Archive for December, 2006
Friday, December 29th, 2006
Darn you, villains!
s originally conceived, this book had one person who was going to act as an antagonist. This book also had a lot of question marks in the middle of it.
After I got through chapter 2, it was pretty clear there were going to be two antagonists. And then when I finished chapter 3, […]
3 Comments » - Posted in Ornithology by CM
Friday, December 22nd, 2006
One-liners and short sentences
o over on Jacqueline Barbour’s blog, Jacqueline’s been talking about one-sentence book descriptions. Of course, nobody can write a book in one sentence. That’s why we call them “books” and not “sentences.” But after playing around with what she’d thrown up there, and realizing that I was writing in my voice rather […]
2 Comments » - Posted in Ornithology by CM
Friday, December 22nd, 2006
Hook
iss Snark’s formula for a hook goes like this:
X is the main guy;
Y is the bad guy;
they meet at Z and all L breaks loose.
If they don’t solve Q, then R starts and if they do it’s Lsquared.
But this only seems to work for romance novels where one character starts off being the bad guy. […]
5 Comments » - Posted in Writing by CM
Thursday, December 21st, 2006
Viewpoint is a dangerous thing
ne of my most shocking discoveries is how much writing from a character’s viewpoint warps the story. See, the problem is that every character out there thinks that he’s the good guy (or girl). And so when you write from her point of view, it’s hard not to make that person likable. In fact, it’s […]
4 Comments » - Posted in Ornithology, Writing by CM
Friday, December 15th, 2006
Crapometer
‘ll update this post. But I’ve sent Miss Snark my hook. It’s my first attempt ever at writing such a thing. I suspect she’ll tell me it’s too much character development and not enough plot. But this is really all about the learning attempt, right?
I’ll post a link here when she […]
9 Comments » - Posted in Writing by CM
Friday, December 15th, 2006
High concept and theme
went with Eve to the RWA meeting last Saturday. They told me I should have a “high concept”–a one-sentence description of my book–and a theme. Themes are apparently things like, “the healing power of love.” I’ve been reading Stephen King’s “On Writing,” and apparently the theme of Carrie was “blood.” So there’s a lot […]
4 Comments » - Posted in Ornithology, Writing by CM
Friday, December 15th, 2006
I’ve been tagged.
o, Eve has tagged me. Bah. I’ve decided to make this fun by lying about one item in each category. I like lying; it’s probably why I enjoy writing fiction. You figure out which one. Except for one category, where three of the things are lies and one of the […]
2 Comments » - Posted in Random by CM
Sunday, December 10th, 2006
Making mountains out of molehills
think that to be a romance writer, you need to have a fundamental optimism in your soul. And I also think that in order to have that, you have to be a genuinely happy person. I don’t mean that you have to be perky, or a Pollyanna. I do mean that […]
6 Comments » - Posted in Romancery, Writing by CM
Sunday, December 3rd, 2006
Sex!
s I mentioned, I write nonconsecutively. I’ve now finished:
The first three chapters
The first kiss
The first time they have sex
And a bit of the epilogue.
All things considered, this is about 25% of the novel. It’s not 25% of the word count; knowing how I write, my revision passes will probably increase the word-count by at least […]
