8 Ways to Break Writer's Block

You jump on the creative train and the passengers are missing. 

You check the first train car: conductor gone.

There's no one to help you but you. Happens to the new and veteran of the writing realm. What do you do? You don't know so here's what I do. It may not work for you. These are just ideas to get it going again.

REBEL

1. Start on something you are not supposed to be doing. Or you are supposed to be doing but didn't want to do in the first place.

I'm very serious. When I worked, my creativity bugged the crap out of me when I was actually working on work, instead of working on drawing or writing. I can't explain it. Ask a neuropsychologist. Ask my neuroscience professor. She was amazing. It's like when you're not thinking about it, stressing that part of the brain, your brain can relax. It's like your brain had to go pee, but you're staring at it, waiting for it to happen. The brain can't go when you're creepy. So do something else and it'll be able to relieve itself.

READ

1) Re-read your work! Get back into your story! Haven't written for a while? You might have to read your entire story to get the feel for it again. Sit down, pen 'n' paper close to you, and just read it. Don't focus on the errors, focus on the tone and plot. You need to understand your protagonist again and you need to see where you might have been going with the book.

If I'm stuck, I read the chapters that are huge in plot info. Like a plan that the characters are about to go through or a secret that hasn't been spilled yet. Jot it down so you remember when you start writing again. Need posties? Use them instead. Super Sticky Post-It notes are amazing to keep on the wall by your writing space.

2) Read someone else's work. I got the Longmire series handy because I love his active voice and simple sentences. I get into the mind of Sheriff Longmire and it's peaceful how he is attentive to detail but oblivious to people's romantic interest in him. He remembers what people wear or how they talk. Craig Johnson, author, keeps you in the mind of the sheriff by focusing his perspective in places with sharp prose. They're light reads for a reason. He's very good at getting the point across without sacrificing setting or inner drama. (You might have read elsewhere I love Longmire...it's not even my genre to love, yet here I am.)

WRITE

1) I know this seems backwards, it's not. Write something you know you can keep writing about. Doesn't have to be your story. Example: I have three projects, two are fan fictions because they're fun, the other is my potential money-maker so that remains top priority. Go through your fun writings, ones you don't have to worry about getting wrong or beating a deadline, or whatever your case is. Write your fan fic, or write something that excites you, or just write about your feelings. Maybe dive into writing about your character's feelings. Free flow writing can really help break that block.

2) Write about writer's block. You'll be researching all the ways to break it, then you write about it, and you end up with an entire blog. (Oh look at that. I just did what I said. Ha!)

EXERCISE

1) 30 minutes of working out helps blood flow and boosts your body and mind. Endorphins, anyone? Don't go killin' yourself on some hardcore workout though. You need you to be able to sit at your writing nest for the next couple hours. DO NOT EXHAUST YOURSELF.

2) Download the Charity Miles app on your phone then go for a walk. Walking is a nice way of getting fresh air and experiencing outside. You get to smell and feel the environment around you. Your brain will go elsewhere and maybe that triggers something to write about. Have Notes or a voice recorder app handy.

I learned a few days ago that Don Brown takes workout breaks to keep the blood flowing. He'll do push-ups by his desk, so if this is my advice to you, and a renowned author also does it, then it must be good!

DRIVE

1) Drive to a destination. I once drove to a different place to buy food because I wanted to experience a different ambiance. I went to an asian market and type in Notes everything I smelled and felt. These are things books can do but movies can't: get you to feel what the character feels. Some books are straight up cinematics. You don't want that. So get all your senses in gear and drive somewhere. Did you know walking downtown New York City smells like warm, poopy diapers? Those big crates you walk over on the sidewalk wafts up the sewage and that's what I smell. It's pleasant to me, but could be nasty to someone else. Write everything down!

2) Drive without a destination. Scenic routes and a quiet drive might help you unwind. I don't recommend the freeway; go some place where you don't have to look every three seconds to see if someone's gonna cut you off. Go rural if you can. Once you know you can't worry about anything, your mind opens up, and thinks freely.

MUSIC

1) Make a playlist for your book or character. Got specific scenes that go with some of the music? Play it. Over and over, if you want to. There's a rhythm for songs, there's rhythm for chapters.

2) Listen to your favorite tracks, instrumental or vocal. If it's your favorite, your brain will love it.

EAT

1) Caffeine. One cup of coffee is good for a mental boost.

http://qz.com/358139/how-to-hack-your-coffee-habit-to-improve-your-focus-and-decrease-anxiety/

2) Nutritious meals that incorporate carbs, protein, and vegetables in one fill your stomach, and helps you focus. Starving yourself starves the brain and makes you cranky. Don't do that. Eat something.

And if all else fails...

SLEEP

1) Chances are you're overloaded, burned out, or whatever you wanna call it. Take a day off and sleep on it. You can choose to just take a nap, or just not work on your book at all that day, take the time to relax, forget about the book, and then go to bed your normal time. Then in the morning (or when ever you write), you're refreshed, and good to go!

If this list isn't exactly what you're looking for, I suggest this: 6 Hacks to Motivate Writing.

