by Lynne | Aug 31, 2016 | Writing, Writing Tips
Words are my business.
I love them dearly, but sometimes, they can be perplexing, confusing, and downright ornery. Here’s one word, a tiny one, that conveys my meaning with its myriad meanings. The tiny word is UP. And it has more definitions and uses than a giraffe has spots. In the dictionary it takes UP, ahem, half a page to define. Let us count the ways UP is employed.
We wake UP in the morning, go outside and look UP at the sky.
We stand UP. We sit UP.
We speak UP at meetings, write UP reports.
We can be UP to a task or not.
We warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen.
UP can be an adverb, an adjective, a preposition, a noun, or a verb. See if you can pick those out.
We dress UP for an occasion, lock UP the house and walk UP the street.
We call UP our friends, fix UP an old car, brighten UP a room with flowers.
We can stir UP trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite or think UP excuses.
We open UP a drain that’s stopped UP.
We open UP a store in the morning and close it UP at night.
It can cloud UP and rain, then clear UP for the sun to shine.
When it doesn’t rain, the earth dries UP. When it does rain, the earth soaks UP the water.
A candidate can be a runner-UP in an election.
We can pick UP a box, or move UP a ladder.
Then there’s that great animated film, UP, about a flying house and . . . well, never mind.
I think you get the idea. If you have more definitions for UP that I missed here, or, perhaps other similar words, please share!
by Lynne | Aug 8, 2016 | Writing, Writing Tips
One of the first things I learned in writing classes was the importance of giving your characters flaws as a way of making them distinctive and memorable. Your characters, particularly the main character, need to stand out from others in your book. They also should stand out from characters in other books.
However, the more books that are written in similar genres, the more difficult this becomes. How do you make your character stand out? Are more “flaws” the answer?
We humans all have a variety of flaws and quirks. (Animals do too, although often not as fatal as their two-legged counterparts.) As writers, we sprinkle our characters with obvious imperfections. They bite their nails, wear lopsided glasses, eat too much Hagen Daz. They dress funny or cut their hair weird or paint their bodies with tattoos. Then there are the stereotypical attributes we’re all tired of. Cops who drink too much and lawyers who work twenty hours a day, both to the detriment of their family life. Women who have an ordinary job during the day but have a secret life at night. I’m sure you can name many more.
I just finished a mystery about a woman cop who was so tough and hard-boiled, she was blinded by her obstinacy. So much so that she wasn’t even close to being real to me. I stopped reading John Grisham when I had enough of his characters’ bleeding-heart liberal attitudes. And I’m a liberal. Enough is enough.
Cops, lawyers, streetwalkers are humans too. Why not give them more realistic qualities? Don’t get me wrong. Characters need to stand out or we will forget them the minute we put the book down. Here’s an example of a character I think could be a role model for all characters. She’s from a movie, so think screenplay not book, and drawn so artfully that I think the title will become part of our lexicon. “Blue Jasmine.” Writer: Woody Allen.
Jasmine is a woman having a really hard time. She married a rich man, but he’s cheating on her. I don’t want to give away any more of the plot than that but suffice it to say she’s freaking out in her new life as a no-longer rich woman. Cate Blanchett is stellar in this role and we feel her pain, her anxiety, her angst, right down to our core. She has the jitters, she has the dropsies, she talks to herself. She’s deeply blue. And, although we don’t always sympathize with her, we feel her blues.
Woody is a master at character development (in all his works.) Sure he exaggerates the flaws, but we all know so well the person he is describing. The characters resonate with us because we’ve met them in real life. Maybe not exactly like the movies, but close enough. “He’s just like my uncle Joe. She’s like my best friend, Susie. He’s like the grocer on the corner.” Damn, he’s good.
How does Woody do it? If I knew, perhaps I’d be selling more books. He is a superb teacher.
There are many writers who can help us hone this skill. If only we would listen.
by Lynne | Aug 1, 2016 | Writing, Writing Tips
I recently finished an excellent novel called “Help for the Haunted.” It’s about two sisters, ages around 14 and 18 and their parents who make a living by helping expunge demons from haunted individuals. Hmm. Well, never mind the plot – it actually works quite well.
When I was about halfway through I happened to notice the name of the author. Isn’t that awful? I didn’t even pay attention to the author’s name until then. Shame. Anyway, the author’s name is John Searles. A male . . . writing in the point of view of two young females. The characters were so well formed and realistic I was surprised to learn they were created by a man.
