Want to Improve Your Writing? Change Your Thinking

By Janice Hardy

A mental shift in how we think about our writing and process can change our perspective, and thus, help us see the things we’ve been missing.

A long time ago, when I was still fairly new to writing, I had my mind blown by a simple “change of perspective” in how I looked at writing. It was a light-bulb moment that finally made me understand something I’d been struggling with at that time—point of view.

In the years that followed, I’ve had plenty of moments where changing how I thought about something writing-related helped me understand it, or use it better. As I’ve spoken with other writers, I’ve seen the same lights go on in their eyes as they looked at something they’d struggled with and finally saw things click into place.

10 Signs of a Great Protagonist

By Janice Hardy

At the heart of every story is a person with a problem, and the more compelling that person is, the better the story will be.

Imagine you’re having lunch one day when you overhear an animated group at a table, gossiping about a bunch of people with crazy lives. Some of them debate which hottie Jess should end up with, while others discuss the terrible behavior of Selene, and not one of them can agree on what Alastair is really up to.

You lean closer, curious about this wild group, and soon realize they’re not talking about life on the cul-de-sac, but their favorite novel—or more specifically—their favorite characters.

If you’re a writer (or a reader), discussing fictional people as if they really existed is normal. For writers, it’s even encouraged.

5 Ways to Make Your Characters Hate You (And Why You Should)

By Janice Hardy

To be a great writer, it helps to be a terrible parent (but only to your characters).

I have this philosophy for my characters—what doesn’t kill them makes them more interesting. It allows me to be as ruthless and mean to them as I want, because I know that in the end, all their suffering will make readers love them even more.

My characters aren’t happy about this, of course, but they understand the necessity.

One of my favorite “evil things” to do to them is force them to face horrible, if not impossible, choices. Choices that will tear them in two, make them question themselves and the path they took, and often leave them in dire situations with no hope in sight.

<cackles gleefully>

3 Ways to Deepen Your Novel’s Premise

By Janice Hardy

The premise is the core of the novel. Make sure it's solid.

When I first started The Shifter (the first book in my trilogy), I didn’t know it was going to be part of a series. But as the story developed, I saw the bigger picture and where the problem facing my protagonist, Nya, could lead to.

As that story continued, I focused more and more on Nya’s journey, because stories are about characters in trouble. But by the time I got to book three, I’d forgotten something really important.

I was ignoring the broader implications of my original premise.

Nya was a “shifter,” someone who could heal by shifting pain from person to person. This included pain of her own, so anytime someone hurt her, she’d be able to shift it right back into them. Which made for some fun fight scenes.

In the first draft of book three, Nya was shifting pain almost without thinking, and while she struggled over the moral aspects of it, getting hurt was no longer an issue for her.

Which was all wrong.

5 Ways to Find the Backstory Readers Want to Know

By Janice Hardy

Readers don’t mind backstory—as long as it’s something they want to hear about.

The first novel I ever wrote was fantasy, so naturally, it had a lot of backstory. Every character had huge histories and shady pasts, and I couldn’t wait to share every last detail with my readers.

And it turned out about how you’d imagine.

Boring pages, no action, flashbacks that nobody but me cared about. It was a mess.

A person’s past is part of life, and everybody has one—especially fictional characters. But that past isn't always relevant, even if it is interesting. Stopping to explain a character's history tends to bog a novel down.

What to Do When You Really Don’t Want to Write That Scene

By Janice Hardy

Some scenes are hard to write, and others fight you every word. Does that mean something is wrong with it?

In every first draft I’ve ever written, I reached a point where I forced myself to finish a scene that didn’t want to be written. It fought me for every word and took days to write, and I just wanted it done and over with. When it was really bad, it threw me right out of my writing groove.

But my outline said to do it, my daily plan said to write it, so I did. And it was terrible. It didn't matter what scene or which book it was in, it always turned out the same.

Eventually, I realized this was a huge red flag that something was wrong with the scene. 

If I didn’t want to write it, what made me think someone would want to read it?

How to Sneak Clues Past Your Readers and Keep Them Guessing

By Janice Hardy

Some writers weave clues so seamlessly into a novel, readers never realize they’re there until they all converge in the end. 

My subconscious is a better writer than I am. It drops in details and makes connections in my first drafts that I don’t see until the next draft—if at all. 

Sometimes, it takes the sharp eyes of my critique group to spot the "clever things" I’ve written that I’m totally unaware of (grin). 

I suspect your subconscious does this, too. It’s only natural. 

Stories churn in our heads even when we aren’t consciously thinking about them. 

Our brains remember throwaway details and build on them without our input. And when we make the connections, we get that rush and think, “Ooo that is soooo cool.”

