Tag: Martha Alderson

Posted in Blogging, Promotion, The Writing Path

Why Blog?

Posted on by beckylevine

Last week, around the time that Martha Alderson guest-posted over here, she and I were talking about blogging in general–why to do it, how to do it “right,” how to make your blog useful, to its readers and to yourself.

So I thought I’d talk about it a bit here. Just a bit, and then I’m going to give you some links to other people’s take on it.

I first started blogging for fun and to connect with other kids’ writers. I still have this other blog, where I talk more about my own projects–the ups and downs–and just silly life stuff.  This blog totally met its objectives–I’ve “met” such wonderful writers there (and even met some of them in person, too). I get support and education about writing for kids. And, honestly, I just have fun blogging.

Then I got the contract with Writer’s Digest to write The Critiquer’s Survival Guide, and I started thinking about promotion. Frankly, it’s a bit tough to think about blogging to promote your book, or yourself, but—equally frankly, it’s the smart thing to do. In my first blog entry here, I talked about what I wanted to do with this new blog. My overall goal is to provide truly helpful, supportive information about writing, marketing, and–yes–critiquing. I hope the blog becomes something just as important for my readers as it is for me.

And, yes, I want to keep having fun with both blogs.

I browsed around the web and found out a bit more about blogging–different reasons for doing it and some good ways to make your blog helpful. Take a look & see what these people have to say.

And let me (and everyone else!) hear from you. Do you blog? Why? What’s the best tip you’ve ever received about how to blog? Feel free to drop the URL to your blog in with your comment!

Posted in Guest Blogger, NaNoWriMo, Plot, Revising, The Writing Path

Guest Blogger: Martha Alderson

Posted on by beckylevine

Martha Alderson is a friend, a critique partner, and a wonderful teacher of plot. Her blog, The Plot Whisperer, is a font of information about crafting your fiction, and you can buy Martha’s book and other plot tools at her website, Blockbuster Plots. To celebrate the end of NaNoWriMo, Martha has declared December National Plot Month and is giving daily tips at her blog to help you get started on revising that manuscript.

I asked Martha to stop by and give us just a taste of this next stage, how to look at those tens of thousands of words you just produced and figure out what you’re supposed to do with them.

Welcome, Martha!

Thank you, Becky, for inviting me to guest blog “about the kind of plotting a writer can do when they’ve FINISHED NaNoWriMo.” I agree with you that this is a crucial time–because, as you say–“it’s the first time (if the writers have done such a fast first draft) that they start shaping the story.”

The craft of writing involves taking what the muse has offered during the first draft and shaping the words into a coherent story. This step involves more than rewriting. The craft of writing requires a revisioning of the overall story.

The first draft is all about getting the words on the page.

Now it is time to forget the words.

Instead, stand back and analyze the story as a whole.

Consider the overall structure, how the characters develop and transform, where the gaps and holes appear, how the dramatic action rises and falls, the flow, the pace, the voice, what themes are introduced, and the overall meaning of the story itself.

Plot Tricks & Tips to Prepare for Draft Two

  • Do not read your manuscript for at least a week, preferably longer.
  • Do not show your first draft to others.
  • No editing. (Editing keeps you at the word level. Now is the time to consider the story as a whole.)
  • Break the story into the Beginning, Middle, and End. Each part has specific parameters and is easier to manage that takes place in each section.
  • List the main events that take place in each section.
  • Plot out step-by-step what happens to the main character in each of the three parts, both in terms of the action and in terms of their own individual growth, based on the action.

If you have a draft of a novel, memoir, or screenplay and are at a loss as to how to take your writing to the next level, join me throughout the month of December. I’ll take you through the process of crafting your first draft into a viable story.

Posted in Revising, The Beginning, Writing Books

Les Edgerton’s Hooked

Posted on by beckylevine

Back in October, I talked about The Writer’s Journey, by Christopher Vogler. In that post, I mentioned Les Edgerton’s book Hooked: Write Fiction That Grabs Readers at Page One & Never Lets Them Go. I said I’d talk more about Edgerton’s book in another post.

So here we are.

With November and NaNoWriMo ending, and the new year heading our way fast, I thought this would be a good time to pick up this thread. Revision is, in a big part, about structure–about what happens when and which scenes go where. Edgerton’s book is solely and completely about the beginnings of a story, but (pardon the pun) that seems as good a place as any to start.

Edgerton talks about a lot of the same things Vogler does—at least in terms of the early part of the hero’s journey. Edgerton may not call everything by the same names, but in his chapters, you’ll find the ordinary world, the inciting incident, the threshold, etc. The big difference, though, between the two books is Edgerton’s emphasis on how quickly we, as writers, have to get those starting points onto the page.

