No one can avoid family themes when writing a fiction novel. Even if the character is a lone hero fighting in the world. That says something about the absence of family, too, now doesn't it?
I've been thinking about the different ways that family matter drives fiction - characters and their motivations, plot, and backstory. I've been trying to take lessons from the master - Charles Dickens. The importance of family is everywhere in his novels.
I particularly like how Dickens can give you several different examples of family figures or family settings - such as in A Christmas Carol and Great Expectations - and force you to compare and contrast the examples. Dickens also has a gift for creating optimistic endings in which the different families and parallel plots of the story all seem to fall miraculously into place, creating new families that somehow fit together tidily - such as in Nicholas Nickelby.
My goal is to apply this tool of story line creation into my own novel. The trick is to subtly focus on family themes that are interesting and relevant today. Themes such as single-parent families, step families, and families in crisis due to war or economics.
HOWEVER - and this is important - the theme should not overwhelm the book to the point where it becomes a social statement and little more. Dickens, for example again, manages to weave several social themes into each novel at once, while making them entertaining and timeless. They are timeless enough that the world still makes movies of Dickens novels... and remakes them and remakes them.
Dickens is, of course, known for his social statements in his novels. But the point is that his novels are fiction based on reality. People are entertained by the fiction - the story - they are not interested in reading a novel-length sermon or diatribe on social failings.
So, sum up. Create relevant family themes, make them timeless, and resolve (or don't resolve) family conflict in a way that drives home the ultimate message you want readers to take away.
What else?
Oh yes. Keep your audience in mind. (But that applies to everything in writing.)
Also, be convincing. If you can't write from personal experience, borrow from others' people experience by asking them to let you swim around in their head (imagining Dumbledore's pensieve here). Apply a lot of imagination to the situation and allow the characters to react honestly.
There. Now I guess I'm ready to start putting it into practice.
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Thursday, November 17, 2011
About a Prologue
To prologue or not to prologue?
I like writing prologues myself. I think they are interesting, they draw you into the book, and they introduce a conflict.
However, I have heard that many agents and editors will not even read the prologue. Some of them are convinced that prologues are useless and so they will rip it out of the book without reading it and proceed to chapter 1. There is an obvious and simple solution to this issue:
Call the prologue "Chapter 1."
I have written a prologue that I would like to make good on my promise to you by posting a sneak peak of it; however, since I hope to publish it one day under my name, I am not so sure that I want to post it online for anybody to copy and paste. I am working on making it into a PDF file that I will share with you.
Speaking of "starts," I have settled on a name for my main character: Sidney. I would give you her last name to be complete, but I'm going to wait for that part. Would J. K. Rowling have told you Harry Potter's full name before publishing the book?
I tried searching baby naming sites for meanings of names. Particularly for a meaning that would fit with my character. However, "Sidney"'s meanings are not too exotic:
"Sidney" could either mean 1) derived from "Saint Denis" in France, or 2) "wide meadow".
It just goes to show that sometimes you pick a name for no other reason than you like the way it sounds. I thought it sounded simple but pretty, athletic (it has actually been used as boy's name), and it spawns a number of possible nicknames.
It's a familiar enough name that people can relate to it and remember it, but it is not over-used either.
What do you think? Like it, hate it, have any suggestions? Let me hear from you.
I like writing prologues myself. I think they are interesting, they draw you into the book, and they introduce a conflict.
However, I have heard that many agents and editors will not even read the prologue. Some of them are convinced that prologues are useless and so they will rip it out of the book without reading it and proceed to chapter 1. There is an obvious and simple solution to this issue:
Call the prologue "Chapter 1."
I have written a prologue that I would like to make good on my promise to you by posting a sneak peak of it; however, since I hope to publish it one day under my name, I am not so sure that I want to post it online for anybody to copy and paste. I am working on making it into a PDF file that I will share with you.
Speaking of "starts," I have settled on a name for my main character: Sidney. I would give you her last name to be complete, but I'm going to wait for that part. Would J. K. Rowling have told you Harry Potter's full name before publishing the book?
I tried searching baby naming sites for meanings of names. Particularly for a meaning that would fit with my character. However, "Sidney"'s meanings are not too exotic:
"Sidney" could either mean 1) derived from "Saint Denis" in France, or 2) "wide meadow".
It just goes to show that sometimes you pick a name for no other reason than you like the way it sounds. I thought it sounded simple but pretty, athletic (it has actually been used as boy's name), and it spawns a number of possible nicknames.
It's a familiar enough name that people can relate to it and remember it, but it is not over-used either.
What do you think? Like it, hate it, have any suggestions? Let me hear from you.
