Westley

Product Placement

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If you get this comment on your ms, it’s because you’ve included some detail that doesn’t seem appropriate. If you keep Chekhov’s Gun in mind, this shouldn’t be a worry, but too often we’ve seen authors who don’t even realise they are doing it. We hope to help those authors, as well.

There are two kinds of product placement: Intentional and Unintentional. The biggest concern is with Intentional…but the slipperiest is Unintentional, so we’ll tackle that first.

Unintentional Product Placement

Too often, we’ve seen the use of informal or slang language inadvertently drop in product names. Over all, there aren’t any real problems with casual speech, especially if your characters are talking, but in some cases, it can cause careless name dropping.

It tends to happen when trademarked names get used in the generic, such as ‘Kleenex®’ instead of ‘tissue’, or ‘Clorox®’ instead of ‘bleach’. If you’re uncertain whether a name you’ve been using for years is in fact a trademarked name, just do a web search and see how it’s used. If you really want to dig into it, check out the US Patent and Trademark Office <uspto.gov> to see how the term is properly used.

In fact, this problem is so wide spread that most folks don’t even realise they are doing it. One time, we had an author who, because of where he was brought up, thought that all refrigerators were named Frigidaire, so every time he went to put the milk away, he’d say, “I’ll go put it in the Frigidaire”, even if it was actually a GE, Whirlpool, Samsung, Kenmore, Maytag or some other brand. Apparently his entire family…back a dozen generations…always called the ice box a Frigidaire, and he didn’t see anything wrong with that.

In casual conversation…in real life…that level of inaccuracy isn’t really an issue (though it may annoy some), but when you want to share your words with the world, you should be more precise and less colloquial. Folks from other parts of the world may not know that Frigidaire is a popular brand of refrigerator…because where they are from, it isn’t.

Intentional Product Placement

The real concern is when authors feel they just have to specify an exact brand or model of some object in their story, probably because they have a specific one in mind or they have one right at hand to look at. If some particular detail is significant in your story, you will include that…but just that, not the particular brand name. In the examples below, you’ll see that mentioning someone speed shifting by smashing the accelerator to the floor in the midst of a shift would be important, but not the name on the outside of the car. Whether someone has to stop to reload a cylinder or just slams in a new magazine would have a definite effect on the action, but the make of the gun would not.

Just remember…the operation of an item is important, not what’s printed on it. You’ll find that the precise make or model of an item doesn’t really add much to the story…as long as you include how the characters have to deal with it. Try to picture the item in the hands of your characters…what do they do with it? How do they make it work? What special features do they have to deal with? That’s what you need to include.

Examples

Here’s a table listing various events that could be happening in your story. We consider how unimportant brand might be…but how important a piece of telling detail might be.

If… It doesn’t matter if it’s a… But it does make a difference if it’s a…
The good guy is
 escaping in a car		 Ford or
 Chevy		 Manual or
 Automatic
The girlfriend is
 putting on makeup		 Revlon or
 Sephora		 Old Lady Burgundy or
 Hot Young Thing Scarlet
The bad guy is
 shooting people		 Colt or
 Remington		 Revolver or
 automatic pistol
The mother is
 going shopping		 Macy’s or
 Target		 Mall full of people or
 an almost abandoned strip
 mall in the bad part of town
The chef is
 slicing tomatoes		 Victorinox or
 Kiwi		 Fillet or
 cleaver
The mentor is
 checking his watch		 Rolex or
 Seiko		 Digital or
 analogue
The brother is
 making a sandwich		 Wonder bread or
 Killer Dave’s		 Whole wheat or
 sourdough
The maid is
 vacuuming		 Hoover or
 Kirby		 Manual or
 electric
The son is
 playing a video game		 Samsung or
 Nintendo		 Phone or
 console

As you can see, the relevant detail may need to be mentioned…or at least alluded to. Stopping to think about that detail may give you an opportunity to include even more descriptions that help the reader see the scene.

Sponsors

On the other hand, if you manage to get Victorinox or Macy’s or Colt to fund your writing, then of course, you need to include their name in your story. If you want, you can even have the good guy use a Colt while the bad guy uses a Remington. That would be a plus for the one and a minus for the other, a technique that’s been used before. In fact, Apple doesn’t mind if their products are visible on the big screen…as long as none of the bad guys have any!

Plotter vs. Pantser

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As many of you know, there are two ways to approach writing: as a Plotter or a Pantser. Plotters like to plan out the entire story before they ever start writing, whereas Pantsers prefer to start writing before they even think about what’s going to happen. Both methods can work, though we feel that there are issues with both.

From my background with programming computers, I am familiar with similar approaches to writing code, known as Top-Down and Bottom-Up. We’ll compare and contrast the two methods.

Plotters or Top-Down

In Top-Down programming, the programmer states the justification for the program as succinctly as possible, identifying all the major functions needed. The fact that those functions are still unwritten isn’t an issue…all we are doing at this step is naming them…describing what they will do comes later. Using the Plotter method in writing, the entire novel is also captured in a few sentences, known as the Logline, and we already know the names of the major ‘functions’ we need: the Five Plot Points.

