Check Your Rhythm

Sometimes you read a story and know something is “off,” but you can’t put your pencil on it. Chances are, the story’s rhythm or “music” is the problem. Most people are aware that rhythm is an inherent facet of poetry, especially classic, rhyming poetry. But if you went to the mall and asked random people if they thought stories have rhythm, the typical person would give you that lopsided, raised-eyebrow look that implies she thinks you’re nuts. 

“What do you mean, rhythm in a story? Like in a song? Foot-tapping rhythm with a beat?”

 “Any kind.” You shrug.

“Well . . . no. There’s poems and songs. That stuff has rhythm. Stories, not so much. No. Stories don’t have rhythm. They’re just plain old talking like people talk."

The fact is, plain old talking does have rhythm, at least when thoughts flow freely. Even the occasional “uhm” or stumble is rhythmic. For example, read aloud the following two sentence excerpt from a YouTube interview between Kathleen Pooler and Susan Weidner. As you read, tap your fingers rhythmically, like a ticking clock or a metronome.

Kathleen: How was writing this story, uh, how did it differ from writing your memoirs?

Susan: Well, it was quite different because I was allowed to use my imagination.

Read these lines aloud again and tap your fingers rhythmically, like a ticking clock or a metronome as you read. Broken into even beats, Kathleen’s sentence sounds like this:

|How was |writing this |story, |uh, |how did it |differ from |writing your |memoirs? 

Susan’s words have a similar flow:

|Well, |it was quite |different be|cause I was |allowed to |use my |imagi|nation. 

Not only are these sentences rhythmic, but they’re streamlined, with no extra words. Contrast this with a sentence from an early draft of written story.

Nobody could refute the certainty of the arrival of furious storms every winter that lashed at houses built out of solid rock that was hewn out of the very bedrock we all lived on . . . 

My head spins and my tongue tangles when I try to read that sentence aloud. I’m reminded of riding on an unpaved mountain road. If this sentence occurred on the first page, I would set this story aside immediately. My sense of things is that if this sentence were actually spoken, it would sound more like this:

Nobody could refute the certain arrival of furious storms every winter. They lashed out at our solid stone houses built from the bedrock we lived on. 

 That revision still isn’t going to gain fame. I’d consider the underlying thought and smooth it even more:

Everyone knew we had killer storms every winter that seemed like they’d wash our solid stone houses off the bedrock we lived on. 

Even that sentence may need more work within the context of the larger story.

Tips for giving your stories rhythm 

• Trim extra words. 


• Clear out the dead would. 


• Question every use of “that.”


•  Eliminate the word “very” and related intensifiers in favor of precise language.


• Use scrap paper and a pen to write the simplest possible version of what you are trying to say in a complicated sentence or passage. Use that to simplify your draft.


• Read sentence and stories aloud! Notice where your tongue stumbles and follow its lead as you edit.


• Read them aloud to a group. You’ll notice where your tongue stumbles, but you may not notice that what your spoken words don’t match what’s on the page. Again, follow the lead of your spoken words. That’s what you really mean, and what sounds best.

Write now: read through the draft of a new story or an older one you haven't seen for awhile and find sentences with awkward rhythm. Use the tips above to smooth them out.

Drill Down, Sentence by Sentence

If you want your story to shine its brightest, you’ve got to drill down to the core. That means going through it, sentence by sentence. The good news is that most sentences are simple enough and will pass without further ado. A few need further attention. Use these examples to find and fix those few.

We continued our trip on to Koufonisia, a lightly populated fishing island for a very late lunch.

At a glance, after adding the missing comma between island and for, most people would be satisfied with that sentence. It’s clear and grammatically correct. But let’s try a few things. Commas slow the eye down, so let’s move the qualifying phrase to a spot before the noun:

We continued our trip on to the lightly populated fishing island of Koufonisia for a very late lunch.

That’s better, but let’s try something else.

Our trip continued to the lightly populated fishing island of Koufonisia, where we enjoyed a very late lunch.

Better? I think so, but wait – when I was a high school freshman, my teacher refused to accept a paper with the word “very” included. “Use a stronger word,” she said. Whether stronger or different, let’s keep working:

Our trip continued to the lightly populated fishing island of Koufonisia, where we enjoyed a long-delayed lunch.

That long delayed lunch is even stronger with one more tweak.

Our trip continued to the lightly populated fishing island of Koufonisia, where a long-delayed lunch staved off impending starvation.

The first changes streamline the initial thought. Reference to the intense hunger adds a layer of sensory involvement that conveys immediacy and draws the reader in a bit more deeply.

These are the tweaks that turn stories from boring to brilliant. Precious few flow forth perfectly formed. This is craft, pure and simple. You make the transition one step at a time, as demonstrated above.

Here’s another sentence that needs work:

We would routinely see large families at the restaurants where we ate with one child, a boy, who was pampered like he was a king.

This one is confusing. Did the author eat with at restaurants with one child and pamper him? Probably not. The rest of the sentence structure doesn’t support that idea. The sentence is also bogged down with “dead would” and extra baggage. Let’s move the parts around and streamline. (You can imagine the intermediate steps.)

While eating at restaurants, we routinely saw large families pampering only sons like kings.

