Writing Tip 8: Plan says Roberta Isleib

Back to the Writing Tips today. Hope everyone had a nice holiday!

Writing is something that you have to plan. It doesn't always come naturally. It seems that if you don't make yourself sit and write, you'll find that there is always a reason NOT to do it. Procrastination is not a writer's friend.

Roberta Isleib, author of ASKING FOR MURDER, (Berkley) the latest in her new advice columnist series, has some simple, direct advice for writers.

Writing Tip 8: Set up a regular schedule and stick to it--do not wait for the muse to strike!

** More advice on novel writing

** Other basic writing tips, the things that are often overlooked

** Your Turn: What's your writing schedule?


-- In ASKING FOR MURDER, Rebecca's good friend, a social worker who does sand play therapy, is found beaten and left for dead. Rebecca searches for clues in her patients' sand trays to track a would-be killer.

She can only hope the clues are buried within easy reach.

Merry Christmas!

Wishing everyone a wonderful, blessed Christmas!

See you on 12/29 for more Writing Tips!

Blog Award - Honest Scrap Award

I'm taking a break from the Writing Tips until after Christmas. They will resume on Mon, 12/29.

Morgan Mandel passed this Honest Scrap award on to me. Thanks, Morgan.

The award is for “scrappy honesty.” To accept it, the recipient has to:
1. List 10 honest things about him/herself (make it interesting, even if you have to dig deep!)
2. Pass the award on to 7 bloggers (I hope I don’t pass it to someone who already has it! If I do, I apologize).


10 Things About Me:
1. I like fruitcake, so there!
2. I'll take fish over meat.
3. I procrastinate.
4. Some women like shoes, I like purses. Never have enough.
5. I still like dolls and toys, but with grown-ups, it's called being a collector.
6. The dog is the boss.
7. I can't eat any meat with pink in it. Yuck!
8. I love to watch Smallville! Wish I'd saved those Superman comics I had as a kid!
9. I love old movies.
10. Clutter is my friend. ha!


Now I'm supposed to tag 7 people. I'll see how many I can come up with:

* Terrie Farley Moran @ Women of Mystery

* Evelyn David @ The Stiletto Gang

* Mayra Calvani @ Mayra's Secret Bookcase

* Beth Groundwater @ Beth Groundwater

* Rob Walker @ Acme Authors. Let's see if he bites.

* That's enough for me. See you after the holidays. Merry Christmas and Happy Hannukah!

Writing Tip 7: Character Guidance - Mary Cunningham

When you're writing, characters should come alive. The author often can hear the characters' voices. The question is, what are they saying?

Writer's Tip 7: Let Your Characters Guide You

Mary Cunningham, author of the young reader Cynthia's Attic series, (THE MISSING LOCKET, THE MAGIC MEDALLION, CURSE OF THE BAYOU, Quake/Echelon Press) readily admits her characters talk to her - and she listens.

"Authors sometimes complain that they have the characters nailed down, but the plot drives them crazy!," she says. "They get to a certain point and hit a wall.

"It made me think about how I wrote the plot for the first two Cynthia's Attic books. I also had my characters in mind, but, strangely enough, they told me where they wanted to go and what they wanted to do (anyone but a writer would think I'm nuts).

"For instance, in the second chapter of Cynthia's Attic: THE MISSING LOCKET, I still wasn't sure of the plot. I sat, hands poised on the keyboard. All at once, my fingers started moving. I looked at the computer screen and read what had been typed: 'Clara? Is that you?'

"Believe it or not, when I read those four words, the whole story fell out in front of me. It can happen that unexpectedly. Oh sure, you still have to write the story, but, if you get stuck, let your characters guide you."

** Good advice and it gives us a reason to talk to ourselves, right?

** What do your characters say to you?


-- Mary Cunningham is the author of the Cynthia's Attic series and co-author of the humor book WOOF: Women Only Over Fifty.

In THE MISSING LOCKET, best friends, Gus and Cynthia snoop in Cynthia's parents' attic, discovering an old trunk that leads them to various adventures. A fun time-travel/fantasy.