In our program, now that we’ve named the major functions, we take each one and describe in detail what it is supposed to do, including identifying any other functions it may need to call. Similarly, keeping the Logline in mind, we expand each of the Plot Points into a few short paragraphs.

In programming, we then recursively build each of the newly identified functions…that means that if we need more functions inside the other functions, we just keep identifying…then defining…deeper and deeper until we are down to basic commands. In writing, we do the same thing: we take the big picture of each Plot Point and create the three acts, describing the action in more and more detail. Those acts are then spread out across various chapters, each with short sketches of what is to occur. Then we take those chapters and break them down into Scenes and Sequels, which are then in turn broken down to their individual Goals, Conflicts, and Disasters, and Reactions, Dilemmas, and Choices, finally arriving at the basic parts of writing.

Each step takes something big and progressively breaks it into smaller pieces, until we have all the details worked out. That’s why this method is also known as Stepwise Refinement.

Positive and Negative Points

  • You know where you’re going…all you need to do is figure out how to get there.
  • Because you don’t have to work on it beginning to end, you can choose which branch to detail next.
  • You have a Logline to guide you, so you know what’s appropriate in each scene.
  • You have to do a lot of work before you have anything you can show to others for critique, and that critique may suggest significant changes.
  • Because you aren’t necessarily writing straight through, some revelation at the end may change the beginning or vice versa.
  •  If a change, no matter how slight, is made to the upper level of the program or the novel, you will need to rewrite much of it to filter that change down through the rest of the project, often resulting in scenes that no longer belong. (Save them for the next project!)

Pantsers or Bottom-Up

In a Bottom-Up design, the programmer creates some simple functions with basic commands, then combines those functions to make more complicated ones…combining again and again until we have a complete program. We just link each newly created function with others, calling them in the right order, to create a new design. It’s similar to building with Legos: We assemble basic blocks to make walls, floors, and people…then put those together to build a house with occupants. The problem sometimes is in matching the walls to each other or to the floors. Occasionally we have to slightly dismantle the structures we already have, fitting them back together as the design progresses.

In both cases, we have a bunch of pre-made pieces, and just stick them together…but it’s how we put them together makes all the difference.

In writing, many Pantsers already have separate scenes they’ve created years ago…and floating around in a binder or two. Characters may exist as well, even with entire Character Sheets previously filled out. As with the Legos, trying to link some of those isolated scenes may be difficult, as the ending of one may not quite match up with the beginning of the next…so you’ll need to customise one or the other to fit. Also, some of those characters may only be close to what we need, so they, too, may need some tweaking.

Often there is no overarching goal, no Logline, so the storyline has no place to aim, resulting in Plot Points that all point in different directions.

The Good and the Bad

  • You already have pieces (both characters and scenes) already sitting around just waiting to be used.
  • Your characters have been living in your head for so long, you know them as you would a friend or sibling.
  • You can share scenes with your Critique Partners to get feedback on where they think the story should head.
  • Because you don’t know what’s going to happen next, your characters might end up putting you into a corner that you’ll have a tough time getting out of.
  • You won’t necessarily have a Logline to guide you, so the story may wander around a bit before stabilising.
  • As you stick scenes together, making them fit may break something inside, requiring more rewrite to make it flow.

Which is better?

We can’t say that one method is better than the other…as long as it fits in with your writing style. What we can say is that often programmers and writers use both in the same project, so experiment and see where it takes you.

Repeating Yourself 1

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We’re going to discuss the first of a few rather interesting stylistic options this month…ones that you may have seen but didn’t even know had a name, and we’ll see about covering a few more next month . All of them appear in poetic writing and have to do with repeating ideas, but they differ in how the repetition is done. Redundancy can be good…as long as it’s not overdone, but if your writing is full of reduplications, your readers may get tired of it. Keep your use of repetitions under control, and you can use the following techniques for emphasis or to establish a character trait.

Pleonasm

When you use too many words to get an idea across, you may be accused of rambling or having verborrhea (the medical term is more properly logorrhea). Many readers will complain if you go on and on without getting to the point, but sometimes it works…as long as you are doing it with some plan in mind. The word ‘pleonasm’ comes from the Greek ‘pleon’ meaning ‘more, too much, or most’ and refers to redundant words. Let me list some examples:

  • Burning fire (fire always burns)
  • Dark night (night is always dark…unless you’re making the point that this night is moonless)
  • Redundant and pleonastic (synonyms)
  • Two separate cars (cars are always separate)
  • Free gift (aren’t all gifts inherently free?)
  • Completely destroyed (can it be only partially destroyed?)
  • Shrugged her shoulders (what else can you shrug?)
  • Nodded his head (can you nod something else?)

Some pleonastic words exist because of mixing languages together. Consider:

  • Pizza pie (‘pizza’ is Italian for ‘pie’)
  • River Avon (‘avon’ is Welsh for ‘river’)
  • Head honcho (‘hancho’ is Japanese for ‘group leader’)
  • Chai tea (‘chá (茶) is Chinese for ‘tea’)
  • Mount Fujiyama (‘Fujiyama’ is Japanese for ‘Fuji Mountain’)

So, repeating yourself to stress some important point (consider Chekhov’s Gun) or show that a character always talks like that is perfectly fine…just make certain you’re doing it intentionally and not out of habit.

