At The Write Practice, we publish a new article each day designed to help writers tackle one part of their writing journey, from generating ideas to grammar to writing and publishing your first book. Each article has a short practice exercise at the end to help you immediately put your learning to use.
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“In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice,” said Victor Frankl.
Every story requires pain and suffering. If the protagonist doesn’t experience pain, he won’t change. “Pain develops character. If you have a story where someone learns through joy, the audience won’t buy it,” said Donald Miller at his Storyline conference.
Joy is great. Your story should incorporate some joy. But the Great Teacher is pain.
If you’re like me, you’re probably looking for balance, balance in your creative life, in your work life, in your social life. You want to know how to balance your creative writing with your blogging and platform building. You want to know how to make money while also pursuing a career in writing. Oh and you’d like to finish reading a book every once in a while, too.
For most of my blogging “career,” I used Pagelines Platform which is, in my opinion, the best and easiest free wordpress theme available. If you want an easy, free theme, I highly recommend Pagelines.
However, in early 2012 I spent the money to upgrade to a premium theme. Here’s why.
Ted Gup gave me lots of great writing advice when I was in his creative nonfiction class in grad school. Write through to the end; don’t edit as you go. Don’t talk about what you’re writing because that steals the life from it. Be careful about parroting yourself.
But by far the best wisdom he ever shared with me was this, “Look for the story behind the story.”
Once a month, we stop practicing and invite you to show off your best work.
Are you interested in being published (in print)? Would you like to get better at the writing craft by working with an editor? Do you enjoy a little friendly competition? And are you a fan of The Write Practice?
Then this writing contest might be for you.
Critique groups are banes or blessings, depending upon your experiences. I’ve endured both, but in the long run I consider a critique group an asset in a writer’s toolbox. They come with their good points and bad, their strong writers and weak, the arrogant and the fearful. And invariably you’ll find the one who deems himself the grammar police.
He (or she) will don a green, red, or other colored pen and commence to circling passive voice, noting Oxford commas, crossing through the use of HAD and THAT, underscoring your split infinitives, and chastising you for beginning a sentence with AND or BUT. Heaven help you if you end a sentence with OF, TO or AT.
And invariably a writer will stand tall and profess that he writes from the soul, the heart, or some other part of their body, and that strict adherence to grammar rules handcuffs a creative spirit.
A few years ago, the memoirist Donald Miller was approached to turn his book Blue Like Jazz into a movie. (Have you seen it yet, by the way? I heard it’s pretty good.) As he started to work with the producers to turn his book, which is essentially the story of his life, into a movie, he was surprised when they said they’d have to cut sections because it wasn’t interesting.
His life wasn’t interesting? His life wouldn’t make a good story?
Trying to start a short story or novel can be difficult, but providing a satisfying ending is just as hard, if not harder.
Recently, I submitted a flash fiction story hoping to get it published. Two days later, the editor replied telling me how much he liked how the story. Unfortunately, he said, the ending didn’t provide enough answers. “Make the end worthwhile”, he said in his last sentence, “and I’ll publish it.”
How many of you struggled in writing a satisfying end for your story? I know I did. After reading that email, I quickly edited my story. I revised and revised and created different versions on how the story ended. Eventually I came up with one that I found satisfying. This time, the story got accepted!
This experience taught me one thing: Writers have to finish strong.
I worked on an article for a magazine today for about four hours. It’s still not finished but it’s close. The muse is pumping and I’m in the flow.
But it’s 5:55 pm and my rest tonight includes a date with my wife at six pm.
I have two options:
1. Post-pone our date for thirty minutes to finish the article.
2. Reject the muse and stop working.
This isn’t a hard decision. My spouse is more important than my writing (sorry, Hemingway), and besides, she’d yell at me if I didn’t turn off. I saved the article and shut down my computer (or I will after finishing this). Done. Rest on.
However, most of the time we don’t make this decision. We choose to postpone rest (a date with ourselves, our souls) all the time.
I’ve noticed the following two problems in my own writng and in the writers I edit:
1. Too much inner monologue.
2. Not enough setting and description.
This is a problem because the more inner monologue you use, the yonger your writing sounds. I don’t know why this is, but inner-monologue-heavy novels feel younger and more fit for teenagers than novels that give less access to their characters’ heads.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Hunger Games is selling millions of copies while Cormac McCarthy is winning awards and living in relative obscurity. We like our inner-monologue-rich novels. But they also feel less like art. Decide whether you want to use it accordingly.