Beth Greenslade's Blog, page 124

Does Your First Chapter Make A Good Impression?

Your first chapter is arguably the most important chapter of your book. This is the one that publishers will read and decide whether your book is worth paying more attention to, and one that your readers will read and decide whether it is worth continuing.

With so many books out there, readers can now afford to be picky. If a book doesn’t grab them from the word go, it makes it tough to reason why they should waste their time struggling on through if they are not enjoying it.

So making your first chapter outstanding is pretty crucial.

Of course, writing chapter one of your book can be somewhat intimidating. You want to get you readers immersed in the story but not give away too much, you want to include lots of details but not pack in so much detail that you overwhelm or confuse. Writing your first chapter can be tricky, but if you manage to include the main points below, then you are doing pretty well.

Be clear on your tense and who is telling the story

Chapter one is where you need to make it clear whose perspective you are telling your story from, and the tense you are telling it in. Consider this carefully. You might, of course, be telling a story that includes different characters POV’s and even in different tenses. If you do just make sure you are clever and obvious about this. Readers do not like being confused and having to go back and check who is saying what can suck the enjoyment right out of the story.

Introduce your main character and make them shine

A strong central character is one of the most important things to introduce to your book right away. You need to make it clear who your protagonist is and then make them so intriguing and exciting that your reader can’t wait to hear more about them.

Set the scene, but not too much

You want to introduce your world to the reader early on in your novel. However, don’t make the common mistake of explaining exactly how everything works in great detail. Readers don’t need to see, hear, smell every single thing in the first chapter. Pick your details carefully and wisely. Use succinct and powerful descriptions to set the scene. Chapter one should focus on your character and their story, so don’t go too overboard when it comes to setting, don’t’ give your readers a ten year history (unless it is crucial to the plot of course).

Present the plot

Your initial chapter needs to hook the reader and draw them in; it should create immediacy, and explain the premise. You don’t have to reveal your entire plot, but focus on the action, make sure something happens, cause trouble, have your main character make a big decision. By the end of your first chapter, your story should have already picked up some pace.

Be daring

To write a first chapter that really stands out you need to be brave. Think about how to make a reader sit up and take notice, to get the hairs on their arms standing up or send a shiver down their spine. Readers, agents, publishers – they all want to read something that excites them, that they have never read before – so make some brave decisions, be bold and daring and it will pay off!

Writing a first chapter is where you get a chance to show off your very best work. Don’t be intimidated by it, or overwhelmed – be excited by it and use these tips to guide and inspire you!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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Why You Can’t Finish Your Writing

Are you the kind of writer that has tonnes of brilliant ideas? One who starts writing full of energy and bubbling with excitement about your story? One who gets a few chapters in and then starts to lose interest, and stops altogether?

If your writing portfolio is mostly made up of half-baked ideas and unfinished pieces of writing, then it’s time to work out why. Ideas that just seem to drizzle out after the first few pages seem doomed to fail, and it can be rather disheartening if this is what happens to you time and time again.

Of course, if your stories or articles remain unfinished that’s fine, right? I mean, it’s not harming anyone but you. But what if you send the first few chapters off to a publisher and they ask to see more? Or you pitch an article idea to a magazine, and it gets accepted?

Then what?

There are perhaps some reasons why this keeps on happening to you. If you address the issue, then you could find that instead of feeling doomed and miserable about your writing, you’ll find that you can write many great pieces, stories, even entire novels to the end. It’s all about making sure that idea is fully formed before you start. Here are some helpful tips.

Give your idea some space

You wake up in the middle of the night buzzing with excitement – you’ve come up with a genius idea for your next piece of writing. Yo hastily scribble a few notes down before going back to sleep. In the morning you take your sleepy scrawl, try to make sense of it, then begin.

The trouble with this is that you haven’t given your idea time to breathe. Just because you have had an idea, you don’t have to write about it straight away. Give yourself time to think about it, to develop it, to work out the finer details. Familiarising yourself with your own idea first will mean you are adequately prepped when you start writing and have a much clearer, well-rounded idea of how the whole piece will work.

