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Corey Whaley on Why Criticism Rocks

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John Corey Whaley is back and he's sharing his ongoing journey to publication. If you'd like to start at the beginning of Corey's story, check out his previous posts about writing his novel and his long search for representation.
Take it away, Corey!

Hello again WEbook,

I'd like to share share a bit more about what I learned during the writing process of Good God Bird. If I could provide other writers with just one bit of advice, it would be to seek constant feedback throughout the novel-writing process. During the two years that I worked on Good God Bird, I had a close friend (with fine-tuned editing skills and a penchant for good literature) review, critique, and provide notes on my working draft. Sometimes I would send her (Randi Anderson) a paragraph, and other times I would send her an entire chapter or two. Each time, I could expect well-thought notes and suggestions to come my way. This helped, early on, to clear up any confusion in my narrative and also gave me a great sounding board for working through new ideas. 

Writing a novel is difficult, very difficult, but asking someone else to read it and honestly point out problems or errors is nearly impossible! But, it’s essential, I think. I learned how to take criticism constructively because I asked for help from a friend. Be careful, though, not all friends make good editors. (Tip: examine a friend or family member’s bookshelf before asking him/her for help). If Dr. Seuss, genius as he was, is the only author present in someone’s home, he or she may not be the greatest authority on the written word. 

Because I was able to share ideas and work closely with someone who provided me with constant constructive criticism and feedback, I believe that the publication process over these next few months will be much easier for me to handle. Already, my agent and his staff sent me a considerable amount of suggestions (all changes were of my choosing, ultimately) and my previous experience with editing, re-writing, and sharing ideas helped to soften the blow. I was able to take a deep breath, read their notes, and venture back into the lives of characters that I hadn’t thought I’d ever meet again. I learned to look at the editing process as an adventure, wherein I get to discover new things about my characters and work to perfect their stories before the world meets them. 

Please feel free to post any and all comments below, or via twitter @corey_whaley.

Looking for a great feedback buddy? Check out some of WEbook's top reviewers!

Finding a Theme (Or Letting the Theme Find You)

Sanjay Bahadur, author of The Sound of Water, guest blogs about finding a theme for a novel -- or letting the theme find you. A bit of background about the book, and about Sanjay's process which included getting feedback via the internet!

The Sound of Water provides an account of an Indian mining disaster as seen from three perspectives: an old miner struggling to save himself and his coworkers hundreds of feet below the surface of the earth; the company and government officials charged with managing the rescue efforts; and the miners' families anxiously awaiting word of survival or death.

While writing the book, the internet proved to be an effective resource for Sanjay. Not only did it strengthen his research but it enabled him to connect with some discerning readers whose suggestions improved the readability of the book. He also received technical guidance from mining engineers promptly through emails, including diagrams or process descriptions. Sanjay writes: “Writing can be a lonely process but internet ensured that I never lacked support or advice.”

As a first time author, the question posed to me most often is: So how did you choose the theme of The Sound of Water? To be frank, I think themes of novels are like taxmen. You don’t find them – they find you.

You may think I am debunking the art of writing and the ability of a writer to craft a good story. Well, I’m not. When a raw theme presents itself to a writer, she (or he – to retain the old world charm) still has to hammer, carve and chisel all her lumps of thoughts to fit that theme and make it presentable.

Imagine if the following “theme” were to strike me: A confused adolescent boy of 17-20 -- perhaps also prone to hallucinating -- gets it into his head that his father had been murdered. He sees ghosts, rants and raves about injustice in this world, takes out his anger on his hapless girlfriend, freaks out his close friends and hatches a wacko plot to take revenge. The plot hinges on performance of a weird play named, say, “The Murder of Gonzago” performed by some traveling drama company! It all ends in plenty of dead bodies, some killed by mistake, some deliberately and some in utter despair.

I don’t know about you, friend -- but I would probably make a mess of it. Or Hong Kong would have produced a B Grade karate flick called “Fist of Blood” or something. But it made “ye olde bard”, Shakespeare create Hamlet. See my point? The skill and presentation always matters. A theme grows like a kernel in the fertile soil of the writer’s imagination. It is how much love, care and attention it gets that makes it a sapling and eventually a flowering tree. All it takes is the courage to plant it -- on paper. Like babies, all themes are potentially great.