Chiasmus

This form of repetition switches things around, in fact the word comes to us from the Greek ‘chiázō’, meaning ‘shaped like the letter chi (which became our English ‘X’) as it reverses the concepts being repeated. It takes a pair of concepts in a statement and presents them in reversed order in the next. The arrangement helps make the idea memorable, so it works well when presenting reasons for consideration. Here are some examples:

  • By day the frolic, and the dance by night
  • Despised, if ugly; if she’s fair, betrayed
  • Who dotes, yet doubts; suspects, yet strongly loves
  • Love without end, and without measure Grace
  • She went to church, but to the bar went he
  • She has all my love; my heart belongs to her

You’ll notice that the second set of concepts can either be synonyms (frolic=dance, dotes=loves, doubts=suspects) or antonyms (day≠night, ugly≠fair, church≠bar), but they are related in some way, as is required. Just switching ideas around, does not make it chiasmus, for example: “She appreciated a tall, cold drink, but Eric was also her love.” Although appreciated is similar to love, Eric is neither similar to nor the opposite of a drink.

Antimetabole

The term chiasmus refers to reversing concepts or ideas…not exact words. When the words themselves are repeated, the proper term is ‘antimetabole’ from the Greek ἀντί (antí), “against, opposite” and μεταβολή (metabolē), “turning about, change.” It works similarly to chiasmus but uses the same words in reverse order. Here are some examples of this form:

  • One for all, and all for one
  • Eat to live, or live to eat
  • If you fail to plan, you plan to fail
  • Say what you mean, and mean what you say
  • Fair is foul, and foul is fair
  • Better have it and not need it than to need it and not have it (one of my favourites)

Many folks consider antimetabole to be a subset of chiasmus…some don’t. Either way, they are definitely related. Next month we’ll address a few more ways you can repeat yourself…and make it beautiful.

Hook Your Reader with a 99¢ Book

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This is a marketing ploy designed for authors with a series of books…or if you plan to have one. The idea is to start off with a low-priced eBook to get the interest of some readers…then convince them that the other books in the series are worth more, for both eBook and Print versions. This practice is similar to the Freemium pricing strategy in which a product or service is offered free (or at a low cost), but then additional features, products, or services are made available at increasing costs (a method that has been used with software since the 1980s). This process works well with software (and eBooks!) for the same reason: cost of distribution is minor.

Once you’ve gotten a loyal reader base, they’ll gladly pay more for additional books because they now value your work. (Of course, that assumes that your first books are truly wonderful.) The general idea is to secure as large a collection of customers as possible right up front, and because your low-cost books are so amazing, those first few readers will spread the word and draw in even more readers.

Get New Readers

Many readers out there are constantly looking for something new and interesting to read…but they are hesitant to invest $5, $10, or even $15 (hard copy) just to see if it’s worthwhile. An option is to find book-selling sites that will allow authors to release a portion of an eBook as a ‘sample’ to lure readers, but if the rest of the book still costs too much, then the sample won’t be very effective in getting new readers to buy the whole thing. Until your name is recognisable, you’ll have to tempt readers with a full book at a low enough cost that they are willing to try you out. Dropping the price of your first book to 99¢ is a good way to entice them.

Quantity Over Profit

Initially you’ll have to be satisfied with only a small profit on each sale, but the key is that every sale is a new customer…just waiting for your next book. Growing your readership is the concept here. Remember, every new reader will not only want your next book, but they will also spread the word about how good your books are, so you’ll gain even more customers.

Rankings and Reviews

Gaining all those readers will help you move up the rankings into the best-selling lists (no matter which distribution channel you’re using), giving you more visibility to other readers as they search for new material. (There are whole courses on how to spike your sales, but we haven’t time for that here. If you want more info on that, let us know. If there’s a large enough response, we may do a posting targeted to that subject.)

The idea is that when a reader searches for a book, they will often take just a glance, then head right down to see how many stars it has in its rating…and how many reviews it has. A 5-star average…with 3 reviews (your mother, your spouse, and your best friend don’t count)…doesn’t have as much influence as a 4.2-star average with 100 reviews, so getting more readers to read and review the book increases the odds that other readers searching for your genre will find your book tempting.

Link to Your Next Book

In each of your books, you need to list your other books and mention your next book (in the Front or Back Matter). You should include a short teaser (a first chapter), but putting in links (eBook or otherwise) can be difficult. The snag with links is that if you include a link to Amazon in a Nook book or vice versa, the publishers and distributors may hesitate to carry it. The same thing happens if you have a Kindle book with links to your printed book…same thing with links to any other competitors.

Using Redirect Links can solve a couple of problems. Redirect Links (also Shortened Links) work by sending your readers to a different page than the link shows. For example, if you have a link that shows <mysite.com/books> it could actually lead to <mysite.com/content/monthly/current_listing>. Not only is it shorter, but it is also easier for readers with a printed copy to type in. (Including a QR code helps with that.)

