Take the February 750word challenge. The website 750words.com challenges writers every month to write every day that month and make it at least 750 words.

Now, think about it. February only has 28 days; except this is a leap year, sorry. Still, that’s one day less to win this challenge. You can write 750 words for 29 days straight, right? Take the challenge!

And here’s the Table of Contents from January’s writing challenge, in case you skipped any or want to repeat one.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

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This month, I am trying to Think Like a Writer and write 750 words a day, practicing my writing, much like a musician plays scales daily.

Today, I will be a Grinch, a mean one.
Why? Because fiction is built on conflict: without bad things happening, the reader is bored. A bored reader equals failure!

Today, I’m going to fill up my 750 words with things that can go wrong in my WIP (work in progress). I’ll go from the totally ridiculous chain-saw massacre things to the kindergarten and tea party small things. Anything and everything that can go wrong.

If I run out of ideas, I’ll try a different scene. But today, I’m all Grinch: my heart is two sizes too small and mean and nasty. Don’t talk to ME today or I’ll snap off your head!

Lists. I don’t care if I write complete sentences or not.

Tip: If you’re using 750words.com like I am, after you write, click on the green image of the number of word you wrote at the bottom of the page. It will take you to your Stats. One of the stats is your state of mind: you’ll see a pie-chart that shows if your writing today was Affectionate, Self-Expressive, Self-Important, Happy, Upset, Sad, or Anxious. I am shooting for Upset, Sad and Anxious today. NO happy, NO Affectionate. GRRRR!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

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Tone is the overall feel of a story. Does this sound depressed, joyful, or hopeful?

Beyond that, though, tone can determine the audience for your story. One of the main differences between a middle grade and YA, or a YA and an adult story, is the tone of the piece. Tone reflects the author’s attitude toward the characters, the plot, the setting, and the theme of the story.

One of the easiest ways to signal tone and, as a result, audience is to control your sentence structure. A simplistic explanation would say that simple sentences are for younger audiences, while longer sentences are for older. But that’s too simplistic.

Tone of a Picture Book

It is true that picture book language is simpler, but it’s not necessarily simplistic.

Clarity is paramount. You can—I love to do this—interrupt a sentence with another sentence. When I was teaching college level courses and taught this sentence construction, one student came back to class and reported that her three year old daughter had done this. Even young kids talk in complex ways. But the connections from sentence to sentence must be absolutely clear. Using lots of introductory clauses, even when well used, can be confusing. Instead, be simple and direct. Make sure everything is clear.

Tone of a Middle Grade

The tone here is more complex and respectful. Never take the tone of talking down to a “little kid.” For sentence structures, you’ll still want to be clear, easy to understand. You can take more detours, for example, explaining a character’s motivations, or describing in more detail. But the tone is honest, open, fun, entertaining. Simple sentences are complemented by compound and complex sentences.

Tone of a Young Adult (YA)

The difference here is that, besides a full range of sentence structures, the attitude is more irreverent, questioning, “edgy.” This may mean experimentation with sentence fragments, POV, invented words, jargon—including cursing, lists, long sentences with plenty of semi-colons. The mandate here is freshness, in content and in presentation (your sentences).

A great book to shake up your grammar is Spunk & Bite: A Writer’s Guild to Bold, Contemporary Style by Arthur Plotnik.

Tone of an Adult Story or Novel

The adult story has sophistication, nuances and maturity as hallmarks of its tone, regardless of genre. The full range of sentence structures can and should be present and you may use whatever is appropriate for your story. For a brush-up on sentence structure possibilities, read this book.

This isn’t a call for simple sentences for picture books.
I write picture books.
I write easy picture books
I write boring picture books.

This is a call to make sure that in the tone—especially in how sentences affect tone—is a crucial part of your decision making as you write a story. Examine your typical sentence structures and shake it up some!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

In celebration of National Picture Book Month and Veteran’s Day:

Give a Military Family a Free Book

11 Ways to Ruin a Photograph book

THE STORY: “11 Ways to Ruin a Photograph”

When her father goes soldiering for a year, a girl decides that without Dad at home, it’s not a family photo album. Though her beloved Nanny is in charge of the album that year, the girl makes sure that photographs of her never turn out well. Photos are blurred, wind blows hair in her face. April rains bring umbrellas to hide behind. Halloween means a mask. This poignant, yet funny family story, expresses a child’s anger and grief for a Dad whose work takes him away for long periods of time. It’s a tribute to the sacrifices made by military families and to those who care for children when a family needs support.

