Once again...The Answers. BYOQ!
- The hardest part might be figuring out what I really want to say. That takes effort and thought but it’s part of the process!
- Then—I have to figure out the BEST way to say what I want to say, the most expressive language to say what I want to say.
- How do I turn up the power of my language....?
- The most useful writing class I had as an undergraduate was an art history class—we had to write about art! I learned so much!
- Try it right now—go find a painting and just describe it. (Trad narrative art is easier at first).
- Then write an ekphrasis….
- (I’ll wait…).
- Other history classes are good, too. (I was a history major, ha).
- Knowledge is good.
- We're in the 21st century, so you will also need to know some basic Photoshop and InDesign. These are very valuable skills!
- I always wanted to tell stories. When I started college I wanted to be a journalist (I wanted to write the A-heds for the Wall Street Journal!).
- But I'm too shy to talk on the phone, so that didn't work out at all....
- Once I set foot in grad school I wanted to be a professor....
- But, basically, I'm a linear word-type guy....
- No, not too much. I just move onto something else....
- Titles...
- When I’m grading or editing, I look at the formatting—it’s something that just jumps off the page. Sloppy formatting is a bad sign.
- If your reader can’t read what you’ve written, you have a problem.
- Be generous—both with other people and with yourself. (Writing is an act of generosity).
- Perhaps practice writing longer sentences, and embedding your ideas in those sentences....?
- Walt Whitman.
- I'm not in college anymore, so I don’t have to read things I don't like. Or finish everything I start.
- It's nice!
- In grad school I was reading a lot of memoirs as I researched my dissertation, and I read The Dead Girl, by Melanie Thernstrom. Dreadful. It was the last book I hated that I finished....
- In my downtime I work on my own books. Also: I drink beer and watch tv.....
- What a great question! And—there is no definitive answer.
- Generally, punctuation is more important in a poem than a story, since there are fewer words in a poem, and every word has to be in the correct context and carry a lot of weight.
- But! Sometimes you can remove punctuation from a poem and speed it up!!!!!
- Read your poem closely, and experiment. How do you want it to sound?
- I go through phases, though I always like reading histories about American stuff in the 19th century....
- The ending should be a big part of your outline. Maybe even the starting point!
- What I've found a couple of times is that the novel stops the scene or two before the projected ending in the outline. Just—there is nothing more to say about this story or this character.
- So: The End.
- But the overall tone of the ending itself is dependent on what has transpired in the novel. Triumphant, elegiac, whatever.
- And—whatever happens—maybe turn up the volume in writing the ending? It's the second-most important part of your book. It's what will stay in your reader's memory.
- Also—who gets the last line? This is really important.
- I guess some writers do the name symbolism thing. But I'm feeling that character names should just be names.
- That said—the name should be appropriate for the characters. Who are they? What year were they born? Where were they born?
- All these factor into the naming conventions....
- Yes...but--
- It will vary from poem to poem!
- George Martin is kind of an outlier, but at the same time his big novels are still under focal control. (Maybe). (Sort of).
- Also—it’s a long long series!
- (Martin needs to get busy and finish those last two books!)
- (Robert Caro needs to finish his LBJ biography, too!)
- I would still advise you to limit the number of important characters in your short stories. Do you really have enough space really make them into individuals?
- Or will they just be names on a page? What is your available narrative space?
- Okay—titles. In ye olde face-to-face class days, I would often send students out to walk about the halls for 10 minutes and come back with 10 titles. (Everyday objects can make great titles!)
- Or—maybe a song lyric that represents something in your story. Or a line from a poem. Or something odd your overhear while walking around....
- We are surrounded by titles.
- And—I usually start stories with a title. The title is sort of where I get the inspiration from.
- (I have a notebook which is nothing but titles. I'll never get them all written!)
- Character names? I really really good resource is the Social Security Administration's baby name listing. The most popular baby names, decade by decade.
- So—figure out more or less when your character was born, and go from there....
- Or—use phone books. (Do phone books still exist?)
- For Burnt House, I had an old WV phonebook and chose many names from there, mixed up by first and last names....
- Outlining! (Outlines are my answer to every writing problem!)
- So I outline, of course. But, yep, I start writing the book or story at the beginning. It's the most important part of your story/novel/memoir/whatever.
- I worry most about beginnings and endings....The middle, generally, can take care of itself.
- I think it's a pretty good idea to have multiple projects going. You can switch from one to another as your get stuck.
- But my experience has been that at some point, one of the projects will catch fire and take over all your time. If that happens, just go with it—you can get back to project B later...
- I'm writing a sequel to Normal School. It takes place in 2020 and features the pandemic and Trumpism and ghosts.
- I haven't generated any new material on it in about six weeks. I'm just too tired. But I have @45000 words, so I work on revisions every day.
- And—last weekend I pulled out an old project and worked on it for a couple of days.
- There's always something to do. As busy as I get, there's always 15 or 20 minutes a day for writing....
- And 15 or 20 minutes a day is enough.
- A page a day is a book a year.
- You can republish a story in a book, no problem. In fact, I'd say that's encouraged! Some journals will take previously published work—always check their listings in Novel & Short Story Writers Market.....
- I read a lot of student stories, and I see the army of characters as a real problem.
- When there are too many people in a six-to-eight-page story, there’s not enough space for the secondary characters to be even flat characters. They're just names on the page.
- And the fact that they stake up valuable narrative space means that the protagonist is given less to do....
- Well, both. Sort of. But you need good work for your buddy to promote.
- Good writers come out of the slush pile all the time. But you have to put yourself in a position to benefit from any publication.
- Hence my encouragement of Literary Citizenship.
- Be active on social media, and support other writers. Let people get to know you.
- Try pushing ahead. The work that is forced is just as good as the work that flows. Can't tell the difference.
- But—you can always skip the tough spots (make sure to update your outline) or bypass a stuck place for something easier.
- (Me—I usually force my way through the tough spots).
- I'm a total oddball and outlier—I look at genres as mostly marketing. (Which has its place, of course). On my level of pen-to-paper, I just write words....
- No—you're fine!
- And—a lot of people do this. I'm thinking right now of the Hemingway novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The book opens with the protag laying on pine needles in a forest watching people, and the last scene...there he is again.
- (His life has changed a lot in the previous three days!)
- So—a form of circularity.
- You can easily do this in a short story or novel. When you're dreamstorming your outline, just work the circularity into it....
- I have a list of seven books I need to write before I die. So—I'm racing the clock.
- I'm 62—will I get them all done? Will my physical and mental health hold out?
- We'll see!
Revision advice from the great Megan Abbot, from her Twitter feed....
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