Pitch your idea (whether you are pitching it or not)

Before you write a single word, write a pitch for your idea. This works for both fiction and article writing. How could you persuade someone they would want to read this, what makes it exciting and unique, what are the themes that bring it together or the argument you are trying to make? How do you want people to feel once they’ve read it?

Give yourself a deadline

Giving yourself structure as a writer is so important and can have a significant influence when it comes to completing those pieces of writing. A deadline means you can’t push an idea to the side or put it on the back burner, you have to write it, and even if it becomes a struggle, you must figure out how to overcome those obstacles and make it work.

Researching, investigating, plotting, planning, and fleshing out your ideas will help you make sure that you feel confident when it comes to actually writing it, and working to a deadline keeps a healthy amount of pressure on to ensure that you finish. Just think how happy you will be when you get to the end – that should be driven enough to keep you pushing through!

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How To Make Every Scene In Your Novel Count

If you really think about it, your novel is just a compilation of scenes that, when read together, tell your story. If your scenes flow into one another and complement one another (with the help of a solid narrative to connect them, of course) then you are on your way to writing a pretty good novel.

However, to make it even better, instead of looking at your book as a whole, pick it apart. Take each and every scene and hold it up to the light, examine it. Is that scene powerful, moving, exciting, dramatic? How does that scene aid your story overall?

Each and every scene that you write in your novel should count for each one is like a mini-story in itself, it needs structure, and therefore it needs an opening, a middle, and an ending too.

Think of your scenes as having a responsibility – they all owe it to your book to adhere to the core of your story, to the central idea, and similarly, they owe it to your reader to provide them with a certain experience – a further insight, a show. Scenes should not be dictated to the reader; rather the reader should be immersed within them. They should feel the air, see the colours; all their senses should be tantalised drawing them further into the story, into the world that you have created for them.

Scenes need to capture attention; they need to reveal information and you as the author need to highlight the information in each scene that is important, show the reader which things they need to pay special attention to.

You can choose to construct your scene in a number of different ways, each serving an individual and unique purpose.

An action scene builds momentum, carries the reader forward, they have energy and movement and make your reader feel exhilarated.

A narrative scene helps readers understand the basis for the story, the have few actions and are generally descriptive. Narrative scenes tell us more about the characters and the world that they live in. An effective narrative scene will reveal secret thoughts, will conjure up images, and will help your readers connect and care for your characters.

A setting scene provides specific visual details which contribute to immersing readers in the world that you have created for them. Using bold descriptive words, and being imaginative and unique both help to build vivid setting scenes which have an enormous impact on the drama of your novel and the impact it has on your readers. Setting scenes can be used cleverly to depict the tone of that’s to come as well as letting readers know exactly how the character is feeling.

Paying attention to your scenes is such an important part of writing your novel. Craft each and every one of them with care. Each scene in your novel should draw your reader in, and immerse them further in the story – so make sure you make every scene count!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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It’s Time To Take Your Writing (And Yourself) Seriously

There are so many writers out there that keep their writing, and the fact that they love it, as a deep, dark shameful secret that they don’t want anyone to know about.

By pretending that we are not writers, or that writing is just a whimsical hobby of ours, we protect ourselves. If it doesn’t mean that much to us it doesn’t matter if we get rejected, it’s OK to go months without doing anything about it. Keep telling yourself that writing is just a side project, a fun and silly thing you do from time to time and soon you’ll start to believe it. If you convince yourself writing isn’t important then you don’t need to try at it. If you don’t try at it it doesn’t matter if you don’t succeed.

But really, in doing so we are not doing ourselves justice. Put us under oath or give us a lie detector test and most writers would say that writing is hugely important to them, in fact, given the chance it is all we want to do. Pretending not to be a writer or that your writing doesn’t matter to you is so much easier then putting yourself out there, being vulnerable and taking risks.

Since it’s the start of the new year why not make a promise to yourself to start taking your writing seriously? Admit that you care about it – tell people it’s your passion. The more you stand proudly and tell the world ‘ I am a writer, this is what I write,’ the more you’ll not only convince other people, but yourself too – and with that conviction comes determination and self-belief – two of the most important attributes any writer can have.

Once you have made that promise to yourself it’s time to act on it. If you are ready to take your writing seriously, do these 5 things.