THIS STORY IS A WINNER!

READ THE BOOK!

Darcy Pattison’s story, “11 Ways to Ruin a Photograph” is the winning children’s story. It is a free download at www.takepart.com/thehelp, or download it here (pdf download).

You can also order it for your:

• Kindle
• Nook
• paperback, coming soon

MORE

Read more at www.11WaystoRuinaPhotograph.
PLEASE pass this along to anyone who might know a military family or to anyone in the military that you know.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Logo art by http://bonnieadamson.net/

After flirting with the idea of doing NaNoWriMo, I decided instead to do PiBoIdMo, or Picture Book Idea Month, the 30 days of November in which I am supposed to come up with 30 picture book ideas.

It makes sense. I am attending the SCBWI Eastern NY Falling Leaves Master Class retreat where five picture book editors will talk to 30 lucky people, including me. Editors attending are Kate Fletcher (Candlewick), Dianne Hess (Scholastic), Sylvie Frank (Holiday House), Marilyn Brigham (Marshall Cavendish) and Kelly Smith (Sterling). Since I had decided to devote part of my fall to picture books anyway, the PiBoIdMo is right up my alley. Focus my efforts. And the writing exercises we do at the retreat will hopefully add to my ideas list. Late next week, look for reports on the retreat.

Meanwhile, I am visiting the dentist this morning, so I’ll think about a tooth fairy story. Not.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

I’m sending out my novel today. Long ago, when submissions were paper, writers and authors often went through rituals to send out a manuscript for their novel or picture book.

• A lucky cat had to sit on the manuscript.
• It had to mailed with certain types of stamps.
• You kissed the envelope for luck.

IN these days of digital submissions, what is your favorite ritual before hitting the SEND button? Please leave a comment and share your rituals. I need to know what works!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Writing is rewriting

Guest post by Anastasia Suen

For years I have been saying that writing is rewriting, and now I have a book that shows it quite clearly, my new picture book, Road Work Ahead (Viking 2011).

This picture book is short, like most of my books. It’s only 120 words, but those words have been rewritten over and over again. Yes, this one has been a lo-o-o-ong time coming. I started this book when my son was 2…and now he’s 27!

Picture Book Inspiration

When my son was 2, he loved to look at all of the trucks and machines along the road, so I started snapping pictures for him. I made him a “look book” that later turned into a picture book. I loved the story in that book, so I sent it out to editors, but it kept coming back, over and over. Editors said they loved it, too, but it wasn’t quite ready. So I kept rewriting it and sending it out…and now 25 years later, it’s finally a book you can hold in your hand.

The 6 Ws of Story

So what made the difference? I used ALL of the 6 Ws this time. I made sure the story had who, what, when, where, why and how. Using all 6 Ws made it a story, not just a list of machines along the road. Stories sell, but lists…well, not so much.

New Beginning and Ending. After the story finally sold I thought it was ready to go, but my editor thought it needed something more. She asked me to write a new beginning and ending, so we knew why the little boy was on the road looking at all of the road work. That also added a who, by showing us the little boy before he got into the car.

So I added my mother and her famous homemade oatmeal cookies to the book. (We used to eat them right after they came out of the oven. Yum!) Driving to Grandma’s house for fresh, warm, homemade oatmeal cookies is definitely a reason to keep going despite all of the traffic delays due to the work along the road. And when you get to eat them at the end of the book, ah, sweet reward! Adding 2 short stanzas was all it took.

The change I made was used by the Publishers Weekly reviewer to describe the book.

“A batch of Grandma’s homemade oatmeal cookies beckons, but for this backseat narrator, the sights and sounds along the road to her house are equally compelling:
“Road work ahead./ Move over. Go slow./ Jackhammers crack./ Look at them go.’”