Tell me what works for you even if it's not on this list. Have you found something that helps you break writer's block? I wanna know about it!

Write Drunk, Edit Sober - What Does It Really Mean?

Although Ernest Hemingway NEVER said this, I wanna live by it. And I'm two shots in. I will not get drunk, but loose. I don't condone nor condemn drinking. In moderation it helps even perfectionists like me to ease out of being such a frissy-frossy. (See? It's working. I'm making sh*t up.) 

There are studies suggesting one or two beers helps INSPIRE ideas, while coffee helps you FOCUS on these ideas. I'm in a chapter that needs to hurry up and finish so I can go back to action scenes, my easiest and more fun writing bits. Hence, the shots to help me unwind, and not fuss over how perfect the scene is. It's a complicated dialogue scene. Lots of information. Lots of stuff I need to just throw out there so when I go Revision mode, I can figure it out then. No biggie. 

Don't worry about your first draft. It's rough because it's for YOU. It's to tell you the story, then you can revise and figure out how it tells others the story. 

Keep writing!

What does "Write Drunk" mean and how did the false quote become so popular?

You could take it literally or less than but the quote simplifies the writer's take on finishing the book first. When you go through the rough draft, you must keep writing, and not care about all the errors, and potential hiccups in your research. Your usual inhibitions are put away when drunk so try to put them away when you're writing. 

What does "Edit Sober" mean?

Without mercy, revise, revise, revise. Remember how you tried correcting your mistakes when you realized what you did while you were drunk? Yeah. You're fixing those. The bad texts, the vocal regrets...you're editing those out of your story. But only Edit Sober when you're DONE WITH YOUR BOOK. Not when you're done with the chapter. Unless you're a blogger. Then yes...please...edit your blog post with murderous enthusiasm.

Helpful Resource: http://problogservice.com/2014/09/19/what-write-drunk-edit-sober-means/

Killing Cliches: A Murder Reference to Writing's Ruthless Saboteur

I'm not nice when it comes to awful dialogue choices writers make, especially if I'm not emotionally invested. It's one of my negative traits. Take Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Some of it is snarky, and times (many times), it's an ugher. You know, when you roll your eyes and ughhh. That.

And it's not just dialogue, it's an action, a scene, or a character. I'll focus on lines and actions since my list can go on and on. If you're looking for the hub of cliche help, this is it. My list may be short(er) but I also have links to other references who have done a major service in hunting cliches and shooting them without remorse. To those blog writers: thank you. To the readers:

In order to kill your target, the cliche, you first must know what it is. When I was a kid, I asked my mom, and she had a difficult time explaining it to my inexperienced self. She said it's a term for when something is done or said from lots of people to the point of exhaustion. (I'm sure she really said, "it's a word describing another word used over and over and over...and over again." Because I would get that at whipper-snapper stage.) Your stage now, is understanding your cliche.

To start, here's a list of cliches I found while watching several shows and movies. A few are from Buffy (naturally), then others from my beloved series Blacklist, my child's movies, and some books I read. 

STAGE 1: Analyze Your Target

You think I--

(Doesn't matter what I think.)

Give me one reason I shouldn't shoot you.

I will be your judge, jury, and executioner.

Who do you think you are?
(I'm the one who...)

I'm sorry. 

(Yeah I'm sorry too.) 

Hang tight! (When someone is hanging upside down.)

• Obvious puns aren't cliches but annoying.

Like a kid in a candy store.

Knife cuts anything like butter.

Star Wars references (I am your father.)

Well then, I guess I better get started.

I should've known.

At long last.

When lots of characters in a row have their own line. They're in a group and it seems out of place that each one would talk one after the other until everyone has a say. Usually happens at end of movies (Disney's Bolt) or my favorite Dragon Age games (scene of characters playing Wicked Grace in Inquisition).

Fair enough.

Slept like a baby. 

• This is wrong for two things: babies do not sleep well and people say it like it's a good thing. 

Slept like a log.

• Somebody got the idea about babies but forgot you can't change one word of a cliche to make it something new. 

It ain't over 'til it's over.

Or any reference to fat ladies singing.

A mother who cannot defend herself or her baby.

• Oh no. We are resourceful. We either are packing or we have taken classes. Stories involving a mother losing or failing is old. Defense is increasing and women are fighters. And demonizing the natural biology of mothers is repulsive and you will lose your audience. If you're a screenwriter and do this (Once Upon A Time, I'm glaring at you), you should know that most females are mothers (and potential mothers) and stay at home to tend their wee ones.
• If it's important that she loses the baby (kidnapping), a mother will do what ever is necessary to get her child back. Grizzly moms. Take them seriously. They might cry but I'm betting it's out of rage, not the whiny dribble I often see on television. ("Please. I just want my baby back." Heaven help (<---cliche) whoever thinks this is okay to say to the villain who just stole the child. Mad Max. Glaring at those writers too.)

Orphans.

• I liked how the love interest in Croods was an orphan but it wasn't the main focus. It was only a key to relating with the father. Main prots as orphans where the writer tries to stir emotion from it is overdone. Orphans who are fighters or don't make a big deal of it (maybe don't even hint it) is okay. Using it to mainly care for character...just stop.

