Paint Your Heroes…

I read a description of the hero in a new novel coming out from a popular romance novelist this week. This was at the first meeting of hero and heroine after many years. It went something like this:

He was older than she remembered. And he was really, very handsome.

My jaw dropped, and I shook my head in disbelief. Really? Is this what readers expect to read in their romance novels or novellas? I think not.

What a terrible, trite description. How could you or I do better? When I’m writing my heroes, heroines, or any characters, I try to think about what is memorable about their looks and features. My aim is to paint a picture with words as the saying goes. Give readers something to touch, see, and feel that goes beyond handsome, ugly, pretty, blah, blah, blah.

Can you see this hero? Do you know what his face would feel like under your fingertips? Can you imagine his scent, skin tone and more?

He pivoted with a lithe, animal grace, and she gasped at the craggy, pink scar running across his forehead. Eyes the color of dusk snapped, and his full lips trembled with rage.

I’d rather be able to see my heroes, and maybe touch them, too. Leave some details to the imagination, but tell readers enough to make them remember your characters.

~Lisa

Don’t Disappoint Your Readers

Have you ever been disappointed by an author who, in an attempt to keep you guessing throughout his mystery, leaves out key information or introduces characters and plot twists at the last minute? A story whose character goes through a complete metamorphosis so that we can later believe he’s the culprit?

Like pulling a rabbit out of a hat, the author might introduce an entirely new character just before the climax, and the reader is cheated out of forming opinions and conclusions. This can be seen as lazy writing by most. There are ways to write your character such that the reader doesn’t know everything, but just enough to get to know this character.

I don’t wish to imply no secrets are good secrets. My favorite characters have an aura of mystery surrounding them, but when they do an about face in personality, or prove to have something in their lives which would be impossible to keep hidden, I begin to suspect the writing skills of the author. How much can we expect a reader to believe?

When writing background on a character whose intentions and/or activities must be kept from the reader for as long as possible, a good way to handle it is by creating a diversion for the reader. This could be by introducing another character who might look like the possible guilty party. It could be a series of events that might explain things about the truly guilty character which would leave a reader in doubt as to his motives. This shadow of doubt can enhance the story’s mysteriousness nicely, and will also prevent contradicting what was written earlier in the story.

The characters you create can have any sort of personality you wish to give them, and they can be involved in activities you decide upon. All readers ask is that you make us believe.

–Jesse

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Inside Your Head

Sometimes inner dialogue or the thoughts of a character as we are in his or her point of view works well. It can help writers avoid telling and put readers closer to the story.

So, how do you get inside a character’s head–technically?

Telling: She knew he was lying to her.

Inner Thoughts: He’s lying to me.

Telling: She felt angry.

Inner Thoughts: I’m so mad right now.

Notice that no filter words are needed there in the inner thoughts (remember that from last week… filter words?). You don’t have to add she thought or she wondered if…

The inner thought works fine on its own. Readers will figure out what you, the author, are doing and that these are the thoughts of the main character in first person point of view.

Things to remember when you use inner thoughts/inner dialogue:

1. Put inner thoughts in the present tense.
2. Use first person point of view in inner thoughts (me, I).
3. Use italics.

That’s it! Just changing much of the telling and boring narration to inner thoughts can put readers closer to your characters. It gets them inside the story and inside the heroine’s or hero’s head. Along with plenty of good action and snappy dialogue, it’s a winning recipe for a writer!

~Lisa

Plot Devices

Plot devices are characters or objects used in a story to help the plot move along. There are several different kinds.

Exposition: The exposition sets the time, place, and sometimes the intent of the character(s), so we enter the story already having a good feel for the plot.

The Hook: This should happen almost immediately. The hook is what grabs the reader’s attention, what makes him want to keep turning those pages. It can be anything from the wish to be rescued from an unchartered island, the need to find out who-dunnit, or the wish to get involved with the lives of the characters.

Rising Action: These are the events that keep us interested in the plot as it moves along toward the conclusion. It may be a series of interesting adventures, or it may be a collection of clues that hint at the answer to a mystery.

Climax: This is the pivotal point of the story, the prize the reader has been looking for. The climax is the summary of all rising action, and is the reason the story was written. It normally comes near the end of the story.

