Writer’s Block–When Your Imaginary Friends Won’t Talk

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author Catherine Castle's writing quote blog series, Imaginary friends, writer's block

Writer’s block is when your imaginary friend won’t talk to you.

 

 

I’m not sure where I got this quote, but I think it’s a hoot. Especially the imaginary friend part.

I don’t really ascribe to the writer’s block theory. Instead, I consider writer’s block to be more of a writer’s avoidance. If you put butt in chair the words will come. They might not be the best words, but they will be words. At least that’s what I’ve believed in the past.

However, for the past few months, several of my imaginary friends, from my WIP A Bride for Mama, haven’t been talking to me. I know there’s a HEA. I know the hero and heroine have to get together, get apart, and get together. I know there are a bunch of funny, screwed-up dates in the book. I’ve been collecting dates-gone-wrong ideas from friends for months now. But every scenario for getting the couple to the inevitable black moments doesn’t seem to work. I’ve been stuck at page 71 for ages, because Allison and Jack won’t tell me where they want to go. I’m also avoiding their story like they’ve got the plague. Hence my writer’s avoidance and not writer’s block theory.

And it’s frustrating, because while I’ve been waiting for them to speak, I’ve co-written two books and a 10,000 word novella with my husband. We wrote the novella in less than a week. My butt in the chair theory has certainly worked there. ARGGH!

Recently, while testing my workshop for the Midwest Writers Conference (which is this April in Indianapolis, Indiana) the characters began to shout at me. In fact, by using my recently developed workshop method, which involves using the Hero’s Journey to create synopses of my book ideas, a host of my characters from several planned books are now yelling, “Write us!”

Suddenly, I have multiple books and half a dozen characters clamoring for my attention. My imaginary friends are calling me at all hours, telling me what’s happening in their lives, urging me to get it down on paper before I forget. They’re invading my dreams, making me daydream, and filling up my head.

Cacophony reigns in my head. It’s wonderful! And it’s overwhelming.

But you know what? I’d rather talk with my imaginary friends than have them snub me. Funny how that works in both life and writing.

What about you? Are your imaginary friends talking to you now? If not, do you have some tricks you use to help them open the lines of communication?

 

 

The Taming of a Booklover’s Human Nature … or not.

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Bibliophilia, Henry WArd Beecher quote, writing quote blog seriess

Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore?–Henry Ward Beecher

 

I am without doubt a confirmed bibliophile, a disease that apparently even Henry Ward Beecher had, as well as many of America’s wealthy homeowners, as witnessed by some of their great libraries.

One of the many bookshelves in the home of poet Carl Sandburg. Every room has at least one floor-to-ceiling bookcase. Photo by Catherine Castle

So, When I read this quote I said, “Oh, that is soooo me.”

As I kid going into the library, I could never choose just one library book. Three was the minimum, and I’ve been known to go as high as seven, or ten, if I was checking out non-fiction for research or skimming. I always returned before the two-week borrowing limit was over and checked out another armload of books. Of course, back then I had the luxury of time on my side. I don’t read books as fast as I did as a teen, but I still collect them. I haven’t lost my love of books, or my weakness for the written word . . .click HERE To read more of this blog, which is posted at SMP Author site where I’m guest blogging today. I hope you’ll join me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Readin’ in the Garden of Eden

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Chinese proverb about books, writing quote about books, writing quote blog seriess

A book is like a garden carried in the pocket.

—Chinese proverb

 

photo by Catherine Castle (c)

I thought about this quote for a while, wondering about what this little proverb meant.

 

Perhaps the proverb means that when you have a book you’ll always have a bit of happiness in your pocket, since there is another Chinese proverb relating to gardens that says, “… if you would be happy all your life, plant a garden.” Reading a book definitely makes me happy.

Maybe carrying a garden in your pocket translates to beauty. There is no greater beauty than that of a well-tended, beautifully designed garden. I love to tour gardens. They give me ideas for my own yard, make me thrill at the color combinations and different plant textures. For me, with hidden vistas and surprises around the bend in the paths a well-thought-out garden is a thing to be admired and learned from. A well thought-out book filled with unexpected twists and turns is also a thing of beauty. The new turn of phrase, use of alliteration and metaphors and similes can make me stop reading and go, “Ahhh,” just like a garden can.

Or does the proverb refer to the way one can get lost in a book, like I lose track of time in my garden and forget to stay hydrated or forget to stop to eat? When I was a teenager I got so engrossed in books that my mother often accused me of ignoring her when I was reading. I wasn’t. In fact, I was so deep in those fictional worlds that I never heard her or the television or my siblings arguing. If the house had started burning down around me even the scream of the fire trucks wouldn’t have roused me from the pages. If you gave me a book, I’d be satisfied for hours or even days. The same thing still happens today. Just ask my hubby when I’m reading around suppertime.

It could be that the proverb only means reading is relaxing. I know I spent many a summer as a carefree teenager relaxing on the porch reading the stacks of books I’d dragged home from the library. The breeze blew gently, or not— if it was a particularly muggy day. I could hear the birds chirping, the leaves rustling, Mom banging pots and pans in the kitchen fixing lunch or dinner. Or sometimes I sat in the sun, squinting at the pages propped on my knees while ants marched up the aluminum chair legs from the grass beneath my chair as I fried my blond skin in UV sunlight. The fragrance of Mom’s garden flowers mingled with my coconut butter suntan oil.

I’m sure when this proverb was first spoken the ancients who said it didn’t know about the M. vaccea bacteria in the soil that reduces stress. But they did know that gardening reduced stress. Maybe not as you’re yanking that three-foot weed out of concrete-hard dirt, but definitely as you’re sitting post-weeding enjoying the fruits of your garden labors. When you combine the two things—reading and nature— I’m sure the relaxation effect has to double.

So as summer wanes, take heed of this Chinese proverb. Grab your book and a glass of iced tea and head outside. Find a beautiful vista and read. Read like your sanity depended on it, and don’t forget to look up occasionally and enjoy the Garden of Eden as you’re readin’.

Do you have a take on the meaning of this proverb? I’d love to hear it.

Using Your Writing Muscles

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avoidance tactics, jane Yolen, writing muscles, writing quote

Exercise the writing muscle every day, even if it is only a letter, notes, a title list, a character sketch, a journal entry. Writers are like dancers, like athletes. Without that exercise, the muscles seize up.- Jane Yolen

This is one of my favorite quotes when I’m feeling guilty about not writing on the WIP book, because I get to count email as writing. Not text shorthand filled with symbols or happy face icons, but real email, where I have to stop and think about what I’m going to say. I also get to count blog posts and poetry, two of my avoiding-the-WIP-tactics. And then there’s editing and revisions. Those count, too, because it’s rewriting the writing. And another of my favorites—writing blurbs for all those ideas for WIP to come. There’s something about creating a compact two or three line blurb that definitely oils my writing muscles.

I don’t know about you, but sometimes exercising the writing muscles is as hard as exercising the rest of my body. You’d think since I like to write a thousand times more than I like to do calisthenics that I’d choose writing over everything else. Unfortunately, I can always find something else that cuts to the front of the line, except when deadlines loom. Deadlines definitely motivate me. In every part of my life. Housecleaning is delayed until the company is scheduled to arrive. Laundry waits until one of us is out of underwear. And don’t get me started on cleaning the bathroom. Although since I’ve begun using straight vinegar in a spray bottle, instead of Scrubbing Bubbles, I can clean and shine the tiles before, during, and after I clean myself with no worry of toxic fumes … if I build in a few extra minutes. But that may be TMI. Sorry about that.

So, back to the writing muscles point of the blog … the next time you’re feeling guilty about not working on your WIP, don’t. Write something else instead and let that WIP scene or plot or whatever is keeping you from the story, bubble in the back of your brain. After all, I think that’s using the old writing muscles, too.

Do you have a favorite WIP-avoidance writing habit?

 

Finding Your Story’s Defining Moment.

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choosing your story moment, W.D. Wetherell, writing quotes, writing tips

Have you ever wondered why some stories are great and others just mediocre? It’s not just the way the author tells the story, her use of voice, fantastic prose or the book’s deep characterization or realist setting. All those things are important to story, and definitely add to the joy of reading. But are they what lies at the core of making your story great?

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Henrykus

 

W.D. Wetherell says… “A story isn’t about a moment in time, a story is about the moment in time.”

 

 

 

 

When we craft our books it’s important to choose the right moment in our characters’ lives to create a story for our readers. We must choose the moment in time, not a moment in time, to not only to start our stories, but to begin our character and story arcs.

So what makes the moment in a story? The moment is a defining moment in the character’s life. A moment when everything is about to change for our hero or heroine. It’s the moment when life, or love, or existence as they know it will never be the same.

Let’s consider the story of Cinderella. Cinderella, in most of its forms, begins something like this:

Once upon a time… there lived a beautiful, happy young girl. Then her mother died, and her father married a widow with two daughters, and everything changed. The girl’s stepmother didn’t like her and showered her daughters with everything money could buy. But, for her stepdaughter there was nothing at all. She had to work hard all day. In the evening, when all her work was finished, she was allowed to sit for a while by the fire, near the cinders. That is how she got her nickname … Cinderella.

For Cinderella the defining moment was the death of her mother and her father’s subsequent marriage to another woman. If the story of Cinderella began with pages and pages of her happy existence with her mother and father and never went any further, would readers want to know more? True, all those things could add up to a sweet, happy story about a lovely girl who had a wonderful life. But they weren’t the defining moment around which Cinderella’s story was formed. Without the wicked step-family, a father who didn’t care about how Cinderella was treated (or who died in some versions), and all her adversity, there isn’t anything to make readers empathize with Cinderella in the same way they do when she’s a motherless girl placed under the thumb of a cruel stepmother.

So how can you find your story’s defining moment? The moment that W.D. Wetherell’s quote references?

When thinking about your story ask yourself:

• Am I starting in the place where the trouble starts? Cinderella’s trouble starts the minute mom dies. Sure she has back story. All characters do, but we only need a line or two at the story’s beginning to show our characters’ former lives.
• Are the moments that make up the story powerful enough to carry the reader through the book? For Cinderella, life might have gone along okay if dad hadn’t remarried, or if the new wife had been nice, or if she hadn’t had children. Instead, she got a double whammy with an entire wicked step-family. If your character’s defining moment problems don’t set her back on her fanny, create some that will.
• Once you have the moment, amp it up and keep the trouble coming. Create dilemmas related to the moment that will propel the story forward. It’s not bad enough that Cinderella has to work all the time. But when she gets a chance to escape for a night at the prince’s ball, she gets hit from all sides to keep her downtrodden. Her family keeps her too busy to go to the ball. She has no ball gown. When Cinderella has completed all the tasks asked of her, she still doesn’t get permission. Even when the fairy godmother comes to the rescue there are conditions, which Cinderella nearly doesn’t fulfill.
• When you think the reward for dealing with the defining moment is in your character’s hands, snatch it away before you let her really have it. The prince is in love with Cinderella, but her family denies there is another daughter in the house when he comes searching for the foot that fits the shoe. Believing them, he starts to leave without her. All seems to be lost at that moment for Cinderella.
• Finally, make the reward for all the suffering your character has had to endure fit the punishments. Cinderella spent years in the cinders, cleaning and scrubbing, and being at the beck and call of her wicked family, and then she must hide her identity from her true love, the prince. It’s only fitting that her reward is a happily-ever-after. She gets her prince and the palace and a bevy of servants to do her bidding. The only additional reward for Cinderella (or just punishment for Cinderella’s wicked family), in my opinion, would have been to banish the wicked step-mother to the Tower and make the wicked step-sisters serve as ladies maids to the queen … forever.
• But we know that Cinderella was pure of heart and would never do such a thing. Besides, those sisters would probably have been more trouble than help.

The next time you think about your story, ask yourself if it’s about a moment in time, or the moment in time that will change your character’s life forever.

What’s the defining moment in your WIP character’s life that spawned your story?

 

 

 

 

Novel Writing — Let Me Count The Ways

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james Scott Bell, Save the Cat beat structure, the Snowflake Writing method, Thomas Berger, Writing from the middle, writing methods, writing quotes

Beginners sometimes ask me how a novel is written, the answer to which is: Any way at all. One knows only when it is finished, and then if one is serious, he will never do it the same way again.”— Thomas Berger, author of Little Big Man

This quote got me to thinking about how many ways I’ve written books. As a solo author, my writing methods jump around like water droplets on a hot skillet, because I want to know how it fits, want try new things, and do everything at once. Even when I’m writing with the hubby, I’m jumping all over the place while he’s trying to reign me in. He calls my methods circular. He’s very linear. You can guess how that must work out. Thankfully, what’s said in the office stays in the office. Consequently, we are still happily married.

I blame mixing it up on my childhood where we moved every five years, minimum, and Mom changed the furniture placement bi-monthly. Walking around in the house in the dark could be hazardous to one’s shins and toes. When I married, the hubby hated rearranging rooms, so I didn’t. I think my frustrated lack of furniture moving has bled over into my disordered writing habits.

Just because my methods vary doesn’t mean I’m not using some sort of structure to help me write. I have the story idea in my head, usually know the beginning and ending; the black moments; and goal, motivation, and conflict for the characters. So I have a pretty good idea of the story and where it’s headed. I just don’t always know the stuff in between. However, the one thing I always know before starting a book is my blurb. I write the blurb, then I write the book.

I have a total of six completed fiction books under my writing belt, seven if we count that first horrible teenage angst book, and a devotional. My first book was written with an out-of-order, scene-by-scene method. It took me seven years to write. Trust me, I won’t ever use that method again. Getting all those scenes in the right place was a nightmare. Nowadays, I might write down a scene out of order when it comes to me while writing, but not the whole book.

The second book came to me in a dream. I hastily wrote the dream down and embellished it as I went along, letting my characters lead the way. This book was total panster, except for what I’d dreamt. One morning, the heroine awoke and ran to the bathroom vomiting. She’d become pregnant. A surprise to both her and me. But the plot twist worked, so I let her keep the baby and changed the story.

The third completed book, The Nun and the Narc, began as a call to a contest entry. No major plotting on this one, either. But I got myself into lots of trouble because the heroine’s vocation didn’t work, and the book wasn’t long enough. So I turned to The Hero’s Journey to shore it up. Eventually, this book sold.

My devotional was a whole other matter. I stared with the premise that it would be comprised of seasonal, story-based devotions with pictures and gardening hints. I gathered ideas with the lofty goal of a devotion for every day, which soon got pared down. I discovered three-hundred and sixty-five devotions are hard to write without repeating yourself.

When I write with the hubby, we plot heavily, yet allow ourselves the freedom to panster within the plotting. As coauthors this works well, since we have to agree on plot, characterization and such at the beginning, yet allows my free-spirited panstering within reason. He still has to sign off on my changes. After finishing the books, we often check for plot twists, black moments, and other plot techniques using the three-act structure. Amazingly enough, the books usually fit the plotting structure.

Although my methods vary, technically, you’d probably call me a plantster, a mix of panster and plotter, since I know plotting keeps me on track and mostly free of the dreaded sagging middle. Been there, know the drill, had to rescue the book.

Having flown by the seat of my pants, used The Hero’s Journey, and the three act scene structure, I’m feeling the urge to try something new. I recently discovered the Save the Cat beats structure, and I’m considering crafting the next book using that method. After that I might give the snowflake method

a whirl or try one of these methods.

• sticky notes
• outlining
• nanowrimo
• character sketches
• chapter summaries
• synopsis first, then write the book
• James Scott Bell’s Writing From the Middle

Aside from the fact that there are many ways to write a book, there’s an additional point to this blog, and I think to the quote. Writing methods are not ironclad structures writers must religiously adhere to in order to make our books wonderful. They are tools in our writing boxes that help us learn structure and plot. Tools that serve us, not the other way around. If we stray from them a bit, and most writers will, we shouldn’t worry about it. After all, surprises have a place in books as well as good structure.

