NaNoWriMo & "Hunger Games"

50k words in one month.  What's not to like?

The problem here is narrowing down the story ideas to one that is mostly developed and doesn't have a complicated plot.  The time travel story will have to wait until later, I am afraid--far to complex in structure for a "write, write, write" month, although I've been musing about it since Switzerland.   Ditto the one set in the Middle East--not developed enough at this point, though I am seriously considering writing down the couple of critical scenes I've been developing in my head since last summer.  I am hovering in indecision between two ideas that came from short stories I already wrote.  I have two more days to think about it.

What would you write about if you had only one month?

I finally broke down and read the "Hunger Games" Trilogy last week.  It took a little over 24 hours to consume.  I loved it and devoured it until the last ... oh, about 20 pages or so.  Then the ending completely fell apart.  (One of my Boot Camp buddies commented that Orson Scott Card probably ruined us for life after teaching us critical reading/editing skills.)  If you loved the books, please don't be offended that I feel like I can't recommend them.  At least part of the problem was that I read them in one day.  Since I loved, loved, loved the first two, I might have felt differently if I had spent a year waiting to read the last one.  But... I didn't.  I read them as though they were one book and the ending was ... odd.

*Possible Spoilers*
My biggest issue with the ending was that the main premise of the trilogy was that, for no reason Katniss can figure, nearly everyone would do anything for her.  Over and over we see people she barely knows risking their lives, giving their lives, following her from hellhole to hellhole.  In the final pages, though, nearly everyone disappears.  Seriously... where was Gale when she was in the hospital?  He disappears to a new job somewhere with no explanation.  Etc. Etc.  One friend suggested an explanation that went along the lines of "everyone having post traumatic stress syndrome" or some such thing.  Perhaps, but this is never really spelled out.  No explanation is ever given or even hinted at.  Look, like Card told us at Boot Camp, "I'll believe anything if you justify it."  There was simply no justification for the mass exodus of main and secondary characters (with the possible exception of Kantiss's mother, whom was never very in-the-picture from the beginning).  The ending was far too short with far too little information about main and secondary characters I had grown to love over the course of the 2 7/8 books that I had followed them through.  I needed more, and there wasn't more.  End of story.

I still love the first two books.  *End of Spoilers*

Writing lesson:  Get that manuscript to a Wise Reader or two that you trust.  Ask after they read the ending how satisfied they were.  You do not need to write the ending they would have loved--this isn't group fan fiction time, for goodness sake--but readers need to feel like they saw loose ends tied up in a way that makes sense based on what you already wrote.  Endings are important.  They are very hard to write.  They are also the last thing your readers will see of your writing before moving on.  Make them count because that is how you will be remembered.

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New Material

The revision of Chapter 5 is going well.  I added 2000 words today to the middle of it.  The need was obvious.  I had a long stretch of nothing just after the opening paragraphs trying to disguise itself as scene while bridging the more interesting Chapter 4 with the rest of the book.  Some readers will indulge these little lapses in writing judgement, but as a rule, I do not.  I also am not very indulgent when it comes to multi-page descriptive passages that don't advance the plot (J.K. Rowling) or multi-page history/back story indulgences (Tolkien), even when they took 30 years to develop, are intricate, intelligently written, and fascinating as stand-alone material.  It's hard as a reader to patiently wade through material barely related to the advancement of the plot when there is an interesting story to get back to.  Skimming is my usual defense when it comes to these sorts of writing issues.

Since I am a new novelist, I can't afford these sorts of indulgences or lapses.  Editors and agents are as impatient as I am out of necessity.  With slush piles and queries constantly backlogged, they usually reject manuscripts with these sorts of issues unless the rest of the material is truly engaging.  Since I cannot be sure that mine is, the order of the day is revision, revision, revision.  I don't want an agent or editor skimming.  Every word needs to count.

The solution to my problem was to merge two needs.  First, there was a need to excise or develop the bridge part of Chapter 5 into something more interesting.  Second, there was a need to show more of a developing relationship between the two main characters.  Voila!

