Rani Divine's Blog, page 9

Inspired to Write: Getting inspiration from everyday life

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by on this, the first day of our series for the month of June! It took me… far longer than it should’ve... to come up with a theme for this month. But come up with one I did, and it’s a really fun one, if you ask me. It better be, or else even I would be bored ;-)
Without further ado, let’s get into it!
Let’s talk about inspiration, this month. It’s one of those things that often takes a long time for writers to find—either that, or it comes to us so easily that we don’t even think of it. Whichever one you are, I thought we’d take some time this month to talk about some of the things writers get inspiration from. Using myself as an example, because, hey, I write a lot.
Inspired to Write: Everyday life
For many writers, myself included, the best form of inspiration is our everyday life. Whether it be a crazy friend or an insane situation that no one in their right mind could believe would actually happen to someone in real life (and yet, did), real life leads to many fascinating stories. For non-genre fiction and nonfiction (of the “creative” nature or not) in particular, this becomes a very easy inspiration for stories. We can literally take what happened and translate it into the pages of our work-in-progress.
Others, of course, need to put in a little more work than that. We science-fiction and fantasy authors have to tweak things in far greater detail in order to make our everyday life stories fit into our worlds. If there was a crazy incident on the highway and we want to translate that into a space race or a daring chase on foot, we’ll have to change things. We can’t even use the same words.
But whatever the case, the real world is a great place to find inspiration for our stories.
Me? I find inspiration in the things around me, all the time. When I was in college, I was inspired by random sentences my teachers said (often in passing), to write long prose pieces that I still adore to this day. I’ve even found the same happen in my Bible study groups, nowadays. Likewise, I find inspiration when I see a mother caring for her child who’s fallen on the sidewalk, when I watch a man stride with confidence into a meeting, when the moon peeks out from behind the Sandia Mountains and shines its orange-yellow light over the city below. Inspiration is always there, just waiting to be seen.
Some might even say that the real world is the very best place to find inspiration for your writing, because the real world is, well, real. The things that inspire you here are the things that will seem the most real to your readers, no matter what genre you write in.
And in many ways, those people would be right.
Next time, let’s talk about a slightly more interesting inspiration, shall we? ;-)
[love]
{Rani Divine}

Keeping the Pace: Making sure you finish the story

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! It’s so nice of you to stop in! I sincerely hope that you’ve all enjoyed our series this month, as we’ve discussed first drafts from the point of view of the new writer. I’ve personally learned a few things along the way, and reminded myself of some things that I really need to keep in mind while I’m getting deeper into my latest work-in-progress.
But today, we have one final topic to discuss, one last thing that I find incredibly important for every writer, whether you’re established or not. Why? Because somehow, we all struggle with this, from time to time.
Keeping the Pace: Making sure you finish the story
There’s something about keeping the pace, while you’re writing, that sometimes makes the process drag on. There’s something about writing at a consistent pace, writing daily or every other day or whatever your schedule might be, and writing at a constant clip, that just… well, it tends to make us all slow down and just want to stop, sometimes.
You know what? That’s okay.
There’s nothing wrong with having times when you really don’t want to write. There’s no problem with taking a day, a week, even a month off if you’ve burned yourself out. It happens to the best of us. Even the greatest novelists in the world have occasionally burned themselves out and needed a break (even if they’re too proud to admit it).
But, it’s (slightly) important that we make sure that doesn’t happen while we’re in the middle of writing our novel. At least, we need to make sure it doesn’t happen to so great an extent that we don’t know what to do with our book when we finally get back to it.
For me, it’s hard to take more than a week off from my book at a time. Yeah, I can take almost a whole week. For some of you, that’ll seem like an insane amount of time. For others, that’ll seem incredibly short. We all have our own processes, after all—and there’s nothing wrong with it. But, it’s also important that we know our limit. You need to know how much time you can take off, how much time your brain will let you take apart from your book, without losing the story completely.
So, I have a few pieces of advice for you, when it comes to keeping the pace. Call it sage, if you will. Just some things I’ve learned along the way, that I’d like to pass to all of you.