The key is to have the links to Amazon, Nook, or even directly to your printer on your page. It takes an extra click or two for your readers, but keeping all your links together makes it easier for you to update them if needed. (Much easier than trying to change a link printed in a book!) Another advantage is that your readers can find the rest of your books there, too. Tracking your Click Through Rate (CTR) will show how your marketing is influencing your sales.

Problems With Link Shorteners

You might be tempted to use commercial link shorteners, but there is one big caveat: most use some kind of domain name that is short and easy to remember…BUT it forces your data to pass through other countries. Country Code Top Level Domains (ccTLD) such as ‘.ly’ (Libya) or ‘.ws’ (Samoa) or ‘.my’ (Malaysia) are controlled by those countries, so care must be taken as the controlling country could monitor or even restrict traffic they find unacceptable. Libya has shut down sites using their Country Code for a variety of reasons. (That’s why I hesitate to click on links like that.)

The best way is to use your own domain name (you do have your own website, don’t you?) and install redirected links yourself. If we have enough requests, we will post a How To that covers the technical details of Redirected Links, but for now we’ll leave it at that.

Burly Detective

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This time we are going to look at a trope (a motif or theme that appears in literature, similar to a cliché but not necessarily negative) that seems to crop up in many new writer’s works. It is the attempt by the writer to avoid using a character’s name repeatedly. The term comes from detective magazines where teams of writers all work on the same series. For some reason, they prefer to not use the main character’s name, rather mentioning him using various alternate descriptions.

Instead of saying that Dick Tracy did something, they would say that the “tall man” did it, or the “blond gumshoe”, or the “man from France”, or the “burly detective”…hence the name. It appears in many places, especially dialogue tags when the speaker’s name would normally appear, and that’s where we are going to focus our efforts today.

Examples

Here are some samples that I just made up on the spot. They are a bit overboard, but you can get the idea.

Detective story:

  • “Let’s see the body,” Dick Tracy said.
  • “Over here.” The sergeant pointed.
  • “Looks gruesome,” the blond investigator said.
  • “Been there overnight,” the uniformed officer said.
  • Shaking his head, the plain-clothed cop flipped the body over.
  • The beat constable said, “Never seen that before.”
  • “A new one every day,” the confident sleuth said.

Romance story:

  • Jill glanced over at the new guy. “Who is he?” she asked.
  • Karen leaned back. “Good looking, isn’t he?”
  • The blonde nodded. “Good enough to eat,” she said licking her lips.
  • “You might want to get to know him first,” the stately woman said.
  • Nodding, the lady in blue adjusted her neckline.
  • Her friend said, “Is that how you’re going to snare him?”
  • “It’s worked before,” the bosomy female said, smiling.

Fantasy story:

  • Elladan tipped his head as he listened.
  • “What do you hear?” Morwen asked.
  • The tall elf waved his hand for silence.
  • Leaning in close, the elven maiden closed her eyes to focus.
  • Raising a finger, the white-blond fellow spoke softly, “In the distance…a disturbance.”
  • Nodding, the svelte nymph said, “Yes, I hear it now.”
  • The ruler of the clan reached for his bow.
  • The princess dropped her hand to the hilt of her sword.
  • “Be ready,” the young monarch said.

As you can see, the effort to avoid reusing the character’s name can get quite confusing…and a bit comical. (And trying to come up with all those different ways to describe characters is rather time-consuming!)

Cleaned up Examples

Let’s look at those same examples…but this time, let’s clean up the problems…and still get all the information across to the reader.

Detective story:

  • “Let’s see the body,” Dick Tracy said.
  • “Over here.” The sergeant pointed. (minor character, so no name used)
  • “Looks gruesome,” Tracy said. (use last name only to be formal)
  • “Been there overnight.” (only two in this conversation, so no need to re-identify every time)
  • Shaking his head, he flipped the body over. (alternating speakers, so it’s clear who does this)
  • The sergeant shuddered. “Never seen that before.” (use same generic identifier)
  • “A new one every day,” Tracy said confidently.

Romance story:

  • Jill smiled over at the new guy. “Who is he?” she asked.
  • Karen leaned back. “Good looking, isn’t he?”
  • She nodded. “Good enough to eat,” she said licking her lips. (it’s clear that it’s not Karen)
  • “You might want to get to know him first.” (only two of them here, so no need to repeat)
  • Nodding, Jill adjusted the neckline of her blue dress. (if the colour is important)
  • Her friend laughed. “Is that how you’re going to snare him?” (show relationship)
  • “It’s worked before,” she said, smiling at her exposed cleavage. (show physical description)

Fantasy story:

  • Elladan tipped his head as he listened.
  • “What do you hear?” Morwen asked.
  • He waved his hand for silence. (we should already know he’s an elf)
  • Leaning in close, she closed her eyes to focus. (‘he’ and ‘she’ work well in this situation)
  • Raising a finger, he spoke softly, “In the distance…a disturbance.” (different genders makes it easy)
  • Nodding, she agreed. “Yes, I hear it now.”
  • He reached for his bow. (we should already know his position in the clan)
  • She dropped her hand to the hilt of her sword.
  • “Be ready,” he said.

