I'm back posting this to create a link in my sidebar. This is the original query getting partial and full manuscript requests.
***********************
"Why, Grandmother, what big teeth you have?"
"The better to eat you with, my dear."
There are times when the wolf disguises itself in the clothing of an innocent grandmother. Then there are times when the wolf has always lurked inside the old woman's mind.
Twenty-one-year-old Jena Polsen feels she has stepped into a fairy tale world as she journeys toward Clare's house so she can take care of her sick grandmother. The trail, her life, up to this point has not been a peaceful one during her stay in the drug rehabilitation clinic after stealing the mayor's car. Still, Jena hopes this opportunity will prove that she can pursue a law-abiding life. Unfortunately, several people have gone missing in the neighborhood including a young man related to her new parole officer. It does not take long for the accusations against Jena because of her criminal record. At the discovery of a bone and a journal at the house, she wonders if something strange has happened inside her grandmother.
An inner guilt over a past incident has created a dark personality in Clare after her recent collapse from a mild stroke. Only on those blood-specked journal pages does Jena soon learn about the beast wearing the mask of her grandmother.
Query letter 4B
For those readers who are new to this blog or haven’t stopped by my more active site, The Surly Writer, then you may not know that I am currently going through the submission process for my manuscript, “Our Perfect Thorn.” The process had been a slow one as I perfected my dreaded nemesis: the query letter. I had gone through many drafts and received the standard form letter, or no response at all. Then Query Letter 4B appeared.
I love this letter. Once I switched over to using this one, I’ve gotten responses even from agencies where they have said in their submission guidelines that they don’t respond to queries they have no interest in. I have even read a rejection where although they could not handle my current manuscript, they encouraged me to send them other projects in the future.
Anyway, I am eagerly sending out my query letters. I am still receiving so many encouraging rejection letters . . .
It seems like a paradox. An encouraging rejection letter? It’s like having the dentist say he is going to give you a painless root canal. Yet I believe this is the reason I haven’t gotten upset over the rejections. When I keep getting the same “Although your premise/story/project/idea is fascinating/interesting/fascinating/interesting . . .” or “your work shows promise,” I can’t really get upset over the letter. I believe the best one was, “I found your writing shows promise. Unfortunately, with the state of publishing today, I must concentrate on projects in which I feel deeply passionate about . . . ”
Taste is subjective. I realize this. I would not want an agent who does not feel passionate enough to take on my project. So I nodded my head, understanding her position concerning my manuscript, and moved onto querying the next person.
I have gotten requests for three-chapter partials and for the full manuscript.
This has my nerves in a tizzy, especially when they ask for an exclusive. I never quite know how to respond. Do I give the simple “Thank you - here it is?” Or do I put more into the letter? What should I include that hasn’t already been discussed in the original query? I’ve mainly kept the emails short, hoping they believe jitters have me being unintentionally abrupt. This is half true. I get the shakes when I read, “Thank you for your query. I/We would be happy to look at your project.” My heart starts thumping faster. My mind is running in circles as I read their requirements on submitting. My body wants to drop on all fours as I make low growling noises for no reason at all.
What to do? Does anybody have advice on this? An article? A link? Or maybe share what you have done? I’m kind of lost on this part.
I love this letter. Once I switched over to using this one, I’ve gotten responses even from agencies where they have said in their submission guidelines that they don’t respond to queries they have no interest in. I have even read a rejection where although they could not handle my current manuscript, they encouraged me to send them other projects in the future.
Anyway, I am eagerly sending out my query letters. I am still receiving so many encouraging rejection letters . . .
It seems like a paradox. An encouraging rejection letter? It’s like having the dentist say he is going to give you a painless root canal. Yet I believe this is the reason I haven’t gotten upset over the rejections. When I keep getting the same “Although your premise/story/project/idea is fascinating/interesting/fascinating/interesting . . .” or “your work shows promise,” I can’t really get upset over the letter. I believe the best one was, “I found your writing shows promise. Unfortunately, with the state of publishing today, I must concentrate on projects in which I feel deeply passionate about . . . ”
Taste is subjective. I realize this. I would not want an agent who does not feel passionate enough to take on my project. So I nodded my head, understanding her position concerning my manuscript, and moved onto querying the next person.
I have gotten requests for three-chapter partials and for the full manuscript.
This has my nerves in a tizzy, especially when they ask for an exclusive. I never quite know how to respond. Do I give the simple “Thank you - here it is?” Or do I put more into the letter? What should I include that hasn’t already been discussed in the original query? I’ve mainly kept the emails short, hoping they believe jitters have me being unintentionally abrupt. This is half true. I get the shakes when I read, “Thank you for your query. I/We would be happy to look at your project.” My heart starts thumping faster. My mind is running in circles as I read their requirements on submitting. My body wants to drop on all fours as I make low growling noises for no reason at all.
What to do? Does anybody have advice on this? An article? A link? Or maybe share what you have done? I’m kind of lost on this part.
Idea Page
I would steal Marty away.
The doctors laughed about my ideas. Laughed about my stone while my son moaned in pain with all the plastic tubes attached to his vital organs. Marty has spent months with these so-called ‘great minds of medicine’ as they had prodded and poked and conducted research papers about his condition. My son reduced to a shriveled lab rat in a white-walled cage as those witch doctors had attended their seminars and preached about their latest findings while hoping to become nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. I asked them again what they were doing to help my son.
“There is nothing we can do but make him comfortable during his last days.”
“Even with all of our technological advances, we’re discovering new diseases daily that are beyond our knowledge.”
HACKS! LIARS! CHARLATANS!
They wanted him to die. They asked, twice, if I would sign over Marty’s remains for study. I bloodied my knuckles on both doctors overeager faces. They filed restraining orders. They complained about my erratic behavior with my exwife Pam, suggesting my presence might be detrimental to Marty’s well-being.
Pam had called me today. I had told her about my stone. She had said she had agreed to the doctors/butchers’ suggestions. She had threatened, “Graham Baxter. If I see you anywhere near that hospital, I will call the police!”
Why won’t anybody believe me? The stone made dead flowers blossom. It gave my old dog Miter the use of his bad leg. It has even brought statues to life. The hospital staff has seen it work. I had strutted through the corridors and shouted for the nurses to come witness the miracle. I had placed the stone on Marty’s chest. He had opened his eyes for the first time in two weeks. Giggled. Then he had slipped back into his dreamless black void when I snatched the stone from the covers and struggled with the guards. I had run away before the sheriff showed up.
I figured out how the stone worked. It transferred life from one object to another. The first time I had bled over the stone, cut my hands on the barbed fence when I had snuck into ol’ man Sumter’s junkyard searching for the streak of light that fell out of the sky. Drunk and a little high, I had stumbled down Hanna Mill Road with the glowing stone I had found in the rusted carburetor. I had laid the stone in the flowerpot, drank one last beer, and took a nap on the kitchen linoleum. When I woke up the next day, a flower had sat inside the pot. A freaking flower from a black thumb gardener! I could not even grow weeds around my double-wide trailer.
If I gave a little life to the stone, a little life it gave to someone else.
There was something else that I needed to tell you. Something else Pam had said in the phone call. The medical insurance was running out on Marty’s life support. She had to buy the cheap-ass stuff. Neither of us could afford to pay the bills from our own pockets. Hell, Pam worked two dead end jobs while living with her parents, and her family was still getting evicted by the landlord. Me? I worked under-the-table. Not a decent job around for a man convicted of beating his exwife’s lover into a body cast. Three times.
Pam had told me that when the insurance ran out, she would have the doctors turn off the life support.
I would take my son away tonight. But first I needed to give life to the stone. It could not be mine, because I needed my strength to carry Marty from the hospital.
The life would have to come from someone else.
**********************
What you have just read was an idea page. This is one of the many processes I use to understand a story I want to work on. Basically, I sat at the computer and focused my mind on nothing except this one thought:
A moral choice based on whether you would save one person by killing another, and have something involving the supernatural with walking statues.
Think of the idea page as a conversation I had with my main character. I wanted to know what his life was like. He told me the very basic elements of how he was feeling, what dilemmas he faced, and a course of action he was going to commit. In this process I also learned his special voice, his driving force in the story, and other characters. Often, I will use this page as a foundation to build a story. Here is another example. For the manuscript I am currently shopping around for publication, I used these thoughts as a base for the storyline.
