, Ayreon brings together a diverse and talented group of musicians, all of whom are virtuosos in their own right. In terms of technical ability and musical composition, the album is a triumph. But there isn't a single truly memorable moment in its 100-minute run time, and the story is ham-fisted, trite, and full of mind-numbing exposition. And this made me realize that my first novel suffered from exactly the same problems. (The whole album might be tongue-in-cheek, and in that case it's probably a masterpiece, but to me it's impossible to tell)

If you've been writing for a while, you may have been through something similar. I'm convinced it's a necessary learning experience. The simple fact is, there are only so many stories the human mind is capable of telling. Depending on how you break things down, there are as few as seven.

That doesn't mean there's no hope, though. People create original, engaging stories all the time. I'm even arrogant enough to think that I've managed it once or twice.

Unfortunately, I can't really tell you exactly how to avoid cliche, and I doubt there's anyone out there who claims to have the recipe for originality (having the recipe kind of precludes the idea of originality, doesn't it?). However, there are plenty of resources when it comes to avoiding cliches. Some stories have been told and retold--usually with the best of intentions--so many times that people started recognizing the pattern, and speaking out about it.

Strange Horizons, an online speculative fiction magazine, keeps an archived list of "Stories We've Seen Too Often", and it's a great warning for spec fic authors like my illustrious self. I am guilty of writing or planning to write two or three of the things that appear on this list.

Writers find inspiration everywhere. I often find it in movies, books, and the struggles of daily life. But it's important to remember that many, many people have access to the same sources of inspiration as you. It's not unusual for two people separated by time and distance to arrive at more or less the exact same idea. So it pays to be aware of what's already been done to death, and save your poor tired fingers from banging out a story that was already done to perfection thirty years ago. While you might still want to write your own telling, awareness will help you temper your expectations for the story's performance on the open market. Writing is never a waste of time--I mean that, never--but trying to sell a story mired in cliche is an emotional flogging you could do without.

If you're a spec fic author, and you're thinking about submitting your latest work, take a look at Strange Horizons' list, and save yourself some pain and anguish. But don't feel guilty if your story is on that list! It's a natural part of the process; like falling off a bike. If you keep getting back on, and keep learning from your mistakes, there's no reason you can't get to the Tour de France.

Editing Characters

Good characters make the difference between memorable stories and forgettable ones. If you're like me, you spend hours poring over character sheets, writing journals and scenes, and collecting details to enrich your characters. Character development is an essential part of plotting.

But what about when the first draft is finished?

Like all facets of novel-writing, character development doesn't have clean borders. The process does not stop and start at any given time. I'd be willing to bet J.K. Rowling is still finding out new things about Harry Potter nearly ten years after the last book was penned.

Don't be scared to edit your characters after you've finished your first draft. In fact, you must do this. Because no matter how carefully you plan them, a good character can still surprise you. In editing, your job is to find those surprises, and react to them.

The first thing I look for when editing characters is places where they have deviated from the character sheets I created during the plotting phase. Sometimes this will be something minute like the color of their eyes, other times it will be something gigantic, like their backstory, or an emotional reaction you would not have predicted from the character sheet.

Typically, whatever has "accidentally" flowed out onto the page is preferable, but not always. Sometimes you'll write your character acting one way, only to remember that you had a very good reason for planning him another way.

For example, I might write a scene where my exorcist priest character hears the confession of a colleague. It might have been the natural thing for him to do in the course of the story. But I might look back and recall that my exorcist priest is supposed to have lost his faith, which gives him a character arc to go through. Depending on the timing of the scene, I might want the exorcist to refuse to help his colleague because he's still battling with his lack of faith.

If you're writing a series of books, you might plan certain character flaws that enable the character to remain interesting or active in your sequels, but in the haphazard process of drafting, you might inadvertently cause the character to overcome those flaws, leaving them with no internal demons in the sequels. In that case, you're probably better off revising your current book such that the demons remain.

Spontaneity is one of the joys of writing, but don't necessarily change your character sheets because it seems like less work. Sometimes it's better to revise the draft back to your original plan. Most of the time, however, the organic development that comes from drafting can produce great results. Whatever you do, make sure to balance what's in your draft against what's in your plotting notes, and choose the direction that results in a better story.

Another important thing I do when editing characters is take a step back and see if there are too many. In my post on character roles, I outlined Dramatica's model of the story jobs available to characters. While the model has some flexibility, it's true that it is seldom a good idea to have two characters fulfilling the same role. Even if you're set up with one character for each job, you might still have too many character arcs cluttering up your novel's emotional space. When I finish a novel, one of the first things I look for is the opportunity to combine characters.

Something magical happens when you take two developed characters and mash them into a single person: you create automatic internal conflict. Not only that, you end up with someone fresher and more original than what you had going in.

Say you have a love interest character in a detective story. She's a typical damsel in distress; you've developed her well, and you like her, but she's not exactly jumping off the page. Then say you have a minor antagonist or a contagonist (see this post for more on what a contagonist is) in the form of a nosy cop. What if the girl was the cop? What if the damsel-n-distress routine was just a ruse to get in the detective's good graces?

