Angela Ackerman's Blog: Writers Helping Writers, page 126

Character Motivation Thesaurus Entry: Escaping a Widespread Disaster

What does your character want? This is an important question to answer because it determines what your protagonist hopes to achieve by the story’s end. If the goal, or outer motivation, is written well, readers will identify fairly quickly what the overall story goal’s going to be and they’ll know what to root for. But how do you know what outer motivation to choose?

If you read enough books, you’ll see the same goals being used for different characters in new scenarios. Through this thesaurus, we’d like to explore these common outer motivations so you can see your options and what those goals might look like on a deeper level.

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Courtesy: Pixabay

Character’s Goal (Outer Motivation): Escaping a widespread disaster

Forms This Might Take: Fleeing an area to escape…

a war
a tyranical government or regime
a terrorist attack causing a major societal disruption that knocks out power, food distribution, the police force, etc.
the aftereffects of a catastrophic weather event (tornado, hurricane, earthquake, volcanic eruption, superstorm, etc.)
an imminent asteroid or meteor strike
a nuclear explosion (resulting from war or an accident at a nearby power plant)
a deadly plague
the zombie apocalypse

Human Need Driving the Goal (Inner Motivation): safety and security

How the Character May Prepare for This Goal: 

Stockpiling survival supplies
Inventorying one’s materials to see what will be useful
Protecting one’s supplies from those who would steal them
Rationing one’s supplies
Talking to experts to determine the extent of the disaster and where it’s safe for one to go
Banding together with others to increase one’s chances of escaping
Mapping out an escape route (deciding which roads to take, what time of day/night to travel, etc.)
Inventorying the strengths of those in one’s company to determine who is best suited to do which jobs
Establishing new and stricter safety routines for one’s family to keep them safe
Acquiring a weapon and learning to use it
Formulating a plan to stop the disaster from happening (if this is possible)

Possible Sacrifices or Costs Associated With This Goal: 

Falling prey to illness, injury, or violence during one’s journey
Becoming separated from loved ones during the journey
Moving from a place of financial security into poverty
Having to start over (making friends, building a career, learning the culture, etc.) in a new place
Trading one place of danger for another (due to civil unrest, prejudice, social inequity, etc.)
Losing loved ones who choose to stay behind
Mental disorders arising from the journey (PTSD, depression, anxiety disorders, etc.)
One’s children being assimilated into the new culture and turning their backs on their heritage, religion, culture, etc.
Leaving behind things of importance (family heirlooms, property that’s been in the family for generations, childhood mementos, etc.)

Roadblocks Which Could Prevent This Goal from Being Achieved: 

Destroyed infrastructure that makes travel difficult (dilapidated bridges, roads blocked with abandoned cars, etc.)
Results of extreme weather that make travel difficult (washed-out bridges, roads being blocked by fallen trees or mudslides, flooding caused by broken dams, etc.)
Environmental factors that make leaving dangerous (air polluted with radiation or volcanic ash, an airborne disease, etc.)
The amount of time it takes to get from one place to another on foot prolonging the journey and increasing the chances of failure
Running out of supplies
A member of one’s party becoming injured or falling ill, slowing everyone down
Power-hungry officials that are reluctant to let people leave
Bureaucratic red tape making it difficult to leave one’s country or get into another
Criminals and those outside of the law preying on travelers
Extreme circumstances ramping up fear and anxiety in other groups, leading to unnecessary conflicts with one’s party
Conflict within one’s group (over which way to go, how to ration supplies, who should be in charge, etc.)
Letting someone into the group who turns out to be a threat
Reaching one’s destination and being denied access

Talents & Skills That Will Help the Character Achieve This Goal:

A Knack for Languages, Archery, Basic First Aid, Blending In, Gaining the Trust of Others, ESP (Clairvoyance), Enhanced Hearing, Enhanced Sense of Smell, Fishing, Foraging, Haggling, Herbalism, Hot-Wiring a Car, Knife Throwing, Lying, Mechanically Inclined, Mentalism, Reading People, Predicting the Weather, Repurposing, Self-Defense, Sewing, Sharpshooting, Strategic Thinking, Super Strength, Survival Skills, Swift-footedness, Wilderness Navigation

Possible Fallout For the Protagonist if This Goal Is Not Met:

Death for oneself and loved ones
Living a life of oppression
Constantly living in fear for the safety and well-being of one’s family
Starvation, being exposed to the elements, and other physical hardships
Being trapped in an unsustainable place and having to fight for survival
Feeling personally responsible for the people in one’s care who die as a result of not escaping the disaster
Having to watch one’s loved ones die
Seeing loved ones be victimized and mistreated by those in charge by those who take over in the void of leadership
Physical, mental, and emotional scars caused by suffering due to not escaping to a place of safety

Clichés to Avoid: 

Characters lacking experience with certain survival skills (shooting a gun, hunting, navigating the wilderness, etc.) easily picking them up with virtually no practice
The long-awaited catastrophe being averted just before disaster strikes
The team dedicated to stopping the catastrophe sacrificing themselves in the final hour to save the rest of civilization
Survivors having a natural resistance to a plague (rendering them immune) that is never explained—one that readers are expected to accept at face value

Click here for a list of our current entries for this thesaurus, along with a master post containing information on the individual fields.

Hand-Selling: How to Kill It at Book and Comic Conventions

Happy to welcome author Andy Peloquin back to the blog–he’s got some tips for in-person events where book selling comes with the territory, so read on!

Comic Conventions, Book Festivals, Book Signings, and other similar events are the best way to connect with readers in your city. Instead of appealing to the internet at large, you’re focused on a target demographic: people who like to read your genre of books in your area.