I write fiction for kids–middle-grade and YA readers. These readers are not known for their patience with authors. You can blame it on action movies and video games, or you can credit these kids with the sense and intelligence to recognize and appreciate a tight, fast-moving opener. As someone who, in the past ten years went from reading (and loving) 700-page Victorian novels to devouring 250-page tense and terse, funny and furious YA books—I can say the decade has been a good education in writing.

Because it’s not just kids’ books that move more quickly today; it’s all books. At first, when you realize just how much Edgerton is asking you to do in the first chapter, first scene, first page, first paragraph, it’s intimidating. And part of your brain may go into the “I don’t have to” whine. But keep reading. And go back to the books you’ve lost most in the past couple of years. You’ll see that he’s right.

It’s not just that we’re told over and over that agents, if we’re lucky, read the first five pages. It’s not just that we know most book buyers skim the first page, maybe the last, then make their decision about whether to buy that book or leave it on the shelf where they found it. It’s that, these days, a good story sucks us in from Page 1, hooks us, and goes racing along so quickly that we have to grab on and ride, just to keep up.

This is the kind of story I want to be writing.

Thankfully, Edgerton doesn’t just point out the necessity of this kind of beginning. He gives thorough, detailed information about the big pieces of this skinny little beginning, and he follows up with seriously helpful (and funny) instructions for how to put those pieces together.

If you haven’t read Hooked, take a look. Especially, if you’re looking at a revision, post-NaNo or not, take a look. I think you’ll be glad.

And don’t forget to check out Martha Alderson’s blog, Plot Whisperer for Writers and Readers, all through the month of December, for tips on plotting out your revision. Martha will be guest-blogging here, too, soon!

Posted in Outlining

Outline: What’s Your Definition?

Posted on by beckylevine

Today’s post is in honor of all the NaNo writers out there, and all variations thereof, who may or may not be writing from some kind of outline. To all of you: Go, go, go!

Outlines. Think back to school–junior high, high school, even college. You had a paper to write, an analysis of a book you’d been assigned. You were organized, you’d learned the method, so you started with an outline. You know: Thesis, Topic Sentences, Supporting Details, Conclusion.

Remember?

It’s a useful technique. I kept at it when I became a technical writer, and I use it today for my nonfiction. It’s a great map to write from, and it gives me a starting point to go back to, if I get distracted or off track, to re-organize things a bit, get my new focus down on paper. And, yes, it’s got that basic form: Chapter 1, Heading 1, Heading 2, etc, etc.

Not so my fiction. Probably because there are too many layers to fiction. If I try to fit them all into headings and subheadings—my brain will implode. Messy. So how do I outline?

I start with Martha Alderson’s Scene Tracker. The Scene Tracker has several columns of information that you fill out for every scene. I add columns of my own, things I tend to forget about unless they’re right in front of me. And I’m sure I fill every column out with a LOT more text than Martha expects. I don’t trust myself to remember big ideas from a word or two, so I end up using a teensy font and get these very skinny, very TALL columns to squint at later. But the system keeps me organized, which keeps me calm and (relatively) sane.

I also always have gaps. I find it too hard to “outline” my story all the way through, without getting down to doing some writing. The outlining process stirs ideas that go beyond details and facts–scenes, character moments, tensions–and I need to start writing.

Before I write any real scenes, though, I usually take things one step further. I open a file for those scenes–starting with the beginning of the story. In that file, I write the basic action that I visualize in the scene–what the hero does, who and what they run into that makes their life difficult, and where, by the last page, they need to be heading. I get down the goal of every major player in the scene, and I try to come up with a plan to put those goals in conflict. I also throw in a lot of fairly random thinking about theme, tension, setting, and various connections I’m starting to see.

When I’ve done this scene planning as long as I can stand it, I start writing.

Do I stay with the “outline” I’ve plugged into my Scene Tracker? Do I stick to the goals and actions I gave my hero in the scene basics?

Sometimes, yes; sometimes, no. I said that I use my nonfiction outline as a guide, as the original drawing board that I often go “back to.” Why should my fiction plan be any different? Would I love to know everything ahead, have the story perfectly drawn out in my head and on paper, so I could just write and write and write? I’ll admit it: Yes, I would.

I just don’t think its possible. And I don’t think it’s a good goal for the writer to shoot for. Every time I lose myself off the outline, I come up with something new and exciting, something that either turns the story in a new, better direction or something that adds a layer, a depth, that simply didn’t exist before.

Here are a few more blogs and articles I found about the variations of outlining:

What about you? What’s your definition of outline these days?