Confusing?

Clearly, it’s easier if the scene has two people of opposite gender, but even so, all those new and different ways to identify the speaker could be confusing…just how many people are standing around talking? In all three of these examples, there are only two, but with the Burly Detective descriptions in the first set, there could be three, four, five, or even more individual people.

Unless you are intentionally writing a parody, try to avoid overusing descriptions in dialogue tags. Either stick with a single name for your character or just leave it out. We’ll know who is who…as long as you’ve created real, believable characters.

Show or Tell?

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You hear it all the time: Show, Don’t Tell…but just what does it mean? And how do you avoid telling? After all, you are telling the story, aren’t you? Well, that may just be the predicament. To make it clearer, we really should refer to stories as being shown…just as movies are shown. We want our readers to experience the story…not be told what happened as if it were a newspaper article. Are we reporting the facts or showing active events?

As you write, envision your tale as a movie…show what can be seen, avoid telling. How many movies have a voice over to explain things? Probably not very many—if any at all. In fact, you’d probably be offended if a movie told you that the main character was angry…instead of showing him slowly crumpling up the note she’d left for him. Would you consider walking out If the voice over told you that the girlfriend was sad, instead of showing her devouring half a chocolate cake, washing it down with beer? You’d feel as if the producers thought you were an idiot if the cop stood in the doorway, scanning the room…and the voice over told you, “Sergeant Murphy looked for clues.” Yet many times, we see authors doing just that…telling instead of letting the reader figure out for himself what the characters are thinking or feeling.

You’ll find that most of your readers are pretty smart…think about it…they picked up your book, didn’t they? That’s a good clue that they know a few things already. Imagine that they are reading your book because they want to enjoy a bit of escape from the cold, cruel world. Give them something they can really get into.

Examples

Now we’re going to get into specific instances that could be found in novels all across the web. In most cases, the expanded showing gives you an opportunity to give the reader more insight into the characters than the curt telling does.

  • Amy was cold.
    • Amy pulled her collar tighter around her neck, turned away from the frigid breeze, and shivered slightly.
  • Bob was tall.
    • Bob could have played center on a basketball team…if it weren’t for the fact that his gangly limbs flew in all directions every time he tried to run.
  • Carl was tired.
    • Carl stared off into the distance, only occasionally rubbing his eyes and shrugging if anyone spoke to him directly.
  • David looked as if he’d slept in his clothes.
    • David tottered out of the bedroom, his sweater wrapped half way around one arm, his pants crumpled up almost to his knees.
  • Eric drove an old car.
    • Eric tooled around town in his classic Chevy, every surface polished until it gleamed.
    • Eric managed to get to the 7-11 with all the parts still attached to his old rust bucket.
  • Frank squinted at the rising sun.
    • Frank winced in pain as the first rays of the morning’s sun pierced into his bloodshot eyes.
  • George liked what he saw when he met Holly.
    • George sucked in his breath as Holly entered the room, feeling as if the whole building were spinning.
  • Holly enjoyed her date with George.
    • Holly gazed at George, entranced by his stories, hardly touching the expensive meal at the fanciest restaurant in town.
  • It was mid-winter.
    • Snow draped the bare trees, pushing their branches closer to the ground.

Sometimes You Need to Tell

Just because you constantly hear Show, Don’t Tell, doesn’t make it a hard and fast rule that must be obeyed at all costs. Occasionally telling is the right thing to do. A newspaper article demands that you report the facts…the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The same thing can apply to fiction as well: often the glossed over facts will suffice.

We can’t follow the Main Character around all the time. You will always have moments when the camera fades to black, time passes, and we refocus on a new scene. You can summarise what happened during the blackout in a short paragraph or two. For example:

  • John fumed about the conversation last night. Kelly was getting really demanding…insisting that he get a job. She knew her income was plenty for the two of them, but he’d give it a try. He walked into the doughnut shop, put his elbows on the counter, and said, “Got a manager back there?”

That short paragraph gives us enough information about what went on last night that we don’t really need to hear or see the whole thing—we can imagine the worst.

Minor characters can get their few seconds in the spotlight then move on, some without even being named:

  • The girl behind the counter was surprised by the request.

Compress the passing of time into a telling paragraph:

  • Spring came and went, and John still hadn’t found anyone to hire him.

Add a bit of backstory in either a flashback…or a telling paragraph:

  • John remembered back to how his father had worked for a construction company. He shook his head. “Nah, that’s not for me.”

When you need to tell, go ahead, but keep it short to avoid boring your readers.

Follow the Rules…Sometimes

Showing…Telling…which to use, and when? Using both appropriately will thrill your readers and entertain them as well. Show to bring them into the story—Tell to move them quickly to the next exciting spot. For readers to experience your story, they need to be shown, but not shown too much. Used judiciously both will work for you.

Maybe it should be Show and Tell.

Pomodoro Technique

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Today we are going to explain how to use a timing system to increase your productivity. This process was developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s and is named for the Italian word for tomato…because that’s what the timer looked like that he used as he was creating the process.

Timing

We use a modified version of the official technique that lasts a total of two and a half hours. It seems to be the best combination for our tasks.

