New Year’s Editing Resolution

The holidays are over and it’s time to get back into the groove of things! I’m not big on New Year’s Resolutions. I’ll just say I’m resolved to edit my novels and move on to publication. Those are lofty enough resolutions for me.

I have collected some websites that provide editing advice. I wanted to share them with my blog followers.

Enjoy!

Seven Editing Questions to Ask Yourself

How to Edit While You Write: 3 Tips on Balancing Progress with Perfectionism

An Editing Checklist

The Editing Recipe

Author S.J. Rozan’s Method of Iterative Revision

Revising a Novel

Tighten Up Your Manuscript

How I Edit

How to Revise Your Novel Through a Read-Aloud-and-Critique Workshop

How to Rewrite

The Role of a Book Editor — and What to Look for When Hiring One

Your Book Needs Editing, and Here’s Why…

How to Edit Your Own Book: Tips from Authors on the Revision Process

How to Revise Your Novel through a Read Aloud and Critique Workshop

Comma Splice

I hope these have helped you!

I love discussions, so leave a comment below and let’s discuss!

Thanks for reading A.G. Zalens blog!

Catching Fire: Book Review

Since I wrote a book review for The Hunger Games, I decided to add the next installment. Now that the movie is out, I’ve been thinking about the story.

Catching Fire (The Hunger Games, #2), by Suzanne Collins, Scholastic Press, September 1, 2009. 391 pages

Katniss and Peeta are sent to each District to show solidarity with President Snow. Their rule breaking at the end of The Hunger Games caused others around the Districts to rebel as well. Trouble happens when they appear at District 11. The home of Rue, the little girl Katniss teamed up with during the Games. There an act of rebellion happens and the results shock and disturb Katniss.

Later on their journey around the Districts and the Capitol they give an interview with a surprise announcement. They hoped it would curb the rebellion, but have little success.

After her return home, Katniss encounters runaways who explain a theory about the elusive District 13. They believe it is occupied by people unhappy with the Capitol and the Districts. Katniss wonders about their revelation, but mostly dismisses it as fanciful.

The efforts of President Snow resulted in little influence so he announces another Hunger Games. The 75^thHunger Games, or the Quarter Quell. For the anniversary special instructions are given that pertain to the contestants. It’s revealed that 24 previous winners would have to enter the games. They hold the same type of lottery with previous contestant who have their names drawn. Katniss and Peeta are chosen along with 22 other previous winners.

The Games are in a new setting and have new challenges. The unexpected ending opens the way to the third installment and the conclusion.

My thoughts on the book:

We delve more into the relationship of Katniss and Peeta and wonder about Gale and if he might ever get his chance with her.

This book stayed as action packed as the first book and I read it with a quick pace. The game winner participation is a twist that I enjoyed. It gave a new perspective for strategy and ability. Everyone understood the rules, so the entire experience of reading this story seemed new and exciting.

The ending comes out of nowhere, but is still relevant and serves a purpose for the plot.

I had a few issues with this story. The 75^th annual game seemed odd. For such an important anniversary we received little notice of its approach. I also wanted more in terms of Katniss’ relationships. She came off as distant to everyone and though she is close with Peeta, it still seemed underdeveloped.

Since the story intrigued me I overlooked those small issues. I delighted in reading the characters I cared about. An overall good read.

I look forward to seeing the movie and seeing how close it stays to the book.

I would love to discuss with you about this and I love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading my blog.
A.G. Zalens

NaNoWriMo Results

My final word count: 50,030! I’m excited about my win and the accomplishment of finishing the challenge. Next up a few days off before diving into editing.

I appreciate all the encouragement and excitement from my family, the people around me, and the NaNoWriMo staff.

Congratulations to all the participants and to the winners! Thanks to everyone who supported us.

I would love to discuss your experiences with NaNo or your wins! I love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading my blog.
A.G. Zalens

Fiction Writing: Create Flow through Outline and Initiate Helpful Editing

I finished my daily NaNoWriMo word count today and wanted to veer off that topic for my next blog post. I’m sure after the first few weeks those who chose not to participate are ready to hear about something other than reaching a word count.

This is the third installment of my Fiction Writing Series here and here.

The first one spoke to plot and how to gain enough content for a full novel. The second one provided content on character development and good ways to know and understand them before you start.

For this one I have given two final preparations before you start the novel. These will help your story fly and soar to the finish.

Step Three:

Outline and Edit

Yeah, these two are a strange grouping. Outline comes at the beginning and editing at the end. So why place them together? Well, I consider them both a necessary preparation of a novel.