What if I took the fairytale, “Little Red Riding Hood,” and broke down the plot? A wolf disguises itself in the clothes of a grandmother. But what if I modernized this? What would happen if the wolf were more metaphorical? It could be the beast of our vices: greed, jealousy, lust, and obsession. The characters could even take on the beast’s personalities: foaming at the mouth when giving in to a drug addiction, a gang laughing like hyenas when they surround a victim, and the grandmother’s glowing yellow eyes when she hides dark secrets . . . etc.
The idea page might be longer than a page, or might even be shorter. It could come from a random short story, a dream, or something I might have seen or heard. It could consist of only the main character, or multiple characters. It could be anything that gets the main story out of the head. Since I have the idea page ready involving Graham Baxter and his stone, here is the expansion of the story so far. I’m not so much worried about grammar and punctuation. All I want is a beginning I can work with.
******************
“Burp! Koff-koff.”
The cold night made the warm beer taste better, as I stared at the can’s picture of rounded snowy mountains and the rushing train speeding off as if those metal wheels aimed for my drunk ass. Doubted anyone would miss me if I died. I, sure as hell, knew my exwife Pam would not shell out a dime for the funeral. I might even be doing the world a favor. There would be less of me to place in the pine box.
Yet what about Marty?
I took a last swig before crushing the empty can against my forehead. Then I threw the crushed aluminum against the tree on Gary’s property as it rebounded into the pile of cans my neighbor saved to collect his nickels down at the recycling plant. My fingers reached under the lounging lawn chair. The next beer pulled out the plastic ring and fizzed when I ripped off the tab. My thumb rubbed against the water beaded on the can as I imagined the train whistle and the whoosh of steam from the pipe. The closest railroad crossing was at the other end of Hanna Mill Road, near to the dairy farm and old fort. Wondered if any trains would be running this late at night? Wondered if I should smoke another bowl of weed before going over there and laying down on the wooden ties? I could lay down and close my eyes and not feel a thing.
Think about how Marty would feel.
Yeah, I could not forget him. I could not take that route of wanting to escape my problems on those rusted tracks. He needed me. Marty had no one else now after his own mother signed those permission papers. Damn her!
The phone rang. I could hear its beeps through the open kitchen window. I placed my hands on the armrest and lifted up to spy the time on the microwave. 12:15am. All of my drinking buddies would be down at Sumter’s Pub and Junkyard too wasted to dial my number. Pam. Her shift ended at midnight at the all-night diner. She had wanted to talk with me about something for the past week. Not really caring what she had to say to me now as the answering machine switched on.
“Hello? Graham? Are you there? Pick up the line. I know you’re there. I have to talk with you.” Two minutes of silence came through the line. “Fine. Be an arrogant prick. And you wonder what happened to our marriage--” Beep.
The machine always cut her off before she could go into her full rant as my arm pulled back and then swung out over my head. The full beer sailed above the double-wide trailer to smack something with a ping on the other side. Probably hit the truck on concrete blocks. I messed up the front axle when Gary and I went off-roading down at the track designed for the dirt bike races. For the past week I was angry with myself over that, and I was angry with Pam over those papers.
Damn the doctors! They were the ones who pressured Pam to do it. Claimed it would be for ‘the good of all humanity and the medical world’ crap if she gave her permission for Marty’s body to become dissected for research study. MY BOY WAS NOT EVEN DEAD YET! But those butchers had already made up their minds. He was a shell of a seven-year-old with an illness causing his organs to “hiccup in spasms until sections failed to receive needed blood and began to die off.” Or so the doctors had attempted to dumb down the explanation for us country hicks. I might not have a degree in medicine. Yet when I see my son strapped to the hospital bed, bouncing in and out of comas, with the monitoring machines fastening their octopus arms of tiny plastic tubes and wires to his body, I could not give a rat’s ass what was wrong. All I wanted to know was what they could do to make things right inside my boy.
“There is nothing we can do but make him comfortable during his final days.”
“Even with all of our technological advances, we’re discovering new diseases daily that are beyond our knowledge.”
They could shove that bull at someone else. If I were a billionaire, they would be falling at my feet trying to help my son in the hopes I would hand over a large donation to open another hospital wing. Dirt poor guaranteed the lowest, cheapest care given that would keep the medical staff from getting sued for malpractice. I fell into the latter category.
My fists pounded on my legs. “HACKS! LIARS!”
Scratching paws sounded against the door along with one plaintive whine. My shout must have woken old Miter. I unwrapped the baling twine from around the armrest and tugged, pulling the other end tied to the trailer door. It opened wide and I waited, listening to his clomps of aged feet. My eyes watched his shadow created from the moth encrusted outdoor light as the bloodhound dragged himself down onto the porch. He had arthritis in all his bones, but worse in the right front leg. The joints stiffened harder than any of my sculpted statues.
Old Miter shuffled sore legs over to the second lounge chair beside me and flopped to the side to get in it. His breath huffed and watery eyes closed. His chest rattled when he breathed, stuttered in short wet rasps as his tongue licked his runny nose in an unconscious habit even during sleep.
Too old. The dog got too old too fast. I could still see him romping through the yard with Marty two years ago, trying to nip at the frisbee my boy held in his teeth in teasing, as I had sat in the bed of my pickup and whacked at the large rock slab taken from the job site. My chisel had hacked off the large chunks. My sandpaper had smoothed the rough areas. Whack! Pam had lounged on the same chair Miter curled in now, as she sipped her Gatorade and flipped through those stupid celebrity magazines. Out the corner of my eye, I had caught her lifting the magazine at me and scrunching her face as she imagined her surroundings dwelled on that glossy page: the mansion, the intellectual athletic son already flocked by admirers, and her sugar daddy who already signed her name as the sole beneficiary on the will. Never mattered to me if she imagined her husband as a movie star. If it made her moan in bed, then so much the better for my sex life.
Lights flashed along the road. Gary never left Sumter’s P&J before closing time, and even then he usually slept on the bar floor until the old man rolled Gary out onto the sidewalk in the morning. The headlights aimed my way. Damn. Was it Sheriff Penghal? Last time the stupid prick drove up here, he had heard about a fight at the convenience store. Figured I had to be the culprit. He was wrong, but it did not stop him for busting me for disorderly conduct on my own property when breaking glass bottles with Marty’s baseball bat.
I sniffed at my clothes and my hands. The weed still smelled strong in the air. There was no way I could hide it from him this time.
The wheels squealed down the ruts along the road, bouncing mercilessly and not caring about the occupants inside. It could not be the police cruiser. I had never made the sheriff that pissed at me, not even when that son-of-a-bitch Mike Larsen stole my wife away. Speaking of sons-of bitches, I now recognized Larsen’s beat-up blue car doing its jiggle shakes toward the trailer. It pulled within the pool of light, Larsen’s face screwed into a mask of anger as he gripped the steering wheel and swung his junk around so the car faced the road back out. When making the turn, I caught Pam’s expression as she sat in the driver’s seat clutching the door and dash to keep from slamming her face into the side window. Annoyance, worry, and maybe a touch of fear dwelled on her lined brow.
What did she do now?
***********
The doctors laughed about my ideas. Laughed about my stone while my son moaned in pain with all the plastic tubes attached to his vital organs. Marty has spent months with these so-called ‘great minds of medicine’ as they had prodded and poked and conducted research papers about his condition. My son reduced to a shriveled lab rat in a white-walled cage as those witch doctors had attended their seminars and preached about their latest findings while hoping to become nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. I asked them again what they were doing to help my son.
“There is nothing we can do but make him comfortable during his last days.”
“Even with all of our technological advances, we’re discovering new diseases daily that are beyond our knowledge.”
HACKS! LIARS! CHARLATANS!
They wanted him to die. They asked, twice, if I would sign over Marty’s remains for study. I bloodied my knuckles on both doctors overeager faces. They filed restraining orders. They complained about my erratic behavior with my exwife Pam, suggesting my presence might be detrimental to Marty’s well-being.
Pam had called me today. I had told her about my stone. She had said she had agreed to the doctors/butchers’ suggestions. She had threatened, “Graham Baxter. If I see you anywhere near that hospital, I will call the police!”