However much you can write today, is enough for today. The same goes for tomorrow, and the day after. Don’t think of your book as a word count—trust me, it’ll just get too stressful. If it helps you to have word goals for a day, use them. If it doesn’t, don’t. If that changes from day to day, you do you. If it helps, give yourself a deadline. If it doesn't, try estimating one.  Have someone you’re accountable to, for how much you’ve written and how your story is going. Tell them everything they’ll let you tell them (bonus points if you can find someone who doesn't mind you spoiling the book for them). Use them for advice on your plot, if you need help along the way. Find your tune. By which I mean, find what music inspires you most, and play it on repeat while you’re writing. When it gets old, change it. But that’ll take a while. When you do reach the end, celebrate! Seriously. Go out. Get some champagne. Do something fun that you couldn’t do while you were trying to reach your deadline (assuming you had one). Most importantly: give yourself some time off. Let your brain breathe. Do something else creative, if you like.

That’s my advice, however simple it may be. I think those are things we all need to hear, time and time again.
I hope I’ve been some help to you, over this month’s series! I still haven’t decided what we’ll be discussing for the month of June, but I can promise you that it’ll be fun! ;-)
[love]
{Rani Divine}

Things Are Heating Up: Writing your inciting incident

Hi everybody, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by, as we enter our final week in the month of May. Is it just me, or does every year seem to go faster than the one before it? In any case, we’re already incredibly near to the end of the month, which means on Thursday we’ll be finishing out this month’s series!
As you know, all month we’ve been talking about first drafts. But instead of looking at them like we usually do, like we writers tend to do after we’ve already written a single first draft of a book, we’re looking at it with the viewpoint of helping authors who maybe don’t really know what they’re doing when they’re writing their first draft (which, by the by, is an incredibly useful thing for even seasoned authors to do, from time to time).
Thus far, we’ve discussed everything from writing styles to discovering your protagonist and antagonist, and today, we’re getting into the meat of the matter.
Things Are Heating Up: Writing your inciting incident
Now, being that we’ve also had a topic on knowing where to start your novel, you probably have a bit of an inkling on where to begin with this already. But I’ll still ask you this question:
What’s your hook? What’s the incident that’s going to draw readers into your book, and make them never want to put the thing down?
That’s what you need to know, when you first start writing. You need to know what that incident is, and you need to write it as close to the beginning of the book as you can. If your inciting incident is in the first chapter, you get brownie points. If it’s in the first five, you’re still doing good. If it doesn’t happen until the middle of the book… well, then you’ve got some issues.
This is a time when you need to work with your outline, if you’re one of those crazy outliners. You need to have an idea of what’s going to draw readers into the story, and it needs to be one of the very first things that you write.
For Coetir, the inciting incident happened within the first couple pages. It was a death. And within the new two chapters, it flowed into an even bigger incident that really started the ball rolling within the story.
So what’s going to start your ball rolling? What’s really going to get this story started in the best way possible? What hook can you give your readers, to make sure they won’t want to put the book down?
For me, this is the best way to start a book. Start with that hook, that line, that incident that’s really going to drive your point home. Start with something that will fascinate your readers, something that will get them thinking, something that will get their hearts pounding. If you can do that, then you’re one step closer to keeping them through the whole book.
Next time, let’s talk about the final step in writing your first draft—making sure you actually finish!
[love]
{Rani Divine}

