Month: April 2020

How to Tell and End a Story

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In this extra, I’m going to share with you part of a presentation that I gave to a local writers group almost five years ago. I’ve covered most of the session in previous posts about Story Elements (Characters, Plot, Theme, Action & Solution, Setting), but now we’re going to discuss the how of getting your story told…and how you’ll aim to end it.

Telling Your Story

It’s important to include specific items in your story, but avoid anything that’s irrelevant. Make certain anything you include are telling details. Use something that means something to the story or the character. The best way to approach the process is to visualise your story as a series of images (almost as if it’s already been made into a movie), because that’s how the reader will experience it. That also makes it easier to reveal only what can be seen. One of the problems with pictures is showing emotions—you can tell the reader that the character is mad, but we want the reader to feel the anger, so how do we do that?

Think about an emotion, then remember a time when you felt that way. Why did you feel that particular sensation? That is what you need to put in your story. If you want to show a couple in love, show them walking hand in hand. If you have a mother who is proud of her child, show her smiling at the burnt toast next to her breakfast in bed. Surprise can be shown by focusing in on the shattered glass lying at the wife’s feet as the husband steps through the door. When you want to show that someone is sad, describe the motionless puppy curled up in the box next to their bed. Fear can be expressed by portraying a rabid dog growling as he slowly advances.

Use the Senses

Remember to involve the senses…all of them. Use real images your readers can visualise—colours, sounds, lights, flavours, smells. Don’t tell them…let them feel the rough stair railing as they cautiously ascend to the attic, let them hear the siren quickly approaching the house that has flames billowing from every window, let them squint into the fog to see the school bus approaching the train crossing, let them smell the coffee gently warming over the campfire surrounded by their friends, let them shudder as they taste the lemon squeezings dripping down their fingers onto the freshly caught salmon. You want to invite your readers into the story, so make it real for them.

Use concrete details—no theories or abstractions here. Don’t tell them he had a dirty shirt…show them the grease stains and coffee dribbles on the cloth so tightly stretched across his belly that it’s starting to split. Don’t tell them that the truck carried some cargo…show them the green truck speeding down the dirt road, filled with soldiers sitting around the large wooden crate. Don’t tell them that betrayal is terrible…show them the smirk on your best friend’s face as he deliberately points you out to the waiting policemen. Don’t tell them that the hero is afraid…show them the hesitation as he feels sweat roll down his ribcage when he steps off the sidewalk to approach the car full of hoodlums.

Ending Your Story

As you approach the ending, remember the Transformation that has taken place in the Hero. He must emerge from his ordeal changed…significantly (for the better…we hope, but not necessarily). There are different styles of endings…and you’ve probably seen most of them. Disney stories all seem to end “and they lived happily ever after.” Benjamin Franklin’s stories usually end “and from this we can see…” Aesop ends his stories with “and the moral is…” All different, but all good, depending on what the author wants the reader to learn from this story. You might want to decide what you want this lesson to be early on in the writing process—write it on a big piece of paper and hang over your writing area.

  • Better safe than sorry
  • Be friends with those you don’t like
  • Don’t judge by appearances
  • The dark path will hold you in control
  • Slow and steady wins the race
  • Overconfidence is weakness
  • Evil deserves no aid

No matter which ending style you decide to use for your story, remember that the Hero has changed, the world is different, ‘normal’ is not what it was before, and what lesson you had in mind is now clear to the characters and reader alike. All must adapt to the new now and move on…in spite of what has transpired.

Character Sheets

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Whether you’ve played D&D or not, I assume you’ve at least heard of it. If you’re unfamiliar with how it works, let me explain the connection to writing. In the game Dungeons and Dragons, players represent characters in an ongoing story built over time. To keep track of the details of each character, the players use a sheet with relevant info that they can refer to as they play. That technique seems to work well for them…and it will for you, too.

Trying to keep track of too many little details as you write can sometimes make the difference between a novel that works and one that doesn’t. The big issue is consistency. If one of your characters has blue eyes at the beginning of the book, but then later he has green eyes, the reader will be confused (as well he should). The Main Character isn’t usually the problem…it’s all those little guys that keep getting mixed up.

How Much Info is Needed?

The extent to which you collect and record info will depend on how long your piece is…and which characters you are documenting. If Flash Fiction (~100 words up to 1000), all you’ll have time for is the basic. For a Short Story (5000 to 10,000 words), you’ll need a bit more info. Novellas (10,000 to 40,000 words) and Novels (80,000 up to 100,000 or more depending on genre) will demand the greatest level of detail. Finally, if you are writing a series of stories, you’ll definitely need some way to keep track of more than just characters.