Why won’t anybody believe me? The stone made dead flowers blossom. It gave my old dog Miter the use of his bad leg. It has even brought statues to life. The hospital staff has seen it work. I had strutted through the corridors and shouted for the nurses to come witness the miracle. I had placed the stone on Marty’s chest. He had opened his eyes for the first time in two weeks. Giggled. Then he had slipped back into his dreamless black void when I snatched the stone from the covers and struggled with the guards. I had run away before the sheriff showed up.
I figured out how the stone worked. It transferred life from one object to another. The first time I had bled over the stone, cut my hands on the barbed fence when I had snuck into ol’ man Sumter’s junkyard searching for the streak of light that fell out of the sky. Drunk and a little high, I had stumbled down Hanna Mill Road with the glowing stone I had found in the rusted carburetor. I had laid the stone in the flowerpot, drank one last beer, and took a nap on the kitchen linoleum. When I woke up the next day, a flower had sat inside the pot. A freaking flower from a black thumb gardener! I could not even grow weeds around my double-wide trailer.
If I gave a little life to the stone, a little life it gave to someone else.
There was something else that I needed to tell you. Something else Pam had said in the phone call. The medical insurance was running out on Marty’s life support. She had to buy the cheap-ass stuff. Neither of us could afford to pay the bills from our own pockets. Hell, Pam worked two dead end jobs while living with her parents, and her family was still getting evicted by the landlord. Me? I worked under-the-table. Not a decent job around for a man convicted of beating his exwife’s lover into a body cast. Three times.
Pam had told me that when the insurance ran out, she would have the doctors turn off the life support.
I would take my son away tonight. But first I needed to give life to the stone. It could not be mine, because I needed my strength to carry Marty from the hospital.
The life would have to come from someone else.
**********************
What you have just read was an idea page. This is one of the many processes I use to understand a story I want to work on. Basically, I sat at the computer and focused my mind on nothing except this one thought:
A moral choice based on whether you would save one person by killing another, and have something involving the supernatural with walking statues.
Think of the idea page as a conversation I had with my main character. I wanted to know what his life was like. He told me the very basic elements of how he was feeling, what dilemmas he faced, and a course of action he was going to commit. In this process I also learned his special voice, his driving force in the story, and other characters. Often, I will use this page as a foundation to build a story. Here is another example. For the manuscript I am currently shopping around for publication, I used these thoughts as a base for the storyline.
What if I took the fairytale, “Little Red Riding Hood,” and broke down the plot? A wolf disguises itself in the clothes of a grandmother. But what if I modernized this? What would happen if the wolf were more metaphorical? It could be the beast of our vices: greed, jealousy, lust, and obsession. The characters could even take on the beast’s personalities: foaming at the mouth when giving in to a drug addiction, a gang laughing like hyenas when they surround a victim, and the grandmother’s glowing yellow eyes when she hides dark secrets . . . etc.
The idea page might be longer than a page, or might even be shorter. It could come from a random short story, a dream, or something I might have seen or heard. It could consist of only the main character, or multiple characters. It could be anything that gets the main story out of the head. Since I have the idea page ready involving Graham Baxter and his stone, here is the expansion of the story so far. I’m not so much worried about grammar and punctuation. All I want is a beginning I can work with.
******************
“Burp! Koff-koff.”
The cold night made the warm beer taste better, as I stared at the can’s picture of rounded snowy mountains and the rushing train speeding off as if those metal wheels aimed for my drunk ass. Doubted anyone would miss me if I died. I, sure as hell, knew my exwife Pam would not shell out a dime for the funeral. I might even be doing the world a favor. There would be less of me to place in the pine box.
Yet what about Marty?
I took a last swig before crushing the empty can against my forehead. Then I threw the crushed aluminum against the tree on Gary’s property as it rebounded into the pile of cans my neighbor saved to collect his nickels down at the recycling plant. My fingers reached under the lounging lawn chair. The next beer pulled out the plastic ring and fizzed when I ripped off the tab. My thumb rubbed against the water beaded on the can as I imagined the train whistle and the whoosh of steam from the pipe. The closest railroad crossing was at the other end of Hanna Mill Road, near to the dairy farm and old fort. Wondered if any trains would be running this late at night? Wondered if I should smoke another bowl of weed before going over there and laying down on the wooden ties? I could lay down and close my eyes and not feel a thing.
Think about how Marty would feel.
Yeah, I could not forget him. I could not take that route of wanting to escape my problems on those rusted tracks. He needed me. Marty had no one else now after his own mother signed those permission papers. Damn her!
The phone rang. I could hear its beeps through the open kitchen window. I placed my hands on the armrest and lifted up to spy the time on the microwave. 12:15am. All of my drinking buddies would be down at Sumter’s Pub and Junkyard too wasted to dial my number. Pam. Her shift ended at midnight at the all-night diner. She had wanted to talk with me about something for the past week. Not really caring what she had to say to me now as the answering machine switched on.
“Hello? Graham? Are you there? Pick up the line. I know you’re there. I have to talk with you.” Two minutes of silence came through the line. “Fine. Be an arrogant prick. And you wonder what happened to our marriage--” Beep.
The machine always cut her off before she could go into her full rant as my arm pulled back and then swung out over my head. The full beer sailed above the double-wide trailer to smack something with a ping on the other side. Probably hit the truck on concrete blocks. I messed up the front axle when Gary and I went off-roading down at the track designed for the dirt bike races. For the past week I was angry with myself over that, and I was angry with Pam over those papers.
Damn the doctors! They were the ones who pressured Pam to do it. Claimed it would be for ‘the good of all humanity and the medical world’ crap if she gave her permission for Marty’s body to become dissected for research study. MY BOY WAS NOT EVEN DEAD YET! But those butchers had already made up their minds. He was a shell of a seven-year-old with an illness causing his organs to “hiccup in spasms until sections failed to receive needed blood and began to die off.” Or so the doctors had attempted to dumb down the explanation for us country hicks. I might not have a degree in medicine. Yet when I see my son strapped to the hospital bed, bouncing in and out of comas, with the monitoring machines fastening their octopus arms of tiny plastic tubes and wires to his body, I could not give a rat’s ass what was wrong. All I wanted to know was what they could do to make things right inside my boy.
“There is nothing we can do but make him comfortable during his final days.”
“Even with all of our technological advances, we’re discovering new diseases daily that are beyond our knowledge.”
They could shove that bull at someone else. If I were a billionaire, they would be falling at my feet trying to help my son in the hopes I would hand over a large donation to open another hospital wing. Dirt poor guaranteed the lowest, cheapest care given that would keep the medical staff from getting sued for malpractice. I fell into the latter category.
My fists pounded on my legs. “HACKS! LIARS!”
Scratching paws sounded against the door along with one plaintive whine. My shout must have woken old Miter. I unwrapped the baling twine from around the armrest and tugged, pulling the other end tied to the trailer door. It opened wide and I waited, listening to his clomps of aged feet. My eyes watched his shadow created from the moth encrusted outdoor light as the bloodhound dragged himself down onto the porch. He had arthritis in all his bones, but worse in the right front leg. The joints stiffened harder than any of my sculpted statues.
Old Miter shuffled sore legs over to the second lounge chair beside me and flopped to the side to get in it. His breath huffed and watery eyes closed. His chest rattled when he breathed, stuttered in short wet rasps as his tongue licked his runny nose in an unconscious habit even during sleep.
Too old. The dog got too old too fast. I could still see him romping through the yard with Marty two years ago, trying to nip at the frisbee my boy held in his teeth in teasing, as I had sat in the bed of my pickup and whacked at the large rock slab taken from the job site. My chisel had hacked off the large chunks. My sandpaper had smoothed the rough areas. Whack! Pam had lounged on the same chair Miter curled in now, as she sipped her Gatorade and flipped through those stupid celebrity magazines. Out the corner of my eye, I had caught her lifting the magazine at me and scrunching her face as she imagined her surroundings dwelled on that glossy page: the mansion, the intellectual athletic son already flocked by admirers, and her sugar daddy who already signed her name as the sole beneficiary on the will. Never mattered to me if she imagined her husband as a movie star. If it made her moan in bed, then so much the better for my sex life.