The Danger Side: Discovering your antagonist

Hey everybody, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by. As you know, all month long we’re talking about those first drafts. We all have to write them, and we all know the struggle of doing it well. This series, however, is slightly geared toward the newer writers out there (or, toward the experienced writers who might feel like they need a bit of a refresher). This month, we’re talking about the checklist of things you’ll need to work on while you’re writing your first draft.
So far, we’ve talked about choosing a genre, really locking down the setting of your world, figuring out whether you’re going to outline or write by the seat of your pants, knowing where to start your story, and meeting your protagonist. Today? The logical continuation…
The Danger Side: Discovering your antagonist
While protagonists are (usually) the characters that come to us from the very start, antagonists generally take a little bit of doing. They’re not always the easiest to work on, not always the simplest to come up with from the beginning—and sometimes, that’s completely okay. There are times when the primary antagonist won’t show up until over halfway through the book, though they’ve always been around and mentioned offhandedly through the first half.
So, how do we come up with them?
It always starts by knowing your protagonist. If you haven’t already, make sure to go back and read Tuesday’s post to work on that part. Why? Because if you don’t know your protagonist, then it’s really difficult to shape the character they’re working against. Antagonists tend toward being the opposite, in many ways, of the protagonist—even if it’s in subtle ways that most readers won’t pick up on immediately. So if you don’t know your protagonist, it’s much more difficult to create an antagonist out of nothing.
That’s what makes creating the antagonist a little bit harder to quantify. You’ll need to decide what the antagonist is doing, and why they’re the antagonist. Who are they antagonizing? Why? What drew them into this life? Why do they think they’re the hero of the story?
Yes, that’s the thing that really makes an antagonist. Every antagonist is the hero in his or her own mind. They really believe that they’re doing the right thing, that they’re fighting on the side of good and that the protagonist is the evil one. That’s what makes a really good antagonist. They’re not evil just to be evil—that’s boring. So, what’s their reasoning for doing what they’re doing? That's one of the first questions you need to ask yourself.
From there, you’ll be able to work backward, just like we did with our protagonist, to come up with a character that completely fits your purposes. Yeah, it’s a little bit roundabout. Yeah, it’ll take you a little longer to come up with your antagonist this way, but I promise that you’ll end up with an antagonist who’s more believable and fluid than any other you’ve written.
Why? Because this one was tailor-made for the story you’re writing, of course.
[love]
{Rani Divine}

Who Are You: Discovering your protagonist

Hey everybody! Welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by. All month long, we’re talking about first drafts, and the checklist of things you need to know (or do) in order to set your first draft up for success. These are all things that I wish someone had talked to me about before I started writing my very first book, so I thought I’d go back and talk to all of you about them. I’m nice like that ;-)
So far, we’ve talked about choosing your genre, really locking down the setting in your story (whether you’re writing in the real world or not), figuring out how you’re going to start writing, and even knowing where to start your story… now, let’s actually start writing, shall we?
Who Are You: Discovering your protagonist
Usually, this is the easiest part of writing (at least for me). My protagonist is generally the first character who introduces themselves to me. They’re the one who first makes their presence known and needs to be written lest I go a little bit crazy. But I understand that it’s not the same way, for a lot of writers. So, how do you discover your protagonist?
I have suggestions!
If your protagonist isn’t coming to you (which I’ve had happen, believe me), sometimes it helps to start thinking about them as a person. You probably have a little bit of an idea of what the story is about, what needs to happen in this magnificent book you’re writing,
So start there.
You know what the story is about, so what kind of person does there need to be, in order for this story to work? Yeah, you’ll be working backwards a little bit, but you’ll get there from here, I swear. Focus on the things your character will need to be good at, will need to be proficient in or need to have gone through, in order to succeed in the quest you’re sending them on.
Write down everything you can think of that might help you in shaping who this character is. If it helps, go to a name generating site and see if you come up with something you like.
From there, go take some personality tests—all from the POV of your protagonist—and keep the results in the file you’ve been working on. Write literally everything down. Determine their hair color, their eye color, shape them into what they need to be, and when you have all of that figured out… start writing.
Now, for me, it doesn’t always work this way. As you know, I’m a deer-in-the-headlights kind of writer—so doing a lot of beforehand research into a character isn’t always the way to go for me. And in that case, you’ll need to be extra vigilant in keeping a file of all the things you think might be important at some point down the line. Note everything you find out about them while you’re writing, so you can be sure to keep them as pure a character as possible. Why? Because while you’re writing by the seat of your pants, it’s really easy to start inserting yourself where your character should be.
Either way, your protagonist will come to you. For some it’s easy, for others it takes some doing—but they will come to you, and hopefully they’ll be the most fun character to write, in your whole book. If not, I’m sorry. I’ve been there, too.
[love]
{Rani Divine}