• Bad Orphans: The Good Dinosaur, Devil May Cry

• Good Orphans: Annie, Oliver Twist, The Croods

Hormonal Love.

• I loved The Little Mermaid. I got older and loved Beauty and the Beast more. I grew up, got my heart broken, crushed, and dumped overboard, and I love the gradual displays of affection two people ha e for one another in the subtlest ways, each carrying an action and reaction in different scenes. Oh Sheriff Longmire, you kill me. But give me that stupid hook up for the sake of "she's a female so I must" (Titan AE) or that "he's so handsome, isn't he?" (The Little Mermaid) and I will be drooling, staring up at the ceiling, waiting for someone to wipe my chin. And neck. And change my shirt. Yuck. 

Long-range weapons used at short range.

• And the hero wonders what they did wrong, or that they got in trouble for drama's sake. No cop does this. No person with basic gun training does this. It's super annoying to watch because humans are not that dumb. 

You're not him/her. Because if you do this, you'll be just like them. 

• Oh. Ehm. Gee. Justifying not killing a murderer because character would "become like them." Batman does this specifically because the comic is about the colorful villains. We love the villains therefore need a pacifist who rejects his ninja training to keep our darlings alive. (And frankly, keeping them alive with their face as a mask--see Death of the Family--got really absurd, kinda fun, but just kill him already. We can re-read oldies.) Conflict (and criminals) would be out of a job if more justice fighters took self-defense seriously, and understood that criminals do criminal things and will not stop doing criminal things. 
• Arrow. I stopped watching this show because I got sick of the hypocrisy. Green Arrow was so much fun...what happened? I think that actor happened. I don't know. Do you know? Tell me if you do.

STAGE 2: Hunt Your Target

It's okay to plug in cliches during your first draft. The first is about putting the story out there so you can see what it's about, not anyone else. Well, maybe your mom. Or significant other. And they'll tell you it's great. It's not. It's horrible. It's a first draft. Be okay with horrible. You wrote a book! Woo! If you're still writing, just keep pushing those words. But if you're revising, this is where you need to be: hunting cliches.

Now that you know what the cliches look like, read them over, highlight them, and decide if it's detestable, or it really is a part of the character's dialogue (because some characters will use cliche in certain genres, especially if you're going for snide, or satirical). If it's questionable, ask someone else. Have you considered a beta reader? I told my husband to point out cliches the instant he finds them in my work. He noticed I used purple prose in my first book. As a perfectionist, mistakes are intolerable, but they happen. I'm slowly accepting this, so if you're similar, I know your pain.

Once you find the cliches, do you shoot to kill, or let 'em live? It depends on you. Your book. But if the cliche really is annoying, and annoying to readers, then put it out of its misery. It will only make your book miserable to read.

STAGE 3: Redrum and Replace

Murder is simple. Weapon of choice, then kill. But getting away with it is the rub (<---cliche). The kill scene needs clean-up. Did you set it up properly so no trace of the cliche would be left behind (<---cliche)? Or will this cliche come back to haunt you (<---cliche) and wreak havoc (<---cliche) on your chapters?

Now here's something that's counter-productive to avoiding cliches: thinking outside the box (<---CLICHE!). 

Gawd. Why? No! Stop it! Just stop it! How do we stop it? The more people talk the more lines are used. The more they're used the more they're overused. So how do you avoid cliches altogether? 

KNOW them. 
UNDERSTAND them. 
Then BEND the rules. 

What? Yes. Bend the rules. Book's not going to be perfect (gasp). But it's a step. Take your cliche and make it a part of your book. Here's how:

1. What is your book's genre?
2. Who are your characters?
3. How do they relate their dialogue to personality?

Are you a horror writer? Are your characters dark? Are you a happy Young Adult writer who like glitter and unicorns? Do you prefer vampires or wizards? Where are your characters from? Who's narrating? Okay, you got the idea. Now work with the cliche.

Example: He avoids her like the plague.

Rewrite: He won't touch a paper with her signature. 

Example: I should have known.

Rewrite: Nothing. 

• Some sentences should just be omitted. If they realized something that was obvious to them, most people don't admit this out loud. They respond with an action or facial expression that means something is going on in their head that we can't see.

Example: At long last.

Rewrite: Hello. 

• No really. That's cute. Especially if it's the antagonist. Remember Star Trek? ("Hi, Christopher. I'm Nero.")

Rewrite: And we're here.

• Or you can turn this phrase into an action, like spreading arms out with a smirk kind of thing.

Example: I slept like a log.

Rewrite: I slept and lost three thousand years. Or: I slept. What year is it?

It's great to be creative with your characters' dialogue, especially the voice of your book. If you have specific objects in your world that only certain characters know about, use them in dialogue to avoid cliches. One character I always think of when doing this is Starfire. She said some crazy things in the comic and show (moreso the show...easier to notice when her breasts weren't taking up her talk bubbles). Only she understood what she meant and left other Titans bemused. 