If that doesn’t sound convincing, let’s try out an open experiment here. Let any aspiring writer put down a theme that has grabbed her or his mind. Let it be just 10 sentences – or a single line. Plant it here, in this public space just so you know you have sowed your kernel in front of witnesses. If you really want to write a book, it will grow. In all probability, you would be the proud owner of a finished manuscript within the next 2-3 years.

Are there any disbelievers out there?

Sanjay Bahadur has a Masters degree in Economics from the University of Mumbai and a MBA from the University of Birmingham, UK.  He joined the Indian Revenue Service in 1989. During 2000-04 he worked as a Director in the Indian Ministry of Coal, which gave him the opportunity to observe mining operations and lives of miners at close quarters.

WEbook Writing Secrets #18: How To Write a Love Scene

by Maya Rodale

Writing a love scene really isn’t much different than any other kind—there is setting, action, characters, dialogue, etc. Yet writing them can make an author nervous. Whether writing erotica or sweetly sensual moments, here are few tips to make your love scenes a pleasurable experience to write and to read.

Dim the lights and turn on some music. Pour yourself a drink, if that’ll help. Basically, set the mood in your writing space. Some people might be able to write erotica under fluorescen t lights on the subway, but some of us need a slightly more romantic setting to let go. Likewise, take a moment to describe the  setting of your love scene.

Forg et about your mom reading it. Nothing kills the mood like imagining your mom or grandmother or boss reading over your shoulder as you type or critiquing the final product. Refuse to consider that while you’re writing. Think of an audience of strangers who paid good money for this. Or pretend no one will read it at all. Whatever you need to do to take the focus away from your insecurities and onto the page.

Research! Read other love scenes, watch porn (if you’re into it), and, you know, practice by yourself or with a partner. This is probably the most fun you’ll ever have with research. Take advantage of it.

Remember all the senses. Making love is a sensual experience, so represent as many senses as you can—touch, taste, sight, smell, sound. For example: how soft is her hair when he runs his fingers through it? What does the sound of his breath tell her about how aroused he is? Is it dark, candlelit, or early morning? Sometimes it helps to go back with different colored pencils and highlight each sense (every instance of sight underlined in green, etc). You’ll see what’s missing. Similarly, you’ve probably given your characters feelings, thoughts, a sense of humor, etc. Those things don’t stop at the bedroom door. Think of all those things as other senses to appeal to, and describe them in your sex scene.

Find sexy synonyms. “Insert Tab A into Slot B” kind of sums up the act of sex, but it’s lacking in romance, sensuality, and fun. The anatomical terms are correct, but can be reminiscent of the doctor’s office (generally not too hot, although…). Seek alternative words that are more seductive. Sex scenes in romance novels are a great place to start—they’re loaded with beautiful, sexy, and explicit language. There’s always the thesaurus, and ones that specialize in erotic words. I personally am partial to The Synonym Finder.

Last but not least, have fun with it! Your readers are more likely to enjoy reading it if you enjoyed writing it.

Maya Rodale is the author of two Regency-set historical romance novels, The Heir And The Spare and The Rogue And The Rival (yes, sex scenes are included!). Visit her on the web at www.mayarodale.com.

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WEbook Writing Secrets #17: Defeat the First Draft Blues, Part 4

This is Part 4 of a series on revising the first draft of a novel. Read Part 1 to find out why it's important to take a break from your first draft before you revise it. Read Part 2 to discover why a messy first draft is a good thing. Part 3 teaches you how to take stock of what works (and what doesn't).

Step 4: Put the Vision back in Revision

"Strategic planning is worthless -- unless there is first a strategic vision." -- John Naisbitt, American writer and thinker

If you've followed steps 1-3 of the WEbook Guide to Revising a Novel, you should have a good handle on your book as it exists today -- warts and all. You may be tempted to get right in there and start applying liquid nitrogen to those warts. But then all you'll be left with is a toad with no warts. Why settle for that when you could have -- oh, I don't know -- a griffin, or a jackalope, or an animatronic space monkey?

