Weekend Writing Workout and Writing Workout Groups

Many people have writing groups where they read and critique each other’s work. It’s definitely a challenge, though, to find a good critique match. You want critique partners who have similar experience and who write in the same genres. And are just as committed to writing and critiquing as you are.

My critique partners are separate from my writing group. I have a handful of friends I trust with early drafts of work and they trust me with theirs. We’ve been reading and critiquing each other for years, growing together as professional writers.

My writing group does something else. We write.

The idea for our writing group stemmed from a long-standing writing group in Seattle called the Louisa’s Writers. (named for both Louisa street and Louisa’s Cafe where the writing happens) Writers show up and write for 45 minutes to an hour, twice a week. I mean write by hand straight, no stopping, no reviewing the work, no crossing out, no editing of any kind. It’s from the gut.

by Alison Woodward

Then the work is shared. No critique involved, although people will point something out later if it struck them as interesting.

When I showed up there last week, there were about 25 people writing. When we started, it went quiet but for the few other patrons. The energy emanating from the collective minds, hearts, guts, and fingers was palpable and the time actually flew by.

Our much smaller writing group (called Louisa’s North, even though it takes place at The Grind) meets every Sunday. We write for 20 minutes, share, write for 20 more, and share again. Same thing – recommended writing by hand, no stopping, reviewing, or editing of any kind.

Why this works: this is far different than writing by yourself into your computer for 20 or 40 minutes. Usually when you write like that you stop and think about your word choice, your plot, your intention, and editing is too convenient. This is riding the momentum of something else. Strange inspirations come when you write with such forward momentum. Directions are explored without attachment. This kind of writing opens you up.

And it doesn’t matter your level of skill or what experiment you’re working on that day. It’s a personal experience. An added bonus to me is the letting go of ego. You read your work raw with no preambles or apologies.

Jack Remick and Bob Ray began the Louisa’s group over 15 years ago. I used to attend back in the late 90′s. Between them they have dozens of books, but they still attend the writing group when they can. And why not?

WHAT THE HECK DO WE WRITE?

We work on whatever calls us to it. Could be a W.I.P. or something new. Jack and Bob used to make up start lines but discovered that whatever needs to be written will come though if everyone simply starts with the line:

Today I am writing about…

And off we go. The mess of the mind, heart, and gut shot through the pen. The rest of the world disappears. It could turn up lost memories, new insights, plot twists, four pages of dialogue, or a monologue from a goddess.

Sometimes I use the startlines I’ve come up with here on my Weekend Writing Workout if they pertain to what I’m working on. Wherever I start, though, something moves.

~   ~   ~

LOOKING FOR OTHER WEEKEND WORKOUT BLOGGERS

Sometimes I can’t get to my weekend workout post due to other writing/life stuff. I’m looking for 4 or 5 other bloggers who’d like to post a Weekend Workout with me on Friday mornings (sending me their links by midnight the night before). That way, writers can jump around from workout to workout, get a whole week full of them, and we can post each other’s links if we don’t have time for an original post. Workouts may vary: poetry, fiction, memoir, etc. As long as it’s a writing exercise AND something you would try yourself.

Contact me at info (at) danikadinsmore (dot) com if you are interested. Please pass the idea on to anyone else you think might be a good candidate.

CLICK HERE for more information about my Weekend Workouts.

Weekend Workout: Sympathy for Bad Boys (and Girls)

Last week I posted a workout about creating compassion for characters. More specifically, getting your readers to sympathize with a protagonist who isn’t a particularly nice person. Who probably changes by the end of the story, who probably redeems him or herself eventually, but who starts out as someone you might not want to bring home for dinner.

This is something I am personally dealing with in my W.I.P. for my protagonist IdoLL. I brought this up in my writing group and we talked about the need to create a “save the cat” moment for her.

Save the Cat is a book, and a concept, by screenwriter Blake Snyder (1956-2009). If you want to show who your hero is, have him save a cat early on in the story. Even if the character is a not-so-nice person, we will immediately have sympathy for him if he saves a cat (conversely, if you want your audience to hate a character, my own screenwriting mentors used to say show him “kick a dog” – don’t ask me why the cat gets saved and the dog gets kicked)

This doesn’t mean literally (could be, but careful of not being cliche). It’s simply a moment that shows the person has a heart. It’s a moment of vulnerability.

