Suggestion: Brainstorm

Brainstorming is a useful tool to remember in order to think outside the box. You can do it alone or with critique partners.

Pick any scene of your story that is slow paced, possibly cliché, and most likely the one readers will skim. Using your mind (or a piece of paper, or a whiteboard) remember how the scene goes without re-reading it. Try to question EVERYTHING that happens in the scene.

Things like:

• Motivation
• Setting (rooms and props)
• Dialogue
• Characters
• Plot
• Tension

Every time you pose an answer to the question think of at least three alternatives and don’t worry about it sounding silly or unlikely. At the end of your brainstorming session the right answer should be clear because you connect this dot of your story to the others without losing your reader.

For an example let’s open J.K. Rowling’s The Sorcerer’s Stone to Chapter 9 “The Midnight Duel” (p. 143 in my edition). Since this is the final draft of this chapter we have to deconstruct it to see what questions Rowling wanted to answer. In parenthesis are possible alternatives that could have come from brainstorming.

• How can we make Harry dread flying lessons? (a storm is coming, the girl he likes is in the same class, he has class with Malfoy, he hears the broom chooses the rider)
• How much does Harry hate Malfoy? (more than homework on weekends, more than Snape, more than being raised as a muggle, more than Dudley)
• How do the Gryffindor first years find out they will have flying lessons with the Slytherins? (Malfoy brags that he’ll show Harry a thing or two, McGonagall announces it at breakfast, Nearly Headless Nick wakes the boys in their bedroom and tells them to hurry or they’ll be late for their first lesson, they find a note pinned up in the Gryffindor common room)
• How will Harry convey his feelings about the news? (announces he won’t learn, throws his books on the ground, sarcastically states he wants to make a fool of himself in front of Malfoy, rips the paper off the wall)

It’s easy to see that Rowling connected the dots to the rest of the story by choosing to make Malfoy the villain in this chapter. Harry has already dealt with Malfoy before, but he is contemplating how he never thought he’d hate someone more than Dudley when he finds a note on the Gryffindor common room wall announcing flying lessons with the Slytherins. Sarcastically he states he wants to make a fool of himself on a broom in front of Malfoy. Tension, motivation, and good pacing because all of this is conveyed in the first two paragraphs of the chapter.

In brainstorming you don’t have to think in a straight line. Each question will make you question something else in the scene. Keep going with whatever question pops up and think it through until you’ve answered all possible questions.

This can be done with any aspect of your story, not just a scene.

• Try it with setting by imagining different characters walking through the set.
• If a character is the problem, imagine that character with each of the other characters in the book and feel out how they would react to different scenarios (helpful, rude, tired, rather split up the chore and do it alone).
• If a scene lacks motivation, break it down until each person has a clear desire to accomplish right now.

This differs from constructive day dreaming in one way: brainstorming is about figuring out if the choices you’ve made are the right ones - constructive day dreaming is about filling in the blank rooms and undefined details.

In short: By brainstorming you can find alternative thoughts that will help the pacing and tension throughout your story. When you consider these alternatives you’ll find inspiration.

Lexicon: Beta Reader

Beta Reader: readers who read your manuscript for fun (not profit) and give you a summary critique of your novel before it is published. What that summary is composed of completely depends on the relationship you set up with your beta reader.

This summary could be anywhere between one paragraph and five pages but does not generally include line editing. Beta readers can be friends or strangers. Just google beta readers and you’ll come up with a dozen different ways to connect with beta readers online.

What is their motivation?

Who wouldn’t want to read a novel for free?

You can have as many beta readers as you have time for, but make sure you have at least 3-5 of them so you can get varied opinions (and if you like the opinions of one of them make sure to keep in touch for your next book). If possible, at least one reader should already be very familiar with the genre you are writing in and pick one reader who has studied the writing craft.

Beta readers are just one side to the editorial triangle (along with editors and critique partners). In the normal flow of events your critique partners will work with you as you write, a content and story editor will help you shape your narrative, then beta readers allow you to get a glimpse at how your audience will react. 

After that you’ll need a line editor, an agent, and a publisher, but try to focus on the important part first: write your novel.

Books: The Fire In Fiction

The Fire In Fiction
My Verdict: Keep On Desk

The Fire In Fiction: Passion, Purpose, and Techniques To Make Your Novel Great by Donald Maass is a great well-rounded book for any genre. I classify it as a workbook because there are many opportunities to test out the theories discussed.
The nine chapters in this book cover the basics of any story: 

• Protagonists 
• Secondary Characters 
• Scenes That Can’t Be Cut 
• World Building 
• Voice 
• Believability
• Humor 
• Tension 
• Why to Keep Writing. 

This is a lot to cover in one book.

There are Practical Tools at the end of each chapter. These give you specific exercises to try right now and then has discussion questions so you can reflect on it. The tools mirror the sub chapters in each chapter, so if you enjoyed reading a particular section, I’d recommend skipping to the practical tool section it corresponds with and trying it out while it is fresh in your mind.

Many of the exercises require you to examine the opposite emotions or ideas you are trying to portray in a scene. How can you think of opposites without synonyms? It becomes a clever way of defining your original intent for a scene.

Put the fire in fiction could translate to put your truth in your fiction. Steal from your emotional experiences in order to make your characters real and original. It is the only way to make an original story, because all plots and arch types have been used before.

You would be doing yourself a disservice to read more than one chapter a day. With such thorough examples to back up his statements in each sub chapter, you need to allow your mind time to mull it over and think of examples in your genre. Then take time to brainstorm and daydream your responses at the end of each chapter. The questions take on a life of their own when held up to your work in progress.

