Difficult little toddlers, first drafts & writing rules

[meg_evonne]

Recently did some crit work for friend. As part of that, I found myself finding similar errors repeated and rather than bleed all over her wonderful work, I compiled a list of what I've learned and placed in my writer's tool box.  

Rules are meant to be broken, however as a recent presenter discussed, "Know them before you break them, and know why you decided to break them."

Here they are for discussion or to have you add your own. These are more editing rules, which lend themselves well to lists. As to character development, plot development, tension, climaxes etc--I yield to JB's writing postings.

First drafts are difficult little toddlers…  Writing Craft Rules According to Meg

Stolen from too many sources to remember

*Avoid word repetition & action repetition  (see how irritating the 'repetition' is? And yep, I did it again.)
*Seek out the simple verb: I ‘needed to hurry’ vs. I ‘hurried’.
*Seek out white space—whenever possible. Many times you ‘report’ through exposition what is said, when the actual dialog might be the better choice. This rule comes from too many sources to name. Mark Nieson lays out his pages on the floor, stands on a chair, and takes a look at the physical black and white on the pages, Darcy Patterson (sp) recommends the shrunken manuscript, i.e. literally shrink your manuscript to 20% or less and look at the black and white on your printed pages. Myself, I like easy and am occasionally OCD, I highlighted dialog one color, exposition another, and then I shrank it on the monitor. I mean WOW! Too much one color—get busy! You double click on the culprit and fix it, then shrink it down and move to the next. Shrinking gives you tons of pages on your monitor to see at once.
*Seek Out the long sentence. 90%, or what feels like 90%, of revision is tighten, tighten, tighten. One trick that I learned was to look for them. (Yes, I highlighted them and researched where and why I used them.  I even shrunk the manuscript to see their positioning. Then I reviewed the best novels I had on hand to see how they used them. Meg Roskoff uses the most beautiful long sentences to end her chapters.
Long sentences can be beautiful and elegant; they can be the signature of an excellent writer.<--yes, I love this sentence that I wrote.  (I took a long sentence Univ. of IA Great Courses class on the subject.) My take in YA, use long sentences as a contrast for emphasis, not as routine practice. In YA, use them when you can truly construct that beautiful, perfect, well-written sentence, but don’t lie to yourself about the quality. Edit 90% of long sentences to the core reason for it to have been written.
*’ly’ adverbs-never use them. (Yet, remember, there are no nevers in writing!  ) Learned from Brett Anthony Johnston, Harvard-creative writing & also Browne & King, Self-editing for Fiction Writers –As Brett said, when you use ‘ly’ adverbs, you haven’t found the right verb.
*Avoid re-capping at the end of a paragraph. Either you wrote it well the first time, making the re-cap un-nesessary, or you didn’t. Trust your writing. Trust your reader. Then keep your main character from re-capping inside the paragraph or in dialog.
*Pimp the senses--all the time. Use them to further plot, character and to set the scene. I took a workshop at Univ. of IA with Mark Nieson and spent an entire year exploring ‘how to write with senses’. Time well spent.
*Know when you write tension, and then don’t stomp on it with extemporaneous exposition—simply nail it. Yeah, this one is actually mine, probably borrowed from my debater coach daughter. I’m defining tension as applicable to romance, to action, and to high emotion packed scenes.
*Every chapter, every paragraph, every sentence, and every word has to earn its place in your writing. Better yet, scenes must earn that right for two, three, even better four or more reasons that further your plot/character. If they don’t cut them. This is an old and tried rule. Even elegant exposition, is only good if it is there for a reason. Literally ask, ‘how does this sentence meet the goal of this scene?’ And ask it for every sentence. If it doesn’t, then you have to pull it or edit it to do so. Or with your historical information that you wish to impart, you must tie it to furthering the plot.
*’my mother’, ‘my father’, ‘my parents’ In 1st POV you are inside your character’s mind; your character will say, “Mother.” You might have an historical conscious decision to do this. If so, be aware that editors see it as a ‘beginners’ error. Jill Santopolo, author, editor, goddess.
 *Use the most active verb possible to ‘brighten’ your writing. ‘I heard’, ‘I felt’, ‘I saw’, ‘I helped’ are reporting verbs, not ‘showing’ verbs. Use instead the direct, simple verb that follows.  Never use 'seemed'. It either is or it isn't. Don't play word games without a reason.
Example: “I heard the sound of horses.” You are telling the reader what they are supposed to hear rather than showing me the sound. Alternative: “Horse hooves clopped—one, two, three, four and then one scrapped off rhythm like it had stumbled, struggling as it climbed.” See the strength of my poor example? You get the idea though.
*Be conscious of your beats. Uhm, I can’t really explain this one. This is my rule, but it is similar to what was taught in the long sentence Great Course. It’s something you know when you read it. Here is an example of great beat use in your work (with one minor edit on my part).
“Off to my left was the men’s dressing room where I never went. (5 beats) Off to my right was the women’s dressing room where I went twice a day. (6 beats) In front of me was the Earl’s bedroom where I was never to go. (7 beats after I edited)” And it’s in the classic story telling three sequence! Simply delicious! Well done!
*Kill all modifiers. Browne & King.  (remember, rules are made to be broken) ‘most’ ‘still’ ‘just’ ‘only’ ‘almost’ 'always' weaken your writing.
*Search ‘I’ and when you see several in a scene, rewrite until the majority disappear.  Scott Tremble’s comment, ‘Your character is full of herself.’ Ouch, hurt and learn.
*Seek out and judge your chapter endings. These are crucial and I think they terrify editors, because every ending is a spot the reader will possibly put down the book—and they may not return! Make sure they are special in some intimate way so the reader is ‘involved’ with your character.
*Book and Chapter beginnings: Dialog best. Action next. Dialog and action together is outstanding! Sorry, I can’t remember who gave these to me. I think it was an author panel at MiHi that included Connie Willis, Patricia Briggs, Tim Powers, among others.
*Protagonists must protag!  Protagonists must be reactive and then proactive to their circumstances. Make your main character react! Writing without that reaction is reported, not emotionally rich. Sharelle Byars Moranville – children’s author, NBA nominee, but I think she stole it from another author/teacher at U of I.  That was the title of the other author’s class. See my scary, scary bones note later. (She referenced the instructor.)
*Use metaphors. They are your friend—just don’t mix them.
*Go for the jugular. When you are in touch with your character’s internal feelings, dig deeper and get more out of them.  This is my rule.
*Look for the beauty in your writing, and then emphasize it through conscious artful decisions from your writer’s craft toolbox.
*English editing uses ‘s’ on toward, forward, backward, etc. American editing doesn’t use the ‘s’.  Jill Santopolo, author, editor at Philomel, instructor.
*Do not personify body parts. Anj Sachdava, but it’s an olden goldie.
*’ing’ verbs are weaker than ‘ed’ verbs. Always chose the strongest verb.  Chris White