In my story, IdoLL would never do something that made her feel vulnerable in front of others. Even hugs from friends can’t last too long. So, her “save the cat” moment is while she’s alone and it’s not so much a cat, but a loving moment with a broken toy her father gave her as a child. She even hides it from others. In this secret time, her true character is revealed.

YOUR WORKOUT

This workout is slightly different because you will write the SCENE at the end of it. Your “save the cat” scene or private vulnerable moment.

1) Set your timer for 5-7 minutes.

Start at the top of the page with the following startline:

My character feels broken when she finds / discovers that . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

2) When the timer stops, Set your timer for 7-10 more minutes.

Start with the following line: 

When my character is alone she faces . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

3) NOW, set your timer for 10-15 more minutes.

WRITE the scene in which we feel the pain of your protagonist’s private moment  (just write what’s happening, don’t get caught up in the minutia of description).

Use the start line:  When he/she walked into the room . . .

Even though you are writing a scene, just Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

Read your exercises and your scene, make notes, highlight what makes sense.

Happy Weekend!

Weekend Workout: Love Uber Alles

Yesterday, while I was procrastinating working on my own blog post, I came across this lovely post by children’s author Kelly Barnhill. It’s basically about how everyone, at some point in their lives, but particularly when we are mean-spirited children, participates in “bad behaviour.” It was also about the child taking responsibility for that behaviour and the parent loving the child in spite the behaviour. What I took away from it was the joy of loving the mess that we are, the whole package. We are tragically flawed beings, and I have always found a certain beauty in that.

We are all mended cracks and creaky gears. We are broken smiles, broken hearts, broken minds and broken lives. We are hack-jobs and cast-offs and wobbly legs and gouged surfaces. We are soft edges, scuffed corners, ungleaming and unvarnished, but pleasant to hold and comforting to touch. (from Barnhill‘s post)

My own mother said that her philosophy as a parent was that the child was never bad, the behaviour was. We are perfect beings who make mistakes – - if you can wrap your head around that oxymoron.

by Rashin Kheirieh

All of this thought-tracked into something I once heard Alexandra Cunningham (one of the lead writers on Desperate Housewives) say on a panel: Write every character with compassion, no matter how different from yourself.

Let’s expand that to say, “Write every character with compassion, no matter how bad their behaviour.”

You can take this to mean write your villains with compassion, but it may be your protagonist who needs more love from you. This is the case for me right now with my aforementioned W.I.P.

IdoLL engages in a lot of bad behaviour. She needs to; that’s the whole point. She is mean-spirited and selfish. Feedback from my focus group has been that it is difficult to empathize with her because of this bad behaviour. However, the majority of this group also told me that they really like her transformation. She redeems herself at the end and they were happy about this. “It’s satisfying” one young reader said.

So, if the reader makes it more than ½ way through the book, they will start to see her transformation, but if the reader puts the book down for lack of connection, they’ll never get there.

My job now is to create more compassion for her at the beginning of the story, so that even though she engages in this bad behaviour, we love her anyway.

I thought perhaps I should do this by writing her with more compassion. The thing is, I DO have a lot of compassion for IdoLL, but I was relying on her sense of humour to carry her through. Cleverness and a sense of humour in your protagonists can often persuade readers into liking them. But this time, it wasn’t enough.

Your Workout

Set your timer for 5-7 minutes.

Start at the top of the page with the following startline:

1) The wound that festers in my character’s heart is made up of …

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

When the timer stops, Set your timer for 7-10 more minutes.

Start with the following line: 

2) My character feels utterly betrayed when . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

When the timer stops, Set your timer for 10-12 more minutes.

Start with the following line: 

3) The pain of this betrayal looks like…

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

Read your exercises, make notes, highlight what makes sense.

Happy Weekend!

End-of-Year Plerk-out!

It’s funny how little down time I allow myself by before I feel the need to get something done. My husband’s the same way. We like to be productive.

During the “holidays” one would most likely find us in our respective offices brain-deep in some type of creative or career project: digitizing rare audio cassettes, typing up old journal pages, writing a proposal for a conference, a class, a book.

Between the productivity we take a walk to a local coffee shop and the subject of how we rarely relax comes up. “It’s because we like our work,” I say to him. “But our work is our play. We don’t work; we plerk.”

