Seldom Disappointed

It Ain’t Easy

Seldom Disappointed, a memoir by Tony Hillerman is dedicated:
“To Marie, who wanted me to do this
and to all you other writers, wannabes,
shouldbes, willbes, and hadbeens included,
I dedicate this effort. You’re the ones who
know it ain’t easy. May you get as lucky as
I have been.”

Hillerman’s detective stories featuring Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee are among my favorite reads. Seldom Disappointed gives us a look into what makes an author. Fans of Hillerman should not miss this book. Aspiring writers can learn a lot from it.

I especially like his image of the writer as a “bag lady pushing her stolen shopping cart through life collecting throw away stuff, which, who knows, might be useful some way some day.” In the book he shows how different experiences have shown up in his books.

His story is also encouraging to any writer who has been told his work is no good or who has been rejected. Even his own agent who had placed his non-fiction work told him to forget the fiction.

He tells his journalism students that the “power to persuade lies in the ability to make people see” and sends them out to bars and bus stations to spot differences in the people and describe them so that the reader can see those details that made the students conclude what they did. If a juror appears bored, what makes him look bored? If a bus patron is drunk, what tells you that?

What memories do we have of characters we’ve met? What stands out in our minds about them? How can we describe them so that other people will come to the same conclusions about them that we did? Write, write, right now.

Butter Pecan

NATIONAL ICE CREAM DAY

Butter Pecan is my favorite ice cream What's yours? How does eating ice cream make you feel? What does your tongue feel? What do you taste? What do you see and smell? How do you eat ice cream? Is there a routine or ritual that you go through when you eat it? When do you eat it? How does writing compare to ice cream? Where do you buy it? At the grocery store? From a street vendor? From an ice cream shop?

What's your fondest moment and ice cream? What's your funniest moment with ice cream? What's your saddest ice cream story?

Do you ever use ice cream as a carrot? I'm going out to do some research after I write. Write right now.

Learning The Craft

LEARNING THE CRAFT

The craft is everything that helps us to effectively tell our story or get our message across. If we’re just writing for ourselves, it doesn’t matter because we know what we mean no matter how we write it down. If we are writing for others or to get published, we have to learn the craft. We have to make our writing clear, persuasive, and compelling.

Craft is important. Only the exceptional genius or the extremely lucky will be published if they lack the skills to put together an effective offering that meets the dictates of the publisher. Work that confuses or tires the reader is not going to get accepted.

Authors spend a lifetime learning their craft. Expect to do that. Do not be too anxious. Focus on the basics first. Books like THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE and THE WRITER’S RULES should be read and kept at hand as part of your basic writing reference library. For each publisher, get their writers’ guidelines and make sure your work conforms to them before making any submissions.

Many writers work too hard on craft. Beyond the basics, relax. Consider it a success if from each book, web site, conference, class, or blog, you pick up one useful tip, insight, or inspiration.

The priority is to write from your passion, love, and burning drive. Write! Write! Right now!

From THE WRITER’S RULES: The Power of Positive Prose -- How to Create it and Get it Published. HELEN GURLEY BROWN: “If you want to be a writer, write. Write something. Write again and again. If nobody sees your output for a while, that’s okay; write for you until it’s time to write for others.”

Targeted Writing

Let’s Write Short Stories

Let’s Write Short Stories by Ralph M. McInerny is great. When it was originally issued it was a course with a workbook and several cassettes and the buyer could send in his work to be critiqued. It had been a marvelous opportunity. This course is now difficult or impossible to find. Even without the critique service, it is a treasure.

Looking on the net for these tapes, I was unsuccessful. However Let’s Write a Mystery, Let’s Write a Novel, and Let’s Write Fiction-- 8 practical lessons were found at prices over a hundred dollars and one at almost two hundred dollars.

In Let’s Write Short Stories, McInerny leads the writer through the process of writing a short story, actually having the writer write along with him. If the writer follows diligently, he’ll have a short story.

McInerny defines the short story as: “The narration of a character’s attempts to extricate himself from a problem.” He also reminds the writer of his obligation to engage the reader because “no one owes you a reading.” Let’s hope that soon Ralph M. McInerny makes his practical approach available again.

Crafting the Romance Story - ebook 2009 by Lynette Rees

For romance writers, practical advice and guidance is here and now in Crafting the Romance Story - ebook 2009 by Lynette Rees. I call this a workbook because if you take your time and work through it, do the exercises, and read the linked articles, you’ll be rewarded with your own self written romance. You may even say, “Well, that was easy. What’s so hard about that?” Trust me, it’s a lot more difficult when someone isn’t holding your hand, guiding you along the way. Rees sheds light along a path to writing the romance story. Take your time, do the work, and you’ll be glad you did. She also details how to go about getting it sold.

Buy this ebook and carefully work through the exercises and read the linked articles. Here’s the link to buy:
https://www.lulu.com/commerce/index.php?fBuyContent=7300519

Let me know what you think of it. I give it my highest rating -- buy it for your writer’s library.

You can find the romances of Lynette Rees at any of the major book sites like amazon.com, borders.com, bn.com, or abebooks.com. Or find them out at:
http://www.thewildrosepress.com/it-happened-one-summer-paperback-p-3081.html

Writing Focus

FOCUS

If we want to write a novel or a short story or a magazine article, eventually we need to focus our writing on that. One way is to choose as our model the novel, story, or article that we like the best.

READ

For the aspiring author, writing-- regularly and often-- claims the top priority followed closely by reading. Read the classic authors and those outstanding in the type of writing you desire to do. Read first for pleasure then read to answer the questions that arise from writing. How does the author hook us, play us, and reel us in? Compare your favorite authors. Then try to imitate them. It is not so easy to imitate them.

If you’re interested in writing novels you may want to walk through the large print area of your library. It is like the rest of the library only smaller easier to walk through rapidly. Look for authors with lots of books. Pick one author and scan the titles. Choose the title you like the best or choose the thinnest book. Do this for five other authors. These authors have published many books that the library has bought; they must be doing something right. Read all of these books. Some may be books you don’t normally read. That’s good. Reading a romance, western, mystery, or thriller will shed light on writing the type of novel you want to write.

If you’re interested in short stories, choose five books of collected short stories. For magazine writing choose five of the best selling magazines. The idea is to gather examples of the successful popular writing in the form you have chosen.

How do these authors compare with your favorite author? How do they start? How are they trying to draw you into their story? Write the first paragraph of your story in the style of each of these five authors. Don’t spend a lot of time doing this. Just read their beginning paragraph; write a paragraph. Write, write, right now.

Warmimg Up

Warm Up

Call it warm up exercises or call it getting into the writer’s mind set, a daily free write is a good way to get started for the day. Just put the pen to paper and write whatever pops into your head and don’t stop until you’ve completed your page or time target. A page is good. It makes getting into whatever else you’re working on easier.

A good book that suggests a way to do your daily write is Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones --freeing the writer within-- @1986. I suggest getting the book on tape version read by the author herself. This book is full of ways to improve your writing, to get in touch with your inner writer, and to enjoy the journey. Listening to her read and then stop and comment on what she just read is a delight. This is an excellent book on the “how to” of writing daily. Listening to Natalie will stretch your mind and your writing.

Write. Write, right now!

Writing Types

TYPES OF WRITING

To improve, we need to write often. Don’t worry too much if what you’re writing is any good. It is a common worry that causes many to give up. Those that keep writing are often surprised by how good their writing appears to them after a few days. It is important to remember that it is the writing and, perhaps, especially the writing when we are struggling to put together a good sentence, that gets us where we are going. To gain this experience any type of writing will do. This is the first type of writing: writing for experience.

Targeted writing is the next type. Whether we want to write humorous essays, short stories, memoirs, creative non-fiction, family histories, novels, newspaper stories, non-fiction, or whatever, we need to do some writing targeted at that. I want to be a writer of short stories and novels. I need to practice that by writing short stories and novels. By trying to write a short story, I become aware of the short story.

Writing to learn the craft is the third type of writing. To learn the craft we need to expand our experience, challenge our thought patterns, and work on our weaknesses. The lessons learned here linger on in our other writings. Exercises may focus on our creativity(like challenging our senses or asking what ifs), our craft proficiency (like point of view or flashbacks), or on the mechanics (like grammar or punctuation).

Write your daily thoughts.

Write your heart’s desire.

Explore your creativity………right now!