Writers in the Storm

Cathy Lamb

I recently started golfing.My husband (nicknamed “Innocent Husband”  because the poor man can never be held responsible for what his wife says or writes), made me.

He has been hoping I would golf with him for over two decades.

I have resisted. Even thinking about trying to put a tiny white ball into a tiny hole hundreds of yards off made my brain want to bust open and shriek.

But Innocent Husband recently bought me clubs, smiled endearingly, and I caved.

I am a terrible golfer. No one told me that golf balls have evil brains. No one told me that the golf ball will do whatever it wants to do no matter how I swing the club. I have hit trees and almost Innocent Husband. I have hit my ball into grass so deep, and so far off course, it took ten minutes to find it.

But I love it. Unbelievably. Miraculously. I love it. As I love writing.

So let me link golfing and writing if I can. I think they have some things in common besides swear words.

1)      Practice Swinging and Scribbling . Golfing takes practice. It’s going to take a lot of practice for me to get the ball to go straight instead of heading straight towards the sand pit. Writing does, too. It takes practice for beginners and for people who have won The National Book Award. You must write. Write and edit your manuscript, but write an article or a blog, too. If you like poetry, write a poem. Write a letter. Write on your computer, write by hand in a beautiful journal. Write in a whole new genre. Write.

2)      Analyze and Dissect. You need to analyze your golf swing so you don’t keep swinging and swinging…and the golf ball is still sitting there cackling meanly up at you from the tee. 

You need to analyze your own work. Don’t tell yourself you’re terrible, but take a hard, deep, honest look at your plot. Will it find an audience? Who is your audience? Is the plot, truly, interesting? What about the characters? Are they unique, compelling, funny, maddening or diabolical? If they need to be likable, are they likable? What about the pacing of your book? Slow pacing kills a plot. I have seen this a hundred times. Is your plot moving right along?

What about the dialogue? Is it realistic? Is it flat out amusing or threatening or thought provoking or utterly sincere? Does it tell the reader about the personality of the characters? Are you using the setting and weather to enhance the plot? Are there character arcs? Will your story evoke emotion in the reader? Will it make them laugh or cry or think or all three?  It should.

3)      Get Outside and Groove. You need to get outside to golf unless you want to break a window and you need to get outside to write. On nice days I set my computer up on my table in my back yard. Hiking helps. Walking helps. Going to the lake or the beach or the mountain helps. (Don’t golf in the mountains.) You need to get a different perspective and being outside will help you think through your work.

4)      Learn from others, like I learn from Innocent Husband when he’s coaching me on the golf course and telling me not to treat the golf ball as the enemy. Read your favorite authors and take their work apart. Why do you like their books? How can you put those elements in your own work? I have learned from Geraldine Brooks, Alice Walker, James McBride, Bailey White, Kaye Gibbons, etc. If you read a book you didn’t like, why?  What can you do to make sure you don’t repeat that author’s mistake?

5)      Never throw your golf clubs in the lake.  Too expensive. Never quit writing if it’s something you love to do. Never.

Good luck. I mean that, I do.

Do you golf? Did you ever think about trying? Have any other golf/writing tips for us?

*     *     *     *     *

About Cathy

Cathy Lamb is currently working on her tenth novel. She would rather be slugging coffee and eating chocolate on a sunny beach.

Her latest book is The Language of Sisters.

Email: CathyLamb@frontier.com

Website - http://cathylamb.org/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/AuthorCathyLamb

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cathy.lamb.9

Pinterest - http://pinterest.com/bookwriter12/

 

Many of my fellow writing parents tell me that the summer school break is a menace to their writing schedule. There's no denying that it's a challenge that takes juggling and creativity. I've already completed the first road trip of the summer, and here are the five benefits I've found (so far).

1. The importance of "location, location, location."

New places and new people add grist to our writing mill. The dysfunctional family at a rest stop..the wise waitress at the roadside cafe..the twitchy person at the front desk of your hotel. They are all new characters, and new things to describe when you are stuck.

