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Cheryl's Musings

Cheryl's Musings: July 2011

Cheryl's Musings

How to Thrive on the Writer's Road

Tuesday

Tuesday Ten: Character Development Through Hobbies

This week, I wanted to expand on one of the character quirks I listed in last week’s Tuesday Ten post: hobbies. If you’re like me, you might give your character a hobby simply to add a bit of color. And hobbies do add color: a good hobby will make your character quirkier and more memorable.

As a writer, though, you may want to make this character detail work even harder and, especially as you get deeper into a book, it can useful to think about what a character’s hobby can accomplish beyond adding surface color.

happyskrappy hobbies

Photo Credit

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Monday

Plot: Finding the Threads (or: How to Eat an Elephant)

Last week, fellow YA author and blogger Julie Musil wrote a terrific post on how to use a spreadsheet analyze and improve your novel’s plot: Performing Plot CPR. If you haven’t read it, check it out. In this post, she provides a framework for getting the big picture of your work in progress so you can see what works, what doesn’t, and what you can cut without regrets.

Photo courtesy of GollyGforce on Flickr Creative Commons

I, too, am deep in the rewrite process—and rewriting a 300-page novel, even one that’s already been through multiple rounds of rewriting and revision is an elephant-sized task. When I try to take on the whole thing at once, it’s easy to get overwhelmed.

However, there’s a time-honored technique for tackling any immense task or problem: divide it into smaller pieces and work on one at a time. Julie’s post explains one way to identify individual story elements where you can focus your efforts, and I want to share another technique: tracing individual story “threads” to make sure that each progresses smoothly and logically throughout the book.

After all, how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

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Friday

Extreme Writers!

I’ve noticed that I, and many other writers I know, develop the skill (because it is a skill) of writing anywhere and everywhere, while cooking dinner, walking the dogs, hiking, sailing, camping…you name it. In honor of the Versatile Writer, I wanted to start featuring all you Extreme Writers. 
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You know who you are—you write rain or shine, during soccer practice and in line at the grocery store, and neither flood nor famine nor dark of night can stop you (because you have a handy-dandy electronic device to capture midnight ideas).

You are….SUPER WRITER!!

<<Ahem.>>

page after pageSo. Send me your pics, of you writing in extreme conditions, whether that be on a bicycle or surrounded by young’uns or lounging on the beach with an umbrella drink where all but the hardiest would fail to write. I’ll post a winner every Friday. For this week’s prize, I offer one of my favorite inspirational writing books, Page After Page: Discover the confidence and passion you need to start writing & keep writing (no matter what!), by Heather Sellers.*

Send submissions to cheryl (at) cherylreifsnyder.com. I can’t wait to see where you all are writing this summer!

:) Cheryl

*If you already have/don’t need Page After Page, other giveaways include Donald Maas’s Writing the Breakout Novel and The Fire in Fiction; and Sol Stein’s On Writing.

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Tuesday

Tuesday Ten: Character Quirks

seer3 Geek confession: I used to play D&D (Dungeons and Dragons, for the uninitiated). In fact, I used to play another gaming system that rivaled D&D back in the day, a system designed by Steve Jackson called GURPS (which I believe stood for Generic Universal Role Playing System). It wasn't nearly as complex or detailed as the D&D 4.0, for which my boys now spend hours memorizing rules and character info, but it had one really cool component that's stuck with me over the years: Character Quirks.

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Monday

Short or Long? Which Way to Post…

I follow several blogs on blogging. I’ve read the advice—write short posts, readers want short posts, keep your word count below 300—and I’m not 100% convinced.

words TerryJohnston

Photo credit

Yes, when I’m searching for information on the Web, I’m more likely to skim than read pages in-depth, and shorter articles are good for that. And I’ve read many great blogs where short posts are the norm. Shorts posts can be funny and succinct while still being informative.

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Wednesday

Grammar Byte: It's vs Its and Four Other Confusing Word Pears

If you had to read that title twice, kudos to you--you've got a bit of the right-brained copy editor angel (or demon, depending on your point of view) whispering in your ear. And that's a very good thing. At least, that's a very good thing when you're in the revision and review stages of writing, preparing to submit your manuscript, because editors, in my experience, have very LOUD copy editor angels (or demons) that can get irate over details like dangling participles, serial commas, and the misuse of it's/its.

 typewriter rahego 

Before you submit, click publish/send, or otherwise send your writing into the world, check for these bad boys...because seriously, how can an editor fully appreciate your writing with that copy editor angel shrieking at her?

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Tuesday

Tuesday Ten: 10 Ways to Craft a Sense of Place

You know the basics of setting creation: describe the who, what, when, and where of your character's surroundings. But how do you move beyond a mere list of details to a setting that draws the reader into your story? 
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Setting can—and should—accomplish far more than simply setting a visual backdrop for plot. Setting can:
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