The Outline

Unless you are a discovery writer (writing until you “discover” an idea and then build your story from there,) you will write an outline.

Answer this question:

How much information do I need to write a complete story?

The beginning, middle, and end are easy place cards to initiate an outline, or main plot, arc, and climax are another option. The outlines most important section is the ending. If you can identify the end then the body and the beginning lead there. Successful books wrap up the plot and sub-plots, especially successful first novels. Established authors can change that up.

After the ending is decided, then look to the conflict. Each scene needs conflict, which is why an antagonist is important to a story. Without conflict readers begin to drift from the book. Something needs to happen and not the same thing over and over. I once read a book where the protagonist went for a run every single day as the important scene and the small amount of conflict came off as repetitive instead of intriguing.

The amount of information in your outline depends on the type of novel you write. A story with many characters, sub-plots, and dramatic conclusions need more detail, yet books with wiggle room for creative development during the writing can have a lot less in the outline.

For me, I write about 12 bullet points and fill in the basic pieces I want to include in the story. As I write I pull from it and expand it as I go. It has worked for me so far.

Editing

Arm yourself with the editing knowledge. My list mostly gives things to avoid.

Editing list:

Avoid “to be verbs”: they are linking verbs that can be replaced with action verbs
- Be, am, is, are, was, were, been, has, have, had, do, did, does, can, could, shall, should, will, would, may, might, must
Avoid adverbs: they are usually telling words instead of showing words
Avoid too many adjectives: one before every word it becomes too much
Avoid common words:
- Beautiful, pretty, really, seriously, literally
Avoid too many metaphors and similes
Avoid redundancies: especially common phrases like sit down, stand up, turn around, etc.
Replace wordy sentences with action or stronger words
Avoid too many propositions
Avoid present participles
Avoid dangling present participles
Make sure your paragraphs and sentences have first word variance
Switch up paragraph and sentence lengths
Have every scene contain a beginning, middle and end
Avoid too much back-story and flashbacks
Avoid large amounts of description of your characters: you should show it instead of telling it
Avoid clichés

First drafts are much cleaner when you apply editing techniques as you write. Some writers like to type their thoughts down without any restrictions for their first draft, and if you don’t mind re-writing almost every sentence of an 80K – 120K word novel, then go for it.

For me, I want to focus on consistency of plot, characters, and structure instead of a ton of re-writing. For my NaNo novel, I’ve attempted to write cleaner. It takes a little longer, but I know the editing will take less time. I’m happy with the trade-off.

With all the prep in place it’s easier to get started and keep on your way to the end.

How do you like to prepare for a novel? A lot of outlines? No outline? Something in-between?

I would love to discuss with you about this and I love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading my blog.
A.G. Zalens

NaNoWriMo: On Track to Meet the Word Count

This month is like the bunny hop, pour coffee, write a few hundred words, complete chores, write some more, run some errands, finish the writing goal, and rest until the next day.

For NaNoWriMo my goal is to write and integrate editing techniques.

Such as these 5 Worthy Tips for Effective Editing. For my recent novel I poured words into my document without any real consistency. Once finished I moved on to edit. Luckily, I took the time to read books and articles before beginning. The only thing that saved me was that I thought to incorporate these two preparations: Fiction Writing: Prepare Before You Start and Fiction Writing: Top Character Creation.

After I edited my novel a third of the way through, I decided to change from present tense to past tense. The reason came from many examples, which showed how past tense moved the sentence along faster than present tense. Even though it’s a young adult/new adult novel I decided I liked the past tense style better.

This set me way back in my editing. I started the edit over and re-wrote just about every sentence. My biggest disappointment was that I waited until I finished to research editing for fiction.

I hope I learned my lesson. So far the prequel I’m writing incorporates what I’ve learned. It takes me a little longer to write. I think of a sentence, and then rewrite it in my head before I type it out. However, I expect this will save me a lot of time and effort when I start my edits.

I’m excited that I’ve kept pace with the suggested 1,667 words a day. Day five and I have 8,579 words written. Several of those days have been hard. I only wrote a little all day and barely finished before I went to bed. However, I think of this Winning Strategy to Beat Editing Blues and now I’m getting into a groove of finishing before noon.

The choice to write the prequel has helped a lot. I’m filling in scenes mentioned in my novel. It’s working out beautifully. I have subplots and fun characters. The twitter account @NaNoWordSprints has also been a huge support in this endeavor. Their prompts and time frames give me that pressure I need to speed up my writing.

I expect to keep up my productivity until month’s end.

Have you found any techniques that help you write? Let me know about your thoughts! I’d love to hear any NaNoWriMo stories, or any writing challenges you have experienced.Thanks for visiting A.G. Zalen’s blog.