Falling Action: There must be some sort of closure, a gentle coming-down of exciting events. After the climax, the falling action is the part of the plot which ties up loose ends, lets us know what the characters are doing now, and gives closure to the story.

Resolution: This is the final recap, the end of the story. It’s the result of the climax and falling action. It’s closure. It’s sometimes a hint of things to come.

Deus ex machina: This is one of the most used and often the most disappointing to readers. It translates to “God of the machine.” In this case, when the story gets to the point where it seems all is lost, no one can save the day, something happens that solves all problems in one fell swoop. In Moliere’s Tartuffe, it’s the king himself who makes everything right. Often, this device is too unbelievable to most contemporary readers, and they lose the ability to suspend disbelief. They are left disappointed.

Angel on the Shoulder: You might see this depicted in cartoons more than literature, but it’s the appearance of conscience. The angel is there on the character’s right shoulder to tell him the right thing to do. The devil might appear on the left shoulder to prod the character to give in to his baser instincts. Sometimes it might be more subtle than some pixie speaking to the character. In Poe’s Telltale Heart, the device was more the character himself speaking.

The MacGuffin: Alfred Hitchcock was notorius for this device, and might even have been the one to coin the term. The MacGuffin is an object which isn’t important to the plot per se, but it drives the characters to do what they must do to find it. The object can be anything: a gemstone, secret papers, or a hidden will.

The Red Herring: This is used often in mysteries. It’s intended to convince the readers they know the answer to the mystery, but then find out it’s only there to throw them off the trail of the true conclusion. In a story where there are multiple suspects, there might be many such red herrings.

The Least Likely Suspect: Agatha Christie knew the value of this device. Often, her guilty party is the one you don’t even notice until the conclusion. This character might appear to have an airtight alibi throughout the story, only to have it revealed as a lie in the final conclusion. This character might be someone who seemingly has no importance to the story until the final facts reveal what he was doing all along.

The Disguise: When you read a story where a character has had some reason to alter his looks, this should be a red flag to you. By the end, his reasons for changing his appearance are most likely to hide his identity while he infiltrates his victim’s life, trying to do whatever it is he wants to do.

The Locked Room: This plot device limits the number of suspects, and if the author is good, the reader isn’t subjected to last minute surprises or plot twists. All the clues are there, if only you know how to analyze them. The locked room is a device which gives the author a good opportunity to solve the mystery before the secrets are revealed.

Themes: Themes are also plot devices. Some of the most common used are Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Self, Man vs. Technology, Man vs. Society, and Man vs. Supernatural. Just about any story you pick up can probably fit into one of these categories.

In choosing the best plot devices for your story, you’ll want to limit how many different devices you use. The more you have going on, the more complicated your story gets, and the danger of losing your focus–the main plot–increases.

There should always be certain devices in your story, such as exposition, hook, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution. A strong theme helps keep both writer and reader rooted to the story, and the rest is gravy.

–Jesse

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One of the bi…

One of the biggest mistakes that authors make is distancing readers from their heroine’s or hero’s point of view, rather than trusting readers to figure out what is going on.

What are some common filter words that create distance in a manuscript? Felt, saw, heard, thought, watched, wondered, looked.

Consider these examples:

Jaycee watched Ray walk across the room.

Ray moved across the room, muscles in his thighs working overtime.

Which is most appealing? The second sentence, right? If Jaycee is the heroine, and we’re already in her point of view as readers, we don’t need the filter. Here’s another example:

Filtered: Jaycee felt angry.

Unfiltered: Jaycee’s breath came fast, and she balled up her fists.

The second example puts readers right there with Jaycee, and it also shows, rather than tells what anger feels like in her body.

Remember, good fiction writing is best… unfiltered.

Punctuation Particulars

Punctuation Basics

One of the most common types of errors editors face deals with punctuation. When we’re reading a book, most of us don’t even think about it–unless it’s wrong. This captures our attention, because if punctuation is wrong, it often confuses the author’s intended meaning.

A lesson in punctuation might be pages long, so we’ll consider commas in this article, since they’re used mistakenly more often than any other punctuation mark. There are a few hard-fast rules when they must be used.

Direct address: When dialogue uses a name or group being addressed, the commas are always used.

Where are you going, Mary?

Okay, Michael, let’s wrap this up.

Take your seats, everyone.

