Janice Hardy's Blog, page 13

A Fun Way to Brainstorm Your Next Story Idea

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy 
Your favorite story, movie, or TV show can be the key to your next great novel idea.
I think for most of us, ideas are pretty easy. They pop into our heads all the time, either as a general concept, a fun character, or an interesting situation. What’s hard, is turning that idea into a workable conflict with a plot that will become a strong novel. That’s where the real skill comes in.
Next time you’re stuck on what to do with your idea, or just need a way to generate an idea, turn to your favorite movies and books and “steal” what you love about them (and no, I’m not advocating plagiarism here, bear with me).

One of my favorite movies is Mama , a creepy, horror/psychological suspense that turns the whole idea of conflict and what it means it be an antagonist on its head. Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

How to Make Readers Care About Your Protagonist—and Your Plot

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

If you’re struggling with a lagging story, a lack of character agency might be the reason why.

A helpful-yet-brutal piece of critique feedback is “Why should I care?” Why should readers care about the character, the conflict, or the story in general? Why should they read this novel you’ve worked so hard to create?

“Because it’s my novel and I love it” might be true, but sadly, no one outside our friends and family accept that as a reason. And sometimes, not even then if we have honest critique partners. Potential readers are lost every day to novels that might be good in every other aspect, but they just “didn’t care” what happened to the characters.

Often, this is due to a lack of agency.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

How the Setting Raises Tension in Your Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Your characters’ world provides opportunities to create mood and raise the tension in your scenes.

Universal Studios' Halloween Horror Nights is a perfect example of how a setting can influence the people in it.

The park is decorated with haunted houses and scary set pieces, and costumed staff (some with chainsaws) lurk in the shadows to jump out at guests. One group is startled and they scream, which makes everyone around them nervous, and just when people start to relax, another staff member leaps out. People who normally wouldn't be startled tend to shriek, because the setting already has them on edge.

This isn’t a happy coincidence. These staff members are trained to target guests who typically scare the easiest, so they look for younger people (particular teens and women) in groups, because they scream the loudest, and screams are contagious.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

How to Write a Spooky Ghost Story

By Rayne Hall, @RayneHall

Part of the How They Do It Series

JH: Ghost stories both thrill and chill, ad readers love them no matter what time of the year . Rayne Hall shares tips for writing a spooky tale.

Ghost stories have always been reader favorites. They appeal to a wider audience than most other stories: children enjoy them as much as adults, and even people who normally cringe at the thought of Horror fiction gain pleasure from a good ghostly yarn. How can you write an entertaining, creepy story?

Plot and Backstory
All good Ghost stories consist of two tales. The first is the past tragedy which keeps the ghost haunting in search of atonement or vengeance. The second is about the person whose life gets thrown off course when the ghost intervenes.

The Ghost story needs more pre-planning than most other dark fiction, because you need to weave these two strands together.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

Why Every Plot Needs A Ticking Clock

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Sometimes, characters need a little boost to get them moving so the plot doesn’t stall.

I tend to procrastinate, especially when I already have a lot that on my plate. My to-do list fills up, and any task that won’t get me into trouble if I ignore it falls lower and lower on the list until it’s forgotten.

This can be problematic in life, but it’s deadly for a plot.

If the novel’s problem can be resolved “whenever” and it doesn’t matter when that happens, there’s no sense of urgency to the story. No urgency lowers tension, and low tension makes it harder for readers to care. And a lack of caring means the book will probably wind up forgotten at the bottom of a to-read list.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

5 Ways Your Dialogue Annoys Your Readers

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Make sure your dialogue is helping your story, not chasing readers away.

I read a lot of first drafts, and one area that frequently needs work is the dialogue. It’s understandable since we often need to write the dialogue before we know what the character’s voice sounds like. Think of it as placeholder dialogue—it’s there to remind us what the character needs to say, but it might not be the way they ought to say it.

For example, the character might be too formal, or say something too on-the-nose about how they feel, or they sound like every other character in the room. The dialogue is more “this is the information the character needs to convey” and less “this is what the character says based on how they feel right now.”
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

Pondering the Prologue: Keep it or Kill it?

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Here are six reasons you may (or may not) need that prologue.

Before I dive in today, I’m guest posting over at Writers in the Storm, with 5 Fun Ways to Take Advantage of Your Character’s Fears. Come on over and take a peek.

Now, back to today’s post…

Like fashion trends, prologues go in and out of style. For a while, they were everywhere—especially in fantasy novels, where readers would learn an important element of the novel’s history, or see a pivotal moment of a character’s past.

Then they fell out of fashion, and agents (and readers) skipped them more often than not. They became dumping grounds for pages of backstory and setup, or ever false first chapters, where they started with another character relevant to the tale, but not the actual protagonist.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

Why “The Worst That Can Happen” Is Terrible Writing Advice

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The worst that can happen isn’t always the best thing for the plot.

For many stories, the worst thing that can happen to the protagonist is that they die. The threat of death looms over them throughout the novel, they face it time and time again, and in the end—surprise surprise—they don’t die.

Which is the problem with death as a stake.

With a few rare exceptions (looking at you Orson Scott Card and George R.R Martin), authors aren’t going to kill off a main character, let along their protagonist. The kinda defeats the purpose of the novel.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

An Unpredictable (and Fun) Trick to Keep Your Plots Unpredictable

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy 
To write unpredictable scenes, try being unpredictable.

Plotting a novel can be a lot of fun, but it can also get a little tedious at times—trying to figure out the next step of a puzzle, crafting the perfect response to every choice your characters make, deciding when, where, and if you need a plot twist. When the muse is on your side the story flows quickly, but when she's not?

For those days, try treating your scenes like a game of chance to kick start the muse and keep readers guessing.
All you need is a single die or a random number generator, and the courage to think outside the box. This exercise is fun, but it can also send your scene in a direction you never anticipated—and might not want to go. And that's okay. You don't have to go where the Muse of Chance sends you, but at least try to think about how that direction might affect the story.Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

5 Ways to Revive a Manuscript That Doesn't Work

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Difficult manuscripts often need tough love and hard choices to make them work.

Last year, I had three manuscripts for novels that didn't work. They were all stories and concepts I loved, but the drafts got less-than-stellar feedback. But I wasn't willing to give up on those stories, because I believed in them, even while they tried to kill me and my muse.

Some of them have been waiting years for me to figure out how to fix them. It took me a while, but I have a good feeling about all three of them now.

Idea #1 I threw out and started over from scratch. I even changed my POV from first to third person. The story stayed the same, but I re-addressed how I told that story.

I completed it a few months ago, and it just needs one last final critique pass. I'm delighted to report that the feedback from my beta readers is now stellar. The last time I had such overwhelmingly positive comments was when my betas were reading my debut novel, The Shifter. I'm taking this as a very good sign.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com