There are lots of "avoiding cliche" tips out there, but not many that gave a solid solution, or at least a helpful example. They stated and addressed but the help was obscured. So I decided to write this for you in hopes that it'll help. Also, this is like a hub. Below are references to cliche posts I appreciated due to their unique insight and different areas of cliches. I suggest the Oxford one first as they actually offer solutions and not just "DON'T WRITE CLICHES MMMKAY?" Yuck. I'm here to help, not yell at you. Mostly. ;)

Further Study References for Cliches:

Oxford Dictionary - Rewriting to Avoid Cliches
681 Cliches to Avoid in your Creative Writing
How to Avoid Cliches in Fantasy Writing
Six Cliches to Watch Out For
(my favorite) 50 Cliched Dialogues to Ban from your Script

Tell me, what are your least favorite cliches? Is it on my list or in any of the links? Share with me! I'd love to hear 'em! 

And if this post helped, please reshare. I post to Pinterest and Tumblr. Find me. Follow me. 
Stalk me. :) 

5 Points God Helps With Writing

The Bible is the most printed book in all of existence. And while lots of writers do not believe in God, they should look into why it's the most popular book and how. Supposedly there have been six billion Bibles printed, but nothing is exact. Still. Wow. It'd be a good idea to have a chat with the best-selling author of the world. Yes?

1. HOPE & LOVE

2. UNORIGINALITY

3. DISCOVERY

4. PACE

5. PURPOSE

= = = = = = =

1. Hope & Love

ROMANS 15:4 -- For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.

Readers look for specific things in stories. Let's look at the best-sellers to find out what they are. Take the Top 10. (I hate citing Wiki, but this isn't an official document, so go with it.) 

The Bible, ~5 to 6 billion

Quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong, Mao Zedong, 900 million

The Qur'an, 800 million

Xinhua Zidian, 400 million

Book of Common Prayer, Thomas Cranmer, unknown

Pilgrim's Progress, John Bunyan, unknown

Foxe's Book of Martyrs, John Foxe, unknown

Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, Jr., 120 million

Harry Potter Book 1, J.K. Rowling, 107 million

And Then There Were None, Agatha Christie, 100 million

(http://www.justanswer.com/general/0nrjs-top-10-printed-books-time.html)

I'm not an expert in most of these books but I have read the Bible, the Qur'an, and definitely Harry Potter. These books contain instruction, hope, an escape, or a peace to accept ourselves as we are. Some have all, some have one. Of course there are lots of other factors that make these best sellers but to the people who actually WANT to read them, they seek hope; they seek love.

What you write should have something like this. Give your readers hope. An underdog is always a fan favorite. (David and Goliath. Katniss and Snow. Potter and Voldemort.) Give your readers love. (God the Father and the World. Lily and Severus.) Give your readers instruction. Give them a moral to a story. Give them mistakes the protagonist made and have the character and reader learn from them.

Faith, Hope, and Love are gifts from God. But the greatest is Love. Hold true to this when working on your story.

2. Unoriginality

ECCLESIASTES 1:9 -- What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

It's okay to be unoriginal. No matter what you write about, someone, or even God already created something similar. The key is to add at least one more attribute that makes it your own. Since I will never give Twilight the time of day, let's go to K. M. Weiland. She inspired me to write this blog, so I should promote her work. In her blog The 4 Tweaks to Writing Truly Original Stories and Characters she mentions her own designs for her genre. She researched the fantasy genre and updated her knowledge on it. She learned about the cliches and tweaked them for her own book. Her dragon became something else. Her races became something more. 

My own example is dragon-related. As Tolkien said, a book isn't worth reading unless there's a dragon, so I made my own race of them. Sort of. People love dragons. It's okay to have them in your work. People love vampires, zombies, and fairies. So does God. He loves the work you do and loves watching you use your borrowed talents. Like a parent smitten with scribbles on a page. God will put it up on a big, heavenly refrigerator, and boast about how awesome your work is. (Not that your work is a bunch of scribbles...)

One of my favorite chapters in the Bible is the Valley of Dry Bones. Anything that shows God being dark and creepy to others is absolutely beautiful to me. He wills the bones to come to life. They shake and mount into skeletons, then all the ooey gooey insides form, then the skin, then the breath. Such poetry in the image. When I read this I knew I wrote my first book for a reason bigger than my own. Though zombies and grim reapers are "nothing new under the sun" I made death my own theme. And I knew, just because it's creepy and dark, God loves it. I made it through His help. 

3. Discovery

MATTHEW 7:8 -- For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

Our finished works are never what we thought they'd be in the beginning. You have your outline, your characters, your theme, and then you start to write. It's a journey all its own. A character's motivations take them in ways we didn't want them to, but they have to, because that's their way. God may have purpose for Jonah, but Jonah didn't listen. What happens when characters don't listen to the author? We give them trials, consequences of their actions that add more dynamics to the story. We somehow knew something would happen but not precisely what. 

Ever paint? You have an idea of what you're going to make, and you try to make it exactly what's in your head, but it turns out completely different. Yet it might be better than what you thought first. There's concept then production. Happens all the time. That's a good thing. It's fun. It breaks the system and adds vibrance from both sides: behind the keyboard and in the story.

