Tag Archives: query

Lesson Twenty-Eight from a Manuscript Red Line: Very Discreet Point of View Switches

Posted on February 20, 2012 | 18 comments

I’ve talked about this before, but the second time might be a charm. I think a lot of people are having trouble with discreet POV switches. The big ones… where we pop heads for half a chapter are easy to find. The one-liners may be harder to spot.

For an intro into where these tips are coming from, please see my post: A Full Manuscript Rejection, or a Gold Mine? You can also click “Rant Worthy Topics” in my right navigation bar. Choose “Gold Mine Manuscript” to see all the lessons to date.

Let’s go back to my little flash fiction scene. Remember Jason and Eric fighting? Let’s add a line to that. (In bold)

Jason grunted as his fist swung toward Eric’s face. Eric tried to dodge, but instead felt the sting of the older boy’s ring cutting into his jaw. He fell to the floor with a muffled thump, and groaned as he rolled over.

Jason wiped his chin and laughed. “I told you to stay down.”

Eric pushed up onto his knees. “Why, so you can just pummel me?” He popped up and swung at Jason, but missed.

Jason ducked and swung at the same time. There was no time for Eric to react. His head creaked back, and his jaw rattled as he crumpled to the floor.

Jason breathed heavily, mopping the sweat from his brow. He grunted and chose his words carefully. “I told you to stay down, idiot.” He snickered at the pitiful scene before him, and walked away.

There you have a short-one paragraph POV switch. The scene is in Eric’s POV. How would Eric know Jason was choosing his words carefully? How would Eric know he was snickering at how pitiful he looked? (Remember Peanut butter and Jelly Syndrome?) Jason could have just remembered a funny joke. Eric has no idea what he is really thinking.

The reason I used “Chose his words carefully” which might be a little odd in the example above, was because those were the words used in the POV switch in the Gold Mine Manuscript. We were in character #1’s POV, and then another character “chose his words carefully”. They flagged it as a POV switch.

Honestly, before reading their comments, I would have read right over this… I have also seen it in published works, but it is a switch in POV. Do your best to keep an eye out for little things like this. It will set your novel apart.

Hope this helps!

18 Comments

Posted in General Writing Tips, Gold Mine Manuscript

Tagged author, beta partner, beta reading, critique, critiquing, editing, Fiction, finding an agent, getting published, literary agent, literary fiction, Manuscript, novel, pitch, query, query help, self publishing, synopsis, writing, Writing help

Lesson Twenty-Six from a Manuscript Red Line: CAPITAL LETTERS

Posted on February 6, 2012 | 28 comments

Do you use Capital letters when your character yells? Do you use them for casting spells? Do you use them for inner thoughts?

Me? No, Jennifer.

I would never do such a thing!

Well, I might… and I have.

Amendment: Hey! This is my 100th post! COOL!

I briefly mentioned CAPS in my first post on the Manuscript Red Line. (That was over Five months ago… Wow) Anyway… here is the explanation. The publisher said:

“The use of capital letters to show emphasis in a scene is not acceptable. Especially don’t use it with magic, since JK Rowling did it that way.” (The Gold Mine author used caps as the character cast his spells) “Come up with something new. This is the key to fantasy – be unique – try not to do what was already done.”

Don’t shoot the messenger… this is their red-line, not mine.

In my novel, the characters don’t cast spells, but I did catch a few YELLING once in a while in CAPITAL LETTERS. I got so used to looking at it that I liked it, but I have to admit, it works much better as “Get out!” rather than “GET OUT!”. I use caps a lot for emphasis in my blog, so they may have wiggled their way into my novel.

For all you spell casters out there: You can do better than JK Rowling. She had her idea. Now you need to come up with yours. What are you going to come up with that everyone else wants to copy?

28 Comments

Posted in General Writing Tips, Gold Mine Manuscript

Tagged author, beta partner, beta reading, Capital Letters, critique, critiquing, Devil Picture, editing, Fiction, finding an agent, getting published, J.K. Rowling, literary agent, literary fiction, Manuscript, novel, pitch, publish, query, query help, self publishing, synopsis, writing, Writing help

Lesson Twenty-Seven from a Manuscript Red Line: Fluidity in Action – How to write a good action scene

Posted on January 28, 2012 | 8 comments

An example of a poorly written action scene:

Jason punched Eric in the face. Eric fell to the floor. Eric groaned and rolled over. Jason wiped his chin and laughed. Eric popped up, and Eric swung at Jason, but missed. Jason ducked and swung at the same time. Eric crumpled to the floor.

(Yes, I totally made this paragraph up.)

The publisher’s comment on a similar (but not as poorly written) scene: This is a very stilted fight scene. It reads action, next action, next action, next action without the fluidity that’s needed for a fight scene.

For an intro into where these tips are coming from, please see my post: A Full Manuscript Rejection, or a Gold Mine?

You can also click “Rant Worthy Topics” in my right navigation bar. Choose “Gold Mine Manuscript” to see all the lessons to date.

I have to admit, when I read the action passages in the Gold Mine Manuscript, I had the same comment. The author was satisfied with the speed of the scenes though, and only made moderate changes. Not being an expert, I backed off and figured it was just a “style choice”. Guess not.

This fits in very well with my recent post on “Art of the Conflict”. This scene is not about dialog, but this is definitely a conflict. This one needs something inserted to break up the action, rather than action inserted to break up the dialog.