Actually, this sentence is a prime example of “telling”. As a reader, I have to guess exactly what is involved in pampering a young boy like a king. I’d have a much better idea what the author intended if she put this observation into a small scene and described what she saw the family doing that led her to the stated conclusion.

Finally, a writing-related example:

One of the best ways to get new story ideas is to trade stories with other people, i.e. a writing group or class.

becomes

Trading stories with friends in a writing group is guaranteed to give you at least half a dozen new memories and story ideas each time you meet. 

The best way to develop this skill is to take ordinary sentences with a moderate degree of complexity and practice moving the parts around. Then take each part and consider ways of refining with slight changes of wording. Play with it. Experiment. Delete the duds. The more you practice, the easier it gets.

Write now: look for complex sentences with several phrases and experiment with moving the phrases into different orders. Look for ways to remove extra words and streamline the message and other spots where you need to amplify with stronger words or descriptive scenes. Above all, think of this as a game and have fun with it!

Energize Your Words

There are lots of ways to add energy to your prose. One of the simplest is to break your habit of using puny phrases such as “there are.” How can I rephrase that first sentence to add more power to it? Here are a few of many alternatives:

• Would you like to add energy to your prose?
• One of the best ways to add energy to your prose is …
• Your prose will be  more compelling if you …
• Readers won’t be able to tear their eyes away when you energize your prose with these simple techniques.

A more typical example for lifestory and memoir writers describes a living room:

It was painted pale green. There was a sofa along the end wall. It was flanked by end tables.

That description reads like a bullet list Let’s try again:

End tables flanked the sofa set against the end wall in the pale green living room.

I’d like to know more details about the sofa, like it's color and style, but at least this second description artfully combines the bullet-list sentences into a single flowing one. 

Phrases such as it was, there were, or any variations of these are a form of passive writing. They suck the life from your words. Breathe vigor into your stories by rewriting to avoid them. In fact, rewording these sentences gives you the opportunity to use more imaginative description, which further energizes your story. For example,

It was really cold out that day.

might become

The biting cold pierced my lungs like a knife.

Knowing where to look for the leaks is the first step toward energizing your stories. Your imagination will grow stronger as you challenge it to plug those leaks. 

Write now: pull out an old story and look for it was or there were phrases. Reword them to eliminate the phrases, adding relevant description as you edit.

Writing Lesson from Michelangelo

When asked how he went about carving such magnificent statues, Michelangelo is said to have explained that he simply looked at the block of marble, saw the statue within, and chipped away everything that wasn't part of it. 

That parable has a lesson for life writers. Most of us have been accustomed to thinking of the task of writing a story as one of creating something from nothing, or transforming intangible memories into a tangible record. We struggle to find the pieces, to find a way of connecting them … writing is hard work, often intimidating and easy to put off. 

There is another way to look at it: Life itself is a story, and Story is the operating system our brains use. When you sit down to write a story, that story is already complete, whole and perfect. Your task as the writer is to look at the vast chunk of story encasing the one you propose to tell and chip away everything that isn't part of your perfect story. 

The first step in this process is to write an initial draft. This isn't the time to agonize over individual words or thoughts — just dump all those memories onto the page. Spare no detail. Your aim is to overwrite. This draft amounts to making the first cuts that knock large chunks off the block of marble. Your next step is to edit that draft, removing the extra pieces that slow the story down. Chip away all the extra words and material that doesn't fully support the story theme and flow. 

Once you have the form of the story right, turn to your imagination and thesaurus to polish the words and descriptions. Give the story sparkle by swapping finely honed synonyms for duplicate words appearing in the same paragraph or close proximity. Add zest to descriptions and zing to dialogue. On the latter, I do caution you not to add so much zing that your grandmother comes across as Joan Rivers. You must remain true to your characters, and retain an air of veracity.

These polishing steps definitely reflect your artistry, but  realizing that the story was always there, waiting to be revealed in all its glory may well defuse most of the stress of writing so it can become the joyful, liberating experience you always dreamed it would be. 

Write now: think of a story you've been meaning to write and chip it out of the mass of Story surrounding it.

Photo by Stanislav Traykov, CC-BY-SA-3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Stick Stories

The crude stick drawings above tell a story: Soku and Buho have a spat. Soku apologizes. They reconcile. The end.

 In October I attended a Road Scholar program at the Pilgrim Pines Conference Center near West Swanzey, New Hampshire. During the course of the week, Alan Rumrill, Director of the Historical Society of Cheshire County shared stories of local history and legends. One of my favorite was about Mrs. Taggart.

One winter day in the pre-Revolutionary era, Mr. Taggart took off for town to stock up on desperately needed provisions. He got caught in a blizzard that detained him for an indefinite period of time, and back then this meant days or weeks, not hours. When he was finally able to return, he did so with dread, fearing his family had perished from hunger. As he finally emerged into the clearing, he found smoke rising from the chimney and his family hale and hearty. Mrs. Taggart had slaughtered and butchered a moose with the family axe, ensuring her family's survival. Frontier women always were a force to be reckoned with!
 
As I reflected on Mrs. Taggart's story, I noticed that story is as simple as the stick figures I used to draw when I was six years old. Just as the sticks in the figures above represent entire people, the sticks in Mrs. Taggart's story form a complete story with beginning, middle, end, tension, characters — it's all there. The term “stick story” came to mind to describe this level of simplicity. Obviously there is a lot more to that story, and we spent a couple of pleasant mealtimes speculating with tablemates about story embellishments. But we kept coming back to the “sticks” of the story to regroup. Perhaps the story was told in more detail 250 years ago. Perhaps time has gnawed the meat from its bones. But the bones persist in local legend, and today we enjoy adding our own meat to revive them.