Changing characters' motivations and roles can be a tricky business, and it can result in a heavy workload. That's why I recommend doing it in the developmental stage, when you'll be making the biggest changes. Think hard about the possibilities, and be willing to put in the extra work. More than any other element, your characters are your story. It's worth a few extra days at the keys to make them the best they can be.

Ten Things About Revision (FenCon Writer's Workshop Part 5)

Revision is war. It's the toughest part about being a writer; so tough that amateurs often skip it altogether. But if you want to be a pro, you're going to have to do it at some point.

------------------------------------------------------------

The following series comes to us from guest blogger and author Tom Howard.

Learn more about Tom by visiting his Amazon Author Page, and check out Tom's latest story in The Good Fight, an anthology of superhero vs. monster stories.

------------------------------------------------------------

FenCon--a long-running science fiction and fantasy convention in Dallas, Texas--hosts an affiliated writers workshop every year, where professional writers share their own experiences with beginning writers in intensive workshops.

My own writing is at a too comfortable plateau, and I attended to learn some new skills to improve my writing. I've enjoyed FenCon writing workshops before and always find something to take away.

I attended the workshop with my friend and frequent collaborator, Belinda Christ. I think she has attended them all. Like me, she's always searching for community and new tools to improve her trade.

This year, 2015, urban fantasy writer, Jaye Wells, did a four-day class for a dozen writers on critiquing each others' work. Ms. Wells used our comments as a springboard to present sessions on structure, conflict, and the other areas writers need to learn their craft.

Part Five - Ten Things About Revision

1. Ice, ice, baby: After you finish the first draft, let the story chill. Go get some sun. Write something else. Go talk to actual people instead of imaginary ones. A couple days is okay. A couple weeks is better. Ideally, you'd have a couple of months. You need distance so you can read it with cold, critical eyes. When you're ready, read your story like a reader in one complete pass. Don't worry about commas. Make quick notes about things that need fixing, but don't get too anal about it. This read is about seeing the big picture of your story as it stands.
2. Arm yourself for battle: For me, this means redoing my storyboard (more on that below) to reflect scenes that need rewriting, shifting around, or deleting altogether. I go chapter by chapter and plot out what needs to be added or deleted, so once I'm in the thick of the swamp, I won't lose my way. I can hear the pantsers out there whining, but revision is about taming that wild beast of a draft into a readable story. A plan will go a long way to making your vision come through for the reader.
3. The red pen of doom: Revision is not a time for the muse. It's not that liminal spot where you're floating through fluffy creative cloud of drafting. Send the muse to the basement with some red wind and reruns of Buffy. Then rip the duct tape off your internal editor’s mouth. Chuckle when she bitches about the pain. She’ll be torturing you soon enough. Give her free reign over the red pen and let her go to work. Encourage her to be merciless. By the time she’s done with the second read of the pages, it needs to look like a murder scene – the blood of your pen everywhere.
4. Get naked: There are a few experiences for writers more terrifying than asking for critique. It feels a little like stripping down in front of a group of catty sorority girls and asking them to circle all your fat in Sharpie. Obviously, being an awesome person, you're too smart to ask for critique from malicious people. No, you need someone you know is tough but fair. Tell them exactly what sort of you need. Even with my published author CPS, I still tell them exactly what I need. "Don't worry about sentence level stuff. I just need a bird's eye." "Hey, can you read this and tell me if the subplot is working?" If you do it right, letting yourself be open to constructive criticism will result in a stronger story.
5. Every chapter, every scene, every sentence: Nothing goes unanalyzed. A book is a complex system with lots of moving parts. You need to make sure they're all working together or face a massive malfunction. While we're at it, every character must have a purpose, every plot twist must build upon the last, and every subplot must braid into the main plot to highlight your themes and conflicts. Sounds like a lot, right? Welcome to the big leagues, son.
6. Sing it, sister: Read it out loud. Yes, all of it. Does the dialogue sound natural? Is the rhythm authentic? If not, fix it. Don't do this in the middle of revision, but after the story is pretty tight and you've done a lot of the heavy lifting of revision. Pace around your house and read the story to your dogs or the dust bunnies. You will be amazed how many mistakes you missed and poor turns of phrase you discover. You might feel like an idiot, but do it anyway.
7. Seven-later dip: In addition to fixing plot holes, revisions also allow you to add complexity to your characters and world. You'll be amazed how much of a difference a well-placed sentence or line of dialogue can deepen characterization. Layer in details that flesh out your scenes and expand your world. Finding opportunities to add these little gems should be on your Must Do List.
8. Get thematic: By the time you're ready to do your first cold read, your themes should have begun to make themselves known to you. Maybe you set out with certain ones in mind, but ones you don't consider have a way of sneaking in when you're not paying attention. If you're writing genre fiction, you need to use a deft hand when it comes to theme. No one wants to be conked over the head with meaning. One way to subtly buttress them, though, is to instill your sentences with theme words. Come up with a list of words that help infuse your story with the right mood and thematic symbols. For an overview of this, read Alexandra Sokoloff's Screenwriting Tricks for Authors.
9. Don't panic: Bi-polar writer's syndrome is a real thing. One minute, you're all "I'M A GENIUS! THIS IS THE BEST BOOK EVER!"  Then it hits you that there is a distinct possibility you could die before you're about to share this work of amazement with the world. Luckily, you listened to me and left a detailed revision plan. You email it to your baffled spouse. "No matter what happens, don't let my publisher hire my nemesis to finish this novel. This is my LEGACY!" Five minutes later, you're slumped over your keyboard howling, "MY EDITOR'S GOING TO TAKE A CONTRACT OUT ON MY LIFE. REVIEWERS ARE GOING TO CHASE ME WITH PITCHFORKS AND FIRE!" You might daydream about quitting writing altogether or getting into an accident so you don't have to finish the book. My advice? Learn to be patient with yourself. Try to enjoy the ride. Also, have a friend on speed dial who will bring you chocolate/bourbon/chocolatey bourbon.
10. The fat lady: There is such as thing as too much revision. Someone once said that novels are never done, just abandoned. At some point, you're going to realize you've just spent four hours deleting and reinserting the same comma. This is a signal, friend. It's time to let go. If you're not under deadline, you have the luxury of revising as long as you want. But the wise writer won't waste years of his or her life trying to turn a three-legged dog into a show pony. Set it in a drawer, send it out for critique, or submit it. Then move on to something new. A lot of wannabes have wasted good years using revisions as an excuse to start something new. Don't let that be you. Listen to the fat lady. She'll tell you it's over. Move on. You've got new worlds to create.