Now, I am not going to put a lot of time into this, since the scene is totally fake. But let me add a little “art” to make it “flow”. Fluidity is what they asked for. Okay, here it goes…

Jason wiped his chin and laughed. “I told you to stay down.”

Eric pushed up onto his knees. “Why, so you can just pummel me?” He popped up and swung at Jason, but missed.

Jason ducked and swung at the same time. There was no time for Eric to react. His head creaked back, and his jaw rattled as he crumpled to the floor.

Better, huh? Not perfect by a long shot, but not bad for three minute flash fiction. Can you feel the difference? The staccato choppy “This happened-That happened” feel is gone, and the scene “flows”.

Of course, this is a first draft. In editing, I would have to remove the “ing” word and the telly “felt”. I would also insert a little emotion when Eric realized he missed, but this is definitely better by far than the first. The art draws you into the scene. You experience it, rather than just watching it.

The art of the conflict… If you don’t have it, go get it.

If you want to see a great published example, pick up a copy of THRONE by Phillip Tucker and open up anywhere in the last hundred pages or so.

I hope this helps to make it more clear!

8 Comments

Posted in General Writing Tips, Gold Mine Manuscript, Uncategorized

Lesson One from the Gold Mine Manuscript Mark-Up: Write Without Looking

Posted on September 7, 2011 | 5 comments

For an intro into where these tips are coming from, please see my post: A Full Manuscript Rejection, or a Gold Mine?

How many times do your characters look at something? Mine do. All the time. I never thought it was a problem. I feel really bad now, because I am the
“Show Vs. Tell Barracuda”, and I absolutely missed this…

If you say your character looks at something, you are telling the reader that they “look”. Show the reader instead.

Example: The wind blew cold, and Magellan looked up into the trees. The branches bent and shook over his head.

Now, I honestly would not think this was telly, because I showed you what he was seeing right afterward. My writing partner did the same thing in her manuscript. The publisher highlighted the “looked” and said “rather than telling us what he is doing, show us what he sees instead.”

Suggested rewrite: The wind blew cold, and Magellan pulled his jacket closer. The branches bent and shook over his head.

Here, I took out the offensive “looked” kept the characterization by giving Magellan something to do (pulling his jacket closer), which gives me a place to mention his name. (In case it’s needed) I left the “what he saw” exactly the way it was originally written. You can assume he looked up. The whole scene actually flows better, and all I did was take a moment to pull out the word “look”.

Even better for you word count barracudas out there… count ‘em… there is one less word in the corrected example. Yea for me!

Here’s another easy one: He ran down the hall and looked at the dark stone walls. The sconces were still lit and the light danced across the ceiling.

Easy fix: He ran down the dark stone hallway. The sconces were still lit and their light danced across the ceiling.

Now, I’ll be honest… This is not always this easy. I’ve growled a little over some of these. But I am going to try my best to take all of the “looks” out of my novel, unless they are in a personal thought… but I will be looking at those pretty closely as well.

Honestly, I emailed my friend yesterday on this, and she said she’s only taken out “most” of the looks. Once in a while, your characters will have to “look”. I am finding the same thing. But I am finding that a lot of them can be removed easily like the ones above. (We also discussed that we’ve read published novels that have “looks” in them. yes, we know they exist… I’m just letting you know there is a publisher out there that redlined it and asked for a revision.)

I am finding I am taking out all of the “looking” that is being done by a POV character, and leaving some of the looks that are not from the POV character.
For instance, if another character in the room (not the POV character)
looks over at the door, you are not going to tell what they see, because you are not in their POV. Therefore, it might to be okay to leave that look in there.
However, I do not let the POV character look up and see that the other character is looking at the door. Does that make sense?

This, by the way, is just my opinion. If I submit, and get slapped for these “looks” I will let you know ASAP.

If you can, get rid of any and all looking, because this publisher emphatically flagged it. Only look as a last resort.

Hope you found this helpful!

5 Comments

Posted in Gold Mine Manuscript

Tagged beta partner, critique, editing, getting published, literary fiction, Manuscript, novel, query, self publishing, writing

Free Professional Writing and Query Help from Real Agents!

Posted on August 16, 2011 | 1 comment

WriteOnCon 2011 starts today and goes through Thursday. If you haven’t heard about it, it’s a really great place to get gads of information all in one place. It’s great stuff presented by industry professionals that writers normally would have to know someone or have to jump through hoops to try to get.

Here is a link to this year’s offerings. http://writeoncon.com/2011/08/gearing-up-for-writeoncon-2011-%E2%80%93-the-full-schedule/

There are question and answer sessions with agents, chances to submit your pitches, queries, and parts of your manuscripts for agents to look at and give feedback on. (And if you are one of the lucky ones, they might ask you to submit something to them off-line)

There are also general topics of discussion. I can’t wait to see the one on writing the perfect opening line. I am so darn tired of writing my first page I can’t stand it!

What’s great about this, is if you are like me, and you can’t get off from work to participate in the live offerings during the day, the posts will still be there when you get home. So, even if you are not participating, you can still learn from the agents that are on-line. It’s a really great opportunity.

So, what are you still doing here reading this blog? Get on over there and learn a few things from some agents and GOOD LUCK with your querying!

1 Comment

Posted in General Writing Tips, Senseless Ranting