In dialogue writing: This category throws lots of writers, no matter how much experience they may have. Along with commas and other punctuation, there are rules for capitalization and speech tags as well. An understanding of all of this helps make punctuating dialogue much easier. Narrative leading to the dialogue needs a comma before the actual spoken words:

She smiled and replied, “Whenever you’re ready.”

Don’t mistake a speech tag with narrative. If the lead-in sentence isn’t a speech tag, don’t use a comma:

She stood before the fireplace. “Why did you leave so early?”

Notice how the ending punctuation of the speech is within the quotation marks. In another example of dialogue, suppose the speech comes first, then the speech tag follows:

“I’m leaving for the office now,” he said.

Since the speech tag follows the speech, but is still part of the overall sentence, the ‘he’ is not capitalized, and the comma is inserted after ‘now’ because the spoken sentence doesn’t end the overall sentence. Now consider a spoken sentence that needs punctuation other than a comma:

“Are you going to school today?” she asked.

The spoken words are a sentence, so a question mark is used. As a side note, a question mark should be used in all question, even rhetorical ones. The subsequent speech tag is not capitalized, even though the question mark is normally a full stop. This follows the same rule as above, where the speech is only part of the overall sentence.

It’s trickier to punctuate a spoken sentence where the speech tag interrupts, rather than leads in or ends it.

“When I know,” he said cheekily,“you’ll know.”

There are times when an action interrupts speech, and the proper way to write it varies with the publisher’s wishes. One of the most common ways to write such a sentence is like the following:

“We know who the culprit is,” he grabbed his notes to illustrate his findings, “but we don’t know where he is.”

Other uses of commas: When using “-ing” clauses, the clause needs commas to separate it from the rest of the sentence to avoid tense confusion.

He ran to the garage, swearing a blue streak.

She left the office, mumbling under her breath.

Introducing a character:

Her grandmother, Agnes Carlysle, was the first woman to teach there.

“This is my brother, David.”

Longer, complicated sentences: One of the most common errors in comma usage is using a semicolon where a comma should be used instead. When two independent but related sentences are combined as one, each one is complete and separated by a semicolon:

She was an elusive little thing; he’d been asking her out for months.

Each side of that semicolon could stand on its own, and so a semicolon is used. However, if either side of it should be dependent, or a sentence fragment, a comma should be used:

He toyed with the idea for several weeks before writing it down on paper, almost certain it would fall apart under close scrutiny.

If you make it a point to notice the punctuation used in the next book you read, you’ll find more examples of the many different ways to properly use commas, as well as other punctuation marks. You’ll notice differences from one publishing firm to another, and one country to any other as well. Most importantly, you’ll see which rules of punctuation are firm, no matter who published the book, and from which country the author came.

–Jesse

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All in the Family

How we address members of our family varies depending on how things are situated in a sentence. Parents are usually used the most often and have the greatest number of errors. Mom and Dad are not only titles of address but they often take the place of our parents’ legal name as well. That’s where the confusion comes into play.

I called Mom today. I called my mom today.

My dad worked on the car this afternoon. Dad worked on the car this afternoon.

First off, the use of a possessive negates the use of capitalization. So whenever they are your parents or being possessed by someone Mom and Dad aren’t capped. However, if mom is replacing someone’s name like, Susan then mom is a proper noun.

So now we’ve got Mom and Dad covered, but what about brother and sister? The only time your brother or sister should be capitalized is if you are referring to a monk or a nun and brother or sister is part of the address. Your siblings use either the possessive or their legal name. I would never address my brother simply as brother, but often times I don’t even use the word brother and just his name. The only case I know of where brother or sister replaces the legal name is if you are a member of the Berenstain Bears family. Mama, Papa, Sister and Brother.

Now what about that extended family? Aunt Patty, my uncles and Grandma Ruth. What are the rules for them? The rules vary a little for the extended family because for Grandma there are multiple ways to address her. For example, Grandma can simply replace her name but can also be part of her address. In this way both Grandma and Grandpa work similarly to Mom and Dad but can have the added address of their legal name tacked on. Aunts and uncles however are always accompanied by their first name: Uncle Steve and Aunt Patty, or my uncle and my aunt if you are using the possessive. Phew! Now keeping that family in line is another undertaking but at least you’ll know how to address them.