God wants us to discover ourselves, more importantly, he wants us to discover life, and as the result, the beauty of his works. Nothing new under the sun? Cuz he made it. But that doesn't mean we've found everything he's made yet. So go out and find it. Go out and find him. Discovery is a relationship between creator and creation. In such a vast world of imagination, anything is possible except the possibility of nothing.

4. Pace

JAMES 1:3 -- For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.

You attend your first date. You sit down with him or her and you say, "Hi," then they say "Hi, my name is blah-blah-blah, I've lived for blah-blah in blah-blah, I do this, this, this, this, and that, that, that, and a little of that, but lots of this. I used to be a murderer/dealer/detective/king/hitman/insert crazy occupation here, until this one other crazy thing happened, so I took up this other thing, and fought with this person crazier than me, but I'm really excited to meet you because I've done all these background checks on you, and you just seem like such an amazing person, and I want to protect you and love you for the rest of our lives, and maybe have children. And a dog. I like dogs." And he or she keeps talking and you run. You run far. That's the sane thing to do, right?

The Bible is layers upon layers of information and we only read one piece and somehow we don't see the same verse we read in a different light until months, maybe years down the road, when we read it again, and it means something else. Or we're first learning about God and only read the nice, happy parts, like the miracles.

"Hi. I'm Jesus. I do miracles."

Then you warm up to him, thinking this is an all right guy. Until he gets angry. He flips merchant tables in the air and yells at people to leave the church. 

What just happened? He's such a chill dude! Why is he acting that way?

You read more. You find out why. One character trait is revealed, and then another, and then another.

Then you want to read the history of this world. This Jesus was planned long before his birth. What? Yeah. How is that possible?

So you read. And the layers keep getting read until you're so involved with the book you can't leave. 

God teaches you pace. He teaches you not to make your readers run away by overloading them with information. He shows you, he doesn't tell you. He shows you active and passive voice. I'm certain God invented the term "info-dump." And even though the Bible is dense with information, he understands that we will become overwhelmed with some pages, so those verses you read years before that made no sense might make sense now. You never know. But that's a faith thing. Not a pace thing. Another topic for another blogger.

5. Purpose

You want to dream big but you have little faith in yourself let alone God. We have to believe there is something more to us than mediocrity. Through hope, love, and discovery, we find our own greatness within what we find already great. It does not mean any of us are the same. It does not mean by others' greatness we are washed out. We are a gallery and the artist. We just need to try and with trying, we find purpose.

ROMANS 5:3-4 -- More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope...

2 TIMOTHY 3:16 -- All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.

God used many people throughout many time periods to create the Bible. And crazy as it is, all the books put together check out. Things that are said in the Old Testament about an angel coming to Earth to save people is written in the New Testament as Jesus. Writers for Old Testament had no clue about Jesus. Never saw him, never existed when He was born. Yet it's there, connecting chapter after chapter with this prophecy that a symbol of unconditional love will arrive to save the people God loves. God used all these writers for a greater purpose that they could not see, but God could. God, the master writer. These writers are one page in a book; one thread in the tapestry. What writers do is very important. Writers spread messages through the painting of words. Know that what you choose to write is important. You have a purpose. You are inspired for a reason and those reasons may be selfish, selfless, or all over the place. But there is always one master writer guiding those reasons for his ultimate reason. 

= = = = = = =

I am in no way an expert of the Bible. I struggled with this because how do I talk about something that's perfectly made? I can't do it justice. I can only hope as I did my best. Some of the verses have nothing to do with the context I've posted. 

(1 JOHN 4:1-3 -- Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.)

But if this post made you read the descriptive text of each verse, then that means you don't take my words at face value, and that's a double win for God and myself. I know you will do anything to seek the truth and God gets some one-on-one time with you. If you're just here for the inspiration that you are something special, and what you're doing is greater than yourself, that's what this post intends.

You are unique.

You have purpose.

You can do anything.

So...

DREAM BIG.

He is not finished with you yet.

PHILIPPIANS 1:6.

4 Reasons Why We Need Miserable Writers

Some of the best writers were miserable. 

While I'm stuck in the middle of my book, I reflect what the new year brought us. 

Heartbreak, misery, and shock. 

But just because your life sucks doesn't mean you should give up. 

It means you have something to say.

The world hurts and our words are supposed to heal it.

What about healing the writer?

Can our own words soothe us or do we selflessly reveal our souls to help others find their own? 

Misery wants to empathize. 

We want to relate.

(Yes, this is a happy photo I took. There have been no gloomy days here so I've been extra cranky. I need my gloom or all the happy irks me. Balance, people. Works both ways.)

1. Brings Value
2. Makes You Relatable
3. Strong Emotions Produce Best Results
4. Therapy for Writer and Reader


Which writer did you relate to who had horrible experiences? Maybe you didn't relate, maybe you just felt their work was beautiful. One of my favorites is Edgar Allan Poe. If anyone read his work, they have at least one favorite. With my disturbing perspective of what's beautiful, his violent poetry speaks to me. It's dark but it's honest. He lost so many in his real life that his only outlet was writing.

Now what if he lived a happy life? Annabel Lee would not have the same impact.