Writing Tip 6: Nicknames, Mary Reed/Eric Mayer

Writing Tip 6: A Rose By Any Other Name...


Authors Mary Reed and Eric Mayer know something about names, having written seven books in their John the Eunuch mystery series set in 6th century Constantinople, beginning with ONE FOR SORROW and the latest, SEVEN FOR A SECRET (Poisoned Pen Press).

Reed says, "In deciding what to call one's characters, nicknames can be very useful.

"Take for example stylites, holy men who lived atop lofty columns, standing there in all weather and never descending to earth.

"Two such stylites are Leo the Castigator and Luke of the Silver Tongue. Both, alas, came to bad ends.

"In the short story 'Leap of Faith,' published in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Leo is murdered in full view of Empress Theodora and half the court while standing alone atop his pillar in an open air/locked room-type mystery. Luke is killed by spontaneous combustion under similar circumstances in our second novel, TWO FOR JOY.

"We venture to suggest their nicknames -- based upon their respective ways of addressing the faithful -- not only add color to their brief appearances, but also indicate their personal characters by employing what we recommend as a useful sort of literary shorthand."


-- Mary Reed and Eric Mayer, authors of the John the Eunuch Mystery series.

In the current, SEVEN FOR A SECRET, Lord Chamberlain, John spends his days counseling Emperor Justinian while passing the small hours of night in conversation with the solemn-eyed girl depicted in a mosaic on his study wall.

He never expected to meet her in a public square or afterwards find her red-dyed corpse in a subterranean cistern. Can he find the truth in time?

** Do you give your characters nicknames? How much do they reveal their character?

Writing Tip 5: Camille Minichino's Take on Time

Time is in short supply these days. We're rushing to stores, rushing to prepare for the holidays, rushing to... write?

Not exactly. You can be eager to write, but take your time about getting to it. More realistically, it can be hard to devote the time to writing, especially when it's a larger project like a novel.

Camille Minichino/Margaret Grace author of The Dollhouse Mystery Series, MURDER IN MINIATURE, MAYHEM IN MINIATURE and the upcoming MALICE IN MINIATURE (Berkley Feb. 09), says you don't need a lot of time to write.

Writing Tip 5: Use Every Minute

She says, "learn to use small amounts of time to further your work in progress. If you wait until you have 'the ideal' setting or block of time, you'll never finish!

"Even if you have only fifteen minutes, make use of it to reconnect with the book."

Good advice! Every minute can add up.

** Your Turn: how/when do you squeeze in writing time?


-- Camille Minichino/Margaret Grace, MAYHEM IN MINIATURE: In Book 2, Gerry and granddaughter Maddie try to help one of Gerry's students who's accused of murder.

In Book 3, MALICE IN MINIATURE, Gerry is going to a reunion at the high school where she taught for more than two decades. But trouble makes an appearance when a former student is accused of murdering an old flame. Gerry and granddaughter Maddie, now 11, find their lives turned upside down as they try to find the answers.

Writing Tip 4, Description, Author Norm Cowie

We think in pictures. A book with just the right words can conjure up the perfect image in our minds. But too much "color" and too much setting can leave the reader...

Well, let Norm Cowie, author of THE NEXT ADVENTURES OF GUY (Draumr Publishing 2007) and the upcoming funny (yes, funny) Young Adult vampire book, FANG FACE (Echelon Press, Aug.'09) tell it his way:

Tip 4: Cut the Description

"Too many people put way too much description in their stories, and run the risk of boring their reader," says Cowie.

Cowie points to author Elmore Leonard who once said the following about writing: "I try to leave out the parts that people skip."

"So, don't describe it unless it needs to be described! It sounds easy, but..."

We know, try it, right?

** What's your take on it?

-- Norm Cowie, THE NEXT ADVENTURES OF GUY, a zany adventure/fantasy continuing the quest of Guy and his college buddies taking on sinister forces and working to save Earth from aliens.

12 Days of Writing, Tip 3, Make it Count

Go to a grocery store or anywhere else and it seems that everyone is talking and talking. People everywhere are on the phone or texting. What do they have to talk about?

