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Do you need to revise something this month? I do! I have a MG novel that I need to go through (again!) and then send it in. Summer Revision Smackdown: Revision Accountability So, I’m heading over to Jolie Steckly‘s and Holly Cupola‘s blogs for their Summer Revision Smackdown (Powered by Licorice, Bum-glue, and You). It’s [...]
3 Tips for Using Mulitple Point of View Characters Limit the number of POV characters. A general caution is to limit the number of POV characters so the reader can be emotionally invested in those few. Zuckerman, in How to Write the Blockbuster Novel, recommends no more than five main characters. Usually, one of the [...]
Commitment v. Revision Your total commitment to the current draft of your novel is in direct conflict with the need to maintain an attitude of revision Teaching Freshmen to Have an Attitude of Revision When I taught Freshman Composition at a local college, I started on the first day by pairing students up with a [...]
Guest blogger, Joni Sensel writes about cutting her story so much that two books became one. I read an ARC of this new book and loved it — the novel revisions worked! Why Cut Out Important Parts of a Novel? Originally I thought my new middle-grade adventure, THE FARWALKER’S QUEST, would be two books of [...]
Character Description Can Reveal Inner and Outer Characteristics I think that Sol Stein’s book, Stein on Writing , has one of the best sections on character descriptions. If you read his book, Stein–like every other fiction teacher–mentions five ways to characterize (physical attributes, clothing, psychological mannerisms, actions, dialogue). But consider this description from his book: “She [...]
Take Your Character’s Pulse The emotional arc of a story is just as important as the narrative arc; it’s just harder to see sometimes. One way to check this emotional or inner conflict arc is to consider scenes one at a time. First mark off one scene in your manuscript. Then, identify the emotional pulse [...]
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