[image error]For many authors, public appearances are terrifying—but they don’t have to be! Angela’s post on Hand-Selling Your Book: How Savvy Are You? provides excellent insight into the basics of selling in person, but I’m going to share “sales secrets” that have enabled me to sell more books and engage with more people.

Stand Up – This is my #1 rule at conventions: never sit! Sitting is more comfortable, but  can make passersby feel like you’re “hiding” behind a wall of books. You’re also more likely to turn on your phone, read a book, or do something that draws your attention inward. When you stand up, you can’t relax, so you’re always looking around, talking to people, and focusing your attention outward–making you more approachable.

Get Them to Stop – Let’s say 5% of people will stop at your booth on the strength of your cover art and swag. But a solid 90% of people will respond to a question like “How are you enjoying the convention?” or “What brings you to the festival?” People LOVE to talk about the things that make them passionate.

Asking about their interests allows you to strike up a real conversation and possibly give you an opening to talk about your books. Remember to always be genuine; talk about their interests, passions, and hobbies. People respond positively to that.

Find Common Ground – Are they wearing a T-shirt you like? Does their costume belong to one of your favorite TV shows? Do they enjoy a certain book genre? Finding that common ground is the most important part of your conversation. If they see that you both like the same thing, they’re more likely to share YOUR interests—like your book!

Make ‘Em Laugh – Laughter can create a positive bond between people. If someone laughs at your joke, their brains are subconsciously telling them that you’re a good person. That positive association helps make them more receptive to you and your book.

Put it In Their Hands – A 2009 study from UCLA found that “merely touching an object results in an increase in perceived ownership”. Translated: if they touch the book, they’re more likely to buy it.

I learned this trick selling comic books. People love to flip through the pages and see the art and colors. It’s a bit different with novels—people will read the back cover material, study the cover, etc. This also goes hand in hand with the next tip.

[image error]Select an Engaging Passage – Choose a section of your book—500 to 1000 words, or one scene—that you think would appeal most to readers. If you’ve connected well with someone you can suggest, “Read a bit, if you like.” The book is in their hands, and you given them something engaging. SO effective for selling the story without saying a word (as long as you’ve taken care to not make them feel pressured).

Find a scene that gets them intrigued in the story/world and want to know more. Just like you use teasers for blog posts, this snippet of your book is meant to HOOK them.

Tell it Like a Story – Instead of saying, “My main character is this, who does this, and this happens,” tell it to them like a story. Give them a bit of information behind what prompted you to write the story, and how it relates to them.

Sharing it like a story—hand gestures, inflections, and excited tone of voice—makes it seem much more interesting to the person you’re talking to.

Be Passionate – A LOT of people have told me, “You sold me on the story,” rather than “The story appealed to me.” Of course the story is going to be good (you’ve labored hard to make it so), but when it comes to selling face-to-face, your passion is going to be the most appealing thing.

People love to see someone excited about something. If your tone of voice, facial expression, body language, gestures, and overall bearing show your enthusiasm and passion (by telling the story you love), people will identify with that and respond positively.

Be Fun – This is a bit too broad to be a specific tip (like the others above), but it’s one I find makes conventions so much more enjoyable for me. Personally I like to take goofy photos, do silly things, come up with crazy ideas to make me and the others around me laugh, and generally have a good time. Heck, I’ll even start dancing if someone next to me plays music. It puts a smile on the faces of those who see me (I am somewhat shameless at conventions), and it makes the time I spend on my feet more enjoyable.

Recommend Your Neighbors – This is a trick I use to both “put good karma into the world” and take advantage of the fact that I’m sitting next to people an entire weekend. If the authors around you write a genre you don’t, recommend the reader pop over to their table to check their books out.

This builds a relationship with the authors around you, and they’ll send people your way as well. Not only do you all end up selling more, it shows you’re a genuinely decent human being willing to help those around you. In the end, the good always comes back to you.

I use the tips above with every single person that passes my booth. I’ve found they help me get my books into the hands of readers a lot better than just sitting back and maintaining that “mysterious author” persona. Be fun, outgoing, and engaging…and you’ll sell MANY more books!

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Andy is getting ready to celebrate a new release–how awesome is that?
[image error]The Last Bucelarii (Book 3): Gateway to the Past

A faceless, nameless assassin.

A forgotten past. 

The Hunter of Voramis–a killer devoid of morals, or something else altogether?

(The Last Bucelarii–dark fantasy with a look at the underside of human nature)

Enjoy dark fantasy? Find this book at Amazon, jump into the whole series, or add it to your Goodreads list if you like!

About Andy Peloquin

[image error]I am, first and foremost, a storyteller and an artist–words are my palette. Fantasy is my genre of choice, and I love to explore the darker side of human nature through the filter of fantasy heroes, villains, and everything in between. I’m also a freelance writer, a book lover, and a guy who just loves to meet new people and spend hours talking about my fascination for the worlds I encounter in the pages of fantasy novels.

Twitter  * Facebook *  Website

Have you sold books in person before? Do you have any tips or ideas to add? Let me know in the comments!

 

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Character Motivation Entry: Protecting One’s Home or Property

What does your character want? This is an important question to answer because it determines what your protagonist hopes to achieve by the story’s end. If the goal, or outer motivation, is written well, readers will identify fairly quickly what the overall story goal’s going to be and they’ll know what to root for. But how do you know what outer motivation to choose?

[image error]If you read enough books, you’ll see the same goals being used for different characters in new scenarios. Through this thesaurus, we’d like to explore these common outer motivations so you can see your options and what those goals might look like on a deeper level.