(SIDENOTE: we discussed the spelling of the combination of “work” and “play” and decided against “plork” because no one would pronounce it right.)

Plerking for me is writing this now. It’s editing a manuscript. It’s jotting a poem down, capturing a melody, brainstorming TV movie ideas. Plerking is when one enjoys the work of one’s life so much that it doesn’t feel like work – which is not to be confused with the ease of the endeavour.

Play can be just as challenging as work. Have you ever played sports? Sports are challenging physically and mentally, but we never ask, “what sport do you work?” Not even to professionals.

A few weeks ago I gave myself (and invited others) the challenge of writing a short story by the end of the year using a paragraph from the 50 First Lines exercise. I posted my top 5 and ended up choosing the following paragraph:

Green, red, blue . . . what mattered the colour of his blood when his heart was a broken hinge? He lay his head back down on the institutional hospital pillow. The nurses didn’t know what to do with him. He had red blood spurting from a gash in his arm and green blood coming from his nose. He reached up and touched it. His nose. Where Karmen had punched him.

EDITING YOUR PLERK

I was on a panel about editing at VCon with four other authors. All of us had different techniques and rituals around editing. The only thing we all completely agreed upon was the importance of it.

When someone asked if it was possible to spend too much time editing, I said, “Perfectionism is the opposite of done, but I have never heard anyone say, ‘Wow, that was a great story, too bad it suffered from over-editing.’ It’s a bit of a balance.”

Here are some basic steps I take when I edit a short story:

-After I pound out the first draft, I usually read it over a few times and do some straight intuitive editing.

-I tend to explain too much in the first drafts of my short stories. If I explain anything I first ask myself, is this information necessary? If so, is there a way to show it in action or dialogue instead?

For instance, here’s a doozy:

Karmen had always loved attention, had loved flaunting her nerdy boy toy with his natural, baby-faced good looks. One-hundred percent human, not like those trendy “mutants” with their artificial modifications. She liked showing him off like a pet, daring any man, woman, or hermaph to challenge her claim.

Instead of explaining all of this, I could have a scene where she takes her boy toy to a party and threatens someone or makes a snide remark about a “mutant.”

-I examine each character individually. What is her motivation? What is his character arc? Who is this person? I visualize each character in my mind doing something. I think it’s important to visualize them in action, not just what they look like physically.

-Once I’ve edited it a few times, I give it to one or two people in my crit arena. I get some feedback, take some notes, read over my notes, and then set them aside. (I don’t obsess over notes. If something clicks, it will reveal itself in the rewrite)

-I PRINT the story out and read it OUT LOUD. This is vital. I read every line for “sound” and “sense.” Meaning, does it sound good and does it make sense for the story.

-I question my “darlings.” If certain lines make me feel clever, I examine them in the context of the story. Yes, cleverness is good, but I was a bit in love with the last line of my story so that each of 3 versions of the ending still contained that final line. I wanted to make sure the last line actually worked.

-I look for the logic of the story. The overall holds-together-ness of it. If I look at it objectively, do the pieces of the story fall together so that the outcome is believed to be a necessary conclusion?

Sometimes when I’m editing I freeze up and procrastinate, fearing that I will somehow “ruin” the story by editing. That I’ll make it worse. I can’t say that has ever happened. I have to remind myself of that. I always save each new version just in case, but I rarely find that I need to refer back to it.

Your End-Of-Year Plerkout:

If you’ve started a short story, use that. If not, find something you’d like to “plerk” on that needs finishing (assess that it is finishable in 6 days). A poem, a song, a collage, even a novel – but only if you’re that close to the end.

The idea is to FINISH something, as in, ready for submission. An actual edit and polish so that you can start the New Year with a brand new story to toss to the story-catchers.

Have a Great New Year and Be Safe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Weekend Workout: End-of-Year Short Story Challenge! (or 50 First Lines Redux!)

I’ve been jumping up and down in my mind (I do that) to use some material from the 50 first lines exercise I started months ago. I used this exercise, another of my favourites, for a writing contest back in February and the results were terrific.

The whole 50 First Lines exercise is a blast and it works. I’ve proven to myself over and over again that it works, and now I have an excuse to use some of my results.

There’s an open call for a short story anthology I’m interested in submitting to and the deadline is Dec 31^st, so it’s perfect timing. If you’d like to join me and submit to this anthology (or to any other anthology or magazine or just want to finish a short story by the end of the year), you can play along. You can play along regardless of anything, but having a goal and a deadline is a great motivator.

