Nicole Zoltack's Blog, page 52

The Only 12 1/2 Writing Rules You'll Ever Need

Another short post today.



My favorite rule is 12 1/2. :)



The one I break the most is 1. I don't always write every day. I try to, but it doesn't always happen. Regardless, I'm always thinking about my stories and trying to work out details and new scenes and dialogue, plus coming up with new ideas. So I think that rule should be changed.



Hm... maybe next week, I'll come up with my set of writing rules. New blog post idea! :)



What are you working on today? Writing? Reading? Have any plans for the weekend?

Going to a Writer's Conference This Weekend

Last year I went to a local writer's conference called The Write Stuff in Allentown, Pa. I had a blast and met several cool authors. I'm going again this year, and I can't wait! Like last year, I'll take plenty of notes at the different workshops and pass along the information onto you.



Have you ever been to a writer's conference? If not, would you ever go to one? What do you or would you hope to get out of a writer's conference?

Deep in my Editing Cave

I'm working hard on edits for MuseItUp Publishing as well as revising two of my own MSs so this blog post is going to be short and full of pictures. Enjoy!





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Vonnegut on Writing and Thanks

In his book Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. listed eight rules for writing a short story:

Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.
Start as close to the end as possible.
Be a Sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them—in order that the reader may see what they are made of.
Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.
Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To hell with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages.
Now, obviously, these can also be applied to writing a novel, not just a short story.



The rule I that caught my attention is 4. Evert sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.



I think this is true, to an extent. If every single sentence revealed character or advanced the action, there would be very little scene setting in your story/novel.



I had the pleasure of being in Adventures in Children's Publishing's First Five Pages Workshop. Between that and the Show Me the Voice Workshop, I have received so much wonderful advice on the beginning of my story. Thank you all so much for your help! I don't plan on stopping there. I am doing to pour of the rest of that MS to true to infuse as much voice, character, and setting into the rest of the story as I did working on the opening.



I'll make sure that my sentences reveal character and advance the action. I'll also incorporate setting, too.



What do you think of Vonnegut's rules? Personally I disagree with #8 completely.

Show Me the Voice Blogfest and Creature Mondays

 

The awesome Brenda Drake is hosting an amazing contest. The amazing Natalie Fischer , who is now agenting at The Bradford Literary Agency, has agreed to be the judge for her Show Me the Voice contest.Natalie is all about the voice and wants you to show it in your first 250 words of your finished manuscript. When critiquing each others' entries, look for voice and please keep your comments nice and helpful, not snarky.  



Click Here for more detailsSo without further ado, here are my first 250 words. Anny comments/suggestions/critiques would be greatly appreciated! This is a slightly different version than the one I posted yesterday, I hope this one is better!Name: Nicole ZoltackTitle: Riona's PenGenre: YA Fantasy



Mr. McMichaels hated me ever since he confiscated a story I wrote during class yesterday. A story about an evil goblin warlord. Named McMichaels.

I guess I can't blame him, but wouldn't most English teachers love students who wanted to be authors? But no. I was lucky he only threatened me with detention. Needless to say, I wasn't looking forward to English class today, and I walked there slowly.

The crowded hallway thinned out as kids slammed puke-green lockers and ducked into their classrooms.

"Riona?" someone called.

I turned and spotted Artex, the new guy. He smiled and waved a piece of paper in his hand. Wow, were his teeth white! "Hi." I smiled back, unsure why he was talking to me. After all, I was decidedly unpopular. I refrained from shuffling my feet. Good-looking boys always made me nervous.

He jogged down the hall to me, and a lock of dark hair fell across his forehead, giving him a tousled look. Oh, yeah, Artex was definitely attractive. "I think this is yours." He handed me the story I had started in Spanish class.

"Thanks." I shoved it into a notebook. "I guess I accidentally left it behind."

"You really wrote poor Roderick into a tight spot. Those bloody pirates are more than he can handle." He fell into step beside me.

My cheeks grew hot. "You read it?" Even though I dreamed of seeing Riona Streaming on the spine of a book, I didn't have the courage to allow someone else to read my writing.

----And now for a new creature for Creature Mondays.

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The salamander is an elemental of fire. Thin, red, and dry-skinned, they are like wisps of a flame and have a wrathful disposition. Some say that salamanders look like lizards.

In the Middle Ages, salamanders were believed needed for fire to exist. Matches, flint, nothing would be able to lit a spark without a salamander. da Vinci wrote that salamanders ate fire.

Supposedly, salamanders are produced by fire. To become immune to being burned, one should smear themselves with salamander blood. It is believed that this notion came about from a real lizard that crawls out from its home within a log of wood once the log was burned. The lizard's name? You guessed it - salamander.

Show Me the Voice Blogfest

 

The awesome Brenda Drake is hosting an amazing contest. The amazing Natalie Fischer , who is now agenting at The Bradford Literary Agency, has agreed to be the judge for her Show Me the Voice contest.Natalie is all about the voice and wants you to show it in your first 250 words of your finished manuscript. When critiquing each others' entries, look for voice and please keep your comments nice and helpful, not snarky.  