In other words, they call it revision for a reason. Now that you know what your book is, it's time to create a vision for what your book could be.

There is no simple formula for discovering the greatest potential inherent in your first draft. You cannot plug in character A's strength rating, divide it by subplot B's development score, and multiply the whole thing by the square root of plot twist C. Instead, you must draw on the mysterious forces of inspiration and vision that led you to want to write a book in the first place. Luckily, there are a few signposts that can help you find your way in the dark.

Below, you will find eight questions that will guide you towards your greatest vision. Before you get started on the questions, establish some ground rules to help you get the most out of this process.

Forget what you think you know. Let go of any preconceptions you have about your book. Presumably, you started your first draft with some more or less definite ideas about plot, character, and/or premise. (Even if you started with nothing, you probably developed some ideas along the way.) Throw them all out the window. You may end up back where you started, concluding that yes, in fact, this is a realistic first-person narrative describing a lonely housewife's journey from depression to international pop stardom. But in order to find your vision, you must create space for the possibility that your book could in fact be a third-person narrative exploring the perspectives of twelve different roadies backstage before the once-lonely housewife's final arena concert.

So many possibilites, so few lifetimes. Once you open yourself up to the possibility that your book could be something other than what you originally imagined it to be, you may find yourself overwhelmed by all the somethings other it could be. Don't despair. Focus on finding the most promising path for your novel, and leave the other possibilities for another day -- and another book.

Keep it positive. Remember when you read through your first draft and took stock of what worked well? Let those bright lights guide you to your vision. As you reflect on the questions below, think mainly about the elements of your draft that stand out as great, successful, and/or energetic.

Grab a pen. Carve out some time in your day to sit down with a pen and a notebook. Devote roughly ten minutes to each of the questions below. If you need to, you can come back to some of the questions again -- and again -- until you're satisfied. You can also jot down other questions that occur to you as you answer these. Remember, you should answer these questions not necessarily about your first draft as it is, but about your book as it could be and as you want it to be.

Document your vision. Spend as much time as you want brainstorming about the questions below. When you feel that you have a solid grasp of the greatest possibility for your story, take one piece of paper and collect the downpour from your brainstorm into a single bucket. Write 2-3 sentences summarizing each answer. (If an answer covers more than one character, it's okay to devote 2-3 sentences to each character.) Incorporate your favorite ideas from the final question ("What if...?") into your answer to question # 7.

The questions:

1. Whose story is it? It's fine if the answer includes more than one person; however, it may be easier if you have one main person to focus on.
2. Who tells the story? This may or may not be the same person as question # 1. It also may or may not be a person in the story at all -- the person telling the story might be you, the author.
3. How does the story begin? Pinpoint the chronological beginning of your story -- not necessarily where you begin telling it, but where the story itself is set in motion.
4. How does the story end? See above, substituting "end" for "begin." Look for the place where the strongest elements of your story resolve themselves.
5. How do the book's characters change over the course of the story? What transformations occur -- or should occur -- to your characters between the story's beginning and its end?
6. How does the reader change over the course of the story? In your vision for your book, imagine what you want your reader to think and feel at the beginning of the book, and chart the changes in their perspective that should take place along the way. You may be mainly concerned with your reader's thoughts about people or events within the book; or, you may want your book to have an effect on your reader's larger worldview.
7. What events or elements of the story are crucial to the changes experienced by your characters and readers? Make a list of things that happen in the story that lead to character or reader transformations and shifts in perspective.
8. What if...? Finally, take ten or twenty minutes to brainstorm on possible new story elements that could strengthen the transformations you envision for your characters and readers. Repeat as necessary.

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WEbook Writing Secrets

Got a secret I don’t know about? Share it with the world in WEbook Writing Secrets. To submit a secret, email me or visit my profile and send me a message with the subject line: Writing Secrets. The best secrets will be published here and in the WEbook Toolbox. Authors will be credited with a byline and a bio.