1. Set goals and targets.

Without giving yourself goals it is easy to continue to put your writing on the back burner and never really get anywhere with it. Give yourself deadlines, create goals and set yourself challenges. Each time you pass one of these milestones you’ll feel so pleased, and seeing the fruits of your labour will only spur you on to do more.

2. Give yourself time.

It’s no good setting goals if you don’t give yourself time to do them. Make sure you set aside chunks of time to work on your writing. Remind yourself that it needs to take priority. You might get the urge to watch Netflix or go out drinking with your friends, but writing is all about discipline, and if you take it seriously then you have to make sacrifices.

3. Beat the resistance.

There is not a writer on the planet who doesn’t have times where they find the actual task of sitting down to write incredibly difficult. You may find yourself coming up with all sorts of weird and wonderful excuses why you need to do something other then write. Learn to understand what it is that is making you procrastinate. Remove any distractions. Acknowledge it, but understand it happens because writing is scary. Focus on how you feel after you’ve written something – that brilliant elated feeling that you are doing something truly meaningful and worthwhile. If you miss your targets or don’t hit your goals try to reassess, think about what you could do differently, try a different track.

Most importantly don’t beat yourself up about it too much. Simply get back to it and carry on.

4. Let your first draft get out before you hate it.

Everyone hates their first draft. Usually they are right to. However, getting your first draft down is more important then making it perfect. Let your first draft be a bit rubbish. If you constantly criticise or try to edit on the go you could soon become disheartened and then you’ll give up before you are done. Being self-critical can just be another way to try and stop ourselves from writing, or pretend that we don’t care. Don’t let yourself be the reason you stop.

5. Tell people.

Don’t let your writing be a secret. Tell people about it. Share it with anyone who is willing to read it. Get it out there. The sooner you begin to tell and show people that you are a writer, the sooner they’ll start thinking of you as one.

If you are a writer then be one. If writing is what makes you happy then write. Don’t be ashamed of your writing or your dreams. Now is the time to take your writing seriously, so do something about it, bite the bullet and see what you can achieve.

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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Achievable Writing Goals For 2017

Every writer needs goals. Goals help us to keep writing, to stay focused and to set deadlines for ourselves.

The start of a new year is a great time to assess how your writing is going, how the last year went, what you felt you did well and what you feel you could have done better. Use this time to really think about what it is you hope to achieve going forward and how you intend to do that.

Then create some shiny, brand-new writing goals for 2017!

Goal setting, however, is not easy. In fact, there is quite an art to doing it well. Give yourself too many goals or ones that are vague or impossibly challenging, and you’ll find yourself failing to achieve them early on and spending the rest of the year licking your wounds. Make your goals too easy and open ended and you’ll find ways to bend your own rules, or will get everything done but have nothing to really show for it at the end.

So what are great goals to set for yourself in 2017? Ones which excite and challenge you without being too overwhelming or difficult to achieve?

Here are some ideas to help you.

Gain a thorough understanding of what you can and can’t do.

Before you set any specific goals assess your writing life so far. Write down how much time you currently spend writing and how much writing you achieve in that time. You need to know exactly how productive you are before you can figure out what goals you can have.

Figure out your writing routine

Be realistic about how much time you can actually spend writing. It’s all very well having grand visions of getting up at 5am writing for an hour then fitting in that run before you head off to do your day job, but when that alarm starts screeching and it’s freezing cold and pitch black staying in your warm and cosy bed will suddenly feel very appealing. Work out when you are most likely to write, and how long for. Can you find ways to extend this a little? There will always be sacrifices here and there that we can make to spend more time writing, but if you make it seem like too much of a chore you will quickly break. Why not make one evening a week a ‘writing evening’ rather then insisting your goal should be to write every day? Finding a balance of what you will stick to while still pushing yourself is what achievable goal setting is all about.

Knock down those barriers.

Only you know what stops you from writing, whether it’s hanging out with friends or simply watching a movie with a loved one. Find out what your blocks are, what will distract you, what makes you procrastinate. I, for example, always tidy my house the night before I want to have a big writing day. I know if I don’t the mess will distract me and I’ll use it as and excuse not to get down to work. Barriers can also be physical and emotional like being too tired to write or being filled with self-doubt. Find strategies in order to avoid these getting in the way of your writing. Acknowledging them is the first step.