General Revision tips:

Storyboard your novels. Use a horizontal whiteboard with post it notes. Put each act on a line with mini-climaxes and resolution. Use different colors for different points of view.

Backloading: put the most powerful word at the end of the sentence. The brain remembers the last word it reads.

Use a list of colors or themes and integrate them into your story. Example: water, moon, chaos. Every paragraph is an opportunity to focus on your theme. Be subliminal.

The problem with character sheets is that we make them before we get into our story and it restricts the author's input. The author should not drive the character; the character should develop naturally.

The 90 Day Novel is a great resource for characters.

Act Structure (FenCon Writer's Workshop Part 4)

New and aspiring authors often say story structure is "confining", or just plain unnecessary. But you rarely hear that sentiment from published, selling authors. [Pete: For more on why you should learn the rules of story structure, check out my post about the Path of Least Resistance]

------------------------------------------------------------

The following series comes to us from guest blogger and author Tom Howard.

Learn more about Tom by visiting his Amazon Author Page, and check out Tom's latest story in The Good Fight, an anthology of superhero vs. monster stories.

------------------------------------------------------------

FenCon--a long-running science fiction and fantasy convention in Dallas, Texas--hosts an affiliated writers workshop every year, where professional writers share their own experiences with beginning writers in intensive workshops.

My own writing is at a too comfortable plateau, and I attended to learn some new skills to improve my writing. I've enjoyed FenCon writing workshops before and always find something to take away.

I attended the workshop with my friend and frequent collaborator, Belinda Christ. I think she has attended them all. Like me, she's always searching for community and new tools to improve her trade.

This year, 2015, urban fantasy writer, Jaye Wells, did a four-day class for a dozen writers on critiquing each others' work. Ms. Wells used our comments as a springboard to present sessions on structure, conflict, and the other areas writers need to learn their craft.

Part Four – Act Structure

The classic three act formula can become four acts by breaking act two into two parts, and can even become five acts depending on the amount of resolution you include. [Pete: Sound familiar? Read my take on this in my post about Four Act Structure and the Stages of Competence]

Act 1: Depending on genre, set up the problem introduction in Act 1, and make the goal to alleviate that problem.

Act 2: Start to pursue the goal and make plans in this act. End of Act 2 is a huge obstacle that changes the plans and goal.

Act 3: New information and a new plan. Try new things for the new plan. End of Act 3 is big boss encounter, where fight scene happens. Internal and External conflict collide. 

Act 4: Starts out with “What do we do now?” Overcome internal demons to overcome external demons. Goal set up in Act 1 does not have to be the climax. This Act can be duplicated also. Lead to resolution.

Act 5: Resolution. Can be long, or short, or set up the next book.

The plot points at the ends of the acts are usually thought of as external changes, but they can (and should) coincide with internal conflict changes.

The Hero’s Journey is just not plot points, it’s character development. People say genre fiction (science fiction, horror, and fantasy) is plot driven, but really the best genre fiction is character and plot driven.

Subplots start in Act 2. If you're not careful, Act 2 and Act 3 become what's called "the Muddy Middle".

General tips: 

• Don’t give your book away. Start at the top. Respect your work.
• Buy and read GMC – Goal, Modivation, and Conflict. Use it to make your characters three dimensional.

Common Style Problems (FenCon Writer's Workshop Part 3)

Editors and publishers all have their pet peeves, and most of them are founded on reasonable principles. Ultimately, writing style is all about making your story easier to read, and good editors will always try to push you in that direction.

------------------------------------------------------------

The following series comes to us from guest blogger and author Tom Howard.

Learn more about Tom by visiting his Amazon Author Page, and check out Tom's latest story in The Good Fight, an anthology of superhero vs. monster stories.

