Tuesdays with Story

Writer’s Mail
Tuesdays with Story
April 20, 2018

We came out

Rain, sleet, and snow kept us away two weeks ago, but 11 TWS writers and old hand Lisa McDougal braved the cold Tuesday evening to consider the works of six of their colleagues.

Millie Mader (chapter, Stone Cold Stripper):

Paul Wagner (short story, part 1 rewrite, “Mad Jack”): Just wanted to say I’m taking all the suggestions given to heart and am trying to put them into the revised work. Gonna be busy this weekend.

Kashmira Sheth and Amit Trivedi (chapter 22):

1. Need to remove words like ‘He wondered’, ‘He thought’ etc.
2. Tracy liked the part with the ‘key and house.’
3. Jack suggested to move the first paragraph to the previous chapter of have some sort of transition between first and second para of chapter 22. Thanks!

Jack Freiburger (chapters 2-3, A Walk on the Water): Comments on Walk Upon the Water more positive than I expected as these chapters are not part of the “ripping yarn” section. Seems our troubled and troublesome anti-hero/unreliable narrator is not unlikeable. Will shorten Cousins by a few lines based on advice and the usual typos. Many thanks.

Amber Boudreau (chapter 1, Avice): Amber’s first chapter of her urban fantasy novel was well received, but Lisa thought it really got going on page eleven. Which is great, because Amber is going to rewrite and has deemed the twenty thousand words she’s already written to be backstory. She will instead start the story 6 months down the road and sprinkle these elements in along the way.

Jerry Peterson (short story, “This One’s for You, James Early”) . . . Tracey Gemmell said that James Early, at age 103, will need help getting on and off his horse. Jack Freiburger suggested that Early’s grandson help him step from the bleachers across the saddle of his horse to get aboard. “Tie youth and age together,” he said. Jack also gave permission to Jerry for Early to use a joke Jack’s mother used to make about old age.

Who’s up next

May 1

Tracey Gemmell (chapters)

Mike Austin (???)

Bob Kralapp (???)

Paul Wagner (short story, rewrite, “Mad Jack”)

Jack Freiburger (chapters, A Walk on the Water)

Kashmira Sheth and Amit Trivedi (chapters)

John Schneller (chapter, Final Stronghold)

 

May 15

Millie Mader (chapter, Stone Cold Stripper)

Larry Sommers (chapter, untitled novel)

Kashmira Sheth and Amit Trivedi (chapters)

Jack Freiburger (???)

Amber Boudreau (chapter, Avice)

Jerry Peterson (short story, “The Candy Run”)

 

Our editor

Tracey Gemmell finished her tenure with this week’s edition. John Schneller takes over the office for May. Email him your good stuff.

We still need a writing prompt for Fifth Tuesday, to be held May 29^th. Send your ideas to Jerry. With the late spring, Tracey wonders if “Cabin Fever” would work.

Jerry’s Writer’s Mail Contribution:

Jane Smiley on writing

“What I realize as I travel through the landscape I once lived in [Iowa], the setting of my novel A Thousand Acres and other works, is that when you are ready, you make use of what is right in front of you, because everything can be inspiring if you are curious about it.”

– “Against the Grain”, Smithsonian Magazine, March 2018

Category on Jeopardy’s College Championship

This was on Monday’s show and it’s for writers . . . well, grammarians (Aren’t we all?): heteronyms . . . words that are spelled the same but are pronounced differently and have different meanings. Can you give an example?

 

How about conflict?

Conflict: Pronounced kunFLIKT– to act against

and Conflict: Pronounced KAHNflict– a fight or disagreement.

One website lists 72 heteronyms and concludes with this note about Heteronymic Sentences: Mary & Harry Baldwin of San Diego are collectors of heteronyms. When they find a word, they compose a sentence that uses the different meanings. For example:

When the brush fire was close, the authorities had to close the road.
I subject my friends to pain when I discuss the subject of my operation.