  • Step 0: Plan—5 minutes—Plan what you are going to do in this round
  • Step 1: Research—25 minutes—Gather info directly related to the task
    • Rest: 5 minutes—Get away from the task (escape from the keyboard)
  • Step 2: Write—25 minutes—Combine and record info collected
    • Rest: 5 minutes—Get away from the task (escape from the keyboard)
  • Step 3: Flow—25 minutes—Do initial clean-up of work produced
    • Rest: 5 minutes—Get away from the task (escape from the keyboard)
  • Step 4: Edit—25 minutes—Edit, close, and backup files
    • Rest: 30 minutes—Get out of the office (take a real break)
  • Loop: Go back to plan the next task

We have found that by doing a couple Loops each day, one early and one later in the day, helps us keep focused on tasks and increases useable output. (The rest of the day we spend resolving the interruptions we’ve set aside—usually just putting out fires.)

How We Use It

We have an agreement here at Turner Editing…if we see someone with a timer running or a “Do Not Disturb” sign posted, we just leave a note on the corner of their desk. We know they’ll get to it as soon as they finish a loop.

Sometimes there are urgent issues that can’t wait. In that case, we are forced to pause the timer and set aside the current task, take care of the intrusion, then restart the same 25 minute Step when returning. Depending on where the interruption came in the Step, that Step may end up getting almost double the time, but with the distraction, it may take all of that extra time to refocus and complete the Step.

If you feel you’ve completed an individual Step but there’s still time left in that Step, you can review what you’ve done so far, lean back and consider what you’ve learned from the process and seek to improve it, or review upcoming tasks to let your subconscious start working on them. There is no stopping early—use the full allotted time to your advantage before moving on to the next Step.

Online Timers

As expected, there are a bunch of different online options to help with this. We’ll list a few and give some pointers.

  • Pomofocus has some settings that you can adjust in the free version and more that require the paid version, but you can’t change the sound at all (a ringing alarm clock). Also the volume is so low that you might miss it if you have a heavy hand when you’re typing.
  • Tomato Timers has a very nice chime as the end of step sound as well as a pause and reset button.
  • Marinara Timer has very big numbers and a choice of interesting sounds.
  • Pomodoro Tracker has a choice of sounds as well as some ticking sounds during each step—a bit intrusive. It does have an option to notify you when there’s only one minute left.
  • The Pomodoro timer in Online Timers seems to be programmable for a variety of timing situations, but it’s too complicated for common use.
  • Eggtimer is fairly straightforward and even has a one-step Pomodoro timer. (If you are daring enough, check out the HTML source and build an entire Pomodoro Loop!)
  • My Tomatoes requires a login just to get started, so we didn’t bother to test it.
  • Online Stopwatch has too many pushy adverts to be useful.

We find that the Tomato Timer is about as basic as it can get…just a timer, no task tracking, no adverts, few options, but we like it the best just for those reasons. The default settings don’t match our timing, so the first thing we do is change the Long Break to 30 minutes, then adjust the sound and volume. We prefer the Doorbell sound as it isn’t too intrusive—we don’t want to get startled out of a deep concentration by a fire siren!

Physical Timers

Of course, if you want to go with the real thing, plenty of timers are available…some of which even look similar to the original tomato timer! If you prefer a physical timer sitting on your desk, we have to recommend any of the Time Cube timers. They come with pre-set times, so you have to pick the one that has the times you need. We like the purple one, even though it doesn’t have a 25 minute setting. We just use a 20 minute plus a 5 minute stretch, so we’ve got a warning that time is running low. Some of our editors prefer the red one that does have a 25…just no 30, so they take their long break with a 20+10. The Time Cube company even has some lovely cubes made of bamboo for a more natural look.

Chekhov’s Gun

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An important principle in writing is that anything the author mentions needs to be significant. If you tell us, then we believe it and look forward to finding out why. The same thing applies to details when describing things. If you tell us some particular piece of information, then we know it must be important…either to the story or to developing the characters. You can’t just fill your book with random items and descriptions. Readers will come away still trying to make sense of it all.

So Why is it Chekhov’s Gun?

Anton Chekhov was a Russian who wrote plays and short stories in Russian during the late 19th century. Although a physician first and a writer second (He himself said, “Medicine is my lawful wife, and literature is my mistress.”), Anton supported his family with his writing. He has also been listed as one of the most influential writers of all time. He claimed that artists were to ask questions…not answer them, so as his writing matured, he experimented with his style, and those changes have shaped the modern short story.

“Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it’s not going to be fired, it shouldn’t be hanging there.”
—Anton Chekhov

He is well known for a variety of things, but the one that interests us here is his quote about what you put into your story (see box to the right). His intent was to ensure that any item mentioned in a story actually had relevance—make certain that everything you put in needs to be there. You aren’t allowed to mention anything, even as small as a flower outside the window…unless that flower becomes relevant to either the story or the development of the character. If you point out something, your readers will go with it…and wait to see how it applies to the story later on. If it never does, they can be disappointed. (And we don’t want disappointed readers, do we?)