If you did not participate in February and want to catch up, or start over again, here’s the whole exercise:

STEP ONE: Write 50 first lines. Seriously. This is not as difficult as it sounds. I recommend doing it in one 30 minute sitting. Just crank them out off the cuff. Don’t think too hard or you’ll crush the gems.

For inspiration, here are the winners from the first round of the contest last Feb.

STEP TWO: Pick your Top 10. Here were mine:

It was the colour of vomit… probably because it was vomit.

The clown nose was the last straw.

The idea was half-baked – - but then again, she liked things a little raw.

The horse was her neighbour’s and they were both studs.

Green, blue, red . . . what mattered the colour of his blood when his heart was a broken hinge?

It was a perfect morning for picking mushrooms.

I was taking a short cut through the cemetery when I spotted it. Him. It.

If he had told her about his origami-folding autistic idiot-savant brother in the first place, they wouldn’t be in this jam.

“I think it can be reattached,” he said.

It wasn’t the first time she had been arrested for bar-fighting, and the other time wasn’t her fault either.

STEP THREE: Write 10 first paragraphs.

After you’ve chosen your Top 10 first lines, write the first paragraph for each. Again, just crank them out as quickly as possible in one sitting. Don’t edit, don’t over think, just write.

Here are the winning paragraphs from the contest.

STEP FOUR: pick 3-5 of your own that you like

Here were my 5 favourite paragraphs:

Green, red, blue . . . what mattered the colour of his blood when his heart was a broken hinge? He lay his head back down on the institutional hospital pillow. The nurses didn’t know what to do with him. He had red blood spurting from a gash in his arm and green blood coming from his nose. He reached up and touched it. His nose. Where Karmen had punched him.

 ~ ~ ~

It was a perfect morning for picking mushrooms. Green and misty in that way that spring teases. If she could identify them, she’s pick them now. They had sprouted up overnight, literally overnight, on the median across from the bus stop. But she couldn’t tell the difference between the poisonous and nonpoisonous ones. Nor did she know how much of the poisonous ones to add into a tincture, so that it would be just this side of magic, and not lethal.

 ~ ~ ~

I was taking a short cut through the cemetery when I spotted it. Him. It. The limping coyote. I had always assumed it was a he. I hadn’t seen him in weeks and I was glad he was safe, although not glad it was almost dark and that I was alone. I shifted my grocery bag to my left arm. Was I supposed to make myself big or small in the face of a coyote? Run towards him, back away, play dead?

 ~ ~ ~

If he had told her about his origami-folding autistic idiot-savant brother in the first place, they wouldn’t be in this jam. Instead he had told her to “wait” outside the non-descript building while he went inside. When he reemerged, sheepishly introducing Simon to her, almost apologetic, she was pale as a ghost. Unresponsive, even when he waved his hand in front of her face. He had no idea what had happened in the 20 minutes she had been sitting there on the bench. He was spooked, but Simon seemed to be all right. His brother placed his paper crane in Marion’s lap and she snapped out of her trance.

 ~ ~ ~

“I think it can be reattached,” he said.  He examined the finger more closely.  The wires had fried, but the finger itself seemed functional. “Here,” he said, handing the finger to ROY, “hold onto that until we can get back to the garage. I’m going to collect some more conch shells from the beach.”

 ~ ~ ~

STEP FIVE: Pick the paragraph that “clicks” for you, ignites the proverbial light bulb, and write a draft of that story by NEXT FRIDAY (Dec 21). That’s one week for a short story (2,000-5,000 words). You can do it. That still leaves 10 days to edit it for submission.

If you’re having trouble choosing from among your brilliant 5 paragraphs, try working on each one a little and see what happens. Since the anthology I’m submitting to is themed (it’s about heroes coming home) it helped in my selection. I looked for the “hero coming home” in each one. I started three different possible stories until one took off.

You’ll know when it does.

NEXT WEEKEND WORKOUT: We’ll edit and polish them by the end of the month.

Have a great weekend!

P.S. Someone just told me writer couple Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch suggested starting a short story each Monday, finishing it during the week, and submitting it that Friday. Now that sounds like a great challenge, and with 50 first lines, you’ve already got a year of stories waiting for you. (Hmmm, I smell a 2013 writing challenge for me)

Weekend Workout: The Fabulous What If?

