AURIA CORTES

As a writing coach, I read dozens of manuscripts each week by aspiring children’s writers. Most are very competent but in many cases, the readability of the text and the emotional impact of the story could be cranked up with just a bit of tweaking.

Here are my current top three tips ….

TIP 1:

Let the reader experience the character’s emotion directly.

Don’t just say: Lydia felt embarrassed. That leaves the reader with a bunch of words that convey pretty well … nothing. The reader needs to feel what Lydia is going through to become emotionally involved in the story. Dredge deep into your own personal experiences to find the right words. Genuine descriptions will feel real to the reader.

Okay … what do you do or feel when you’re embarrassed? You might feel a warm flush creep up your face. You might stare dumbly at your shoes or discover something important under your fingernail. You might force a laugh or put on a fake-cheerful smile.

Instead of telling the reader that Lydia felt embarrassed show her experiencing the embarrassment:

Lydia’s face grew warm. She busied herself with a loose thread on her jacket.

TIP 2:

Make friends with the delete button. Why? Because good writing is tight writing. I’ve lost track of the number of editors and agents I’ve heard lately saying: I want a great story written sparely.

What does this mean? It means you should say what you want to say using as few words as possible. This will force you to use only your sharpest images, your most engaging dialogue, your liveliest action.

Here’s a trick: Pretend that you have to fax your story to a publisher at $2.00 a word. You’ll quickly discover words, phrases, sentences and whole paragraphs that aren’t vital to the story. If you find your ms shrunk to half its original size – don’t panic, celebrate!! That means it’s more tightly written and has a livelier pace.

Here’s an example of pruning:

BEFORE:

Andrew noticed that there was a very big spider on his pillow.

AFTER:

An enormous spider sat on Andrew’s pillow.

This example reminds us of the impact created when you move the focal part of a sentence (in this case, the spider) to the beginning.

TIP 3:

Instead of beginning sentences with ‘He saw” or “She heard”, launch directly into the action. Here’s what I mean …

BEFORE:

Jemma saw Dad cooking muffins.

AFTER

Dad was cooking muffins.

If Jemma is your viewpoint character, the reader will instinctively know who is observing Dad. By talking about the main character (Jemma saw Dad …), you remind the reader that a narrator is at work, describing the scene from a distance.

Watch out for:

He/she saw …

He/she watched …

He/she noticed …

He/she looked at …

By avoiding these and describing the action directly, you strengthen the readers’ ability to imagine themselves in the role of the viewpoint character.

Happy editing!

Jill McDougall has published over a hundred books for children and is working on her next 100.

You can find more writing tips at Jill’s website www.jillmcdougall.com.au and download a free preview of her ebook: Become a Children’s Writer.

You’ve got that blessed first draft completed and now it is time to jump from the frying pan into the fire. You’ve got to clean it up and get it ready for submission. The first thing you need to do is to set it aside and give your mind some space from it so you can go back to it with fresh eyes. Don’t go back to it with the mistaken idea that it will just need a little tweaking. You are going to need to do some serious overhauling on that baby and the more comfortable you are with the idea, the more productive your edits and revisions will be.

Okay, you’ve taken some time and now you are ready to rip that mother up! Make sure you have all the tools you need.

A back-up ink cartridge or toner.
A fresh ream of paper for printing out your chapters.
A highlighter or two.
A notepad.
A dictionary.
A Thesaurus.
A Tape recorder with a couple blank tapes.

Now that you are prepared, make sure that you have a couple of hours each day where you can go off alone with no interruptions. Build yourself a comfortable little nook and settle in.

Step one: Use your search and replace function to highlight the weak verbs. Use a different color for each word (was, were, knew, felt, seemed). Generally, these words are overused and can be replaced with stronger and more active verbs to make your work flow with ease.

Step two: Print out your first chapter. You want to work one chapter at a time. Take out your tape recorder and read your first chapter aloud. Follow along on your hard copy.

Step three: Once you have it recorded, play it back. Listen to your voice and the flow and cadence. Use your highlighter to accent anything that you stumbled over in your reading.

Step four: Get out your notepad now. Rewind your tape and listen again. This time, make notes of any words that sound awkward or out of place. If anything stands out or might make the average reader stumble, make a note of it. Listen for any words that you might use repeatedly in a short amount of space.

Step five: Set your recorder aside and focus on your hard copy now. Using your Word Grammar Check is fine, but do NOT rely on it for total accuracy. If you are unsure of the validity of a comma or the proper usage of a dash, ellipsis, semi-colon, etc. Check the spelling of those words commonly misspelled (their, there, they’re, piqued, peeked, peaked, etc.) Take nothing for granted.

Step six: Go back to step one and repeat until the chapter is perfect. Once you cannot find any additional errors or necessary (learn the difference between needed and wanted) edits, move onto the next chapter.

About The Author Karen Syed is the proud owner of Echelon Press, LLC. Every day is a new success story for her as she continues to grow herself and her business. She has seen seven novels published, along with numerous articles and short stories. As a former bookstore owner, she garnered a nomination from Publishers Weekly for their Bookseller of the Year award. You can learn more about Karen Syed at http://www.hartofthematter.com.

Guest Contributor: Santosh Kumar

It was reported that the great American author Sinclair Lewis was once asked to give a lecture on writing to a group of college students: “Looking out at this gathering,” he said to the assembled students, “makes me want to know how many of you really and truly wish to become writers?” Every hand in the room went up. Lewis looked at them for a moment and then folded his notes and put them away. “If that’s true,” he said, “then the best advice I can give you is to go home and start writing.” He then turned and left the room.  

If the first secret of writing is to write and if you’ve set up some sort of writing schedule, the next step is to figure out what to write. Opening a brand new file and looking at a blank screen often results in a kind of brain-freeze; we feel as idea-less as the empty screen we’re staring at. Writing exercises can help us thaw our idea bank.  

The goal of a writing exercise is to open your mind and allow you to hone your skills and experiment. The joy of such an exercise is it’s not ‘for real.’ That is, there’s no thought of pleasing an editor or finding a publisher or meeting a deadline or getting paid. You’re just writing, with your internal editor turned off. Some freelancers find writing exercises so effective and freeing they actually begin every writing session with a 10 or 15-minute exercise. Others use them more sporadically. But however you do it, writing exercises will help you with your writing.  

Use writing exercises in your writing schedule, as a natural part of your writing discipline; use the exercises often and watch your writing improve. Ideally, a writing exercise is short, requiring you to spend no more than 10 or 15 minutes writing, thinking and feeling about something that’s unrelated to the rest of your writing work.  

In a way, they are like mini-meditations and mini-vacations because they clear out the cobwebs and give you a new view. It’s that new view, that different way of seeing, of expressing, that’s the key to a good writing exercise. Naturally, not every exercise blows your mind every time. Sometimes you are just not ready for the challenge presented, but even then, the seed is planted. Sometimes you are simply not up for doing a writing exercise, which is okay too. Again, simply reading can set some new thoughts in motion. 

Santosh Kumar can be reached at nanak1037@gmail.com