I like stories where people are always in comas or becoming amnesiacs or dying and then coming back to life and endings where it turns out it was all just in the narrator's head. I like time travel and alternate universes and I don't even mind if it isn't consistent or doesn't make sense (though it is preferable). I like 'it was all just a dream' endings and melodramatic characters and split personalities and axe murderers. I'm not talking stories that are borderline ridiculous here, I'm talking all-out preposterous soap-opera-worthy novels. I want things to blow up that logically wouldn't. I want someone to inexplicably develop the ability to read minds.
This is a terrible thing to admit to and will probably forever damage your opinion of me. But gosh, folks, aren't crazy stories a lot of fun? I try and write at least semi-realistic stuff, but only through a lot of effort. I mean, I really want to throw in a mind-reader and aliens and amnesia, but I'd rather write well. When it comes to what I read and watch and so forth, though, much as I love those literary novels about first-world problems, I don't have a whole lot of desire to read novels that are super-realistic because life is super-realistic and really, no novel is going to be as vivid as real life. Also realistic stories are always more depressing than ridiculous ones. (Okay, a little realism is nice. And good writing is always excellent. But when it comes to escapism I think you really need crazy-weird plotlines.)
Does everyone secretly love really preposterous novels and TV shows and movies? Or are you all cultured ladies and gents who watch art-house films and read literary fiction and have never seen a soap opera in your life?
5 Tips for Writing What You (Don’t) Know
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Another guest post I wrote in the past (the internet. It's like a time machine) - this time from The Blog Realm in September 2009.
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Always, when I stumble across writing advice on the internet, I see the same line: Write What You Know.
The issue for me is that I’m fifteen, and I don't know much at all. Until three years ago, I was a member of the Beanie Kids fan club. I still order off the kids menu at restaurants. I shop in the Junior section of clothes stores (though I am clinging to my childhood a lot more than other people my age). I write realistic teen fiction. Sometimes I write about things I haven’t experienced, or decide to base a novel around something I know nothing about (much research is involved). I’ve written three novels, and I’ll hopefully write many more. My writing is a place where I can get out of my comfort zone.
What I want to say is this: you don’t have to have experienced what you write. Many successful crime thrillers were written by people who were never policemen. J.K. Rowling didn’t go to Hogwarts, and Stephenie Meyer didn’t date a sparkly vampire (no matter how much she may wish she had).. Sure, the rules are different in fantasy, but what makes them ultimately successful is the writing, the characters and plot, the emotional appeal of it all. Here are some things to keep in mind when you’re writing about something that’s completely foreign to you:
1. Research, research, research. Create a file on your computer and browse the internet. The library is also an incredibly useful resource. If the story is busting to come out, don’t tell yourself you have to research everything first. You can research as you go. And don’t research for months on end – the actual writing is the important bit. You’ll know when you have enough information, and it’s worth getting a good book on your preferred topic so that you can look something up when you’re stuck on the novel instead of getting distracted on the internet by your emails and Twitter (I am guilty of tweeting instead of writing. I confess!)
2. If possible, get someone knowledgeable to read your book. Just as important as your beta-readers! Get a doctor friend to read your medical thriller, or a lawyer to read your courtroom drama. It’s even better if you can call up these people as you write, so that when you think you’re completely off track, they can reassure you (and even if you are writing about something you know, a friend to call and talk to when you get stuck, or think you’re terrible, is definitely a must for most writers. In general, we doubt ourselves a lot).
3. Don’t forget about your characters and plot! You can’t support a novel on a theme alone, and way too often I’ve read teen books with little substance – it’s just a book about [insert pertinent issue to teens here]. First and foremost, write a novel that will satisfy readers. (I find it best to imagine myself as the reader, and try and be objective about it.)
4. Make sure there’s emotional pull. You’ve decided to write a story about a mother dying of breast cancer. You haven’t personally known any cancer sufferers, but you know a doctor whose willing to fact check for you, and you’ve done all the research.. The most important thing here is that your novel doesn’t fall flat when it comes to emotion – you don’t have to have experienced that to know the emotions it would evoke, and these should be central to your novel (mainly character-driven novels). The way a novel makes me feel determines whether or not I enjoy it – it doesn’t matter if that emotion is sadness or happiness, it just has to be strong.