Get some support and reward yourself.

There is nothing more helpful when it comes to sticking to your goals then having an army of people to support you. Find a writing community, tell your family and friends. The more people that know your goals the more likely you are to stick to them. Other writers can help you stay on track, as well as give your feedback and help you improve your work too. Giving yourself rewards each time you achieve a goal is another way of making sure you stick to them!

The best way to create writing goals is to make them sensible and achievable but also know that when you achieve them you’ll look back with a sense of pride! Do that and you are sure to have an excellent writing year!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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Embrace Your Failures And Become A better Writer

Writing is full of failures. Failure to meet deadlines failure to achieve your word count, failure to get an agent or publisher. In fact, I think it is pretty reasonable to say that there is no writer on this planet who doesn’t experience failure pretty much throughout their entire career.

Even the most celebrated authors, ones who now have glittering careers and all the riches and fame to go with it, at one point started out as new writers, as ordinary writers, as writers who hadn’t published anything. They were just as nervous and scared, and they also suffered rejection (often more then once) before someone recognised their talent.

Failure is difficult for writers. Most writers tend to be perfectionists. Their work is their art and it is delicate and intimate and has to be exactly right before it is shared with the world. When a writer decides to do so they make themselves extremely vulnerable (something which writers hate) and then if they do ‘fail’ it is all the harder to pick themselves back up and try again.

That’s why learning that it’s OK to fail and even using failure as a way to become a better writer is so important. Writers may experience failure throughout their career, so being able to cope with it can make all the difference.

If you don’t try you’ll never know. Next time you get a rejection, instead of feeling miserable about it remind yourself that you did something incredibly brave. It is scary and daunting to send off a submission. Always be for putting yourself out there. Finishing a manuscript is a huge achievement, you should always celebrate that. Each time you ‘fail’ just remember how great it is that you tried in the first place.

Failure teaches us lessons. Each and every time we fail we learn something – about ourselves or about our writing. We can use these lessons to improve and to try again. Without failing we might never get better, so think of failing as an opportunity to learn something new and to get better at our craft.

You get stronger each time. Failure makes you stronger. Imagine being someone who always got everything they wanted. Would you really want that? Failing and not getting what we want is part of what makes our lives challenging and varied and interesting. Each time you fail, use it to become become stronger and get back out there even more determined than you were before.

You learn to be kind to yourself. Because writers go through so much failure, they learn how to be kind to themselves. It’s simply not productive to beat yourself up every time you don’t achieve a goal. Learning when to push yourself but also when to give yourself a break are important lessons every writer should learn.

Failure is never going to be something that feels completely easy. However learning how to handle failure, deal with it, find positives in it and then to let it go will make you a stronger, more productive and better writer.

How do you handle failure? Let us know!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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Why Your Should Write Your Book This Year

Make 2017 the year that you write your book. Why not? Go on; you can do it; I promise you!

Writing a book can be scary and daunting, but if you have always toyed with the idea of doing so then now is the time to get on with it and just start.

We understand that it takes courage to start writing a book and plenty of willpower and dedication too. However, if you have that niggling urge to write your story you know you’ll be so pleased if you do.

If you aren’t convinced here are some great reasons why you need to write your book right now!

Your story is important

No one can tell your story quite like you can, how wonderful is that? In the palm of your hand, you have a gift – to tell a story just the way you want to. That matters. Even if you don’t feel as though your idea is unique enough just remember that your experiences and unique perspective make all the difference. Don’t keep it to yourself, share it!

Challenges are good

If you never challenge or push yourself your life will be full of mediocracy. Writing a book is a huge challenge and one that not many people achieve. Why not be in that small, amazing group of people who have done it? Think how brilliant that would be. It could lead to something life changing, it may not. But once you have finished your book it is out there forever, and that’s something pretty special in itself.

Only writing will make you a better writer

You can read all the books in the world but unless you write something you are never going to become a better writer. Practice, fail, write something rubbish, practice some more, fail some more, write some more – just keep going, each time you write something, you’ll learn some lessons and improve. Writing a book will make you a better writer.

It’s now or never

How long can you keep putting off writing a book? The truth is you can keep procrastinating forever. What are you waiting for? Now is the perfect time you write your book because it’s as good a time as any. There will always be excuses, other things getting in the way, and if you keep using those things as reasons not to write you may never get that book written. So just realise that no better time to write is coming, stop waiting and just get on with it – today!

You’ll leave something behind

Writing a book is a sort of legacy. Knowing that decades from now someone thousands of miles away could pick up your book and read it and be inspired, moved, or simply entertained by it is quite an awesome feeling is it not? Without writing your book you can’t hope to experience that, so make sure that you do.

Writing a book is tough, but it’s also one of the most rewarding and satisfying accomplishments anyone can achieve. You have got what it takes. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Start writing your book right now!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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Writing Contests – Are They Worth It?

Writing contests offer writers a great deal. A cash lump sum prize, the chance to see your work in print, the sense of personal pride and achievement, and of course a useful addition to include in your submission letters and on your ‘writing CV’.However, often writing contests cost to enter, can take months before you find out the results, have huge competition and, even if you do win, may not be well-known enough to really be worth the entry fee. Then, of course, there is making sure that the contest itself is legitimate. Some may, for example, claim to be running the contest in the hope of finding the next big book to publish – however, can get out of actually doing so by claiming that none of the entries were ‘publishable,’ and therefore never having to pay out.

So if you are thinking of entering writing contests, then it is a good idea to do your research, and carefully consider which ones have the best chance of giving you what you need.

Here are some things to consider:

Check the sponsors. If the competition is legitimate and useful to writers, it will likely be sponsored by publishers, well-known publications, educational establishments or not-for-profit literary groups. Check to see whether the competition is held regularly. An annual competition is more established and should provide details of past winners too.

There are of course a huge number of other writing contests that will be run and sponsored by individuals or businesses outside of this remit. However, it is always important to pay particular attention to the sponsors as this will give you a good indication of how the competition is run.

Read the rules and the fine print. Make sure you read and understand the rules before you enter. You need to know the deadline, the prize, the fees, exactly how and in what format to submit when the winners will be announced, whether your work can be submitted or published elsewhere and the terms and conditions if you are chosen as a winner.

Often winners have to give up some of their rights to the work, so be careful that you understand this and are happy to do so before you enter. Following all the rules and regulations carefully will make sure that your entry will be accepted. Often if you have done something incorrectly, your submission will be rejected, but you won’t necessarily be notified of that fact.

Make sure the prize is something you want. Authors have different reasons for entering competitions. It could just be for fun, for recognition, to try and win the money, or to try and get published. Make sure that the entry fee is commensurate with the prize. Most authors have a limited amount of time and money to spend on competitions and some simply aren’t worth it!

Be realistic. There are, of course, some huge, prestigious writing competitions out there that, if you win, could do wonders for your writing career. However, it is important to remember that winning a big writing competition is almost as difficult as getting a publishing deal -so if you are hoping to make a proper living out of winning competition prize money then think again!

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket and explore other ways to get your work published and make money such as starting a blog or sending it off to relevant publications. Not winning a writing contest might also feel like yet a rejection – so be prepared to be thick-skinned about it.

If it sounds suspicious, it probably is. If the prize is to have your work published in an anthology – but then you have to buy a copy to see it, you should probably steer clear. Or if your work will be published but will be edited first subject to ‘editing fees’ then why bother? If this is the case, you might as well go down the self-publishing route. If the prize is to be published but only online this may make alarm bells ring too.

At the end of the day entering writing contests can pay off in many ways, they give you an opportunity to present your work to agents and editors without actually submitting – therefore giving you an idea of how it would fare if you did.

Winning a competition could kickstart your writing career, and bring you fortune and fame. However, perhaps above all else, writing contests can help you keep writing, they give you deadlines and specific assignments which can lead to great things – even if you don’t win!

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Ways To Reward Yourself For Writing

One of the best ways to make sure that you keep up with all your writing goals this year is to give yourself rewards every time you do!We all know that writing is challenging, and even though we may love it, it certainly has its ups and downs, and there are times where sitting down to write feels like the last thing on earth that we want to do.