Friday, November 11, 2011
11 Days, 11 Writing Tips, and 11 articles
Today is 11/11/11, and it's a busy day.
11 Days In
So far I am doing pretty good with my goal of writing every day. I have missed two days this month of writing "creatively" for 30 minutes but it was usually because I had a busy day of writing my freelance articles. I have written a couple of scenes for my book, in no particular order, which I have been reassured is okay.
Maybe I will post a sneak peak of a scene from my novel-in-progress in some future post.
11 Reasons to Keep Going
This morning I found this link:
It's very good and I will probably refer to it again. I often need reminders to stick to my goals and to just keep writing. I think the writing muses reward writers for working hard even when we feel uninspired. I had a music teacher tell me once that "'People say I'm lucky. The harder I work, the luckier I get.' So keep practicing." Or something to that effect.
11 Items for Today
For now, I have a busy day of writing freelance articles and then squeezing in my 30 minutes of creative writing. The good news is that I have my most difficult freelance articles done for the week and my assignments today should be fairly... manageable.
I am starting to feel some excitement when I think about my book and look forward to writing it each day. That's a good sign. I think.
Does anyone else have a connection to "11" today? Have you had a sign from the universe that 11 is your magic number?
Have a happy day of eleven!
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Why the Title?
After much deliberation (believe me), I decided to title my blog "I write therefore I am." Maybe you have heard a similiar statement before.
Writing is art, architecture, and history. It is what we are remembered by and how our lives and our existence are preserved. Because I write - in my journal, on my blogs, in poems, and in fictional stories - I am therefore preserving bits and pieces of myself.
Of course I am not the only one that does this. But I thought of it first. :)
So why isn't the title, "I am therefore I write"? It could be; and that, too, would be an interesting statement.
Most, if not all, human beings feel compelled to leave evidence of their existence through whatever means they can. For an increasing number of people, their choice of self evidence is writing. I won't give you the stats on the growing number of bloggers, but I know it's a positive number.
Not all people, however, choose to express themselves by writing. They create other things, like paintings, buildings, gardens, or... other people.
My primary choice of self preservation is writing. So, not everyone who exists writes, but those who write... exist. Not just currently, but as long as their writing does.
Maybe that's one of the reasons why I've chosen words as my primary means of leaving evidence of myself - because it will last (at least I hope so). Maybe it's because I am best at creating things with words - people, situations, beauty, mystery, color, sensation, conflict. I do it with words, and I revel when the results of my words seem to provide as many answers as they do introduce new mystery into the world.
That's part of the fun, too, I guess. I cannot just give my descendants a journal of letters addressed to them saying, "This is how you will remember me. The End." I have got to keep those people guessing and wondering and puzzling over my true "self"ness.
I like to be mysterious. And more often than not, the subconscious ideas that find their way through my writing say a lot more about me than I can ever decipher or communicate consciously.
Writing is art, architecture, and history. It is what we are remembered by and how our lives and our existence are preserved. Because I write - in my journal, on my blogs, in poems, and in fictional stories - I am therefore preserving bits and pieces of myself.
Of course I am not the only one that does this. But I thought of it first. :)
So why isn't the title, "I am therefore I write"? It could be; and that, too, would be an interesting statement.
Most, if not all, human beings feel compelled to leave evidence of their existence through whatever means they can. For an increasing number of people, their choice of self evidence is writing. I won't give you the stats on the growing number of bloggers, but I know it's a positive number.
Not all people, however, choose to express themselves by writing. They create other things, like paintings, buildings, gardens, or... other people.
My primary choice of self preservation is writing. So, not everyone who exists writes, but those who write... exist. Not just currently, but as long as their writing does.
That's part of the fun, too, I guess. I cannot just give my descendants a journal of letters addressed to them saying, "This is how you will remember me. The End." I have got to keep those people guessing and wondering and puzzling over my true "self"ness.
I like to be mysterious. And more often than not, the subconscious ideas that find their way through my writing say a lot more about me than I can ever decipher or communicate consciously.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Naming Characters
I am stuck.
What a great sign this is.
How am I going to write a whole novel when my brain can't seem to produce a single scene without knowing the characters' names?
I know that naming your characters is important, because the name gives the reader the first impression about the character and automatically sets up some assumptions in your mind. Are they tall, short, confident, shy, funny, serious, unique, or approachable?
When I was a teenager I would write short stories just for fun and it never seemed to be a major problem to pick the characters' names. I simply picked names I liked. That's simpler than it sounds, because names I liked weren't always great names.