The tie-in with life story writing is the challenge of making modern stories as memorable as that stick story, as simple as Dick and Jane. Of course we want to add the details that flesh out those sticks and breath life into them, but if the stick structure isn’t there, the story won’t stand the test of time. 

Two tips for working with stick stories

1. Draft a new story in stick story form before developing it further. This should make it easier to stay focused and avoid pointless sidetracks
2. Keep basic story ideas in stick story form to cement the concept for later development. This takes only minutes and should fit on an index card.

The stick stories are what people remember. You can count on them forgetting the details soon after reading or hearing, but if the sticks are well-drawn, well-assembled, they’ll remember the story!

Write now: pull out your story idea list and select half a dozen entries. Write these in stick story form to be fleshed out another time. Or check a few older stories to make sure their stick stories stand on their own.  

The Tree of Life Writing

The Tree of Life Writing  

Since a picture is worth 1000 words, the picture above should represent about three blog posts worth of insight. I first recognized the interrelationships among the various aspects of life writing over a year ago and included a simpler graphic with a post, The Life Writing Progression, on July 5, 2009.

Sarabelle gifted me with this picture last month while I was preparing material for my Writing for the Health of It class. I’d been thinking about the core Story (capital S) that defines us, and how everything we write grows out of that Story and expresses aspects of it. I was considering how some of our writing is deeply personal and earthy, best left out of sight and unshared. That root writing leads to insight and imparts power to our words and voice as we write publicly visible stories and essays.

When I began pondering the role of memoir in tying together the loose ends of life, and recalled that memoir is composed of the brush strokes of smaller stories, Sarabelle whispered, “You're thinking of a tree.” Sure enough, the image of a tree came clearly to mind. After I studied it a few minutes, she whispered again, "Now, draw it." That advice seemed a bit odd since I don't pretend to be an artist. But I began doodling.

One more element appeared as I worked on the picture. I had not realized that the soil the tree grows in also plays a role. That soil is composed of memories. Our root writing draws nutrients from raw memory, converting them to the empowering energy required for the tree to grow, forming branches and leaves above ground and more roots below.

The longer I think about this tree and the organic wholeness of the life writing process, the more excited I get. We grow individually by writing about our own lives, and we grow collectively as we share stories and provide safe spaces for affirming and supporting each other. As the seasons change and the tree matures, its leaves compost into the soil of memory for future generations, helping life go on.

So there you have it — the Tree of Life Writing. Ponder it and let it speak directly to you as it has to me.

Write now: do some writing practice on the way your life writing fits into this tree concept. Are you limiting it to certain forms? Would your writing and your life benefit from branching out into other forms? Try a form you haven’t explored lately or at all.

1000 Ways to Describe a Feeling

Would you believe there are more than 1000 words and phrases to describe feelings. 1000? That's right. And most are single words. I've compiled a list of that many. The list does not include any metaphors, and undoubtedly there are at least another hundred words not there.

The list has history. It began in June 2007 when I read a blog post that prompted me to ask people to send me lists of emotion labels. Results poured in as friends and readers submitted lists with hundreds of words and phrases. It took a bit of doing to compile them all and eliminate the duplicates. I was fascinated to see how little overlap there was among the various lists. I've since had several classes make lists as an exercise, and the master list continued to grow. Now that it has reached the 1000 mark, it's ready for public consumption. If you think of any words not listed there, please send them to me so it can continue to grow!

You may wonder why it matters to know all these words. Generally speaking, it doesn't. But it's an amazing thing to read over this list and realize the infinite variability of both the English language and our ability to experience nuances of emotion. Reading the list will surely heighten awareness of your internal state, and that's a good thing. Research has shown that labeling emotion calms the brain and helps the stories form that make sense of our experience.

Increased awareness of emotional state will also give you more response options, widen your perspective, and prompt greater levels of personal insight.

As icing on the cake, all those extra words will make you a stronger writer by adding variety and precision to your stories and depth to your perception.

Who can afford to ignore this list? Right-click this link to download the file.

Write now: write a story about an emotional event and use several new words to describe your feelings in exquisite detail.

Out of the Mouth of a Physicist

When I read something especially juicy and anyone’s within earshot, I can’t resist the temptation to read aloud. My spouse has grown used to this, sometimes enjoying the passages, but mostly staring at me to remind me he prefers to read things for himself — unless he’s driving the car.

A few minutes ago I picked up a new memoir and began reading. The first sentence screamed to be read, and since he was working on a crossword nearby, he was fair game. I continued into another paragraph before he stared me down. I suppressed my chuckle.

“Sounds like an author who uses a lot of adjectives,” he commented.

“What?” I’d read fewer than a dozen lines from a small page. I glanced at the passage and selected words popped out. Audaciously French ... pigeon gray pebbles ... most gigantic pair of hedge clippers. Every adjective was doubled.

“I don’t like authors who use excessive adjectives,” he continued. “They sound like they’re trying to impress people with their ability to describe in great detail something that I don’t care much about.”

