How to Get Published

by Al Kalar

Good writers get all they can out of a verb.

For instance, when a character moves from one place to another in a scene, he doesn’t “move across the room”. He “plunges”, “saunters”, “minces”, “charges”, “slinks”, etc. across the room.

Let’s look at an example:

Jim moved over to Henry and hit him in the face.

[yawn]

Jim charged Henry and smashed a fist into his face.

So, what happened to Henry?

Henry fell to the floor. His nose was bleeding.

[Wake me when it's over]

Henry crashed to the floor, blood flowing from his mangled nose.

Remember to review your verbs when you edit your own work. Not just action verbs, but any verb. Victims aren’t afraid, they “quake”; their knees shake, their stomachs churn, and their bowls threaten to disgrace them.

Your thesaurus (often built into your word processor) can be a good friend, but your mind and a command of a wide range of verbs are your main weapons.

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 John Bowers

No matter what genre you prefer, the best novels (unless they are comedies) have one thing in common: drama.

To write drama, you must be dramatic.  To be dramatic, you must use exactly the right words, every time. As I said in my last article, anyone can string subjects and verbs together, but to be remembered, your writing must be memorable.  Nothing is more memorable (in my opinion, anyway) than drama.

The Right Words

I have two favorite kinds of drama: personal relationships and action.  Today we’ll talk about action, since it’s the easier of the two and easily the most fun to write. (more…)

When dealing with rejection as writer, remember: it’s a numbers game. You have to go through ‘no’s to get to ‘yes’. Play the game!  -Cheryl Tardif

by Al Kalar

Some of the best writing on television goes into the production of 24, the high-tension fast-moving thriller staring Kiefer Sutherland as agent Jack Bauer.

What makes the show so riveting? What can novelists learn from the show?

A huge appeal of the show is the almost non-stop action. There is always something happening. For twenty-four hours (over 24 episodes), the characters are constantly challenged by the “bad guys”. No rest, no ruminations, no time to sit down and just chat.

And forget about sleeping.

Every episode is filled to the brim with tension. Not something you want to view just before going to bed.  But their formula brings you back every week to see what happens next; especially if you’re an action junkie like me. (more…)