Character’s Goal (Outer Motivation): Protecting One’s Home or Property

Forms This Might Take:

Protecting one’s home against the elements (a forest fire, a tropical storm)
Protecting one’s community during a civil war or attack
Protecting one’s farm from those wishing to seize one’s property and assets
Protecting one’s property from animals or creatures intent on doing harm
Warding off a supernatural attack
Safeguarding a keep
Safeguarding a lab or facility
Protecting an embassy or government building from terrorists or hostiles
Protecting one’s neighborhood during a riot
Protecting one’s home from the undead
Warding off attacks from renegade militant groups
Keeping pirates from boarding one’s ship
Protecting one’s home and family from violent individuals (a home invasion)
Protecting a church, school, business, or other building one feels ownership of during times of violence and unrest
Protecting one’s property from government agencies seeking to dismantle the group or organization within (a cult, an extremist group, etc.)
Protecting one’s business from rivals seeking to steal trade secrets, patents, or other information

Human Need Driving the Goal (Inner Motivation): safety and security

How the Character May Prepare for This Goal:

Investigating one’s enemy to better understand their strengths and weaknesses
Choosing a peaceful approach and attempting to work with those who represent a danger to one’s home or community by offering something they need (supplies, information, access to resources, etc.) in exchange for not interfering
Gathering resources so one can operate independently for a period of time if necessary (food, water, medicine, etc.)
Fortifying one’s home (boarding up windows, barring doors, installing shutters, reinforcing walls or other parts of the structure)
Placing guards and lookouts around one’s community
Creating natural traps and fortifications (digging pits, building perimeter walls and enclosures,burying mines, etc.)
Altering the landscape for protection (removing trees for greater visibility, creating a fire break, etc.)
Installing security systems
Hiring protective forces
Entering a training program (for weapons, hand-to-hand combat, defense, etc.)
Purchasing weapons
Investigating how to create homemade explosives
Studying building blueprints for vulnerabilities
Preparing an escape route
Digging an underground tunnel network or sewer system for strategic movement around the property or to use as an escape if necessary
Making plans and creating protocols for different situations that might happen
Reaching out to others for help (resources, manpower, weapons, protection)
Placing wards, sacred stones, or other spiritual protections around one’s home
Arranging for a blessing or spiritual cleansing of one’s home
Buying protective gear (gas masks, protective suits, etc.)
Investing in surveillance (cameras, listening devices, security guards, metal detectors, alarms, etc.)
Installing safes, panic rooms, or other fortified areas as a last resort if the home or building is breached

Possible Sacrifices or Costs Associated With This Goal:

Damaged relationships between family members or neighbors who may not see eye to eye on the path forward
Destruction of one’s property during an assault
A loved one being injured or killed
Running up debt to purchase what one needs to protect one’s home
Impaired judgement from a lack of sleep or paranoia due to stress
Being injured while protecting one’s home
Losing special mementos or having one’s assets damaged
Losing one’s standing in one’s community
Being viewed as paranoid or extreme by others for one’s protective measures
An innocent accidentally being hurt by one’s own defenses (a trap, friendly fire, etc.)

Roadblocks Which Could Prevent This Goal from Being Achieved:

A traitor who flips and secretly helps those who are seeking to overtake one’s home
An enemy who is well-equipped and well-manned
An enemy who is patient, and willing to wait it out until one is forced to give up (when resources run out, or a critical need emerges, like needing access to a doctor or medicine)
A fire breaking out that creates chaos and weakens one’s defenses
Having a home that is difficult to fortify (it has lots of windows, it is not in a defensible position, the property is so large it is impossible to surveil well, etc.)
Being pressured by one’s neighbors to give up because they have, losing one’s “strength in numbers” position
The enemy having access to a weapon that one cannot counter (a biological weapon, a supernatural force, technology that reveals one’s position to the enemy, etc.)
Running out of supplies
Sleep deprivation, an illness, or injuries that weaken one to the point that defense is difficult if not impossible
The enemy capturing someone one loves and using them as a chess piece

Talents & Skills That Will Help the Character Achieve This Goal:

A Knack for Languages
Archery
Astral Projection
Basic First Aid
Good Listening Skills
Blending In
Carpentry
Gaining the Trust of Others
ESP (Clairvoyance)
Enhanced Hearing
Enhanced Sense of Smell
Enhanced Taste Buds
Foraging
Charm
Hot-Wiring a Car
High Pain Tolerance
Knife Throwing
Knowledge of Explosives
Lip-Reading
Lying
Mechanically Inclined
A Knack for Making Money
Multitasking
Organization
Photographic Memory
Psychokinesis
Reading People
Repurposing
Self-Defense
Sharpshooting
Strategic Thinking
Super Strength
Survival Skills
Swift-footedness
Wilderness Navigation
Wrestling

Possible Fallout For the Protagonist if This Goal Is Not Met:

The loss of wealth, status, power, and property
Making an enemy that puts one in even greater danger
Losing one’s livelihood as a result of forfeiting one’s home or property
Becoming homeless
Losing whatever one was trying to protect (a family member, a priceless artifact, cherished objects, a cure for an illness, a special prototype, etc.)
Items falling into the wrong hands (weapons, a virus that can be weaponized, sensitive documents, etc.)

Click here for a list of our current entries for this thesaurus, along with a master post containing information on the individual fields.
Image: 3557203 @Pixabay

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Critiques 4 U

[image error]Hi, everyone! I’m hip deep in preparations for the DARA workshop I’ll be speaking at in Dallas (if you’re in the area, I’d love to see you there!). And in the process, I’ve discovered that I can only cram so much stuff in my brain. I need some down time, which always includes good reading material, so it’s time for

CRITIQUES 4 U!

If you’re working on a first page and would like some objective feedback, please leave a comment that includes: 

1) your email address. Some of you have expressed concern about making your email address public; if you’re sure that the email address associated with your WordPress account is correct, you don’t have to include it here. But if you do win and I’m unable to contact you through that email address, I’ll have to choose an alternate winner.