[LizW65]

Meg:  can you explain/clarify the "American editing doesn't use the 's'"?  That one has me baffled.  Thanks!

[Enjorous]

In American English you would say "I went toward the light" in British English they would say "I went towards the light"

[meg_evonne]

yes, Enjorous has it right.

English: forwards, backwards, towards, upwards, downwards etc
American: forward, backward, toward, upward, downward

Like many of the 'rules' my first take was, "Are you out of your mind? Most of the books I read...." Trip to library opened my eyes. A huge amount of my reading is British, especially when I was growing up.  Authors like Stewart, Renault, Fleming, O'Donnell, among tons. And that doesn't count my preference for the English historical romance genre such as Phillipa Gregory or the author of Eleanor, Wrath of God. Even today, I'm far more likely to pick up Dick Francis or Ian Rankin than Clancy for my evening read for example.

That make sense?

[LizW65]

Thanks to both.  I've read so many British novels over the years that I honestly wouldn't have noticed that!

[SuperflyMD]

In American English you would say "I went toward the light" in British English they would say "I went towards the light"

This one has annoyed me since high school. 

I write like I speak, and I say towards, forwards and backwards, so I write those words as well.  Maybe it's a southern dialect thing? My family is all old Louisiana  preachers and teachers, maybe something stuck.

