On Writing Well: Revisiting the Basics
As you may remember, I teach for a MFA Program, working primarily with students who are finishing their creative writingthesis projects. This week, I’m in the throes of grading final projects, reviewingmanuscripts up to 60 pages. For this week’s post, I thought I’d revisit some ofthe basics that keep popping up in these projects.
Over the years, I have gathered quitea collection of articles and handouts that target some basic writing conceptsthat are often overlooked in workshops. I’ve highlighted some of these inprevious posts.
I use these resources for my students,and thought you might be interested in a few of these:
Narrative Structure
Backstory and Exposition: 4 Key Tactics. SusanDeFreitas, contributing writer at Jane Friedman’s blog, explores effectivestrategies in inserting backstory into your narrative, explaining, “Landingyour novel opening can be tricky. On the one hand, you need to get the readersucked into the present moment of the story as it’s unfolding; on the otherhand, there’s a lot you need to explain about the past, which is precisely thesort of thing that puts readers to sleep…This info is generally known asbackstory (essential information about the characters’ past) and exposition(essential information about the context of the story). Getting it right is oneof the biggest challenges you’ll face with your novel.”
Story Structure: 7 Narrative Structures All Writers ShouldKnow. As the writers on Reedsy blog offers,“While using a pre-existing blueprint might make you worry about ending up witha formulaic, predictable story, you can probably analyze most of your favoritebooks using various narrative structures that writers have been using fordecades (if not centuries)!” This blog post explores seven distinctstory structures that any writer can use to build a compelling narrative.
Narratevs. Dramatize. Alex Donne’s excellent videoexplains the difference between narrating and dramatizing (show vs. tell), andhow you can fix these issues during the revision. Revision is when the magichappens!
Filter Words and Phrases to Avoid in Writing Fiction. AnneR. Allen created an excellent handout that provides a list of writingfilters, with practical examples of how to replace them. As she states, “All words exist for a reason. Use them wisely to create engaging narrative.”
Purple Prose and the Word Surgeon’s Scalpel. TomBentley at Writer UnBoxed elaborates on how these filter words rob yournarrative of its vigor. Bently offers excellent examples and explanations,reminding writers to “Keep in mind that when you clean upyour writing, you’re not scrubbing it of the voice that makes it distinct anddelightful. You’re clearing your throat so that voice sings out strong and true.”
(Related to NarrativeStructure) Dialogue
How to Format Dialogue. Dax MacGregor offers nice illustrations on how to format dialogue, stating“Whether you are writing a short story, full novel or anything in between, theway you format dialogue is the same.”
The MasterClass in How to Format Dialogue in Your ShortStory and Novel. The MasterClass staff puttogether this excellent handout, stating, “Whether you’re working on a novel orshort story, writing dialogue can be a challenge. If you’re concerned about howto punctuate dialogue or how to format your quotation marks, fear not; therules of dialogue in fiction and nonfiction can be mastered by following a fewsimple rules.
Active vs PassiveCharacters
How Can We Make Our Characters More Proactive? JamiGold’s excellent handout details how a character needs agency in their story,stating “In other words, passive and reactive characters—those withoutagency—go with the flow, make no decisions, and don’t affect the story becausethey’re always one step behind. In contrast, proactive/active characters makethe story what it is.”
On Passive Characters. MaryCole of Good Story Company explains, “It's hard for readers to engage with apassive character, especially in the protagonist role.”
Five Ways to Tell If You Have A Passive Protagonist (And IfYou Do, How To Fix Them). Jimena I. Novaro’sexcellent discussion offers a study into passive characters, comparing twobeloved novels to illustrate her points, stating “ To illustrate these fiveplaces where you can identify a passive protagonist, I’m going to use two booksthat I love. They’re both good books, but one has the unfortunate flaw ofhaving a passive protagonist, while the other has an awesome, activeprotagonist. The examples for a passive protagonist are from Harry Potter andthe Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling; the examples for an active protagonist arefrom Sabriel by Garth Nix.”
Finding the Emotional Core. Relatedto creating active characters is taking advantage of a character’s emotionalcore. Jo Eberhardt on Writer UnBoxed explores strategies on how to createauthentic characters that readers care about, stating, “Createa character who feels deep emotions, and invite the reader to join them ontheir journey. It creates a bond that can never be broken between yourcharacter and your reader — one that will still exist decades into the future.”
Plot Structures
On Pacing: Faster than the Speed of Thought. DonaldMaass at Writers UnBoxed explains, “Plot pace is generally what peoplemean. Keep things moving. Get to the next event. Don’tmeander around, cut to the chase. Get to the meat and quickly moveon. It’s as if story is a double-speed march, or ought to be…As we know,however, story is not always about moving events along rapidly.”
Good Transitions: A Guide to Cementing StoriesTogether. Amanda Mascarelle illustrates theprocess of creating strong transitions that move the story forward, stating,“Most writers learned in elementary school that a good story requires acompelling beginning, middle, and end. But how does one make the pieces fitneatly together? From my tattered memory of grade school, my teachers skippedthat part. Or maybe I was home with the chicken pox the day we learned abouttransitions—the words and phrases, often subtly deployed, that give storiesshape and tug readers from idea to idea.”
Mastering Scene Transitions. BethHill of The Editor’s Blog discusses how to create effective scene transitions,explaining, “A scene transition takes characters and readers to a new location,a new time, or a new point of view. Transitions can also be used to show acharacter’s change in heart or frame of mind.”
(Related to Plot)Chapter Building
How To Organize A Chapter.NathanBransford explores strategies to create chapters that move the plot forward,explaining “Too many writers treat their chapters like tanks of gas. They takeoff without really knowing where they’re going, drive around aimlessly untilthey run out of fuel, sputter to a stop, and then they start the next chapterafter someone takes pity on them and tows them somewhere new.” Of particularinterest, he offers a very nice discussion on creating cliffhangers that engagereaders, stating , “The key to crafting a great cliffhanger is to construct theclimax of a chapter so that its resolution opens up even bigger questions.Think about the fate of Dumbledore in the Harry Potter novels, Han Solo beingfrozen in carbonite in Star Wars, or “Who shot J.R.” on Dallas.”
How to Structure Chapters of Your Novel: 8 Tips for WritingChapters. In this very interesting discussion,MasterClass explains eight strategies that help writers create reader-friendlychapters, explaining, “Chapters are the vessels of story structure,organizing the plot points of the larger work and allowing the reader totake a break and absorb what they’ve learned. A short story can be read in onesitting, but a novel is usually broken up into accessible parts, forming a bookthat can be easily revisited whenever the moment arises. Structuring chaptersin a way that keeps readers immersed in the story is essential tonovel-writing.”
And, related to structuring chapters comes thisessential read on tension-building. Jordan Rosenfeld’s How to Write A PageTurner: Craft a Story Your Readers Can’t Put Down (Writers Digest Books, 2019).From the back-cover:
“Tension is the heart of conflict, thebackbone of uncertainty, the hallmark of danger. It keeps readers guessing and characterson their toes. When you’ve got tension in place, stories leave readersbreathless and wanting more. When it’s missing, scenes feel inconsequential,plots drag and characters meander.”
Happy writing!
-- BobbiMiller