Actually, it's not as simple as that.  I spent all weekend coming up with bits of scenes that would fit in that part of the novel that showed both character development and relationship development, but it was fun work.  I am very pleased with the result.  Now I just need to do a "read-aloud" session on that chapter and send it in the direction of the Wise Reader.

One of my buddies from Orson Scott Card's Boot Camp challenged us last summer to get those manuscripts out there.  That is my goal, but I want to send out a manuscript that has already been revised and edited to the best of my current ability.  Hopefully, I will be able to send the complete manuscript out in a month or so.

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Reading Out Loud

Since I had a little extra time today after some beginning revisions of Chapter 5, I decided to trot out a tried and true technique for editing.  I went back to the beginning of the manuscript and read the story out loud.  I did not, by the way, invent this technique.  I read about it in an article about Tamora Pierce, who in turn, was told to do it by her editor.  I am sure it's been around for a long time, but I only began using it a few years ago.  What a difference it has made in my writing. 

Reading out loud makes your eyes slow down.  (For me, significantly.  I can read about 100 pages an hour of a "Harry Potter" level book.)  Slowing down means that you are more likely to catch errors that your spelling/grammar check didn't remark on.  Reading out loud also means that you have a chance to hear how smooth your words sound.  It's funny how many times a clever turn of phrase actually catches on the tongue when it is oral rather than in your head.  Long sentences that are punctuated correctly but still make the reader pant to get through in one breath are another find when you read out loud.  Words, particularly proper names, that are tricky to pronounce get found.  When I am composing, I rarely notice these things, and my brain skips over them when I am skimming through my manuscript later. 

There are other ways to slow down, of course.  I have heard of using a ruler to go line by line.  I have heard of reading only until you find your first error and then walking away for 5-10 minutes.  I have also heard of reading and editing only one paragraph at a time (which is an agonizingly slow process, let me tell you).  Few techniques compare, though, to the simple act of reading your manuscript out loud to hear how it sounds. 

What do you do when you are editing?

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On to Chapters 3 & 4

The Wise Reader gave me positive feedback on the changes to the first two chapters.  I must be heading in the right direction.

Chapters 3 & 4 of "Spellbound" did not need as much editing as the first two.  I added a few paragraphs of interaction between Izabella and her siblings, which I had decided was necessary to show a bit more of their relationship before that relationship became important later on in the story.  I also broke the end off of chapter 4 because it had gotten too long and unwieldy by far--and the part at the end truly needed to be its own chapter.  I plan to expand it a little tomorrow. 

I also did a few small edits that centered around objections that some of my various readers had.

I've been asked if I always change things to suit the readers who go over my manuscript.  The answer is "it depends."  Orson Scott Card asserts that the Wise Reader is always right... and he is, up to a point.  The Wise Reader is always right about their reaction to your writing, but that reaction may or may not be correct in a generic sense, based on their background, favorite types of stories, or their emotional baggage on topics covered.  For example, I really don't like the horror genre.  Any review of mine of a story from that genre is going to be heavily colored by the fact that over the top violence and I just don't get along.  Similarly, since becoming a mother, I just don't handle "children in jeopardy" stories very well.  You might not want me to review those either.  If I do read them, I try to stick to the basic "well written" issues:  clarity, consistency, a good sense of timing, and such, but it will be a struggle to be objective. 

Card told me at Boot Camp that he doesn't like stories with mermaids & vampires, and has become bored with SF (likely from reading it so much).   From my own experience, he also has issues with stories about handicapped children (which I understand), boys who rebuild cars, and artists (which seriously surprised me).  I still remember him telling the gentleman who wrote the story about the boys who rebuild cars (which had already gotten a fairly positive set of reviews from the other fifteen of us) that he felt as if he had read a different story than the rest of us had.  In all likelihood, exactly so, based on his background.  If you ever get an itch to go to Boot Camp yourself, you might want to stay away from those topics. 