The text quoted in the review was the original beginning of the story. I had jumped too far into the action. What worked better was taking a few steps back and letting the reader know who the narrator was and why he was on the road in the first place.

Yes, writing is rewriting! (And a good editor makes ALL the difference. Thanks, Regina!)

For more on writing and revising picture books, see WriteaPictureBook.com

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Introduced first in 2007, debut children’s authors have formed a cooperative effort to market their books. I featured Revision Stories from the Classes of 2k8 and 2k9 and this feature returns this year with the Class of 2k11.

• Class of 2008
• Class of 2009
• MORE 2k11

On Revisions and The Pull of Gravity

Guest post by Gae Polisner

I have revised The Pull of Gravity (Frances Foster Books/Farrar Straus Giroux, May 2011) at least four times, including two major overhauls and two significant clean-up revisions. As for the two major overhauls, during those, I rewrote, added, removed, and, um, then restored, scenes and changed the entire chronology (as further described below), and yet, ultimately, it remains the original book I shopped to my publisher on Day One. Only – I’m pretty sure – better.

Revision Struggle Invisible to Readers

I think maybe that is the key to revision – that the hours of sweaty frustration, doubt, exhausted temper tantrums and sometimes tears cannot be tangibly seen – or picked out – in the final version, only viscerally felt as you read a more cohesive, engaging story.
At any rate, here’s the shaggy-dog tale of revisions in my case.
Through serendipity, my editor (the eponymous Frances Foster) got her hands on a very early version of my manuscript (then called, Steinbeck, The Scoot, and the Pull of Gravity). She loved and adored it (while I’m sure feeling it needed some good hard work), and so passed it around “the house” in anticipation of resounding agreement. Which it did not get. Instead, one well-regarded editor in particular had some harsh criticism and strong reservations, and, as a result, my editor reluctantly passed on it.

Battered but not deterred, I set to work revising so we could send it out wide to other publishers, bearing in mind the harsh, yes, but at times insightful, criticism of the Editor-Who-Did-Not-Love. At that time, at my then-agent’s recommendation (and despite my own concerns), I also monkeyed with the chronology of the story.
As my agent and I were about to shop it wide, Frances came back asking if revisions had been made and if she might see it again. From there, it passed muster house-wide.

A book deal was made (hooray!) and then I sat down with Frances.
She loved some of the revisions that had been made, some fleshing out of the story, some fixes of you-know-who’s issues, BUT she missed the original chronology and wanted it restored. Easier said than done, to keep the new but restore the old and seamlessly weave it together.
I’m guessing that one revision back took a hundred hours. But without the full exercise, I wouldn’t have had some of the great new scenes and fleshing out, and, moreover, I wouldn’t have had a book deal.
The thing with revisions is you have to breathe, and you have to be patient and painstaking. And you have to be willing to put in the time. Because, for most of us, the first draft is just that: drafty. It’s the revisions that make the book.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

30 Days to a Stronger Scene

What has the most potential for improving your writing? Learning to write a strong scene; then making sure every scene in your story is strong. Because it’s so important, we’ll spend the next 30 days breaking down scenes and trying to write the strongest possible.
30 Days to a Stronger Scene Table of Contents

What is a scene?

It is a self-contained unit of action within a story, novel, or script.
The action has a beginning, middle and end; it consists of external actions, thought and emotions of characters. A character has an underlying goal or need and s/he tries to achieve that goal; complications and obstacles prevent the character from reaching the goal and the scene ends in a disaster.

Why write in scenes?

Because it’s easier to build tension, write tight and stay focused when writing in scenes. Using a scene means everything in that section of the story is focused on the character’s current goal; all obstacles relate to that goal; the disaster increases tension and puts the character in even hotter water. The result is that readers stay tuned.

How do I know if I write in scenes?

The Box Test. One test to see if you write in scenes is to literally mark one your manuscript, drawing a box around the scene. It may cover several pages, but you can box it out. The scene structure may be loose and not fully developed, but within that box, there should be some sense of movement toward a goal.