Where to Begin: Starting your story in the right place

Hi guys! Welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by. As you know, this month we’re talking about writing first drafts, those drafts that are always amazing and incredible in our minds—and yet somehow end up being a mess by the time we sit down to edit them. Oh well, at least we have fun along the way!
Unlike previous times when we’ve discussed first drafts, this time, I’m talking it through like you’ve never written a book in your life and just really need a place to start. Why? Because every writer was there at one point, and most need a little guidance along the way.
Where to Begin: Starting your story in the right place
This is perhaps the hardest thing to quantify, out of every topic in this series. A story starts at the beginning, after all. What other starting place could there be? And yet, there are hundreds of thousands of other places where a book could start, and I’m here to tell you that a lot of those other options are the better ones.
Let’s start with a little explanation of why I say so, because this will change depending on who you’re marketing to.
Here in the United States, where I’m from, readers’ attention spans are getting shorter and shorter. Don’t you say anything, UK—you’re right on our heels in terms of attention spans, even if you won’t admit it. What this means for us, as authors, is that if we start our book at the beginning of the story, our reader is more apt to get bored and put it down before they ever reach the end. That’s not something any of us want to have happen.
So, you have to make sure your book starts with some action, or with some gripping event that won’t lose your readers’ attention.
I’ll use some of my openers as an example.

Coetir: People of the Woods starts with a man being killed, his body disappearing into thin air when he dies. Mynidd: People of the Hills starts with a war, which, if you’ve read any of the other Druid Novels, is a complete shock and reversal of character type. Dwr: People in the Water starts with Arneia’s discovery that humans are leaving the plains and travelling over the water—something her people have been awaiting for centuries.

If you don’t start with action, you risk readers not being interested at all.
What I suggest, to get around this, is to write the beginning at the beginning. Start writing where you think the story starts—but know, all the while, that this probably won’t be where the actual manuscript starts, once you get into the editing phase. Keep writing, with this idea in mind that you need to find a place to really start this novel, a place that will catch your readers’ attention and hold it as long as possible.
I’ve done that, a time or two. And though it always pains me to cut those first few (or many) pages from my manuscript, it’s always worth it in the end.
If you’re not like me, however, and you’re an outliner. Fortune of fortunes! Your outline can be the place where you decide where to start from, so you’ll have less of a dilemma in the long run. I don’t know how you do it. I really don’t.
[love]
{Rani Divine}

To Pants or Not to Pants: Knowing your writing startup style

Hi everybody! Welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by. Last week, we started a new series, and I’ve been super excited to get into the thick of this thing. This month, as you’ll know if you joined us last week, we’re talking all about first drafts—about writing first drafts, I mean. It’s a topic we haven’t covered in a while, and I want to go a little bit more in-depth with it, this time.
Last week, we talked about picking a genre and truly defining your setting—things that definitely need to be done before you start writing—and today, we’re really getting into the meat of the matter.
To Pants or Not to Pants: Knowing your writing startup style
Me? I’m a seat-of-your-pants kind of girl. I prefer calling it deer-in-the-headlights… but I thought “pants” would be more fun in the title ;-)
Before you really start working on your manuscript, this is a big thing you need to decide on. Are you the kind of writer who’s like me, who prefers to not know what’s going on in the story and to discover it a little bit at a time, or are you the kind of writer who prefers to know anything and everything before they start putting words on the page?
Both are valid responses. Just because I don’t outline doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate those who do. I don’t know how they do it, if I’m being perfectly honest, but in a way, I do admire them for doing it.
But let’s get down to the nitty gritty, before we go any further.
Seat of your Pants/Deer in the Headlights
These are the authors who, like me, discover the story as they go. We might have a vague idea of what’s going to happen in the more immediate future, maybe snippets of information that will point us in the right direction for the long term, but we don’t have an outline and we don’t really know where we’re going with all this.
If you’re this style of writer, then the world is your oyster at this point! Just sit down and start writing. You already have your genre and your setting—usually, your protagonist will be the first thing that comes to you when you really get into the writing, and fortunately for you, they’re one of the first things you’ll need to know when you start writing.
Outliners
These authors, somehow, some way which eludes me to all ends, write the entire outline of their book before they start writing. They know what’s coming when, who’s going where, and what’s really going on at all times. They mold their twists and turns before they even start writing the book.
You might say that this sounds easier. After all, this way you’d have an idea of what you’re doing. And in a way, you’d be right.
If you’re this style of author, if you’re the author who needs to know everything before you start writing, then you’ll need to sit back and outline before you go any further. Yeah, it’ll take you a little more time to start out, but it’ll be well worth it in the long run, I promise.