Lights flashed along the road. Gary never left Sumter’s P&J before closing time, and even then he usually slept on the bar floor until the old man rolled Gary out onto the sidewalk in the morning. The headlights aimed my way. Damn. Was it Sheriff Penghal? Last time the stupid prick drove up here, he had heard about a fight at the convenience store. Figured I had to be the culprit. He was wrong, but it did not stop him for busting me for disorderly conduct on my own property when breaking glass bottles with Marty’s baseball bat.
I sniffed at my clothes and my hands. The weed still smelled strong in the air. There was no way I could hide it from him this time.
The wheels squealed down the ruts along the road, bouncing mercilessly and not caring about the occupants inside. It could not be the police cruiser. I had never made the sheriff that pissed at me, not even when that son-of-a-bitch Mike Larsen stole my wife away. Speaking of sons-of bitches, I now recognized Larsen’s beat-up blue car doing its jiggle shakes toward the trailer. It pulled within the pool of light, Larsen’s face screwed into a mask of anger as he gripped the steering wheel and swung his junk around so the car faced the road back out. When making the turn, I caught Pam’s expression as she sat in the driver’s seat clutching the door and dash to keep from slamming her face into the side window. Annoyance, worry, and maybe a touch of fear dwelled on her lined brow.
What did she do now?
***********
Pitch Paragraph Contest - Theme is Luck
The good people hosting the Book Roast blog are having a pitch paragraph session on Tuesday, March 17. Since it is the official St. Patrick’s Day . . . uh . . . day, the theme is Luck.
That’s right. Craft a pitch paragraph (real or for fun) within 75 words featuring this theme and post it over there. The judges are several blogging editors who will choose their favorites among the entries. Share in the day of fun from 7am to 7pm Eastern Standard Time. Then, afterward, go out and get your drunk on.
Hm? Yes, I do plan to submit a pitch. I just don’t know which one. I spent the whole weekend making reserve posts for my more active blog, The Surly Writer. Then I spent the rest of the time coming up with pitches. I did not want to change the pitch for the manuscript that I am currently submitting to agents just to fit these guidelines. So I am freestyling with several works-in-progress.
Anyway, I have several pitch paragraphs that I must choose from and I will post them here for everyone to see. Come Tuesday, I will make my decision.
**************
Pitch paragraph 1: Stanza - 78 words (need to cut out three words)
Blue Triage: Being a fan of this band can kill you, but at least you’ll die famous.
Trevor dreams of becoming an idolized rock star. He buys picture frames for the paparazzi photos of him lying in the toilet next to a whiskey bottle. Suffering from writer’s block, his luck changes when a lyrical roadie overdoses - leaving behind hit songs. Overcome with greed, Trevor begins killing other musicians. Yet his band mates become suspicious of their sudden fame.
**************
Pitch paragraph 2: The Stoneman - 75 words
Graham has found good fortune not within a four-leaf clover, but inside a stone. He lifted his Coors beer at the heavens in prayer and the glowing rock came down. It is a miracle for his critically-ill son since the stone gives life to anything it touches, although someone else’s life has to end for it to work. A life for a life is the moral choice Graham must make in this suspense, The Stoneman.
**************
Pitch paragraph 3: Scary Darling - 75 words
George has the greatest job. He works near the Broadway star, Mabel Durhan: a temperamental singer at odds with a rival actress. When Mabel wants her competition to disappear, it is his lucky day as he demands for her undying love in reward for his help. Yet Mabel marries a Broadway producer instead. So George has to remind her that it is a bad idea to renege on a deal made with the Grim Reaper.
***************
Pitch paragraph 4: The Tragedy of Paul Gruyna - 75 words
Monique cannot believe her luck when Jeff agrees to have all-night sex with her. The opportunity to murder the man who killed her sister is making Monique all giddy inside. Yet when wiping the blood away from his tattoo, she realizes that she had killed the wrong man. Instead, this is Jeff’s twin brother, Paul. Now Monique must hide her secret from Jeff who begins to fall in love with her during his investigations.
That’s right. Craft a pitch paragraph (real or for fun) within 75 words featuring this theme and post it over there. The judges are several blogging editors who will choose their favorites among the entries. Share in the day of fun from 7am to 7pm Eastern Standard Time. Then, afterward, go out and get your drunk on.
Hm? Yes, I do plan to submit a pitch. I just don’t know which one. I spent the whole weekend making reserve posts for my more active blog, The Surly Writer. Then I spent the rest of the time coming up with pitches. I did not want to change the pitch for the manuscript that I am currently submitting to agents just to fit these guidelines. So I am freestyling with several works-in-progress.
Anyway, I have several pitch paragraphs that I must choose from and I will post them here for everyone to see. Come Tuesday, I will make my decision.
**************
Pitch paragraph 1: Stanza - 78 words (need to cut out three words)
Blue Triage: Being a fan of this band can kill you, but at least you’ll die famous.
Trevor dreams of becoming an idolized rock star. He buys picture frames for the paparazzi photos of him lying in the toilet next to a whiskey bottle. Suffering from writer’s block, his luck changes when a lyrical roadie overdoses - leaving behind hit songs. Overcome with greed, Trevor begins killing other musicians. Yet his band mates become suspicious of their sudden fame.
**************
Pitch paragraph 2: The Stoneman - 75 words
Graham has found good fortune not within a four-leaf clover, but inside a stone. He lifted his Coors beer at the heavens in prayer and the glowing rock came down. It is a miracle for his critically-ill son since the stone gives life to anything it touches, although someone else’s life has to end for it to work. A life for a life is the moral choice Graham must make in this suspense, The Stoneman.
**************
Pitch paragraph 3: Scary Darling - 75 words
George has the greatest job. He works near the Broadway star, Mabel Durhan: a temperamental singer at odds with a rival actress. When Mabel wants her competition to disappear, it is his lucky day as he demands for her undying love in reward for his help. Yet Mabel marries a Broadway producer instead. So George has to remind her that it is a bad idea to renege on a deal made with the Grim Reaper.
***************
Pitch paragraph 4: The Tragedy of Paul Gruyna - 75 words
Monique cannot believe her luck when Jeff agrees to have all-night sex with her. The opportunity to murder the man who killed her sister is making Monique all giddy inside. Yet when wiping the blood away from his tattoo, she realizes that she had killed the wrong man. Instead, this is Jeff’s twin brother, Paul. Now Monique must hide her secret from Jeff who begins to fall in love with her during his investigations.
Let the Imagination go wild: Scenes
*This is a repost from my other blog. It is very similar to the other one concerning posts where I used the same elements. Yet for this post, I created a scene using dialogue*
Another reader question popped up in the comments section concerning a writing topic that I might actually give advice about. Im–ma-gin-nat-tion . . . as Spongebob Squarepants would say to Squidworth in the empty box as Spongebob’s hands waved apart and a rainbow appeared (my nephews love that yellow cartoon sponge).
EVERYBODY HAS AN IMAGINATION! Sometimes it can just elude us when the reality of everyday life pushes in. In other words, we get the dreaded Writer’s Block! *SCREAM*
When this happens, we need to find something that sparks our creative fires. There are several places to look when trying to find this tinder. I would like to list the ways I come up with a plot and dialogue, but I cannot. I am one of those weird people who has the ideas crowded in the old noggin. But let’s see if I can help in another way.
List all the shows, movies, and books you have watched and read recently.
I like this idea because you can place yourself in the scenes. How would you have reacted in those situations? What would you have done? What would you have changed? It is incredible what your imagination can expand upon until you have made a story all of its own. And do not stop there. Write a journal of what happened to you today. Yet also add your own fantasies on what you might have wished happened. Change the dialogue you had with someone, but keep the rest of the scene. Then evolve from this by changing the mood, background, and adding characters.
Heck, you can even list what you ate for dinner last week just to get ideas. Hmm . . . let me go with the food topic and give a sneak peek on how my imagination works.
Chicken and dumplings
Pork and veggies
Sausage and pasta
Leftovers
Fish sandwiches.
Let’s stop there. I like that fish part. What words go with fish? Fish and chips. Fish fry. Fish store.
Oh! A fish store, or it could be a marketplace with fishmongers selling their catches. I like the concept of an open market, with stalls everywhere and people mingling. We have the makings of dialogue with this. I am going to stick with the conversation without any descriptive background.
***********
Fishmonger: “Fresh fish! Fresh fish for sell! Right off the boat! You won’t find a better quality at a cheaper price anywhere else.”
