Tag Archives: Writing Wednesday

#WritingWednesday with Morton S. Gray: Five top tips.

Following the release of her latest novel, Christmas at the Little Beach Café  Morton S. Gray shares her five top writing tips.

Congratulations on the fab new release Morton, I can’t wait to read it. And thank you for stopping by in your busy week. All that remains for me to say is, over to you…

Having recently finished my fifth novel, here are my five writing recommendations:

Allow time for musing – I find that if I allow my mind to wander, especially if I’ve just been thinking about the book I am writing, or want to write, then other things occur to me seemingly by magic. I even find that if I’m listening to music relevant lyrics seem to jump out of the songs and I can use these as writing prompts.

Always try to have something in your book that amuses you even if it isn’t a humorous book, so that when you have edited the manuscript so many times you are absolutely sick of it, you can still find something to smile about.

Carry a means of writing down ideas with you at all times, be that a notebook and pen, dictaphone or a phone app. You never know when inspiration might strike and it is all too easy to think you will remember the thought and then kick yourself later for not writing it down.

Feed your mind – sorry, I don’t mean chocolate – I mean learn new things whenever you can. You never know when you can use something in a book. My forays in early 2020 were into weaving and soap making!

Save pictures that inspire you. For example, many of my characters have been based on photographs from clothing catalogues and magazines. My mother commented the other day when I ripped a page out of a flyer we were recycling – ‘Do you want to buy that jumper as a Christmas present?’ The answer was – ‘No, this guy would make a great hero.’


About Morton S. Gray:

Award winning author of five romance novels, Morton S. Gray lives with her husband, two sons and Lily, the tiny white dog, in Worcestershire, U.K. She has been reading and writing fiction for as long as she can remember, penning her first attempt at a novel aged fourteen. She is a member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association and The Society of Authors.


Books by Morton S. Gray (click the titles to discover more, or to purchase):

Newly released, Christmas at the Little Beach Café is already gaining great reviews. Here’s the blurb:

Run away to the little beach café this Christmas …

Five years ago at Christmas, solicitor Justin Sadler made the decision to leave his comfortable existence behind and move to the coast. Since then, he’s tried his best to ignore the festive season and, as he sits in the little beach café and reflects on that fateful night when his life was turned upside down, he expects his fifth Christmas alone to be no different to any of the others since he made his escape.

But when he encounters a mystery woman on the beach, he soon realises he may have found a fellow runaway and kindred spirit. Could Justin finally be ready to move on and let Christmas into his life again?


Morton’s debut novel The Girl on the Beach was published after she won the Choc Lit Publishing Search for a Star competition. This story follows a woman with a troubled past as she tries to unravel the mystery surrounding her son’s new headteacher, Harry Dixon. The book is available as a paperback and e-book.

Her second book for Choc Lit The Truth Lies Buried is another romantic suspense novel, The book tells the story of Jenny Simpson and Carver Rodgers as they uncover secrets from their past. This book is available as an e-book, paperback and audiobook.

Christmas at Borteen Bay was Morton’s first Christmas novella. It is set in her fictional seaside town of Borteen and follows the story of Pippa Freeman, who runs the Rose Court Guesthouse with her mother, and local policeman Ethan Gibson, as they unravel a family secret as Christmas approaches.

Bestselling Sunny Days on the Beach, is her fourth novel for Choc Lit. Again set in Borteen, this book is the story of what happens when craft shop owner, Mandy Vanes takes in an abandoned teenager, Nick Crossten and the repercussions when Graham Frankley, a gin distiller, arrives in town to say he has received a letter telling him he is Nick’s father.


You can find out more about Morton and her work here: website | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Apricot Plots

#WritingWednesday with Jane Cable: Self-Editing.

A PERSONAL APPROACH TO SELF-EDITING.

I am the ultimate dirty first drafter. I have learnt to bash out the bones of a novel in around three months, starting with just a few pages of the outline agreed with my publisher, but with the strong proviso that details may change.

What I end up with is invariably a bit of a mess, so rather than feel slightly sick at the prospect of fixing it all at once, I go through the manuscript again and again, focussing on one aspect of the editing at a time.

Consistency
Very often the story – or at least the character arcs – have changed a great deal as I’ve been writing so this edit is to update the beginning and middle for what I’ve learnt by the end. It’s mainly dealing with my characters’ motivations and conflicts so vital to the logical progression of the story.

Structure
I don’t worry too much about structure as I write. That said, I like to make sure that the key points, the dips and crescendos, are in roughly the right place. There are many frameworks to choose from, but my preference is for Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat. It was originally devised for screenplay but keeps a novel tight as well.

Necessity
I go through every scene, then every paragraph in every scene, to make sure it’s absolutely essential to the story; either moving the plot forwards or giving the reader vital information about a character. If it does neither, however much I may like it, it goes.

Emotion
Each major character has their own edit for this, when I go through the whole story from their point of view, thinking deeply about how they feel as events unfold. It’s perhaps the most intense phase for me, and not something I can do all day, but it pays huge dividends when you get it right.

