Why writing is my saviour

In my current world of anxiety issues, writing is my saviour. Why? There are a couple of reasons, and here I outline them.

1. While writing, I am concentrating on the world of my characters. So I am not thinking about me and my anxiety problems. Unless I happen to write about a character with anxiety and/or Asperger's. My current adult wip has an Aspie lady in it as the main character, but I have made her different from me. She is younger and braver than me.

2. If I didn't write, I wouldn't have books to publish and then sell. Having books to sell, means I can go out and sell them at markets and libraries. Yes, I do have to go out and cross roads, even if my mum has to come with me to the place, but I am still getting out. I do not want to become stuck in my own home with anxiety. I want to go out and meet people, talking about books.

I currently have put The Racing Angel and One Good Turn back into paperback (available from Amazon), so will have more books to sell for both adults and children.

Creating characters to care about

Last Saturday I went to the last SCBWI Masterclass of the year (the only one I had managed to get to this year). It was on how to create characters to care about with Piers Torday of 'Last Wild' trilogy fame. (Confession – sorry to say that I hadn't heard of him before then. But now I know what he has written, want to buy the books).

He told us how he got writing his books. He wrote 'The Last Wild' 17 times. What inspired him.

We then had to write out our homework from our favourite children's book. Then wrote another exercise based on that. This gave me an idea how to start a children's animal series I have in mind. Shall have to write or type that out for a reminder.

I can't remember if Piers said this himself or he told us it was another author, but he said, (and I agree), you can't write if you don't read.

When you write you should get the child to visualise the characters.

Then we had another exercise based on classic children's characters. This gave me yet another idea for another animal series.

You should read widely and deeply. Read 10 books on the topic. Piers read 10 books about wolves for his trilogy. He quoted Jacqueline Wilson with 'Write with one eye on the market'.

Then it was another exercise about child inspiration or what frightened you as a child. I wrote something that might turn into a series of Asper fiction for children. We shall see.

Think about your character – their function, originality, voice and choices.

Another exercise based on your homework, which leads to a bit more homework.

Story – think motivation.

I enjoyed the day despite coughing my way through it, esp at the end when I got a tickle. Aargh. I also enjoyed the sweet potato fries I had, but couldn't eat them all as there were too many.

Finding your inner child workshop with Melvin Burgess

I can't believe it was 2 weekends ago that I went to the retreat. One of the talks I went to by Melvin Burgess was 'Finding your inner child'. Here is what we did:

We talked about group dynamics and the different types there are. There are the ones with a leader, a star, a sidekick, a topper (who's top at everything), the one with a leader who likes to be in competition, the star who wants to be in all the groups, one that has a third wheel (that was what I was in), dropkick group with no friends by default and go together (another I belonged to).

Then we had to write down about a group you belonged to, write the characters, their appearances and group dynamics. This made me think about a group of girls I went around with at secondary school. There were 3 girls (2 Asian and 1 white) belonging to one tutor group, and a group of 2 (Asian and 1 white) in another group. The latter white girl was slightly on the edge of the group, and there was me - the invisible wheel. We had to write in the pov of the leader and what you thought they had thought about you at the time. Interesting exercise.

We had to write a couple of incidences at school.

The last exercise was a group of 3 exercise. We had to interview each other and get a story about their childhood days. One member of mine talked about moving schools so found it hard to get on until later years, the other talked about coaching younger ones. Both these stories I made a note of for my Rainbow School characters and what they could do in the books. I talked about my primary school days and how I felt about that being shy and quiet with my Asperger's, which I didn't know it was back then.

All in all, I found it a very useful and interesting workshop. So, thank you, Melvin.

RNA Conference Day 3

Finally, I have got round to post about the last day of the conference.

The first talk I went to was by Catherine Jones, talking about her life in the army and writing career in the army and onwards. Then was a talk about how to keep readers reading by Emma Darwin. She told us the many ways of writing styles there are, inc one I didn't know about called 'free indirect style'.  She gave us exercises to do in the different writing styles. One of these gave me an idea for a teen/YA book.

