Tip O'Day #452 - Lessons to Unlearn

Guest blogger Margaret Callow tells the lessons you must learn, and then unlearn.

What I know of the craft we call writing has been sourced to me by learning along the way. I’ve gathered up suggestions, advice and knowledge. Add to these copious reading. It seems there is not a writer around who is not willing to guide another, often based on their own ideas and assumptions. It is a support system I think most writers cherish. I know I do.

On the road to getting published, prospective friends are met, some only to be discarded. Others are kept and nurtured, like all good friendships. While always grateful for input and help from others, for me this is also a cautionary tale. Learning can be confusing. I offer you some simple examples. Beware of too many adjectives and adverbs; distance yourself from had and the; be warned of purple prose; never info dump; be wary of prefaces. No matter the genre, it all applies. If like me, you are a willing learner, all of this will be assimilated eagerly like food for a hungry chick in a nest, but here’s my dilemma: be ready to throw it out the window at a moment’s notice.

There will probably be many experienced writers who on reading this will nod knowingly, but I am sure there are some less confident who like me have had quite a rude awakening. Or is it only me? Surely not. When my first novel was picked up with an offer to publish, I spent many a weary hour with the editor writing back in all the missing hads, extending description, adding adjectives and adverbs which I had so carefully avoided, and numerous other small adjustments which I had considered no-no's.

Please don't take this as any form of criticism of the editor, far from it. So grateful was I that she liked my work, I would have gladly written these things in my own blood, had she asked.

So for any would-be writers out there, just remember nothing is written in stone. Personal preferences often play a part in editing. Hopefully, just as you know the story you wish to tell, so your editor knows all about editing.

Learning never stops, that I do know. Last autumn, I signed a contract with Holland House Books. They are interested in my three early Medieval rebellions and a novel which is based on a true Norfolk story, about the last man to hang as a public spectacle at Norwich Castle in 1849. Working with H.H. editing is almost done and once again, I have absorbed a lot of new information. I hope this work will be published sometime this year. It is only a working title at the moment, but when there is a link, you can be sure you will see it somewhere!

Tip O'Day #424 - How to Start?

Guest blogger Jessica Knauss on “Creating an Exciting Beginning.”

I write in two genres. For short pieces and my contemporary longer fiction, I can honestly say that the first few lines drop into my head. It’s as if my muse says, Here you go. What happens next? It’s the most exciting part of writing and gets me enthused for the entire story, so I hope that enthusiasm is transmitted to the reader.

I was sitting at a table at my grandmother’s house, absently rubbing the bony part of my nose, when the first line of Rhinoceros Dreams appeared out of nowhere: “Allie had an outsized bump on the bridge of her nose that made her think she might be turning into a rhinoceros.” Although the story went through several drafts, the first line was a keeper from that moment.

On the other hand, the first line of Unpredictable Factors in Human Obedience involved the main character ordering vegetarian substitute bacon for the charity dinner that figures in the climax. Once the first draft was finished, I realized I no longer needed the part about the fake bacon. I cut it so the story starts with a hint at the main character’s self-absorption, but I’ll never forget that the story would not have come into being if not for that lost sentence.

My current WIP, a New Adult paranormal tentatively titled Middle Awash in Talent, begins this way:

When my little sister staggered through that rough-hewn doorway, blood still dripping artistically from the slash across her bellybutton where they’d sewn her up, and declared that she no longer needed my attention, she finally started to seem interesting to me.

Beth and I started off on the wrong foot.

That crazy image, written during that time between sleep and waking, eventually led to a vivid narrator, a world where some people train to use their telekinesis or other strange powers, and unexpected twists and turns at a breakneck pace all over the northern hemisphere. When I finish it as a novella or novel, I may change a few words of the beginning, but overall it has served the story exceptionally well.

My muse hasn’t been so generous with my historical novel. Although I’ve finished the first draft of The Seven Noble Knights of Lara, the really inspired passages take place well within the book. In fact, I put so much pressure on myself to write an awesome beginning that I started with Chapter II. I’ve now gone back and forth with the beginning four or five times. Can it start slowly? Should the beginning with a bang be an entire chapter, or just a prologue-type fragment? How much of the bad guy should I show up front? What will draw the reader in? Once the novel gets going, all my beta readers have reported feeling like they’ve been transported to the year and place and can hardly put it down, but I’m far from figuring out what would make a new reader turn the first page.

I hope my editor can help with this decision. There’s still a chance the right beginning will drop into my head when I’m least expecting it, but that doesn’t seem like a very reliable method, if it’s a method at all. I’ve written The Seven Noble Knights of Lara much differently than anything else – it was well planned, while my contemporary stories are purely pantsed. So when I do figure out this beginning, I hope it’s a technique I can use for all the other historical fiction I’m planning. Wish me luck! Any suggestions are welcome.

Jessica was the first person to interview Dixon as a writer. She blogs at this link and provides updates about The Seven Noble Knights of Lara here.

For those unfamiliar with the word pantsed, this refers to the spectrum of writers, with planners at one end, and those who write by the seat of their pants at the other end. Thus, some authors refer to themselves as pantsers, and their prose could be said to be pantsed. Class dismissed.