I know, I know . . . I’ve mentioned my timed “what if” exercise before, but I’m too lazy to go back and see what I said about it. I bring this one back to you this weekend simply because I used it this morning while writing and found it useful.

There is something simple and wonderful about a good “what if” exercise. I always seem to find what I need from it. I use it with kids and adults and probably more so than any other “what do I do now” exercise when I’m stuck writing or editing.

click for source

There are a few ways I use my “what if.” Sometimes I already have an idea and just set the timer (10 to 15 minutes), and start with the line “What if … ,” writing spontaneously to work out the idea. Other times I make a list and write as many “what if” scenarios as possible, or I keep listing them until one suddenly pops out as “the answer.”

For example, I used this latter technique a few days ago when working with one of my young writers. She had to create a short story starting with the line “I looked out the classroom window and the playground was empty.”

“Cool,” I said, “let’s make a ‘what if’ list!”

She started writing her list:

-What if it was summertime?
-What if there had been a flu epidemic?
-What if it was the janitor looking out the window?
-What if school had been closed down for some reason?
-What if the school was about to be demolished?

We both looked at each other when she wrote that last one.

“I like it,” I said. “So do I,” said she.

“Okay, what else? Why is the narrator standing there? Start another ‘what if’ list.”

-What if the narrator was going to sabotage the demolition?
-What if he was a teacher who wanted to see it one last time?
-What if he used to go to that elementary school?
-What if he was the one demolishing the school and it was his old school?

Yeah! We knew she had it with that last one. What a great little vignette she could now write about a man who comes to revisit his past just before demolishing it.

She could have done a third “what if” with that last one. What if someone comes in and catches him crying? What if he refuses to cry? What if he remembers a painful moment in elementary school? What if that were the moment he shut himself off to love? And so on.

This is such a helpful brainstorming technique you can turn to, with no pressure, when you’re stuck (or not!). You can start brainstorming a story idea with a “what if” as in the example above, or you can use it to explore one particular idea in the middle of your story.

Today I needed Brigitta to have an encounter with something new and awesome and frightening. It dawned on my right away that she would meet the Eternal Dragon. But what would it do when it met her?

“What if she meets the Eternal Dragon and It . . .”

REMEMBER if you do the list to actually WRITE IT BY HAND and write the words “what if” each time to keep your thoughts moving. GREAT exercise for teachers for creative writing assignments.

If a 12-year-old can do this exercise successfully, so can you.

Have a great weekend.

Weekend Workout: Too Much Information (in a good way)

This is a tardy Weekend Workout, but all my ‘Merican friends were probably digesting for the past two days and couldn’t write anyway.

I was planning to do a rerun this weekend, but ran across a note to myself about using TMI (too much information) to create conflict (big, small, serious, humorous). I was specifically thinking about it because of a real life example. Okay, my 74-year-old mom has discovered boys again. I think this is great, since my dad died 6 years ago. But there’s only so much I want to hear about my mom’s escapades. Can you imagine writing that scene into a comedy script?

That’s a minor conflict, but there are other ways TMI can create serious internal and external conflicts, like if your character learns something she doesn’t want to know or shouldn’t know. TMI can put your character’s marriage, job, or life at risk. Maybe she knows her sister is having an affair, maybe she knows her boss is bribing the mafia, maybe she knows (as in one of the Cloud Atlas stories) that a report about an unsafe energy source is being hidden from public eye.

You get the point.

I put this brand spanking new exercise together based on this idea. If you try it, let me know how you think it worked.

your workout

Set your timer for 5 minutes.
Start at the top of the page with the following startline:

1) My protagonist is in EXTERNAL conflict when she learns . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

When the timer stops, Set your timer for 7 more minutes.
Start with the following line: 

1) My protagonist is in INTERNAL conflict when she learns . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

When the timer stops, Set your timer for 10 more minutes.
Start with the following line: 

3) Too Much Information for my protagonist means that she must . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

Read your exercises, make notes, highlight what makes sense.

Happy (Thanksgiving) Weekend!

