In the first part of this Public Speaking for Authors series, we covered Organizing Your Talk . Now that you’ve made your notes and have decided on the points you want to cover and have tied it all together, you’re ready to start practicing. Remember, don’t write out your talk. Or, if you absolutely must write it out, then now’s the time to set it aside and work from your notes. 1. Sometimes, instead of giving a talk, you’re simply doing a reading. You probably won’t need notes for that, but practice what you’ll say about yourself (in case there’s no one there to introduce you) and what you might say about your book. Be sure you bring a copy of your book with you, with the pages marked that you’re going to read - the starting point to the ending point. 2. If you are giving a talk, you still need to know what you’ll say to introduce yourself and your book - even if someone is supposed to introduce you. You never know what might happen to delay that person. So be prepared. 3. Now tha...

We spend hour after hour, day after day, month after month, in front of a computer, writing. For the most part, that’s what authors do. We write. Then we get published. And realize we also have to speak … alone, in front of the room. With people looking at us … waiting to be entertained … hoping we’ll tell them the secret to finding an agent or getting published … or expecting us to enthrall them with a plot that will make them happily open their wallets. When what we most want to do is hide in our offices and write. But we have to sell the book - and to sell the book, we have to speak. The good news is: To speak we have to write. We can do that. We’re writers. Preparing for a speech or talk is not the same as writing a book or story, though. 1. You’re not going to write the speech out. If you do, then you’re likely to try to take the written speech to the podium and read it. Reading is for excerpts from your book. 2. If you’re doing a book tour that takes you from city to city, y...

The Internet has facilitated the growth of global communities with people all over the world coming together to interact over specific interests - from role playing games and programming to cooking and parenting - as well as a general need to connect. Perhaps the biggest divider of community is language. If you can read and communicate in a certain language you can join that community; if you can’t you are naturally excluded or you have to build your own community. For those of us who speak English, coming across spelling and grammar idiosyncrasies can often bring back the awareness that we are communicating with others from a totally different culture half-way around the world. It can be tricky for editors to decide whether a “foreign” voice needs to be changed to conform, or retained for its fresh appeal. It’s a fine line that depends on many variables including an "irritation" factor. In fiction writing, dialogue is often spelt with artistic licence (i.e., incorrectly) in ...

I doubt that the imagination can be suppressed. If you truly eradicated it in a child, he would grow up to be an eggplant. ~ Ursula K. Le Guin

First, a bit of backstory: Spot, a curious and rambunctious greyhound, loved to explore the neighborhood. Each time he got out, he roamed farther and farther from home—which explained why he was left behind when his family followed the moving van away from the house and headed a thousand miles across country. When Spot returned, his family was gone. He scratched at the door and looked into the empty house through the big front window. Where was Troy? His young master would be lost without him. The boy was different from other kids, and Spot had gravitated toward him at once. Of course, he didn’t know anything about autism; he just knew Troy needed him. The scene below, pulled from Spot’s search for Troy, is related from three points of view. We’ll begin with omniscient POV. This scene contains 396 words. Spot spied the dogcatcher’s wagon as soon as it turned the corner. Sprinting across the street, he headed for the park halfway down the block. “There he is!” the dri...

Point of view—POV—sounds simple enough. We just have to look at the story from a character’s perspective. However, doing it can be deceptively complex. “Is it really a big deal?” we ask ourselves. “Yes!” screams our inner editor. Why? Our bouncing from one viewpoint to another prevents our readers from building strong relationships with our characters. Consider this example: Lexi turned and stared at the blonde girl striding toward her. What did she want? Whatever it was didn’t really matter. Not after what Mischa had done. Mischa thought Lexi would run when she saw her, but the mousy girl stood her ground. At least she had guts. But then she didn’t know the truth about Jason, did she? We learn what both girls are thinking, but the omniscient point of view doesn’t inspire us to sympathize with one girl, to cheer for the other, or to develop a strong like or dislike for either one. We have no connection. We are distant observers of rather than participants. Now let’s revisit the scene f...