If you’re used to writing scripts, scenes in a novel work a little bit different. For scripts, scenes are mandatory and a new scene starts any time the location changes: for example, if a character is outside a house and walks inside. Scenes in scripts tend to be short. For a novel, a scene can extend longer and cover several minor changes of setting. So, if you’re used to writing scripts, instead think of scene sequences, or a series of scenes that cover a distinct goal of a character.

Is writing in scenes easy to learn?

Yes. The basics are simple. The nuances are as easy and as hard as any other story writing skills.

What will 30 Days to a Stronger Scene cover?

Everything you ever wanted to know about scenes. And then some. Stay tuned.

Want more immediately? Here are two great resources.

• 
  Sandra Scofield’s book is an excellent primer for writing scenes. Her examples are drawn mostly from the literary genre, rather than popular noves, so I find them hard to slog through sometimes. But everything else in her book is excellent.




• This classic by Jack Bickham gives the lowdown on scenes in detail. It’s a gem.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Using the Hero’s Journey to Plot

At the Michigan SCBWI conference two weeks ago, I was asked to teach about the Hero’s Journey. Taken from Joseph Campbell’s classic work on folklore, the hero’s journey is a classic paradigm for plot, especially for quest stories. The best book for studying the hero’s journey is The Writer’s Journey by Christopher Vogler.

While we usually see the hero’s journey used for a quest story, it can be used in many other types of stories, including contemporary children’s stories. Here’s my take on how The Bridge to Terabithia fits into the Hero’s Journey. I doubt Paterson was thinking about this paradigm as she wrote; but it’s a classic paradigm that can shortcut your plotting process and give you something great to work with.

ORDINARY WORLD

OPENING or BRIDGING CONFLICT: Jess wants to run, but his family doesn’t appreciate him.
Main Supporting Character hinted at: new family moving into Perkin’s old place.

Jess wants to do art, as supported by (Mentor) Miss Edmunds, but his family doesn’t think it’s worth his time to pursue.

Meets Leslie and the first week of classes, she beats all the boys at running. (Notice that Leslie doesn’t enter the story until chapter 3! The Ordinary World is often slighted by beginning writers and this is an excellent example to study for the importance of this stage.)

CALL TO ADVENTURE/REFUSAL

After the race Leslie tries to befriend him, telling him he’s the “only kid in this durned school worth shooting,” but he brushes her off brusquely, telling her, “So shoot me.”

MEETING WITH MENTOR

The one bright spot on the horizon is Miss Edmunds’s weekly visit to the school.

2ND CALL TO ADVENTURE

Leslie admits to class that her family doesn’t have a TV. Jess wants to protect/comfort her, but can’t.

CROSSING THE THRESHOLD

Jess supports Leslie against girl bully, Janice Avery.
Their friendship begins.

TESTS, ENEMIES AND ALLIES

Jess and Leslie’s friendship continues to grow and deepen in the next couple of months, both in school and in Terabithia.

• Enemies: Janice Avery has a subplot of her own.
• Tests: Christmas gifts – Jess finds free puppy, Prince Terrin, for Leslie; she gives him paint supplies

SUPREME ORDEAL: FEELS ABANDONED

Leslie helps Dad remodel their house and Jess feels abandoned. When Leslie realizes this, she invites Jess to help paint the golden room.

REWARD

Golden room and play in Terabithia.

ROAD BACK: HE IS CHANGING LESLIE NOW

Jess convinces Leslie that they have to try to help Janice, the bully.
Raise the stakes: Jess’ Dad is laid off work.

DEATH & RESURRECTION

When Jess goes with his teacher to an art gallery, Leslie goes to Terabithia alone and is drowned.
He thinks about how Leslie has changed him, and he realizes that the only way to preserve both those changes and her memory is to preserve Terabithia.

RETURN WITH ELIXIR

In one of the most poignant “return with elixir” moments in children’s literature, Jess introduces his little sister, MayBelle to Terabithia saying, “there’s a rumor going around that the beautiful girl arriving today might be the queen they’ve been waiting for.” He’s passing on the wider outlook on life that Leslie had introduced to him.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win