For central characters consider a full sheet of info, but for peripheral characters who just walk on, say their lines, and disappear, you may be able to have a half dozen on a single sheet. Let’s list a few of the items you’ll need:

  • Flash Fiction
    • Name, age, height, weight, body type, hair colour and style, complexion
  • Short Stories
    • All the above and…
    • Backstory, mannerisms (tics), identifying features (tattoos, scars, etc.)
  • Novellas and Novels
    • All the above and…
    • Personality traits, needs, wants, family ties, interests and hobbies, favourites (food, colour, sayings), friend connections (people and animals), education, religion
    • Motivations, obstacles, conflict resolution techniques, prejudices, philosophy on life, family life
    • Timeline of life, covering major events
    • Descriptive summary (2 to 3 pgphs)
  • Book Series
    • Along with complete details for most characters, you’ll also need to note down locations, culture and society, level of technology, and any elements specific to your story or genre

You’ll notice that minor things such as clothing are not listed. That’s because those items will change throughout the story (unless it’s a very short one). Styles of clothing may be listed to match that character’s personality, but nothing in particular

How Do I Keep It All Together?

Here is where a D&D type character sheet comes in handy. Although similar, character sheets for writing focus more on the information listed above, rather than gaming stats. A simple one would have the character’s name at the top, space for a picture (any picture found in a magazine that inspires you as you create the character), and relevant items listed on the rest of the sheet. Keep the sheets handy as you write, so when some aspect of a character comes up in the writing, you can quickly grab your sheets and make certain to use the correct characteristic.

Maintaining character sheets will get easier with time. Once you’ve made a few, and determined just what you need to help with your style of writing, you can create blank forms to use for future characters. Having a binder with all the sheets grouped by story will also allow you to take existing characters, copy their sheet, then modify them to save time when you need new characters in new stories. You can have a whole slew of extras just sitting around waiting to be called into play.

Sometimes just thinking about the lists above will bring up ideas that you hadn’t even considered before. That’s good, as it will help you define your characters. In fact, some authors intentionally create Character Sheets as a way to brainstorm new ideas about their characters. As you are going over the list, follow any ideas that come to you—dive down the rabbit hole with full abandon, possibly creating an entire scene from a character’s backstory.

“Remember: Plot is no more than footprints left in the snow after your characters have run by on their way to incredible destinations.”
—Ray Bradbury in Zen in the Art of Writing (1990)

Using the Character Sheet

In spite of taking all that time to assemble such a wealth of knowledge, remember that you will actually use very little of it in the story itself. Merely noting down these details will firm up who your characters are…in your mind. You’ll have an in-depth awareness of them, so you’ll know how they would react in any given situation…but you never need to share that info with the reader.

As an extension of the sheet, some folks recommend using a list personality profile questions to find out who your characters are. If you do that, be careful to not take it too far. Some of those lists have over 300 questions, but you certainly don’t need to answer them all to make your characters full and rounded. If you do decide to use a list of questions, don’t do it until you already have a pretty good idea of who your character is. Those questions can get into such detail, but if you don’t have the basics down first, you’ll just be adding skin to a non-existent skeleton.

Using Styles

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One of our readers recently pointed out that although we mention in a couple places about how to access style shortcuts, we never really discuss just what, or how important, Styles are, so we’re going to rectify that right now. In Word (and many other writing programs), paragraphs can be set to specific styles…allowing for consistent appearance. The best thing about using styles properly is that if you change a style, it changes all paragraphs of the same style instantaneously…saving you from having to search out and change each one manually.

Seeing Styles

Before you can adequately use styles, you need to be able to see them. Two places where Styles become visible and useful are the Navigation Pane and the Style Area Pane (only in Draft or Outline). Turn on the Navigation Pane by selecting the View Tab, and in the Show Group, check the Navigation Pane box. You should now be able to see it to the left of everything. It may not show much, unless your document is already using styles. The Heading Styles listed in the Navigation Pane can be individually expanded or collapsed by using the small triangles or you can globally show headings of any level by Right-Clicking and choosing Show Heading Levels. That will show the level you pick and any higher.