I began to wonder how many other books I’ve read had characters developed by an opposite sex author. One that came to mind immediately was “Memoirs of a Geisha.” In this book, the author, Arthur Golden, does an excellent job of portraying the opposite sex main character. (Not to mention all the cultural differences that required a great deal of research.)
The other book I recalled was “She’s Come Undone,” by Wally Lamb. Also an excellent portrayal of a female character by a male author. Here the protagonist deals with rape, the death of her mother and suicide. How much tragedy and trauma can one woman deal with and how can the male author empathize so poignantly?
In “Help for the Haunted,” clearly I assumed the author was female. I applaud John Searles for getting into the heads of two young women so artfully. But how did he do it? Does he have daughters? Does he teach high school girls? Does he vet his characters through other young women to see if they are, indeed, realistic?
In my novel, “The Triangle Murders,” I attempted the same thing. The main character is a male homicide cop. But in this case, Frank Mead had been developed in other books with the help of a female character. In this book I simply let him fly on his own. The point is that Frank “grew” around my female protagonist in other books and I felt I knew him well enough to give him the lead. But how well did I know him compared to my female lead? As a woman, how well can I know any man?
Is it enough to be married, teach, be a CASA for teen foster youth, have brothers, sons, uncles and cousins of the opposite sex, to claim to know what goes on in their heads? Is writing about characters from an opposite gender point of view different from writing about characters in a different time zone or location?
I think it is. What do you think?
by Lynne | Jul 25, 2016 | Writing, Writing Tips
Writers understand that the space in which they create stories is vitally important. While some writers, I suppose, can do their work in a closet, I, personally, need a window to the natural world.
Cityscapes and high rises evoke creativity as well: gritty crime novels, hard-boiled detective stories, or futuristic Metropolis-like science fiction. But to me, there’s something uniquely inventive and inspiring about nature.
So when I moved (back) to a small town in Vermont from a big city in California, my writing world changed. I now look out on a green landscape, okay, brown and white in the winter, with the sounds of birds as the primary auditory backdrop. An occasional deer, moose, and, to my surprise, bear will be sighted in the distance.
I’m not a stranger to this environment. I taught in Vermont after my college days. It’s been many years since I’ve lived here yet it seems like yesterday. Some things are meant to be.
Robert Frost lived in Vermont. He became the official poet laureate of the Green Mountain State and wrote much of his verse in a log cabin in central Vermont. The State of Vermont has recognized him with a Robert Frost Wayside picnic area and a Robert Frost Interpretive Trail, (along which selections of his poems are posted.) There’s also a Robert Frost Memorial Drive, and, the Bread Loaf School of English that Frost cofounded, as well as the farm where he lived. (He actually owned five farms in Vermont.)
Rudyard Kipling, the English writer, and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, moved here in 1892 and wrote The Jungle Book and other short stories. In fact, he lived less than a mile from where I now live.
Mystery writer, Archer Mayor, lives here and his mysteries do, indeed, take place in Vermont.
So, you ask, will my mysteries now center on tracking scat in the Vermont woods? Nah. I will continue to write historical mysteries and solve them with modern technology. Unless I can discover a true mystery in Vermont.
And there are some. Take the man who vanished in 1949 while on a bus trip to Bennington; or five people who went missing between 1945 and 1950, in the “Bennington Triangle” (really?) an area near Glastonbury Mountain; or a human skill found on the side of the road in Danby in 2012; or the disappearance of a Bennington college student in 1971 (there’s that Triangle again.) Then, of course, there’s Champ, Lake Champlain’s own Loch Ness monster. Over 600 people have claimed to see him. Jeez Louise, why not me?
I never expected this window in my office to give me plots or characters or even backdrops for my books. The beauty of my new landscape simply gives my imagination and inventiveness free reign to go where they will. Isn’t that what fiction writing is about?
by Lynne | May 9, 2016 | Writing, Writing Tips
One of the most important, but often most difficult part of writing a novel is selecting names for your characters. When you begin you might already have some in mind. But as the characters morph during the writing process, that name might no longer fit. If you’re writing a series and the same characters reappear, you still need to name new characters.
Villains’ names are particularly important to get right. Common sense tells you that “Melvin Fuddrucker” is probably not the best handle for a serial killer. Or is it? Do you want to throw the reader off and let him like or sympathize with your bad guy? Do you want the reader to think: Melvin, hmm, an accountant or a store clerk, when in reality, Melvin is a triathlete, computer genius, and serial killer? Obfuscation may be a good thing.
The good guys shouldn’t be shortchanged either. You want your characters to be memorable and to have your readers calling them by name six months after they’ve read your book. I have a hard time remembering names six hours after reading some books. But characters from other books stay with me for a lifetime. LONESOME DOVE by Larry McMurtry comes to mind. How can you forget Augustus, Call, Newt, or for heaven’s sake, Pea Eye?
