The Blog That Time Did Not Forget: Three tips from a writer's blogcation

I liken living in the 21st century to a young child born in the 19th century who saw an incandescent lamp light their room for the first time and who lived long enough into the 20th century to watch on a black and white television an astronaut take one small step for man kind.

The only difference is now we don’t have to live to a ripe old age to watch the advancement of technology for it changes overnight, literally.  

For many of my devoted followers, thank you by the way, you may have noticed I have not posted many blogs articles over the past three months.  If you are reading this today, I would again like to thank you for your loyalty, but please be assured it was not due to slacking off.  I would like to think of my absence as more of conducting an experiment in time travel.  

Let’s explore:

My last two articles posted were devoted to time and space in fictional writing.  If you missed them or would like to discover them for the first time, (click here for Part I and click here for Part II).   

In them, we explored techniques that can be used to help transport your readers through time.  Afterall, writing is one of the unique forms of art in which all five senses can be used to achieve this!  

During that time, I began to have flashbacks to when I first started writing.  A time when I unequivocally knew that one day I was going to become a published author!  So, I decided to take a blogcation.  

What did I discover during my time off?  That I did become a published author and if I ever had high hopes of doing it again then some things needed to change.   

Listed below are the top three major tips I discovered during my blogcation that I hope will help you too if you are at a point in your writing career where you may be wondering, “What am I doing wrong?”

REDISCOVER

By taking time to sit, in silence, and free write reasons why you ever wanted to become a writer helps to awaken dreams that have long ago been tucked away deep within your inner thoughts.

For example, here are four of the numerous phrases that seemed to magically appear on my notepad, but once I saw them, I remembered.

To make a difference   

To bring wonder to a child!

To inspire...

Life long...dream

So go ahead, grab a notepad and pen and find a cozy quite spot to sit and ponder and then be ready to rediscover the writer inside you that’s still full of dreams and imagination just waiting to come alive!  (Oh, and one important note, if you have a furry pawed ghostwriter like Efi Loo, don’t forget to include them too!)

REORGANIZE

Prior to becoming a writer, I owned and operated my own interior design business where I not only helped my clients create the home of their dreams through design and color, but also through the art of feng shui.  

What is feng shui?  Feng shui, (pronounced fung shway; fung, meaning wind, and shway, meaning water), is an ancient art and science developed over 3,000 years ago in China where the principle of five elements in shapes; water, wood, fire, metal and earth are used to bring harmony to a space through the use of color and the placement of objects.

What does this all have to do with being a writer?  Everything!  Taking a blogcation helped me realize I could use the help of an interior designer to come in and help revitalize my work space.  Then it hit me, I am a trained interior designer and I wasn’t living up to the advice people once paid me for!  

Clutter is one of the biggest no-no’s in feng shui, because it prevents positive energy, (chi), from flowing freely through a room.  But wait you say, all writers know that clutter is our best friend because having all that paper strewn about our desk is a sign of progress, right?   

Wrong, think again.  Clutter is nothing more than a sign of a bogged down mind which can prevent you from moving forward in a positive way.  

If you have been feeling heavy minded lately and can’t seem to get your creative juices flowing, look around at your work space with feng shui eyes and you just might be surprised at the amount of “progress” you have piling up in front of you!  

Take time to clear your workspace by creating folders for unfinished manuscripts and scribbled story ideas on crumpled up napkins and coffee stained work in progress’ you’ve been editing for months.  

Then while you’re still motivated by the uplifting feeling, organize a closet or clean out a junk drawer and then get ready, because your inner writer will have come alive and nothing will stop it from wanting to write!

RECONNECT    

As with any structure, the foundation is its strength and the stronger its foundation the taller it can rise.  

One of the main lessons any coach can teach their players when they fall into a slump is to go back to the basics.  The same lesson can be applied to any writer.  

Often times, we find ourselves so caught up in our own works of art that we tend to forget we had a starting point.  Then when our flame begins to flicker and burn low we feel lost and confused and don’t know how to start over again.  

Whether you started fresh out of college or spent many years pursuing your dreams of one day becoming a published author, you had a beginning, and it’s important as time speeds by into the unknown future that you take time to revisit your past and those lessons learned that helped to build your foundation as a writer.  It can renew and revitalize old forgotten lessons that once propelled you forward.  

To quote Albert Einstein, “‘Time is relative,’” and as I stated in the beginning, now we don’t have to live to a ripe old age to watch the advancement of technology for it changes overnight, literally.  

I should know, for as the cliche goes, proof is in the pudding.  During my three month blogcation, Facebook came out with a new look, as did Blogger and Twitter, and once again I had to learn new skills to catch up to the 21st century.  

Only this time I realized there was one thing that remained solid over time, my foundation, and I’m glad I took time to revisit my past and add another brick from my memory as to why I wanted to become a published author.

How about you, do you remember why you became a writer?

Until next time,

Keep on thriving, keep on striving and keep on writing!

T.K. Millin

From Seconds to Eternity: Time and Space in Fictional Writing - Part 1

“When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity.”  -Albert Einstein 

Literature, in its own right, is tied to time like no other art form I know of.  For example, a photograph or a painting is an image of a moment in time and last only as long as it takes to look at it.  Same could be said about music.  A song lasting 2.5 minutes represents the 2.5 minutes it takes to listen to it.  