“Bingo!” I answered. “You’re saying that adjectives in general are okay, but we should choose them with precision to avoid the need for piling them up.”

“Yeah. And many writers overdo similes too.”

This curmudgeonly wisdom sounds as if it were spoken by Andy Rooney, but not so; it comes from a nuclear physicist who once took a freshman English class. But he knows good writing when he sees it, and has little patience with anything less. He has an uncanny ability to zoom in on structural flaws and inconsistencies with laser-like precision, even with such minuscule samples as this.

Which all goes to show that some of our most powerful writing lessons may come from unexpected sources, and as you look for feedback, you shouldn’t rely solely on writing classes, groups, or coaches. Go exploring and turn over leaves in several cabbage patches, because you never know where you’ll find a master analyst.

And now I’ll return to my reading. Silently. I can deal with the adjectives, and the story does sound juicy. 

Write now: pull out a finished story or scene that includes plenty of description (I hope you have piles of these). Read through it and look for opportunities to sharpen adjectives, making them more precise and check for excessive use of similes.

Working Together to Strengthen Writing Skills

What’s better than sitting in your favorite chair rereading one of your own stories? Sitting in a reading group, reading that story to an appreciative audience!

You’ve probably heard that the #1 fear of Americans is public speaking. If the option had been on the list, I have no doubt that “Reading my own work to a group” would surely be #2, and it might even be #1, because nearly everyone writes their own speech before delivering it.

Toastmasters was officially founded in 1924 by Ralph Smedley to help men improve their ability to effectively speak to groups. The seeds he planted have grown like kudzu, spreading around the world. More than 4,000,000 people, both men and women, have benefited from Toastmasters training, myself included. I recommend it to any writer, even if you never speak to groups. Membership fees are affordable, and the training in organizing your thoughts will help you think and write more clearly!

The key to the success of Toastmaster clubs is the use of peer evaluation. There are no teachers or professionals in Toastmasters, though some clubs have teachers or professional speakers among the members. Although thereare no classes outside club meetings, annual conferences at the area, regional and national levels offer workshops and presentations on honing specific skills. Members take turns evaluating each others speeches, highlighting things they did well as well as one or two points for improvement. Serving in the evaluator role helps members become more discerning listeners, enabling them to learn from the experience of others as well as their own.

Quite sadly, there is no well-oiled national organization available to give writers the same benefit, but that doesn’t mean you can’t experience it. Find or form a writers group in your local area. Find one that emphasizes the positive aspects of a piece as well as giving pointers for improving it. Participate with gusto, always bring a story, ready to read. Remember that the input you receive from others is only their opinion, and that you are free to take their advice or leave it. If you can't find such a group, start one.

Although nothing can beat the pleasure and value of reading your work aloud to a live group, online groups are also valuable. In an online group, you can submit your work and receive written feedback from a number of people, often strangers, Again, look for a supportive group that appreciates your strengths as well as tenderly helping improve your skills. 

Write now: a story about an experience speaking in public. Include plenty of sensory detail, like self-talk, wobbly knees, shaky voice, damp palms. Describe the way your notes shook in your hands. Let readers know how your tummy felt. Then think about reading this story in public, and join the Life Writers Critique Group to shore up your skills.

Celebrating National Grammar Day

Today is National Grammar Day. To celebrate, I’m sharing some amusing grammar mistakes that made it into print.

“Except for a tragic accident, the 35th annual Bath Heritage Days parade went off without a hitch.” The Times Record (Bath, Maine). A tragic accident is a minor deviation from going off without a hitch!

“The Patchwork Quilt Guild met to celebrate Christmas with a gift and cookie exchange. Kay Hanley wore a necklace and she was lit up and flashing all during the meeting.”  From the Fallon (Montana) County Times. What was in the punch?

“Hundreds of marijuana plants were discovered growing in a south Lakeland home Saturday. Two were arrested.” From the (Polk County, Florida) Ledger. Only two out of hundreds?

“Domestic diva Martha Stewart still needs a crutch to lean on as she recovered from hip surgery during a cocktail party in the Hamptons.” From the Globe. Most of us have surgery in a hospital.

“On All-Star weekend, the city gleamed with banners welcoming visitors hanging from lampposts.” From the Titusville (Pennsylvania) Herald. What about the visitors who persist in walking around?

Each of these examples violates both a rule of grammar and common sense. In this case, forget about the rules, because very few people mentally thumb through rule books as they write. Hopefully you’ll catch these as you reread. Use these tips to up the odds of finding errors like these and other less amusing ones before your general readership does.

1. Set your work aside for a day or more. A week or month is even better. Letting some time pass weakens the memory of writing those words and refreshes your vision.
2. Read your work aloud. If you can get someone to listen as you read, so much the better. If not, read it aloud just as if someone were sitting there. This requires you to focus on each word.
3. Trade proofreading with a writing pal. E-mail works well for this purpose.
4. Show it to a critique group, local or online.
5. Hire an editor. This step is calling in the big guns, not a step you take for casual material.

If a mistake like this does slip through, console yourself by realizing how much fun people are having reading it and don’t beat yourself up.

Write now: if you don’t already have one, find a writing buddy or two, and also a critique group. Do an online search to look for groups. Margot Finke published an excellent article on this topic. You’ll find other suggestions in my post, "What to Do When You Can’t Afford an Editor."

