Story Sensei

“As you know, Bob, your mother left you at the age of five to run off to California with the family lawyer, leaving you to be raised by your bohemian grandparents. Do think it’s affecting your judgment about this child abandonment case?” Be careful about dialogue that’s there just to inform the reader. Bob would know what his mother did, and wouldn’t need to be told or reminded. “You’re too close to this case, Bob.” “What do you mean?” He crossed his arms. She spoke with a hitch of hesitation in her voice. “You were the same age as this kid when your mom . . .” She didn’t have to say it. As a child, he’d prayed for an earthquake to swallow up both his mother and the ex-family lawyer in California. Maybe he was too close to this. Some things won’t seem like telling at first, but at closer look they might: She spoke with a hitch of hesitation in her voice. “You were the same age as this kid when your mom left you for the family lawyer.” (Does Bob need to be reminded whom she ran off with...

Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to find and/or further develop your voice. (Most of these exercises are taken from Finding Your Writer's Voice: A Guide to Creative Fiction by Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall ) Keep practicing. Voice is developed by writing, writing, writing. Try doing a voice writing exercise each week. It only takes a few minutes, and that weekly stretching and warm-up will help your writing the rest of the week. And not just short exercises--use your manuscript as practice ground for unleashing your raw voice. Take a scene, or a page of your manuscript. Work some of the exercises with that piece of your writing. Not only will you be developing your voice, you’ll also be working on beefing up your manuscript. Don’t be discouraged if the exercises don’t seem to be showing dramatic results. Often a writer’s voice comes out subtly, in waves or glimpses. Some writers’ voices are loud, others are soft and more subtle. Don’t a...

Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to find and/or further develop your voice. (Most of these exercises are taken from Finding Your Writer's Voice: A Guide to Creative Fiction by Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall ) Speak your voice through characters. Like a ventriloquist, you throw your voice into a story character so that it's you and yet not you speaking. More than anything, it should be the character's voice that dominates, but your own voice will add vibrancy to your character. Your heroine will have her own unique way of speaking, and it will also depend on her audience. She may speak one way to her mother and a different way to the hero. Through it all, don't be limited by her personality--rather, let her individuality unleash your own raw voice. Take a persona and notice if you speak directly in his voice--in his skin--or describe him as if you're in the room. Sometimes, this can indicate a preference for first person v...

Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to find and/or further develop your voice. (Most of these exercises are taken from Finding Your Writer's Voice: A Guide to Creative Fiction by Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall ) Take a lesson from children's storytelling. When children tell stories, they improvise with things connected to their emotions, urgent and important to them at the moment. The duckie in their lap, the blue carpet, the stinky smell from the diaper bag, the lint under the table. It doesn't have to make sense, it doesn't have to be polished. What makes their stories compelling is that it's raw and free. Our writers' voices come out when we can emulate their storytelling mindset. This is related to what we say in public and private. There are certain things we will only say to our families, or sometimes just to ourselves. I'm not talking about foul language or unpleasant bodily functions. Opinions, one-line zinge...

Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to find and/or further develop your voice. (Most of these exercises are taken from Finding Your Writer's Voice: A Guide to Creative Fiction by Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall ) Discover your natural rhythm. All of us have a natural cadence to our speech and thoughts. It's a combination of our genes and environments. For every writer, it's unique. Write nonsense words in grammatically correct sentences, or do free-writing--keep the pen moving even if you just write nonsense or the same sentence over and over. You'll discover things about your voice. Your sentence length, your word choice. Alliteration, metaphors, similes. Twists of phrase, dialect. Learn to be aware of these aspects of your voice's cadence.

Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to find and/or further develop your voice. (Most of these exercises are taken from Finding Your Writer's Voice: A Guide to Creative Fiction by Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall ) Write your voice with your whole body. An opera singer or a screaming child uses his entire body to project his voice. It's a comprehensive, total physical feat. A writer is the same. You want to use your entire being--your whole body--to bring out your writer's voice. This will mean different things to different writers. The important thing is to discover your own all-encompassing combination of rhythm, force, and music that is your voice. The key is all-encompassing--try to involve all of you, not just your mind. Try to imagine what it's like for you to write from your gut, from your toes, digging in with your shoulders, straining with your spine. Make it an energetic feat, requiring force and strength, pulling in aspe...

Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to find and/or further develop your voice. (Most of these exercises are taken from Finding Your Writer's Voice: A Guide to Creative Fiction by Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall ) Unusual situations and a sense of urgency will bring out voice. External stimuli: Create a certain setting or mood by surrounding yourself with objects that will put you emotionally in different states. Try laying on your desk several things that make you mad. Or maybe things that make you sad. Be creative and utilize all five senses. Create different atmospheres that run the gamut of your emotions--don't hold back. Explore difficult emotions, intense emotions. Internal stimuli: Use your mind to put you in different places, at different times. A cold, lonely prison cell. A loud, crowded prison cell. An abandoned warehouse during WW2 with bombs exploding. A desolate cornfield during the Depression. What's important is to put ...

One vital way to make your writing stand out is voice. In many of the contest entries I've judged and manuscripts I've critiqued, writers have muted their natural voice to sound bland and generic. Writing that's alive with its own distinct vocal flavor is a joy to read. The prose is richer and more vibrant, the characters more three-dimensional--all because the writer opens herself to her own writing style and revels in it. However, voice can also be the most difficult and slippery aspect of writing craft to discover and perfect. Raw, creative voice often doesn't result in a polished piece. The key is to first lay down the story with your unhindered voice and polish later. But how to unleash your voice? Many times, a writer's internal critic is hampering the free reign of his unique style, but certain exercises can help him lift all restraints, open the cage door, and let the lion roar. Not all these exercises will work for every writer, but some might enable you to...

Howard Books fiction editor Terry Whalin has started a "Writing Tip of the Day" where you can insert html code into your blog or website and have his writing tip automatically change each day. He has 31 tips now, and intends to write more later. Information is at this blog post . I've inserted it in my sidebar so you can see what it looks like. It's a terrific idea and Terry's background and expertise makes him an ideal person to write these tips for writers.

This is a page or two listing books similar to yours but different in some way. This is to show how your book would both fit in and stand out from the books already in print. Make sure the books you list aren’t too old. List recent titles over older ones. Show clearly how the books are similar, but also show clearly how yours differ. For example: Embryo Factory: The Stem Cell Wars by Rev. Richard A. Humphrey and Dr. Loren J. Humphrey, ACW Press, 2003. This Christian suspense dives deep into the complex moral and technical issues surrounding stem cell research, using a minister and a physician as protagonists. Bitter Dragon also deals with stem cell research, but takes the issue a step further into human cloning and fetal tissue harvesting for disease therapy, with a backdrop of action and adventure pushing the Asian heroine into danger.

Don’t list things like “willing to appear on Oprah”—well, duh. Plus so few authors actually make it on Oprah, period. Be specific about what you personally can do. What groups do you belong to, and what can you realistically do to use your connections to promote your book? For example: Do you work in a school and can you influence the librarian or other schools’ libraries to carry your book? Do you belong to any national organizations and can you give workshops on your book topic at your local chapter? Do you have an active blog or website and can you utilize that to spread the word on the internet?