Zip It Up

That is what I will do with this post on this last day of the A to Z Blogging Challenge, zip it up. Finish it, be done with it; let it go. I can tell you I’m not happy about it either. I’ve enjoyed this last month of blogging, of tuning into other blogs and finding out what is happening out there with so many others. Bad timing doesn’t help. My parents (mum and “step” dad) just left today to head home to North Carolina after a ten day stay that was super and so greatly appreciated. They haven’t been down (to south Georgia) in two years because I’ve gone up to NC every month for those last two years to visit my father in a home. So of course I see the rest of the family as well while I’m there.

Now I am home alone with only my little dog Bonaparte to keep me company, until this evening when my husband comes home from work. I’m glad to have more time in my day to write but the first day of their departure and the last day of the A to Z challenge coming tomorrow, well, the timing is not well done for my tear ducts.

However, I’ve found some amazing blogs this year and will continue to follow them even after the challenge is over. Thank you to all who dropped by and left comments or started to follow me. I’m so very happy to have met you. So this is it. I’m zipping up the month of April with this farewell…

Take the high road, fly whenever you can, and don’t listen to those who would keep you chained, earthbound and silent.

You are worth more than anyone else can tell you.

Peace to you all. I hope to continue to see you through the year. Until next April….  

P.S. I will participate in the A to Z Reflections on Friday, May 3^rd    

Images from:
commons.wikimedia.org

laurabwriter.blogspot.com

www.funnyjunk.com

Yield

Today is about yielding. What does that mean to the story, to where your protagonist needs to go? I have three protagonists in the story of The Seventh Man. Each one has life lessons to learn. Each one has a “growth” curve to find within the confines of the novel, and each one must, if they are to progress along this growth curve, yield to the life lessons they find within.

And yet each one will choose a different path than what they perhaps thought they were meant to by the end of the novel. This yielding to lessons, to the curve life demands is crucial to the success of the novel, and if you think about it, your life as well within your writer’s world and without. As we write we grow and change and hopefully become better at what we do. Isn’t that why we are constantly told to write as often as possible, if not every day?

When did you start writing seriously? How have you, as a writer, changed since that time? Are you now where you thought you would be when you started? I am a better writer than when I started, but I’m not done with my journey. I’ll continue on, whether it’s the left or right fork I choose in the roads ahead or whether I eventually give it up all together. For me writing is all about choices and learning to yield, be that to my characters and what they want from me, or to the bloodying of a mss to make sure it is the best it can be. I yield to the lessons this writing life continues to teach me. I try every day to be better than I was the day before in some way. This blogging challenge has been a great help to me in that regard. I’ve learned different lessons this time around than I learned last year and I look forward to see where I am next April when I once again take up the A to Z gauntlet. 

 

Images from:

www.traderplanet.com 

www.ehow.com

zerofabricwastefashion.blogspot.com

pundithouse.com

cathygrahamcoaching.wordpress.com

X-ray

My word for today is X-ray, as in a beam that can see through the skin to the bones underneath.

We, as writers are in effect x-ray machines. We must write the bones of a story before we can lay upon them the layers that will eventually produce something readable. Think of the outline perhaps, as the bones of your story. During this process we must be able to “see” through the skin of our wip to examine the bones and how they affect our story. Like in the show “Bones”  http://www.fox.com/bones/  Angela Montenegro, the forensic artist, is often required to make a precise rendition of a skull’s face. With her super artistic talent and way with technology, Angela turns a skull (or sometimes even partial skull) into a likeness of the person the skull once looked like. Angela must delve deep and follow the lines the skull gives her to make what will ultimately be the skull’s face, and of course, in this show her likenesses always portray the person precisely as they were.

We must do the same. We must be able to see through the skin and muscle of our wip and see the bones beneath to be able to follow the lines, delve deep, and make the reader forget all about the bones. We want them to see only the skin of our creation, but we want them to feel the depth of the bones so that when they are finished with our labor of love, sweat and heartache, they put it down and look at it and feel sorry that it’s over.