Cassandra

Become Your Characters

If you want your readers to get involved in your story, and you do, you’ll strive to make it as real as anything in their non-reading time. You’ll want to avoid making them larger than life, because we can’t relate to them. We’ll have no sympathy. Give them some insecurities we can recognize so we can share their experiences as if we really are part of the story.

Showing versus telling falls into this category. Don’t just tell us a story, grab us and throw us into it! Hover like a ghost over your characters so when you write from their point of view, we are thinking what they’re thinking, and feeling what they’re feeling.

One of the first things that draws me into a story is the search for the character I most see eye to eye with. Normally, it’s every character. If I can’t do that, then I generally feel the story isn’t all that great, and I may not even finish it. I wouldn’t break my neck to buy the author’s next book, either.

But make their world mine while I have that book open, and I won’t rest until I’ve read everything that author has written. Sounds like a good way to build yourself a readership, eh?

–Jesse

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Sight, Site

There are a lot of common errors that are easy to make as a writer but the one that is making me cringe lately are homophones. Homophones are words that are spelled the same when spoken but are not spelled the same way and do not have the same meaning. A reader can sometimes distinguish the meaning by context but a wrong word choice can change the way your intelligence is viewed by your reader.

A couple of the most common homophones that make me cringe are your and you’re, their and there. Although there is one particular homophone I would like to point out. I’ve been seeing this error a lot lately, not just in works I edit but I have noticed this same error in books I’ve purchased for myself, and that is sight and site. The word sight refers to your vision, something you see, but site is the position of something like a building, a town, etc.

The site of her brought joy to his heart.

This will be the sight of our greatest triumph.

In these two examples you can see how this word is misused. Choices like this give the impression that you don’t know the meaning of the words you are writing, or that you are not smart enough to make the distinction. Homophones are easy to overlook because if you are simply reading aloud the sound of the word can give you the impression that your word choice is the correct one. Also, as long as your homophone is spelled correctly it won’t be picked up by spell check. So make sure you have another set of eyes looking over your work so I can stop cringing as I read.

Cassandra
homophones

What Makes a Classic?

I’m sure you’ve read books that even your grandmother read as a student. The theme is timeless, the settings understood by all, and the plot as enjoyable as it ever was. What makes these classic masterpieces classics?

There is no list to speak of. If you get twenty people in a room to discuss what makes a story a classic, you’ll get twenty different lists. But there are certain factors that are universally accepted as contributors.

Morality. If you think back to any of the classic novels you had been assigned to read in school, you’ll find that they all contain a certain aspect of morality. There is some lesson to be learned in that story, like poetic justice (Silas Marner, by George Eliot), or the loss of innocence (David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens). Classic novels always seem to have some sort of impact on the society of the time.

Language. Though the words and phrases used will vary with the times, there are always readers who will remember quotes from a classic novel. Perhaps it’s the clever turn of phrase, or the imagery it calls up that make it memorable. Who doesn’t remember the classic line, “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times…” (Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens)

Universality. No matter how the story develops, it always has a theme and plot that would be recognized worldwide, and to the bulk of the population. The characters can be identified with by all readers. The message the book sends out would be familiar to any who read it, such as adventurous travels (Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain, and Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams).

Timelessness. Jane Austen wrote her novels in the early 1800s. Does that mean we can’t relate to her characters’ experiences and feelings in Sense and Sensibility? Pride and Prejudice? A hundred years from now, will readers be unable to understand Harry Potter and his entry into the world of magic, and his fight against the evil Voldemort?

Unforgettable characters. Most people, if given a few characters’ names, would be able to name the book and author who created them. Even those who haven’t read The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Alexander Dumas) would know who Quasimodo and Esmeralda are. If you mention Dorothy, The Cowardly Lion, and Toto, everyone knows you’re referring to The Wizard of Oz (Frank Baum). Many of these classic characters could be pantomimed or drawn by even the least skilled artists and we’d recognize them (Phantom of the Opera, Gaston Leroux, or Pinocchio, Carlo Collodi).

There are so many things that could be added to the list of factors which make a novel a classic. In my opinion (that is, of a reader) the most important concept is universality. The theme would be one which everyone could relate to, the characters’ personalities credible to all, and the language, even if translated, understood and appreciated by anyone who reads it.

–Jesse

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