This is a guest post from ghostwriter Dawn Colclasure’s Substack presentations, with permission to reprint, of course! I found it especially helpful because it pinpoints why sometimes great writing advice isn’t understood or used correctly even by experiences authors. So, please read it hear and then subscribe to Dawn’s Substack series for a wide variety of articles that will help your own careers--in ways you might not have imagine! Find it at
https://dawncolclasure.substack.com/. I think you’ll also find a book or two of her to enjoy just by searching on her name at Amazon; she’s prolific and she writes in many genres. You’re likely to find your favorite among them.
A Guest Post By Dawn Colclasure
Sometime ago, I started writing the eighth story in my GHOST Group series. This series is about a group of kids who create a ghosthunting club to investigate the many hauntings in their haunted town. Unfortunately, I struggled writing this story, and after I picked it up again just recently to tackle yet again and hopefully finish writing it, I soon learned why. One of the things I wrote in my book 365 Tips for Writers is that the reader doesn’t know what the writer knows. While I was trying to make this tip apply to both the writer of fiction and nonfiction, this tip heavily applies to writing fiction. The writer may know what a character is seeing, thinking, smelling, hearing, doing, tasting and feeling, but unless that’s included in the story, the reader won’t know this. And I discovered, as I reviewed what I’d written for this story, that these elements were missing all over the place. There was A LOT the reader would not be aware of and maybe even confused by. I knew what a character saw when she looked at her drawing and decided it was perfect, but the reader didn’t. I knew what another character saw and smelled when he entered a freshly cleaned kitchen, but the reader didn’t. Why? Because these details were missing from the story! As I realized this mistake, I was reminded of a couple of other stories I once started reading, and why this very thing made me stop reading them. In one story, there were two characters talking. The writer, bless their heart, decided to stop using dialogue tags, leaving readers in the dark on who was speaking. Normally, readers notice the last person talking and just assume the next string of dialogue was coming from the other person talking. That’s how I went with it to get through that scene. But it was when, surprise! A THIRD character entered the conversation and the writer STILL did not use dialogue tags that I lost interest in reading any more of that story. I could not figure out who was talking! (And, yes, it was nothing but dialogue, without anyone doing anything, feeling anything, thinking anything or seeing anything.) In the other story, a ghostly little girl reveals to her father her hidden remains buried in the basement. The father suddenly runs up to the bedroom where his wife is sleeping, awakens her, and yells accusations at her that she had killed their daughter. The wife’s first words? “I told you I didn’t want any children!” That was where the writer lost me. A NORMAL person would want to know why her husband woke her up screaming these accusations at her. And if she was guilty, she would likely deny it at first. Even if her husband had the remains to prove he’d found what was left of a person, the guilty party could still say there is no way to prove it was the remains of their previously missing child. She would deny it to buy herself some time. But instead of readers being made aware of these thoughts or feelings (and there are lots more that would come into play here), the wife instead responded with the claim that she had never wanted children anyway, thereby incriminating herself. While it’s true that writers need to keep certain things from the reader in order to hold interest, failing to share what a character is thinking, seeing, feeling, tasting, hearing and doing should not be one of them. Even if the character is trying to keep a weapon hidden or feeling uneasy that their cover might be blown, there are certain ways you can still write about these things without dropping the ball on your character’s guilt or identity. When I’m reading a story, I want to be COMPLETELY in the story. I want to see what the characters see. I want to know and feel what the characters know and feel. This helps me to stay in a story and it will hold my interest a lot better than some character immediately confessing to a murder that we knew nothing about in the first place. |
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Find the entire HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers at Amazon’s
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Carolyn Howard-Johnson is the author of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. She is also a marketing consultant, editor, and author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers including the award-winning third edition of "The Frugal Book Promoter" and "The Frugal Editor." Her "How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically” is also available in its second edition. Learn more on her Amazon profile page, http://bit.ly/CarolynsAmznProfile.
Carolyn’s "Great Little Last Minute Editing Tips for Writers"and "The Great First Impression Book Proposal,” are perfect inexpensive gifts for writers who want to be traditionally published.
Carolyn has three FRUGAL books for retailers, too, including one she encourages authors to read because it helps them convince retailers to host their workshops, presentations, and signings. It is the first in that series "A Retailer’s Guide to Frugal In-Store Promotions: How To Increase Profits and Spit in the Eyes of Economic Downturns with Thrifty Events and Sales Techniques” and gives authors insight on what will convince retailers to include authors as part of their marketing campaign.
Carolyn also helps writers extend the exposure of their favorite reviews at TheNewBookReview.blogspot.com absolutely free along with her associate Lois W. Stern, and blogs at all things editing--grammar, formatting and more right here at the "The Frugal, Smart, and Tuned-In Editor" (http://TheFrugalEditor.blogspot.com). (She plans to work on it harder this year including more guest posts like this one!).
Her SharingwithWriters.blogspot.com blog focuses on the writing life and book marketing and promotion. It is a Writers' Digest 101 Best blogs pick.
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Dawn Colclasure also writes a column for ReaderViews.com’s free e-magazine, “First Chapter Plus” edited by Suzanne Violante. An author of many colors, she writes fiction and nonfiction as well as poetry. Use Amazon’s great search engine to find all of her work. Or find her here:
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