Do you want to pick a random page of your current work and dissect it a bunch of different ways? This book will help you do it. It’s definitely a good choice to browse when you are fleshing out a book or starting to draw the connecting lines of a new plot.

It would probably take you a month of hard work to try out each of the practical tools at the end of the chapters. That is both exciting and daunting.

Your Homework (beyond the Practical Tools at the end of each chapter): Decide what fuels your passion for writing fiction and find a way to connect with that on at least a weekly basis.


Rating Scale: Keep On Desk, Own it, Read it, Skim it, Don't Bother

Suggestion: Pen name

Don’t use a pen name.

• Be proud of your work and put your name all over it. Most people who start writing don’t finish it or don’t publish it.
• The internet means there are no secrets. Someone will eventually figure out who you are anyway.
• Branding isn’t just about branding your series – it’s about branding you as an author. You want your brand to remind people of you, not some mask you put on. When you’ve won people over with one series, why act like you don’t have more for them to read? They’ll move on to another author and forget about you if they don’t see new releases scheduled soon. You want people to find all your work.

Even if you write in different genres:

a.) most people read in more than one genre. 

b.) they might know someone who reads your other genre and suggest you.

In short: Proudly use the same name from start to finish for your career.

For the other side of the coin, try this article: http://www.writing-world.com/business/pseudonym.shtml 

And if you agree with that side follow it up with the Ten Questions listed here: http://www.writing-world.com/business/pen.shtml  

Lexicon: Science Fiction - Hard vs. Soft

Science Fiction Hard vs. Soft: all Science Fiction must have a sense of wonder, a what-if scenario, science, and the adventure of discovery. 

Hard Science Fiction: adheres firmly to the scientific method and the currently known rules of our universe. Science is about always asking questions and discarding disproven theories. This means that the science used is a true science – one that is defined by laws based on theory (if you drop an apple it falls because of gravity and you can calculate at what rate it falls by certain variables – etc).

Soft Science Fiction: Usually means that the story is not scientifically accurate. As is the right of all fiction writers the author took an idea not necessarily provable through science we have today and made it work in their world by sheer force of will. Some would also lump social sciences here. A social science is not easily defined by laws based on theory because culture and emotional mindset do not prove to always be the same.

Another way to look at it is: Hard Science Fiction focuses on the science (accuracy above all else, a glimpse of where science came from and especially where it is going). Soft Science Fiction focuses on people (how do humans usually interact with each other or other species, why do they react the same way or what causes the outcomes to be different).

Examples:

Hard Science Fiction: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne, I, Robot by Isaac Asimov, and The Fountains of Paradise by Arthur C. Clark.

Soft Science Fiction: Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card, Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis, and The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin.

Books: Worlds of Wonder

Worlds of Wonder

My Verdict: Skim It

Worlds of Wonder: How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy by David Gerrold is a good book for those debating about writing in science fiction for the first time.

In the first 88 pages Gerrold easily describes science fiction step by step and defines where it crosses in to fantasy. You must have:

• A sense of wonder
• A what if scenario
• Adhere firmly to the scientific method and the currently known rules of our universe
• Science is about always asking questions and discarding disproven theories
• The adventure of discovery

While he refers to all science fiction, some might argue that his view leans more to Hard Science Fiction because of his focus on real technology instead of bolognium (made-up technology).

The fantasy chapters did not have clear structure to them or go in depth. Fantasy usually makes its own rules, so he cautions wisely that you understand the newly invented rules of your universe and stick to them for the whole story. He best explains this with, "The reader will suspend disbelief - he won't suspend common sense." (P29).

The other 148 pages of the book are filled with chapters on writing, such as: theme, style, first lines, last lines, simile, metric prose, dialogue and many more. The examples are all science fiction and fantasy, but mostly well known if you've been formally educated in writing.

Throughout the book he refers to and lists a large number of authors. If you are just getting into science fiction and fantasy or want to re-read some of the staples the following list is a good place to start.

Alfred Bester
Marion Zimmer Bradley
CJ Cherryh
Arthur C. Clarke
Harlan Ellison
Jack Finney
Robert A. Heinlein
Zenna Henderson
Ursula K. LeGuin
Richard Matheson
Anne McCaffrey
Judith Merrill
Larry Niven
Frederik Pohl
Ayn Rand
Spider Robinson
Joanna Russ
Theodore Sturgeon
J.R.R. Tolkien - just Fantasy
Jack Vance
A.E. Van Vogt
Kate Wilhelm
Connie Willis
Roger Zelazny

The chapters are mostly concise and for those wondering if they want to write science fiction this might be a good place to start your decision. If you're looking for fantasy - skip this book.

Your Homework: Pick the three authors in your current genre that made you want to write in the same field and read them again to confirm why they impress you.

Rating Scale: Keep On Desk, Own It, Read It, Skim It, Don't Bother

Lexicon: Historical Fiction

           Historical Fiction: a made-up story that includes a real setting during a specific year range. 

      It might include: real people from that time and/or real events (President Lincoln, Cleopatra, Shakespeare, Ghandi, war, the black plague, Haley’s comet, Pompeii’s volcano catastrophe, the stock market crash of 1929, etc). 

      Various sub-genres exist: 

•       Just setting: using some or all details of a specific time period with characters that are completely or mostly fictitious (most High Fantasy novels are based on medieval Europe). 
•       Specific Important People: a.) choosing a real person and following from their point of view b.) using a fictional character that glimpses the historic person(s). 
•       Alternate History: one major change has caused a difference in the events that took place (such as a time traveling character or new technology turns the tide of war).

      Examples: The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah, Honolulu by Alan Brennert, Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, and Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld.