5 Ways Repetition Hurts Your Novel

By Janice Hardy

How to spot and fix those sneaky repetitions that weaken your prose.

Aside from a great one liner, a declaration of love, or a juicy piece of gossip, most people don’t like to hear the same thing over and over. This is doubly true for readers, and repeating yourself in a novel can make your story feel redundant, stale, or even poorly edited.

When you consider a typical novel runs between 80,000 and 100,000 words, it’s no wonder words (and even ideas) get repeated. Some of those words readers don’t notice (such as said) and others stand out even if you only used them once or twice (like antidisestablishmentarianism). 

Repetition drags down your pacing and makes even strong prose feel clunky.

The Importance of Commas, Meter, and Reading Aloud for the Fiction Writer

By Dario Ciriello, @Dario_Ciriello 

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: How your writing sounds is just as important as how it reads. Dario Ciriello discusses how rhythm and meter work to create memorable writing.

I recently completed an edit for a client, Cordia Pearson¹, whom I’d gently persuaded to let me introduce Oxford commas into her list phrases. The reasoning for this is that using the Oxford (aka serial) comma never does any harm, and can prevent serious confusion. Consider the sentence,

My parents, Jesus, and Lady Gaga taught me all I know.

If you remove the serial comma after Jesus, the meaning changes, and not for the better.

Uncovering the Mysteries of Narrative Flow in the Opening of Stephen King's 11/22/63

By Jeanne Cavelos

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: Studying the masters is a wonderful way to improve your own writing, and Stephen King is certainly one of the masters. Please help me welcome Jeanne Cavelos to the lecture hall today, to learn more about how King uses narrative flow in his novel, 11/22/63.

Jeanne Cavelos is the director of the Odyssey Writing Workshops Charitable Trust, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization devoted to helping writers of fantasy, science fiction, and horror improve their work.

Jeanne began her professional life as an astrophysicist working at NASA. After earning her MFA in creative writing, she moved into a career in publishing, becoming a senior editor at Bantam Doubleday Dell, where she edited award-winning science fiction, fantasy, and horror novels and won the World Fantasy Award. Jeanne left New York to pursue her own writing career and find a more in-depth way of working with writers. She has had seven books published; her last novel was Invoking Darkness, the third volume in her best-selling trilogy The Passing of the Techno-Mages. Her writing has twice been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award.

Jeanne is currently working on a near-future science thriller, Fatal Spiral. Since Jeanne loves working with developing writers, she created the Odyssey Writing Workshop in 1996, which quickly became one of the most respected programs in the world for writers of the fantastic. In 2010, she launched Odyssey Online Classes; live, intensive, interactive courses that use the techniques that have proven so effective at the workshop. Three online classes are announced each fall with application deadlines in December. The class Getting the Big Picture: The Key to Revising Your Novel will include the issues discussed in this article. Jeanne is also an English lecturer at Saint Anselm College, where she teaches fiction and nonfiction writing.

Website | Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Goodreads.

For more information about Odyssey, check out this YouTube video.

Take it away Jeanne...

4 Ways to Keep Your Sentences From All Sounding the Same

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

A varied sentence structure can help keep your writing from sounding stale and flat.

After eight years of diagnosing pages here, and a few decades of critique experience, I’m quite familiar with issues writers face—from those just starting to write, to those on the brink of selling their novels, and even those with multiple published novels. Some aspects of writing are difficult for almost everyone, and each stage of the author’s journey has its own set of challenges.

One of those challenges is writing sentences that don’t all sound the same.

Three Fun Literary Devices to Make Your Prose Sing

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

I'm a huge fan of Aaron Sorkin, who writes some of the best dialogue in the business. If you’re a fan of The West Wing, you’ve seen a particular trio of literary devices used in almost every speech President Bartlett gives. Heck, you’ve heard these in almost every speech anyone has ever given.

Anaphora, epistrophe, and symploce.

What are they? (besides loads of fun):

Finding Rhythm and Voice for a Beginning that Sings

By Karina Sumner-Smith, @ksumnersmith

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: Starting a novel can be a scary time, especially if things aren't going well or you get off to a slow start. There are things you can do to shake up the muse and find the spark to get your opening working again. Karina Sumner-Smith visits the lecture hall today to share a few tips to make your beginning sing.

Karina Sumner-Smith is a fantasy author and freelance writer. Her debut novel, Radiant, was published by Talos/Skyhorse in September 2014, with the second and third books in the trilogy to follow in 2015. Prior to focusing on novel-length work, Karina published a range of fantasy, science fiction and horror short stories, including Nebula Award nominated story “An End to All Things,” and ultra-short story “When the Zombies Win,” which appeared in two Best of the Year anthologies. Visit her online at karinasumnersmith.com.

Website | Twitter | Goodreads | Pinterest | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indie Bound

Take it away Karina...

Give Me a Beat: Rhythm in Dialogue

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Just like rhythm in the narrative can hook or bore your reader, the flow of your dialogue can also cause a reader to stay or skim. Too many tags can sound choppy, too few can get confusing. How you say it plays a big role in how much your readers want to hear, so look at how your dialogue -- and what comes after it -- hits your reader's ears.

Rhythm and Pattern in a Picture Book

By Iza Trapani

JH: I'm always excited to bring on guest authors who do things I don't do. One of those things is picture books. They're such a specialized market and there's little room for error when you're dealing with under 500 words. So today. I'd like to welcome Iza Trapani to tell us a little about rhythm in picture books (and rhythm is something even novelists can benefit from). Her latest book is The Bear Went Over the Mountain, so check it out.

Iza has published over 20 books. She's always loved children’s literature- from the wacky brilliance of Dr. Seuss to the timeless, love-filled classics of Margaret Wise Brown and a slew of others in between. The combination of simple but elegant text and enchanting illustrations has always been an irresistible package and has fascinated her all my life. As a child she spent hours immersed in the magical world of books and tries to re-create some of that magic for others to enjoy. You can find Iza at her website, blog or twitter @IzaTrapani .

Take it away Iza...

Guest Author Miranda Kenneally: A Book is a Song

By Miranda Kenneally

Today we have YA author (and fellow NLA writer) Miranda Kenneally here to chat with us about making your writing sing, and the little things you can do to make a big difference. Her novel CATCHING JORDAN is another one generating a lot of buzz out there, so check it out. I was a huge fan of the old Zanballer books when I was a kid, so this one is going on my holiday list for sure.

Miranda is the author of CATCHING JORDAN, a contemporary YA novel about football and femininity, coming in December 2011. Other books include THE GIRL I USED TO BE (fall 2012) and BAD, BAD THING (spring 2013). Miranda is the co-creator of Dear Teen Me. The Dear Teen Me Anthology will be published by Zest Books (distributed by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) in late 2012. She enjoys reading and writing young adult literature, and loves Star Trek, music, sports, Mexican food, Twitter, coffee, and her husband. Follow her on Twitter or Facebook. Miranda is represented by Sara Megibow at Nelson Literary Agency.

Take it away Miranda…

Feel the Rhythm of the Words

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Fiction it about more than describing a situation and telling readers about it. Good fiction flows and dances across the page, using every word to captivate the reader and lure them deeper into the story.

 
Which is why rhythm is so important. How the text flows matters, because choppy writing can jar readers right out of the story. It often reads like a list, with flat description, focusing more on the what than the who or the why. There's no sense of storytelling, just boring explanation.