For those of you who haven’t been around as long and don’t know why I can’t outline: I get bored. Plain and simple. If I know what’s coming in the story, I don’t want to write it because I already know what happens. My brain is childish sometimes, I know. I don’t know what to do with me. I’ll just stick to being a deer in the headlights, okay?
[love]
{Rani Divine}

To See or Not to See: Locking down the setting of your literary world

Hi everybody! Welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by. As you know, this month we’re talking about writing first drafts—but more than that, we’re talking about it as though we’ve never written a book before, and need a few pointers to help get us on the right track. We’re talking about writing from the eyes of a newbie, someone who needs a little guidance to make sure they get the best possible words onto their pages, so they’ll be mildly less annoyed when it comes to the editing phase (don’t worry newbies, we’re all annoyed by editing. Even me, and I’m an editor).
Tuesday, we talked about discovering your genre. Today, let’s hone it in a little bit further.
To See or Not to See: Locking down the setting of your literary world
Remember, writers: even if you’re writing a fiction novel that takes place in the real world, you’re writing about a fictitious version of the real world, and therefore still need to decide on your setting and get a good handle on what everything looks like and where everything is, spatially.
Setting is one of those things that can take your book from good to completely amazing, particularly if you have a really good handle on where everything is located, on distances between things and places, and on time in general. Yes, I categorize time as a part of the setting, because time plays a large factor in what everything looks like (i.e. seasons change, so does your setting).
I personally like to sit down and write a long document that describes my setting. I don’t do this all the time, but especially if I’m just starting out on a new book, I find it extremely helpful to sit down and write what my world looks like, and how it works. Now, if you’re working with present day (or even past) Earth, you’ll have a much easier time of this. You’ll likely already know the big things you’ll need to know, and anything you don’t know, you can Google. Google Earth is your friend, if you write books set in the real world, present day.
But for me, my worlds are always different from Earth. I write science-fiction and fantasy, which means I generally have to make up whole new worlds, new realms, new methods of being.
Here’s a list of things you should know about your world, especially if you’re creating a new one:
What does the architecture look like? How big are the cities? What do people eat? Where do they get their food? What do people drink? Where does their water come from? What happens to waste? Where do crops grow? What are the primary modes of travel, and how fast are they? What are the primary jobs people have? In what kind of buildings do people live? What's the population of your main city(s)?  What happens to the poor? Where do they live? How do they survive?Where do people buy goods? What do people do for fun?  What is the monetary system like? Is it consistent, throughout the world, or are there different monetary systems between countries (like there are in the real world)?

I could go on and on, honestly, but these are some of the basic things you’ll want to get a handle on, to make sure your story is as authentic as possible. So get out a pencil and paper, open a new Word document, Scrivener file, or what have you, and start writing. Describe what your main cities look like. Describe the people in their day to day lives. Discuss monetary issues, politics, waste and repairs, modes of travel, roadways, food production, anything you can think of that probably won’t have an impact on your story—but will play a small part in it, and therefore should be well thought out by you, the writer.
If you take the time to do this, before you start writing, your reader will be able to see it. I promise. The better you know your world, the more your readers will believe every single thing you write within that world. Why? Because if you answer the questions your readers never thought to ask, then it’ll never occur to them to ask those questions, later on. It’s all about creating realism, in every way we can.
Next week, we’ll get to the actual story writing part!
[love]
{Rani Divine}

What in the World: Choosing your genre

Hi guys, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m so glad you stopped by. Last month, we spent our time talking about editing those first drafts, the things we need to check on while we’re editing, and the art of training our eyes to find all the errors on our pages. Today, we’re starting a new series! And we’re going to go back in time, in a sense.
See, now that I’ve finished editing my book, I am, of course, starting on writing a new one. Which gives me a wonderful excuse to talk about writingfirst drafts! Which I haven’t talked about in a long time, if you hadn’t noticed. It’s really just as important as editing. If you don’t get your story well figured out in the writing of your first draft, there’s really no amount of editing that will help you. So it’s extremely important that we write well, that we think through our stories, and that we try our darnedest to get everything as solid as possible during the writing phrase.
As always, we’ll start at the beginning.
What in the World: Choosing your genre
For some of us, this isn’t a question at all. There’re only one or two genres we ever write in, one or two genres where we thrive and shine and are easily able to create story after story. But what if this is your first draft, ever? What if this is the first book you’ve ever written, and you just don’t know where to start at all?
That’s where it comes in handy, to know what genre you want to write.
Now, at this point, I’ll assume that you have an idea about a story. You have a notion, something that you think would be well-translated into a novel, something that you just really want to get onto that page. But you’re not sure what kind of story it will be, really. You’re maybe not certain what genre you should be writing in, to make this story work out the way it should, the way you feel like it wants to go.
For me, it’s important to know my genre before I start writing the book. If I don’t know the genre, I’m more apt to do things wrong. After all, there are certain tropes we constantly follow in thrillers and horror stories, but that we never approach in fiction, mystery, or romance. There are certain things we do in sci-fi and fantasy, which we would never dream of broaching in historical fiction. If you don’t know your genre when you start, you’ve made it easier for you to do something wrong, to err along the way, to make a mess for yourself to clean up during the editing phase—and we’re trying to make this as easy on you as possible. Really, we are.
To that end, here are a few questions I think you should ask yourself, as you’re sitting down and getting some words down on paper:

What kinds of stories do you like to read? Have you ever read this kind of story before? (i.e. have you read anything like your idea, in the past?)What kinds of stories have you read, in whose genre your idea might fit?

I ask these questions because, of course, if you’re not reading, you really shouldn’t be writing. The two go hand in hand. If you don’t know anything about books, if you haven’t read since you were a little kid and have no idea what’s on the market right now, then maybe writing your book should be more of a hobby, something to fiddle with in the background, and something you won’t need to put that much effort into. Why? Because writers are readers, and if you’re not a reader, you can’t be a writer. Why? Because if you don’t read, you’ll know nothing about genre, about tropes, about the way different genres set up their stories—things you need to know, while you’re writing your book.
For me, it’s easy. I primarily read science fiction and fantasy novels. Occasionally, I’ll read a thriller. So I know the common tropes of these genres, I know what readers expect and what they’re looking for when they pick up a book from these genres—because it’s what I’m looking for, when I pick up a book from this genre.
The moral of the story is: in order to determine what kind of story you want to write, what genre you want to write in, you’ll need to know a thing or two about reading. Once you do, it’ll be pretty easy to pick out your style and know where you fit in. Promise.
[love]
{Rani Divine}

Ignore the Rules: Showing, not telling

Hi, and welcome back to Too Many Books to Count! I’m glad you’re here. It’s been a really fun month, spending time editing and relaying to you some of the more important things to look out for while you’re editing. In fact, if you want a little more of this sort of thing, I’ll be doing a very similar series in the blog at RAD Writing over the month of May, and I’d be very happy for you to stop by and show some love!
For this, the last of the month’s blogs, I want to break the mold, just a little bit. Like I said on Tuesday, this time I want to talk about the other side of the coin—primarily because it’s something not a lot of people are willing to talk about, because in the long run, it’s much harder to quantify.
Ignore the Rules: Showing, not telling
Tuesday, we talked about making sure that you’re showing and not telling, in the majority of your manuscript—but if you were paying attention, you’ll’ve noticed that I said the majority of your manuscript (i.e. there are times when you should, in fact, be telling and not showing).
*gasp*
I know, it’s shocking, isn’t it? Everyone always says that the entire story should be shown and not told, that we need to focus all our skills on making sure we’re always telling and never showing, that we’re allowing our readers to experience everything within the story, without skipping over any little thing.
But that’s the problem.
See, sometimes, readers want us to skip over those details. There are moments in story where we don’t need to be sharing so much, where we don’t need to be showing every little thing. There are times when our characters are exhausted and we can show that more clearly by telling instead of showing, by having them climb in bed, roll over, and flick off the light, instead of the overly wordy alternative.
Point is, it’s okay to tell, sometimes. Really, it is. I promise.
So in this, the last blog post in the series, I wanted to tell you something that most writers and editors will never tell you. It’s important, especially as you move forward in your writing career, that you train yourself to know what sentences should be shown and what sentences should be told. There’s a delicate balance, between the two. If you read enough from your favorite authors, you’ll start to notice it, too. No one ever fully shows a story. There’s always some telling going on, and it’s important that we recognize it.
Go ahead then. Tell me a story. Just don’t tell the whole thing. Make sure you show the important parts. Really, make sure you show the story, just go ahead and tell some parts, to skip over the pieces that aren’t really important but are still kinda necessary. You know what ones I mean. ;-)
[love]
{Rani Divine}