------------------------------------------------------------

FenCon--a long-running science fiction and fantasy convention in Dallas, Texas--hosts an affiliated writers workshop every year, where professional writers share their own experiences with beginning writers in intensive workshops.

My own writing is at a too comfortable plateau, and I attended to learn some new skills to improve my writing. I've enjoyed FenCon writing workshops before and always find something to take away.

I attended the workshop with my friend and frequent collaborator, Belinda Christ. I think she has attended them all. Like me, she's always searching for community and new tools to improve her trade.

This year, 2015, urban fantasy writer, Jaye Wells, did a four-day class for a dozen writers on critiquing each others' work. Ms. Wells used our comments as a springboard to present sessions on structure, conflict, and the other areas writers need to learn their craft.

Part Three - Common Style Problems

The following list of style problems rank among the most aggravating to editors and publishers. Do everything to avoid them.

• Too many that's. The word "that" is almost always clutter. Occasionally, you need it for clarity, but 75% of the time, it can be left out.
• Bad Dialogue Punctuation. Not knowing where to use your commas and periods is a sure path to the slush pile. Pick up a novel and punctuate the dialogue as the author does. [Pete: and check out my post on dialogue mechanics.]
• Missing comma before direct address. "Good morning, O'Dell." not "Good morning O'Dell."
• You don't need the speaking verb (said) if you have an action line surrounding the dialogue. [Pete: for more on this, check out my post about beats]
• Fancy synonyms for "said". Action lines are best, but some old-school editors insist on only using "said". But the worst thing you can do is use a thesaurus to keep from using "said". Obscure synonyms are distracting, and adverbs and adjectives should be avoided in dialogue.
• Too many subordinate clauses and participle phrases. "As" and "ing" phrases are a matter of timing. They show two actions happening simultaneously, and some things you can't do simultaneously.
• Cliche beginnings. Don't start the story with a line of dialogue. Or with a character waking up. Or with the weather.
• Ellipses fever. It's tempting to use ellipses every time you want a drawn out pause, but it also gets annoying to look at, and readers skip over them more often than not. Know how to use them correctly. In dialogue, ellipses indicate trailing off, an em dash (—) indicates interrupting.  One in every paragraph is not acceptable. And don't use ellipses to indicate pauses in middle of dialogue. Break up dialogue with action.
• Tense shifts. Past tense should be past and present should be present for the entire thing. No shifting back and forth.
• Risky grammar. If you're going to use conjunctions at the beginning of sentences, know what rules you're breaking. Every time you do this, you risk looking like you don't know.
• Uncommon punctuation. A semi-colon should be used sparingly or not at all. Colons, too.
• Too much narrative distance. Character's voice should not only be dialogue but also the narrative. Third person point of view should be close and not omniscient. Distancing words like "she saw", "she looked", and "she felt" separate the reader from the character. Watch your narrative distance closely.

Jaye Wells' general suggestions:

• Get a copy of Strunk and White's Elements of Style and look up specific questions. No need to read it from cover to cover.
• Use Grammarly to check your work.
• For the Oxford comma (a, b, and c), use the publishing house's style guide, but use the serial comma for clarity.
• Don't spend a lot of money on marketing (cons, readers) when you should spend it on learning the craft. Use margielawson.com if you want to workshops from Margie Lawson personally.
• RWA (Romance Writers of America) does great Craft and Business workshops that apply to all writers.
• The MFA program at Seton Hill is a crash course on writing that equals ten years worth of experience.
• The Rule of Three: If a writer brings up something three times, it is IMPORTANT and will be part of the plot and climax. Conversely, if you mention something more than once, you'd better involve it in the plot.
• Pope in a Pool: Look for opportunities to break up exposition with active events. The pope could be swimming laps in the background during a long exposition dump.

Top Ten Plotting Pitfalls (FenCon Writer's Workshop Part 2)

Anyone who writes Science Fiction, Horror, or Fantasy knows how easy it is to get tied up in world building. Here are some of the common pitfalls that beleaguer speculative fiction writers and how to avoid them.

------------------------------------------------------------

The following series comes to us from guest blogger and author Tom Howard.

Learn more about Tom by visiting his Amazon Author Page, and check out Tom's latest story in The Good Fight, an anthology of superhero vs. monster stories.

------------------------------------------------------------

FenCon--a long-running science fiction and fantasy convention in Dallas, Texas--hosts an affiliated writers’ workshop every year, where professional writers share their own experiences with beginning writers in intensive workshops.

My own writing is at a too comfortable plateau, and I attended to learn some new skills to improve my writing. I’ve enjoyed FenCon writing workshops before and always find something to take away.

I attended the workshop with my friend and frequent collaborator, Belinda Christ. I think she has attended them all. Like me, she’s always searching for community and new tools to improve her trade.

This year, 2015, urban fantasy writer, Jaye Wells, did a four-day class for a dozen writers on critiquing each others’ work. Ms. Wells used our comments as a springboard to present sessions on structure, conflict, and the other areas writers need to learn their craft.