Word by Word

While I was in Mexico awhile back, I struggled to express ideas in my rudimentary Spanish. I had to build sentences word by word. One day I realized that building stories is much like what I was going through to build sentences. Let’s take a look at how one sentence unfolds.

We go.

This sentence is grammatically complete, but it does not express a complete thought. It begs for amplification. Where do we go?

We go to mountains.

That’s better. But what mountains?

We go to Sierra Madre mountains.

And when do we go there?

We go to Sierra Madre mountains yesterday.

Why did we go?

We go to Sierra Madre mountains yesterday to take pictures.

How did we get there?

We go on bus to Sierra Madre mountains yesterday to take pictures.

Now the sentence story is complete. We know who is doing what (going), when, where, why and how. Those same elements are needed to tell a complete story, whether the story is one sentence long or hundreds of pages.

You probably notice an error in that sentence. The meaning is clear enough, but the verb is incorrect. It should read “We went ... .” If you wanted to polish the sentence further you could rearrange and tweak the wording, for example,

Yesterday we enjoyed a bus ride into the Sierra
Madre mountains and took piles of pictures of Indians.

You build a story the same way, thought-by-thought, answering the key questions and polishing at the end.

Write now: build a short story, thought-by-thought, answering the key questions of who, what, where, when and why. Make sure your story has a beginning (set the scene), middle (describe the actions) and end (tie the loose ends together). Get those bones on paper, and then rearrange the words, amplify the content to make it more clear, and polish your prose.

Mapping My Mind

Remember that resolution I made to complete The Los Alamos Years (working title)? We have an ancient grandfather clock in the living room and this morning it reminded me that the year will fly past in a blur, so it’s time to get my fingers moving.

I began by making a list in my journal of specific features of life in Los Alamos that distinguished it from other places I might have grown up. As the list grew, I saw overlap and interrelationships. Suddenly I realized a MindMap would be a far better way of making these thoughts visible and clear. Clear thoughts lead to clear writing.

MindMeister to the rescue! There are several online mindmapping services that you can use for free. There’s also an opensource off-line one you can download for free, but I haven’t yet explored it. MindMeister is the one I chose today. It’s easy to use, but somewhat limited in formatting options. at least for the free account level.

I did not specifically copy the list from my journal, but used it as a springboard. The map you see below is primitive. I’ll probably move some things around and add far more elements, branching out another layer or two. I’ll add notes. I’ll draw some connector lines. But this is a start, and I share it with you here. 

I find mindmapping ever so useful in getting things out in a way I can see relationships. Chronology is not always the best way to organize and present memories, though ultimately you may use chronology as a thread to link clusters of scenes through the overall story.

Most likely I’ll use the mindmap as a checklist to make sure I incorporate these elements into scenes one place or another within the overall story to convey a strong sense of place, time and culture. A few are story seeds, but most are descriptive elements.

If you want to experiment with mindmapping, you can go online, or do it on the biggest piece of paper you can find. Since I tend to run out of space for some topics, I’m partial to digital mindmaps, at least to begin, so I can move branches around, and I’m not limited by paper size.

The best way to master mindmaps is to start making them. They will especially appeal to intuitive, “right brained” people, who will instinctively understand them. If you want more detailed guidance, I discuss mindmapping in The Heart and Craft of Lifestory Writing, and one of my all-time favorite resources on this topic is Joyce Wycoff’s classic book, Transformation Thinking. Joyce encourages people to use markers, draw pictures, and otherwise make their maps visually appealing.

Write now: try your hand at a small mindmap, online with MindMeister or on a sheet of paper. You may be amazed at what comes to mind, and the interconnections you find.

What to Do When You Can't Afford an Editor

I’ve recently read several posts about the prohibitive cost of having your manuscript professionally edited. For a book of 200 or more pages, those costs can climb to $3000 or more, and that does not include layout (figure at least $2 per page) or cover design ($200 or more, maybe lots more).  What’s a poor patronless writer to do?

Contrary to prevailing wisdom, I believe it is possible to learn enough to do a reasonable job of editing your own work, though input from others is invaluable. Below are some ideas to control the cost of editing, and to ensure that any funds you do expend will do double duty to develop your skills while enhancing your current manuscript:

Find an excellent critique group — online or local. Get a copy of Becky Levine’s brand new book, The Writing & Critique Group Survival Guide: How to Make Revisions, Self-Edit, and Give and Receive Feedback, for guidance on making this process work.

Use beta readers, but be sure you choose discerning ones, not just "Oh, wow, you wrote a book!" people who are impressed with anything more elaborate than signing checks. If you belong to a book club, you know who the discerning readers are. If not, ask around. Use the guidelines in Becky's book to tell these readers how to be helpful to you.

Join a writing organization appropriate for your genre, i.e. National Association of Memoir Writers, Mystery Writers of America, or the National Association of Writers and Editors. You may also find local organizations. Take full advantage of teleseminars, conferences, classes, and other member benefits.

Take classes — online or local. These will be an investment in skill-building to help you in the future as well as now, and they may turn up critique partners. Writing organizations are a good source of prequalified classes. Some local continuing education classes are terrific, and others may be of questionable quality, so check the instructor out.

Invest in a few hours of coaching. Find a coach who will structure an agreement to give you the help and honest feedback you need to develop your skills, not a standardized one-size-fits-all prepackaged plan. I often recommend classes taught by other people or books that will help my clients strengthen specific skills.

