How to Get Published

by Al Kalar

Keep the action going. I know we’ve discussed this before, but it bears repeating because we still receive manuscripts with “info dumps” scattered throughout the story. Worse, many start out with an info-dump that is the author’s lame attempt to bring the reader up to speed. I’m not referring to recaps of previous books in a series designed to remind the reader of what s/he read six months ago.

Any time you stop the flow of the story to tell the reader something, you risk losing that reader. You yank him out of the story itself. The action stops with an arrow frozen in mid-air while some “off-screen” voice describes the developmental history of the bow and the flight characteristics of various types of arrows. By the time the arrow starts flying again, the reader has forgotten why it was shot and is certainly “sitting in her chair” rather than “swinging a sword on a rain-soaked crag in 10^th century Scotland”. (more…)

by Al Kalar

Paragraphs:

Steinbeck wrote in short, simple, declarative sentences.

John Norman could fill multiple pages with one boring paragraph. Some of his sentences rambled on forever.

Steinbeck won a Pulitzer prize. Norman didn’t.

There are no clear-cut rules as to how long a sentence or paragraph should be. A sentence should cover one thought only. A paragraph should cover one subject only.

If you find yourself using semi-colons (;) instead of periods, you may have a problem. (more…)

by Al Kalar

Last week we learned about keeping your viewpoint consistent (1^st person, 3^rd person, omniscient).

Now we’ll delve into “tense”. There are a number of different tenses: present, future, past, and past perfect to name the four most encountered. (more…)

by Al Kalar

There are three viewpoints of most novels that are part of the author’s “voice”: first person, third person, omniscient. Once you pick one, stick to it; don’t change part way through OR (horrors) from chapter to chapter.

First person: The story is told from the viewpoint of a character.

“I did this.

I saw that.

I remember back when . . .”. (more…)

by Al Kalar

As an editor, I see a number of problems that either spell “rejection” or “more work for me - sigh”. This is the first of a series on those problems.

The problem of “voice” is actually a two-part problem:

1. The author’s voice
2. Character voice.

The author’s “voice”

The sum of how s/he writes non-dialog prose (or poetry). Word choices, sentence structure, slang, contractions, and unique ways of expressing things.

If you write your prose to exactly follow the rules of English, you can overdo it and end up sounding like the Queen of England, rather than a “regular person”. There is a pretty wide range of language use that the average reader will find to be acceptable, but if you go outside that range, you may alienate your audience. (more…)

by Diane O’Connell

If you’re like many writers, getting that first draft down can give you a rush of excitement. The words flow freely, the ideas come at lightning speed, the book seems to be coming together just as you had in your head.  But then you read it back and — oh, boy, does it need fixing! The thought of cleaning up the “mess” you created is about as appealing as cleaning out a garage stuffed with a quarter century of accumulated stuff — and just as overwhelming.

Many first-time authors begin the revising process by going through their manuscript line by line and painstakingly “editing”: correcting syntax, adding some things, taking out other things, cleaning up punctuation and spelling. Often, this process can seem like torture. And there’s a good reason why. (more…)

by Al Kalar

There’s a lot of information for aspiring writers. Some has to do with the truly important stuff. Some is aimed at the details behind the important stuff. And some is, frankly, misinformation (”BS”).

Given today’s publishing market and the economics of the industry, breaking into print, as a “successful” new author, is very difficult. In fact, the odds are against you. I’m sorry, but it’s true. But by following this rule, you can improve the odds substantially.

You may have heard this before, but it bears repeating; because it’s THE MOST IMPORTANT RULE: (more…)

by John Bowers

Writing fiction is hard work, but it’s also fun. As a writer you get to create everything, from the world in which your characters live to the characters themselves. You get to determine whether they live or die. But sometimes writing can be daunting; for example, giving your characters a name. How, exactly, does that work?

It could be very easy, of course, if you don’t mind using the same old names as everyone else. You could call your character Dick and his girlfriend Jane, but doing that might kill your chances at a sale before anyone read past the names. If you want your characters to be memorable, you need to give them names to remember. But with millions of novels out there, and ten times as many characters, how do you find such a name that hasn’t already been used? (more…)

by John Bowers

During my first year in college (which was also my last year in college) I took a creative writing course; only three of those enrolled were regular day students - the rest were older people with families and jobs. It was an informal class in which we talked a lot about writing and everyone shared stories and chapters, which were read aloud. I expected my writing to be a big hit, but I had a surprise in store.

“I’m amazed at your dialog!” one man told me. “It sounds so natural.”

“What’s your secret?” another lady asked.

Secret? I didn’t know there was a secret. I was telling a story, the characters spoke, and I wrote it down. I was more amazed than they were, that anyone would have trouble writing dialog.

But apparently some people do. So what’s the “secret”? (more…)

Award-winning novelist Ricahard Bausch spoke to Operation Homecoming workshop participants at Fort Drum, New York, offering his “Ten Commandments” for developing good writing.

Courtesy of the National Endowment for the arts.