One the Road: Take Advantage of Your Reader’s Expectations

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

I'm over at Writers in the Storm today with Take Advantage of Your Reader’s Expectations. Here's a sneak peek:

To strengthen your story, look at each scene as a reader would.

We writers spend a lot of time looking at our work like, well, a writer. We study plot and structure, pace and tension, character and dialogue, but how often do we think about how the reader is going to react to our story?

One of my critique groups is a “critique as we write” group. Every week, we turn in two chapters of our first drafts or whatever draft we’re revising. It’s a great way to keep our writing momentum going since we have people waiting for pages, but it’s had a much better benefit than we realized when we started the group. 

We get real-time feedback about what readers expect to happen next.

 This has utterly changed the direction of two of my novels so far, and both for the better.

 Read the full article here.

On the Road: Is Your Story Hurting Your Novel?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

I'm over at Writers in the Storm today with 5 Ways Your Story Hurts Your Novel. Here's a sneak peek:

When your technical writing skills are at a professional level, but you're still not getting bites from agents, editors (or readers if you self-publish), it's time to look at the story itself.

One of the more frustrating aspects of being an author is the sheer unfairness of publishing. There’s a strange and unfathomable ratio between good writing and good storytelling that sends some manuscripts to the reject pile and others to the bestseller list.

And nobody knows what that ratio is—worse, it’s different for each person, and even each genre.

“Great writing” isn’t enough, and we’ve all read books that aren't well written but still sold millions of copies.

Now, I'm certainly NOT saying that good writing skill isn't something to worry about or work toward. Just that these “badly written best sellers” resonated with readers on such a deep level that they didn't care about the technical craft of the text. They didn't read them to marvel at the skills of the authors, they read them for the stories.

 Read the full article here.

On the Road: Tips on Creating Unique Character Voices

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Hi all!

I'm guest posting at Writers in the Storm today, with 5 Steps to Creating a Unique Character Voice. 

Here's a sneak peek:

Create unique character voices by varying how they communicate with other characters.

I’m one of those writers who needs to put my characters through a first draft before I figure out who they really are. Tossing them into trouble and watching how they wrangle their way out of it helps me get to know them. Their dialogue and voices are usually interchangeable at first. It’s more about what they say than how they say it, or even why they say it.

The voices usually come to me as I write, and by the end of the first draft, I’ve written snippets of voice that let me see and hear the characters. On draft two, I develop those snippets into fleshed-out characters.

Since I don’t hear my characters first (like many writers do), I make conscious choices about their voices, and craft them same as I do a setting or the plot. Which keeps my authorial nose out of my character’s business, and lets them be who they are—not extensions of who I am. Characters who all sound like the protagonist or the author is a common first-draft issue for a lot of writers.

The author’s voice sometimes gets in the way of the character’s voice.

Read the rest of the article at WITS. 

On the Road: 5 Ways to Keep Your Protagonist Proactive

I'm guest posting at Writers in the Storm today, with 5 Ways to Keep Your Protagonist Proactive and your plot moving. 

If your protagonist isn’t making the story happen, then why are they the protagonist?

A protagonist who sits around waiting for things to happen or just goes along for the ride when things do happen, isn’t doing anything to help advance the story. It might seem like it because they’re in the middle of everything, but if you took them out and put any other character in there, would things still unfold the same way?

With a reactive protagonist, the answer is often “Yes,” because the plot is happening to them, not because of them. They’re not making any decisions that only they could make, based on motivations unique to them. Anyone faced with X problem would make Y choice, because the author set it up that way so Z would happen. The character is irrelevant to how the plot turns out.

Read the full post here!

On the Road: Conflict Isn't Just about the Fighting

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

I'm over at Jami Gold's blog today, talking about one of the common misconceptions with conflict. Come on over and say hello!

Here's a sneak peek:

Conflict is a tricky thing. It’s vital to stories, and used all the time by writers everywhere, but it’s one of the more misunderstood elements of writing out there.

It’s a pain in the butt that makes us want to bash our heads against our keyboards on a regular basis, and even makes us want to curl up and cry in the corner. I’ve been there myself, so I know how frustrating it can be (which is why I wrote a book to help my fellow writers avoid some of that frustration and keyboard-bashing).

Creating conflict isn’t that hard once you figure out what it means and how it applies to your novel. Realizing it isn’t a one-size-fits-all means you’ll be able to find the right conflict to suit your need, no matter what that need is. You’ll know how to parse feedback and how to diagnose your own manuscripts to spot trouble areas before they become problems. (read the rest here)