5. Above all else, tell a great story. Kind of revisiting 3 and 4 here, but it should be repeated: tell the story you want to tell, with characters that demand to be written. Don’t think about whether it will fit in the market, or whether you should put it off until the economy improves. If you have that passion, and if you have that drive, write your novel, and make it the best it can possibly be. Good luck!
--
Always, when I stumble across writing advice on the internet, I see the same line: Write What You Know.
The issue for me is that I’m fifteen, and I don't know much at all. Until three years ago, I was a member of the Beanie Kids fan club. I still order off the kids menu at restaurants. I shop in the Junior section of clothes stores (though I am clinging to my childhood a lot more than other people my age). I write realistic teen fiction. Sometimes I write about things I haven’t experienced, or decide to base a novel around something I know nothing about (much research is involved). I’ve written three novels, and I’ll hopefully write many more. My writing is a place where I can get out of my comfort zone.
What I want to say is this: you don’t have to have experienced what you write. Many successful crime thrillers were written by people who were never policemen. J.K. Rowling didn’t go to Hogwarts, and Stephenie Meyer didn’t date a sparkly vampire (no matter how much she may wish she had).. Sure, the rules are different in fantasy, but what makes them ultimately successful is the writing, the characters and plot, the emotional appeal of it all. Here are some things to keep in mind when you’re writing about something that’s completely foreign to you:
1. Research, research, research. Create a file on your computer and browse the internet. The library is also an incredibly useful resource. If the story is busting to come out, don’t tell yourself you have to research everything first. You can research as you go. And don’t research for months on end – the actual writing is the important bit. You’ll know when you have enough information, and it’s worth getting a good book on your preferred topic so that you can look something up when you’re stuck on the novel instead of getting distracted on the internet by your emails and Twitter (I am guilty of tweeting instead of writing. I confess!)
2. If possible, get someone knowledgeable to read your book. Just as important as your beta-readers! Get a doctor friend to read your medical thriller, or a lawyer to read your courtroom drama. It’s even better if you can call up these people as you write, so that when you think you’re completely off track, they can reassure you (and even if you are writing about something you know, a friend to call and talk to when you get stuck, or think you’re terrible, is definitely a must for most writers. In general, we doubt ourselves a lot).
3. Don’t forget about your characters and plot! You can’t support a novel on a theme alone, and way too often I’ve read teen books with little substance – it’s just a book about [insert pertinent issue to teens here]. First and foremost, write a novel that will satisfy readers. (I find it best to imagine myself as the reader, and try and be objective about it.)
4. Make sure there’s emotional pull. You’ve decided to write a story about a mother dying of breast cancer. You haven’t personally known any cancer sufferers, but you know a doctor whose willing to fact check for you, and you’ve done all the research.. The most important thing here is that your novel doesn’t fall flat when it comes to emotion – you don’t have to have experienced that to know the emotions it would evoke, and these should be central to your novel (mainly character-driven novels). The way a novel makes me feel determines whether or not I enjoy it – it doesn’t matter if that emotion is sadness or happiness, it just has to be strong.
5. Above all else, tell a great story. Kind of revisiting 3 and 4 here, but it should be repeated: tell the story you want to tell, with characters that demand to be written. Don’t think about whether it will fit in the market, or whether you should put it off until the economy improves. If you have that passion, and if you have that drive, write your novel, and make it the best it can possibly be. Good luck!
Writing Bootcamp: Writer’s Bootcamp: Why You Should Celebrate Your Rejection Letter by Holly Schindler
Friday, November 11, 2011
Writing Bootcamp is a blog series in which I invite fabulous authors to share with you (yes, you! assuming you are an inquisitive writer) their best bits of writerly advice. Today Holly Schindler talks about the good things about getting rejected.--
Every writer faces rejection—at every stage of his or her career. And while it’s easy to focus merely on the “no,” the most important thing a writer can do is remind him or herself about all the wonderful things that a rejection actually implies and provides:
1). You have the guts to submit. I’ve heard writers described repeatedly as a shy bunch. Not so, I’d argue. It takes guts to put yourself on the page and to send that work—which feels so personal and private—out to be critiqued, possibly passed over for other work. If you’re submitting, you have courage—every bit as much as someone who gets up on a stage to perform. Period.
2). If you’re getting any kind of personal letter at all, it means that the editor or agent saw something quite positive and promising in your work. Keep at it.
3). If you submitted a book, rather than just a query, don’t simply concentrate on the fact that your book was passed over. Remind yourself that the book was read—which means that you’ve got a stand-out query! That in itself is quite an accomplishment. If one editor or agent found that query promising, another will, too. Believe that you’ll receive another request for the manuscript in full.