NaNoWriMo – The Challenge to Craft An Emotion Filled Story in 30 Days

National November Writing Month, NaNoWriMo, NaNo, Na na na − okay that last one I made up.

Saying NaNoWriMo is awkward, but then the full title is long and the last words end up mumbled. Not that it matters, since any attempt to explain NaNoWriMo to non-writers is useless. I receive the cocked head and confused expression.

The main question asked is, “Why?”

My answer is that it sounds fun. Plus, I recently finished the rough edits of my novel (Yay!) I’m ready to let it sit for a while before I look at it with fresh eyes. A month away will do me some good, so it’s the perfect time to start something new.

I’ve decided to write a prequel to my novel. It will fit the word count and I have the characters ready to go in my mind. I’m excited to get started and I just need to flush out the full plot.

Wish me luck! And good luck to all who are participating this year.

Here are some resources I’ve read to prepare for NaNoWriMo:

NaNoWriMo blog posts:

National November Writing Month

Why You Should Consider Sharing Your Novel As You Go

Roadtrip to NaNo: How Setting Can Act as a Character In Your Novel

Roadtrip to NaNo: Creating 3-D Characters By People Watching

Kristen Lamb’s blog posts:

NaNoWriMo—Training Lean, Mean, Writing Machines

How to Make Sure Your NaNo Project Isn’t a Hot Mess

Fueling the Muse for NaNoWriMo—Part One

Fueling the Muse Part 2—How to Give Your NaNo Story a Beating Heart and a Skeleton

M.J. Wright’s blog posts:

Sixty second writing tips: pushing the NaNo edges

Questions to ask before starting your novel

Write it now: how to make readers feel what you do when writing

How to write a 50,000 word novel in a month

I would I love to hear from you! Let me know about your plans for NaNoWriMo or the conversations you’ve had about it.

Thanks for reading my blog.
A.G. Zalens

Fiction Writing: Top Character Creation

This is the second installment in my Fiction Writing Series and it’s all about characters.

“He’s such a character.” A phrase people say to endear a quirky action by someone they like, and a wonderful way to understand what to include in our fictional characters. Readers need those attributes to inspire a fondness for the overall story, like the ugly duckling who turns into a swan. Many times when a reader anticipates the next scene he or she will skip the description and move to the dialog. The setting can wait while we find out what happens to the character.

Step Two:

Swan Character Development

A book reviewer, who references the fictional character as if he or she is a real person, gives the biggest complement to an author. The author made the writing decisions, but the reader attributes those decisions to the character, and it shows how well-developed they are.

As writers we should look to other authors as motivation for those times the writing gets hard. We need to remember they are normal people just like us who struggled with their writing as well. I like to read or watch author interviews as a reminder and it seems to help me move forward with more confidence.

Reading is another great way to see what works in a character and why people love or hate them enough to recommend the book to other people.

Answer this question first:

What are your characters?

In most cases the answer is human, but there are other choices in fiction writing.

Human
Witch/Wizard
Mythological character
Werewolf
Space alien
Vampire
New unique creature

Once you decide it becomes easier to decide their characteristics. For the non-human characters develop a list of characteristics that differ from humans. Their speech patterns, the way they walk, their interactions, and anything else you can think of to make them real.

Next, answer this question:

Who are they?

Each character will be identified by their everyday lives. An interesting plot puts some disruption into their normal routine and takes them forward into the story. Decide what each character does. Are they in school, or police officers, thieves, painters, ranchers, businessmen, fire fighters, serial killers, or any other profession you can image?

Once you know what they do every day it’s easier to keep track of their interactions with others, their speech patterns, and for world building.

Then, answer this question:

Where do they come from?

A wealthy character will react differently than an orphan. Someone who just went through a loss acts different from someone with no major losses. Every unique culture has differentiating opinions, taboos, norms, and motivations. The knowledge of a character’s background gives a writer what they need to make big decisions in a story.

Not every character needs a ton of details, but the main characters need that extra development. Also, when you have uncertainty about the actions or dialog you can go back to the background to make those choices.

Finally, answer this question:

What are the specifics?

This is where you decide the gender and names of your characters. With gender you have two options. However, the name choices are extensive. The internet and resource books make it a lot easier. You can go to baby name websites and search for definitions, first letters, nationality, or other criteria that will help you decide.

The one rule to remember in choosing a name: unique names are more difficult for readers to keep track of and remember. The more common or short the name the more likely the reader can relate to them and recall it when they review the book or tell friends about it.

In order to decide how your character will react in many situations you could fill out personality quizzes and answer the questions as your characters. Tons of websites offer quizzes from Facebook to teen magazines. Other avenues for questions are media interviews, Reddit’s AMA (ask me anything) with celebrities, or twitter ask hash tags. Just take the questions and answer from your character’s perspective.

Of course, the best way to develop a character is to incorporate personality traits from people you know. The exact replica isn’t necessary, but if you know how someone will react in life then you can decide how your character will respond in your story.

What are the best ways to develop interesting characters? Is it important to know about the character before you begin writing? How do you tackle this process?

I would love to discuss with you about this and I love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading my blog.
A.G. Zalens

NaNoWriMo—Training Lean, Mean, Writing Machines

Kristen Lamb's Blog

Yesterday Jami posted about NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), and I really hope you guys take her class because she is truly a gifted teacher. Today, I want to talk a little bit about what writers (especially new writers) can gain from NaNo.

NaNo Teaches Endurance

I remember years ago thinking, “Wow, if I could just write a thousand words a day, that would be AMAZING.” When I looked at professional authors, it was like watching a marathon runner—all the while knowing I couldn’t run a flight of stairs without requiring oxygen and possibly a defibrillator to restart my heart. I so struggled to get words on a page, and Lord help me if I saw something shiny.

Of course, after years of practiced discipline, I generally have a thousand words written by breakfast. When I fast-draft (which I do for all my books), my average is abnormally…

View original post 1,084 more words

Book Reviews: Who Needs Them? Authors Do!

Writers start out as book lovers, long before we pick up a pencil or write a sentence. Readers find value in books. Writers find value in sharing our thoughts and ideas. Reading and writing complete each other. We can’t do one without the other. Writers have no profitable value without readers. Readers have no fun value without writers (okay maybe that’s just me!)

It’s personal to open a book and give it our quality time, interest, and attention. Plus, the money spent on the book increases its worth. Readers understand this evaluation of a book.

Book Reviewers

Book reviewers have an increased value when they add that extra step. Serious reviewers will take notes on the book, follow the POV, pay attention to details, and then write a thorough review about their experience.

Books are worth a lot to a reader, especially book reviewers.

Positive Reviews

It’s no wonder readers are zealous about their books. For the stories that inspire passion, the book reviewers are a writer’s best customer. Many reviews written are over-the-moon, enthusiastic, engaging, flashy, and emotional pieces of praise every author dreams of receiving.

A potential buyer who sees these reviews will want that same experience and will purchase the book. If they feel the same way about the book, they’ll add their own positive reviews and spread the word. This is an important way to make a book successful, and one enthusiastic review by a popular reviewer can spur a book to higher heights.

Negative Reviews

What writers may not realize is that those same reviewers, so loved for their positive reviews are also known for their undesirable reviews. If they believe a book has wasted their precious quality time, money, and effort they will write as much passion into their negative pieces as they do their positive ones. They don’t spare anyone’s feelings, but write from their heart.

Authors fear these reviews more than any other step in the process. Some writers won’t even release their books if they anticipate negative feedback. If any book struggles to launch big, and then receives a 1-star, did not finish, hate-this-book review from a popular reviewer, it may hurt book sales, but not always.

There is hope though. Many reviewers won’t write-off an author just because of one negative experience with a book. They know that even the authors they adore will write one or two books they won’t like. They may not like one, but it’s possible to love another. It’s not career ending.

Authors Respond

Unfortunately, this is where some authors make the mistake of challenging the book reviewers. The book enthusiasts take their reviews as seriously as authors take their books. It’s personal to be corrected, lectured, and disrespected by an author for a review. The reviewer is the customer of a product and they don’t get paid for their efforts. They write reviews because of their love for books and they don’t expect confrontation from an author.

Most reviews give helpful critiques, good or bad, that readers can use as a tool to decide to buy a book. It’s also clear when a review focuses on personal attacks and unfair assessments. Readers ignore overly cruel reviews, or at least disregarded them as irrelevant. The author intervention is unnecessary. Trust your customers.

Authors are like small business owners, many of which go out of business if they offer a product no one wants and they refuse to adapt and produce a product people do want. It isn’t the customer’s fault for not liking the product. It’s the nature of business. An entrepreneur puts themselves out there and the customer decides their business fate, the owner needs to adjust. Blaming the customer only ensures any future attempt is tainted by the customer’s bad experience with the owner.

Things to remember about book reviewers:

Books are more valuable than the money spent
Their reviews come from their heart and passion
It takes a lot of effort to write a review
Writing a review is serious
They won’t always give up on an author for a negative experience
Every reader is a customer
Customer experience is important for future purchases
Expectations for liking a book are high
They love books and want to voice their opinions

Authors who don’t respect reviewers will have a hard time selling their books. Every positive and negative response is an opportunity to grow and develop as writers.

What do you think about book reviewers who write harsh and negative criticism? Should they be stopped or given opportunity to voice their opinions?

I would love to discuss with you about this and I love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading my blog.
A.G. Zalens

Goodreads’ Policy and the New Path for Authors
Regarding Goodreads new policy, To agree or not to agree…..
We’re on to “those” people – Trolls (A note: The serious book reviewers are not trolls. They have hundreds of reviews and ratings, more of which are positive than negative.)

Goodreads’ Policy and the New Path for Authors

Times are different for writers. An author gives everything to their writing and sets aside many things to make sure it’s presentable. Only to realize the gut-wrenching writing was the easy part of the process.

The hard part comes next: marketing.

Moving away from past authorship

In the past authors relied on editors, agents, and publisher to promote their books. However, with more books published and less money for each author, the industry pushed the marketing on the authors.

This transition has caused problems for authors.

Before the digital age authors’ access to reviews was limited. Reviews were written by the media or spread by word of mouth in local book clubs. Readers spent time in book stores reading back covers and asking employees for suggestions. Since authors couldn’t influence the reviews their time was devoted to their craft. They wrote and that’s it.

Moving into modern authorship

Now, every blogger, reviewer, and socially active person has the ability to write a public review of books. Couple that with authors promoting their own books and it spells disaster.

Here’s the issue, writers need good reviews to sell more books. No longer do people need to join a local book club or wait for Oprah to announce the next best read to find a book they’ll love. They just open their favorite site and see what’s good.

So if those reviews are negative then book ratings go down, people pass over the book, and sales tank. This concerns the author/marketer who needs those reviews to sell books, a dilemma.

We need reviewers but we don’t want the negative reviews. Yet, reviews are subjective based on many factors in a reader’s life. Maybe when she went to the library that young adult paranormal romance sounded perfect, but by the time she finish she wished it had been a horror fantasy and felt disappointed. Or maybe he bought the book because his buddy recommended it but he couldn’t connect to the first person present tense and abandoned the book.

Not everyone will love our books. In fact, only a small niche is going to enjoy it at all. Negative reviews should always be expected. How an author reacts to it is important.

Our behavior affects our product, especially when that behavior is public on sites such as: Goodreads and Amazon. Readers are the customer and how we treat our customers will impact our sales.

Authors and the entrepreneurship phase

I understand both aspects of this problem since I’m writing a book and I’ve worked in the marketing industry. We are artists of words, not of convincing strangers to love our words. However, with this new environment many authors seem to forget the other aspect of the writer’s life: entrepreneurship.

Owning a product for sale means authors take on the roll of manager: professional, helpful, understanding, complimentary, and willing to make the customer happy. A bad manager is someone who stirs up conflict with their customers and says or does negative things toward them.

A public figure needs to accept the negative personal comments and focus on the positive. Then learn from it and make the product better the next time.

Goodreads to the rescue

I’ve seen Goodreads struggle in the past few months with authors and reviewers clashing about reviews. The site now warns authors how to respond to reviews. ←

Goodreads announced a new policy that essentially tells reviewers to be nice to authors. Though, this is intended to keep the peace, the management should treat the site like any other product review site.

When an employee of a company acts irresponsibly the customer calls that bad customer service. The book reviewer is the customer and the author is the owner. The person who needs to make the experience pleasurable is the author. The reader reviews and gives feedback.

Reviewers are intelligent and can spot a review that reads hate instead of reasonable and they will ignore those reviews. Goodreads should let the market sort out the problem instead of intervening. Though I’m sure it’s hard to have people complaining on both sides.

Customers need encouragement and assurance that their experience will be pleasing even if they say something that might hurt someone’s feelings. It wouldn’t be wise for Bill Gates or Jack Welch to go on a review site and complain about the bad reviews. In the same way, it isn’t a good idea for authors to respond to negative book reviews. This is an issue customers can handle and the authors need to adjust to.

Limiting reviewers ability to be honest also leads to posters making a point in this fashion:

I hope in the future this policy goes away or at least isn’t enforced. It’s bad for business.

P.S. I intended to do a character post, but I read Goodreads’ new policy about reviews and the responses from many book bloggers. I wanted to add my opinion. I’ll post this other topic soon.

Did you know about the Goodreads policy and what is your response?

I love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading my blog

A.G. Zalens