Accessing the Style Area Pane is more involved. First click on the blue File tab, then select Options (near the bottom). Once there, click on Advanced and scroll down to the Display section. There you’ll find the “Style area pane width in Draft and Outline views:” Set it to a number between 0.5 and 0.75. You can adjust it later, but you need to be able to see it before you can move it around. Click OK to make it happen. Now, when you’re in Draft View (Ctrl-Alt-N) or Outline View (Ctrl-Alt-O), you’ll see the style name for each pgph in a column to the left of the content. Now you can drag the vertical line next to it to adjust the width.

Applying Styles

The most common styles are the built-in Heading Styles. Heading 1 through Heading 9 are each a subheading of the proceeding one, but you can create custom styles—in fact, I recommend it. My typical novel file has styles named Chap Num, Chap Name, etc. I set them up so that when I type a Chapter Number, the next paragraph is automatically Chapter Name, and Body follows next. When I start a new chapter, I just type, no thinking, no formatting, no issues.

You can use any of the styles shown in the Home Tab, but sometimes you don’t want any of those. Good news: You can add to or remove styles in that list. I suggest you remove the ones you aren’t going to use and add in any custom ones you’ve created.

Creating new styles is easy enough…just make formatting changes to a paragraph, then Right-Click, point to Styles ►, and choose Save Selection as New Quick Style… Then give it an appropriate name, and you’re ready to go. Once you have a few styles defined, changing the style of any given paragraph is straightforward. Just click in the paragraph, then click the appropriate Style in the Home Tab. If you’re using the Heading 1, 2, or 3 Styles, you can apply them with a quickie key press: Ctrl-Alt-1, 2, or 3. (Apparently they decided that the other heading styles aren’t used often enough to warrant a shortcut.)

In your haste to be stylish, be careful to not create too many. It defeats the purpose if you have a different style for everything, but do style all the major sections appropriately. It will help you keep focused on your content when the Navigation Pane shows your headings—you can see right where you are in the overall document.

Use Style

Now that you can see, apply, and create your own styles, you need to remember to use them. If you save a blank file with all your styles in it, you can use it as a template whenever you’re starting up a new project. Have fun!

Creating an Author Website

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There are only a few things that you must do in the writing world…and even fewer that everyone agrees on, but if you plan to actually sell your book to folks you don’t know, you’re going to have to let them know it exists. To do that, you’re going to need a website where you can promote your wonderful works, call it your ‘home’ on the Internet—a place to focus your marketing efforts.

What to Name Your Site

Only a few things seem to be required no matter who you ask. The first, and most important one, is getting a Domain Name that matches your Author Name. If the name on the cover of your books doesn’t guide folks to your site, then most likely, they’ll never find you. If you find your given name is too common…or matches someone else (search the web to see who comes up), you may have to opt for a pen name, a nom de plume, a pseudonym. Many famous authors have chosen to use a different name for their writing to hide who they are. For example if they already have a non-fiction following and are now branching out into fiction (Charles Dodgson wrote as Lewis Carroll) or if they are writing an exposé and want to remain safe from persecution (Steven Billy Mitchell used the pseudonym Andy McNab to hide his connection to a failed military mission).

Other reasons to pick a new name is that your given name may not feel right for the topic you’re writing. Pearl Gray didn’t feel his name fit the western genre that he wrote, so he dropped his first name and changed the spelling of his last name to become Zane Grey. Then there are the gender issues where some female writers will hide their gender with either a pseudonym (like Alice B. Sheldon who published under James Tiptree, Jr.) or just initials (such as D. C. Fontana, J. D. Robb, and of course J. K. Rowling). Another reason may be that you’re trying out a new genre and you don’t want to confuse your readers. For example, Isaac Asimov used the name Paul French for a series of juvenile science fiction that didn’t fit into the rest of his writing.

What to Put on Your Site

The first thing visitors should see is your latest book (you do have more than one by now, right?). They aren’t there to find out about you…they want something to read, so show them what you have. As they scroll, they should find your other books, either listed vertically or just a horizontal row of covers. Each one should have a short blurb and should link to a page with more details (and a purchase link).

If you have a Mailing List, you could ask them to sign up for it…offer them some kind of reward for doing so…maybe the beginning of a new story or a short that hasn’t been published or a newsletter that will let them know what’s going on with you. You want to keep them informed and get some kind of response from them. A Call to Action is required if you’re going to get any good out of this site.

Next on the list should be your events page. You’ll want them to find you, either on line or live at a book signing or author promotion. If you team up with other authors in your local area, you could find a bookstore where you can all set up tables to sell signed copies of your book. That’s always appreciated by your readers.