2) your story’s genre (no erotica, please)

Also, please be sure your first page is ready to go so I can critique it before next month’s contest rolls around. If it needs some work and you won’t be able to get it to me right away, I’d like to ask that you plan on entering the next contest, once any necessary tweaking has been taken care of.

How to Rescue a Book in Danger of Dying

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Some experts claim that as many as 82% of adults dream of writing a book. They have a story they are burning to tell or a message they are dying to convey. The advent of self-publishing has given all these people the opportunity to fulfill this dream – but first, they have to actually write the book, and writing a book that people actually want to read turns out to be a lot harder than it first seems.

The vast number of that 82% never get past the first few chapters. They may talk about writing a book, read books about writing a book, or attend conferences and courses about writing a book, but the work of sitting down and actually writing the book never happens.

You can tell if your book is in danger of dying if any of the following is true:

You talk about the book more than you write. You discuss craft and theory, you brainstorm about the next chapter, you compare your book to other people’s work – and you convince yourself that all that talking is somehow leading to progress.
You dread sitting down to write. It’s not fun, it brings you no joy, it’s an energy suck. You know you’re supposed to love it – this is what writers do, after all – and you love it in an abstract way but you don’t love the day-to-day doing of it.
The feedback you are getting whenever you dare to share your work is lukewarm at best, and so you just keep rewriting the same few pages, trying to get them “right” even though you aren’t really sure what that even means anymore.

If this describes you and your relationship to your book project, here are some steps to take to get out of the danger zone:

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Courtesy: Pixabay

Step 1: Decide if you WANT to save it

Ask yourself:

Do I care about saving this book?
If your answer is, “Hell, yes,” then go to Step 2.
If the answer is that it would be a relief to let it go, then let yourself let it go, and find another dream to dream.
If the answer is neutral, consider letting the idea go for a period of time – say a month – and seeing how that feels. If you can stop writing, perhaps you should stop writing.

Step 2: Decide WHY you should save it.

Ask yourself:

Why exactly am I doing this? What are my goals and objectives for my book? Why am I writing it? Check all that apply:

To make money
To make a name for myself as an expert/authority
To influence/educate/illuminate/comfort/entertain people
To raise my voice/speak up/claim my story
To prove that I can do it, either to myself or others
Because I feel called to do it/I am burning to do it/I can’t rest until I do it
To leave a legacy for my family
Other: __________________________________________




Is it in my power to achieve my stated goals and objectives?

If the answer is yes, move to Step 3.
If the answer is no – if, for example, your goal is to make money, and money depends on a fickle public finding and liking your book—ask yourself: is it worth the risk to move forward with an uncertain outcome? Perhaps you can reframe your idea of success so that it is in your power to achieve it.

Step 3: Decide WHO you should save it for

Ask yourself:

Who else will care about what you’re writing? Be very specific about your ideal reader. Describe him/her in two sentences. Think in terms of what keeps them up at night, what they are afraid of, what they most want in the world.
Now write down how your book gives them what you need – is it entertainment, escape, solace, information, inspiration?
Write these answers on a Post-It note to keep on your desktop: “I am writing this book because I believe (target readers) desperately need (deeply held value).”
Don’t write forward until you can answer this question, because writers need readers. It’s how we close the creative loop.

Step 5: Define your POINT

Ask yourself:

What’s my point? What am I trying to say? (And yes, fiction and memoir must make a point, too. If you are having trouble wrapping your mind around this, think of your favorite books and the points they make…) 

Step 6: Make sure you’re STARTING in the right place

Print out the first chapter of your book – or if you don’t yet have a complete first chapter, print out whatever you have. Go sit somewhere comfortable like a couch or a happy reading chair. Read your pages straight through as if you have never seen them before.

For fiction, memoir and narrative non-fiction, ask yourself:

Does the reader know EXACTLY who to root for and EXACTLY what’s at stake? Not in a vague way but in a super clear way – clear enough that if asked, they could say, “I am rooting for X person to achieve Y thing.” (In memoir, X person is you, who is both the narrator and the protagonist.)
Does the reader know EXACTLY what would happen if this person doesn’t get what they want?

For self-help/how-to, ask yourself:

Does the reader know EXACTLY what they are going to learn how to do and why?
Is the path to success crystal clear?

For any genre, if the answers are no, odds are good that you are not starting in the right place. You are probably gearing up, ramping up, warming up. You want to start in the place where it’s crystal clear what’s happening (or what the problem is for self-help/ how-to) and why it matters. Rewrite your opening so that you can answer yes to these questions.

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Courtesy: Pixabay

Step 7: Make sure you know where it’s all LEADING

Ask yourself:

Where does my book end?
Write this out in relation to the point you defined above and the place where the book begins. Think of the beginning and the end as a frame for the point you are trying to make.

For fiction and memoir: does the character get what they want or not?
For self-help/how-to: does the reader have what they need to achieve success?

Step 8: Lock in effective writing HABITS

Ask yourself:

Are the people I’m sharing my work with actually supporting my forward progress and helping me become a better writer? If not, find new writing friends.
Do I have the (physical/psychological) space I need to write well? If not, find it. Ditch the kitchen table for the library, save up for noise cancelling headphones for the coffee shop, use Internet-blocking software, start training your family to leave you alone after 9 pm three nights a week.
What am I willing to give up to finish this book? Commitment takes sacrifice. What can you let go of in your life to make room for this project?
How can I measure my success? Give yourself deadlines and find someone to share them with so they can hold you accountable.

Step 9: Be GENTLE with yourself

Writing is hard work – far harder than most people realize. Don’t beat yourself up if it’s not going the way you would like it to go. Keep at it – and remind yourself that if it were easy, 82% of all adults would be authors, and writing a book would not be the deeply satisfying achievement it is.

