Tag: 2020 resolution

2020 – Week 12 and Covid-19

Welp, it’s been a crazy couple of weeks, my kid has been home because the daycare is closed, and even though I’ve been home a lot this week too, I haven’t been able to accomplish a whole lot story wise. I still haven’t met my last goal.

In fact, yesterday is the first day I’ve been able to sit down and revisit chap 7 sc 2. I made a few changes, beefed up one or two things, and since I was viewing it in word, I corrected a couple grammar issues it picked up for me. More on that in an upcoming post “Evolution of a Manuscript – part 2”.

With coronavirus having such a huge impact across the world, I’ve had to devote a lot of time this week to other things, but I’m ready to put my writing cap back on and get chap 7 completely knocked out!

So, my goal for this week is to get chap 7 sc 2 peer review ready, and complete the draft of chap 7 sc 3, which is still about 75% done.

Use the time you have at home in the coming weeks to your advantage. Start a blog, seek new inspiration, explore a different genre, or just capitalize on the time you have away from social activities to reinvigorate your muse.

As somber as it is, there are some truly eye opening things occurring around the globe. There are lots of photo galleries popping up on the web of before and after photos of normally crowded places. Take a moment to scan through some of them, or watch a couple youtube videos of people in seriously affected places, you may find something that inspires an idea.

Not to make light of the seriousness of our current time, but I would be remiss if I didn’t point out how unique it is as well. There may just be something about it that will spark your muse. So take a moment to explore, not just the world we live in, but the time we’re living in.

2020 – Week 10 and Tailoring Chapter/Scene Length to your Audience

I met my goal this week and tweaked my latest scene, chapter 7 scene 2 which is the subject of my “Evolution of a Scene” series, which you can read about here, and I also have my first draft of the next scene about 75% completed.

I don’t know if I want to tack this latest scene onto chapter 7 or start a new chapter with it. I’ll have to see how it flows and what the final word count is after I finish it. I don’t like making chapters too long, but I also don’t like starting new chapters if it doesn’t feel like a natural place to stop. This scene shows my characters leaving a location where they’ve been for several chapters, so in my head it feels more natural as a conclusion to a chapter than a beginning.

I’ve been giving a lot of thought to how I want my book structured: Chapters comprised of multiple scenes; or a chapter per POV/GoT style?

V12 was structured into chapters with titles, and was sectioned off according to a word length/event type formula which really wasn’t very accurate. For example, I had a chapter titled Thellshun, where 2 scenes took place in the realm of Thellshun, but since those 2 scenes were short, I chucked in a scene from another POV which took place in the Shallinath realm so that the chapter length was a consistent range with the others. So the chapter title only fit 2/3 of the chapter. A little confusing for the reader.

For consistency’s sake for v19, I decided to remove chapter titles and just use numbers (chap 1, chap 2, etc), and then base the length off of word count, between 4000-5500 words, which is usually 2 or 3 scenes.

This is a common way to parcel out a novel, I’ve seen it quite a bit and I like it as a reader.

But I also like knowing exactly whose POV it is when I enter the chapter, and the current setup isn’t as friendly in that department as I’d like. I may start a chapter with Gonivein, but before I’m done I’m back to Gadnor. So what? Well, doing that means that the first paragraph of every scene requires another introduction, which wouldn’t be necessary if each chapter was a unique POV.

The problem I have with POV chapters is the potential for inconsistent chapter length. Kelric’s scene might be 4 pages, but when I switch over to Gadnor, he has two back to back which are 4 each, so do I combine them into one 8 page chapter? Have the same POV in back to back chapters? What if one scene is only 2 pages?

All of these are options I need to weigh carefully. And a lot will come down to the flow of the finished product. Hopefully, a beta reader can provide me a recommendation. I may decide to send out a word count multi-scene version and a POV version to beta readers with some type of rubric so I can get a standardized feedback response, and from there determine which chapter format works best to heighten interest.

Why is this so important, you ask? The story is still the same, right? Well, like it or not, chapter structure can make a huge difference in how your reader experiences your book. If there’s a 20 page chapter looming ahead, I may get overwhelmed and put it off for weeks, and maybe never come back to it if life gets too busy, even if the writing is engaging and the story is interesting. Smaller chapters could remedy this.

On the flip side, it may be hard to keep track of placement in a novel if there are too many chapters. And varied length of chapters, personally, I find annoying. When I have a chapter that is 2 pages, and the next one is 11, I get a little bit twitchy. As a reader, there are certain things I would like to just expect ahead of time before I sit down to read, such as if I have time while I wait on my pizza to be ready to finish a chapter, consistency of length will give me that. Even though it doesn’t change the overall story much, it still can add or take away from the overall experience.