These days, talk is cheap - and plentiful. When it comes to writing, though, too much verbiage can be a problem.

Tip 3: Make Every Word Count

"Challenge every word," says Joanna Campbell Slan, author of PAPER, SCISSORS, DEATH (Midnight Ink).

"When I worked in advertising, we had so little space that I learned to 'challenge' every word, to ask each word, 'Can you be deleted or replaced?'

"In school, most of us pad to meet the assigned word length. Our papers are bloated with excess. We are rewarded for being verbose. That model is all wrong.

Unless you are being paid by the word, you should make every word pay its own way by being lean, clean and specific."

** Look for more tips for writers at Joanna's blog

-- Joanna Campbell Slan, author of PAPER, SCISSORS DEATH, A Kiki Lowenstein Scrap-N-Craft Mystery (Midnight Ink).

Kiki Lowenstein, scrapbooker, mother, killer? Now she must find who killed her husband - and his girlfriend - before the killer closes in on her.

12 Days of Writing, Tip 2: When the Blues are Good

Writers all have those days when they wonder if they're on the right track. It's easy to get the blues when the writing isn't going well, the naysayers are talking, and manuscripts are going nowhere.

Today's guest Peggy Ehrhart, author of SWEET MAN IS GONE (Five Star/Gale/Cengage, July 2008), has sang the blues. Like many writers, she knows about discouragement - and success. Her advice?

Tip 2 – Never Stop.

Sure, we've all been told never to give up in our quest to become published --I wrote five books before I sold my blues mystery, SWEET MAN IS GONE to Five Star, Ehrhart says.

"But there's another sense in which 'never stop' is good advice. I found that revising as I went along often meant that I spent weeks on one chapter, and it might be a chapter that I discarded in a later version of the project!

"Now I plough ahead, not striving for perfection but just getting my story told.

"I outline the whole thing in advance so I know where I'm going, then I write four pages a day and focus on piling up those pages.

"If I write every day, I don't even need to reread the pages from the day before because the material is still fresh in my mind. (If I pause to reread, I can't resist revising. Then I'm fussing over what I already did rather than moving ahead.)

"When the whole story is told, I go back and tinker to my heart's content-and that's fun too."

-- SWEET MAN IS GONE by Peggy Ehrhart - Blues-singer Maxx Maxwell is smart, talented, and gorgeous, with a band that's taking off. Then her guitarist plunges to his death and Maxx fears her career is over. When the death is ruled a suicide, Maxx vows to find the answer.

12 Days of Writing, Tip 1: Inspiration & Rewriting

Now that the 12 Days of Christmas in Miniature is over, I thought I'd follow up with another series, this time on THE 12 DAYS OF WRITING (and maybe more if I get enough advice to share.)

The series will be a few short thoughts and a writing tip from myself and other authors. Be sure to come back daily and see who is offering up their pearls of writing wisdom.

Writing as Work

Writing can be one of the most enjoyable and rewarding things you'll ever do. But don't let anyone kid you. It can also also be one of the hardest and most frustrating of occupations, as well.

Once the aura of the byline and getting published wears off, the writing becomes work. It's putting one word after another and constructing one sentence after another until you reach the desired word count.

Forget muses. Deadlines don't wait for inspiration. If you are getting paid to write, whether it be fiction or nonfiction, the writing has to be done, period. But that is only the beginning.


Tip #1: Write and then rewrite.

By Christine Verstraete, author of Searching For A Starry Night, A Miniature Art Mystery

You may polish as you write or go back and fix things up later, but don't expect the first draft to be your last. Good writers know that writing means rewriting. It may mean getting feedback from one editor, fixing things, then getting feedback from another editor, fixing them some more, and so on. It means re-reading until you can't see the words on the page. The best advice: write, let the manuscript sit for a couple days if possible, then go back to it. Rest and rewrite. Write, spruce, polish.
--

For other thoughts on writing inspiration, check out these Mystery Writing Lessons from author PD James.

** Your Turn: Share your view on inspiration and rewriting.

** Be sure to come back tomorrow and see who's dropped in.