4). If you’ve received a rejection with a detailed critique and an invitation to resubmit, you’re lucky in many different ways. Sure, you’ve got an editor or agent who’s seriously interested and invested at this point. Just as importantly, though, you’ve not got the chance to test your revision skills.
Even after a book is acquired, it most often undergoes one or more rounds of revision—global revision, that is—before the copyedits start. And nothing prepared me for this process more than all the rounds of rejection and revision I endured before I sold my first book.
Rejection, in many ways, isn’t just a means to an end. It isn’t something a writer endures in order to finally snag that first yes. Rejection is itself a kind of college…and the lessons you learn during the rejection process will serve you, time and again, in your career as an author.
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Holly Schindler is the author of YA novels A BLUE SO DARK & PLAYING HURT, as well as a middle grade novel, THE JUNCTION OF SUNSHINE AND LUCKY. You can follow her on Twitter (@holly_schindler), Facebook, her lovely blog & hollyschindler.com for more info about her & her books!
The Art of (Bad) Novel Writing
Monday, November 7, 2011
This was originally a guest post on First Novels Club in August of 2009. I know, ancient history! In internet time, that's like when dinosaurs were roaming the earth. Enjoy the totally unaltered goodness of 15-year-old Steph's novelling advice. Oh, young Steph, you crazy kid. I promise to give you some brand! new! content! from old, wise 17-year-old Steph shortly.
Oh and good luck with NaNoWriMo, writerly folks.
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I’m writing this in a Word document. I’m hitting the recount button with each word I type. Okay, I’m up to 23 words including the title. Now I’m up to 32! How long should this guest post be? I’ve never written a guest post before. I wonder where I’m going to go with this guest post. Recount. Yay! 63 words!
That previous paragraph is both an example of the fact that I’m a bit of an idiot (an idiot with an excuse, I’m a teenager, okay?) and also a lot like me writing my first novel when I was seven.
Have I lost you already? It’s okay, I’ve lost myself as well. I’m going to go looking for myself. If I come back before I return, can you hold on to me and make sure I don’t wander off again?
That first novel I wrote when I was seven didn’t progress past the first chapter. An eventful first chapter – wherein the heroine, Rose Merryhem, moved into a new house, rode an escalator to heaven, met some kind of archangel, went to the beach with a woman called Tabitha and ate some cornflakes – but only one chapter all the same. I’m a bit of an expert at crappy novels.
I’m also a bit of an expert at zombie movies, procrastinating and veering way off topic, but that’s entirely not the right stuff for this informative guest post, which, after reading, you will be able to very successfully complete a crappy novel which will then live under your bed for the next ten to fifteen years.
This is where I stop rambling and start informing:To write a bad novel, you have to sit down and write. You have to pump out the number of words you think there should be in a novel. You write and write and write. Make sure that the tense jumps around and there’s no specific plot.
And if you want your book to be really terrible, make sure you never ever edit it! Editing will improve your novel! You want a bad novel, remember?
Writing a bad novel is easy. Writing a good novel is hard. The first draft is only a tiny little bit of the work involved.
But here’s the thing:It’s okay to write a bad novel. The only way to improve your writing is to write and write and write and write.
A novel will never be great after you’ve written the first draft. In fact, the first draft of your first novel will inevitably be pretty bad, unless you’re some kind of super freak who can write awesome books in one go, in which case I shall kidnap you and hold you hostage, forcing you to write novels for me at gunpoint.
I don’t have a gun, so you can sleep easy for the time being, but the point is that once your writing is good, for it to become great, you’re going to have to learn to edit. You’re going to have to hack your manuscript to pieces and then tape it together. You’re going to have to obliterate entire scenes if they’re not necessary to the plot or character development.
It’s going to be really hard, because you love your characters. Or at least you should, since I do, and I don’t want to be crazy for loving my characters, so you oughta love yours. But this painful process is necessary if you’re going to make your book the best it can possibly be. It will be slow and painful, but it’s also going to be worth it in the end.
You have to let other people read your work and accept their honest opinions to help you improve your work. Other writers, preferably. The wonderful ladies of First Novels Club obviously have the right idea!
And of course, you should read and read and read. Be familiar with the genre you’re writing for.
But wait, what happened here? I was meant to tell you how to write a bad novel.