A good example of this is the last book I read, it was 140 pages in length, but there were NO chapter breaks. None. There were little squigglies to denote a change in scene, but it just wasn’t the same. I felt like I needed to read the whole thing in one sit down, which was just too much, and when I paused at a scene break I didn’t feel like it was a good stopping place. It just tilted my reading experience.

So. Moral of the story: chapter breaks matter. Scene breaks matter, chapter and scene length matter. So before you publish, consider carefully how your manuscript is structured, because regardless of how good your story is, how engaging your plot, how buttoned up your editing–your readers have lives outside of your book. Pauses and breaks should compliment your audience and the pacing of your plot.

My goal for this week is to go through the editing process for ch 7-2 and finish my ch 7-2/ch 8-1 scene and figure out where it needs to go.

Happy writing!

2020 – Week 9 and Using Music to Invoke Imagery

I did not meet my writing goal this week! Grr! I got about half of the scene tweaked, but not all of it, and no editing. So I’ll be spending some time this week doing just that and hopefully moving on to the next scene.

I had a critique meetup this past weekend and we spent several minutes brainstorming on writing strategies. One writer shared that she creates music playlists to listen to when writing certain genres or scenes, and that it invokes her muse more naturally and easily.

Before she said it, I hadn’t realized that this is already a method that has proven itself successful for me. The last scene I wrote with all the action was 90% contrived during my commute to work and replaying I See Stars “Ten Thousand Feet” over and over. For some reason, that song invoked some very powerful imagery in my head that I had to put on paper, and thus, my scene was born.

That was by pure accident though. Now that using music as inspiration has been brought to my attention by another writer, I can spend some time purposely putting together soundtracks to help invoke my muse with different types of scenes.

This is another benefit of having a writing group. You never know what tips and strategies you will learn. Writer groups are so awesome! If you haven’t already, find one. You won’t regret it!

2020 – Week 8

I exceeded my goal this week, tweaking my dream sequence and not only drafted the first paragraph of the next scene, but completed the draft, adding another 1041 words to my running total. My manuscript is now over 32,000 words.

My goal for this week is to tweak the new scene, and run it through my editing process.

Happy writing!

2020 – Week 7

I completed my goal this week to get my last scene ready for peer review and get my first draft of the dream sequence done. Yay!

Well, I decided the dream didn’t need to be a gigantic scene, it’s only a couple of paragraphs, and with a little tweaking to the previous scene, I was able to just tack it onto the beginning of that one. I think that will be much better than trying to make a small dream sequence unnecessarily large, although it does make this scene even heftier than it was before, but I think it will keep the reader from becoming bored, which is really important as I’m nearing the middle of the book.

So often, novels have a very engaging setup, but then the middle ceases to be interesting. I want to avoid that by making informational bits as concise as possible so the reader doesnt become bogged down.

My goal this week is to edit the new dream paragraph and get at least the first paragraph of the next scene drafted.

Happy writing!

2020 – Week 6 “To Cut or Not to Cut”

I’ve made some excellent progress this week and exceeded my goal to fill in the missing pieces of the scene. The pieces are in and I’ve started my editing process. I’m currently on step 5.

Every step reveals something that needs changing, something that doesn’t look or sound right, or something that’s still missing or would sound better restructured, cut, or moved somewhere else. I cannot stress the importance of self-editing enough.

The original v12 version had a dream sequence before this particular scene I’m writing happens, and I’m seriously debating putting it back in. It might be important for character development…not necessarily for the plot at this point though, which is why I wanted to cut it. It’s a bit of a dilemma, but I think I’m going to add it back in. It does reveal to the reader a little something about this character, and also throws a little mystery in there too.

So my goal for this week is to finish up editing this scene and get it sent off to a peer for review, and also get the first paragraph of the dream sequence written. I won’t have a chance to write much this weekend so hopefully I’ll be able to accomplish this!

Happy writing!

2020 – Week 5 and “Agent Killers”

I was able to get all 3 scenes edited and sent to a peer to review. I did add in a few more paragraphs to two of the scenes to add a bit more depth, and one of them now reminds the reader of a small detail in an earlier scene and hopefully makes it more cohesive overall.

One of the issues I’ve experienced in my writing journey is how disconnected later chapters can become from earlier ones, especially when it’s a book executed over several years. I’ve read many self-published books that have this problem, and as much as possible I want to avoid this. There’s nothing more frustrating than reading a novel from cover to cover and by the end there are one or two things that were never or poorly explained. While I’m trying to be proactive about this with my work, it’s inevitable that I won’t catch everything.