5 Questions to Turn a Character from Flat to Fabulous

By Janice Hardy

Sometimes we just need to ask the right questions to create a memorable character.

Some writers develop incredibly detailed characters before they ever start a story.

I am not one of those writers.

I do the bare minimum necessary to create a character, then I throw them into my story and see what they do. By the time I’ve written the first draft, I know who they are and can revise accordingly.

Although I’ve written this way for decades, I’m not sure I’d recommend it. It’s an interesting tactic, but it has left me with a lot of revising I might not have needed if I’d done a bit more character work before I started writing. Characters drive the plot, and I’m a plot-driven writer, so my process is missing a critical aspect when I think about it from that perspective.  

It doesn’t take much effort to build a solid foundation for a character.

An Easy Tip to Avoid Infodumps in Your Dialogue

By Janice Hardy

Just because a character says it, doesn’t mean it isn’t an infodump.

Dialogue is one of my favorite parts of writing. It's fast-paced, grabs attention, and usually keeps the reader reading. When two characters are having a zippy conversation, readers feel like they’re hanging out with them and are part of the story.

But those conversations can also contain the dreaded infodump-as-dialogue.

Infodumping (throwing in a lot of "need-to-know" information at one time) doesn't just happen to prose. Characters can have conversations they'd never have, talking about things they'd never talk about, just so authors can explain things to readers.

Which is bad, because...

Infodumps remind readers they’re reading, and can knock them right out of the story.

Why "Start With the Action" Messes Up So Many Writers

By Janice Hardy

Sometimes really great advice is anything but helpful.

If I took a poll for the most common writing advice, “start with the action” would make the list. 

Which it should, as it’s great advice. But it’s also like saying, “show, don’t tell.” You know you ought to do it, but you don’t always know how, and those four words don’t really help you write the beginning of your novel.

This can be especially hard on new writers, because they might think they’re doing everything right, but still get negative feedback or even rejections on their manuscripts. “I do start with action,” they cry. “Can’t you see that car barreling off that cliff there? What do I have to do, blow up a planet?”

Well, no. And that's where the problem lies.

If you don’t know what “action” means in fiction, you can easily misunderstand how to use it.

The Recipe for Writing a Great Scene

By Janice Hardy

A great scene is a lot like a great meal. 

Maybe it's because I'm married to a guy who loves to cook, but I think of scenes like I think of food. Meals with one item on the plate might be tasty while you eat it, but once it's done, you kinda forget about it. And it's rarely as satisfying. 

But the meals with multiple items and layers of flavors going on? I still talk about some of those meals.  

Due to nature of writing and storytelling, it's easy for writers to think of scenes as "one item meals." We even describe them that way sometimes, such as, "This is the scene where Bob finds the body in the trunk.” "This is the scene where they finally kiss." "This scene is where it all goes wrong."

There's nothing wrong with this, as scenes do tend to have a main point to them. But the best scenes typically have multiple things going on, too. Plot things, character things, backstory things. A common rule of thumb here...

Give every scene at least three reasons for being in your novel. 

Can You Hear Me Now? Developing Your Narrative Voice

By Janice Hardy 

Your narrative voice sets you apart from other writers.

Voice is one of those things that's easy to spot, but hard to define. There is no formula for it, no set of rules. Without a strong narrative voice, stories fall flat and you wind up with a lot of "Close, but it just didn't grab me as much as I'd hoped" type rejections. With a strong voice, your prose sings.

Voice is the feeling that there's a person behind the words. It's the judgment of the world around the characters and how they convey their opinions about that world to the reader. It's also the rhythm of the words they say, and the words you as the author choose. Is your writing casual or formal? Simple or complex? Flowery or basic? 

It's the little decisions you instinctively make while you write that make your writing sound like you.

So how do you do that?

5 Edits to Strengthen Your Writing, Right Now

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Making some simple word edits can turn a flat scene into one that sings.

Back when I was first learning how to write, I loved discovering a great writing tip--the ones I could immediately apply to my work and see actual improvement were the best. I got especially excited over lists of words or specific examples, because I could search and find the weak areas right away. Which is probably why I like to do a lot of lists and examples now in my own articles.

While there's nothing inherently wrong with a "weak word," they do tend to hang around trouble areas--just like those red flag words with show, don't tell. They're good places to start when something feels off in your work or you're getting negative feedback and aren't sure why. 

If you're looking for easy ways to improve your writing, here are great words to search for to identify potentially weak areas.

Let's a take a peek at a few of the more common troublemakers that often pull readers out of a story.

How Do You Know if Your Writing is Getting Better?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy 

Without objective feedback, it's hard to know if you're improving or just making the same mistakes. 