Last month we started looking at some quirky differences between UK English (written English used in the UK and countries like Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa) and US or North American English used in the US, Canada, and countries that do a lot of written communication in US English (such as India, Singapore, Hong Kong). Here are some examples that you shared with us: Marsha Pants: NA = trousers; UK = underwear Rubber: UK = eraser! Fit: UK = slang for sexy or attractive; NA = in good physical condition Specialty (NA) vs Speciality (UK) Artefact (UK) vs Artifact (NA) Star A fanny in American means your bottom but in England that means a lady's private parts. Meg "Color" and "colour" Jon Gibbs When I first moved to the US, I got a strange look from a builder when I told him his partner had popped out for a fag. In England that means you've stepped outside for a cigarette. Apparently it means something quite different over here :) menopausaloldbag (MO...

Effective use of verbs seems to be a little understood concept by many writers, and most of us could profit from a brief (not to be confused with short) review of three verb forms. “Active” verbs denote action by the subject of the sentence. Writers, however, often miss the obvious here, a.k.a. ACTION. This oversight results in potentially powerful sentences that, instead, strike the reader as blah. Let’s consider some examples of strong verbs along with definitive adjectives and enhanced structures that turn a boring, almost empty canvas into a detailed word picture. Boring and uninspired: Mary sat down in the chair. Disappointed and exhausted, she fell asleep. Enhancement 1: Mary sank into the chair. Her descending eyelids encased her tears even before her head found a resting place against its plush back. Enhancement 2: Mary dropped into the chair. Her red-rimmed eyes drifted closed the moment her head burrowed into the corner of its winged back. Enhancement 3: Mary slum...

Many novelists began their writing careers as journalists, and it's easy to see how they took the plunge. Newspaper stories are endless fodder for the imagination. Here's an example from today's paper: Residents at a Briargate home had some unexpected company early today, when a truck with at least four passengers crashed into their house. Police said the Ford D-150 was traveling east on Briargate Boulevard from Rangewood Drive shortly after 2 a.m. when the driver failed to negotiate the intersection at Conifer Drive. The truck crashed into the living room of the home, then plowed on through a dining room area before taking out part of a back wall. Two people inside the home were not injured. Four people in the truck ran from the scene. Police did not release any names. Four people ran from the truck? Doesn't that get your imagination in gear? Barring the obvious conclusion that drugs or alcohol were involved, what wild scenarios can you dream up to explain this behavio...

A man reserves his true and deepest love not for the species of woman in whose company he finds himself electrified and enkindled, but for that one in whose company he may feel tenderly drowsy. ~ George Jean Nathan

Here with the rest of her tips on what she learned by rewriting one of her books is romance author, Ginger Simpson: Some of the other things I noticed that weakened my book, White Heart, Lakota Spirit included: *Overdone words. Starting too many sentences with "Oh," and "Well." Honestly, what was I thinking? Was my editor snoozing? In rewriting and eliminating those it has improved the flow of the story immensely. *Having action and reaction out of sync. Action comes before reaction. Sometimes you have to stop and think about how to word a sentence so you show the reader what happened before you show the character's reaction. You can't have someone jump before the gun fires...well you can if you want, but it isn't correct. *Internal thoughts. This story was fraught with way too many. I've since learned that most publishers prefer having very few internal thoughts. Publishers would rather the writer use dialogue or simply pose questions for the reade...

The Blood Red Pencil is pleased to welcome romance author, Ginger Simpson, for a couple of guest blogs. She originally wrote a version of this for her own blog, and we thought it would be helpful for other writers to read what she experienced in doing a rewrite of an older book. So, without any further comment, here is Ginger: I recently reclaimed the rights to one of my previously published books, White Heart, Lakota Spirit , which I wrote in 2005. During our last camping trip, it was so uncomfortably hot, I stayed in the camper and wanted something to read. I pulled out my copy of Lakota Spirit and read it -- this time as a reader. Wow. I couldn't believe how differently I would have written the book today, so rather than renew my contract, I asked to have the rights revert back to me. I wanted to redo the story and eliminate such mistakes as: *Describing a person's voice before they speak. We all know that tags should follow the dialogue, especially when you're writing...

