I wrote a first draft of a picture book this week. Except, I didn’t finish. And that’s a good thing.

This often happens to me when I’m writing the first draft of a picture book or the first draft of a chapter. I write and write and write, then suddenly stop. Why stop?

When something says, "STOP!", you need to listen.

Research Needed. Often, I need to research some detail. For nonfiction, it probably means I need more resources to answer specific questions. And, well, the same thing for fiction. Yes, you need solid facts upon which to build a fictional story. It must be believable. For example, I might need to know exactly how long it takes robin eggs to hatch before I can finish my plot timeline.

Voice Needs Tweaking. Sometimes the voice needs to be tweaked, or totally overhauled. I may need to try it from another POV, another attitude, or switch from a picture book to a short chapter book. Something is just off in the storytelling. To remedy this, I need to stop and play with format and voice to find where this story fits best.

In other words, the first draft is to tell you what your story is. Second and following drafts are about finding the most dramatic way to tell the story so that it will reach your target audience. That’s the fun part. So, when I suddenly stop before the end of a draft, I know the fun has just begun.

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Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

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Sometimes I write for other places or other places talk about my books. Here are some links for your reading pleasure.

2012 Writer’s Market

This year’s market guide–the best in the industry–includes my article on Book Trailers. Based on my experience writing The Book Trailer Manual, the article talks about the pros/cons of book trailers, how to create them and options for the content of your trailers. You can see my book trailers on my YouTube Darcy Pattison channel.

Voice: A Conversation of Many

Author Bobbi Miller has put together a great conversation on Voice in this presentation: A Conversation of Many: What is Voice Anyway?
Besides my take on voice, read what these authors, editors and professionals have to say: Cheryl Klein, Kathi Appelt, Adam Gidwitz, Eric Kimmel, Nathan Brandsford, Emma Dryden and many more.

Reviews of Prairie Storms

Order NOW!

• Taking Time for Mommy
• Just Another New Blog
• Mom of 3 Dolls: And One More
• Heck of a Bunch
• Just Our Thoughts
• Peace, Love and Rainbows
• Feathered Quill
• Elizabeth O. Dulemba
• Simply Science

Have you seen the Prairie Storms September Coloring Page?

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

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I am working on a novel revision for an editor and I expect to turn it in by Monday. But today, as I was reading through one last time to polish everything up–oh, my gosh!–there’s still so much work to do.

Last Minute Revisions

At this point, it’s not major structural changes or big plot changes. Instead, I am looking to tighten every scene and make as many connections as possible. And I am polishing language and voice.

Here are some thing that I’m working on:

Connections. I noticed that K gave A something. Now, K is a minor character, and while I like K, the connection here was weak. Instead, I wondered how the story would work if C gave A that same thing. Much nicer! It brought back in a sub-plot/theme with C that I thought would never work into this part of the story.

Conflict and Tension. Yes, the mainstay of fiction is conflict and tension and you’d think I would have that right by now. Instead, I realized that I was relying on the external conflict and ignoring the internal conflict. What I needed was conflict to be within my main character, while at the same time, she is facing external problems. I had to go back paragraph by paragraph and make sure that the internal conflict was present, was related to the external problem and that it grew over the course of the story.

Pacing. I separated one long chapter into two chapters, making sure the ending of the first chapter was a cliff-hanger and the beginning of the next chapter had a good hook.

Verbs. Yes, verbs. As we all know by now, strong verbs make for good story language and a strong voice. And I was doing pretty well. But I noticed in this chapter that I was slacking off some. For example, I replaced “They stared” with “They gaped”, and later with “They gawked.” Subtle differences, yes, but important.

Characterization. I am confident that A is a strong character. But what about B, C, D, E, F, G? As I read through, I am looking for places to characterize them better.

When is a Novel Revision Finished?