 

 

Weekend Workout: Prepping fo NaNo (or not)

I still haven’t decided whether I’m participating in NaNoWriMo this year, which begins, according to the ticking clock on their website, in 19 days, 12 hours, and 42 minutes, and 30 seconds (29… 28… 27…)

Regardless of whether you are going for NaNo 2012, starting a new project, or editing an old, I cannot stress enough the fabulousness of the Sequence and Beat Sheet. It is both inspirational and practical. I used to be much more of a “pantser” when it came to writing, but being organized beforehand has done wonders for my writing process AND saved heartache while editing.

I posted about this last year before NaNo and wanted to do so again for those about to begin. So, pardon the repeat post, although it has been edited and updated.

THE SEQUENCE AND BEAT SHEET

Basically, this is a form of outline for a story. Because of my screenwriting background, I tend to think of stories in sequences, beats, scenes, etc. Studying screenwriting is extremely helpful when learning about story structure.

After I’ve done copious amounts of prewriting (i.e. I basically know what the story is about and where I want to go), I write my first Sequence and Beat Sheet.

SEQUENCES are series of scenes that act as mini-movies. They have a set up and pay off and end in a change in status quo. Large “reversals” and “reveals” can happen at the end of a sequence to make the story go in a new direction (extremely important if you want readers to keep reading).

Writing out the sequences breaks a story down into manageable “chunks.”  In novels, those chunks usually turn into chapters, although you don’t really have to worry about that just yet.

Beats are the smaller steps inside each sequence that get you from the beginning to the end. For example, in one sequence these might be your beats:

-Anna gets a horse for her birthday.
-She starts riding lessons and has natural talent.
-Anna’s father loses his job.
-Parents can’t afford to keep the horse, or the lessons, Anna devastated.

See the change in status quo? Anna started happy and optimistic, praised for her natural talent, the world is her oyster. Then, boom, no more horse, no more lessons, no more rosy future, and new tensions in the home.

The next sequence might be like this:

-Anna convinces parents to wait one more week before selling the horse.
-Anna gets a job at the stables to support her horse-riding.
-Anna falls from a loft and breaks her leg.
-She learns her leg will never heal properly without surgery, which they can’t afford. Good-bye horse-riding.

In this sequence, Anna goes from a new optimistic and rosy-future, only to crash even farther than the first time (also important for storytelling, intensify the complications as the story enfolds). These changes from the character getting closer to her goal, and then the goal being yanked from sight, are called “reversals.” This is how we empathize with characters – we want them to get their goal, and something gets in their way.

Sometimes I know exactly what’s going to happen in a sequence and my beats are more detailed. Other times I get to the middle of a sequence and I’m not sure what’s going to happen, but I know something must happen, so I write something vague and add in some questions:

Anna makes an ally at the hospital (male/female? a love interest?)

For an even more detailed post about the Sequence Approach, CLICK HERE

art by Jose Manuel Merello, click for source

APPROACHING THE SEQUENCES AND BEAT SHEET

When writing out my sequences and beats, the first thing I think about is how the “status quo” is going to change at the end of the sequence, then I write out the beats it will take to get there. I also name my sequences (what is the mini story I am telling here?)

I use this Sequence and Beat sheet as an outline when writing the story, AND I rewrite it before I do my first big edit.

Here’s the second sequence of Intergalactic (the YA Sci Fi story I wrote for NaNoWriMo last year). This is the rewritten version, not my original.

SEQUENCE 2 – The Rethulan Gig
For this sequence, I wanted IdoLL to start nervous and impressed with the palatial quality of this venue, only for something major to go wrong so that the gig is a bust.

I came up with main beats for this sequence:

*IdoLL and the Intergalactics land on Rethula and meet the intimidating queen, who immediately dislikes IdoLL.
*IdoLL learns that she playing a private birthday party for the princess, and she’s not the main act.
*When they arrive at the venue, it is filled with children.
*An obnoxious mini-com call interrupts her tribute to Rethula.
*IdoLL storms out of the concert.

If I need more information, I sometimes go back and fill in a few details (bitty beats), to make sure that each scene has TENSION (as well as set up and foreshadowing). For instance, in the scene where she meets the queen – I added the following smaller beats:

*IdoLL meets the Rethulan Queen:
-IdoLL is uber-impressed with the palace and all the pomp and circumstance
-The Queen appears and has a creepy way of gliding on one foot.
-She mauls IdoLL’s face with her finger nodes to make sure IdoLL is “non infectious.”
-She throws IdoLL and her bandmates into a cell-slash-greenroom and won’t let them leave due to security reasons.