This is why a beta reader is a must when the draft is finished because they can identify inconsistencies and discrepencies from throughout the book that we as the writer will miss. Everything flows in our head at super high speed, especially stories that have been near and dear to us for years. A new person who knows nothing about it reading it through from start to finish is the only way to truly find these “agent killers.” Cause that’s what they are. If there’s confusion somewhere, an agent will kill your manuscript and throw it in the burn pile. Ruthless. But that’s the truth. Agents exist to make money, and a book that needs reworking is not in their acceptance criteria.

Peer reviews scene by scene are great, but without that cover to cover beta read (at least once), it is just not enough to polish your manuscript for an agent.

For my scene I needed to finish this week, I almost got a very rough draft done. I rushed through a lot just to get it down and have somewhere to work from this week, and I’m still missing a small part of the scene that’s pretty crucial, but it’s like 90%.

A lot is happening in this scene and it’s going to be quite a large one once I get it polished and fill in the blanks. There are some tragic things happening here and happening fast, and it’s going to be a hefty chapter when all is said and done, but hopefully it will be an exciting read.

This scene still needs a lot of work, so my goal for this week will be to finish the last missing piece, revise it, and get it ready for the editing process.

5/52 weeks of 2020 are gone, and I’ve completed one scene so far. I’m happy with how I’ve kept up with my goals, but I’m realizing that if I really want to be done by this year I need to pick up the pace a bit. There’s a lot left to tell between current scene and the end.

Happy Writing!

2020 – Week 4

I only partially met my goal this week, but I feel that I made up for it by doing some additional new scene work.

Last week my goal was to edit the last three scenes I’ve completed, and I made it to step 5 of my self-editing process, which you can read about here. As a Scrivner user, I type in courier font. Compiling it into a word doc changes the layout and I also change the font to Times New Roman. It’s a totally fresh way to look at my scene. Not only did Microsoft identify some pronouns I dorked up but it also suggested I make some phrases more concise, and visually I caught a few redundant words also with the different view.

I also added in some missing character development pieces that are needed for this scene, since my character is meeting an old friend. This wasn’t really clear before, so now hopefully there’s a little more depth to the narrative and a greater impact for the following scene.

That’s as far as my editing took me. I have yet to convert it into a 5×9 10 pt font format, which is basically book form. That’s the next step, and then I’ll be ready to send it to a peer to review.

I made some good progress on the next scene this week as an extra. It’s not complete, but I’ve got a good start and I know how I want it to go.

So my goal for this week is finish editing those 3 scenes, and finish the first draft of the next scene.

Happy writing!

2020 – Week 3 and Scene Stacking

I met my writing goals this week, decided whose perspective the next scene would be, what would happen in it, and drafted my first paragraph.

There are about 150 words so far, but I have a direction now, and I’ve found that accomplishing that is the hardest part sometimes.

This scene is a continuation of the scene I just completed, and from the same POV. I usually like to move to a different character to avoid the story becoming stagnant, but I realize that nothing is really happening in the rest of the story at this particular time. I am also trying to make sure that all the scenes take place chronologically. For example, I don’t want my A character to be doing something on a Tuesday afternoon in chapter 4, and then jump to character B doing something on the previous Sunday at dawn in chapter 5. That’s just too confusing for the reader. This means stacking scenes from one character’s POV. The trick is making sure this character’s plot is interesting enough to keep the reader engaged.

Even when the character development is stellar, I have to be mindful that when having a lot of scenes back to back of one POV, there is a risk of the reader forgetting what was happening with character B way back in chapter 3. I don’t want to invent exposition to keep these characters alive per say, but I don’t want their importance to be forgotten either. I hate having to go back 30 pages to remember what’s going on. It’s a delicate balance that I’m not entirely sure I’m getting right. This will be an important piece of feedback I’ll be expecting from a beta reader when the manuscript in completed.

Even though I met my goal this week, I did not go back and edit my completed scene. I now have 3 scenes that need to be edited. So my goal for this week is to edit those 3 scenes and then send them off to a peer to review.

Happy writing!

2020 – Week 2

It’s week 2 of 2020 and I’m pleased to say that I have completed the scene I was working on in my last post, added an additional 949 words.  It is now 1687 words, an excellent scene length. Of course, this is the first draft of it, so I’m going to let it sit for a day or two and then go through my editing process, which you can learn about here on my blog Editing Tricks That Don’t Cost a Dime.

My goal for week 3 of 2020 is to figure out what the final scene in this chapter will be–from whose perspective–solidify what exactly is taking place in the scene, and at least get my opening paragraph drafted.

Here’s to keeping up the progress!

Happy writing!

 

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