Part Two - Top Ten Plotting Pitfalls

1. Shoe-horning – Don’t do your world building last. The world organically builds your characters, because they come from that world. If ideas start coming to you during the writing process, don't be tempted to just mash them into huge paragraphs of exposition. Take a break from writing the actual story and let the ideas flow out. When they have, you can go back through them and decide which ones you actually need at that point of the story.
2. OCDiety – Don't be so invested in the details that the story doesn’t unfold organically. This is connected to shoe-horning; nobody wants to stop reading about a poisoned character to hear a lesson on the healing flora of your world. It might be good for you to know it, but don't dive so deep you can't get back out. Know just enough about your world to write. 
3. Jargon Fouls – Watch made-up words that aren’t necessary, and don’t be too clever with your naming. Reading words you can't pronounce gets annoying fast. It's good to get specific with language when you're world building--even down to slurs and insults in your native language--but don't go so far that it's irritating to read.
4. Does Not Compute – Watch your character's motivations and the customs of your society. Don't put your characters in a difficult-to-believe situation just because it's convenient for the story. Creating something from nothing has to have some internal logic, no matter how fantastic. 
5. Dangerously Derivative – There's nothing new under the sun, but that doesn't mean you can just copy-paste someone else's world and color over a few spots. Be inspired by your favorite stories, but make sure you're bringing something original to the table.
6. The Rube Goldberg Flaw – Don’t make your world too complicated unless you’re George R.R. Martin. The more complicated the plot, the less world building is necessary and vice versa. If you can get your characters from A to B in three steps, don't put them through ten.
7. Conformity – Just because you've worked hard to create your culture doesn't mean you can't rock the boat a little. Consider the culture's beliefs and conformity and then rebel against them. Always be looking for some new element of the world to help breathe some life into the story. 
8. Procrastination – Don’t world build to avoid writing. It's fun, but sooner or later you have to be finished, or nobody will ever get to visit the world you've created.
9. One-Sidedness – If you've created a broad and vivid world, don't just sow us one person's image of it. Everyone looks at the world in a unique way. Think about how different people see a room differently and apply that to your writing. 
10. Dullness – If you've never done anything interesting, how can you have anything interesting to say? Have real-life adventures to provide realism to your work.

------------------------------------------------------------

Tom's report from FenCon continues next week with some Common Style Problems.

World Building (FenCon Writer's Workshop Part 1)

World building is the process of establishing the rules of the universe you create for your story. Every genre uses world building to some extent; from hardcore sword and sorcery novels, to the small town detective novel, to aliens in space. The amount of backstory to include depends on different the story universe is from our known world.

------------------------------------------------------------

The following series comes to us from guest blogger and author Tom Howard.

Learn more about Tom by visiting his Amazon Author Page, and check out Tom's latest story in The Good Fight, an anthology of superhero vs. monster stories.

------------------------------------------------------------

FenCon--a long-running science fiction and fantasy convention in Dallas, Texas--hosts an affiliated writers’ workshop every year, where professional writers share their own experiences with beginning writers in intensive workshops.

My own writing is at a too comfortable plateau, and I attended to learn some new skills to improve my writing. I’ve enjoyed FenCon writing workshops before and always find something to take away.

I attended the workshop with my friend and frequent collaborator, Belinda Christ. I think she has attended them all. Like me, she’s always searching for community and new tools to improve her trade.

This year, 2015, urban fantasy writer, Jaye Wells, did a four-day class for a dozen writers on critiquing each others’ work. Ms. Wells used our comments as a springboard to present sessions on structure, conflict, and the other areas writers need to learn their craft.

Part One - World Building

What is world building? Creating a sandbox for your character. Not just the setting, but the cultures, races, history, and everything that influences your character. Characters have to be products of the world; they have to be connected to it. It's not just a set with an actor in front of it; that’s a two dimensional story. Instead, make your world a character. 

World building is not just the map at the front of the book.

Research is key. That will give you ideas for where your characters came from. Build your world by origins. As you’re creating this world, think of how it diverges from the normal world.

World building is the Forest and the Trees; where the forest is macro world building and the trees are micro world building. The more specific you can be, the more grounded the reader feels in that world.

The Five Ps of World Building

1. People
2. Places
3. Problems (from the structure of society)
4. Practices
5. Peculiarities

All are required for the sixth P: Plot. Plot is what happens when People with interesting Practices in a specific Place try to solve their Peculiar Problems. (Like this Quote? Click Here to Tweet it!)

People: Gender? Age? Race? Background? Profession? [Pete: My Character Sheet template might be helpful here]

Place: City/town/village/planet? Geography? [Pete: My General Setting and Specific Setting templates my help with this]

Problem: What’s the problem facing this person or people in this town? Is it a vampire horde? Alien? A murderer? A social issue? [Pete: My Premise Sheet template might be useful here]

Practices: What is the culture of this place or people that might influence the story? What habits or details about the characters influence the story?

Peculiarities: These are the fun details. The twists on things we expect. These details will help your story stand out and give it your unique voice.

As you brainstorm, the most important question to ask yourself is, "Wouldn’t it be weird/cool if…"

Cut out magazine pictures and ask yourself what attracts you about it? Find a music playlist that fits with your world. [Pete: Browse Pinterest for ideas!]

The ultimate goal of world building is for you, the writer, to be fascinated and excited to spend lots of time in this new world. You can create pages of background and not use it. That’s okay because it colors your world and may be important in the next book.