On our last trip, there was an older man who had Middle Eastern music blaring out of his pocket at the breakfast buffet. Like all around the buffet. He was a total giver who walked to every corner of the room, so he could share with everybody.

I don't know about you, but I can't think before coffee. I especially can't think over drums and violins before coffee. I was bonkers within five minutes of the Music Man sitting next to us. I put my coffee in a to-go cup, went upstairs and got this dude out of my system and onto the page in a hilarious scene. He was so much fun to write, and I never would have run across him in my usual writing cocoon. 

I know most writers are cave dwellers who often don't leave their homes (or their pajamas) for days on end. *hitches up flannel pants* But a new environment brings a fresh view to your story. When I think a scene is boring, the easiest fix is a change of scenery. Go to a coffee shop, or the library, or the park.

2. It takes a village.

Don't be the only set of eyes reading your manuscript. Especially if you don't have a critique group, your summer road trip can be a godsend to your book. Read that baby out loud to your driver. If you're the driver, make your passenger read it to you. You'll clearly see what's missing when you hear your book read out loud.

3. Nothing replaces paper.

I don't know why this is, but the eyes see new things in print than they do on your screen. Every writer I know recommends a printed copy for final revisions.

I also use paper to be able to write in the car. Sometimes my eyes can see the plot better, and the view out of the window can add to the experience. Additionally, I can read those pages to my Dragon software so that the work makes it to the page for more revision. I freak out a little bit if I can't see forward progress, and then all the work gets stalled. God bless Dragon!

4. Take a nap.

Susan and Harry Squires did a fantastic post about Talking Back to Your Brain. They explain why it's important to ask yourself small manageable questions as part of your writing process.

The Squires recommend you not ask yourself large esoteric questions like: "Why am I stuck?" or "Why do I suck, and I can't finish this chapter and I'll never finish this book..." (You get the picture.) Instead, formulate a small specific question like: "I need to get my character from the beach to the mountains. Who should they travel with and why?" You get the picture.

Think small and be specific. 

It is completely true that if I'm thinking about an issue with my manuscript and I nod off for a nap, I'll wake up with - if not an answer - at least a potential solution to my issue.

There's cool brain stuff involved in this, so be sure to click the link and read that post!

5. An hour is golden.

As long as you don't get carsick, setting "time chunk" goals is a great way to use your passenger time on a road trip (or the school line, or your lunch break) for writing.

I don't know about you but, if I'm in a timed sprint I write faster. I don't know why. But it just seems like the act of setting a limit on it makes my brain stop lollygagging and bring out its "A" game. I talked about this group sprint concept quite a bit in my Holy-Moly-I-Won NaNoWriMo article a few months back.

Most of all, be flexible and creative. If you need the writing time, find ways to get it. We're writers...we know how to find creative solutions to problems. Or perhaps you'll give yourself permission to just take a break from writing altogether and enjoy your summer break. You're allowed to do that if you don't have a deadline! Really, I promise. You can take a writing break as long you put a specific date on the calendar to get back in the writing saddle.

Bonus Link: Here's a great article on self-editing: 10 Simple Ways to Edit Your Own Book by Blake Atwood at The Write Life.

What are your most valued tips and tricks when school breaks and vacations smash your writing schedule to smithereens? Do you love the summer break, or hate it? (Enquiring minds want to know!)

*  *  *  *  *  *

About Jenny Hansen

By day, Jenny provides training and social media marketing for an accounting firm. By night she writes humor, memoir, women’s fiction and short stories. After 18 years as a corporate software trainer, she’s delighted to sit down while she works.