Almost every writer at some point has wondered, "Is my writing getting any better?" I've wondered about it, many writers I know have wondered about it, and odds are good you have, too. It's a normal question when what you're doing is so subjective. 

Sadly, there's no easy checklist to verify if you're improving or not. It's also really tough to judge our writing, because it's hard to be subjective about our own work. We can love our bad writing and hate our good writing—and we often have trouble telling the difference. 

Of course, you can always get a paid critique or manuscript review from a trusted professional source, but not everyone has or can afford that option. For this post, I'm focusing on what we can do on our own.  

An Easy Tip for Tightening Your Novel’s Plot

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

A loose plot can easily unravel, but tying up the threads strengthens the entire novel.

One of my favorite things when writing is when I make an accidental connection that fits so well it looks like I’d planned it all along. It’s my subconscious working in the background.

One day, it dawned on me that I didn’t have to wait for my inner writer to clue me in—I could consciously look for those connections.

Once I started looking, I found multiple “hidden connections” per book that deepened the plot and made it more unpredictable. The obvious characters became red herrings for the more subtle characters lurking in the background doing “plot things” and making the story work.

Plus, it’s a ton of fun.

Broken, but Still Good: 3 Ways to Create Character Flaws

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Choose the right flaws and weaknesses to round out your characters.

There's an old saying: "I'm not looking for the perfect man, just one with faults I like." No clue where I heard this, but it always stuck with me, because it’s so true. Everyone has faults, and some are more palatable than others.

This is true for our characters, too. Their flaws and weaknesses make them three-dimensional people readers can relate to and root for. They also allow our characters to make the mistakes and bad choices that lead to compelling plots.

But picking any old flaw isn't going to cut it. Who cares if the protagonist can't cook if cooking never matters to the story? So what if they can’t commit if they’re never asked to? It's important to choose flaws and weaknesses that add to the overall novel.

Getting the Best Response From Your Characters

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Don't confuse your readers by mixing up what happens when and why.

When one of my nieces was little, she'd tell me stories about her day. They usually made no sense, and not just because she was seven. She'd always tell me what she did before she told me why she did it.

"I cried on the swings, because it wasn't fair and they yelled at me."

It often took multiple follow-up questions to get the real story that she got scolded for playing in a sandbox she'd been told three times not to play in (the reason why involved a cat mistaking it for a litter box).  

Granted, few writers write a novel like a seven year old telling a story, but mixing up the stimulus/response structure happens all the time. Usually it's a small mistake that readers can figure out and move on from, but sometimes it's a big error and leaves them confused.

5 Common Problems With Beginnings

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

If your beginning isn't working, no one will get to the ending.

A novel’s beginning is under a lot of pressure. It has to introduce the protagonist and characters, setup the world and story, and get the plot moving, all while hooking our readers and making them want to turn the page. 

With all that setup and introduction, it’s no wonder a first draft often has the wrong opening scene, or takes too much time to get going.

The only thing tougher than writing a beginning is writing the ending. Except for writing the middle.

If a beginning isn’t working, it’s usually due to not grabbing the reader’s interest, either by lack of a compelling problem, nothing happening, or taking too long to get to the actual story.

Tighten Your Novel with a Preposition Patrol

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

A tighter novel helps keeps readers engaged in the story.

When I first started writing, my novels were long. Like, seriously long. This isn’t unusual for a new writer, and like countless ones before me, I set out to learn how to trim some of those excess words from my manuscript.

One of the things I discovered was the, “words you don’t always need” advice. On that list was “cut prepositions.”

I’d learned enough about writing at that point to know you shouldn’t heed advice without understanding the reasoning behind it, so I sat down and studied why prepositions and prepositional phrases were so awful.

What I found was—they aren’t.

The Faceless Villain: What to do When Your Protagonist Is the "Bad Guy"

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Not every story has a villain at its center—sometimes the problem is the protagonist.

For a lot of writers, the hardest-to-write conflict is the Person vs. Self conflict. Quite often, the antagonist is a physical being the protagonist can physically fight. But in a PvS conflict, there's no one plotting against the protagonist. The antagonist is something to overcome, such as depression, or grief, or a self-destructive streak that’s core to who the protagonist is and a flaw they need to fix by the end of the novel.

These stories are more challenging, but there’s no “Big Bad Guy” causing all the trouble.

An antagonist can come from any of the four basic conflict types, and they each focus on a different type of conflict opposition. We've discussed the person vs. society conflicts, and person vs. nature conflicts, so let's continue with the person vs. self antagonists.  

Like any good conflict, even if your protagonist is dealing with a difficult personal issue, they'll still have an external antagonist to reckon with.