Woman shopper: “I’ll take three pounds of shrimp, please.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, ma’am. Anything else?”
Child: “I want to play with the squid!”
Woman shopper: “You can’t play with it right now. Mommy has to get home to cook for the dinner party tonight.”
Fishmonger: “And besides, you never know when a tentacle will grab ya!”
Child: “Hee-hee!”
Fishmonger: “Okay, who’s next?”
Man shopper: “I’ll take a whole cod.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, sir. Thanks for waiting.”
************
Let’s stop again. I am really enjoying this part. Most of the conversation is something you would expect to hear at any outdoor market whether you are buying fish, vegetables, or donuts (although I would shop somewhere else if they sold squid next to the chocolate eclairs). Don’t forget that you can go to a store and just listen at how people interact with each other. Great ideas and dialogue will come to you. Listen and watch everyone. Take notes.
Now I will get back to this scene. I need to give the characters, well, character. Physical attributes. Personality. Let’s use the dialogue above to help.
************
A smiling fishmonger with a pleasant attitude because he likes kids. This is the reason he jokes around and does not make any rude comments about the woman holding up the line.
An impatient mother who wishes she had enough time in the day to get everything done. I suspect she has been shopping for most of the morning, with hair strands starting to stick out and her face flushed. It is a very important party for her because she bought this much shrimp.
A bored child since he wants to play with the squid. Obviously this is an adult party. The kid would be dragging Mommy home if it were for him, and no one serves shrimp at a child’s shindig.
A male shopper who is patient with the woman and child because he did not interrupt or push to get his order in.
**************
Okay, we have a little more understanding of the people and the dialogue. We have part of the background on where the dialogue takes place. Yet we still need background for the people. What actions are they doing while talking? What would you expect them to do from the information we already have? Ask yourself questions to paint a mental picture of the scene.
A little boy is pointing at the squid in excitement. His finger is about to poke the cephalopod.
A mother is trying to control her child, hold other purchases, and keep an eye on the time while digging in her purse for cash. She could be double-checking her shopping list to make sure she has everything.
The fishmonger is handling goods, joking with the child, and moving his attention to the other shopper. And the other shopper is studying the fish trying to decide what to purchase.
I need to have main character in this. The obvious one would be the mother because we know why she is there and lots of action is going on around her. Yet I never do anything predictable. Instead, I would pick either the fishmonger or the other shopper because I would feel more comfortable with them. I will pick the fishmonger. For me to connect with this character in so short of a time, I have to become him. There is no other choice for me to linger and watch his mood. So I will write the dialogue in first-person for the fishmonger. Third-person would feel too awkward for me in this situation. Also, I will not have to come up with names for the characters.
*****************
Mid-afternoon. The bendable metal shutter for the counter was still shut. I heard the voices rising in the marketplace, the buyers and sellers laughing and arguing and taken in with the life handed down as roles to play. Where should I be in this drama? How could I return my life to those days? What was my purpose in this stall and in this very existence?
Why could it have not been me on that bus?
My fingers wiped the drops of water from the photo. Then I shoved it into my shirt pocket. My apron helped to erase the wetness from my eyes, and a hearty blow from my nose dried up things there. I turned to the shutter, took three breaths, and slapped a fake smile on my face. My hands grabbed the handle. My ears listened to the clacking as the metal slats rose in the tracking. I gave myself no time to stay on depressed thoughts.
“Fresh fish! Fresh fish for sale! Right off the boat! You won’t find a better quality at a cheaper price anywhere else.”
My bellow drew the few stragglers left in the marketplace. The woman was the first to hurry over with a young lad in tow. A rolling huff blew from his chest. The poor thing. The marketplace held little excitement for a child of his age.
The woman banged her knees against the stall. Her eyes scanned the shelves. Before I could tell her the day’s specials, she had her order placed. “I’ll take three pounds of shrimp, please.”
I had worked this stall for three years and seen all types of people. I knew a harried person when I saw one without having to study the woman’s flushed face and tousled hair. The order sat on the counter and the cash register spat out the receipt before her shoe could begin to tap with impatience.
I said, “Here you go, ma’am. Anything else?”
“I want to play with the squid,” the little lad piped out. His finger pointed at the bin. His body bounced in place as if attached to springs. I had to give a real smile at him. My thoughts thanked the boy for his curious nature.
“You can’t play with it right now. “ The woman took out a notepad and a pen. She scribbled across the paper. “Mommy has to get home to cook for the dinner party tonight.”
I gave a wink at him. “Besides, you never know when a tentacle will grab ya!” My arms lifted and then swooped down at the boy in pretend.
His hands covered his grinning mouth. Yet not before I heard his, “Hee-hee!”
The woman grabbed her order and ushered her son away from the stall. I caught his small wave in goodbye. In return, I waved back. It felt so good to hear a child’s laughter again, even if it was for a moment.
I turned back to the gathering crowd, ready to face the world and all of its uncertainties. “Okay, who’s next?”
A man stepped forward. “I’ll take a whole cod.”
He had gestured at the smallest one. I picked out the biggest fish and charged him half-price. “Here you go, sir. Thanks for waiting.”
*******************
I hope this little peek into my imagination, and how to write dialogue, helps.
Another reader question popped up in the comments section concerning a writing topic that I might actually give advice about. Im–ma-gin-nat-tion . . . as Spongebob Squarepants would say to Squidworth in the empty box as Spongebob’s hands waved apart and a rainbow appeared (my nephews love that yellow cartoon sponge).
EVERYBODY HAS AN IMAGINATION! Sometimes it can just elude us when the reality of everyday life pushes in. In other words, we get the dreaded Writer’s Block! *SCREAM*
When this happens, we need to find something that sparks our creative fires. There are several places to look when trying to find this tinder. I would like to list the ways I come up with a plot and dialogue, but I cannot. I am one of those weird people who has the ideas crowded in the old noggin. But let’s see if I can help in another way.
List all the shows, movies, and books you have watched and read recently.
I like this idea because you can place yourself in the scenes. How would you have reacted in those situations? What would you have done? What would you have changed? It is incredible what your imagination can expand upon until you have made a story all of its own. And do not stop there. Write a journal of what happened to you today. Yet also add your own fantasies on what you might have wished happened. Change the dialogue you had with someone, but keep the rest of the scene. Then evolve from this by changing the mood, background, and adding characters.
Heck, you can even list what you ate for dinner last week just to get ideas. Hmm . . . let me go with the food topic and give a sneak peek on how my imagination works.
Chicken and dumplings
Pork and veggies
Sausage and pasta
Leftovers
Fish sandwiches.
Let’s stop there. I like that fish part. What words go with fish? Fish and chips. Fish fry. Fish store.
Oh! A fish store, or it could be a marketplace with fishmongers selling their catches. I like the concept of an open market, with stalls everywhere and people mingling. We have the makings of dialogue with this. I am going to stick with the conversation without any descriptive background.
***********
Fishmonger: “Fresh fish! Fresh fish for sell! Right off the boat! You won’t find a better quality at a cheaper price anywhere else.”
Woman shopper: “I’ll take three pounds of shrimp, please.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, ma’am. Anything else?”
Child: “I want to play with the squid!”
Woman shopper: “You can’t play with it right now. Mommy has to get home to cook for the dinner party tonight.”
Fishmonger: “And besides, you never know when a tentacle will grab ya!”
Child: “Hee-hee!”
Fishmonger: “Okay, who’s next?”
Man shopper: “I’ll take a whole cod.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, sir. Thanks for waiting.”
************
Let’s stop again. I am really enjoying this part. Most of the conversation is something you would expect to hear at any outdoor market whether you are buying fish, vegetables, or donuts (although I would shop somewhere else if they sold squid next to the chocolate eclairs). Don’t forget that you can go to a store and just listen at how people interact with each other. Great ideas and dialogue will come to you. Listen and watch everyone. Take notes.
Now I will get back to this scene. I need to give the characters, well, character. Physical attributes. Personality. Let’s use the dialogue above to help.
************
A smiling fishmonger with a pleasant attitude because he likes kids. This is the reason he jokes around and does not make any rude comments about the woman holding up the line.
An impatient mother who wishes she had enough time in the day to get everything done. I suspect she has been shopping for most of the morning, with hair strands starting to stick out and her face flushed. It is a very important party for her because she bought this much shrimp.
