Janice Hardy's Blog, page 27

4 Steps for Choosing What Details to Describe in a Scene

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

It’s not always clear which details need to go into a scene, which can lead to a muddy, forgetful scene.

I was revising the opening scene of my science fiction novel this week, based on my latest critiques. It’s a complex novel with a lot of world building, and some of the critical details were getting lost or weren’t triggering the right expectation from my readers. That’s pretty normal for early drafts critiques, but clearly, I needed to establish a few more details.

It would have been easy to just dump them in, but infodumps on your first page rarely work to hook a reader. I had to find ways to convey the important information readers needed without infodumping, telling, or explaining.

It also would have been easy to list out what I knew was there and bombard readers with a slew of details to wade through. That’s not something I enjoy reading, so I avoid writing it as well. A list of random, often generic details does nothing to give readers a strong sense of the world and what’s going on in that world.

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

9 Questions You Must Ask Your Main Character

By Laurence MacNaughton, @LMacNaughton

Part of The How They Do It Series

JH: Since characters are the reason a story exists, it's good to know certain things about them. Laurence MacNaughton shares questions to get to the heart of your characters—and your story.
A memorable main character lingers in a reader's memory far longer than any details about the plot. That's why your main character is the single most important part of your story. If you want to create a character that readers will remember for years to come, first get inside your character's head and ask them these nine questions.

1. Who are you and what you do?
What we're looking for here is your character's "high concept." This can be as simple as an adjective and a profession: a notorious outlaw, a heavy-drinking ad executive, a time-traveling detective. Whatever. It's your story.

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

5 Places to Find Your Novel’s Theme

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Theme is one of the best plotting tools a writer has.

I’ve always been a plot-focused writer, so theme was something I never paid a lot of attention to when I was learning how to write. I didn’t think I needed it, because theme was for literary novels or stories with deep, meaningful messages, not for commercial fiction and good old-fashioned adventures.

Eventually, I realized that was total bunk.

Theme is a highly useful part of any novel, be it a light-hearted romp or a nail-biting adventure. It’s an element that gives greater meaning to the story and turns background fluff into substance.

Theme can tie individual pieces of a story together so they work on multiple levels. Theme allows descriptive details to resonate with a character’s mood, or lets a plot point become a mirror to an internal struggle. Theme makes everything in the story matter more.

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

WIP Diagnostic: Is This Working? A Closer Look at an SF Short Story Opening

Critique by Maria D'Marco

WIP Diagnostics is a weekly column that studies a snippet of a work in progress for specific issues. Readers are encouraged to send in work with questions, and we diagnose it on the site. It’s part critique, part example, and designed to help the submitter as well as anyone else having a similar problem.

If you're interested in submitting to WIP Diagnostics, please check out these guidelines. 

Submissions currently in the queue: Zero

Please Note: As of today, critique slots are open.

This week’s questions:

I'm wondering about the voice of the narrator. Is it funny, hokey, overdone, stupid? In short, does it work? There's some spots where the narrator is telling rather than showing, but in 1st person, it often seems more realistic to 'just say it.' Do you agree? And the practical stuff: Do you want to read the rest of the story? Would you want to read more stories told by this narrator? Did it make you start to chuckle?

Market/Genre: Science Fiction Short Story

On to the diagnosis…

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

Story Structure: How the Midpoint Reversal Works in a Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The midpoint reversal is the glue that holds the first and second halves of the novel together.

Like many writers, I used to hate middles. My novels always bogged down halfway through, the plot hit a wall, or I realized it had gone so far off track I was writing a different novel. I can’t tell you how many times I just chucked the whole draft and started over.

Until I discovered the midpoint reversal, and it changed my writing life.

After that, middles weren’t a problem anymore, and plotting became a whole lot easier. I didn’t bog down or fizzle out, and I always knew where my plot was headed.