Hire an editor for a a chapter or two. Learn from the results and apply that to the rest of your work.

Read books about writing. Use the recommended exercises. Check my website for a long list of recommended titles.

Read books in your chosen genre. Analyze their structure on several levels — storyline, style, use of dialogue, scene development, etc. This no-cost, do-it-yourself writing clinic is a powerful way to increase skill.

If you take advantage of even two or three of these suggestions, your skills will grow, your writing will sparkle, and you can self-publish a book that sounds as professional as any put out by a Big Name New York house. 

Write now: make a list of ideas for getting no-cost feedback on your writing and do some research on classes, coaching services, and organizations that can help you strengthen you skills.

Misplaced Muttering and Mumbling

To my mind, a character who routinely muttered and mumbled would seem eccentric, to say the least, if not sullen or belligerent. An image that comes to mind is an old estate caretaker, wiry and bent with age, given to conversing with plants as he prunes them. Another is a street person suffering some form of mental illness.

Not long ago I read an adventure novel, which charity demands I refrain from naming. I’ll refer to the author simply as Jane. The two main characters were teenagers of extraordinary intelligence and achievement. The imaginative plot held my interest, but as I read, I quickly became distracted by the number of times these brilliant, well-behaved young people muttered and mumbled. Hardly a page went by without one or another of these words appearing in at least one dialogue tag. 

Maybe I would have been less aware of this if I didn’t teach classes in Writing Dynamic Dialogue, but having fairly recently completed an in-depth study of that topic, I took a closer look. I noted that on rare occasions, muttering did seem justified, but each of these circumstances would have been better served by simple whispering, a tag the author rarely used. 

I soon realized that Jane had used muttering and mumbling in situations more suited for internal monologue. She did use internal monologue on rare occasions, but not nearly as often as it was called for. I commend Jane for using dialogue rather than expressing the characters’ thoughts as straight narrative. Obviously she took lessons about “showing rather than telling” seriously. Dialogue is a powerful way of “showing,” but not if it results in distracting behavior  not in keeping with your character.

Perhaps she heard or read a caution somewhere about limiting use of internal monologue. Although I have never come across such advice, a liberal mixture of internal monologue and standard dialogue could be confusing, with the use of quotation marks seeming almost random, and a manuscript using italics for extensive  monologue may look cluttered to some.

In my search for a cure, I found a number of passages where creative editing could allow the main characters to show reactions and perceptions non-verbally rather than using either dialogue or internal monologue. This book was fiction, but memoir writers face the same challenge — to reach beyond the obvious and find innovative ways around the speed bumps that distract readers and cause them to put our volumes aside.

Write now: do some writing practice, filling a page with snippets of random self-talk or internal monologue. Don’t make it one long string — use short pieces, not longer than one line each. When you have half a dozen examples, explore non-verbal ways of demonstrating these thoughts and reactions.

The Importance of Correct Punctuation

Photo by Liz West from Flickr.com

Words are the raw ingredients of communication. When we speak, we use inflection and pauses (together with facial expression and body language when we have visual contact) to add layers of meaning to the words. On the page, punctuation serves the same purpose.

Just as tone of voice may vary to suit the speaker’s intent, so might punctuation. Compare these two examples to see what a difference punctuation can make.

Dear John,
I want a man who knows what love is all about. You are generous, kind, thoughtful. People who are not like you admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me for other men. I yearn for you. I have no feelings whatsoever when we're apart. I can be forever happy—will you let me be yours?
Gloria

* * *

Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is. All about you are generous, kind, thoughtful people, who are not like you. Admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me. For other men, I yearn. For you, I have no feelings whatsoever. When we're apart, I can be forever happy. Will you let me be?
Yours,
Gloria

The exact same words convey diametrically different messages with a change of punctuation. In this case the difference was intentional. In real life (read "your writing") inadvertent omissions or errors may cause unintentional confusion. It’s worth investing a little time in boning up on punctuation basics to avoid mishaps and misunderstandings.

That leads me to some shameless self-promotion. One of the unique features of my book, The Heart and Craft of Lifestory Writing, is a brief, but comprehensive guide to all the punctuation you need for writing life stories, essays or memoir. It’s conveniently arranged in table format with brief examples to show how each rule works. That chapter also includes an overview of basic grammar and other ways to avoid confusion and convey the message you intend.

You don’t need to buy the book unless you want to take advantage of the comprehensive set of other writing tools it includes. You can track down the punctuation information for free on any of hundreds of Internet sites, or you may already have a book that covers it extensively. The advantage of my book is having it all at your fingertips on just a few pages. However you get it, whatever your resource, do take a few minutes to bone up and give your words the polish they deserve.

Write now: pull out a story you wrote a few months ago. Check to see if all the commas are right, using whatever resources you have available, web or print. How about the dialogue? (You did use dialogue, right?) Is it punctuated correctly?

Interview with Heather Summerhayes Cariou

Heather Summerhayes Cariou's book, Sixtyfive Roses: A Sister's Memoir, is not new to this blog. I published a review of in on Amazon back in June introduced here by a post on June 2, and I've referred to it a couple of times since.