When she’s not at her personal blog, More Cowbell, Jenny can be found on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, or here at Writers In The Storm

Aimie K. Runyan

As an author of historical fiction, my work must—almost by definition—begin with a concept. Am I going to write a gritty saga about the women who flew as combat pilots for Russia in the Second World War (I did and it was great fun)? Am I going to write a sweeping fictionalized biography of Joan of Arc? A dark and twisty Tudor-era mystery? I have to be grounded in that first to know what I’m doing. That’s the easy part in many ways. But as many writers will tell you, a story isn’t just something happening. It’s something happening to someone. Even in the case of a Joan of Arc biography, you have to decide who your Joan is. Bold and fearless or tentative and unsettled? These are all decisions you have to make.

I was recently asked if I could change direction on my work-in-progress. As in, shelve what I was working on and start over on something very, very different. Fine by me, I can come back to the other project when the market is right for it. I’m every bit as excited about the new project, and being flexible is definitely an indispensable trait for anyone in this crazy business. I was set to chat with my new editor the following week to discuss the new idea, so I had work to do. In order to nail the call I’d have to figure out one thing: Who is my protagonist?

I spent half a day driving around trying to get hold of a research book I’d need to get a better sense of the history. You might wonder why I needed the research book to figure that out. My protagonist—an invention of my own brain--had nothing to do with the dates, facts, and figures that I’d find in the book. But as I read about the life and times my unknown protagonist was living in, my brain would automatically try to figure out the type of woman who would be daunted by, and eventually thrive, under the stressors I would put on her. As I read, I began to ask myself what she looked like, what she wore, where she lived. Definitely a place to start. She also insisted that her name be Ruby. Sure thing, girl, you’re the star of the show.

But I had to ask her some deeper questions.

What do your days look like? Who are your friends? Do you have any friends? What is your secret pleasure? What embarrasses you? What annoys you? And even bigger: what do you want out of life? I’m not one to necessarily spend a lot of time writing character sketches, though I almost always take some notes. I prefer to have these ideas in my head and let them come out as I actually draft the story. Sometimes my characters really add another dimension in the second draft and that’s always a fun discovery. I’m a voracious plotter, so this organic development is how I regain the thrill of discovery that I lose by knowing the general direction of the narrative.

So once I have some ideas in my head, I open up my trusty OneNote Workbook that I use for everything (timelines, lists of names, interesting articles, and so on) and make a sheet for the protagonist. I Google for pictures to find someone who looks as I envision my character would, perhaps searching for images of some items in their life that are important as well and paste it all in the page. I might throw together a few paragraphs about my protagonist’s thoughts on life and goals we’ll see unveil in the story. Maybe some bigger goals we won’t see. Then I get to work clickety-clacking on some chapters.

Seems easy, right? Well some characters are easier to crack than others. A prime example of a difficult character is the protagonist from my upcoming novel, Daughters of the Night Sky. My protagonist, Katya, is an officer in the Red Army. She’s driven to learn how to fly from the time she’s a child because life has forced her to grow up before her time. She was focused, determined, and married to her work. She and I didn’t have a lot in common, and she was pretty closed-lipped (as any good officer in the Red Army would have been), so coaxing the character onto the page took some time.

I spent a lot more time doing freewriting exercises when I couldn’t reflect her personality on the page. Writing letters from Katya to important people in her life was one that helped a lot. Even then, my redheaded pilot was a character that really needed a second draft to add the final dimension into her personality. Even tweaks in drafts six and seven brought out some spark in her. It was a challenge, but I think she came into herself at long last. It was definitely worth the struggle, but thank goodness this new girl, Ruby, is a whole lot chattier than Katya ever was.

So, what tips and tricks do you use to breathe life into your protagonist?

Share with the crowd!

*     *     *     *

Aimie K. Runyan is a historian and author who writes to celebrate history’s unsung heroines. She is the author of two previous historical novels: Promised to the Crown and Duty to the Crown. She is active as an educator and a speaker in the writing community and beyond. She lives in Colorado with her wonderful husband and two (usually) adorable children. To learn more about Aimie and her work, please visit www.aimiekrunyan.com.