Pacing in Your Writing

Cary gave us some tips on pacing today:
Biggest distinction: what the story is focused on.

Fast vs. Slow

Emotions, thoughts,

Fast: background fades away. You will cut a lot of adjectives and adverbs - use descriptive verbs instead.
i.e. was a glorious, beautiful sunrise. --> The sun had lept into the sky.
Slow: wider view. You take in details around you, backgrounds, scenery, overall view of characters.

Transitions: Don't jump between fast-paced and slow-paced. Try to build up to faster-paced sections, and build-down to slower sections.
i.e. including details that give the reader a sense of foreboding makes them expect a faster-paced scene. After an intense, stressful scene there might be a sense of relief, and at that point it is natural for the pace to slow down.

Also, it can be helpful to think about the tone of your scene, and how that affects how you write it. See our post on Tone.

More on Scrivner!

Hey guys! Hope you're all getting some writing done this weekend :)

If you are, please take a look at Scrivner. It's such a useful program. I just realized that I had planned a scene to take place in November and then realized it was thanksgiving week and I'd need to rearrange my scenes. It was SO much easier to do in Scriver than it would have been to try to rework in a single word document or in multiple word documents.

Here's a new blog from writer Gwen Hernandez (who wrote Scriver for Dummies) that gives you lots of how-to and tips on using Scrivner: The Edited Life.

Nanowrimo: A Novel in 30 Days

Nanowrimo stands for National Novel Writing Month, and takes place from November 1st - 31st.
The goal is to write 50,000 words in one month.

This is a ted talk we watched this week about setting 30-day goals...like writing a novel :)

 
Scrivner - Fantastic program for helping you write a novel
How to write a novel using scrivner
Write faster with scrivner

Point of View

General Point of View information:

No reason to redo what has already been done well: See This Page about the types of Point of View.

Writing in first person vs. third person is not only changing 'he'/'she' to 'I'.  When writing in first person, the story can be told with thoughts, emotions, and opinions mixed into the narration.

Pronouns & Point of View
*If you need help with knowing what word choice / pronouns go with what point of view, click here.

WRITING EXERCISE 1: Write a couple paragraphs (or use something you've already written) and change it between first person and third person. Second person is used less often, but you could try it out if you would like.
Past / Present Tense
We looked at two examples of first person writing:

• The Lightning Thief - First person past tense (I mumbled, etc.)
• Hunger Games - First person present tense (I prop, I swing, I always)

If you want to see the same passage of text in a past tense and a present tense form, here is a good example.

WRITING EXERCISE 2: Write a couple paragraphs (or use something you've already written) and change it between past and present tense.


Writing from the Opposite Gender's Point of View:
These are some of my favorite tips:

• Draw from real life; pay attention to conversation and actions of the other gender
• Men tend to speak more directly than women
• Avoid Stereotypes!

From: CrimsonLeague
More to read on Writing the Opposite Gender....
http://www.indiesunlimited.com/2013/01/16/writing-pov-the-opposite-sex/
http://learnasyouwrite.com/how-to-write-pov-for-the-opposite-sex/http://learnasyouwrite.com/how-to-write-pov-for-the-opposite-sex/

WRITING EXERCISE 3: (I recommend doing this in first person). Pick a scene you've been writing. Make a list of details a boy would notice and a girl would notice (and what they would both notice). Notice what's the same, what's different. Then write a paragraph from a male perspective (involving those details and in a relatively more direct style) and a paragraph from a female perspective (again, involving the details you think a girl would notice over a guy).
THE TEST: Give your two paragraphs to a reader, and ask them to tell you what gender narrator each paragraph is from.

Some Related Posts on Character / Voice:
Realistic and Exciting Characters
Notes on Tone, Style & Voice
Knowing Your Characters

Heroes and Villains

Heroes:

• Not perfect - they do need to have a flaw.
• Lame middle name - makes them humble/laughable
• Base - who they are before they start - DON'T have your character exist just for the plot
• Relate to them or have sympathy for them
• Ideal - the reader likes something about them - maybe they admire the character or wish they could be more like them.
• Paradox / Inner Conflict - they need to be pulled in different directions, to make them interesting and (hopefully) this can be connected to the plot.
• Past, Present, Future (Back story, experiences that have shaped them; then who they are now; future motivations and desires)

 Villains
*Remember that not everyone who opposes the protagonist is a villain. They may just be misguided, or they may have good reasons for their actions as well.

•  It is not an interesting story without conflict - you ALWAYS want to have some inner conflict in your story. Then a good book will have some external conflict (with others or with nature)
• Don't have your villain opposing the protagonist just to go against the protagonist. They will have other reasons, self-interest, twisted ideologies/misguided principles.
• What threat do they pose to the protagonist?
• This will make them more believable.
• Try not to make "cardboard cut-out" villains - try to make them original.
• Villains NEED to have a backstory - as good as the protagonist's.*
•  Making your Villain relateable as well will make your story more complex - which actually makes it more believable because in real life people are complex and everyone has bad/good sides.

*But also remember, though just about every character should have a back story, note every back story should be written down in the book, necessarily.

Examples:
Megamind

• You might think he is simply going against Metroman (because they talk about it in the movie)
• BUT he identifies with the role of the villain. He "plays the game" to please himself, and because it's fun, and
• "If I was the bad boy, I was going to be the baddest boy of them all."

Sauron (Lord of the Rings)

• Wasn't doing things just to be evil
• He had motivations: for himself
• The ring is evil, but it still does things to rejoin it's master

Earlier Post: Being Unique with your Characters

Talking about plot this week!

Cary will be talking to us about plot this week, so get ready for that. :)

Also, join the group on facebook!

How to Critique Prose

First, critique does not equate negativity. Focus on the good things they have in their writing too.

Cary talked to us about three broad categories that critiques fall under:

1. Syntax
- Spelling mistakes, sentence structure, grammar, technical details.
If it's a positive comment, mention it.
Unless it affects your reading experience, don't mention it. Those nit-picky details don't need to be brought up in the meeting, you can highlight mistakes / in your comments and email to the person later.
2. Structure
- What affects the flow of the piece and how it fits together. Beginning > Middle > End, how characters are introduced, how the plot is progressing.

3. Style
- Their naming choices, the language they decide to use, how they tell the story. This involves style, voice, tone, etc.

A critique is not an attack on your writing, we don't want to be attacking or defending. We are giving feedback, ideas, advice.