Are You in Pain?

Are you in Pain? Question for your character.
So, I’m sitting at the hosptial, waiting for my husband to follow in Harry Smith’s footsteps and get the Couric Procedure (screening colonoscopy). Every wall has a sign asking, “Are you in pain?

0 No Pain/Happy face

Opening Lines

12 Ways to Start a Novel
First lines. We all obsess over our novel’s first lines, and rightly so, because from it the rest of the story must flow naturally and without a pause. Here are 10 strategies to use on first lines for your novel. I’ve illustrated them with the “100 Best Lines from Novels,” [...]

Dialogue Talk

Doing the character checklist this week, I realized that I hadn’t written much about dialogue. Oh, I have a couple times.

Character Checklist

Character Checklist

EXTERNALS
Name or Nickname: Does the character’s name evoke something about him or her? Does it resonate in the story?
Character Roles and Jobs. Have you fully explored the possibilities of family and community roles? Are they working at cliche jobs or fascinating jobs?

Plotting with Scenes

This entry is part 3 of 8 in the series Build a Stronger PlotThis is part of a continuing series on plot.
Plotting with Scenes
The second level of plotting is Scenes: this is where the story moves from the cliched outline level to the specific level of your story.
Moving from Abstract to Concrete
Suppose you want to [...]

after the holidays

Picking up the threads of a story is difficult after a holiday. Here’s four suggestions for making it easier:
Read. Read through a couple

Separate POV chapters

More Than One POV? Split to Revise
My current draft of my WIP novel has two point of view characters. I’ve just copied each POV into its own separate file to revise and edit.

Voice. The main reason for this is to work on getting a consistent voice for each point of view. When they are intertwined, [...]

Winter Writing with Kids

HAPPY HOLIDAYS
For the last few years, I’ve posted writing tips from Winter Holiday personalities. For example, Frosty the Snowman has 6 Top Writing Tips. This year, as our Christmas gift to you, we’ve collected these into one downloadable pdf. It’s a bit early, but teachers will be planning December and January lessons soon, and we [...]

Line Editing

While we were traveling last week, I didn’t get any new scenes revised, but I did do some line editing.
3 Line Editing Strategies
When I line edit, I’m trying to balance three things:

Smooth, easy to read. First, I want the text to be smooth and easy to read. I try to read aloud or

October News & Links

Oliver News and Let Me Solve Your Writing Problems

Oliver News. Since The Journey of Oliver K. Woodman has come out in paperback this year, it has been featured in many recommended book lists. For example,