Writing Tips: Experience EVERYTHING

I’m starting the third read through of Enchanted, which naturally brings to mind the writing tips and tricks that I follow. But today I don’t want to talk about story structure and grammar, I want to talk about inspiration. Inspiration is everywhere, because of that it’s easy to drown it out and focus on every day life. If you want to be a great writer is to wake up and experience everything.

Most authors write about things they haven’t experienced, I’m no exception. I haven’t cleaned the den of a dragon, time traveled to the Dark Ages, or attended a royal ball. However, I took an archery class which helped a lot with writing Robyn Hood, I observed my college’s fencing club years ago which made my research for King Arthur and Her Knights easier, I’ve trail ridden horses through different country sides–giving me a feel for accurately describing nature, I try to cook and eat lots of different foods, one time I even walked around  blindfolded so I could accurately describe a character who has been temporarily blinded.

Try to expand your cultural horizons, go to museums, listen to music you don’t normally listen to, try new foods, go to a fabric store and touch the different fabrics. When you’re writing it’s important to engage and stimulate all of your senses, you never know when you will use it in a future story. In my opinion the weirder the experience the better!

It’s true that you can write about what you don’t know, and it can be a fantastic story. But if you include past experiences–which let you add vivid details–your stories will pop and the ideas will flow. Most importantly, new experiences are your best weapon against writers block as they are catalysts for inspiration.  They can even given inspiration to you in a future story–when I observed the fencing club King Arthur and Her Knights wasn’t even an idea in my brain, when I started writing Enthroned I was so thankful I did that!!

Writing Tips: Resources I Use

Hello, Champions! I know today isn’t a regular update day, but I was too busy yesterday and I’ll be too busy tomorrow so today it is! (I was considering updating tomorrow with a Bad Poetry Day post, but I decided to spare you the horror.)

My Life at the MBRC has been polished and uploaded again and will (hopefully) soon be available for purchase on Smashwords. I am about to launch into the first rewrite of Enchanted.

The only reason why I haven’t started already is because I’m waiting on a book: The Wadsworth Handbook. It was actually the shortened/pocket sized Wadsworth handbook that was recommended to me, but a local library had the big copy so I decided to check that out first. Why am I checking out a style book? Because I recognize that making sure I have complete sentences and no spelling errors in my stories isn’t enough, they need to be punctually correct too. I’m hoping this book will help me iron out my difficulties with comma usage. (Yes, I can hear all of you sighing with relief.)

While I’m waiting for this book (I’m picking it up tomorrow) I thought I would mention a few other books that have helped me with my writing.

How I write: Secrets of a Best Selling Author: This book is written by Janet Evanovich, author of the best selling Stephanie Plum series. If you’ve ever read any of the Stephanie Plum books you will enjoy reading the details Janet shares about the series and how she came to write it. If you’re a budding writer this is a great book that addresses some of the lesser known details about writing–like interviewing people for book research. Some of what Janet has to share is advice you can get in just about any writing book, but the real jewel of this book is the advice Janet gives about characters. (In case you haven’t read a Stephanie Plum book, characters are what Janet is famous for.) After reading this book the first time during a rewrite of Life Reader I was inspired to cut several unnecessary background characters. It was like taking a dagger to the chest, but it also was the best move I made for that draft.

A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing: Yes, I’m not stupid. This is a blog, not a book. But for anyone who is thinking of writing a book this blog is an invaluable guide that will hopefully tempt you to the path I’m on, the path of the Indie Author. Joe Konrath is technically the blogger, but he is hosting a lot of guests posts these days that have fantastic advice. Here’s the thing–everyone featured on this blog including Konrath himself are Indie Authors. Few, if any besides Konrath, have agents, and all of them make the bulk of their sales through self publishing ebooks. If you are at all interesting in publishing ebooks–which is what I do–this is place to go. (It will keep you busy for weeks.)

Writing Magic: I haven’t actually read this book yet. It’s waiting at the library for me with Wadsworth. The reason why I am including it  even though I haven’t read it is because I’ve been told this book is great for young aspiring authors. (Think middle schoolers or high schoolers.) I wrote the first draft of Princess Ahira and Life Reader when I was in high school. Both books had to go through major rewrites to get to the format they are in today, but the fact that I have published them and they are actually selling shows that I had good ideas as a teenager. The thing is my actual writing craft needed a lot of work back then. To make a long story short, if you know a young writer it’s important to not only encourage their writing, but to also encourage them to study the art of writing. Some of the style guides I’ve read are about as interesting as painting a wall. This book–I’ve been told–is more inviting and interesting and will hopefully give your young writer an extra spark.

I’ve read a lot more books about writing, but this is a pretty good start. I will let you know if Wadsworth is worth checking out, otherwise I’ll be sniffing around for another style guide. Thanks for reading, Champions, I will see you on Monday!

Writing Tips: What I’ve learned: -ly adjectives

Even though I have released seven books on the Kindle to date, and I’ve written countless more stories that will never see the light of day, I’m still learning about writing. Writing is a never ending process because you never stop learning. Even if one has all the technical and grammar rules mastered there’s always more to learn about characterization and plotting the plot.

Recently I learned the lie of -ly adjectives. Bluntly put, when writing a book about 75% of -ly adjectives/words are unnecessary. What the heck is a -ly adjective? Exactly what it sounds like, an adjective that ends with ly. Here are a few examples: Quietly, quickly, softly, gently, angrily, sadly, and jumpily. Those sound like words that are fantastic and need to be included, right? Wrong! These -ly adjectives usually occur when paired with a verb, in example: quietly whispered and quickly ran.

Think about quietly whispered for a moment. Is it really necessary to say you quietly whispered? Wouldn’t it automatically be assumed you’re quiet because otherwise you wouldn’t be whispering? The same goes for quickly ran, if you’re running wouldn’t it be obvious that you’re being quick about it? The -ly adjectives are unnecessary because the verb already gives you an idea about the action and how it should be played out.

As a side note suddenly is a ly word that gets over used a lot. “Suddenly the bear walked out of the woods.” It describes that the bear arrived all of a sudden, which is OK. However, the sentence would be a lot more remarkable if you used a stronger verb to describe that instead of the word suddenly.

Please note that I said about 75% of the -ly adjectives/words are unnecessary. You’re going to run into -ly words that are necessary. The idea behind this writing trick is that you watch for words that aren’t needed because the verb already describes it accurately. Some words, like accurately for instance, are going to be necessary because they change the idea of the verb. (ie: Accurately shot as opposed to inaccurately shot)

If you’re writing and you find you have a lot of -ly words that are necessary don’t stress out about it. I have often discovered that people make up a lot of writing rules. There are so many rules, in fact, that they often cancel each other out. Personally, I learned that it’s best to take these writing “rules” as tips, so I watch for them but I also don’t hesitate to break them.