Um, never. I think I could endlessly revise a novel and my friends will attest to that. But at some point, I’ve done all I can do without more feedback. With this final pass through, I’ll be at that point. It will be time to send the novel out into the world for someone to read and evaluate. Does that mean I am finished with revisions on this particular novel? Doubtful. Bu until some fresh eyes catch weak areas, I can’t see anything else to do. Soon, very soon, it will be on its way.

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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Creating the voice you want for your story or novel begins with Word Choices. It continues with control of your sentences. I emphasize control because many writers–well, they just write. Without consideration of sentence structures.

Sentences, as the basic building block of the written word, need careful attention. You can write long, short, simple, complex, parallel, convoluted or fragmented. Yes. Fragments work.

When do you use which sentence structure. Here’s where it helps to read your work aloud, listening for a smooth flow. Does the writing disappear and let the story come forward, or does the writing force you to stop and read again for clarity? Are there frequent stutters as the rhythm of the piece breaks down?

Where do you want the emphasis?

In Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace, Joseph Williams takes a scholarly look at sentences and how to manage them. Of course, there are lessons on omitting the passive voice, creating strong subjects of sentences and making sure there is clarity throughout. He also speaks of putting the emphasis where you want it to be. For example, I often ask people to look at a paragraph and identify the most important word/phrase in that paragraph. Williams says the ends of sentences are positions of emphasis or stress. So, I ask the writers to reword the sentence and put the most important word last.

Consider the differences between these two sentences.

1. The Revolution has begun.
2. It was the beginning of the Revolution.

#1 is shorter and emphasizes that something has started.
#2 is longer and emphasizes there is a Revolution. It uses the “It was. . .” construction to push the important information to the end of the sentence. A careful writer would weigh the disadvantage of the weaker to-be verb with the advantage of putting the word “Revolution” in the position of stress.

The choice depends on where you want the readers to focus. It’s a choice that affects style, clarity and, of course, voice.

Here are other posts on using great sentences to create voice.

• Voice Friday: Sentences
• Voice Friday: Sentence Control
• Sentence Fragments: Use for Conversational Tone

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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Voice begins with the right choice of words

Word choices matter!

1. Word origins can make a difference: fire is a strong Anglo-Saxon word, while inferno is a Latin-based word.
2. Length or syllable count matter: fire is single syllable, while inferno has three syllables.
3. The connotations of words matter. Does inferno carry connotations of hell? While fire makes you think of a cozy campfire? Connotations can be personal, but they also are cultural and these nuances matter.
4. The formality of words, from formal to informal, can change voice.
5. Progressions–for example, comparative to superlative–also affect voice.
6. Jargon is the specialized vocabulary for a subject: for example, in baseball, you would talk about steals, earned runs and RBIs. Slang is contemporary language that means something to today’s audience only.

Words That Mean Something Else

Classic rhetoric discusses tropes, or the ways that words are used. Sometimes we call this figurative language, but it’s mostly how the word is used. Here are some common tropes.

1. Metaphor/Simile: Two unlike things are said to be alike. The comparison is implied for a metaphor, but explicit for a simile.
   Ex. Eating, he was a pig.
   He ate like a pig.
2. Synecdoche: Part stand for the whole.
   Ex. He’s in trouble with the law. (Law stands for police or legal system.)
3. Syllepsis: Use of one verb that is understood differently in relation to two or more objects.
   Ex. His boat and his dreams sank.
4. Anthimeria: One part of speech is exchanged for another.
   Ex. They enrolled in parenting class. (Parent is a noun used as an adjective.)
5. Periphrasis: Substitution of one or more descriptive words for a proper name.
   Ex. Blue-Eyes can croon a great tune.
6. Personification: Attribution of human qualities to inanimate objects or abstractions.
   Ex. No one, not even rain, has such small hands. (e.e. cummings)
7. Litotes: Use of understatement to intensify an idea. It usually involves denying the contrary.
   Ex. It isn’t very serious. I have this tiny little tumor on the brain. —J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
8. Oxymoron: Juxtaposition of two contradictory words.
   Ex. To win is to lose.