------------------------------------------------------------

Tom's report from FenCon continues next week with a list of the Top Ten Plotting Pitfalls!

Beats

In real life, we don't have conspicuous, over-taxed speaker attributions telling us how people are feeling.  As humans, we're hard-wired to read the body language of everyone around us, and we constantly assess their emotions on a subconscious level.  

This is possible in fiction as well.  The strongest place to express character emotion in a scene is dialogue.  The second strongest place to put emotion is in beats--moments of body language surrounding the dialogue.

Bob ran his hand up my thigh.  "You're so fucking hot."

Punctuated and paragraphed properly, beats often eliminate the need for speaker attributions entirely.  That doesn't mean you should use them all the time, because a passage too full of beats takes on a stop-start rhythm that itself becomes conspicuous, and conspicuousness is what we're trying to avoid.

I find that 2-3 beats per 10-15 of dialogue is about all you can get away with, though there are surely exceptions.  In general, I recommend a single speaker attribution or beat at the beginning of a two-speaker conversation, and then let the seesaw rhythm carry for as long as it can--usually no more than 5-6 lines before I feel the need to sprinkle in some setting or internal monologue.

If you've got three or more speakers, you'll need either an attribution or a beat attached to every line, so I tend to shoot for about one part body language to two parts "said", and I try to keep three-plus conversations as short as possible.  They're hard to write, and harder to read.

How you write beats--and how many you use--depends somewhat on your POV.  I tend to favor intimate third person in my work, so often what I do is simply describe a bit of body language...

He leaned forward.  "Keep talking."

He thrust out his chest.  "What are you looking at, bro?"

...and let the reader fill in the emotional blanks just as they do in real life.  This has two benefits; 1) the language is immediate and inconspicuous, and 2) it actually pulls the reader deeper into the story by allowing them to participate in building the story world.

In first person, you have the benefit of full intimacy with a single character, so if your POV character has a conscious thought about the speaker, you can work even more layers into the dialogue:

He thrust out his chest.  "What are you looking at, bro?"What a douchebag! "Nothing, sorry."

This not only tells you more about the speaker, but more about the POV character.  The POV character in the above example clearly has a much different personality than the one in the following example:

He thrust out his chest.  "What are you looking at, bro?"Intriguing, how simian dominance behaviors have yet to be bred out of mankind. "Nothing, sorry."

I find, in an intimate third person POV, you can pretty much write internal monologue just as you would in first person, but it behooves the story to keep them to a minimum.  If we pause for our POV character to appraise every line of dialogue, the story fails to proceed.  Moderation is good in first person too, but you have a little more leeway.

Another issue worth pointing out is that when you rely more on body language than attributions, you allow your dialogue to remain grounded in the scene.  Any body language is great, but if you focus solely on people's facial expressions, posture, etc., you'll quickly find that you have tons of scenes where people are constantly grinning, or frowning, or running their hands through their hair, or leaning forward.  The best thing to do is to craft body language that shows characters interacting with the setting around them.

Say you have a heated argument between two lovers.  You could just write them sitting on the couch, or in the bedroom, and they could bandy wits to your heart's content.  But the scene could be spiced up considerably by having them do something.  Could this argument take place during a couples golf tournament?  How about in the middle of cooking dinner (which would give them plates and sauce pots to throw...)?

Any time you can attach a setting to your body language, you not only wind up with fresher, more original body language, you end up with more realistic settings.  Big, thundering blocks of description can be fun to write, but they're...less fun to read.  They're best kept to your notes.  Readers don't remember that stuff anyway. What readers remember is people doing things.  A character acting on an object makes that object real, and invites the reader to fill in all kinds of details surrounding that object.  It's one of the basic ways to show and not tell.

Between beats and good-old "said", you should have 99% of dialogue situations covered.  Sticking to these inconspicuous devices will help you develop that strong, fluid style that keeps readers locked in your story.

Said

In his enlightening book On Writing Stephen King makes a passionate endorsement for the word "said", advising writers to use it in preference to any of its many synonyms.  But, being a writer, not an editor, he doesn't do much to back up his endorsement.

I'm often asked about the word "said".  It's something a lot of writers have trouble digesting, and some even reject the common wisdom outright.  However, I do have an opinion on the matter, and as usual it's a strong one.

I pretty much agree with Uncle Stevie on this one, but On Writing is not the first place I encountered this tip.  My favorite book on the craft; Dave King and Renni Browne's Self-Editing for Fiction Writers touches on this also.  Their argument is two-fold: first, avoiding the unadorned "said" often forces your character into a physical impossibility.  One does not "gasp" a sentence.  A gasp is, by its very definition, not a sentence.  Second, fancy synonyms for "said" always catch you in the act of stuffing character emotion into what should be a purely mechanical device.  Character emotions do not belong in speaker attributions, they should be present in the dialogue itself.  If that's not possible (and it sometimes isn't), emotion belongs in the pieces of body language surrounding the dialogue (what I call "beats".  More about beats in this post).

Speaker attributions are a mechanical device, and they have but one humble purpose: to identify the speaker.  Ideally, they should be thought of almost like punctuation.  And everyone agrees that over-punctuating makes you look desperate to get your point across!!! Don't you agree???