For another POV on an outline that I find fascinating and informative hop over to WriterRachael’s blog and see what she has to say about “Who, What, When, Where and Why,” from yesterday’s W post. http://writerachael.com/1/post/2013/04/w-is-for-who-what-where-when-and-why.html

If you have a strong and deep underlying structure under the overlay of words that make up your story, you stand a better chance of writing something worth reading.

How do you view the “bones” of your story? Do you feel they are strong enough to give your story worthwhile substance? 

Jack and Angela on "Bones"

Images from:

streetanatomy.com 

home2.fvcc.edu

background-pictures.feedio.net 

 

Today is For W

I thought about this day of W and came up with way too many words to write about (there were three just then), and so I thought I wouldn’t concentrate on just one W word. I would write and see how many I could use while still writing a meaningful post (meaningful is a relative term here).

Writing about the A to Z challenge puts me in a state of wondrous rapture. I waltz around my office in a state of woozy happiness with the thought of all the warmhearted folks I’ve met this month

through the words we all share and love to put to paper, be you “writer” or not. To be a writer entails much time alone, but here is proof of all my workfellows out in the world writing alongside me. I might be alone in my office, but not in my online world.
Three or four hundred years ago I would have been condemned as a witch, communicating soundlessly with wayfarers around the world, wasting time in front of screens while I wantonly spurn “real” companionship. But they, those long ago accusers would have been wrong. Because the magic I/we have isn’t mystical or an illusion. This is our real life. This is what gives meaning to each and every day. We are not woebegone winesops (I hope!), or warlocks, or weary worms writhing in barren soil. We may worry and be

wary of never being read, except, wait! We ARE being read. Right now you are reading my words and that is the true wonder, which keeps us from whining. Instead we willfully write whenever and wherever we can and I for one won’t stop till I drop. Hopefully I will waken in the wee hours of tomorrow morning and find that you have come by for a visit, read this wacky post and left a warm and witty comment. If not, I won’t wallow in my misery. I’ll just write more words and in my heart of hearts, wish you well.

Images from:

www.biblepicturegallery.com

www.freefoto.com

www.thecoloringbarn.com

school.discoveryeducation.com

Vague: a Horror Word for Writers

Vague. Definition: Of uncertain, indefinite, or unclear character or meaning: "patients with vague symptoms". Thinking or communicating in an unfocused or imprecise way: "he had been vague about his activities.”

I won’t be vague; this is a writer’s horror word! This word and its synonyms: indistinct or indefinite, are words I NEVER want applied to me as a writer much less my work, especially in dialog. 

Would you write a conversation like this? 

            “Do much yesterday?”

“Nothin’ much. How ‘bout you?”

“Same.”

“How’s the family?”                                       

“Guess they’re all just fine.”

 

The only time I ever saw this work—and it only worked because it was making fun of being vague or indistinct—was on the Andy Griffith Show. It was clever there because of the timing and set up. Normally, however, we as writers avoid this kind of dialog like rotten road pizza. Have you ever caught yourself being lazy and writing something maybe not this bad, but at least something so vague or boring that when you look at it again you have to ask yourself where your brain was that day?

There are times as writers we are purposely vague about details and plot twists in our stories because we want to pique reader’s interest, involve them, so we leave things out or write in a way that leaves different interpretations available to the reader. But we are never vague about how we write those scenes and certainly not in dialog. 

Does this dialog draw you in?

           

“What makes you smile,” he asked.

“You.”

“A reflection.”

“Maybe. Why don’t you want to know my name?”

“I have no need of it.”

“But—”

“Names belong to another world.”

She closed her eyes.

He ran his thumb down the length of her face. “Don’t think. Open your eyes. Stay with me.”

Images from:

www.ew.com

http://www.collegehumor.com

entertainment.inquirer.net