Balance
If you think about it, most books are made up of action, description and dialogue, so with this edit I highlight each one in a different colour. That pretty soon tells me if the balance of the book is wrong and where I need to put it right.

Timeline
This involves going through the whole manuscript and putting a date and time on each scene, using just the clues in the text. It’s surprising how many errors it can throw up and is a useful reference point going forwards.


Jane Cable writes romance with a twist and a look over the shoulder at the past. She published her first novel, the multi-award winning The Cheesemaker’s House, independently and is now signed by Sapere Books.

Discover more about Jane and her work, here: Facebook | Twitter | website | Apricot Plots | Sister Scribes .


#WritingWednesday with Angela Barton: Plot Holes.

What is a Plot Hole?

When we’re editing our manuscripts, it’s so easy to focus on the little details that we want to improve, that we miss our story’s biggest weaknesses. The main oversight in editing is the dreaded plot hole.

A plot hole is an inconsistency or gap in the narrative of our story. It contradicts the flow of logic established in our story. Some examples:

  1. The personality of a character suddenly changes.
  2. A secondary character has an obstacle in their life, but it’s never concluded in your story.
  3. Your readers rarely forgive illogical events. For eg. A character travels to Spain from America and is drinking in a coffee bar later the same morning.
  4. One of your characters has forgotten an important fact that they knew earlier in the storyline.

How To Find and Correct a Plot Hole in Your Manuscript.

Readers’ suspension of disbelief may ensure that some of your story’s smaller plot holes are missed or ignored. But there’s a limit to how much they will accept. Here are some tips for finding your plot hole:

  1. Be objective when editing. The easiest way to do this is to step away from your manuscript and leave it for a few days, or longer. Review it later with fresh eyes.
  2. Refuse to be influenced by your own opinions and emotions. Edit from the perspective of your characters.
  3. Writing a continuity list can be helpful. I’ve made my own form which lists the chapter numbers along with a sentence or two about the storyline in that chapter and which characters are present. I also make a note of the month/year the scene takes place which also helps with continuity. (see photograph)
  4. Take time to question the logic of your plot. Does the previous storyline lead to that moment or has a journey or question gone unanswered? Have your characters made choices or said things that don’treflect their personality?
  5. Keep a checklist of your subplots and make sure all of them are complete. Close all open ends.
  6. Keep notes on your revised edits. They may open up a future plot hole that needs managing.
  7. I recommend a professional edit as a safety net to plot holes. If this is too pricey, ask a writer friend to have a read through.


About Angela Barton:

Angela was born in London and grew up in Nottingham. She is married with three grown up children and adorable six-year-old twin granddaughters. She is passionate about writing both contemporary and historical fiction and loves time spent researching for her novels. In 2018 Angela signed publishing contracts for three of her completed novels.

In addition to writing, Angela also relaxes by making landscapes using free motion sewing on a machine. She is a member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association and a reader for their New Writers’ Scheme. Angela is also a member of Nottingham Writers’ Studio, the Society of Authors and Ellipses and Ampersands’ fiction critique group.

Discover more about Angela Barton and her novels here: Twitter | Facebook | Blog | Amazon | Angela is also a member of Apricot Plots.

 

#WritingWednesday with Caroline James: Keep Writing.

Great advice from Caroline James on writing regularly and getting that first draft down:

Take a notebook, sit down and write in longhand for half an hour. Write anything that comes into your head. Let your stream of consciousness flow. Do this every morning for a week and see what happens. I promise; something will connect and your creativity will spark. In her book, The Artist’s Way, author Julia Cameron calls this, The Morning Pages, and many writers including myself, practice every day. Don’t forget that you have to write badly in order to get better and the more you write the more your writing will improve.

Stephen King, the famous author, who has sold millions of books, states that in order to write well you should read prolifically. He wrote a book for writers called, On Writing, and I highly recommend using some of his methods.

Begin a writing project and allow yourself time to write. Take time out of your day to sit down in a space that you can call your own, for however long you have. At the moment, we can’t take ourselves off to cafés or parks, so it is important to make it clear to your household members that this is your bit of ‘me time.’ If you write in challenging circumstances, you can write anywhere. Every day that you don’t write because you don’t know what to write or where to begin, is another day of not being a writer.

Don’t worry about grammar and spelling.

Just get it written. Get to the end of your first draft. The most important thing is to get your story on the page. You can check everything later. Don’t stop the flow by worrying over poor spelling or grammar. Once the first draft is in the bag then editing, re-editing and re-writing can be done.


Best-selling author Caroline James writes women’s fiction. 

Discover more about her novels or contact Caroline here: Website | Twitter | Facebook | Blog | Amazon


#WritingWednesday with Desiree Vilena: Writing Exercises.

5 Short Fiction Exercises to Rescue You from Writer’s Block by Desiree Vilena.

Writing short fiction is, without a doubt, one of my favorite pastimes. However, it’s so much more than that: I’ve found it’s also one of the best ways to sharpen my prose, hone my sense of narrative structure, and liberate my mind when I’m stuck on anotherpiece of writing.