Descriptions Count, Too

In a similar vein, you can’t mislead readers by very carefully describing a room…unless that description reveals some piece of information that makes a difference to the story or the characters. (A general description is fine…and necessary.) Also, if you mention some product-specific detail when describing an item, make certain that it’s necessary. When introducing a fast car, just say, “a red, two-door, sports car”—not “a 1969 Ford Mustang Mach 1 with headers and a spoiler.” The reader can picture whatever kind of car seems to fit. Same with firearms. Just say, “an automatic pistol”—not “an Israeli-made Jericho 941F 9mm with Cherrywood, cross-ground grips.” A can of soda is just a can of soda—not “a can of Coke with the classic logo on it, dented on one side.”

Of course, if the specific make, model, colour, or condition really is important to the story, then, yes, go ahead and include it, but make certain that it is absolutely needed. Irrelevant details tend to distract from the action.

Who is Your Target Reader?

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Before you get too far in writing, it is a good idea to identify your Target Reader. That’s the person (singular) you have in mind when telling your story. It’s always easier to picture one individual as your reader…and you can just sit down and tell them what you want to tell the whole world. That’s what you write…just as if you were face to face with them…keep it casual and don’t try to impress them with your vocabulary. For the first few stories I wrote down, I pictured my kids. Of course, those stories started off as bedtime stories to those kids, so it was easy to keep them in mind as I put it all down on paper.

Who is Your Target Market?

There are a LOT of people out there…and some of them don’t care to read what you’ve written, but there’s a fragment of them that would dearly love to read your stuff…so how do you find them? In the marketing world, a differentiation is made between a Target Market and a Target Audience. I’ll try to explain the difference…and why it’s important.

Your Target Market are folks who might be interested in your product (your book). They tend to share attributes that you can identify: age, location, interests, available time, etc. If you’ve written a book about the origins of the street names in Sacramento, then you’d be aiming for 40-60 year olds, living in or around Sacramento, with an interest in history, who have plenty of spare time to go exploring the city. On the other hand, if you’ve written a Sci-Fi adventure book, your market would include 15-30 year olds, living anywhere in the US, who find escape in reading, and have time during a commute to read a chapter a day.

You probably are included in your own Target Market…because you’re writing what you like to read, right?

Who is Your Target Audience?

Your Target Audience are the folks that you can send your message to. You couldn’t possibly tell all the folks in your Target Market about your book…you only have so many resources. Most first-time authors (especially self-published ones) are likely to do their own marketing, so they have to use the methods available to them. (Yes, you could hire a company to blanket the world, but could you really afford it at this point? And what would the payoff be?)

Using social networking to share info about your book is a typical approach. You could even set up an author page (besides your personal page) to focus your efforts. Other ideas include bookmarks or info cards that you could drop off at local libraries or bookstores. If you manage to join in a multi-author book signing or have a big release party for you book, you might want to invest in a full-sized poster to stand next to your table.

Any way you get the message out will help with sales.

The Overlap

Those sales come from the overlap between your Market and your Audience. When you send out your adverts, you’ll be aiming for your Audience, but there will be some folks in your Market who won’t get the message…and there will be others, in your Audience, who will get your message but aren’t in your Market. Your objective is to widen your Audience enough to encompass as much of your Market as you can.

Analysing your Market and your Audience may be tough, but once you start getting sales, you can check to see how accurate your predictions are…and adjusting either could result in more sales…always a good thing!

Author Intrusion

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  • This is a long and involved topic. If you’re unhappy about the length, please let us know. We’ll try to keep future discussions a bit shorter. Thanks!

First time writers (as well as a few seasoned authors) are likely to insert their opinions into their writing…whether they are aware of it or not, and that’s just the trouble. You need to know when it’s your characters talking or your narrator telling the story…and not you lecturing the reader. New writers need to remember that the story is intended to be viewed through the characters in a fictional world.

Readers are here for the character’s story…not the author’s opinion on things. They want to imagine that the world you’ve created is real. Any intrusions can distract or confuse readers when it upsets the flow, and it’s annoying, too. Readers will be disappointed that they’ve been kicked out of the story by the interruption.

Now, it’s perfectly fine for characters to have opinions…it adds to their personality, but it needs to fit in the story. The problem is that the author has to create all the characters…including the protagonist…he just has to be careful to not inadvertently create a copy of himself. As much as you may want to, you don’t get to live in your story world vicariously through your creations. Yes, they are your creations, and you are the god of this world, but although they may be made in your image, they are not you. You are the author, not a character in the story. Escapism is one thing, but you can’t get there from here.

On the other hand, using personal experience is not intrusion. If you’ve lived through a car crash, then having your characters succumb to the same physical and emotional trauma you experienced is perfectly fine. The feelings you had, when felt by your characters, helps make your world seem real.

Examples

There are a few different places where Author Intrusion shows up. We are going to address two main areas, but there are others, so keep an eye out for them.

Politics

Some intrusions come about due to trying to be politically correct. If your antagonist really is a bad guy, then he should think and talk like one, no holds barred. There is no need to comment on his badness.

  • “Those weirdos from Mars should all be rounded up and dumped on an island,” Paul said. It wasn’t the right thing to do, but that’s how he felt.