For that reason, I trust some opinions of my work more than others.  Readers with far more experience reading in the genre or topic of my work are far more likely to get their objections taken seriously.  It may also depend on the background of the reader. The protagonist of my trilogy manuscript loses her father early on, and I took the opinions of my friend who lost her father young far more seriously than others--at least about that section of the story. 

Complaints that something is confusing, boring, or contradictory always get my attention.  Complaints that a character is acting out of character always get a closer look.  Objections to my world building, particularly if there is a parallel here in this world, not so much.  Just because you wouldn't have made that choice in your writing does not mean that I can't make a different choice.  

And then there is, of course, the matter of the majority rule.  If several readers all tell me the same thing, there is probably something that needs to be corrected or adjusted there. I take those suggestions very seriously.  And I am always grateful for any feedback, negative or positive.  I appreciate everyone who has taken the time to read and comment on my stories.  The time you took in helping me has been invaluable to my development as an author. 

One of the great things about writing and reading is that it is so subjective.  If you don't like a certain genre or style of writing, there are hundreds of others to entertain, enlighten, or inspire you.  Just reading through the blogs of some of my favorite writers and agents, I can find opinions so diverse as to give me hope that eventually my little story will find a home. 

What are your favorite kinds of stories?

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Editing & Writing Rules

The first two chapters of "Spellbound" are finally edited to my satisfaction.  We will see what the Wise Reader has to say.  The two main problematic areas were:  too much back story in the opening (a fairly normal issue with a first draft or even second draft) and a bunch of reader quibbles over the first failed romance.  Apparently my readers didn't find a first romance before finding true love realistic.  I am of the opinion that this is actually how it usually is in the real world.  That was actually my only serious quibble with "Twilight"  -- that Isabella had claimed to have never been in love prior to meeting Edward.  If only it worked that way.  It would sure save a lot of heartache and angst in the teenage set.

One of my readers even went so far as to suggest that there was a rule out there that the male lead in a romance storyline HAS to be the first person of note the female lead lays her eyes on, and likely vise versa.  (Or something to that effect... has to be introduced first in the book before any potential rivals, that sort of thing.)  This reader was very serious that this rule was not to be broken.  I remember blinking at her for a few moments before realizing she was serious, and then my brain trotted through the plot lines of at least a dozen fairly popular books or series, of all different genres, some of which are classics, where this is simply not the case.  I bet you can think of a few.

I can see the point of the "rule," but as a rule, this isn't how romance works in real life.  At all.  Just about ever.  And it totally gives away the ending if it's always followed.  I asked this reader if she wouldn't, just once, like to be surprised at the ending of the book, trying to decide how serious an issue this was for her.  She told me that the good news was that I had made her very curious to read on.

Yes.  That would be the point.  If you always follow the rules, your story becomes a novel-length mad-lib.

But... I did think over the reader's comments for a few months, ran the issue by my sweetheart, and decided to at least tone down the expectations.  Perhaps someday I will post the writer's cut version of Chapter 2 and other readers can decide for themselves.

The ironic thing, at least from my point of view, is that the male romantic lead was in fact mentioned in the book long before the other fellow came along in Chapter 2.  But I couldn't tell this reader that... it would spoil her ability to be a good reader for the rest of the chapters--and spoil the surprise.  Wonder of wonders.  I followed the rule.  *grins*

When you write, do you always follow the rules?

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Finally Getting Down To Business

After many months of false starts, I finally sat down to work on revising my fantasy novel this week.  (I would have rather worked on the SF, but it would seem that with fantasy being more marketable these days, the fantasy might be a better start.)  The opening was very weak and exposition heavy.  The solution:  cut all the bits of exposition, noting the point of each one, and then working each point into the action somewhere in the first chapter.  Easier said than done, I know.  I also completed all of the edits I decided on after the first chapters went through the rounds of the writer's group and got some feedback from my better half.  I promised the first two chapters to my good friend and Wise Reader tomorrow.  It will be interesting to see how they fare. 

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