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-- Melissa

WEbook Writing Secrets #16: Defeat the First Draft Blues, Part 3

This is Part 3 of a series on revising the first draft of a novel. Read Part 1 to find out why it's important to take a break from your first draft before you revise it. Read Part 2 to discover why a messy first draft is a good thing.

Step 3: Survey the Damage

So you've taken a nice, long break from your novel, and you've made peace with its imperfections. Now it's time to survey the damage -- but don't worry. You won't be making a list of all the things you did wrong. Instead, you'll be looking at what you did right, and asking yourself some very important questions.

Find What Works

When you come back to your novel after a break, the first thing you need to do is read it. That may seem obvious, but it's important that you set some guidelines for how you will read the first draft.

• DON'T change a word. That's right, not a single word. Don't add a comma, don't remove a quotation mark. Don't make any changes at all to your manuscript.
• DO read in big, uninterrupted chunks. If you can manage it, set aside a few consecutive days to get through the book. You may not be able to do it all in one sitting, but the last thing you want is a two-week break between page 100 and page 101.
• DO print your manuscript. Working from a hard copy instead of a computer screen has many advantages. It will make it easier to resist the temptation to start "fixing" things. (See above.) And, you can scribble all over a piece of paper. (See below.) That doesn't work so well on a monitor.
• DO break out the highlighters and colored markers. How you choose to mark up your manuscript is up to you, but it pays to get creative.
• DO look for what works. Underline or highlight any passages that are particularly resonant, well-written, and effective. Write notes in the margin, pointing out sections of strong characterization, setting, action, etc. 
• DO ask questions. As you read, leave yourself memos asking what, where, how, who, and, most importantly, why. 
• DON'T get too focused on flaws. You could agonize over why a scene doesn't work, only to decide later that the entire sub-plot it belongs to needs to go. For now, think of yourself as a doctor treating a patient with an exotic, unknown disease. You can't make a diagnosis, much less prescribe a treatment, until you take the patient's history and make a list of all the symptoms. As you're reading, jot down a note if a scene moves too quickly or slowly; if dialogue is stilted; if a character does something implausible; or if something just plain doesn't make sense. Then let it go, and move on to the next page.

Ask for Help

Feedback can be a great help to a writer -- but it's important to get the right kind of feedback for whatever stage you're at with your novel. When you're planning a revision of a first draft, ask your readers to follow the above guidelines, with one modification: tell them not to focus on the flaws at all. Let your readers know that the manuscript is very rough, and you'll be working out the kinks soon. For now, you're interested in hearing what elements of the book your readers like the most.

Coming Soon: Defeat the First Draft Blues, Part 4: Find your Vision

Join the Conversation

Share your revision wisdom and woes with fellow WEbookers on the WEbook forums.

WEbook Writing Secrets

Got a secret I don’t know about? Share it with the world in WEbook Writing Secrets. To submit a secret, email me or visit my profile and send me a message with the subject line: Writing Secrets. The best secrets will be published here and in the WEbook Toolbox. Authors will be credited with a byline and a bio.

Get Feedback on your Novel at WEbook

Find readers for your work – sign up for WEbook today.

-- Melissa

WEbook Writing Secret # 15: Defeat the First Draft Blues, Part 2

This is Part 2 of a series on revising the first draft of a novel, dedicated to all the NaNoWriMo winners out there. Read Part 1 here.

Step 2: Embrace the Mess

When I was a kid, my mom had a cross-stitched sign in our living room that said, "A messy house is the sign of a brilliant mind." If I knew how to cross-stitch, I'd hang a similar sign over my desk: "A messy first draft is the sign of a brilliant mind."

I know a few good writers who edit their work as they write it. Sentence 1 has to be just right before they can move onto Sentence 2. Chapter 1 has to be perfect before they write Chapter 2.  If they get to Chapter 13 and decide to make a change that affects Chapters 1, 2, 5, and 9, they go back and fix those chapters before they write Chapter 14.  Some of these writers even manage to finish books!

This guide to revision is not for those writers.