Tip O'Day #412 - Diversity in the Wild West

Guest blogger Diana Harrison has a shocker for you.

People are rather surprised by the fact that a British woman writes Westerns, which is probably why I write as D M Harrison. After that comes their amazement that the Wild West genre is still alive and well.

I consider Westerns to be a combination of adventure, mystery and thriller with a sprinkle of romance or sauciness. The West attracted pioneering men and women, encouraged by a government that wanted to open up the continent. The books in the Western genre are set in the few years between 1849-1900. This short era has given us more characters than many other periods in history.

My knowledge of the Wild West came initially from films and TV series, followed by books I’ve read, Internet searches, and visits to the American West. Although used to films stars like John Wayne and Clint Eastwood, I wasn't ready for the small buildings in the (now preserved) ghost towns.

As I researched the era further, I found the West was made up of a melting pot of races, colors and creeds. I have attempted to reflect its diverse make-up in my books. I depict the Native Americans as courageous Nomads who unfortunately did not survive the different culture of the Frontiersmen and women. The Native Americans thought there was enough land for everyone to share but the new people fenced it off. Sharing was not in their nature.

My books develop with an idea - a robbery, a kidnapping, a railroad coming through - and then I put it in a time and place. I see the main character and how he/she is involved in the situation. Then I build on that. I write the story from beginning to end, and then I write it over and over again until I've checked all my facts and I'm satisfied with it. After that I send it to a publisher and hope they like it.

My stories are as diverse as the Wild West itself. Robbery in Savage Page, published by Robert Hale Ltd, has a Chinese-American as its main protagonist. In The Buffalo Soldier, published by Solstice Publishing, the main character is an African-American. The Comanche's Revenge, published by Robert Hale, describes what life is like for a young boy kidnapped by the Comanche. Kato's Army, published by Robert Hale Ltd, tries to depict the strong role women played in the West, fighting alongside their men. Blood Brothers, published on Kindle, describes the paths chosen by three brothers, and asks whether blood is truly a strong bond.

Look out for Diana’s next book with Solstice Publishing, Going to see the Elephant, describing the hardships and the wonders of a 3,000 mile overland trip to Oregon and California from a female POV. Her website is dmharrison.com and her Amazon.UK page is amazon.co.uk/D.-M.-Harrison

Tip O'Day #392 - Time Travel

Guest blogger Sheila Bali on “How History Leads to Historical Fiction.”

I write historical fiction, and I’m quick to admit that I’m not a historian. I just love to write about the past. Flip open the pages of a historical novel and you are thrown into another time. A woman in Ireland during the potato famine digs for bits of food. A child of the Industrial Revolution in England toils in a textile mill. A man trapped in a coal mine in Wales dares to cuss as he prays. In historical fiction, these characters live on the page as they once lived in time. They tell us their story, and in this way they tell us about history.

Since the beginning of language, storytellers have created tales steeped in history. History is the greatest source of both information and story. As listeners and readers of historical fiction, we too revel in history—we are entertained, enlightened, horrified, engaged.

My forthcoming novel, Shattered Tears for My Homeland, takes place during the turbulent years of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. I have spent over a year on research alone, reading archived newspapers and magazines, interviewing people, viewing documentaries and black-and-white films, and thumbing through the dog-eared volumes of history. A daunting task? Of course. But I need correct information, lots of it, and I need to understand it so well that it almost becomes part of me. My handwritten notes are voluminous—even in this technological age, huge quantities of paper go into research. With all the files and folders, and folders within folders, I sometimes think I’m obsessed. I’m sure you can picture this, and perhaps you are chuckling. I’m chuckling too, but it has all paid off.

During all of this, I have begun to learn the difference between the history that historians write and the historical fiction that novelists write. Reading history is like going on a journey of ifs, maybes, could bes and can’t bes. Novelists take those ifs, maybes, could bes and can’t bes and do wonderfully creative things with them. But I understand now why historians cringe at the release of a historical novel: sometimes historical fiction produces historical distortion.

If you gathered all the historians in the world and put them together in a hall, they would disagree on almost everything. History is generally scripted by the victors. Where go the spoils, so goes history. But some history is written by the vanquished, and their perspective is entirely different. They tell another tale. It is for this reason that the accuracy of history is always in dispute. Just as there are two sides to every coin, there are two sides, at least, to every piece of history. What is a novelist to do?

As a writer of historical fiction, I investigate all points of view. Readers, I believe, should be able to identify with more than one side. They should know how the vanquished feel crawling out of the ashes, overcoming the obstacles. This makes writing historical fiction challenging, but it is worth it. It takes a long time to write a novel, longer than I had imagined. Sometimes my patience wears thin and I find myself wanting to plow through to the end. I must dedicate the time it takes, however long that turns out to be. I cannot afford errors or falsehoods.

History scholars excavate facts from the past. They unearth precise dates, capture victories and losses in battles and wars, cite lives lost, and redraw maps. They name rulers, despots, tyrants and heroes. They analyze the results of treaties.