[image error]Jennie has worked in publishing for more than 30 years. She is the author of four novels, three memoirs, and The Writer’s Guide to Agony and Defeat. An instructor at the UCLA Extension Writing Program for 10 years, she is also the founder and chief creative officer of Author Accelerator, an online program that offers affordable, customized book coaching so you can write your best book. Find out more about Jennie here, visit her blog, discover the resources and coaching available at her Author Accelerator website, and connect online.

Twitter | Instagram

 

 

Character Motivation Thesaurus Entry: Pursuing Justice For Oneself or Others

What does your character want? This is an important question to answer because it determines what your protagonist hopes to achieve by the story’s end. If the goal, or outer motivation, is written well, readers will identify fairly quickly what the overall story goal’s going to be and they’ll know what to root for. But how do you know what outer motivation to choose?

If you read enough books, you’ll see the same goals being used for different characters in new scenarios. Through this thesaurus, we’d like to explore these common outer motivations so you can see your options and what those goals might look like on a deeper level.

[image error]

Courtesy: Pixabay

Character’s Goal (Outer Motivation): Pursuing Justice for Oneself or Others

Forms This Might Take: 

Winning a court case and proving oneself or one’s client innocent
Enacting a law that will provide equality for a group of people
Changing the status quo (in a country, school, organization, etc.) in way that brings about justice for someone
Making something available to others that one believes to be a personal right (freedom, education, clean water, the ability to vote, etc.)
Saving someone from being bullied, persecuted, or discriminated against
Bringing an unjust situation to light so it can be addressed
Exposing the deeds of an evil person or entity so justice will be served

Human Need Driving the Goal (Inner Motivation): love and belonging

How the Character May Prepare for This Goal: 

Inserting oneself (to some degree) into the oppressed group to get a feel for what they’re going through
Looking for allies within the oppressed group who are willing to go public
Finding external allies who are in a specific position to help (doctors, judges, lawyers, government officials, celebrities, experts in a field, etc.)
Gathering evidence
Reading up on prior fights for this group that produced favorable results
Organizing rallies and protests to increase public awareness
Raising funds
Counteracting propaganda (through a blog or YouTube channel, by distributing fliers and pamphlets, with media interviews, etc.)
Shifting one’s priorities so this pursuit can be given more time and energy
Visiting the oppressed group or area as a way of doing research
Studying the situation to educate oneself
Exploring alternative solutions that could help solve the problem (different ways of getting clean water to an area, finding cost-effective methods of bringing education to those without it)
Educating the people (if necessary) on the situation and what they can do to decrease their own victimization

Possible Sacrifices or Costs Associated With This Goal: 

being harmed (physically, financially, etc.) by those who don’t want the status quo to change
strained relations with family members who are being threatened or attacked due to one’s involvement
losing friends who don’t agree that injustice is happening and don’t support one’s goal
one’s reputation being ruined in a smear campaign
becoming so impassioned with this culture or group of people that one loses touch with one’s own
becoming so obsessed with righting the wrong that one sacrifices one’s family, career, health, or mental well-being
Giving up hobbies, memberships in organizations, or passions that once were important but now seem trivial in comparison to the greater wrong that’s happening

Roadblocks Which Could Prevent This Goal from Being Achieved: 

Powerful people or organizations who are deliberately oppressing the group for their own gain
Legislature and bureaucratic red tape that make change difficult
Ignorance or denial among the public
Lack of resources (money, time, volunteers, etc.)
Lack of necessary skills
Cultural barriers (not speaking the language, prejudices that make one untrustworthy to the people one wants to help, etc.)
Naïveté or overzealousness leading to lapses in judgment

Talents & Skills That Will Help the Character Achieve This Goal:

A Knack for Languages
Good Listening Skills
Gaining the Trust of Others
ESP (Clairvoyance)
Empathy
Charm
Mechanically Inclined
Mentalism
A Knack for Making Money
Multitasking
Organization
Photographic Memory
Promotion
Reading People
Strategic Thinking 

 

Possible Fallout For the Protagonist if This Goal Is Not Met:

Oppression and possibly loss of life for those one is fighting for
A lack of meaning in one’s own life
Substance abuse (due to guilt or wanting to dull the knowledge that people are continuing to be oppressed)
An inability to continue living in the culture that didn’t help the oppressed or refused to see the injustice
Depression and mental illness
One’s failure proving the naysayers right, reinforcing their ignorance and decreasing the chances of someone else taking up this fight down the road

Clichés to Avoid: 

The crusader who sacrifices everything (health, finances, family) but is unable to overcome the opposition and ends up penniless and alone
The stereotypes that lend themselves to this role (hippies, rabid environmentalists, etc.)

Click here for a list of our current entries for this thesaurus, along with a master post containing information on the individual fields.

ProWritingAid: A Useful Tool For Many Types Of Writing

Today’s post is brought to you by Resident Writing Coach, April Bradley, who knows her way around the editing desk (and then some!). Read on to get her take on ProWritingAid, a great piece of editing software for writers.

[image error]When Angela asked me to review some editing software, I was intrigued. I had never used this kind of tool before and wondered how developers could create something that performed better than a sophisticated grammar program. As a writer, I use self-editing strategies during revision. As a developmental and line editor, grammar programs are, of course, useful, but do not help me with nuanced problems that interfere with elements such as structure, character development, pacing, flow, voice, technique, style, and momentum. ProWritingAid exceeded my expectations.

ProWritingAid is an editing and style software that provides support to writers after the drafting stage. Users may compose within the program or work with other platforms such as Microsoft Word, Mac, Scrivener, Open/Libre Office, and Google by import within the on-line editor, as an add-on plug-in, and as a desktop application.

Premium users have unrestricted access to the premium toolbar in addition to the free editor and a number of operations that allow a user to analyze and edit on several levels, including a plagiarism checker. ProWritingAid does not supplant developmental, line, and copy editing, but it helps writers become better ones, and for those of us who do edit, it is a useful and fun program, especially for those of us who enjoy data.

This is no mere grammar and spell-checker. This product has a great deal of depth, and yet it is intuitively easy to use. Users easily can become dependent on the generated reports and neglect the features that provide more extensive analysis.

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ProWritingAid provides 25 reports, including a Summary Report and an option to customize reports. The following reports are among my favourite:

The Writing Style Report, a comprehensive report that revels elements that weaken readability such as passive voice and repetitive sentence starts.


The Grammar Check works much like one in any word processor but with the added benefit of the expertise of copy editors.


The Overused Words Report identifies problematic words that falls into five main categories: Too Wishy-Washy, Telling Rather Than Showing, Weak Words Dependent on Intensifiers, Nonspecific Words, Awkward Sentence Constructions. In the drafting stage, these kinds of words on the sentence level is often where writers like to revise.


The Sticky Sentence Report tallies “glue words,” which are the most commonly used articles, prepositions, and conjunctions that obscure clarity. The software’s suggestion is that sentences contain less than 45% glue words.


The Sentence Length Report and The Pacing Check Report provide users with information about sentence variety and a bar graph to show how readers experience the speed of your prose.


The Sensory Check looks for words and constructions that refer to the five senses.


The Alliteration Report looks for instances of words with repetitive consonant sound at the beginning. I found this particular report fascinating and helpful. Along with The Eloquence Check that is another technique report, writers who are working on the sentence level and over the arc of an entire work, word choice and the relationships between words is vital.


The House Style Check is a feature I appreciate. Many businesses have their own style, even if it jumps of AP, Chicago, or MLA. This feature allows a user to look for specific issues in a document that are not standardized in word processors.

(Learn more about the full array of reports here as well visit as these articles on The Summary Report and The Combo Report.)

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ProWritingAid analyzes seven types of writing: General, Academic, Business, Technical, Creative, Causal, and Web. I uploaded drafts and finished works (my own, and those solicited from friends) in the following categories: fiction, creative nonfiction, academic, blog posts, business technical writing, and casual email from 150 words to 15,000.

Here’s what a couple of the reports looked like for one of my published flash creative nonfiction pieces (click to enlarge):

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The summary report is too long to grab in a single screenshot, but here is a sample:

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According to this tool, my sentences are sticky with empty words and the pacing is slow. I agree. This is something I’d like to revise, but not for pacing. The slow pacing is deliberate. One thing I also notice: I never, ever break the 67 percent on editing.

The final feature I’d like to mention is Word Explorer. This feature is so much word-wonderful fun. I could fall into it and not emerge for days—and I am one of those people who fool around on the OED site.A sound bite from the site:

“The Word Explorer helps you break through writer’s block. It shows you definitions, synonyms, examples, rhymes, collocations and more. Type a word in the search box to get going.”

Word Explorer provoked a gasp from me, and I ended up playing with it for quite a while. This aspect of ProWritingAid is a writing prompt as well as a resource for finding the perfect word and make “semantic leaps.”

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Overall, the program offered the most helpful analysis with Business, Creative, Causal, and Web writing. When I used it to analyze academic and technical writing, it focused too much on end notes and minutiae. This is unsurprising, however, and my samples were highly polished: one was a soon-to-be-published article in a peer-reviewed journal, and the other was a report for the State of Tennessee by the Commission On Children.

ProWritingAid did offer a good analysis of readability and clarity. Overall, I enjoyed the program. It doesn’t take the place of discernment and good judgment with what to do with the information. Pricing is currently $40 for one year, $60 for two years, $80 for three year, and $140 for a lifetime subscription. Plagiarism checks are very reasonable from one-time charges to package deals.

Final Takeaway: Writers and editors, check it out! And if you do, there’s a special code for Writers Helping Writers readers and One Stop For Writers users: type in WRITERSHELPING into the discount code box and you’ll get 25% off.

How awesome is that?

Have you used ProWritingAid before? Would something like this help you strengthen your writing? Let us know in the comments.

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[image error]April Bradley has a Master’s in Ethics from Yale University and studied Philosophy and Theology as a post-graduate scholar at Cambridge University. Her fiction has appeared in many literary magazines and has been nominated for the 2015 Best of the Net Anthology as well as the 2017 Pushcart Prize.

She is the Associate Editor for Bartleby Snopes Literary Magazine and Press and the Founder and Editor of Women Who Flash Their Lit. Find out more about April here, visit her website, and catch up with her online.

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What Does It Mean To “Raise the Stakes”?

[image error]Yay! I’m happy to be back at WHW as a Resident Writing Coach. *waves* Last time I visited, we discussed how understanding the interconnectedness of our story elements can help us with revisions, and today we’re going to dig deeper into one of those elements: our story’s stakes.

Stakes are simply the consequences of failure. If our character doesn’t reach their goal, what will happen? What can go wrong?

Low stakes—such as when there are no consequences or failure would be no big deal—can create problems with our story’s conflicts, tension, and pacing, as well as weaken motivations and make goals seem less important.

So we definitely want to follow advice like “Raise the stakes throughout your story,” but how do we do that?

Step #1: Check for Goals

We all know that our protagonist should have a goal (or at least an unconscious longing) in every scene, right? But we’re not referring to just a big-picture story goal like “beat the bad guy.” Rather, scenes should also have a specific, immediate goal.

For example, the character wants to…:

get the job
help a family member
reassure a friend
avoid trouble
win the bet
arrive on time
prove their competence
beat the rush-hour traffic, etc.

Step #2: Identify the Cost of Failure

Without consequences for failure, readers have no reason to care about or root for a certain outcome—any will do. So we have to identify what the negative consequences are if the character fails to reach those goals.