The problem is, I think my writing is starting to venture into the ‘okay novel’ territory. Not quite publishable yet, but I’m reading and writing and revising and submitting. People read my work and give me honest appraisals of it, and every time someone says, ‘Hey, this could be better if you…’ I’m not immediately thinking they’re insulting my literary genius. I’m learning.
That ‘bad novel’ thing? You might have to ask somebody else.
That previous paragraph is both an example of the fact that I’m a bit of an idiot (an idiot with an excuse, I’m a teenager, okay?) and also a lot like me writing my first novel when I was seven.
Have I lost you already? It’s okay, I’ve lost myself as well. I’m going to go looking for myself. If I come back before I return, can you hold on to me and make sure I don’t wander off again?
That first novel I wrote when I was seven didn’t progress past the first chapter. An eventful first chapter – wherein the heroine, Rose Merryhem, moved into a new house, rode an escalator to heaven, met some kind of archangel, went to the beach with a woman called Tabitha and ate some cornflakes – but only one chapter all the same. I’m a bit of an expert at crappy novels.
I’m also a bit of an expert at zombie movies, procrastinating and veering way off topic, but that’s entirely not the right stuff for this informative guest post, which, after reading, you will be able to very successfully complete a crappy novel which will then live under your bed for the next ten to fifteen years.
This is where I stop rambling and start informing:To write a bad novel, you have to sit down and write. You have to pump out the number of words you think there should be in a novel. You write and write and write. Make sure that the tense jumps around and there’s no specific plot.
And if you want your book to be really terrible, make sure you never ever edit it! Editing will improve your novel! You want a bad novel, remember?
Writing a bad novel is easy. Writing a good novel is hard. The first draft is only a tiny little bit of the work involved.
But here’s the thing:It’s okay to write a bad novel. The only way to improve your writing is to write and write and write and write.
A novel will never be great after you’ve written the first draft. In fact, the first draft of your first novel will inevitably be pretty bad, unless you’re some kind of super freak who can write awesome books in one go, in which case I shall kidnap you and hold you hostage, forcing you to write novels for me at gunpoint.
I don’t have a gun, so you can sleep easy for the time being, but the point is that once your writing is good, for it to become great, you’re going to have to learn to edit. You’re going to have to hack your manuscript to pieces and then tape it together. You’re going to have to obliterate entire scenes if they’re not necessary to the plot or character development.
It’s going to be really hard, because you love your characters. Or at least you should, since I do, and I don’t want to be crazy for loving my characters, so you oughta love yours. But this painful process is necessary if you’re going to make your book the best it can possibly be. It will be slow and painful, but it’s also going to be worth it in the end.
You have to let other people read your work and accept their honest opinions to help you improve your work. Other writers, preferably. The wonderful ladies of First Novels Club obviously have the right idea!
And of course, you should read and read and read. Be familiar with the genre you’re writing for.
But wait, what happened here? I was meant to tell you how to write a bad novel.
The problem is, I think my writing is starting to venture into the ‘okay novel’ territory. Not quite publishable yet, but I’m reading and writing and revising and submitting. People read my work and give me honest appraisals of it, and every time someone says, ‘Hey, this could be better if you…’ I’m not immediately thinking they’re insulting my literary genius. I’m learning.
That ‘bad novel’ thing? You might have to ask somebody else.
Where'd you go, Steph Bowe?
Monday, November 7, 2011
Folks. There is a lot of rhyming fun to be had with my surname. (It's bow as in bow and arrow rather than take a bow. Oh no, Steph Bowe! Etc, etc.) But that's not what this post is about. This post is about being very, very, very busy, but the sort of busy that will soon dissipate and be replaced by a bunch of other things.
I'm moving from just outside Melbourne to the Gold Coast in Queensland. I'm also in the midst of exam season. I'll have finished high school and will be living two states away in a little over a fortnight. I'm also going to be a full-time writer (probably only until I decide what I want to study, and I'm living with my family, but it's still new and terrifying).
I'm moving from just outside Melbourne to the Gold Coast in Queensland. I'm also in the midst of exam season. I'll have finished high school and will be living two states away in a little over a fortnight. I'm also going to be a full-time writer (probably only until I decide what I want to study, and I'm living with my family, but it's still new and terrifying).
As you can imagine, I am really super busy, as I am sure you are too (due to exams, NaNo, general life). But! I promise I will be back to writing madly once December arrives. In the meantime, stay fabulous.
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