For more on how Word Choices Affect Voice, read these:

• Voice Friday: Word Choices
• Voice Friday: Word Connotations
• Voice Friday: Word Sounds
• Voice Friday: Words for Your Voice

Do you have any examples of how word choices changed the voice of a story?

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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Design Star Finds Voice

Last night, I watched HGTV crown the new “Design Star,” Meg Caswell. I had watched some throughout the season and the judge’s commentary always made me think of the writer’s voice.

One of the challenges of the Design Star is to meld entertainment and solid interior design, making information fun. While they are at it, the designers must also find their “voice,” their online persona that will carry the show. Much like novelist, they must find a way to bring their personality to bear on the material.

At one point, the judges warned Karl that his “nervous laugh” was getting in the way of his performance. We have nervous laughs, too.

A common commentary–for the Design Star and the novelist–is to relax and be yourself. Yeah, right. With millions watching you expect Meg and Karl to “be themselves”? With readers flocking to your book, your story, editors expect you to be yourself? That advice is helpful? NOT!

In fact, most advice about finding your voice or improving your voice, fail me. I can’t “dig deep into myself and find things I want to express.” I can’t “let my personality flow out through the pen onto the paper.” It’s too vague. I need something solid, something to try.

The Writer’s Voice

Today, I’ll start a series about voice and how to manipulate voice. I approach it not as a mystical thing, but as a matter of practical manipulation of the elements that writers have at hand: words, sentences, passages. We will look at each of these in turn and how they fit together to create the voice of a piece of writing. Join me for the next few weeks to talk about voice.

So, really–did you want Meg or Karl to win?
And–how would you define a writer’s voice?

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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It seems like all I am doing is printing out my WIP right now. Of course. Revising a novel is always a circular process.

Get it Right the First Time

Some authors get it right the first time; others claim to get it right the first time. For experienced writers, who are used to editing, it may be possible for a first or an early draft to be near perfect. Lucky you!

Creep up on Right

I am fairly experienced at novel revision and editing a text. But editing my own work is a matter of circling back, round and round, in a seemingly endless circle. I make changes here or there, but it’s hard to keep track of the flow of the story. Do those changes really do what I hope they do? Have I gone too far or not far enough?

The only way to know is to read the story again from the beginning. Or later in the novel, I can pick a chapter to read from, but it needs to be 2-3 chapter ahead of what I just edited.

Consistency. I am looking for consistency in voice and tone, and those can only be assessed when you look at longer passages.

Holes. I am also looking for holes in the story. If I indicate in Chapter 8 that a beggar is one-legged, does he suddenly grow a leg in Chapter 12. Again, I need to look at longer passages for these types of details.

Tension. I am always checking to make sure the story’s tension is as high as possible. Maybe a stronger verb will evoke stronger emotion, or maybe slight rewording will help. I’m at a fairly late stage of revising (it’s gone through several major revisions already and I’m confident of the overall structure by now) so I doubt it will need major re-structuring. Instead, this is probably some early polishing.

Pacing. I am also monitoring myself: do I get bored at any point? Where did I stop paying attention to the words? If I bore myself, then I will bore the reader. Yes, I realize that part of the boredom is that I’ve read this novel upteen times. But there are parts that I happily read multiple times; and there are parts where I struggle to read it again. It’s those places that I evaluate for pacing issues: can I omit something to speed up the story? Can I reword it to speed it up?

These are not conscious, check-off-a-list things I do, just what I try to keep in mind as I endlessly print, read, edit, print, read, edit. . .

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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Where did July and August go?

Computer Woes. First, my server has been wonky for the last two weeks–apologies. If you have any difficulty getting to pages, please send me an email so I can straighten it out (darcy at darcypattison dot com).