It’s obviously not Paul who thinks it isn’t right…that’s the author letting us know that he doesn’t think it’s right. On the other hand, Paul does think it’s right. In his mind, that’s what needs to be done—he’s a bad guy, through and through, but that’s fine, as antagonists often are. You need to remember that the characters you create are not you. They can be, and often are, very different from you, the author. If the readers can’t figure out that Paul is in the wrong, then it isn’t your job to tell them.

An author’s personal opinions shouldn’t come out of the mouths of characters who obviously don’t feel that way.

  • Erik knelt and placed his spear point down, in deference to the untouched maiden in front of him.

Virginity may be a Judeo-Christian concept held in high esteem, but to the Vikings, it wasn’t even considered. Be careful to avoid writing into your story notions that don’t fit in with the time, locale, or civilisations you are depicting.

Knowledge

Frequently concepts that should be foreign to the characters…but obviously not to the author or readers…somehow get mentioned.

  • William hefted his sword, blocking the sunlight glaring off his opponent’s shield, desperately in need of a good pair of sunglasses.

Hello? The medieval knight wants sunglasses? Not likely. The author would want them in that situation, and any reader would understand the need, but the character shouldn’t be thinking that. You need to keep modern thoughts out of your historical character’s minds…unless William is a time traveller! That would make all the difference.

Knowledge common to readers and authors…but not to characters…can slip in if you’re not careful. Also any research you’ve done can influence your knowledge, but unless the characters have access to the same source of information, they can’t comment on it.

  • “Watson, come here. I need you,” Bell said into the first functional telephone, not knowing that in the future everyone would carry one in their pockets.

If he doesn’t know it, then it shouldn’t be here.

Research done by the author to add a semblance of reality needs to be suppressed if the characters wouldn’t know it.

  • Mike leaned over and whispered, “You mean it will go boom, like when U-235 is impacted by a neutron and splits into Krypton, a noble gas, and Barium, an alkaline earth metal?”

No one actually talks like that, not even an expert in the field of atomic fission, but an author who has over-researched the topic might feel he has to share what he’s learned…and instead of telling us in narrative, he forces one of his characters to spout the nonsense, thinking he can then blame the character for it.

Let the characters speak for themselves.

Avoiding Intrusion

Try to picture the story from the viewpoint of your characters. If you’ve created full characters, not flat ones, they will know what they want to say and do, so let them. Step back from your writing, as you’re writing it…and afterwards. Put it on a shelf for a couple weeks, then read it over again. If anything seems out of place, it probably is. There’s nothing wrong with general knowledge and familiarity with how things work, but the details need to be left up to experts, not your commonplace characters.

Your Beta Readers and Critique Partners will often point out places where it sounds like you talking, not the characters. If you can’t see it, they will. Take their advice and clean it up. If there are certain words that you use in normal life, watch out for your characters using them, too. You may be an expert in some field, but are your characters? Let them go consult an expert in the story, not have all the knowledge they need right at hand.

When you try to balance things out by putting in a character who has a different opinion than you do, but then make him look stupid for that, then you are revealing how you really feel about the topic. Each character should have his or her own personality, different from each other and you. If the reader stops to question the motivation of a character, there is something wrong.

Don’t worry if your Beta Readers or Critique Partners don’t catch it…your editor should, but do you really want to rely on the skills of others? Or would you rather just do it right the first time?

Intentional Intrusion

There are times when you may want to include Author Intrusion as a literary device. That’s fine to do, just make certain that your readers know that’s what you are doing. Many famous authors have done so with impunity. If you feel you can follow in the footsteps of great authors, you are welcome to try, just consider the techniques of the successful ones first. In theatre and movies, this practice is known as breaking the fourth wall…the wall separating the audience from the action. If a character or the narrator turns and speaks directly to the audience, it won’t confuse your reader, just jump right in and say it.

Examples

Isaac Asimov was great for this, as he would often address the reader directly with “Dear Reader”. You knew he, as the author, was talking directly to you, as a reader, and it seemed so casual and direct that you welcomed the discussion he was having with you.

Of course, in non-fiction, it isn’t too much of a stretch to see the author as a teacher addressing students. In fiction, it could be a bit of a distraction to have the author step in and talk to the reader. You’re there for the action and excitement of the story…not a sit-down with someone who will be teaching you something, but it has been done…and can work quite well.

Charlotte Brontë speaks directly to the reader in setting up a scene. For example, consider this extract from Jane Eyre: “A new chapter in a novel is something like a new scene in a play; and when I draw up the curtain this time, reader, you must fancy you see a room in the George Inn at Millcote, with such large figured papering on the walls as inns have; such a carpet, such furniture, such ornaments on the mantle-piece…”

Think about The Princess Bride…the author is telling us about having a story read to him by his father but written by someone else completely. That frees up Goldman to talk to the reader about the inner story being read. (Known as a Frame Story, it is a literary device all on its own.)

If you do decide to try your hand at intentional intrusion, be careful, as it can appear, if not done well, to be lazy writing. It is best used in satire or where the intrusion is obviously ironic. Good luck!