However, for those that keep at it and don’t give up, the benefits can be plentiful! Achieving your writing goals and having success in your writing career is so exciting and satisfying. However, until all that hard work pays off it is a good idea to give yourself little rewards along the way to make sure you keep driving for that goal.

So what are the different ways you could motivate yourself to write? Here are some ideas.

Make sure that your writing rewards are things that you want. They can’t just be ‘write for an hour, and then you can eat dinner.’ You’ll no doubt eat dinner anyway so where is the real motivation to write? You could even team up with a writing pal to keep you egging each other on, or get your family involved so they can help you. Your partner could give you a 30-minute foot rub if you write 1000 words that day, or your kids could promise to do the washing up without you having to nag! Letting someone else be in control of your rewards is a good way of making sure you can’t cheat too!

It’s probably not a good idea to make your rewards financial – or if you do this keep it to once in a blue moon, otherwise you might find yourself writing lots but unable to pay your electricity bill! So if you are eyeing up a particular dress for example only reward yourself with it if you do something really impressive like finish your entire book.

Rewards don’t have to be overly complicated. They can be quick and easy like watching an episode from your favourite box set, or reading that book you are really into or just letting yourself have a biscuit with your cup of tea.

Make the rewards fit the activity, so if it is something you do every day such as write a new page from your book, then keep the reward small and simple. The bigger and better the achievement the bigger and better your reward can be!

Every time you achieve a writing goal, you are one step closer to success, and making sure that you celebrate those little achievements will keep you motivated to write. How do you reward yourself when you achieve a writing goal? We’d love to know!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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How To Give Constructive Criticism On Writing

 It an be quite daunting when a writer gives you something of their work to read. You want to give them useful feedback but, knowing how sensitive writers can be it can often feel easier just to tell them everything you loved rather than pointing out things that could be improved upon.

If you are part of a writing group, online forum or just have some writing pals you like to share your work with then it can be important and so much more helpful to give them constructive and useful feedback. Learning to do so will not only help you to help your fellow writers but will also make you more aware of when someone is giving you advice that is intended to help you. This will hopefully make it a little easier to take the next time someone does make suggestions for change and improvement about your work.

So what is constructive criticism and how can you learn how to give it?

The most important part to remember is the ‘constructive’ part. Without it, you are simply being critical, and the writer will feel that and immediately start to get defensive (and understandably so). If there is something that you don’t like about a piece of writing that is absolutely fine, you are entitled to your opinion after all. However, if you can’t explain succinctly and carefully why it is you feel this way it may not be that helpful to share your feelings.

Not everyone likes to read the same sort of thing so you must be prepared to try to find ways of appreciating different types of writing, even if they might not be your usual cup of tea. Every time you find a part you don’t like, however, it is important to ask yourself why. Is it just that you don’t like this type of writing or is there something actually wrong with the piece? A constructive piece of criticism for example, might be that you don’t find what the male protagonist is saying is believable because their actions and speech sounds too feminine. Your can provide examples to back up what you mean. Then the author can do something with that and use your comments to improve their work.

You don’t have to be completely honest when it comes to critiquing a fellow writers work. Being frank and candid is helpful but picking on every tiny little thing that you didn’t like will just make them feel as though you are petty and therefore less likely to listen to you.

Remember the sandwich method. If you want to say something negative about an authors work, then sandwich it between two positives. Find something good and complimentary and say that first, then slip in your criticism and then say something else that will make them happy. That way you have carefully cushioned the blow for the author and they will be able to accept what you have said a lot more readily.

Don’t feel bad. If someone has asked you to critique their work, then you owe it to them to do it thoroughly and truthfully. Think of it as being cruel to be kind. If writers don’t hear about the mistakes, they have made or get a true feel for what readers will make of their book they won’t be able to improve. Remember that you are doing them a favour and if they get upset by your critique gently point this out to them.

Be prepared to be ignored. Even the most well-intended constructive criticism may well be ignored. Writers are protective of their writing; their work is precious and fragile and even the most well-intended critique may not be welcomed. As long as you know you have tried your best to be tactful as well as helpful then you have done your job, and there is not much more you can do!

Bethany Cadman -author of ‘Doctor Vanilla’s Sunflowers’

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