A strong midpoint reversal just flat out makes a novel easier to write.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

Tips on Writing "The Boring Stuff" Readers Tend to Skip

By Jenna Harte
Part of The How They Do It Series
JH: Readers skim when they read, especially if nothing is really going on in the story. Jenna Harte shares tips on keeping readers engaged in your novel.
Jenna Harte is a die-hard romantic writing about characters who are passionate about and committed to each other, and frequently getting into trouble. She is the author of the Valentine Mysteries, the first of which, Deadly Valentine , reached the quarter-finals in Amazon’s Breakthrough Novel Award in 2013. She has a contemporary romance series, Southern Heat, and a cozy mystery series, Sophie Parker Coupon Mystery Series. 

Romance authors can join her free writing community for support, accountability and more at WritewithHarte. Jenna loves talking to anyone and everyone about romance fiction. You can join her free romance fiction reader community, SwoonworthyHEA to talk romance with other readers. 
Website | Goodreads | Facebook | Pinterest | Instagram | YouTube
Take it away Jenna...

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

6 Places Infodumps Like to Hide in Your Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Not everything you know about your story belongs in your novel.

A quick heads up...I'm over at Writers in the Storm today asking, Does Your Novel Have a Problem? 

People tend to think infodumps are the bane of science fiction and fantasy writers, but they happen to everyone. Mystery writers dump how and why characters wound up in places they shouldn’t be in, romance writers share the tragic backstories of the love interests, historical writers elaborate on the history (though their readers probably enjoy their infodumps), and mainstream writers share way too much information about the people and places in their story.

We all do it, and I actually don’t mind infodumps on a first draft. It’s a useful way to get the history and backgrounds straight in my head as I write, but they’ve got to go during draft two.

Infodumps pull readers out of the story to explain something in the story.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

It’s About Time. Make the Most of the 24 Hours We All Get

By Shanna Swendson, @ShannaSwendson

Part of The Writer’s Life Series 

JH: Managing time is one of the more difficult things about being a writer. Shanna Swendson shares tips on how to keep writing, and how to stop the things that distract you from writing.  

Shanna Swendson earned a journalism degree from the University of Texas but decided it was more fun to make up the people she wrote about and became a novelist. She’s written a number of fantasy novels for teens and adults, including the Enchanted, Inc. series and the Rebel Mechanics series. She devotes her spare time to reading, knitting, and music. Her newest novel is the paranormal mystery  Interview with a Dead Editor . 

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

Take it away Shanna…

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

A Core Question for Getting to Know Your Character

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

Even if you do little to no character development before you start writing, asking this one question can pinpoint the core of who that character is.

Since I write science fiction and fantasy, those character templates with tons of questions never worked for me. They’re always rooted in the real world and I spent too much time trying to figure out if “god-appointed assassin” was their employment, religion, or maybe even a calling.

I can see the appeal of such a questionnaire, but I tend to be a minimalist when creating characters. I like to learn who they are by tossing them into the plot and seeing what they do. But it helps to have a starting point for those characters, otherwise they develop willy nilly and feel completely inconsistent and at odds with themselves. They make decisions based on plot (what I want) and not what they want.

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com

Story Structure: How the Act Two Choice Works in a Novel

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy

The act two choice is a pivotal moment in your novel, and the wrong choice could send your middle in the wrong direction.

It’s far too easy to know what happens at the end of act one and just plow on forward into act two without really thinking about how the protagonist got there. Did they choose it, or were they dragged along?

Most writing advice and structures combine the act one problem (whatever name it’s called, as it has several) and the act two choice, but I find it more helpful to think of them as two separate moments. This is the first major plot point where the protagonist needs to choose to move forward. So it seems only logical to pay attention to what that choice is.

If there’s no choice being made, that’s a red flag the protagonist might be reactive or have no agency to act. Without that clear goal, there’s a pretty good chance you’ll get stuck within a few chapters, because you don’t know what the protagonist is trying to do. You might know generally, or know where the plot is supposed to go, but without that act-one-to-act-two-goal-handoff, the narrative drive often stalls, because the act two choice is the transitional moment linking the beginning and the middle.

Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com