Then was a talk by Tamsyn Murray about emotion in YA. She explained one three YA books are so successful: 'The Fault in our Stars', Hunger Games and the Year of the Rat. They have these in common: Strong indentifiable and central theme. Memorable characters, quality writing, fantastic storytelling, brilliant world building, love, romance, crossover appeal, word of mouth success, PR commitment from publisher and luck. You have to know your reader. Research what's out there. Remember how intense your teen years were. Understand that readers form strong bonds with characters they like - make them relatable and make them care. Let them experience loss in a safe way. How? ID your theme early. Know what your book wants to say. Create loveable characters. Do something different. Don't be afraid to write strong emotions. Deepen the conflict there is already not add more. In teen books, more action has to happen more often. MG is best for engagement.

So there you have what I learnt and come away with. I hope you have learnt something, too.

For newbie writers - write what you know

This post has come from a meeting with an author client whom I'm helping improve his story and get it published as an ebook. Yesterday I put a writing tip on Facebook and Twitter saying 'Tap into your knowledge'. This is the same as write what you know. So, if you have been a police detective and you are writing this genre, then write about what you know. Tap into your knowledge of what you did and this will enhance the story and make it more authentic and believable. My client hadn't done this, and I had told him to do it. I believe that this will make his story more believable and true to life than it is.

This is what I've been doing with my Asperkids series. I tapped into my memories of what I was like as a child with Asperger's Syndrome and other health problems whilst at school. I've also been trying to do with this with short stories I've been writing for women's magazines. Putting my memories of incidents that have happened to me into the characters' lives.

So, if you are a newbie writer, my best advice is to write what you know. Tap into that knowledge of yours.

If you want more hints and tips about writing, then why not sign up to my newsletter at awlist3836174@aweber.com

Retreat Part 2 - What I learnt

This is part two where I talk about what I learnt at the retreat. There are three different ways I learnt: about plot, about one of my characters in Charlie and about myself.

I didn't learn that much about plot, but what I did learn was that you can write a book in verse instead of prose, the traditional way. Eg Robert Paul Weston's first book is in rhyming verse. You can do it as diary format, either by journal, blog or text. This was in Elizabeth Wein's second talk during the weekend. We did exercises, and it was doing one of these where we had to write the first scene in the pov of another character that I learned a bit more about Charlie's little sister, Wendy. I learned that she cared about him, which doesn't come across in what I had already written. So I am going to add a scene where Charlie faints and sees her looking at him concerned.

So that is what I learnt about plot and one of my characters. About myself: I learnt that although I'm an Aspie, if I want to find out something from someone or connect with someone for a reason, then I will go and do it. After I had the one-to-one with the agent, who suggested I try writing to niche publishers, I remembered that a couple of the others were primary teachers. Would they know about reading matter for special needs children? I approached one of them, Zoe Boyd-Clack, whom I recalled was a primary teacher, and she kindly phoned her brother, whose partner works with special needs children to ask about what books they read, to find out which publisher the books are by. I have yet to hear, but I do hope I do. So, that is what I mean by when I want to do something, I do it.

If I hear any news about that, I will let you know. It was a great weekend. I got a lot of writing done (more on that in the next post), made contacts and got ideas on where to send my Asperkids series to.

RNA workshop/retreat day on 15 Feb 2014 - and what I learnt

Last Saturday I made my way on bus to Holborn to go to the RNA London/SE workshop/retreat day. I passed where that car was smashed in by falling bricks from a building. Horrible. Feel so sorry for her family. Anyway, I got there in time to get a good seat.

It started at 10.15 with Julie Cohen and her talk about learning structure with Pixar films. I've not seen it before and thought it was great. We watched the beginning of Wall-E, and I got a new take on it. It's about a lonely robot who finds love in a deserted world of rubbish. I liked the underlying message about recycling more or the world can be like this. We also watched a clip of Finding Nemo, where the main plot and the subplot meets. This is what I learnt: plot structure is structure of the emotional arc. We were given the three act structure of the film Cars. Backstory at the start of the story can be used in the setting as in Wall-E, where we see papers on the ground about trash covering Earth. Pixar starts their films with emotional arc. They have repeated motifs eg in Wall-E, holding hands means love. The subplot - thematic plot. More plot and add to character. Cars has a circular structure where the ending reflects the start of the film - the main character is in a car race, which is how he began the story.