The character of IdoLL is a bit of a brat, so I wanted to create a sequence where we would sympathize with her, where she is devastated and we are devastated with her. There are bits of unexpected foreshadowing with the way the queen moves and her mauling IdoLL’s face with her finger nodes, which come to fruition later in the story when the princess stows away on IdoLL’s ship. Everything here is intentional and serves a purpose in the larger story.

handwritten Sequence and Beat Sheet

Does this sound like a lot of work? It can be. But when I’m writing the story,  I’m always SO glad I have my beat sheet to follow. Even if there are some blank spaces and vague ideas. I can always fill them in when I get to that sequence.

Let me know if you have any questions about any of this! And let me know if you try your own beat sheet and, if so, how it goes.

Weekend Workout: Inspired by Images

In my workshops I often use writing exercises around objects and images. They make excellent jumping off points for writing practice, but you can also use these exercises as a way to move deeper into your story. Below I have included 3 different exercises you can use to inspire your writing.

art by Gizem Vural. click for source.

You’ve probably heard writers chant SHOW not TELL a hundred-thousand times. One of the ways to do this is to constantly come back to the image. As you’re writing, ask yourself, if this were a movie, what would I see on screen?

IMAGE LISTING

EXERCISE #1

Here’s a nice warm-up exercise if you just want to write, but aren’t working on anything in particular.

Take a walk outside for 10-15 minutes. Do not talk with anyone, do not write anything down, simply observe anything and everything as you walk. Make a mental note about what you see. Sometimes I say hello to the images as I notice them. It sounds silly, but it works. Something like: Hello tennis shoe hanging over telephone wire… hello dead crow in the green grass… hello blonde twins boys on the monkey bars… hello ant playing tug-a-war with another ant over a bread crumb… Any image that strikes you, make a mental note.

Then, go inside and LIST as many of the images that you saw. Don’t do anything other than list them at this time:

Black tennis shoes hanging on telephone wire
Mutilated dead crow in green grass under tree with spring blossoms
Blonde twin boys in blue jackets swinging towards each other on the monkey bars
Black BBQ in the empty parking lot at the firestation.
ETC.

Give yourself 5-10 minutes to make this list.

Then, go through and circle the images that speak to you. When I do this in my workshops, I have other people pick three lines for you. Pick ONE line and use it as a starting off piece for a poem or a piece of prose. Write for 7-10 minutes without stopping. (you know the drill)

EXAMPLE

A black BBQ in the empty parking lot of the Fire Station as if
young men had to interrupt hamburgers on a warm blue day
to attend a meeting
no sense of emergency
lid closed
who would secure a lid if sirens were blaring?
who would take time to bring in the mustard if
flames leapt across homes?
who would bring in the trash, the bag of buns, the relish
who would manage the utensils
if bells were jarring the senses?
no, everything from this picnic walked away
the blue-uniforms still wear their crumbs
there may even be dishes to wash
but for now they digest their bit of summer’s end
and let the BBQ rest
for there is no rain

IMAGES FROM MEMORY

EXERCISE #2

If you’d like to do some backstory work for your W.I.P., pick a character from your current story and think about images that come to her mind when she thinks about her childhood.

We all have images from our childhood that we’ve attached meaning to. When I think of my childhood, some of the images that come up for me are the huge almond tree in my front yard that delivered bitter nuts, my dad’s tools in the garage, the 500 National Geographic magazines my parents refused to throw away, and our enormous square record player that was more a piece of furniture.

Think about your character’s past. What images come up for her when she thinks about her childhood? Make a list of at least 10 images, the more, the better.

Once you have your images, select one. Let’s say my character thinks about her father’s broken watch that sat on his desk for months. Take that image and set your timer for 7-10 minutes. Write about the associations that come with that image. Do not stop or edit your work.

Startline: When my character thinks about ____________, it always reminds her of…

EXAMPLE:

When Polly thinks about her father’s broken watch on the counter, it always reminds her of how many broken things she has in her life. Things get broken and don’t get put back together. The basement window, the lawn mower, the reclining chair… how many things have to break around her until she breaks? Until she can no longer be put back together…

FROM IMAGE TO ACTION

EXERCISE #3

Using the same idea of image listing, pick a scene from your story that you’d like to work on. Let’s say I want to work on the scene where “Mavis confronts Prof. Herbert’s wife, Terri.”