When those treaties fail, like the Treaty of Versailles that ended World War I, the historical novelist might illuminate a broader truth, a universal truth, as it was lived at a certain time in the past. The novelist writes the bigger scene, the scene of ordinary people, how they survived with everything stacked against them, and in that way the novelist takes the reader to the doorstep of history.

How does the novelist do this? Through convincing, well-developed characters that transport the reader into another time. The characters of historical fiction relive the past by experiencing it in the present. They wake to the sound of tanks rolling through the town and flee the shaking house. If I have researched my history properly, I will know what happens to that town, and that will determine what my characters do next. Do they run to the streets, to the forest, to bomb shelters? What are the names of the streets? Is there even a forest? Did bomb shelters exist? Are my characters engulfed by bullets or by flames? Do sirens scream? Do radios blare? What are the messages? Who lives? Who dies?

The historical novelist gleans the rubble of the past, tasting the grit, extracting the jewels. History becomes an eye-witness account, and we, the readers, live the scene. As we do, we learn, we appreciate, and we vow never to forget the past.

Learn more about Sheila at her website (www.sheilabali.com) or her blog (http://sheilabali.com/wordpress/).

Tip O'Day #391 - An Author's Blog Tour

Guest blogger Malika Gandhi on Writing Her Novel – the Past, Present and Future.

Dixon says: Some aspiring authors have only a vague idea what a blog tour is. With more and more book stores vanishing, and some of the remaining ones being hostile to Indie writers, online blog tours have taken the place of "real" book tours in which newly published authors would travel from store to store, reading excerpts from their works and signing copies for purchasers. In this case, Malika Gandhi has arranged to appear in writers, readers and reviewers blogs each day during this month. (US readers may notice a few different spellings, as the author is British.) I was flattered to be asked to participate, and I hope you enjoy the following.

In Freedom of the Monsoon, I wrote about India and its history, spurred on by the violence during British colonisation. As I researched the subject and read accounts of Indian citizens who survived that dangerous and frightening era, I felt anger and frustration. I felt fascination too.

I wanted readers around the world to know what happened during the time of the Quit India Movement and how it affected the Indian population.

Looking into the details. Details were searched for this book. Emotions and actions were a large part. I looked into the souls of these people as I read what they went through, how they were treated and how they saw the British Empire. Some took life as it was and were satisfied, if not happy about the way they lived. They didn’t see or chose to ignore the bad treatment of their fellow neighbours and carried on life regardless. But there were people out there who wanted to see the British out, to see justice done.

I was lucky to stumble upon a website where real experiences of the riots and killings were told. These people told of their fear.

Writing Freedom of the Monsoon. I began to write Freedom of the Monsoon. I portrayed the violence, the romances and the day-to-day life through five individuals, whose lives were very different from one another. These five were Rakesh, a freedom fighter, Dev, a griever and confused man, Pooja, a head strong girl who was dealt a worse than death fate, Amit, a lovely soul who fell in love with the wrong girl and Sunil, an engaged young man who tried to deal with what he witnessed.

Freedom of the Monsoon was published but I had another job to do. I had to carry on writing – I needed a sequel, which told of the aftermath of Indian Independence – the partition of India which became India and Pakistan. Book two is currently being written.

Publication. News of the book’s publication travelled throughout Leicester’s Indian community, to India and to Canada and the States. As both Indian and non-Indian citizens read the book, it led to more research for some. I was delighted with the response and so I began a blog. This site was to be the base of Freedom of the Monsoon, which then evolved into more. It began to carry more information in article form about the period of colonisation; it told of India’s history in detail. It brought culture to the readers.

The Present and Future? What does the present hold for Freedom of the Monsoon? Great reviews and comments and recognition are brilliant. The future will hopefully bring more awareness of India’s crucial and horrendous history.

There have been great novels on the Independence of India in different contexts. May Freedom of the Monsoon join those ranks.

Malika’s book is available as both eBook and paperback, and you can find it at Amazon.com or Amazon.uk. She blogs at http://malikagandhi.wordpress.com/.

Tip O'Day #232 - "Get Lenin"

Guest blogger Robert Craven on the travails of historical fiction.

I still pinch myself. It took Get Lenin five years to grow from an idea to the novel. It started as a dream, then became a journey. Along the way I grew. As with all journeys, it had rough parts as well as smooth parts. The final destination remains unknown.

The idea started when I read a book review about Lenin’s Embalmers, revealing that Lenin’s mausoleum was shipped out of Moscow to the Ural mountains during the German advance in 1941. The first thought that came into my head was “What would happen if...”

Get Lenin finished as a novella clocking in at a modest 26,000 words as a straight adventure, then I started to pitch it. The subject matter of a stranded German unit in Russia during WWII was always going to have limited appeal. As the rejections clogged up the in-box, my wife pointed out that the main female character (Eva Molenaar) was quite unsympathetic. I went back and developed Eva from an innocent caught in the wrong place at the wrong time to an assured heroine. During the course of the pitches, I posted to the peer-review site authonomy.com. From there I found Night Publishing.