Let's assume that your first draft is a total mess. You wrote it (maybe in a single month); you left it alone long enough to get some perspective; and now you know for sure:  This book is a piece of junk.  No one in the history of time has ever written a book this bad.  At the beginning of the book, your main character's name is John; by the end, it's Jan.  You have no idea how or why Jan spent three chapters in Bangladesh shopping for a puppy -- she lives in Indiana, and she hates dogs.  Plus, you forgot to give Jan any friends, family, or source of income.  Whoops!

Good thing writers are so famously crazy.  You'll need at least two separate personalities to deal with this mess.

Personality #1: The Creator.  The Creator is great at coming up with cool ideas (like sending your main character to Bangladesh).  Flashes of insight and inspiration are the Creator's specialty.  Without the Creator, the world -- and your book -- would be very, very boring.  However, the Creator is lousy at logic and planning.  That's why you need...

Personality #2:  The Editor.  The Editor cleans up the messes the Creator leaves behind.  Editors are great at seeing the big picture, making outlines, setting deadlines, fixing details, and refining language.

If your first draft is a mess, that's a sign that your Creator has been hard at work -- which is a very good thing.  A mess means you've been thinking big, and you probably have some really great ideas buried under all the digressions and mistakes.  Now it's time for the Editor to take over for a while. 

In the steps to come, you will learn when to delegate responsibility to the Editor, and when to call on the Creator. For now, make a deal with yourself: The Creator and the Editor are not allowed in the same room without a chaperon.  

And stop worrying about the mess.  If you want to build the Sistine Chapel, you have to spill some paint.

Coming Soon: Step 3: Survey the Damage

Join the Conversation

Share your revision wisdom and woes with fellow WEbookers on the WEbook forums.

WEbook Writing Secrets

Got a secret I don’t know about? Share it with the world in WEbook Writing Secrets. To submit a secret, email me or visit my profile and send me a message with the subject line: Writing Secrets. The best secrets will be published here and in the WEbook Toolbox. Authors will be credited with a byline and a bio.

Start Writing Now

Put your secrets to work – sign up for WEbook today.

-- Melissa

WEbook Writing Secret # 14: Defeat the First Draft Blues, Part 1

National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo) ended November 30, but for the 21,683 writers who successfully completed a 50,000-word (or longer) draft of a novel, the work has just begun. If you're one of them -- or if you've ever stared at a first draft of a novel, wondering, "What's next?" -- WEbook Writing Secrets are here to help.

This is the first in a series of practical tips for writers facing the first draft blues.

It's Not Over!

Unless you're Jack Kerouac, chances are good that the work you create in a white-hot frenzy is nowhere near publishable quality. (Frankly, I've always had my doubts about old Jack, too.) Even if you're not sure you want to publish your novel, you can learn just as much -- and perhaps more -- about telling a story from editing and revision as you can from writing a first draft. Here's how it's done.

(Note: These tips come from my experience working with writers to get their first -- or second, or third, or fifteenth -- draft of a novel in shape for publication. None of these steps are compulsory. Plenty of people write, revise, and publish novels without following my advice. If you have work habits that work for you, keep working 'em!)

Step 1: Take Five

A first draft of a novel is a lot like a really, really dense forest. There may be a path in there, but if you're lost in the trees, you'll never find it. Get out of the forest. In fact, go far enough for long enough that you completely forget what the forest is like. Then, rent a helicopter and fly over the forest, making a map of what you see from a distance. When you get back into the trees, you'll be less likely to get lost.

What does this mean in non-metaphorical terms?  Quite simply: Take a break, then come back and read your entire first draft with fresh eyes, making notes before you start changing anything. Your break should be long enough that you forget a lot of the details of what you wrote. The length of this break will vary depending on how much your mind resembles a steel trap. There are a few things you can do to speed up the process. Choose one of these cross-training activities, or combine a few.

1) Read one great book. Pick something long and difficult that you've been meaning to tackle since high school. Anything written by a 19th-century Russian writer or an early modernist European should do the trick. Spend a week or two on War and Peace or The Magic Mountain, and you'll have no idea what you were working on before. Beware! Reading dense old books can infect your writing style. This is more of a danger during the composition process, but you should be on guard for accidental overdose nonetheless.