When darkness veils your life, it's an opportunity to create. When Alan Rickman died, my soul broke. Didn't want to do anything that day. I got drunk and cried. My years of drawing fan art, writing fan fics, and watching his films three-fourths of my life led to a very miserable week. After I sobered up his day of death, I painted. I had to. The brushstrokes were therapeutic. I didn't hurry it up to post my tribute with everyone else, I just painted for my soul's sake. 21+ hours later, I submitted my tribute on my art page. For miserable reasons, it ended up being my best work yet. I handled every detail with perfection (as much as I could). This is one version:

Didn't sleep. Didn't eat much. Even stopped drinking. Cried a lot watching my painting become him. Skipped the Bargaining stage. Disbelief, Anger, and Sadness mostly. I shouldn't use my emotions to work, but sometimes I need to. It produces the best results. If I didn't find a way to channel my emotions, I would've kept drinking. Not good for anyone who depends on me.

Another way I coped with tragedy came more immediate, years back when my dog died. I never got serious about writing until his death. I had to write. I promised him.

It still hurts.

My first book leaks my loss of the greatest friend ever. People will find solace in their loss through acceptance of death. That's my hope, anyway. Nobody should deal with that alone.

Our darkness is what gives us value. Without miserable moments, we can't be relatable. Total misery is doom but if we find the balance to accept the light and dark, then we can find the words to make writing worth reading. I'm not saying be miserable all the time. Not saying be happy all the time either (ugh...that's the worst...so fake...hate fake, all-happy people). But we can't help what happens to us. We can help what we do about it.

Further insight to accepting our darkness: Why Our Dark Sides Make Us Better Writers

Writers who led miserable lives:

John Berryman
Virginia Woolf
Edgar Allan Poe
Tennessee Williams
Hunter S. Thompson
Ernest Hemingway
Robert E Howard
Anne Sexton
Sylvia Plath

And again, not saying misery is a good thing or that we should glorify it, but successful writers had awful lives. Certain all these committed suicide. If you think your life sucks and are not talking to someone about it, don't keep it in. Seek the light. Sometimes writing won't be enough to soothe your ache. I want you to find hope. Every aspect of your life is meaningful, even the misery. But if it hurts too much, please--please--don't keep it to yourself. Those stages to suicide are bullshit. My friend died and no one saw it coming. Wanna talk? I'm here. Seriously.

This post is a mess. No apologies. Talking about misery where spots are still sore is not my favorite, but I have to, especially if it helps you.

Tell me what you think. Tell me your feels.

Movies to Watch to Pick Apart the Story

These are movies I have watched dozens of times. Some are traditions to watch during holidays or important events. But as a writer I see them as trophies to the profession. Lots of story, strong character introductions and development. Lots of plot. Plot twists. Motivations for plot. Arcs. Everything.

 There are flaws in everything, but these I found great films to study. 

And watch. 

Go watch them. 

Now.

Stardust

Character arcs and motivations are clear, concise character development, quickly attached to characters in short time.

Love Actually

Story builds from separate characters and climax is a crescendo of all character arcs woven to one fixed location. Everyone has a favorite character in this movie. Mine's the prime minister (Hugh Grant), but of course I like the author (Colin Firth) as well. Tugs at heartstrings; story never gets old no matter how many times I watch it. Christmas tradition movie.

The Fifth Element

Fast pace in caring about characters and story. 

Fun, cult classic. Never gets old.

Ferngully

Watch for core values in characters and how they're affected by others. Good character internal/external conflict.

The Negotiator

Motivation becomes the plot twist. I obsessed over this movie in my teens. Bought soundtrack to reenact scenes in my bedroom. Nerrrrrd.

The Usual Suspects

Speaking of plot twists and motivations...this movie.

Murder of Crows

And this one.

The Holiday

If Jude Law didn't sell you, the sweet story of internal conflict meeting external conflict will leave you in happy tears. Talk about gumption.

Rise of the Guardians

Character conflict, motivations, story. It's beautiful. Another blog mentioned the man in the moon being a horrible idea. It didn't affect me as much, but I slightly agree after reading their argument. They made "him" too omniscient. But watch this anyway if you like stories about finding meaning in circumstances.

Megamind

Gawd. That swallow. All fangirls know this scene and we rewind it every time. Character dilemma. Lots of internal conflict. And a pretty blue alien.

Run Fatboy Run

Heartwarming comedy about how far characters will go to achieve their desires.

The Kid

Cute story, character conflict, fast attachment to protagonist, great character introductions and quick, powerfully shown personality traits.

The Wedding Date

I just saw this movie last night. No joke. Why didn't I see it sooner!? Clear personality traits shown on the spot, fast care for protagonist, secondary protagonists are equally strong. Motivations, plot moves smoothly. Fun, sweet. Resolution weak.

As Good As It Gets

Motivations and plot. How characters change each other. Effing Jack Nicholson, just watch it.

The Croods

My kid's favorite movie. It's fast-paced and precise with characters and story. To the point with every scene building to an explosion of emotion and you don't realize you're a part of the family until the point of no return.

The Lego Movie

A tear jerker.