The beauty of "said" is that it's transparent.  The reader doesn't really even see the word.  Assuming they're sufficiently focused on the story (and not the words on the page) their mind will instantaneously substitute the speaker's identity, and the attribution will have done its job without ever calling attention to itself.  In my opinion, this kind of transparency is the most noble goal a writer can have.

Because "said" is so transparent, anything else in its place becomes conspicuous.  In general, we don't want readers to focus on our words, we want them in the story.  But used properly, the conspicuousness of another verb can actually work to your advantage, provided you aren't using it as a crutch to prop up weak dialogue.

Personally, I feel free to use any verb that denotes the volume, tone, or (occasionally) cadence of a speaker's voice.  Shouted, whispered, whined, or blurted will sometimes find their way into my work, but I use them sparingly because I know that every one is a risk.  Any verb in place of "said" has the ability to knock the reader out of the story, and make them focus on the word itself.  Most of the time, the risk isn't worth it.

Another common problem I see with beginning writers is the inclination to use adverbs to prop up their speaker attributions.  People never just "say" anything, they say it "sarcastically", or "brightly", or "arrogantly.  Again, this catches you in the act of stuffing character emotion where it doesn't belong, but on a grammatical level, it catches you using two words to do the work of one.  Everybody hates it when we see six construction workers standing around watching one guy pour asphalt into a pothole.  Why should we be any less infuriated when words do the same thing?

The reason is of course that when we write a line of dialogue, we hear it in our head.  We struggle to capture the exact way the character said it, because we want the reader to hear it the way we did.  But I find it seldom matters whether the reader hears a line of dialogue exactly the way I heard it when I wrote it.  Part of the joy of reading is that you get to read a story in your unique way, and if I, the writer, force you to read it exactly my way, I rob you of that joy.  It's a perfect example of a writer standing in the way of his own work--sacrificing transparency.

So I've let go of the idea that readers must read every line a certain way, and focus instead on clarity.  I trust my readers to be smart enough to pick up on subtext, and I try to make it easy to pay attention.  And truthfully, if you have to jump through awkward, wordy hoops to ensure that readers hear a line just so, chances are something is wrong with the line itself, and your efforts would be better spent pumping up the dialogue itself.

If you feel the urge to use something other than "said"--or God forbid, to use "said" along with an adverb--what's really going on is you have a character emotion you're trying to work into dialogue.  A speaker attribution is by far the weakest hook to hang emotions on.  The dialogue itself is by far the strongest.  Which has more emotion:

"I find you very attractive," Bob panted arousedly.

or

"You're so fucking hot."

I have found it is usually possible to reword any line so that it carries the proper emotion.  Occasionally though, you will want the dialogue to be slightly off kilter with the emotion, either for comic effect, or because the character feels some need to restrain themselves.  So how do you work those subtleties into a passage of dialogue?  How do we show sarcasm without clunky attributions like "he said sarcastically?" or "he quipped"?  How can we show that a speaker is saying something they don't really believe?

But in those situations, body language can almost always help you, using what Browne and King refer to as "beats".  And for that, you'll have to take a look at the next article.

Often when I express my opinion on this matter, people say "But I see it all the time in published authors' work!!!"  It's true, some authors get away with verbs like "intoned", or "guffawed".  Some editors don't care.  And many readers won't actually notice, or feel intruded upon.  Sometimes, these verbs aren't that conspicuous, because whatever is going on in the scene is sufficiently engaging that we don't notice.  No matter what principle we're discussing, there will always be some author who "gets away with" doing it the "wrong way".

But you don't want to "get away" with your writing, do you?  You don't want your writing to be some savagery you perpetrate on your readers, do you?  If not, stick to "said".

Tell a Damn Story!

Nobody ever sat down and said, "You know, I've got some extra time.  Maybe I should spend it letting some writer cram their opinions down my throat."

If you ask people why they read, nobody will answer, "Because I like to hear what fiction authors think about real-world issues."

This is an issue that perplexes and angers me a great deal, and it ties in to my thoughts on the Path of Least Resistance.  So many authors--especially new ones--seem to think that novels are a good way to put their political, religious, or philosophical opinions across.  And they labor under the false impression that their opinions are welcome.

Now, I'll be the first to admit that stories are a great way to put ideas across.  Isaac Asimov taught me about the power of individuality and rational thought.  J.K. Rowling taught me about the power of friendship and love.  H.P. Lovecraft made me irrationally terrified of large mountains, even when I'm not on top of them.

Because I believe every story makes an argument--whether the author means to or not--it follows that stories communicate ideas.  But that isn't why humans write stories, and it's certainly not why readers read novels.  Nobody likes it when a story is a thin, obvious excuse for climbing on a soap box.

If someone picks up a book, and within a few pages they can see the author only wrote it as an excuse to wax philosophical, they get turned off to that book and that author--even if they agree with them.  Surely you've read books, or seen movies, and had this reaction.  It's that feeling that you've been deceived; that somebody pulled a bait-and-switch on you.  Nobody likes the feeling of being suckered, even if they like whatever they've been suckered into.  And if you feel the need to sucker people into listening to your opinions, maybe you ought to keep them to yourself.