There is much to appreciate in this book, and two of them are especially relevant to the classes I teach on writing sparkling description and dynamic dialogue. Heather is a master of both. Today Heather has agreed to be my guest for the second in a series of mini-interviews especially for readers of The Heart and Craft of Life Writing. 

In this interview, Heather explains how she was able to craft compelling descriptions of places from times long past and dialogue about events that happened thirty or forty years ago. As a bonus for listeners, she gives several tips that will help anyone with writing dialogue, description, or really anything.

The interview lasts for 14 minutes. You can listen on the player below, or click the link to download it for listening on your mp3 player. 

Download file

Write now: listen to the interview and try Heather's tip on using poetry to loosen up your creative right brain.

Dialogue: The Writer's Swiss Army Knife

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Photo from Victorinox

The more I study the topic of writing dialogue, the more convinced I’ve become that dialogue is the writer’s Swiss Army Knife. You don’t have to know what all the other tools on the knife are for if all you want to do is whittle the tip of a willow pole for roasting a marshmallow. But it’s handy to know about the tweezers when someone gets a splinter, and the little scissors are a godsend for snipping off loose threads and hangnails. Screwdrivers come in handy every now and then, and so it goes. Swiss Army knives prune, snip, and open all sorts of things, and so does dialogue.

Even those of us who are fortunate enough to have dialogue pour forth naturally can benefit from learning more about the functions it serves, and how it works. Some of these functions include

• Setting a mood
• Concisely conveying information
• Adding rhythm and color
• Developing character
• And more

Even if you include dialogue in your initial draft (most people don’t), you are likely to overlook hidden opportunities to put it to best use. Do you know the secret signals for sliding it in the perfect spots? I don’t think you’ll find that answer on the Internet. How do you make it clear who is speaking without including the name every time? Do you know when to use single quotes and when to use double? Should you write about the voices in your head, and the conversations they have? What about the accuracy of the words you put in the mouths of other people?

Ever since I announced this class and the preview call, questions on that last topic have been pouring in. Truth in Dialogue seems to be the number one concern of memoir writers. I will address that topic in the preview call, so be sure to click over to the NAMW site and register for the call before it begins at 6 pm eastern time, Wednesday, August 26. If you register, you’ll receive a link to download the recording, so you won’t miss the call even if you can’t dial in live.

I’ve also written a guest post on this topic which will appear the day of the call on Karen Walker’s Following the Whispers blog.

Please join me on the call, in the class, and over at Karen’s blog to learn more about adding dynamic dialogue to your stories.

Write now: write a story and include as much dialogue as you can recall. If you don't remember what people said, write whatever you think they would have said. Don't worry if you aren't 100% accurate. Just write it!

How to Read Like a Writer

One of the best workshops a writer can take is found between the covers of books, and if you have a library card and return your books on time, it doesn’t need to cost a penny. Of course I’m talking about reading, often, widely, and deeply. Reading the work of others fires your imagination, and exposes you to myriad voices and ways of expressing thoughts and opinions.

Before I give you tips on how to turn your reading time into your own personal writer’s workshop, please heed this caution: Reading the polished prose of successful writers can put your Inner Critic on steroids. “I can never write that well,” it screams into your brain, hiding behind the first person pronoun as a disguise. “Why bother? My life is so dull, and my writing plain as dirt. I don’t know grammar and forget to run spellcheck. Nobody cares anyway. Why should I bother?”

Here’s what you shout back to that Inner Critic, out loud if nobody’s listening or you’re holding a cellphone to your ear: “I’m a student. I’m learning. I write better today than I did last (year, month), and next year I’ll be even better. If you look at the details, my life is amazing, and I’ll use this book to find a way to show that to other people.”

You don’t have to stick to reading memoir. Well-written novels, mysteries, travelogues, and other topical non-fiction books are also useful. Here are tips to make them do double duty for you:

• Take notes. Since I generally read library books, I don’t make notes on the page, but I do stick in Post-It flags when I find an especially delectable description or a section that lights my fire. Right now I’m reading Christina Baldwin’s amazing book Storycatcher: Making Sense of Our Lives through the Power and Practice of Story. This book is like rich chocolate to me, so I’m taking my time with it. I’m only about a quarter of the way through, and it already looks like a porcupine, with pink quills sticking out the edges. Later I’ll sit at my computer as I go back through and transcribe notes from those sections. That works better for me than taking notes longhand on paper, but you’ll find your own system.
• Ask the same question about the book as a whole. What did you like? What didn’t work as well? What questions are you left with? Why would you or would you not recommend this book to a friend?
• Analyze. When you find those glowing sections, ask yourself what grabs your attention? What makes this section work especially well for you? Jot down the answers and create your own text or checklist to use when you are writing.
• Review it. Write a review of the book. This may be a long and detailed or a few sentences. Post your review on Amazon if you feel brave and have an account. The process of writing the review helps you hone your writing skills and practice putting random thoughts in logical order.
• Discuss it. Join a book discussion group, at your library or bookstore, or start your own. You can also find online book discussion groups. You can learn even more from hearing how other people experienced the book.

For a powerful set of examples of how to wring the last bit of juice from the books you read, visit Jerry Waxler’s blog, Memory Writer’s Network and browse through his 150+ insightful analyses and reviews.