Not kidding.

Ratatouille

Happy endings for everyone. Antagonist included. Lots of motivations to drive plot. Main anta and secondary anta, with primary prot and secondary prot. Fun mayhem.

Just Go With It

Don't be sick of Adam Sandler just yet. This one's a sweet take on a French play. Internal conflict and romantic tangles with hindrances. You'll love it.

Flushed Away

K.M Weiland talks about characters who believe a lie. Prot is happy in his lie and you watch him realize the lie isn't all great.

The Patriot

I take this movie seriously. Powerful motivations in all characters. And a huge reason to despise the antagonist right away. Small intervals of humanity and humor to attach audience to prots. Watch plot driven by passion. But watch because it's the Revolutionary War.

No bigger motivation than the people dictated by a king overseas.

Hope this list helps. Leave me a comment! Also I wanna know what movies you love.

What's your favorite movie? Why should a writer watch it?

6 Eyesores to Chop in Writing

I edit my photos like I write. I want clarity and subject. I want to know exactly what I'm looking at. I want all the distractions out of the way so I can admire the view. If anything hinders that, I toss it. First rule: dump the blurry photos. Doesn't matter if it's a great shot; it's not a great shot if it's blurry. There are some I keep just for myself, like if it was a once-in-a-lifetime catch of my kid, but just for me. I don't post it for anyone else. Blurry makes the entire subject an eyesore. If people treated writing like I do photos, there would be more intriguing things for me to read. Like I toss my photos, I toss my books. If I see excessive use of narrating (someone telling me about something, and not letting me experience the moment through the character), I close that book. Especially first couple pages. I'm super picky because my time is valuable. I don't want to waste my day reading a book that could be good. I want to know it's good. (The Shack is still the crappiest book in existence. I don't care how many Christians try to tell me otherwise. I tried three times. I threw it three times.)

The huge turn-offs in reading are found in six eyesores of writing. Want your reader to keep turning the page? Dump the blurry photos.

The 6 (6?) Eyesores:

1. Passive Voice
2. Distracting Prose
3. Said Synonyms
4. Type Usage
5. Telling
6. Cliches


#1 Passive Voice

Active: Sam stabbed Tallis in the face.
Passive: Tallis' face was stabbed by Sam's knife.

Active: I ate the cookies.
Passive: The cookies were eaten by me.

Active: Active is aggressive and hits the point.
Passive: The point which Active hits is aggressive.

Nobody likes beating around passive entrails except politicians, so keep your voice active. In Active, the subject makes the action. Have you ever heard someone talk indirectly? I'd hate to bring up politics again (passive-sounding, did you catch that?), but they're so good at beating the dead Passivity that it's eye-rolling. During the Benghazi hearings, Clinton couldn't come up with a single Yes or No answer. "That could be correct." "That is possible." And so on. Besides making my military blood boil, she makes every use of INDIRECT voice, aka passive. She can't own up to the responsibility of the subject's actions.

Your job is to own up. In dialogue, you need your characters to get to the point because that's what your reader wants. Unless you have that conflicting character who's making life hard for everyone, or is trying to keep a secret. In which case, Clintonify the crap out of that dialogue. Annoy your other characters and annoy the reader. Then at the end of the book, make someone punch that character in the face, because that's what the majority of your readers will want to do.

#2 Distracting Prose

Those over-elaborate details of setting, the character's description (even though the character may not even be noticing these things about themselves), the long sentences with too many adjectives...

...stop it. Read some Stephen King. They're "scary" books. So what? Know what's scary? An angry reader with a tome in their hand waiting to chuck it across the room.

Here's an example page: Declutter Your Prose

When you're writing journalism, you do not use filler words, especially in the first paragraph. News is news, not excessive poetry. In this age, people are fast-paced. Make it so the fast-paced people want something to read in the short amount of time they have between checking Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and calling Mom before lunch break is over.

In fiction writing, don't overstep the "crisp, clear blue water cascading the mountainside, splishing with plumes of mist that cast a veil over the--"

I threw the book away at "crisp" and "clear". I used to write like that. I still might. If I do, and I notice, I growl at myself. Grrr... Yep. You're not the only one I'm hard on. *snorts* Difficult with. That's better. I spend enough time catching myself in my own errors, I really don't need others to do it for me. Color Code Personality: Blue. That's me. Honesty and Rules. I love them. I love rules. I know when to bend them but in distracting prose? No bendy! No breaky! Get to the point!

If you're going into descriptions of setting, make it a short paragraph. Practice journalism and realize what's really important for setting. What is it that your character notices? If it's a male character, do you think they'd notice what shade of pink some girl's lips are? What type of tree they're leaning against? If you leave out detailed descriptions, you give freedom to your artistic fans. You know...the ones that like to draw fan art. Yes. Make them happy. Give them freedom. Make them imagine for themselves what kind of tree he's leaning against. Unless he's an arborist. Then go nuts. But guys don't care about shades of color.

#3 Said Synonyms

One of the best poems I listened to used said over and over again. It didn't matter because it was about the dialogue.