Take 5-10 minutes and do an image listing exercise around this scene. What do I see in my mind as this takes place? Set your time and do not stop listing images, even if you are unsure of them. You don’t have to use them for anything later, and you don’t want to miss anything that comes to mind.

(BTW – if you ever need to think about a scene before you start, simply write “The scene I need to write next is the scene where…” and write spontaneously for 5-10 minutes)

EXAMPLE

Mavis kicks Terri’s door
Terri in a grey sweatsuit with paint stains
Mavis in her nurse’s uniform
Terri and Mavis drinking wine on the back porch
Terri showing Mavis a photo of her son
The full moon when Mavis steps off the porch
ETC.

Then, write the scene starting with whichever image you want. It doesn’t have to be the first thing that happens in the scene, it just needs to launch you into it. Keep all the other images in mind as you write.

EXAMPLE:

Terri and Mavis sit on the back porch, feet on white stools, a bottle of red wine between them. Mavis has removed her nurse’s cap and Terri has a bathrobe on over her sweats.

“He’s no demon, you know,” says Mavis.

“I know,” says Terri, “It’s just easier to think of him that way.”

ETC.

Have a great weekend writing!

Weekend Workout: Reversal of Fortune

AuthorSalon.com is an intense virtual writing workshop through which, having done your due diligence, the organizers of the site present your manuscript and pitch packet to their agent and publisher contacts. It’s a fantastic concept, and it’s a lot of work. Work you have to be willing to do as a writer.

One of their requirements is a Plot and Conflict Outline, and as much as this sounds like homework, or strikes terror into your heart, it’s a great way to see how well your story holds together. For instance, do you have escalating complications that get in the way of your protagonist’s exterior goal? Do you have a major reversal en route to the climax?

These are things that were drilled into me during my screenwriting program, and things I have taught in my classes. But oftentimes when I’m writing I don’t even think about them anymore, because storytelling has become much more intuitive for me. Taking a step back and working my W.I.P. through the plot and conflict outline got me thinking about these important plot elements again. In particular, the “reversal.”

A reversal means a reversal of fortune. From good fortune to bad fortune or bad fortune to good fortune. Comedy relies heavily on reversals (the movie “The Jerk” with Steve Martin comes to mind, the way his fortune keeps turning from good to bad and back again). Reversals can happen as a result of your character’s choices and actions or influence their choices and actions. There may be minor reversals in your story (i.e. the shy boy has finally gotten the nerve to ask that girl out, only to find she’s just gotten engaged), but a major reversal has the ability to stop your protagonist in her tracks and change her exterior goal to solve something more immediate and ultimately more important (which addresses her interior need).

For instance, in my W.I.P. Intergalactic, IdoLL’s exterior goal is to save her waning career at all costs, either through her tour or by immortalizing herself in some way so that she doesn’t become obsolete. She’s lost in a false identity and afraid of being a nobody, afraid that who she really is isn’t enough.

She keeps taking a step forward, then falling two steps back as complication after complication curses her tour. A stowaway princess igniting an interplanetary war is the major complication standing in her way. When it looks like she’ll finally get a break and be immortalized at the Hall of Famous Fame, she loses it all when her bandmates are kidnapped, and she must team up with her nemesis in order to save them.

When she finds herself alone with her nemesis, her goal changes and the story addresses her interior need. With the tour demolished, she now seeks to save the people who have been her loyal friends, as she realizes how much they mean to her. Her interior need is to become vulnerable, to express her true self, and she does this through her personal sacrifices. Ultimately, she goes from being self-centered, hiding behind a mask, to being a true and grateful friend.

It is only through this major reversal, when she is stripped of everything and everyone she hides behind, that she can finally get what she really needs.

Art by Alison Woodward, Click for source

Your Workout:

Set your timer for 5 minutes.

Start at the top of the page with the following startline:

1) My protagonist is closest to reaching her goal when. . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

When the timer stops, Set your timer for 7 more minutes.

Start with the following line: 

2) Things are looking up for my protagonist until . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

When the timer stops, Set your timer for 10 more minutes.

Start with the following line: 

3) When my protagonist realizes she won’t reach her goal she . . .

Write, don’t stop, don’t edit, don’t cross out.

Read your exercises, make notes, highlight what makes sense.

Happy Weekend!