A bored child since he wants to play with the squid. Obviously this is an adult party. The kid would be dragging Mommy home if it were for him, and no one serves shrimp at a child’s shindig.
A male shopper who is patient with the woman and child because he did not interrupt or push to get his order in.
**************
Okay, we have a little more understanding of the people and the dialogue. We have part of the background on where the dialogue takes place. Yet we still need background for the people. What actions are they doing while talking? What would you expect them to do from the information we already have? Ask yourself questions to paint a mental picture of the scene.
A little boy is pointing at the squid in excitement. His finger is about to poke the cephalopod.
A mother is trying to control her child, hold other purchases, and keep an eye on the time while digging in her purse for cash. She could be double-checking her shopping list to make sure she has everything.
The fishmonger is handling goods, joking with the child, and moving his attention to the other shopper. And the other shopper is studying the fish trying to decide what to purchase.
I need to have main character in this. The obvious one would be the mother because we know why she is there and lots of action is going on around her. Yet I never do anything predictable. Instead, I would pick either the fishmonger or the other shopper because I would feel more comfortable with them. I will pick the fishmonger. For me to connect with this character in so short of a time, I have to become him. There is no other choice for me to linger and watch his mood. So I will write the dialogue in first-person for the fishmonger. Third-person would feel too awkward for me in this situation. Also, I will not have to come up with names for the characters.
*****************
Mid-afternoon. The bendable metal shutter for the counter was still shut. I heard the voices rising in the marketplace, the buyers and sellers laughing and arguing and taken in with the life handed down as roles to play. Where should I be in this drama? How could I return my life to those days? What was my purpose in this stall and in this very existence?
Why could it have not been me on that bus?
My fingers wiped the drops of water from the photo. Then I shoved it into my shirt pocket. My apron helped to erase the wetness from my eyes, and a hearty blow from my nose dried up things there. I turned to the shutter, took three breaths, and slapped a fake smile on my face. My hands grabbed the handle. My ears listened to the clacking as the metal slats rose in the tracking. I gave myself no time to stay on depressed thoughts.
“Fresh fish! Fresh fish for sale! Right off the boat! You won’t find a better quality at a cheaper price anywhere else.”
My bellow drew the few stragglers left in the marketplace. The woman was the first to hurry over with a young lad in tow. A rolling huff blew from his chest. The poor thing. The marketplace held little excitement for a child of his age.
The woman banged her knees against the stall. Her eyes scanned the shelves. Before I could tell her the day’s specials, she had her order placed. “I’ll take three pounds of shrimp, please.”
I had worked this stall for three years and seen all types of people. I knew a harried person when I saw one without having to study the woman’s flushed face and tousled hair. The order sat on the counter and the cash register spat out the receipt before her shoe could begin to tap with impatience.
I said, “Here you go, ma’am. Anything else?”
“I want to play with the squid,” the little lad piped out. His finger pointed at the bin. His body bounced in place as if attached to springs. I had to give a real smile at him. My thoughts thanked the boy for his curious nature.
“You can’t play with it right now. “ The woman took out a notepad and a pen. She scribbled across the paper. “Mommy has to get home to cook for the dinner party tonight.”
I gave a wink at him. “Besides, you never know when a tentacle will grab ya!” My arms lifted and then swooped down at the boy in pretend.
His hands covered his grinning mouth. Yet not before I heard his, “Hee-hee!”
The woman grabbed her order and ushered her son away from the stall. I caught his small wave in goodbye. In return, I waved back. It felt so good to hear a child’s laughter again, even if it was for a moment.
I turned back to the gathering crowd, ready to face the world and all of its uncertainties. “Okay, who’s next?”
A man stepped forward. “I’ll take a whole cod.”
He had gestured at the smallest one. I picked out the biggest fish and charged him half-price. “Here you go, sir. Thanks for waiting.”
*******************
I hope this little peek into my imagination, and how to write dialogue, helps.
Beta Readers
It is an interesting concept, and it is one that’s worthwhile for every writer to have whether they are published or unpublished. I have had my own work read by a beta reader, and his observations were unique when providing a different perspective concerning my overall writing.
Now that I consider it, this is not a new experience for me. It is new with my writing. Yet during other aspects in my life I have either given critiques or been at the receiving end. I have a few examples for you.
From 1991-1993, I attended a technical school during my high school days. I enrolled in Computer Business and Information Science classes, which is just a fancy title meaning I learned how to create computer programs while debugging potential problems in the applications. The class was straightforward. The teacher would hand out textbooks for a certain computer language (Fortran, COBOL, MS-Dos, Spreadsheet) and we had the remaining nine weeks to get as far as we could through the book. The more we did, the higher the grade. The only time the teacher stood in front of the class to actually “teach” was whenever all the students struggled on a particular chapter. That was it. The students were on their own in getting the work done.
We helped each other out, which the teacher allowed so long as we did not copy the other person’s program sheet. Often I scanned over someone’s printout, looking for those bugs that he/she could not find, providing feedback on what would help to make the program run smoother. In essence, I provided a fresh set of eyes and an open mind for what was on the page.
Another time I have experienced critiques is when I am involved with my wedding work. I would create sample invitations that I have sent out to potential clients, who would study the work and which designs they want to keep and which they want changed. Also, I have worked with a florist who has asked my opinion about her floral arrangements. She needed someone else’s attention to detail that would help her in creating a pleasing floral piece.
These instances are similar to what a beta reader does when they look over a manuscript. They have not read the story before, so their minds are quicker to catch those problems (like plot holes or waffly scenes) that the writer has missed because they have become too meshed in their own story to see those problems clearly. The beta reader takes note of those places that need editing out, or something added in, to create a pleasing work that satisfies the reader’s mind.
Critiques are found in everyone’s life. Whether it is having someone taste the spaghetti sauce as they suggest adding more pepper, or you straighten the skewed picture frame hanging on the wall at a friend’s house, we are open to advice that makes our existence a little bit better.
So why not when it comes to our writing?
Thank you, my beta reader.
Now that I consider it, this is not a new experience for me. It is new with my writing. Yet during other aspects in my life I have either given critiques or been at the receiving end. I have a few examples for you.
From 1991-1993, I attended a technical school during my high school days. I enrolled in Computer Business and Information Science classes, which is just a fancy title meaning I learned how to create computer programs while debugging potential problems in the applications. The class was straightforward. The teacher would hand out textbooks for a certain computer language (Fortran, COBOL, MS-Dos, Spreadsheet) and we had the remaining nine weeks to get as far as we could through the book. The more we did, the higher the grade. The only time the teacher stood in front of the class to actually “teach” was whenever all the students struggled on a particular chapter. That was it. The students were on their own in getting the work done.
We helped each other out, which the teacher allowed so long as we did not copy the other person’s program sheet. Often I scanned over someone’s printout, looking for those bugs that he/she could not find, providing feedback on what would help to make the program run smoother. In essence, I provided a fresh set of eyes and an open mind for what was on the page.
Another time I have experienced critiques is when I am involved with my wedding work. I would create sample invitations that I have sent out to potential clients, who would study the work and which designs they want to keep and which they want changed. Also, I have worked with a florist who has asked my opinion about her floral arrangements. She needed someone else’s attention to detail that would help her in creating a pleasing floral piece.
These instances are similar to what a beta reader does when they look over a manuscript. They have not read the story before, so their minds are quicker to catch those problems (like plot holes or waffly scenes) that the writer has missed because they have become too meshed in their own story to see those problems clearly. The beta reader takes note of those places that need editing out, or something added in, to create a pleasing work that satisfies the reader’s mind.
Critiques are found in everyone’s life. Whether it is having someone taste the spaghetti sauce as they suggest adding more pepper, or you straighten the skewed picture frame hanging on the wall at a friend’s house, we are open to advice that makes our existence a little bit better.
So why not when it comes to our writing?
Thank you, my beta reader.
Let the imagination run WILD!
I have found that a very strange thing is going on. People like to ask me questions about where I get all my writing ideas. I never know quite how to answer their questions, because the answer just seems obvious.
IMAGINATION!