If you keep the "saids" monotonous, it won't distract the reader from what's being said. Fuss over synonyms because you think you said "said" too many times and you're overthinking it. There's a post going around on Pinterest, talking about different ways to say "say"......do not like this. It's for amateur writers who aren't ready for the big books yet. If you're worried about using "said" then you're going to slow yourself down.

I use said even when I know my character is screaming. I use an exclamation point when a character shouts. The exclamation does the shouting for me because I don't use it often. And you don't need to make fence posts out of it.

!!!!!!!!!!!!

#4 Type Usage

Italics. Underlines. Fence posts. They're distractions and the reader will come out of your world because they'll notice they've been reading. You don't want them to notice they're reading. You want their eyes to move over words, vessels into your character's eyes. Make them become the character. Type usage goes into deep perspective, or deep point of view.

Leaving out italics kept the words moving. It's Svetlana's perspective, so all words will be hers. The reader is in her head, so any use of italics to show she's thinking is irrelevant. Any underlines for a word she may strongly pronounce isn't necessary if the sentence structure is written well. The reader will get which words are emphasized. They're smart. Let them show you how smart they are. Svetlana wouldn't have an impact on the situation with Caelum if the reader had to read this:

Svetlana looked down at her hands.

If it were that simple then she could just turn her skin to ice.

Her hands frosted over into an amethyst hue.

Now I'm just telling you what she thought with type usage. You're not actually feeling it.

#5 Telling

Will Smith's character in Men in Black brought the viewers along for the ride in the world of sci-fi. If he was just sitting at Kay's desk, being told all the happenings of his new job, there wouldn't be a movie.

Show don't Tell.

We mean it. Get rid of the She thought, he thought; he realized, she saw. It'll look like the story is told to the reader, not the character going through the story. Telling is narrating. Narrating is bad, mmmkay? A character's thoughts are the words. Let them go.

Example:

“Holy spades on a rainy day. Did you quad-shot this?” Darlana asked.

“Only for you, my dear.”

Darlana plugged the port into the register; it beeped, and she placed it back in her pocket.

“You are a blessing,” Darlana said, walking away.

The straw never left her lips from the stand to outside. She even maneuvered herself onto the bike without having to drop the cup in her custom holder. How long was she at work for? In all the gloomy, rainy days, today turned out to be clear, and glistening. As Darlana pedaled (one hand on the handlebar), the chilly air nipped her face; she took in the scene, eyes glancing at the array of flowers and bushes about the parking lot, and the birds singing in the trees.

What a perfect day—away from the curse of monotony, away from judgement, away from the hassles of survivalism. She had a credit port to unleash on the sinking ship of capitalism. What a better place to go than where a girl can drown in a sea of fashion: the shopping center.

* * *

Getting coffee is a favorite pasttime, even for characters. Makes people happy. Makes them do things. Splurge, even. A fantastic example (not of coffee) is in The Shining, where Stephen King pulls us into Jack's mind, and uses deep perspective to make us feel Jack's experience. The movie isn't as personal as the book; recommend reading it to gain insight.

#6 Cliches

One of my problems as a writer is coming up with ways to twist a cliche into something original. Watching shows and hearing the characters talk and know exactly what they're going to say--. Hello, eye roll. I went to a writer's workshop where Brad Bell and Jane Espenson discussed several topics, including this one. They showed us a screenplay Bell did with Husbands (?), and how the character said "elephant in the room" without saying it. It was brilliant. They said, "Wow, how'd that elephant get in here" or something like that. I have the screenplay somewhere in my folders. If you catch your characters saying cliche things, maybe because you're just spitting out dialogue, and those words are the first things that pop into your head, then go back, and re-direct the phrases.

In the earlier text, I wrote "beating around the bush" without saying so, but you got the idea. "...beating around the passive entrails..."

It's time we get creative with cliches because there truly is nothing new under the sun...oh look at that...a bible verse. I wouldn't redirect anything from the Bible...but if it needs to be changed in your book, do so. I'm won't leave God out of anything, though. Bad things happen. O_o (<---oh look! distracting type usage!)

Cliches don't have to be about dialogue, either. Characters and genres play into it. I used cliches in my first book to make a point, that not everything is entirely cliche.

A mad scientist is one layer, a bad German accent is another layer, but add everything else into the story--like how he's not so mad, and he's actually a bio-engineer, and he really is German but only his accent comes out when he's stressed, and some other things I can't say cuz it would spoil the story of my first book...

But everyone loves a mad scientist. And everyone makes them their own style. In order for your audience to care about them, there has to be more than mwahahas and crazy hair.

Practice twisting the cliches. Watch what you say and see how people react. Watch a cheesy show. Once Upon A Time is good. Most of what they say on there is total cliche. Sorry, Espenson. I don't know what the writing team was thinking. Riding old characters for several seasons is a Hollywood cliche in itself. Make something new. Stop reliving old ideas. It was nice at first. Now?

Now I'm ranting. I gotta get outta here!

One week until NaNoWriMo. Are you doing it?

I am. Blogs will be shortened for November, if they exist at all. Maybe I'll post crazy somethings to inspire you, or terrify you, into doing NaNoWriMo next year. XD Fun times.