However—unlike goals—stakes don’t have to be immediate. Humans often act to avoid imagined trouble—think of parents who try to get their baby into a certain day care center because they believe that will lead to a good school, college, job, and lifelong success for their adult child years in the future. *smile* Our characters can behave the same way.

Stakes could be a specific failure to reach the goal (doesn’t get the job), or they could be a general risk, threat, fear, etc. of related failure (my child won’t be a successful adult). Stakes can be anything that motivates our character into acting to avoid the feared situation becoming reality.

Step #3: Ensure the Cost Increases during the Story

Ever wonder what counts as increasing stakes? Are stakes less than life-and-death too weak? Or if the protagonist is at risk of death, how do we increase the stakes from there?

Judging stakes as strong or weak all depends on context. In one story, not getting a job could be devastating. In another story, that failure could simply mean the character doesn’t get the prestige of a promotion.

[image error]In other words, it’s up to us as the author to sell the idea of how strong a stake is. A self-sacrificing type of character might think the risk of death is no big deal, but if the next scene shows their loved one at risk, that could be a huge increase in the stakes even though it’s not about them anymore.

“Raising the stakes” refers to how close the cost hits to home for that character. How much would failure “attack” their sense of self, who they are or want to be?

Why Is It Important to Raise the Stakes?

Characters might not be as eager to take the story’s journey if they knew all the obstacles ahead of time. The stakes are a way to force characters not to give up or walk away in the face of a story’s increasingly difficult conflicts and obstacles.

Also, at their heart, stories aren’t about plot. Rather, the plot reveals who the characters are.

The plot’s rising stakes force characters to make riskier and riskier choices. By the end of the story, they’re doing things they never would have imagined they’d do at the beginning of the story, and readers get to see the character’s essence, as they’re stripped down and vulnerable.

Other Tips for Using Stakes in Our Story:

Stakes don’t have to increase every Some scenes can reinforce stakes, reminding readers of the risks. Or scenes can deepen stakes, with the character becoming more involved with the same risks.
Subplots have their own consequences, which might be lower than the stakes of the main plot. That means stakes might decrease from one scene to the next if the story changes focus to a subplot. However, within each subplot, the stakes will

Subplots are often a good place to let our characters fail completely with no opportunity to “fix” the situation. Dealing with the consequences of a subplot failure can maintain the story’s tension in the middle act, and our protagonist’s failure in one situation can make the other stakes seem more possible too.

How do you raise the stakes in your scenes?

[image error]Muttering writing advice in tongues, Jami decided to put her talent for making up stuff to good use. Fueled by chocolate, she creates writing resources and writes award-winning paranormal romance stories where normal need not apply. Just ask her family—and zombie cat.

Find out more about Jami here, hang out with her on social media, or visit her website and Goodreads profile.

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Image: Readon @ Pixabay

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Dan Blank: The Daily Practice of Growing Your Audience

Finding your book’s ideal audience and the people who are influential with that group is a core piece of marketing, but many authors struggle with where to even begin. Dan Blank of WeGrowMedia is here with practical, actionable steps to show you how to find readers and build relationships that will help you immeasurably down the road.

[image error]Today I want to talk about why you need to begin developing your audience for your book as early as possible. Then I want to share practical steps you can take each day to do this, even amidst an otherwise busy life.

[image error]This comes from the methodology I share in my new book, Be the Gateway: A Practical Guide to Sharing Your Creative Work and Engaging an Audience. I frame the process as crafting a gateway that leads people to your writing, opening the gate to your ideal readers, and then leading them through your gateway in meaningful ways. It is a process filled with joy, not spammy marketing tactics.

It takes time to understand who your ideal readers are, how to connect with them, and develop trusting relationships with those who already have their attention. This sets the foundation for what all authors want: word of mouth marketing.

Let’s establish a process for you to find what will engage your ideal audience Here are three steps I want you to take:

Study Your Marketplace

Know the marketplace your book will be a part of better than anyone. Here is the process I just went through with one of my clients who writes fiction:

Identify “comps” for your book. These are comparable works that your ideal readers likely know about. They are comparable works that booksellers and librarians may know of when you tell them the genre or topic you write within. Seek out comps that have been published within the past few years, and as best you can, pay particular attention to those authors who didn’t initially find success decades ago.
Research each comp book and comp author. Go to the book pages on Amazon and Goodreads, and read through their book description, their author bio, and reviews for the book. Then seek out the author’s website, their social media channels, and any videos that feature them on YouTube. In doing so, identify the phrases that these authors seem to repeat; the ways they frame their books; the language that readers use again and again to say why these loved these books; notice where these people (both the authors and the readers) show up online: what channels.
Use this initial round of comps to map the marketplace. See what other books Amazon recommends and determine if these are comps as well. See who reviews and mentions the comp books — what media, websites, events, and other prominent places online and off.

Throughout this process, you will move from having only a vague understanding of your marketplace, to knowing every comparable book, why they engage readers, how they developed an audience, and the names and faces of those who are advocates of books like yours.

This is a daily and weekly research process. Take simple actions each day to develop this. In the beginning, you may feel confused, even frustrated. I encourage you to persist through that. Because that is where the magic is.

Most authors skip this research, and around book launch, they are left hoping that their book magically finds readers.

At the end of each week, write down one new thing you learned about your audience from your research. After a few months what you will find is that your understand the marketplace surrounding your book better than nearly any other author. Imagine what it will feel like to have that kind of awareness and certainty when developing a launch plan for your next book.

Test Your Messaging

Your voice is the most powerful tool you have to truly develop an audience and engage people in a meaningful way. Not an app, not a button, not some “social media hack.” By your voice: I mean your writing, your actual voice, or any way that you meaningfully share your creative vision with others.

[image error]Instead of waiting until launch to make a “big splash” with your book, use your voice to bring us along in your journey.