After Julie came Laura Longrigg and Laura Gerrard, Jean Fullerton's agent and editor. They both said that it is the voice and USP being great is what they look for. If you are a member of the NWS, you can mention this in a query letter to them. Also, add a section about you. Your background, why you wrote the story, what you like to read etc.

Then came the '10 Common Mistakes that authors make' and this is where I learnt a lot and came to a decision.
Plotting - know your characters inside and out. Never forget your readers are interested in relationships. Start at a critical point in the story. Work in any backstory subtly. Don't put in mundale details such as making cups of tea. Know your market and readership. Know your publisher requirements (I will check the few publishers I have in mind for a romance I will shortly be working on). If it has a saggy middle then the story hasn't been thought through properly. Have a satisfying ending. Make your characters likeable. The reader has to ID with them, so the story has to be believable. The hero - the reader has to desire him, and want the heroine to want him too. Understand where you want the story to go before starting or the characters won't progress. Don't make the plot entirely driven. In an edit, you can highlight the external and internal conflicts to work this out).
POV - don't head hop unless you're Nora Roberts. Tell not show. Get POV right and experience what your character is feeling. Use emotion and feeling not reportage. And get your punctuation right for speech.

What I learned from that last talk by Melanie Hilton, the NWS organiser, was to make your story believable. In the romance novel that I plan to work on later this year, I was going to have a ghost in it, but I now feel that won't be believable so what the ghost was going to do will be done by the young male neighbour, who falls in love with a librarian, who happens to be the granddaughter. I can't wait to rewrite the book now, but have two projects to work and complete before that.

Character names - are yours similar?

When I was thinking about all the ebooks and books and stories I've been writing recently, it occurred to me that most of the names of the characters I've created are very similar. In my YA fantasy series 'The Guardian Angels' there is Lizzie and Danny. In my 7+ magical school series I'm writing there is Billy and now Charlie. In my first attempt at writing for middle-grade, there is Rosie and Allie (short for Alexandra). I am trying to put in characters with different sounding names, really.
I do wonder if it is because my name is Julie and has the sound at the end.

So, was wondering, do any of you out there give your characters similar sounding names like I've done? Let me know, so I feel not alone in doing it. Look forward to hearing from you all.

Woman's Weekly Fiction Workshop - What I learnt about how to write for them

On 7 June I went to Southwark Street in London (near London Bridge) to a workshop by Woman's Weekly. I had recently had a story rejected by them so wanted to find out what they look for. Here is what I learnt.

They publish/write for all walks of life. The stories are information and entertainment but not shocking. They accept a variety of stories, but not horror with blood etc and no sex - has to be behind doors.  Crime has to be done off stage if it is a crime story. Mystery/crime still has to have warmth, think cosy crime.  Characters have encounters that changes lives. Characters have to have a problem. Don't get too attached to your story as you might decide to change things.  The one question you should ask yourself, and what I now think when I want to write for them is Is this likely? If it's no, then the reader won't believe in it, if yes or could be, then reader will and they could accept it. This is why my story was rejected. It was magical realism and wasn't likely to happen in real life. Your story mustn't be too tame or predictable either.  For weekly issue they accept stories of 1000 and 2000 words; for the specials they want anything up to 8000 words. Hurrah for me, as I like writing long short stories that length.

Serials
Room for experiements. Strong plots. Each part has to have a cliff hanger at end of it. Have authentic background (real life again). Don't let background be story. Fairly happy endings. Character is essential. Write their background so they can appear to behave consistently.
Style/language not too matter of fact. Not overwritten with too many words. Cross out too many adverbs eg like that. (I thought oh dear, I know I do that.) No repetition, stating the obvious. Don't sign post things.

Rejection - as I said above, has to be realistic for the reader to get lost in the story. If it isn't, you have lost that reader. Know your market. Write in your own voice. Be nosy.

We had an exercise next. Write an opener about a letter. I couldn't think what to write, then read the exercise sheet where it said think about what happens later in the story. So I did, remembered a story I had in mind to write and wrote the opener. We all had to read our exercise out. Gaynor Davies said they were all good.

I learnt that WW stories gets to dilemma in the first sentence.

That is all for now. Back again with more about serials etc next week.