What’s your favorite novel-writing method? Do you do any of those I’ve mentioned or something completely different? I’d love to know.

Go Around Come Around Reading

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Buck Rogers, guest blogging at SMP Authors, Laura Ingalls Wilder, new to you books, remakes of books, Samuel Butler writing quote, Tarzan, writing quote about books

I’m blogging at the SMP author site today. So, please click on the link below to come join me.

“The oldest books are still only just out to those who have not read them.”

— Samuel Butler.

 

I love this quote. Want to know why? Because it means my book is never going to be old. Somewhere, sometime, someone will discover The Nun and the Narc and all the books I will have published in the future, and I will be a newly discovered author, again and again. Who wouldn’t want that? I’d love to have my books go-around-and-come-around and be just out to someone time and time again. …

Click here to read the rest of the post.

 

 

 

 

 

What old-to-you-book have you made just out to someone you know?

How to Stack the Writing Odds in Your Favor

If you write one story, it may be bad; if you write a hundred, you have the odds in your favor.

– Edgar Rice Burroughs

 

Recently the senior editor of Soul Mate Publishing sent out her bi-monthly update letter to her authors talking about what works for selling books and what doesn’t. Interestingly enough, she said things like print ads don’t work, including Facebook ads. She maintains that the best thing to do is put out one book, then another, then another, then another, and keep the quality high. Because, once an author has a breakout book, your fans will want to read your backlist. Currently, she’s placing more emphasis on writing the next book and author chats and other interaction with future reader than paid ads. I like that. It’s cheaper marketing.

Apparently, Edgar Rice Burroughs agrees with my editor, except for the quality part. But he has a point, because as writers we all know that first book probably sucks, as well as number two and three. I know mine did. That’s why book number one or two and maybe three may never see the light of day.

Original Charcoal drawing of Johnny Crawford by Catherine

After all, I wrote my first book back in the early sixties when I was in love with teenaged television actor Johnny Crawford. If you remember the TV series The Rifleman, you’ll know who I’m talking about. Johnny was the hero and I, naturally, was the heroine. I wrote it long-hand, complete with hand-drawn floor plans of the Hollywood home we ended up in after we married. I proudly bound it in one of those paper notebooks with the brass thingys that you bent back to hold in the pages. I thought what I’d written was pure poetry on paper. Shows you how much I knew back then J

I hunted for that sappy book number one the other day and came across the paper printouts of other books written since that first adolescent, star-struck love story hit the pages. I also found a few rejection notices for my other early books that said things like:

• Doesn’t hold our interest
• Clichéd plot device
• Competent writing and
• Author shows potential but needs to work on characters and plot.

Competent writing? That was depressing. Who wants to be just competent?

I kept digging in the file drawer, and I came across a few judged contests from a book written a few years later and those comments were so much more encouraging. They said things like:

• The characters are strong from the beginning
• The story is refreshing
• Author isn’t afraid to write outside the box
• I could visualize the characters
• The action is great
• Great voice!

Comments like that made me feel that my writing was progressing. Even back then, I was doing what Edgar Rice Burroughs’ quote says: continuing to write stories and putting the odds in my favor.

Today, I’m a published author who’s winning contests and getting five-star reviews.

So keep on writing, even if that first book you wrote was awful. Keep writing even if your first published book doesn’t sell much or win contests or become the next Harry Potter phenomenon. Keep on writing because eventually the odds will be in your favor.

And it will stop all those voices screaming in your head for you to tell their story.

 

 

Bibliophilia – Disease, Delight, or Disgrace?

Tags

Bibliophilia, SMP guest blogging, writing quote

photo by C.Castle

 

I’m over at the Soul Mate Publishing Authors blog today talking about bibliophilia and this quote from Desiderius Erasmus.

“When I get a little money, I buy books; and if any is left, I buy food and clothes.”

Can you relate? Come see just what I mean by my title.  See you there!