When you’re editing your manuscript, make at least one read-through out loud. When you read silently, it’s easy to skim through the words. You wrote them. You’ve read them a gazillion times. For at least one read-through, though, slow down and read it aloud word by word and listen to yourself. Reading aloud helps you catch things like words that should be contractions but aren’t. You have a character who’s describing someone else. He says: “He is in his fifties, but you would guess him to be eighty by looks, ten by intelligence. Stairs do not go all the way to the top; know what I mean?” Problem is, this will come across to your readers as sounding almost robotic. It doesn’t flow. It doesn’t sound the way you and I actually talk. We use contractions in our conversations. So you instead change it to: “He’s in his fifties, but you’d guess him to be eighty by looks, ten by intelligence. Stairs don’t go all the way to the top; know what I mean?” A lot of the time, what we type is not wh...

In an earlier post about charting the novel story arc, I advised the writer to watch out for sections where the story's tension level drops and stays low across several pages or, even worse, several chapters. How do you identify passages that slow down the story and perhaps cause an agent or editor to toss your manuscript aside? When viewing the novel as a whole, I use these visual clues to identify scenes or chapters that might need work: 1. Very little white space (not counting the margins) – This indicates that your paragraphs might be too long, or you have an opportunity to break up the narrative with dialogue, if appropriate for the scene. 2. Backstory or flashbacks that last more than one page – If you set these insertions apart from the rest of the book by putting text in italics, or using asterisks or hash marks as separators, they’re easy to spot. Without these clues, however, you’ll need to read carefully and mark the beginning and end of such passages. If too lo...

Today we're visiting with Hank Phillippi Ryan, Agatha award-winning novelist of PRIME TIME, out this month from MIRA Books . I've just finished it, and it's a snappy and fast read! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Think that annoying spam clogging your computer is just so much cyber junk mail? Top notch TV reporter Charlotte McNally suspects it may be much more than that—in fact, she thinks some of it may be carrying secret big money messages to the group of insiders with the key to decode it. Problem is, the last outsider who deciphered the truth now resides in the local morgue. Is this the biggest story of Charlie's life? Or the one that will end it? Charlie's also facing another dilemma: what happens when a top-notch TV reporter is married to her job—but begins to worry that the camera doesn't love her anymore? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dani : Welcome to the BRP, Hank. (have a beer and feel free to belch... kidding.;) Hank : Oh, lovely, Dani. I didn’t know it would...

At least half the mystery novels published violate the law that the solution, once revealed, must seem to be inevitable. ~ Raymond Chandler

I love a good cozy mystery, but not just for the intrigue of discovering the villain. The best ones have a bit of romance to spice things up. I mean a little tiny bit, not searing like so many of Nora Roberts' books. Writing romance is an art in itself, and melding it with mystery takes a really deft hand. But the end result is incomparable, the best of both worlds to me. In a cozy novel, the mystery and romance are just that - cozy - which is about all I can handle. A while back, Shelley Thrasher explained to us how to make things CLICK between characters and amidst the sheets, and you can read about that here . You can also check out Writing Romance by Vanessa Grant for everything a writer needs to make a book sizzle, "from spark to finish". Included is a CD with Excel template to track character history and timelines. I recommend the book to anyone thinking of trying out the romance genre. If that's more than you wanted to know, experience my ideal of the mystery/...