2) Read three silly books. The books should be reasonably well-written (you don't want to rot your writer's brain), but light and fast. It's best to steer clear of your novel's genre -- if you wrote a horror novel, don't read Stephen King. For all writers, I recommend anything by P.G. Wodehouse.

3) Complete a physical challenge. Train for a 5K, a 10K, a marathon, or a triathlon. Hike a segment of the Appalachian trail. Climb a literal mountain.

4) Become an art enthusiast. Take two weeks, and see as many plays, dance performances, concerts, and museum exhibits as your schedule and your town's cultural offerings will permit. Don't go to literary readings -- they lead to nothing but pointless, poisonous fantasies about what you'll wear to your first book signing.

5) Don't stop writing -- but don't work on your novel, and don't start anything that can't be finished in a day. Your goal is not to start new projects during this time -- you just need to keep the old writing muscles in decent shape. Think of yourself as an athlete in the off-season, or an opera singer between shows. You want to run drills and sing some light scales, but you also need to rest. Commit to a few weeks of free-writing for an hour or so a day, or write some 200-word short short stories. File the stories away for later. When you're done with your novel, you can pull them out and use them for inspiration for your next project.

Coming Soon: Step 2: Embrace the Mess

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Share your revision wisdom and woes with fellow WEbookers on the WEbook forums.

WEbook Writing Secrets

Got a secret I don’t know about? Share it with the world in WEbook Writing Secrets. To submit a secret, email me or visit my profile and send me a message with the subject line: Writing Secrets. The best secrets will be published here and in the WEbook Toolbox. Authors will be credited with a byline and a bio.

Start Writing Now

Put your secrets to work – sign up for WEbook today.

-- Melissa

WEbook Writing Secret # 13: Surprise! It’s your Character!

By FirstYearGrad

The better we know someone, the more they surprise us with their inconsistencies.

I once worked with a woman who color-coded her desk drawers.  She sorted her pens and pencils into three separate holders, depending on the duty they were to perform, and never thought to put a plastic coated paper clip into the same pot as the shiny silver wires.

One day I agreed to pick her up for work.  When I got to her house, I was shocked to see that her kitchen table was covered with last night’s dishes, and her sink was full of even older dishes.  A great orange tabby cat walked up and down the counter, carefully picking its way around newspapers and old mail.  The floor may have been clean, but it was hard to see it under the pile of dirty laundry.

Now, if I had put this woman into a story before I visited her house, her character would have been flat, one-sided, and uninteresting.  As I got to know her better, she surprised me all the time with new sides to her personality.

So, writer, know your character -- and you best know them better then that person you sit next to at work.

Desperately Seeking FirstYearGrad

Are you the author of this clever writing tip?  If so, please visit my profile and send me a message so I can include a short bio with your entry!

WEbook Writing Secrets

Got a secret I don’t know about? Share it with the world in WEbook Writing Secrets. To submit a secret, email me or visit my profile and send me a message with the subject line: Writing Secrets. The best secrets will be published here and in the WEbook Toolbox. Authors will be credited with a byline and a bio.

Start Writing Now

Put your secrets to work – sign up for WEbook today.

-- Melissa

WEbook Writing Secret # 12: Make Your Own Book Club Guide

By Marieke

Many serious novels, especially those that tackle social subjects, come with a reading guide, which supplies questions for book clubs, students, and other committed readers. If you’re writing a novel, why not make up your own reading guide as you go along? Imagine the questions your readers may have about your book’s themes and characters – this will help you find the strengths and weaknesses of your story.

Here are some suggestions for questions to include in your “Writer’s Reading Guide”:

1. How do the first and last scene frame your novel?

2. Why are the main characters friends? And what do they fear from each other?

(After the Reading Guide to The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini )

3.  Discuss the topic of marriage as it is represented in your novel.

4. What are your thoughts on the structure of your novel?

(After the Reading Guide to The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan)

5. What rules, both written and unwritten, do the characters follow in the novel?

6. In what ways do the settings affect their residents?

(After the Reading Guide to The Cider House Rules by John Irving)

You can find more reading guides on readinggroupguides.com.