Click Here for more detailsSo without further ado, here are my first 250 words. Anny comments/suggestions/critiques would be greatly appreciated!Name: Nicole ZoltackTitle: Riona's PenGenre: YA FantasyMr. McMichaels hated me ever since he confiscated a story I wrote during class. A story about an evil goblin warlord. Named McMichaels.

I guess I can't blame him for that but wouldn't you think most English teachers would love students who wanted to be authors?

The crowded hallway slowly thinned out as kids entered their classrooms. I passed by a few students retrieving books from their hideous green lockers on my way to English class. I loved green, deep forest green, not the locker's pale puke green.

"Riona?" someone called.

I turned and saw Artex, a recent transfer student approach, a piece of paper in his hand. Despite being a recent transfer student, he was already popular due to his charm and good looks. "Hi." I smiled, unsure why he was talking to me. After all, I was decidedly unpopular. Plus, good-looking boys always made me nervous.

"I think this is yours." He handed me the paper.

I skimmed it. Yes it was mine, a story I had started in Spanish class. "Thank you. I didn't realize it was missing."

"Poor Roderick. You really wrote him into a tight spot. Those bloody pirates are more than he can handle." He fell into step beside me.

My cheeks grew hot. "You read it?" Even though I dreamed of seeing my name, Riona Streaming, on the spine of a book, I didn't have the courage to allow someone else to read my writing.

He laughed and brushed back some of his dark hair from his forehead.

Agent Pitch Contest

Super agent Ammi-Joan Paquette has so kindly offered to host a pitch contest on YAtopia. And seeing as she's currently closed to submissions, this is an opportunity you simply CANNOT miss out on.



It's really quite simple what you have to do. Ready?



1) Be a follower of the blog. Nice and easy.



2) Blog about this contest and include a link with your entry. If you don't have a blog, you may tweet or make a facebook status. But they prefer blog.



3) Create a TWO SENTENCE pitch. And not a massively long run-on sentence either. Two concise sentences that will hook Joan to your book and have her desperate to read more.



4) Include the opening line of your manuscript.



5) Manuscripts that you submit should be completed. It is left up to you whether you decide to submit a half finished manuscript. You'll have to deal with it SHOULD Joan request you send her the full.



6) This contest will be capped at either 150 entries OR will end midnight on the 24th March.



7) Winners to be announced (along with prizes) on 31st March.



8) Only childrens and young adult categories will be accepted.



Good luck!! Post your entries on YAtopia's blog!I did! Good luck!

The Power of Words

Son #1 loves to babble yet. His vocabulary is growing with each day but he still says a lot of made up words. Two nights ago, when we're were telling him that we love him before putting him down in his bed for the night, he finally said those three little words back.



"I love you."



It came out more like "I luv u" but it completely melted my heart.





Now how does this relate to writing?



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We should strive to make each line of dialogue to have impact. It doesn't always have to be life-altering, but it should have meaning. It should also be unique onto that character - i.e. each line should only have been said by that character, no one else should have/could have said it. This goes to voice. If each character has been written to be unique and has a unique enough voice, their dialogue would be their own, dependent upon their character. If they have an accent, it would give their words flavor. If they have little education, they wouldn't use proper English all the time. Etc...



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Now if only he would say "I love you, Mommy" I would be a puddle on the floor.

POV Slippage

I don't know about you, but before I started to write seriously, I didn't mind head-hopping. Didn't bother me in the least.



Now I know better. And it bothers me. Really bothers me. Like through the book across the room bothers me.



It took me some time before I grew to hate head hopping. When I first wrote Woman of Honor, there were a few instances - ok, more than just a few - where I head-hopped. Whoops!



I recently got my edits back for Champion of Valor. I was so pleased that there was only one instance of POV slippage (of course I wish that I had caught them all but still only missing one is definitely a step in the right head-firmly-attached-not-going-anywhere direction).



The offender: Her face paled.



At first glance this might not seem like a POV slip. I, for one, can actually feel myself go pale, but that's just it - I feel it, I can't see it. Her face paled is fine when the her in question is not the person whose POV the scene is in. But in this case, it is. So yes, this is a POV slip.



How did I fix it? A wave of weakness washed over her, and she could feel the blood drain from her face.



Does head-hopping bother you? What areas have you tackled to overcome to make your writing better?

I would have given anything to be like....

In honor of the release of Kirsten Hubbard's Like Mandarin, a bunch of bloggers are talking about who they would have given anything to be like, either when they were a teenager or now.



When I was a teenager, I would have given anything to be like...



my older brother. He had it all, especially a driver's license and a car.



Cher from Clueless. Come on, she was blond, popular, and the boys fell all over themselves for her.



Now I would give anything to be like...



Elana Johnson. Her blog is awesome, I can't wait to read Possession, she inspires me.



LiLa. Awesome sister bloggers. I never laugh when reading a blog post more than when I'm reading one of theirs. I so want to write a story with my sister now. Either sister (I have two, both younger than me)



JK Rowling. If I could be an eighth as successful as her, I would be thrilled.



So who would you have given anything to be like when you were a teenager? And who would you give anything to be like now?