I have a lot of it, and my imagination has yet to let me down. Yet I realize that sometimes it can elude us when the reality of everyday life pushes in. In other words, we get the dreaded Writer’s Block! *SCREAM*
When this happens, we need to find something that sparks our creative fires. There are several places to look when trying to find this tinder. Something mentioned frequently in writers’ posts is this phrase, “Write what you know.” This is sound advice. Yet always be aware that just because you have no knowledge about espionage does not mean you cannot create a story about spies. A writer needs to simply do her/his research on the topic and add something from their own lives (like origami) to give a personal touch to their writing.
A spy novel featuring secret documents disguised as origami in a worldwide paper-folding competition held at a kabuki theater in Japan.
I picked origami because it once was a hobby of mine as a kid. I picked Japan as the setting since origami originated as a Japanese art, along with kabuki (popular drama featuring song and dance) in keeping with this theme.
I know . . . I know. Just because I have an idea for a story doesn’t mean I have a storyline. Yet this post is step one in gleaning ideas from the imagination when your head is coming up empty for a good plot. Remember; every great story began from a tiny idea. Sometimes the hard part is finding the idea. Here are a few ways that might help get the creative juices boiling.
List all the shows, movies, and books you have watched and read.
I like this because you can place yourself in the scenes. How would you have reacted in those situations? What would you have done? What would you have changed? It is incredible what your imagination can expand upon until you have made a story all of its own. And do not stop there. Write a journal of what happened to you today. Yet also add your own fantasies on what you might have wished happened. Change the dialogue you had with someone, but keep the rest of the scene. Then evolve from this by changing the mood, background, and adding characters.
Heck, you can even list what you ate for dinner last week just to get ideas. Hmm . . . let me go with the food topic and give a sneak peek on how my imagination works.
Chicken and dumplings
Pork and veggies
Sausage and pasta
Leftovers
Fish sandwiches.
Let’s stop there. I like that fish part. What words go with fish? Fish and chips. Fish fry. Fish store.
Oh! A fish store, or it could be a marketplace with fishmongers selling their catches. I like the concept of an open market, with stalls everywhere and people mingling. We have the makings of dialogue with this. I am going to stick with the conversation without any descriptive background.
***********
Fishmonger: “Fresh Fish! Fresh Fish for sell! Right off the boat! You won’t find a better quality at a cheaper price anywhere else.”
Woman shopper: “I’ll take three pounds of shrimp, please.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, ma’am. Anything else?”
Child: “I want to play with the squid!”
Woman shopper: “You can’t play with it right now. Mommy has to get home to cook for the dinner party tonight.”
Fishmonger: “And besides, you never know when a tentacle will grab ya!”
Child: “Hee-hee!”
Fishmonger: “Ha-ha! Okay, who is next?”
Man shopper: “I’ll take a whole cod.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, sir. Thanks for waiting.”
************
Let’s stop again. I am really enjoying this scene. Most of the conversation is something you would expect to hear at any outdoor market whether you are buying fish, vegetables, or donuts (although I would shop somewhere else if they sold squid next to the chocolate eclairs). Don’t forget that you can go to a marketplace or store and just listen at how people interact with each other. Great plot ideas will come to you. Listen and watch everyone. Take notes.
Now I will get back to this scene. I need to give the characters, well, character. Physical attributes. Personality. Let’s use the dialogue above to help.
************
A smiling fishmonger with a pleasant attitude because he likes kids. This is the reason he jokes around and does not make any rude comments about the woman holding up the line.
An impatient mother who wishes she had enough time in the day to get everything done. I suspect she has been shopping for most of the morning, with hair strands starting to stick out and her face becoming flushed. And this must be a very important party for her if she is buying that much shrimp.
A bored child since he or she wants to play with the squid. Obviously this is an adult party. The kid would be dragging Mommy home if the party were for him/her. A child’s party would never serve shrimp.
A male shopper who is patient with the woman and child because he did not interrupt or push to get his order in.
**************
This male shopper has intrigued me although his description is sparse. Sure, many writers would go with the woman and child, maybe because they might have experienced something similar to this when shopping with their own kids. This is a good avenue to take with lots of possibilities (party with maybe a boss or an old flame on the guest list). But I do not have kids, and I do not trust myself enough to make up a novel-length story featuring children. I want to walk beside the man. I want to understand his life.
What happens next? Well, he just bought a whole fish and he cannot do any more shopping while carrying it around. He has to head home. Does something happen to him on the way? Is someone waiting for him at home? Is there anything special about the fish?
Ask yourself these questions. Ask A LOT of questions about the situation. On occasion, the imagination will create ideas when asked or something familiar will show up. Like the news article I heard about involving a fisherman who lost his wedding ring but several years later he gets it back after catching the fish that swallowed it. I think I will take the ring-swallow route.
So the man goes home. Yet my imagination is saying that nobody else is there although he is married because of the ring. No. Wait. He was married. I do not see any wife wanting to clean a whole fish when her husband could have bought the fillets instead. He also enjoys fishing, yet why wouldn’t he have caught his own? Maybe he once enjoyed it.
This means he is an older gentleman, widowed, who doesn’t mind cleaning his own fish but does not want to deal with the troubles of going fishing.
See how the imagination works. Here are the makings of a story. All I did was create a dinner list, write out dialogue at a marketplace, and create more in-depth information by asking questions. We also have the start of a nice situation featuring a lost wedding ring soon to be discovered. Let’s keep going.
*************
He ends up finding the ring without choking on a fishbone. Yet where do I go from there? Perhaps I need to examine his life. How did his wife die? Or is she really dead?
Never be afraid to take several steps back and let the imagination have its way on how the plot changes. Having the man as a widow is interesting, yet having the man believe he is a widow could lead to other possibilities. Let’s concentrate on the ring now. What is so special about it? How does he know the ring is really his? There is the possibility that the jeweler has several with the same design. Maybe his wife had something etched on the inside. Lots of people inscribe their love on marriage tokens.
So the man looks inside the ring and reads the words. Ben, my love.
Yes, it is his ring. But wait. Someone has scraped a message into the surface after those words, maybe using a rusty nail.
Help! 26th st. Ann.
Well, that is unexpected.
****************
Now look at all the possibilities I have created in this outline ( my tiny, plot-spoiler woman is wearing a party hat and lying face down on the rug, belching mightily from the booze and twirling a noisemaker in happiness.) Let your ideas go wild. Make lists. Listen and watch people. Ask questions. Do research. Write what you know and feel comfortable about it. Create a little tinder to ignite your imagination. You will be amazed at what you can create from there.
WRITE ON, GOOD PEOPLE! WRITE ON!
IMAGINATION!
I have a lot of it, and my imagination has yet to let me down. Yet I realize that sometimes it can elude us when the reality of everyday life pushes in. In other words, we get the dreaded Writer’s Block! *SCREAM*
When this happens, we need to find something that sparks our creative fires. There are several places to look when trying to find this tinder. Something mentioned frequently in writers’ posts is this phrase, “Write what you know.” This is sound advice. Yet always be aware that just because you have no knowledge about espionage does not mean you cannot create a story about spies. A writer needs to simply do her/his research on the topic and add something from their own lives (like origami) to give a personal touch to their writing.
A spy novel featuring secret documents disguised as origami in a worldwide paper-folding competition held at a kabuki theater in Japan.
I picked origami because it once was a hobby of mine as a kid. I picked Japan as the setting since origami originated as a Japanese art, along with kabuki (popular drama featuring song and dance) in keeping with this theme.
I know . . . I know. Just because I have an idea for a story doesn’t mean I have a storyline. Yet this post is step one in gleaning ideas from the imagination when your head is coming up empty for a good plot. Remember; every great story began from a tiny idea. Sometimes the hard part is finding the idea. Here are a few ways that might help get the creative juices boiling.
List all the shows, movies, and books you have watched and read.
I like this because you can place yourself in the scenes. How would you have reacted in those situations? What would you have done? What would you have changed? It is incredible what your imagination can expand upon until you have made a story all of its own. And do not stop there. Write a journal of what happened to you today. Yet also add your own fantasies on what you might have wished happened. Change the dialogue you had with someone, but keep the rest of the scene. Then evolve from this by changing the mood, background, and adding characters.
Heck, you can even list what you ate for dinner last week just to get ideas. Hmm . . . let me go with the food topic and give a sneak peek on how my imagination works.
Chicken and dumplings
Pork and veggies
Sausage and pasta
Leftovers
Fish sandwiches.