A book takes time to read as well; however, the reader can be transported through time whether they spend five minutes reading or several hours.  For example, it’s possible to write a story that takes thirty minutes to read and covers thirty minutes of action or the time covered could be stretched out over a lifetime.  There are no requirements when it comes to fictional writing.  

As a writer, the possibilities to capture time and space in a story are infinite; but just like a scientist developing a time machine, there are methods to the madness and I’m not talking about something as complex as a flux capacitor! 

Let’s explore:

Summary and Scene

Summary covers a relatively long period of time in a short amount of distance.  It’s a useful method to help reveal information, explain a character’s background, change the pace or to advance forward or backwards in time.

Scene is to fiction what the five senses are to living.  In other words, they allow your readers to experience the elements of your characters’ lives through sight, sound, scent, taste and touch.

It’s possible to write a short story in a single scene, without any summary at all, but it’s not possible to write a successful story completely in summary.  By summarizing events rather than having them realized as moments of time in your character’s life, you disconnect the reader from putting themselves in your character’s shoes.  

To put it simply, summary allows you to speed up time in your story and fill in the gap of missing information, scene allows you to slow the pace and fill in the gap of missing details; smells, colors, sensations...etc., you get the picture.  

Eventually, a story requires a trigger or a crisis to occur that is crucial to a turning point in your protagonist’s life and cannot be summarized, therefore, all stories require scenes.   

One simple formula I use to help keep on track to bring balance between summary and scene is the following:

Scene elements Summary elements

Goal                Emotion

Conflict             Thought

Disaster            Decision

                       Action

Basically, in a scene, a character has a goal (maybe to fix a cup of coffee, thus allowing smell and taste to be interjected) then a conflict arises (they knock the mug over, spilling hot coffee on their lap, in could come sight and touch) and next a disaster (the phone rings, Aunt Ruby just died, time for sound).  

Moving from scene to summary will now allow the pace to quicken.  The character reacts to the news (they remember when growing up they were the only one Aunt Ruby never sent a birthday or Christmas present to (a long period of time in a short distance)) then they think about what just happened (Aunt Ruby became filthy rich when her husband died) now they make a decision (they will go to the funeral and put on a show of sorrow) then the character takes action based upon their decision (they take their best suit to the cleaners).  

So as we can see, by using the method of summary and scene we are able to transport our readers through time in a matter of a few sentences or several pages.

In Part II, we will explore two more methods for transporting our readers through time; flashback and slow motion.

Until next time,

Keep on thriving, keep on striving and keep on writing!

T.K. Millin

Showing is Believing: Grasp the Principle of Filtering and Never Tell Again

All writers start out as beginners.  Whether they spent years in school or ventured out on their own in search of their dreams, there was an invisible start line etched across the beginning of their pathway to a writer’s life.

Like many beginning authors, I started out writing all my stories in first person (read my post here) and ended every line of dialogue with an attribution of either she said, he said or they cried! (read my post about it here)

Then there was the infamous challenge of overcoming the don’t tell ‘em, show ’em syndrome.  If you ever find yourself wondering how in the world can you show something to the reader without telling them, then you are not alone.    

For example: It’s easy to think if my character has walked into a room and sat in a chair by the window and looked out and saw her neighbor fall to the ground that the only way my readers are going to know they fell is if I write the scene like this:

{Mary made her way to the chair by the window and graciously sat down.  She looked out the window and saw her neighbor, Mr. Pepper, standing in his front yard.  She noticed a strange look on his face and then she saw him clutch his chest and fall to his knees.}

In writing fiction, you will often times be writing through some observing consciousness and when you ask the reader to observe the observer, you start to tell not show and inadvertently get in their line of sight.  

By removing the filters, you allow your readers to remain inside the character’s stream of consciousness.  

Let’s explore:

The filter is a common error and as a beginning writer, difficult to recognize.  Even experienced writers can still fall prey to the natural urge to tell not show syndrome, but once you grasp the principle of filtering it’s an exciting way to make your writing more vivid.  

Taking our example from above (I’ve highlighted the filters) and then removed them to “show” how our scene can be more vivid.  

With filters:

  {Mary made her way to the chair by the window and graciously sat down.  She looked out the window and saw her neighbor, Mr. Pepper, standing in his front yard.  She noticed a strange look on his face and then she saw him clutch his chest and fall to his knees.}

Filters removed:

{Mary made her way to the chair by the window and graciously sat down. Across the street her neighbor, Mr. Pepper, was standing in his front yard with a strange look on his face. Suddenly, he clutched his chest and fell to his knees.}

Notice how in the revised version with the filters removed, it reads as though you are Mary observing the scene and not someone standing next to you telling you what she was seeing.  

So, the next time you are self-editing your story, make a mental note to watch for filters and experiment by removing them.  You just might be amazed how vivid your scene becomes!

How about you have you learned to spot filters (or perhaps you refer to them as something else)?  If so, I would love to have you share how it has improved your writing.

Until next time,

Keep on thriving, keep on striving and keep on writing!

T.K. Millin