Many writers say it: "I don't read when I'm writing". They think it will contaminate their voice, that whatever style they're reading will somehow seep into their work and it really won't be theirs. That's only a problem if you're writing a 21st-century urban romance and last night's reading of Pride and Prejudice has you making your characters sound like they're in an English drawing room and not a Miami nightclub!
A plot structure is nothing more than a tool for organizing events in temporal sequence. While there are more such structures than there are professional writers, few of them meet what thousands of students consider a critical test: are they actually easy to use and apply? A simple tool, however limited, can be of greater use than a complicated tool that requires years to master. Remember: you will achieve real quality in your writing only by mastering your basics.
Take out your book's outline (or notes or whatever pages you have written so far) and highlight the writer's tools you are using. Now you may not see them as tools. For instance, your character is sitting in a car and she's having a memory of a car accident that happened when she was little and you tell the story of the accident. That's a flashback. Maybe you used internal dialogue, maybe you're telling your novel in the 2nd person voice or your whole book is historical fiction so getting the setting right is crucial. Once you've identified your main tools, ask yourself, "What tool do I want help with the most?" Then...
Hero Confronted With A Challenge. "Come with me, Luke, learn the ways of the Force." This is pretty clear, right? There has to be a challenge, or a beckoning, or the character won't begin to change-and all great writing is about change. 2) Hero Initially rejects the challenge, :I promised Uncle Owen I'd work on the moisture evaporators." A real challenge, one that can provoke real change, will be frightening and exciting. A character will usually have some reservations.
What's the Best Way for You to Learn From What You're Reading? Ask yourself this question to help you develop a way to work with what you're learning from the book you're reading. It may be a matter of taking a few notes on the types of words the author uses or the kinds of details he or she uses to create an effective scene setter. Or it could be more complicated. When I was learning about flashbacks, I was trying to figure out how long you could keep the reader in the past without losing the tension in the present day storyline. So I took The Prince of Tides and did a rough outline of it, counting out how many chapters and how many pages Mr. Conroy devoted to his past and present day story lines. I also noted what the reader learned or what was revealed in each chapter so I could get a sense of how he paced the book. That's just what made sense to me--to create a visual that could help me grasp the whole book. What would help you best understand what a writer has done? This is important because it will help you with the last tip..
Initial Confrontation with Evil, and defeat. Obi-Wan's death. Or possibly the disastrous attack on the Death Star. One is private and emotional, the other spectacular and physical.
A plot structure is nothing more than a tool for organizing events in temporal sequence. While there are more such structures than there are professional writers, few of them meet what thousands of students consider a critical test: are they actually easy to use and apply? A simple tool, however limited, can be of greater use than a complicated tool that requires years to master. Remember: you will achieve real quality in your writing only by mastering your basics.
Take out your book's outline (or notes or whatever pages you have written so far) and highlight the writer's tools you are using. Now you may not see them as tools. For instance, your character is sitting in a car and she's having a memory of a car accident that happened when she was little and you tell the story of the accident. That's a flashback. Maybe you used internal dialogue, maybe you're telling your novel in the 2nd person voice or your whole book is historical fiction so getting the setting right is crucial. Once you've identified your main tools, ask yourself, "What tool do I want help with the most?" Then...
Hero Confronted With A Challenge. "Come with me, Luke, learn the ways of the Force." This is pretty clear, right? There has to be a challenge, or a beckoning, or the character won't begin to change-and all great writing is about change. 2) Hero Initially rejects the challenge, :I promised Uncle Owen I'd work on the moisture evaporators." A real challenge, one that can provoke real change, will be frightening and exciting. A character will usually have some reservations.
What's the Best Way for You to Learn From What You're Reading? Ask yourself this question to help you develop a way to work with what you're learning from the book you're reading. It may be a matter of taking a few notes on the types of words the author uses or the kinds of details he or she uses to create an effective scene setter. Or it could be more complicated. When I was learning about flashbacks, I was trying to figure out how long you could keep the reader in the past without losing the tension in the present day storyline. So I took The Prince of Tides and did a rough outline of it, counting out how many chapters and how many pages Mr. Conroy devoted to his past and present day story lines. I also noted what the reader learned or what was revealed in each chapter so I could get a sense of how he paced the book. That's just what made sense to me--to create a visual that could help me grasp the whole book. What would help you best understand what a writer has done? This is important because it will help you with the last tip..
Initial Confrontation with Evil, and defeat. Obi-Wan's death. Or possibly the disastrous attack on the Death Star. One is private and emotional, the other spectacular and physical.
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Looking to find the best deal on hanging chairs, then visit Tim's other articles to find the best advice on bedrooms chairs for you.
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