So how do you choose names?
One thing to remember. Try not to have too many characters with the same first initial. So, Bob, Bill, Binky, Belinda, and Bruce would probably be confusing. A couple are okay, of course. My two main characters are Maggie and Mead. Duh. One’s a first name, one’s a last. But I’ve avoided other “M” names unless they are historically necessary.
Also, unusual names are okay but too many are dicey. Throw a few Jenovas in with the Jennifers. Don’t make them too hard to pronounce, either out loud or in the reader’s head. It’s frustrating. Of course, if many of your characters are from countries other than the States, throw that idea out the window. But, perhaps, giving them a nickname will make them easier to recall.
One problem with historical novels is that using the real names of people involved can present problems. For instance, in some books by Sharon Kay Penman, one of my all-time favorite writers of historical England, she explained that the spelling of some characters had to be changed to distinguish one Maud from another Maude. (Lots of Henrys, Johns and James as well. Yoiks!)
Timing is very important. Names fall in and out of favor over the years, so take care not to use a very modern YA name like Aisha or Brandon in a book about merry old England.
When you’re creating a character name from scratch, consider these: personality, looks, age, ethnicity, stature in the community, occupation, attitudes toward politics, etc., values, whether the character is single, married, gay. Does the character remind you of a good friend, a bad friend, a worker, colleague, television or movie character (Dexter? Miss Marple? Morse? Lynley? Zen?) Does the character have a sense of humor? Is the character always depressed, upbeat, brutally honest, or unbearably shy? What are their quirks, flaws, hobbies, passions, hates? Does he carry around a blue plastic bag instead of a briefcase like Tony Hill?
Do you want the character’s name to conjure up something in the reader’s mind? Like Charlie Parker in John Connolly’s books makes me automatically think of the jazz musician.
I had a difficult time giving my villain in TIME EXPOSURE a meaningful name. He was, by profession, a Shakespearean actor in disguise on the battlefield as a sutler (a guy who went around selling goods to the foot soldiers.) What name would this actor choose for himself? He selected the name Jack Cade for his cover. Why?
Jack Cade was actually a real person who led the peasants in the Kent rebellion of 1450. He was also a character in Shakespeare’s play Henry VI, Part 2. In the play he talks to his friend, Dick the Butcher, whose most famous line is “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.” I thought my villain would get a kick out of that, and since he probably didn’t want to be called Dick the Butcher, Jack Cade he became.
Don’t underestimate the importance of your character’s names. If you want your readers to love a character, naming him Hitler or Attila would be a tough sell. Find names you like as you read books or newspapers, watch movies, or meet new folks at a party, and jot them down for the future. You might even try the phone book, but then you don’t have the advantage of seeing the name in action on a real person. Make something up, but explain in the novel what the name means to the characters involved.
While Shakespeare said “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet,” it would be hard to conjure up a picture of a beautiful flower if you called the rose, Skunk.
by Lynne | Apr 4, 2016 | Writing Tips
Whether you’re a self-published or traditionally-published author, you are no doubt engaging in marketing your books. One effective way to accomplish this is by blogging regularly on social media sites. However, recently, a number of writer “groups” within those sites have put a kibosh on posting a blog with links that take the reader back to your website, ergo, your books. In other words, no self-promotion.
I can understand this . . . to some extent. But what if you’re trying to make a point about the craft of writing? Can you not use your own writing to emphasize the point? After all, whose writing do you know best?
What about the research you’ve done? Why did you choose a particular location, or a particular time period in history? Can you not reference your own writing to enhance the reader’s understanding? If I discuss how I researched the forensics of fire in 1911 for one of my books, wouldn’t it be helpful to use a bit of background from it to clarify?
There are many self-promo groups on Facebook and Google + and you can post links directly to your books without feeling guilty. But what about sharing your own experiences or knowledge about writing? How you created your characters, developed your plot, built in tension and conflict. Why you choose to write in the past or the future. Who your target audience might be. How do you write a blog like this and never mention examples from your books?
A second concern regarding posting blogs: When a site administrator asks you not to post a link to your blog, the alternative is to cut and paste the blog directly onto the site. Frankly, I think this looks tacky and much less professional than sending someone to the blog page on your website.
Let’s give the readers some credit. If they choose to read your blog, they can click on the link and read it. No one is forcing them to browse the website any further. Certainly no one is forcing them to purchase a book.
Please share your thoughts.