At the Public Safety Writers Association Conference, we also had a panel with a publisher (one who posts here and os my publisher, Billie Johnson), along with a couple of free-lance editors. 1. One of the first tips given was a query letter must be free of typos. 2. Many publishers today expect the author to have a marketing plan that tells how the author is going to promote their book. 3. Having your book edited before you submit is a good idea. It was suggested that the author get recommendations for an editor from someone he/she knows and trusts. Beware of agents who take on a writer, then recommend an editor. 4. The author should be sure to follow the publishers' guidelines for submissions. Not doing that can be what kicks the author's manuscript out without even being considered. The panel on Developing Characters consisted of an editor and several published authors, here are the highlights from that panel: The main character should have flaws and reasons for not wanting t...

Recently, I attended the Public Safety Writers Association's conference where the most wonderful award winning mystery author, Betty Webb, was a keynote speaker and also gave us some marvelous mystery writing tips. Betty told us how not to begin a mystery novel as well as how to do it. A couple of the how not to begin were with the weather and a dream. The first page of the novel is a promise to the reader. It should have action, action, action--a crisis not of the main character's own making, and he or she should solve the problem him or herself. The first page better be the best possible. She said there are two elements to a story: style and structure. She suggested having a dead body on the first page and another in the middle. It is a good idea to have the detective or sleuth be the one to discover the body. Tension should build on every page. A strong arc of action is what sells a book. Only use one or two sentences for back story. Another tip was to circle all the "w...

This week, we welcome novelist, Marilyn Meredith to our blogging team! For my first post, I decided to report on some of the things I learned at the Public Safety Writers Association’s conference. Most of the people who attend are either connected to law enforcement in some way or writing mysteries. The first panel consisted of police officers and a prosecuting attorney who talked about what bothered them with what was portrayed on TV, movies and in books. Several mentioned procedural problems such as using lights and sirens when going to the scene of an ongoing crime, like a bank robbery. Nothing like letting the bad guys know it’s time to scoot. Not knowing the difference between the police and sheriff's departments, parole and probation, and using the terms interchangeably drove another police person nuts. Though it happens often in movies and TV, lieutenants don't go to the crime scene or do the leg work, they take care of the paperwork and procedure. CSI people never walk ...

Don’t Murder Your Mystery By Chris Roerden Publisher: Bella Rosa Books ISBN-13: 978-1933523132 List Price: $17.95 One of the best books I’ve read on writing and self-editing is the Agatha Award Winner for Best Non-Fiction Book, Don’t Murder Your Mystery (24 Fiction-Writing Techniques to Save Your Manuscript from Turning Up . . . D.O.A.). “Enthusiastically recommended” by Midwest Book Review and deemed “a valuable reference work” by mystery author Sara Paretsky, the book has also been expanded into an all-genre version called Don’t Sabotage Your Submission . Roerden begins her book with this prescription precaution: “For long-lasting relief, apply this remedy to drafts that have finished digesting. Attempting to revise while still writing can lead to double vision accompanied by intermittent paralysis of the hands.” By comparing the stages of revision and self-editing to clues during a crime investigation, Roerden uses humor and example to demonstrate why manuscripts are declared dead...

If you're not yet a fan of author, Susan Wittig Albert's blog , head over there today and read a couple of good posts about the use of pseudonyms in writing. She has some interesting stories to tell about her own choices over the years! (Note for later: July 18 & 19, 2009)

The best time for planning a book is while you're doing the dishes.~Agatha Christie

Honestly, you'd think I'd get over this obsession about adverbs, but I just can't help myself, especially when I keep seeing their misuse over and over in books. Like many beginning writers, I used adverbs liberally when first starting out. I thought they were needed to tell the reader how someone was speaking or how they were acting. Then the light bulb went off. "Geesh, Maryann, it's about showing, not telling." About the same time, I was taking a screenwriting class and learned that it was a huge no-no to use an adverb to indicate how a line was to be spoken. For instance: MIKE (loudly) Get the hell out of my room. My creative writing instructor told the class that it's not the writer's place to tell the actor how to speak - that's the director's job. And we can help the actor and director by writing a line of dialogue that conveys the urgency. The words should indicate how the line should be delivered. Once I got that through my thick skull...