Books are indeed a powerful workshop, but I also encourage you to sign up for occasional classes, workshops and writing groups. Books can inspire your ideas and help you craft your content, but they will never supplant the value of feedback from compassionate and insightful readers. You’ll also benefit from reading books about writing, participating in teleseminars and listening to podcasts about writing. For further guidance and inspiration, get involved with the Life Writer's Forum (see box in left column to join) or the National Association of Memoir Writers.

Write now: write a short review of the last book you read. If it’s been awhile, visit the library and check out a few. Bring home several. You don’t have to read them all, but it’s helpful to browse through them and you’ll help the library by keeping circulation stats high.

Write From Your Own Experience

When you write memoir you can only directly describe your own thoughts and sensations. If you are writing a scene that includes others, you are limited to writing what you can observe or what they tell you.

For example, it’s entirely appropriate to write “The air was precisely skin temperature, and I was tempted to run naked to celebrate the return of summer, but I was afraid old man Jones would peak through a knothole in the fence, and I didn’t want to be sullied by his eyes.”

You can write that about yourself, because you know your own thoughts. You can’t tell us that Janna was tempted to run naked unless Janna told you that herself. In that case, dialog would be a good way to put those words in her mouth. Let her tell her part of the story herself. For example,

“What a glorious day!” I said, raising my arms to the sun and raising my face.

“Oh yes! It’s perfect!” she agreed. “The air feels like it isn’t even there. I’m tempted to peel off my clothes and run naked, but I’d die if old man Jones looked through that knothole.” She looked around warily. “I’ll bet he does when he hears us out here. I don’t want that old lech looking at me even with my clothes on!”

There are other ways you can maintain the integrity of your story if you don’t have first hand knowledge of someone else’s experience or thoughts. For example, in her memoir, Sixtyfive Roses: A Sister's Memoir, Heather Summerhayes Cariou writes about a home visit the doctor made to her sister: “He took Pam’s temperature. Gently, he folded back her nightie, slowly moving his stethoscope over her emaciated chest and across her bony white back. I wondered if it felt cold.”

Heather tells us what she saw the doctor do, then she tells us what she didn’t know. That’s powerful. She maintains her credibility. We don’t actually know. If it had been in the doctor’s pocket, maybe it wasn’t. Heather wondered, and so do we.

In other circumstances, you can speculate, “He must have felt like he’d just walked on water.” Or you can substitute your reaction, for example, “If I’d been in her shoes, I would have screamed bloody murder. It just didn’t seem fair.”

Remember, this is your story. Tell it like you saw it, felt it, heard it, smelled or thought about it. Always keep your supporting cast inside your own vision and head.

Write now: write a scene involving someone else who had an opinion, reacted to a situation, or otherwise had something to say. Use dialog or your own observations to convey that person’s experience.

Like Eating Unsweetened Baking Chocolate

Four different people in the last twenty-four hours have e-mailed me the link to a website with a photography of President Obama’s inauguration address. The photo was taken with a gigapan robot device, enabling viewers to zoom in, much like GoogleEarth or GoogleMaps displays. From a perspective covering hundreds of thousands of onlookers, you can zoom in to dimly see individual notes on band members’ sheets of music. You can also clearly see the expressions on the Bush and Cheney families’ faces. As I looked at President Bush’s expression, my first thought was, He looks really unhappy. Then I thought, That’s a good start, and utterly trite — how can I describe him more accurately? I thought about the advice I give students: “Really, very, too, and similar words are meaningless fluff. They add nothing. Tell your readers what you see that makes the person or object more than ordinarily (whatever term you are using). If you say the day was very cold, tell them what is unique or impressive about the coldness of that day.” My current class had lots of fun last week coming up with descriptions of the cold day we were currently experiencing, and once their imaginations were unlocked, they soared, moving from the sublime to the ridiculous. We all had a good laugh and creative jolt. Turning my attention back to George Bush, I let my mind wander. Leaving out “very” still left things vague. Happy is no more descriptive than cold. How else could I put it? Does he look angry? Not exactly? Disconcerted? Yes, but that’s not quite it either. Outraged? Homicidal? No ... Then the word “bitter” came to mind. That’s it! He looks bitter. But how bitter? He looks like he just took a bite of unsweetened baking chocolate. He looks like he just ate a whole block of unsweetened baking chocolate. That did it. It fit my perception. On second thought, maybe he doesn’t look bitter. Maybe he looks like he’s fighting back tears (and who would blame him?), or like he's at his best friend's funeral. I’ll leave that for you to decide if you click over to take a look for yourself. My focus here is on writing description, not analyzing George Bush’s state of mind. Aside from straying from my topic, such analysis would be pure speculation, because I don’t know his state of mind. All I can accurately relate is a description of what I see. If you want to learn more about the fine points of writing descriptions and join in a discussion of the topic, please join me for half an hour at 7:30 est on Thursday, February 5 for a free preview of my four-week teleclass, Make Your Stories Sparkle. The teleclass is sponsored by the National Association of Memoir Writers and begins on February 13. You can sign up for the free preview and learn about the details of the workshop on the NAMW website. Do sign up even if you can’t dial in on Thursday. The call will be recorded and everyone who signs up will get a link to download it and listen later. Write now: take a look at that gigapan picture and write your own descriptions of various people you see there. (The view area will have more height if you click the fullscreen link on the left edge below the snapshot bar.) Or describe something else of your choice, then be brave and post your description as a comment.