About the Author

Marieke van Buytene from the Netherlands is freelance writer, editor and creative writing teacher, so fate has decreed that she’ll never get a novel published.  Fortunately, a friend tipped her on WEbook in August 2008, so now at least she can share The Devil’s Virgin, and soon also her comic mystery stories and more.

WEbook Writing Secrets

Got a secret I don’t know about? Share it with the world in WEbook Writing Secrets. To submit a secret, email me or visit my profile and send me a message with the subject line: Writing Secrets. The best secrets will be published here and in the WEbook Toolbox. Authors will be credited with a byline and a bio.

Start Writing Now

Put your secrets to work – sign up for WEbook today.

-- Melissa

WEbook Writing Secret #11: Cut the Stage Directions

Melissa arrived at the office five minutes late, as usual. She opened the door and walked down the hall. She put her laptop down on her desk and sat in her chair. She double-clicked on her Outlook folder, and brought up her cluttered to-do list. Stage Directions Blog was written right at the top. Great. She’d been looking forward to this for a long time. But first, she had to do something about breakfast. It was no good writing on an empty stomach. She pulled her whole wheat bagel out of her backpack and unwrapped it. She put a napkin in her lap. She tore off a chunk of bagel and put it in her mouth. She chewed. She swallowed. Soon, the bagel was gone, and it was time to write the blog entry. She opened Microsoft Word (despite the program’s nightmarish incompatibility with Typepad’s text editor), and put her hands on the keyboard. She began to type.

Cut!

You follow all that, readers? Or did you scan right down to the bottom, thinking, “All right already with the napkin in your lap! Get to the good stuff!”

If you answered the latter, I don’t blame you. That paragraph is a living, breathing specimen of a prose writer’s mortal enemy: Stage Directions.

Any time you narrate a physical action that gets a person from point A to point B, you’re using Stage Directions. Of course, sometimes it’s necessary to include some stage directions. But many writers – especially novices – use far too many stage directions in their writing.

The term Stage Directions comes from – you guessed it – playwriting, where stage directions are used to tell actors what they should do with their bodies during a play. Some plays include more stage directions than others. The most basic stage directions provide cues only for when a character enters or exits the stage. But plays never provide detailed directions for every single action a character should make during the play. Why not? Because actors and directors would revolt! “Don’t micromanage me!” they would exclaim. “I can create my own interpretation of my character’s actions! Give me some creative freedom!”

Your readers are sort of like these actors and directors. If a person you’re writing about goes from the kitchen table to the back door, you don’t need to tell your readers about how they stood up, walked around the table, walked into the hall, opened the door to the laundry room, etc. Your readers are perfectly capable of filling in the blanks with their imaginations. In fact, the process of doing this is one of the major pleasures of reading. Don’t rob your reader of that pleasure by micromanaging his or her imagination.

How do you know what stage directions to put in, and which to leave out? Practice, practice, practice. You might start by putting a lot of unnecessary directions in, and then taking them out in editing. Wise, helpful readers can help you find places in your writing where you use too many stage directions. As a general rule, you should include only those physical actions which are absolutely necessary for a reader’s comprehension of a scene; and those which reveal something interesting about your character or his/her situation. If you’re still uncertain, pretend your characters are capable of teleporting both through time and space. If you can teleport them somewhere without totally confusing your reader, or missing something crucial in the story, don’t describe the steps it would take for them to get there.

Now try this on for size:

Melissa arrived at the office five minutes late, as usual. She glanced at her cluttered to-do list: Stage Directions Blog. Great. She’d been looking forward to this for a long time. But first, she had to do something about breakfast. It was no good writing on an empty stomach. She tried to make her whole wheat bagel last, but before she knew it, it was time to write the blog entry. She opened Microsoft Word (despite the program’s nightmarish incompatibility with Typepad’s text editor), and began to type.

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-- Melissa