Elizabeth Spann Craig's Blog, page 226

Lists for Inspiration

I'm a huge list maker.

This has a lot to do with my need to outsource my horrible memory.
It also helps me sleep better at night, knowing that I've thought of all the things I need to do the next day…and I haven't dropped the ball anywhere.

So it's only natural that making lists would help me write my book, too.

Somehow, it's easier for me to come up with lots of different ideas if I make them into bullet points and put them in list form.  I can  focus my list and have it be:

My protagonist's catch-phrases.
My protagonist's features.  Different physical traits of my protagonist.
My protagonist's facial expressions.

If you do this with plotting, it can be useful, too.  The idea is to come up with as many different resolutions for the scene you're writing or for the next scene as you can…no matter how outlandish they might be.  Some ideas will be completely ridiculous, but some might end up being useful.

5 possible endings for this book.
5 twists.
5 possible subplots.
5 ways the subplots could tie into the main plot.

Or you could do it for character growth:

5 ways the character could grow.
5 surprising things that we could learn about a character.
Top 10 list of things that bother the protagonist (then 10 things that would drive the character crazy that I could write into the book.)
10 things this character loves more than anything.

You could find other uses for lists, too:

5 ways to add some unexpected elements to the book (humor, suspense, sadness, fear.)

5 ways to describe the setting.

I love making lists because sometimes I'm looking for a way to squeeze in just a little more writing—but I only have ten minutes.  That amount of time is perfect for list-making, and I've found the exercise can really help me brainstorm more ideas.

Sometimes I'll just add list titles in my notebook and keep it in my car or laptop bag for when I end up with a little dead time.  That way I don't even have to figure out what list I want to start…I can just jump right in.

Do you use lists to brainstorm?  Mind maps?  What works for you?

Diverting Attention

My daughter and I were at the Halloween store last weekend, trying to find her a costume.  For some reason, it's never easy finding one for her—she has this perfect mental image of what she's looking for…and the store rarely has it.

We decided to walk around the store a little bit. It was one of those huge Halloween warehouse places that's a temporary store—it opens up wherever there's a vacant big-box store or a vacant strip mall spot, then closes down after Halloween is over.

This store had...

Twitterific

Here are writing links that I've posted to Twitter for the past week. If you're looking for a particular topic, just plug in your keyword into the search box at the top left-hand corner of the blog (on the black header right above my blog name…next to the Blogger symbol…the small search window is next to the magnifying glass) and the roundup with your subject will come up. To narrow your search down on the page, do a CTRL+F, type your subject, and hit enter.

Unfortunately, I've had...

One Big Reason Agents are Hard to Come By--Time

Last week, I posted some resources for finding agents.
It's really tough to find representation.  I think, honestly, there are lots of reasons for this.

One is that agents need to believe they can find a buyer for the manuscript you're pitching.

I have a strong suspicion that another reason is because just one author is a lot of work.

My agent, Ellen Pepus, spends a lot of time just with me.  I know this because of the number of emails that we send back and forth when we're really at fever pitch...

E-Reading Revolution—Finding Good Books

During my August book tour, I visited lots of different bookstores and talked to many different managers.

Several of them mentioned, with some concern, the e-book revolution.  One manager went so far as to say that their bookstore would likely resemble an Apple store or a cell phone retailer in a few years—with e-readers and e-reader accessories on display. 

She added that bookstore staff would be needed to sell and offer customer support for the readers.  They'd have a service department to fi...

5 Questions That Always Surprise Me When I Write a Book

Every time I write a book, I'm surprised by the problems I run into—even though the problems are always the same. And actually, looking at my list of issues, I'm not sure there's a whole lot I can do to prevent them from cropping up, unless I really wanted to change my approach to writing a book. Maybe that's why they keep recurring!

5 Questions that Always Pop Up Once While Writing My Books

1. Where do I go next? I'm guessing this is a problem faced more frequently by folks who don't ...

Favorites

My daughter is nine years old. Like lots of nine year olds, she loves to poll everyone on their favorites.

And you'd better have an answer.

I haven't thought very much about my favorite anything for probably the last thirty years.

Until now. :) After several conversations with my daughter that ended with her saying, "How could you not know what your favorite song/color/food/season/book/movie is?!" then I actually took a few minutes to think about it one night.

I was able to make...

Pacing Ourselves

On Saturday, the kids and I went on a bike ride.

We're mismatched bikers. My teenage son is the super biker, easily losing us without even realizing it. My daughter is still on a little-kid bike with no gears, and I need to stick behind her to make sure she doesn't get left behind. Me? I'll fall off the bike if I bike too slowly…which sometimes happens when the greenway gets too sandy and my daughter pops off her bike unexpectedly to walk the trail instead of bike it. I always seem to...

Writing and Revising in Layers

Working on a first draft can be really challenging. There's the plot to wrangle into shape, the conflict to ramp up, the characters to breathe life into. And there are a whole lot of pages to write before the final scene.

There's so much to include that I frequently don't include it all in the first draft.

In fact, there are some things that I never put in my first draft because I spend way too much time thinking about them and it messes up my pace.

Using a layered approach to writing a...

Twitterific

Here are writing links that I've posted to Twitter for the past week. If you're looking for a particular topic, just plug in your keyword into the search box at the top left-hand corner of the blog (on the black header right above my blog name…next to the Blogger symbol…the small search window is next to the magnifying glass) and the roundup with your subject will come up. To narrow your search down on the page, do a CTRL+F, type your subject, and hit enter.

What do the most highly paid...