Picture of Westley in Victorian outfitThe last thing every author site should have is the About the Author page. That’s where you put your contact info (via a form instead of publishing your email address). That makes you seem more approachable. Any links to social media would be good, too. And don’t forget a good picture (unless you’re in hiding!) like the one of me to the right. Although it’s a bit old, I really like this shot—it has the right attitude.  🙂

Share Your Page

That just about covers all the needed items. If you have other ideas, go ahead and add them in…after you’ve gotten the basics. Send us the site address, so we can see how you’re doing. We might just feature you and your work in a future posting!

Head Hopping

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Although Head Hopping sounds as if it could be some kind of children’s game, in writing, it’s a problem many newbie authors aren’t even aware of—despite being a logical mistake. After all, as he is creating his characters, he is all of them, in all their heads, feeling for all of them. He may balk at trying to keep in just one character’s view, because he then runs into the difficulty of letting the Reader know what the bad guy is planning—without letting the MC know. Some editors are rather touchy about POV slips, and some even judge it to be an amateurish mistake, so many stories come back from critique all marked up: Head Hopping. Once you’ve become serious about writing, you’ll probably discover that, other than Show Don’t Tell, you hear mentions of Head Hopping often…and wonder what it is.

Well, Head Hopping is related to Point of View—the perspective of the character through whose eyes and ears we experience the story. If the story suddenly switches from one character’s viewpoint to another, it disrupts the flow of the story…confusing readers, making them stop to figure out where they are. That means we need to understand just what Point of View is.

What is POV?

We have a post dedicated to POV, so here we are just going to hit the high points. First Person—in the head of the MC. Second Person—in your own head. Third Person Limited—in no one’s head…just a Fly on the Wall. Whatever the fly sees, the reader sees…whatever the fly hears, the reader hears—only in that room, at that time—no internal thoughts or emotions at all, just faces scrunched up or tears running down cheeks.

Third Person Omniscient—in everyone’s head, but only from a distance. We lose the opportunity to know any of the characters up close. The Omniscient Narrator, far removed from the story, sees all, knows all, and can report on the thoughts and emotions of anyone, but we don’t get to hear those thoughts or feel those emotions from the characters themselves. This technique avoids head hopping by taking a bird’s eye view, removing the reader from the story, from the action, from the characters—not telling the story from any one character’s perspective, rather from the perspective of some unidentified, all-knowing, massive, floating entity who is not even involved in the story. In some stories that may work, but most readers want to be in the action (picturing themselves as the characters…you know, escapism).

So, Where’s The Problem?

Most of the levels of POV are safe from Head Hopping. The issue only pops up when we use Third Person Close. In that POV, we sit on a character’s shoulder…listening to his thoughts, feeling his emotions, seeing the world through his eyes. Now although that’s a fine and dandy way to pull a reader into a story, because you are actually in his head, you can’t be in anyone else’s. In most cases, that’s satisfactory. The only difficulty is when you have some information that the POV character doesn’t have or isn’t supposed to have. How do you get that information to the reader?… Or do you?

Sometimes a lack of information is a good thing. Suspense can keep the reader interested, and instead of giving everything away, you can let the Reader (and the MC) figure things out for themselves based on what has been revealed—a technique known as Sub Text. Just remember that bouncing around in multiple points of view can not only be confusing to the reader, but also kick them out of the story, reminding them that they are reading something…rather than being there. As with an Omniscient Narrator, the reader can’t be in the story, experiencing it first-hand. The head hopping prevents them from suspending their disbelief. Let your readers become part of your story—keep them happy. Keep the POV tight, and your readers will develop a strong, emotional connection to the character…unbroken by lazy writing—they’ll care about him and what happens to him.

Revealing Information

Sometimes, there are things happening out of the view of the POV character, but he needs to know about them. The quick and easy way to handle this situation is to have a Witness. Some other character can come running up and tell the MC all about what just happened down the street, around the corner, in the building. If the information isn’t urgent, then finding out later may work, via a news article or a message.

On the other hand, you may have some information that the MC isn’t supposed to know (such as what the bad guy is doing). The only way to reveal that info to the reader is by switching to a new POV…and that can be done only at a break—a section break, a chapter break, or a scene break (don’t forget to use *** to show a change in location, time, or POV).

Avoid Head Hopping

When you list out your scenes and their purpose, always include the POV character…the character who has the most to gain or lose in that scene. That will also allow you to see whether all your key characters are getting a turn at presenting the story. Then, just start the scene with their name and write on!