Travel. For me, this summer included a great two-week trip to China. Our friend of ten years was getting engaged and invited us to the engagement party. Wow, what a great trip. So much to see and do–and we did all the usual things. Beijing in July was very smoggy. But we had a couple clear days to climb the Great Wall and see the Forbidden City. My favorite part was wandering the streets, as you’ll see in this video of a street vendor blowing a caramel-sugar pig:

Research (NOT!) After China, I did research (NOT!). My friend, Dori Butler won the Edgar award this year for the best children’s mystery for her series, The Buddy Files. (IF you haven’t read them, you need to!) She’s working on a new mystery–duh! And doing research: she’s recently shot a Taurus 380 and a Glock 22.40.

Why can’t I do cool research, I wondered? So, I went and had my throat slashed. Well, technically, they called it minor surgery as they took out my thyroid. But I now have the personal experience to go with Dori’s to write that mystery thriller. Hmmm. Maybe I don’t like research so much.

Back to Normal. But all it well here in the mid-South. And I’m back in the saddle with lots of plans for fall!

Plans for Fall.

• Random Acts of Publicity: By Wednesday, I’ll have the complete info posted on this fun week when it’s “All About Your Friend’s Book.”
• And I’m planning a September series on the Writer’s Voice.

So, how was YOUR summer? Any interesting trips, research, writing? Please share your good news!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Importance of Sentence Variety

My niece was here this weekend and we talked about her college writing experience. She said they try to change her habitual writing of high school into something more sophisticated. For example, they eschew the five-paragraph essay, rightly so. Instead, they look for more sophisticated structures.

But when I teach writing, I focus on not just on structures, but on the craft of writing itself. It begins with sentences, especially with sentence variety: long, short, simple, complex, convoluted, straight forward, building with a series, stopping abruptly, or continuing forward to complete a thought.

One of the most helpful things I ever did was work through The Art of Styling Sentences: 20 Patterns for Success. It forces you to look at sentences in all their simplicity, complexity and glory.

For example, do you know how–it’s really easy–to interrupt a sentence with another sentence and correctly punctuate it? The patterns encourage writers to gain control of their language and punctuation, to throw fear of commas and semi-colons and colons out the window, and start writing what they want to write.

Summer Challenge

Summer is a challenging time for some writers because kids are home. So here’s a perfect challenge for you, a challenge that will improve your writing with very little effort!

Are you holding back because you don’t know how to punctuate something? Try this summer challenge with a partner: each week choose a new sentence pattern and use it somewhere at least five times. Have your partner check up and make sure it was used correctly. The first few patterns are simple, but the book builds in complexity. You’ll come out of the summer with a stronger control of the language you use in any context, but it will particularly help your fiction. Really. (Isn’t THAT a great sentence fragment, used correctly? You need to control even those rogues.)

After you’ve worked through the patterns in this book, there are two a final challenges.

• Write at least a 100 word sentence, correctly punctuated.
• Correctly use a sentence fragment. Really.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

First Drafts are Uncertain, by Nature

I’m at that fragile stage of the first draft when I’m not totally committed to this story. I’m still feeling my way and haven’t yet gained confidence that I will like the story, or that my readers will like it. I’m walking on eggshells.

What can I do to GET committed?

Play with voice.

The main thing I’m doing is to continue to play with voice, making sure that I’m not tied into one way of telling this story yet. I’m doing first person, third person, omniscient. Different narrators are popping up. I’m trying a loose collection of short scenes and trying longer, more connected things. Playing.

Keep writing.

Though it feels like I’m swimming upstream against a heavy curtain, I’m still writing. Just bits and pieces each day, but pages are starting to accumulate so that I can start to see the shape of things. I’m writing.

Embrace uncertainty.

Hardest for me personally is to embrace the uncertainty of this stage of a first draft of a novel. I’m liking the main event and the characters and even most of the plot (so far). But I’ve found that there are two things I need to know. First, what is the story that I want to tell. Second, what is the best way to tell that story.

I’ve found the story, at least I’ve caught it and am wrestling with it. What this draft will tell me is whether I’ve found the best way to tell that story.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win