In the past several years, authors have been told to create websites, email newsletters, blogs, book trailers, podcasts, and use Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr, and so much else. An artist I spoke to last week told me that she keeps having people tell her:

You have to be everywhere — on every social media channel
You have to keep promoting your work — pound it into people’s heads.

Bleh. Nobody wants this. Not you, and not the audience you hope to engage. Instead, what if, as you study your marketplace in the steps I listed above, you began slowly engaging with some of these people. Not by broadcasting spammy Tweets about your book, but via direct messages as two people who are passionate about the same kinds of books.

In doing so, learn what engages people. What feels right for you to say to others that gets them to lean in and want to chat?

There are two ways to do this:

The human level: what feels right to you? What gets people to respond? What develops the foundation of relationships with others who you would consider colleagues in your field: advocates for books such as yours.
The technical level: use social media ads, a/b testing features in email newsletters and other data to try out five ways of talking about your book, and see which one gets more attention, and converts them to taking an action: clicking a link, subscribing to a newsletter, following you on social media. Even if you could care less about developing a social media following, this data becomes useful for you when determining how to writer your book description, and how to develop a marketing plan for a book launch.

Developing your voice is a practice. I know, your vision may be confident, and the voice you have with your friends may feel unwavering and clear. But to a marketplace of readers, it takes time to develop, to gain clarity, and for you to understand why things resonate.

In this process of studying the marketplace and testing what resonates, focus on developing relationships with those who are as passionate about books as you are.

This should be a daily practice of coming together with others in celebration of books, stories, and the passion that made you become an author in the first place.

[image error]Dan Blank is the author of Be the Gateway: A Practical Guide to Sharing Your Creative Work and Engaging an Audience. He is also the founder of WeGrowMedia, where he helps writers and creative professionals share their stories and grow their audience.

He has worked with hundreds of individuals and amazing organizations who support creative people, such as Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group, Sesame Workshop, Workman Publishing, J. Walter Thompson, Abrams Books, Writers House, The Kenyon Review, Writer’s Digest, Library Journal, and many others. You can find Dan on his blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

Have a question for Dan on finding & connecting with your book’s audience or influencers? Let us know in the comments!

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Conflict and Suspense Belong in Every Kind of Novel

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What is the goal of the novel? Is it to entertain? Teach? Preach? Stir up anger? Change the world? Make the author a lot of money?

It can be any of these things, but in the end, none of these objectives will work to their full potential unless they forge, in some way, a satisfying emotional experience for the reader. And what gets the reader hooked emotionally? Trouble! Readers are gripped as they vicariously experience a massive pile of trouble on a lead character.

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That’s where conflict comes in. While there those who say plot comes from character, I say Bosh. Character comes from plot.

Why? Because true character is only revealed in crisis. Put your character into big trouble (plot) and then we’ll see what he or she is made of (character). If you don’t believe me, imagine a 400-page novel about Scarlett O’Hara where she just sits on the porch all day, sipping mint juleps and flirting. Gone With the Wind only takes off when Scarlett finds out Ashley is going to marry Melanie (trouble!) and then the Civil War breaks out (big trouble!)

Another way to think about it is this: we all wear masks in our lives. A major crisis forces us to take off the mask and reveal who we really are. That’s the role of conflict in fiction: to rip the mask off the character.

Now, conflict must be of sufficient magnitude to matter to readers. That’s why I teach that “death stakes” must be involved. Your lead character must be facing death—which can be physical, professional, or psychological.

Genre doesn’t matter. In a literary novel like The Catcher in the Rye, it’s psychological death. Holden Caulfield must find meaning in the world or he will “die inside.” Psychological death is also the key to a category romance. If the two lovers do not get together, they will lose their soul mate. They will die inside and forever have diminished lives (that’s the feeling you need to create). Think about it. Why was Titanic such a hit with teen girls? It wasn’t because of the special effects!

In The Silence of the Lambs, professional death is on the line. Clarice Starling must help bring down Buffalo Bill in part by playing mind games with Hannibal Lecter. If she doesn’t prevail, another innocent will die (physical death in the subplot) and Clarice’s career will be over.

And in thrillers, of course, you have the threat of physical death hanging over the whole thing.

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The second element is suspense, and I don’t just mean in the suspense novel per se. Suspense means to “delay resolution so as to excite anticipation.” Another way to say this is that it’s the opposite of having a predictable story. If the reader keeps guessing what’s going to happen, and is right, there is no great pleasure in reading the novel.

We’ve all had the wonderful experience of being so caught up in a story that we have to keep turning the pages. This is where writing technique can be studied and learned and applied. For example, there are various ways you can end a chapter so readers are compelled to read on. I call these “Read on Prompts,” and it was one of the first things I personally studied when I started learning to write. I went to a used bookstore and bought a bunch of King, Koontz, and Grisham. When I’d get to the end of a chapter I’d write in pencil on the page what they did to get me to read on.

Invaluable.

Again, genre doesn’t matter. You have to be able to excite anticipation and avoid predictability. Suspense technique helps you to do that. I am so passionate about this that I wrote a book on the subject: Conflict & Suspense  (Writer’s Digest Books). In fact, if you were to concentrate almost exclusively on these two key elements for the next few months, your books will take a huge step toward that exalted “next level” everyone always talks about.

Raymond Chandler’s legendary PI, Philip Marlowe, once told a client, “Trouble is my business.” It’s yours, too, writer. Now go make some.

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Jim is the author of the #1 bestseller for writers, Plot & Structure, and numerous thrillers, including, Romeo’s Rules, Try Dying and Don’t Leave Me. His popular books on fiction craft can be found here. His thrillers have been called “heart-whamming” (Publishers Weekly) and can be browsed here. Find out more about Jim on our Resident Writing Coach page, and connect with him online.

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