Since I started writing short stories, they’ve become my go-to whenever I can’t seem to make progress on a longer project. Today I want to share some of the short fiction exercises that I use to “unstick” myself, in hopes that they might help you, too! These exercises work particularly well if you have established characters, but if you don’t — or if you need a break from your WIP — feel free to invent some on the spot, or borrow some from another author just for fun. Without further ado, here we go.

1. Write a few hundred words of dialogue:

Writing dialogue used to intimidate me hugely. Somehow I got it in my head that if I couldn’t say the words out loud without them sounding totally stilted, it was bad dialogue. This was before I figured out there’s a reason why I’m a writer, not an actor — and also that dialogue doesn’t need to be Sorkin-esque all the time! When embarking on a short piece in particular, you’re free to write total fluff without worrying too much about where it ends up.

This is why penning a bit of banter is now one of my favorite ways to conquer writer’s block. Most of the time, it’s a nice diversion more than anything: deciding what the characters should discuss, throwing in a few points of contention, and seeing where the conversation leads. But writing dialogue is also a fantastic way to get to know your characters — ideally, it makes you think more deeply about their personalities, opinions, and how they might express these things in dialogue, as well as what they might conceal (intentionally or not).

2. Write on a “question to fall in love”:

Remember the New York Times’ 36 questions to fall in love? Another short-form approach to solving writer’s block (that can also be quite conducive to character development!) is to write a short story based on one of these questions. My personal favorites include “Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?” and “When did you last cry in front of another person?”, but there are plenty more lighthearted options to inspire you.

Again, it’s great if you can do this with your own characters, but sometimes a question will catch your eye and simply beg for an original story. You might write a flashback scene answering one of the “memory” or “childhood” questions, or a speculative story about the premise of #6 (“If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the mind or body of a 30-year-old, which would you choose?”). If you’re in the mood to write creative nonfiction, you could even try answering one of the questions yourself! Though there are only 36 questions, the ways in which you might respond are endless — and of course, you can always combine this exercise with the dialogue exercise and have your characters answer the questions together (especially if you want them to fall in love).

3. Write a story based on a specific prompt:

Then again, sometimes you want a prompt that tells you exactly what to write. This may be the case if your writer’s block stems from toomuch freedom, rather than not enough. Indeed, this often happens to me when I want to start a new piece, but feel overwhelmed by possibilities. If this sounds like you, too, a prescriptive prompt is the way to go!

The only challenge is choosing the prompt in the first place. Luckily, it’s easy to narrow it down using a plot generator, or by organizing your writing prompts by genre! Still too much choice for you? Take a look at the most recent contest in the sidebar of that directory — this will give you a taster of just five prompts, each with a clear directive, such as “Write about a character putting something into a time capsule.” If you manage to finish your story by the end of the week, you can even submit it to possibly win the contest (a nice little bonus to this creative exercise).

4. Write a revealing dream sequence:

I know what you’re thinking: aren’t fictional dream sequences tough to pull off without lapsing into heavy-handedness? But as with all writing exercises, I’d posit that a dream sequence doesn’t need to be perfectly written — though it’s ideal if you can make it meaningful in some way.

I’ll usually turn to dreams when I’m stuck on character motivations and want to feel them out in an indirect manner. Writing a dream sequence can be almost like a Rorschach test: whatever I include in a dream illuminates what I might need to address more substantially in the text. Whether this is a fear the character needs to overcome, a solution to a problem they’ve been grappling with, or a romantic interest they haven’t yet admitted, such a sequence will almost always give me new material to work with — not to mention it’s another great way to connect with your characters in general!

5. Write a scene between secondary characters:

Romance writers will no doubt be familiar with this one, as it’s one of the best ways to lay the foundation for a sequel. But even outside of romance, I’ve found that taking a break from your main characters to flesh out the supporting cast (just like you’re taking a break from your novel with short fiction!) can be both refreshing andenlightening.

So here’s the final exercise: pick a couple of secondary characters (not necessarily your favorites — whomever you think might interact in an interesting manner!) and write about them. Once more, feel free to combine this with any of the above exercises, or just think about what these secondary characters might be doing while the protagonists are protagonist-ing and run with it.

This exercise is an especially helpful reminder that every character in a novel should be three-dimensional, even if they’re not central to the action! If you start writing a scene between secondary characters and realize you have no idea who they are or what purposes they serve, now is your chance to fix it before you publish your book.

Of course, short fiction exercises can’t remedy every problem you might have, particularly with something as expansive as writer’s block. But in my experience, there’s usually an exercise that will get to the heart of it — whether that’s character uncertainty, plot knots, or simply feeling overwhelmed with the task of writing. The trick is knowing yourself as an author, so you can pick the solution that will work for you.


Desiree Villena is a writer with Reedsy, a marketplace that connects authors and publishers with the world’s best editors, designers, and marketers. In her spare time, Desiree enjoys reading contemporary fiction, writing short stories, and making very slow progress on her novel.