For example, when I started writing an adventure-fantasy type story about a girl who could talk to fairies and was looking for her real father, I intended to come up with entirely unique, made-up names. My protagonist's name was Sanalei, and the fairy queen she met up with along the paint was Laiandrea. Do you see my problem?
First, how do you pronounce those names and do I really want to be forced to create a pronounciation guide and glossary to my book?
Second, what a mouthful!
Thirdly, what a whole lot of work coming up with 100% original syllables for three- and four-syllable-long names.
I never finished that "book," althought I am incorporating some of the same ideas into my new effort.
I think the protagonist in my very first book will be a girl. It's just a starting point; any starting point. I am a girl, I understand girl emotions, I can write from a perspective of a girl.
So, a girl it is.
Also, I am using the idea of various Brothers Grimm folk tales (found in this excellent, comprehensive Christmas book from my husband) where a girl/princess is displaced from one or more of her parents at birth and undergoes a journey to discover who she really is. Annnnnd it wouldn't hurt if she encounters a love interest along the way. Annnnnd there will be magic, adventure, romance, friendship, violence, fear...
Do I sound like I'm trying too hard to sell it?
In truth, it has to have all of those factors if I'm even going to stay interested in writing it. My sort of unspoken (but now written) rule of writing a novel is: If I'm not interested in writing it, how can I expect anyone else to be interested enough to read it?
Does anyone want to choose a name for my heroine? I've gone to babynamesworld.com, and I've searched for names by first letter, by origin, and by meaning. Origin and meaning aren't quite as important to me as simply the sound and feel of the name.
(I am also a poet, after all, who basks in the sound and feel of words simply for the sake of it.)
I need a name that is feminine, but strong. Elegant enough for a princess but simple enough for a warrior. A name familiar enough to belong to someone alive today and that can be shortened into a nickname.
So far I've considered first names like Valerie, Alicia, Natalie, Victoria, Melanie, Audrey, Regina. But none of them have hit me over the head with a crow bar yet and screamed, "It's me, you idiot!"
Also, there's still the last name to consider. Bother.
Any suggestions?
What a great sign this is.
How am I going to write a whole novel when my brain can't seem to produce a single scene without knowing the characters' names?
I know that naming your characters is important, because the name gives the reader the first impression about the character and automatically sets up some assumptions in your mind. Are they tall, short, confident, shy, funny, serious, unique, or approachable?
When I was a teenager I would write short stories just for fun and it never seemed to be a major problem to pick the characters' names. I simply picked names I liked. That's simpler than it sounds, because names I liked weren't always great names.
For example, when I started writing an adventure-fantasy type story about a girl who could talk to fairies and was looking for her real father, I intended to come up with entirely unique, made-up names. My protagonist's name was Sanalei, and the fairy queen she met up with along the paint was Laiandrea. Do you see my problem?
First, how do you pronounce those names and do I really want to be forced to create a pronounciation guide and glossary to my book?
Second, what a mouthful!
Thirdly, what a whole lot of work coming up with 100% original syllables for three- and four-syllable-long names.
I never finished that "book," althought I am incorporating some of the same ideas into my new effort.
I think the protagonist in my very first book will be a girl. It's just a starting point; any starting point. I am a girl, I understand girl emotions, I can write from a perspective of a girl.
So, a girl it is.
Also, I am using the idea of various Brothers Grimm folk tales (found in this excellent, comprehensive Christmas book from my husband) where a girl/princess is displaced from one or more of her parents at birth and undergoes a journey to discover who she really is. Annnnnd it wouldn't hurt if she encounters a love interest along the way. Annnnnd there will be magic, adventure, romance, friendship, violence, fear...Do I sound like I'm trying too hard to sell it?
In truth, it has to have all of those factors if I'm even going to stay interested in writing it. My sort of unspoken (but now written) rule of writing a novel is: If I'm not interested in writing it, how can I expect anyone else to be interested enough to read it?
Does anyone want to choose a name for my heroine? I've gone to babynamesworld.com, and I've searched for names by first letter, by origin, and by meaning. Origin and meaning aren't quite as important to me as simply the sound and feel of the name.
(I am also a poet, after all, who basks in the sound and feel of words simply for the sake of it.)
I need a name that is feminine, but strong. Elegant enough for a princess but simple enough for a warrior. A name familiar enough to belong to someone alive today and that can be shortened into a nickname.
So far I've considered first names like Valerie, Alicia, Natalie, Victoria, Melanie, Audrey, Regina. But none of them have hit me over the head with a crow bar yet and screamed, "It's me, you idiot!"
Also, there's still the last name to consider. Bother.
Any suggestions?
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