Let’s stop there. I like that fish part. What words go with fish? Fish and chips. Fish fry. Fish store.
Oh! A fish store, or it could be a marketplace with fishmongers selling their catches. I like the concept of an open market, with stalls everywhere and people mingling. We have the makings of dialogue with this. I am going to stick with the conversation without any descriptive background.
***********
Fishmonger: “Fresh Fish! Fresh Fish for sell! Right off the boat! You won’t find a better quality at a cheaper price anywhere else.”
Woman shopper: “I’ll take three pounds of shrimp, please.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, ma’am. Anything else?”
Child: “I want to play with the squid!”
Woman shopper: “You can’t play with it right now. Mommy has to get home to cook for the dinner party tonight.”
Fishmonger: “And besides, you never know when a tentacle will grab ya!”
Child: “Hee-hee!”
Fishmonger: “Ha-ha! Okay, who is next?”
Man shopper: “I’ll take a whole cod.”
Fishmonger: “Here you go, sir. Thanks for waiting.”
************
Let’s stop again. I am really enjoying this scene. Most of the conversation is something you would expect to hear at any outdoor market whether you are buying fish, vegetables, or donuts (although I would shop somewhere else if they sold squid next to the chocolate eclairs). Don’t forget that you can go to a marketplace or store and just listen at how people interact with each other. Great plot ideas will come to you. Listen and watch everyone. Take notes.
Now I will get back to this scene. I need to give the characters, well, character. Physical attributes. Personality. Let’s use the dialogue above to help.
************
A smiling fishmonger with a pleasant attitude because he likes kids. This is the reason he jokes around and does not make any rude comments about the woman holding up the line.
An impatient mother who wishes she had enough time in the day to get everything done. I suspect she has been shopping for most of the morning, with hair strands starting to stick out and her face becoming flushed. And this must be a very important party for her if she is buying that much shrimp.
A bored child since he or she wants to play with the squid. Obviously this is an adult party. The kid would be dragging Mommy home if the party were for him/her. A child’s party would never serve shrimp.
A male shopper who is patient with the woman and child because he did not interrupt or push to get his order in.
**************
This male shopper has intrigued me although his description is sparse. Sure, many writers would go with the woman and child, maybe because they might have experienced something similar to this when shopping with their own kids. This is a good avenue to take with lots of possibilities (party with maybe a boss or an old flame on the guest list). But I do not have kids, and I do not trust myself enough to make up a novel-length story featuring children. I want to walk beside the man. I want to understand his life.
What happens next? Well, he just bought a whole fish and he cannot do any more shopping while carrying it around. He has to head home. Does something happen to him on the way? Is someone waiting for him at home? Is there anything special about the fish?
Ask yourself these questions. Ask A LOT of questions about the situation. On occasion, the imagination will create ideas when asked or something familiar will show up. Like the news article I heard about involving a fisherman who lost his wedding ring but several years later he gets it back after catching the fish that swallowed it. I think I will take the ring-swallow route.
So the man goes home. Yet my imagination is saying that nobody else is there although he is married because of the ring. No. Wait. He was married. I do not see any wife wanting to clean a whole fish when her husband could have bought the fillets instead. He also enjoys fishing, yet why wouldn’t he have caught his own? Maybe he once enjoyed it.
This means he is an older gentleman, widowed, who doesn’t mind cleaning his own fish but does not want to deal with the troubles of going fishing.
See how the imagination works. Here are the makings of a story. All I did was create a dinner list, write out dialogue at a marketplace, and create more in-depth information by asking questions. We also have the start of a nice situation featuring a lost wedding ring soon to be discovered. Let’s keep going.
*************
He ends up finding the ring without choking on a fishbone. Yet where do I go from there? Perhaps I need to examine his life. How did his wife die? Or is she really dead?
Never be afraid to take several steps back and let the imagination have its way on how the plot changes. Having the man as a widow is interesting, yet having the man believe he is a widow could lead to other possibilities. Let’s concentrate on the ring now. What is so special about it? How does he know the ring is really his? There is the possibility that the jeweler has several with the same design. Maybe his wife had something etched on the inside. Lots of people inscribe their love on marriage tokens.
So the man looks inside the ring and reads the words. Ben, my love.
Yes, it is his ring. But wait. Someone has scraped a message into the surface after those words, maybe using a rusty nail.
Help! 26th st. Ann.
Well, that is unexpected.
****************
Now look at all the possibilities I have created in this outline ( my tiny, plot-spoiler woman is wearing a party hat and lying face down on the rug, belching mightily from the booze and twirling a noisemaker in happiness.) Let your ideas go wild. Make lists. Listen and watch people. Ask questions. Do research. Write what you know and feel comfortable about it. Create a little tinder to ignite your imagination. You will be amazed at what you can create from there.
WRITE ON, GOOD PEOPLE! WRITE ON!
Blog news and Mental Tics
I guess I should make a few posts here. This place has been a sort of dumping ground for tidbits from my other blog, The Surly Writer, and I had yet to decide else to do here. I suppose I can talk about writing topics, since for some reason I am chalk full of them right now. You can still see whatever tidbits from works-in-progress and completed manuscripts I jot down now and again. Yet I will place the links in my sidebar. So be prepared to check over there for any new pieces posted (and when I get the links set up) highlighted in . . . um . . . bright purple is pretty.
One of the recent writing topics pounding in the gray matter involves what I call “mental tics.” I (and I would like to believe this happens to all writers) will sometimes get a certain word mired into my stories. I will overuse this word - ad nauseam - until every paragraph becomes a landmine field of useless jargon. Right next to my computer, I keep a list of words to delete or change whenever I am editing. Here is my list:
was
were
being
became
become
with
so
as
while
if
that
then
when
after
any negatives: no, none, not, nothing, little, never, and the contraction “n’t” as in can’t, won’t doesn’t, don’t, wasn’t
adverbs
I am sure you have noticed in this post that I have used a few on my list. This is because of two reasons. One, I am a little more lenient on my blogs than I am in my manuscripts. Two, go ahead and use the words, just do not OVERUSE them. A paragraph rift with negatives and adverbs and passive voice will catch a reader’s attention in a bad way.
I believe I am improving when it comes to my list, especially for one mental tic: Only. *shudder* I have yet to figure out why this adverb hangs around my typing fingers, but it has made my “Public Enemy Number One” list of words to watch out for and delete with harsh prejudice. Also, I used to be an addict when it came to using the conjunction “as.” This sentence extender had to go. Long sentences crave this word along with “so, while, if, that, with.”
I implore all writers out there. Create a list of your own. Keep it handy. It can help you improve on your writing.
*********************
Sigh. Infinitives just turned into my Public Enemy Number Two. I have to work on getting rid of “to + base verb” phrases, as in “to pull,” or “to push,” or “to go to the store and buy myself more manuscript polish.”
One of the recent writing topics pounding in the gray matter involves what I call “mental tics.” I (and I would like to believe this happens to all writers) will sometimes get a certain word mired into my stories. I will overuse this word - ad nauseam - until every paragraph becomes a landmine field of useless jargon. Right next to my computer, I keep a list of words to delete or change whenever I am editing. Here is my list:
was
were
being
became
become
with
so
as
while
if
that
then
when
after
any negatives: no, none, not, nothing, little, never, and the contraction “n’t” as in can’t, won’t doesn’t, don’t, wasn’t
adverbs
I am sure you have noticed in this post that I have used a few on my list. This is because of two reasons. One, I am a little more lenient on my blogs than I am in my manuscripts. Two, go ahead and use the words, just do not OVERUSE them. A paragraph rift with negatives and adverbs and passive voice will catch a reader’s attention in a bad way.
I believe I am improving when it comes to my list, especially for one mental tic: Only. *shudder* I have yet to figure out why this adverb hangs around my typing fingers, but it has made my “Public Enemy Number One” list of words to watch out for and delete with harsh prejudice. Also, I used to be an addict when it came to using the conjunction “as.” This sentence extender had to go. Long sentences crave this word along with “so, while, if, that, with.”
I implore all writers out there. Create a list of your own. Keep it handy. It can help you improve on your writing.
*********************
Sigh. Infinitives just turned into my Public Enemy Number Two. I have to work on getting rid of “to + base verb” phrases, as in “to pull,” or “to push,” or “to go to the store and buy myself more manuscript polish.”
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