There are dozens of great reasons to write fiction, but in my mind, the most pure and noble is simply because you want to tell a story.

Don't write a novel because you want people to think racism is deplorable.  Write a novel because you have a moving, emotional story in your head that demonstrates that racism is deplorable.  Don't write a novel so you can espouse your environmentalist views.  Tell an enlightening, human story that demonstrates why we must be better stewards of the planet.

In short, don't tell us what you think, show us something that might make us think like you do.  Because in truth, that's the only way to reach people anyway.  Nobody enjoys being lectured to.  Nobody accepts a new idea because somebody else badgered them into it.  People learn from their experiences.  So if you want to teach them something, you have to make them experience something.

Readers read because they want to be transported into a story.  Audiences go to movies because they want to feel something.  As consumers of entertainment, we want to be excited, thrilled, scared, and relieved.  We want to fall in love with the good guys and hate the bad guys.  We don't want to be lectured at, or admonished for our behavior.  We get plenty of that from our parents and bosses.

We read books and watch movies because we have a basic need to get out of our own heads for a while.  If we happen to discover something profound while we're out, that's great.  But that's not the reason we go out in the first place.

If all you want is to express your views, you should be a blogger, not a novelist.  But if you're willing to let your opinions--and yourself--play second fiddle, you might be able to tell people a story.  And that story might just change them.  And they'll love you for it.

I Used to Hate That Book

We all have those books, the ones we never wanted to read, the ones we forced ourselves to finish, the ones we immediately tried to purge from our memories. We read most of those books in high school.

------------------------------------------------------------

This guest post is from Tom Treweek, award-winning journalist and author of The Dutchman's Mine.  You can check out more of Tom's work on his website, and you can follow him on Facebook.

------------------------------------------------------------

I actually loved books in high school--the ones I brought for myself. I read a lot of Michael Crichton back then. A lot. I was an adolescent boy who found a book about dinosaurs running wild in the modern world. Was I supposed to resist?

The only classes I got bad grades in were reading. It wasn't because I wasn't good at it, it's because I never read what they wanted me to read. Yeah, down with the man.

And one of those books that sunk my grades (that sunk a lot of students' grades) was The Great Gatsby. Yeah, that one. The book that, at the time, seemed to exist only so teachers could educate their pupils on the many forms of symbolism. I mean, seriously, can't I just enjoy a book without having to pull out some special decoder ring to figure out which color is supposed to represent the resurfacing lust for an old flame? God.

I finished that book on fast forward, skimming as quickly as possible, trusting that I'd pick up the important points from the class discussion.

I didn't, hence the bad grade.

Move ahead twenty years (after we pause so I can weep silently at the time that's flown by), and I could be found back in school, this time during my stint as a substitute teacher. One one particular day, I found myself overseeing a "resource" class, which is code for one of two things: either the school's cognitively challenged students, or its behaviorally challenged students. This class was the latter, and the teacher, who was out sick (or "sick") had been reading them The Great Gatsby.

Every other class in the school had the students read it for themselves, but this class couldn't be trusted with this task. The only way they were going to get some of F. Scott into their brains was via the silky smooth tones of a quality amateur reader.

Whatever. I didn't pick the assignments. I just tried to get through the day, just like the kids who were barely pretending to pay attention in front of me.

So I opened the book and read a sentence. God, it was just as boring as I remembered. I read another. Then a paragraph.

Then Lucille poured a drink. And it all came together for me in one glorious moment.

Everyone was drunk practically without pause for the entire book!

I couldn't help myself. I suddenly slurred my speech as I read the words between quotation marks, drawing laughs from students. It was probably a bad idea, or it would have been if I had thought about it for even a second. Maybe those kids found a new love of books. Maybe I pushed them toward alcoholism. Being an optimist, I prefer to think I did both.

But the revelation wasn't for them. It was for me. And it wasn't just Gatsby that opened up for me. I suddenly saw how all books transform at the mood of their readers, how the different stages of life alter our perspectives, how the accumulation of experiences only add depth to fictional imagery.

The way we read anything is overwhelmingly colored by the experiences we take into that reading. Traumatic histories that cloud our future, a bad breakup, a restful weekend, a new relationship, these all shape the way we understand our favorite literature. That's why so often, when we return to a book years later, we'll find that we interpret it differently. That's how I finally found The Great Gatsby entertaining, having first read it before my first drink, and then reading it again after becoming almost as professional a drinker as a wordsmith.

But it could be a bit more subtle than that. Maybe sometimes you read Lord of the Rings and focus on Sam's heroism, and sometimes you focus on his sacrifice. Sometimes you look at that sacrifice with pride and other times with regret. There is no limit of the ways your current circumstances can affect the way you read.

With this revelation, I was a new man, a new reader, a new writer. And probably corrupter of children.

I tell you this story not only to make you laugh at my past follies but also to encourage you to revisit those books you loved in your youth--and those books you didn't. They change. They grow. They evolve. Just like you do. And the test of true friendship is the ability to grow together. Yes, books are your friends. Sigh, I am such a nerd.

What books have changed for you? Which ones do you want to revisit? Share them in the comments below.