I'm not sayin' I'd let it keep me from getting published, but I'd at least arm-wrestle an editor over it.

[Enjorous]

Or just find an editor who's also British

[meg_evonne]

 

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Grumble moan grump grumble moan.

Some of those rules there, like seeking out the simple verbs and not using passive voice, seem to me to come from notions of what makes good prose that are a bit too restrictive; it feels like the underlying assumption is that the Object of the Exercise is for the words to be transparent and simple and convey the story as simply and clearly as possible, which is a way for a story to be good, but not the only way for a story to be good.  Working that way kind of rules out a whole bunch of books that are very dear to me, highly regarded, and really worth having; it would mean there'd be no Gormenghast, no Book of the New Sun, no Desolation Road nor The Phoenix Guards nor The Worm Ouroboros. The beauty of the words in themselves can be part of the pleasure of the reading experience.  I hate to see people giving up on that, as if all prose aspired to the condition of a New York Times editorial.

An example, a t-shirt from Steve Brust's cafepress shop:

My esteemed parents did themselves the honor of traveling to Dragaera City for a holiday, enjoying the city's tolerably fine meals and expensive entertainments. However, the unfortunate timing of their visit led to its interruption by the riots and uprisings preceding that crucial point in our history when the conflict between Lord Adron e'Kieron and Emperor Tortaalik erupted into open rebellion, culminating in the explosion of raw amorphia that transformed the city and its environs into the Lesser Sea of Chaos.

While I am happy to report that my parents had the good fortune to escape the Disaster and return home safely with their luggage, they pretended that due to the haste of their departure from the city, the only token that they could provide of their adventure was this nearly unremarkable garment, made, you perceive, of sadly cheap fabric with unimaginative tailoring: a common shirt.

--Two Words from a Certain Gentleman of the House of the Hawk

You could in theory make the core content of that "My parents went to Dragaera City and all they got me was this lousy t-shirt" (that's kind of the point).  Think how much world background and character information you lose by doing so.  (Paarfi not being an overly verbose windbag with a very finicky attention to precise small points of etiquette and a tendency to digression would not be Paarfi. I've no idea what Paarfi's average sentence-length is; when I do the same sort of Alexandre-Dumas style, I can easily get chapters where the sentence length averages fifty words, and that's counting dialogue exchanges where a goodly fraction of the sentences are two or three words long.)

The words aren't a conduit between a Story and a Reader, that are doing better the smoother the flow from one to the other.  The words are the story.  Every word you pick, and every choice you make, is informed by who is telling the story, and tells the reader about the kind of person the viewpoint character is, that they are the person who would make that word choice.  This is true of any POV, though it's most obvious in first. And, well, there are people who inside their heads think of their mother as "Mother", and people who think of their mother as "my mother", and the decision of which you use tells you something about the person and the social context.  (Viewpoint character of the thing I am working on right now was brought up in a society where biological parentage is not important in defining who counts as your family, and the people who are actually around is.  The guy who brought her up is "Great-uncle Marcus", in her head, but her actual biological mother, whom she's met a handful of times, is "my mother", not "Mother".  This is one of many indications that there is not a contemporary-Western-assumed-standard important emotional connection there.)

[meg_evonne]

Neurovore, how true, how true. Even more so, how sad, how sad.

These rules of course apply to the run of the mill commercial piece and the desires of run of the mill editors and agents in today's market. Frustrating, but, I think, agonizingly true. It also applies to the vast majority of readers who prefer the quick and easy over the more in depth work.

That being said, I have always applauded your style of writing and it will do you well!  Rules are meant to be broken, especially petty, get-her-done, get-her-out there type rules.   

[Aludra]

As a reader, not a writer, 3 observations:

1. Meeting a publisher's deepest desires is becoming slightly less relevant.  Calling someone self published is no longer an insult.  Break the rules, submit to a publisher, publish anyways and link me the purchase/sample page.

2. I love prosey language in what I read. Most of my favorite authors are "wordy". I think being 'fed' Dr Suess as my 'mother's milk' of books lead me to love well written language and the sounds it makes for what they are, and not rely on action and dialogue alone to keep me involved in a story. 