WRITERS’ INSTITUTE MADISON 2018

Amber, Paul, Tracey, Larry and Nora attended the conference in Madison. Below are some highlights.

From Larry: a small takeaway from Jeff Kurz’s workshop on “Pitching”:

Front-loading your pitch: Focus more on the beginning than on the end. Focus more on setup and characters. If your beginning and setup are compelling the agent will want to know more. Write out a synopsis, but you’re probably not going to be able to work your way through it.

Think about story’s structure:

1. Conflict, which collides with:
2. Inciting incident or turning point.
3. Resolution.

When writing, adjectives are frowned upon; but in the pitching situation, adjectives are your friends!

 From Tracey:

 FILTER and FILLER words: information from Nick Chiarkas

Upon my writing desk, I have a board with my favorite (and necessary) reminders – I need them written and right in front of me nagging away. This is one of them, although I pay most attention to this on my rewrites (from the first to the final edit). For my first draft I follow Shannon Hale’s example, “When writing a first draft I remind myself that I’m simply shoveling sand into a box so that later I can build castles.”

I was recently asked, “What is the difference between “FILTER” words and “FILLER” words. I thought I would post my response here as well (probably more information than you want).

“Filter” words are a POV issue, while “Filler” words are writing in general problem.  Suzannah Windsor (Editor of Compose: A Journal of Simply Good Writing), defines filter words this way:

Filter words are those that unnecessarily filter the reader’s experience through a character’s point of view.  “Filtering” is when you place a character between the detail you want to present and the reader. The term was started by Janet Burroway in her book On Writing.

In terms of examples, watch out for:

to see

to hear

to think

to touch

to wonder

to realize

to watch

to look

to seem

to feel (or feel like)

can

to decide

to sound (or sound like)

Let’s imagine a character in your novel is walking down a street during peak hour.

You might, for example, write:

Sarah FELT a sinking feeling as she REALIZED she’d forgotten her purse back at the cafe across the street. She SAW cars filing past, their bumpers end-to-end. She HEARD the impatient honk of horns and WONDERED how she could quickly cross the busy road before someone took off with her bag. But the traffic SEEMED impenetrable, and she DECIDED to run to the intersection at the end of the block.

Eliminating the bolded words in CAPS removes the filters that distances us, the readers, from this character’s experience:

Sarah’s stomach sank. Her purse—she’d forgotten it back at the cafe across the street. Cars filed past, their bumpers end-to-end. Horns honked impatiently. Could she make it across the road before someone took off with her bag? She ran past the impenetrable stream of traffic, toward the intersection at the end of the block.

Of course, there are usually exceptions to every rule.

Just because filter words tend to be weak doesn’t mean they never have a place in our writing. Sometimes they are helpful and even necessary.

Susan Dennard of Let the Words Flow writes that we should use filter words when they are critical to the meaning of the sentence.

If there’s no better way to phrase something than to use a filter word, then it’s probably okay to do so.

With respect to Filler words, according to Erin Feldman (founder of Write Right), everyone has filler words. One of mine is “just.” I’m conscious of it because it was brought to my attention during a poetry workshop several years ago. Before that, I didn’t even notice it. It was a “filler” in much the same way that everyone has their own version of a verbal pause.

Filler words can be almost any word, but ten of the more common ones include the following:

1. Just. I thought I should start this list with my own pitfall. “Just” isn’t a required word most of the time; it’s more often added to effect a version of “quite.”
2. So. “So” is often used to describe the quality of something, i.e., “he was so late,” but the word is incomplete without an explanation. If the explanation isn’t required or shouldn’t be given, the word “so” should not be used. The case is the same for the word “such.”
3. Very. Like “so,” “very” is used to describe the quality of something: “he was very late.” The word doesn’t really say much of anything and should be cut.
4. Really. “Really” functions like “very” and “so” and is another filler to guard against.
5. That. “That” often is a word used to connect phrases together but is rarely necessary. My advice with this particular word is to read the sentence aloud, once with the word and once without it. If the sentence makes sense without the word, cut it.
6. And then. These two words are used to show progression, but they’re not needed. The story should be able to unfold on its own. If it can’t, revisiting the plot is required, not the addition of “and then.” This advice also applies to the words “and so.”
7. But. “But” is a conjunction that joins phrases within a single sentence together. The word can be used to start a sentence – a use usually reserved for informal writing – but it isn’t needed. The advice also applies to other conjunctions such as “and” and “yet” as well as words like “however.”
8. Of. “Of” is a word not always required as in the case of “off of” and “outside of.”
9. Some. “Some” is often used as an adverb meaning “somewhat” or as an adjective meaning “remarkable,” but it’s more correct to use the actual words than the colloquial “some.”
10. Like. “Like” may be more often heard when speaking, but it occasionally encroaches upon the written word.

I hope this is helpful, it was, and is for me. Nick

A couple of links Tracey found to further discuss the topic:

https://www.scribophile.com/academy/an-introduction-to-filtering

https://writeitsideways.com/are-these-filter-words-weakening-your-fiction/

 

Pat’s advice for finding all those filter or filler words:

Use the Replace (Ctrl+H) window. Select Format at the bottom.

then Font to select a color or other font type to find easily.

then do Replace All.

Repeat for all of your weasel words. (I highlighted the ‘of’ here as it’s a filler word mentioned 😉)

Tracey recently found the website ‘WordHippo’, which provides alternative words, synonyms, antonyms, etc.  https://www.wordhippo.com/

***

Ann Voss Peterson provided advice on PACING. The following link takes you to a blog she wrote about the subject.

http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/2013/07/pacing-by-ann-voss-peterson.html

 ***

Character Mining: Ann Voss Peterson:

The following is Tracey’s outline compiled from Ann’s session:

Plot comes from character. Character must have wants, needs and fears. Character may only know wants, but author must know needs and fears.

WANTS: must be

1. Urgent
2. Important to character
3. Specific
4. Concrete
5. Measurable

NEEDS: physical want moves to emotional need. Want, or outer goal, symbolizes inner need. Find out need by asking why your character wants what they want.

1. Not concrete
2. Emotional
3. Character may or may not be aware of need

FEARS: deep fears are next step down from needs.

• Almost always subconscious
• Often fear is the opposite of need

THREE GEMS OF PLOT: layer all else on top of these gems

1. Instigating event
2. Moment of commitment – to get to outer goal or want. Should happen by page 50. Readers/agents don’t have attention span to get to page 100 like they used to!

• Must have twist or turning point – one or more. At least one before midpoint, one after midpoint. After any change, must be a stock-taking, regrouping, introspection
• Midpoint scene – acknowledges need, not want

3. Crisis: write your plot to the crisis – this is the fear.

• Character can choose the right thing
• Character can choose the wrong thing
• It must be a tough decision: to face the fear or not.
• After crisis must come dark moment, rock bottom, followed by climax where character is a changed person. Resolution ties up loose ends.
• A good ending means character has faced fear – doesn’t have to win or be happy. Can be destroyed by fear e.g. Shakespeare. Must resolve all questions for closure. This is the new world after the book ends.

Other comments:

• Characters SAY wants, FEEL needs, may not know fears.
• Wants of protagonist is in direct opposition to wants of antagonist

***

Overheard at the conference:

A presenter mentioned James Patterson’s secret to great endings: write down everything that could possibly happen. Think through your story. Separate endings that are possible, pick the most outrageous one that makes sense. That’s your ending.

Ann Voss Peterson: ‘The stuff you’re afraid to write is what everyone wants to read.’

Lucy Sanna: ‘When choosing your POV, always go with the character who has the most to lose.”

Matt Forbeck: ‘Beware workshops and writers groups. You don’t want your book written by committee.’ 😉