3. "Avoid word repetition & action repetition" is a rule that I THOROUGHLY agree with.  It really pulls me out of SOD and makes me grit my teeth when I see redundancy.  Use the opportunity to be more descriptive, please! I live for details and immersion.

I need to go buy that Brust shirt now, and see what other designs he's come up with. That man is a genius.

[Razil]

I agree with Aludra as both a reader and an aspiring writer. Most of those rules make my eyes twitch. Particularly since most of my favorite authors liberally ignore them. They can be helpful,but also hinder. I spent a year and a half in fiction workshops run by a resident author at my university, using the Browne&king book. After the first draft,I threw it aside and broke rules all the time.I was the only one to do so, so I was the only one whose work stood out, ina good way. I think those rules are wonderful when they fit the story you are trying to tell, but are a pain to force where they make things worse.

That teacher gave the best advice I have received thus far: "Write anything you want, however you want. Then fix it. Then do it again. Somewhere along the way, you'll find what's right." He also said, "Writing is easy. Rewriting is the hardest thing you will ever do. Writing doesn't make you an author, rewriting does."

[OZ]

*’my mother’, ‘my father’, ‘my parents’ In 1st POV you are inside your character’s mind; your character will say, “Mother.” You might have an historical conscious decision to do this. If so, be aware that editors see it as a ‘beginners’ error. Jill Santopolo, author, editor, goddess.

I know that Neurovore already mentioned this one but I struggle with it as well. If I am talking or writing to most people, I will say "my mother" since the assumption is that they also have a mother that is different than mine. The obvious exception to this is if I am talking to one of my siblings. In most first person POV that I read the character is telling the story to me, the reader. Unless I am supposed to be a sibling of the writer/main character, I would expect to hear him say "my mother" unless, possibly, he or she was very young.

I do know people that will simply say Mother or Father (or Mom or Dad) regardless of the person they are speaking to but I have always thought it awkward.

[meg_evonne]

 I've been reading recently with an eye toward the rules above.

'Tighten' is not gutting a work. Even going back to verbose Dickens, you will find that the rules are usually followed. This was further noted as I read my first Game of Thrones. Description of place for example isn't random, but specific. It might have the flavor of meandering, but when you decipher it carefully--wow--it is all set up.

'Tighten' means no filler on the pages; it doesn't mean that you can't drop your reader into the maelstrom of your world until it clings like a second skin. In fact, for some writers, this is essential.  However, the difference in quality isn't in the length of the 'tightening process' but in the chosen preciseness or purposeful lack of preciseness of your speedy arrow that counts.

We can all confess as we revise our work that some description is foreboding, foretelling, revealing, etc--but some of it is crap the reader doesn't need, nor wants to know. Yes, we needed to know it, but we don't need to share literally everything with the reader, letting them fill in the blanks themselves as a participant.

Now, as to Game of Thrones, just how much does HBO subscription cost, because this work is bloody brilliant.  (I will give boredom on the first few chapters, but after that--pure gold.)

spelling check edit.  client came in... ;-)

[Aludra]

I've been reading recently with an eye toward the rules above.

'Tighten' is not gutting a work. Even going back to verbose Dickens, you will find that the rules are usually followed. This was further noted as I read my first Game of Thrones. Description of place for example isn't random, but specific. It might have the flavor of meandering, but when you decipher it carefully--wow--it is all set up.

'Tighten' means no filler on the pages; it doesn't mean that you can't drop your reader into the maelstrom of your world until it clings like a second skin. In fact, for some writers, this is essential.  However, the difference in quality isn't in the length of the 'tightening process' but in the chosen presicness or purposeful lack of presciceness of your speedy arrow that counts.

We can all confess as we revise our work that some description is foreboding, foretelling, revealing, etc--but some of it is crap the reader doesn't need, nor wants to know. Yes, we needed to know it, but we don't need to share literally everything with the reader, letting them fill in the blanks themselves as a participant.

Now, as to Game of Thrones, just how much does HBO subscription cost, because this work is bloody brilliant.  (I will give boredom on the first few chapters, but after that--pure gold.)

I think HBO scrip price depends on a few things, but we added it to our package for 10$/month.