Three Writing Tips for Building an Outline

Today’s guest post is by Alexis Bonari, a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident blogger at onlinedegrees.org, researching areas of accredited online degrees. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.

One of my literature professors once told me that there’s no wrong way to create an outline so long as it accomplishes the intended purpose. By the time they are asked to complete a lengthy project Read more

How to Write a Memoir With a Partner

Today’s guest post, “How to Write a Memoir with a Partner” is by Deborah Prutzman, co-author of Addie of the Flint Hills: A Prairie Child During the Depression (1915-1935).

Few writers would argue that writing is a solitary pursuit. That said, collaborations between two or more writers do occur, and some have been highly successful. This is especially true when it comes to memoirs. Why? Because often one person has a remarkable story to tell but is not a professional writer, and the other person is needed to help write the personal story (and tell it in a most compelling way).

Sometimes that person is a relative or friend. Sometimes that person is a professional, paid ghostwriter or editor. In my case, I helped my mom write her memoir. At age 94 she had an interesting story to tell but needed my help to access her memories and then organize and write them in the form of a book. This was our first collaboration but hopefully not our last, because Mom wants to do a whole series of books!

In writing this memoir with my mother, I learned a lot and am delighted to be able to share my “lessons learned,” some of which will hopefully be helpful to you.

Steps to Writing a Memoir

1. Start with whatever your partner can do. It can be a recorded or written list or a spoken dialogue about his or her life. If your partner cannot start, you might offer a list of key events and ask for feedback, thoughts, and reactions about these or inquire about how friends and family were affected by these events.
2. Develop a list of questions on a specific topic coming from multiple angles and ask about one or two each time you meet.
3. Listen and write everything down. You may not think something your partner says is significant, but months later you will see why it matters.
4. Let your partner repeat stories, and view this as a chance to get new details and better words.
5. Tell others about the effort. Many of our friends and relatives sent photos or came to visit and told Mom stories. Some of this material made its way into the book. Some triggered memories, which was also wonderful for all of us.
6. Have your partner answer three overarching questions, appropriate to the time, and weave these into the book. These can differ based on your interests and the interests of your partner and family, friends, or business associates. I asked my mother what was her experience of the moment, what was the family dynamic in her judgment now, looking back, and how did the economy back then impact her.
7. Buy books, music, and videos of the places and times to trigger memories. Mom would look at these on her own and write down a memory or thought that these brought to mind. Many of these comments were incorporated into the text. As part of the research I also reached out to local historical societies, and went on Ebay looking for relevant items, old postcards, programs, etc. Also, reviewing the materials provided hours of fun for her while I was not there.
8. Read, reread, and discuss the draft text. Again, this provided many enjoyable hours for Mom when she was otherwise alone. Often I asked her to focus on a theme or a person and spend the next few days writing down whatever came to mind.
9. Always work with whatever your partner’s natural tendency is. Nail it down and then push for the opposite. My mother was very factual; almost matter of fact and devoid of emotion. I captured that, and then pushed to find the little details that hinted at the emotions, which began slowly but surely to release the flood of feelings!
10. Have a professional editor go over the manuscript for typos, grammar, and punctuation and also to edit out any redundancies.

More Thoughts on How to Write a Memoir

One more thing I can add from my experience that really worked: Just asking someone to write his or her memoirs can be overwhelming for that person. In our case, for a year or so previous to actually writing, we laid down the groundwork by making a video.

It was a simple production. We gathered all the family photos we could find and put them in a more or less chronological order. Mom thought about her life and we agreed upon a loose script. Then, I asked questions and she responded. We edited it down to an hour or two and were very satisfied with our results. When I finally suggested that Mom write down her memories, she had a framework.

The bones of the story are the partner’s life, the person who lived the events (unless you both did). What really matters is capturing that person’s thoughts and experiences, so be nonjudgmental in order to freely allow your partner to lead you down the path of his or her past life. With my mother, I tried to be curious about why she thought and felt certain things. I am a lawyer and a pretty strong woman, so the role of a more passive partner is not one that I am all that comfortable with. It took effort, but I was able to channel her thoughts and experiences. Working on the book brought all sorts of good things to my family and most of all, brought Mom and me closer together.

When the memoir I wrote with my mother was finished, we found a publisher, hired a publicist, and then went back to mom’s local roots for a mini book tour, which was highly successful. Mom loves to read and re-read her book. Now we are going on to the next 20 years. I hope you and your writing partner are equally delighted with the end result of your venture.

To learn more about the memoir that Deborah wrote with her mother, and to get more tips on how to write a memoir, please visit www.adalinesorace.com.

Creative Cross Pollination

Today’s post is a special treat – a guest post from Jennie Nash, author of The Only True Genius in the Family, which was published earlier this month by Berkley Trade.

Creative Cross Pollination, or How Knitting, Painting and Gardening Can Help You Become a Better Writer

by Jennie Nash, author of The Only True Genius in the Family

Writing is a thing that you necessarily do by yourself. Even if you’re sitting in a crowded Starbucks or the reading room of a fantastic library, you are the only one who is going to decide which word to put down next, which scene to write next and which project to see through to completion. In a great essay entitled, “The Talent of the Room,” Michael Ventura put it best: “Writing is something you do alone in a room. Copy that sentence and put it on your wall because there’s no way to exaggerate or overemphasize this fact. It’s the most important thing to remember if you want to be a writer. Writing is something you do alone in a room.”

The strangest thing has happened to me, however, during the writing of my last two books. Around about page 100, I start to obsess about getting up and going out, and the places I always fantasize about going are places where I could make some other kind of art. I’d think about going to the art store and buying giant tubes of paint, going to the yarn store and buying bags of merino wool, or taking a class in how to throw a clay pot. I became mesmerized by the idea of starting a new project – something with color, something with texture, something that’s just more tangible than words on a page.

I used to fight the impulse. I thought that a “real” writer would just stay in the room and finish the story. What I found, however, is that if I allow myself the freedom to wander, creatively speaking, it always helps my work. Spend a little time in a bead shop stringing chunks of turquoise on a wire and you’ll understand something about rhythm. Run your hands over some bright red baby alpaca yarn, and you’ll learn something about texture. And if you need a reminder that failure is an inherent part of creativity and that throwing out a few hundred words (or pages) isn’t the end of the world? Try turning a chunk of clay into a bowl.

I know that writers have to work alone in a room, but I also know this: the more experiences of life we can take in there with us, the richer our work will be. I no longer shy away from the urge to create something besides stories – to play with color, texture, pattern, rhythm, and taste. My fifth book is coming out this month, and I’m in the middle of my sixth…and I also have some horribly misshapen clay bowls on a shelf, some painfully thin scarves in a drawer, and a few paintings on my bathroom wall that feature a rather hideous shade of olive green that I mixed right on the canvas just because I thought it would be fun.

Jennie Nash lives in Los Angeles, California with her husband and two daughters. She is an instructor at the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. Visit her website, www.jennienash.com, to read first chapter of her new novel, The Only True Genius in the Family. Visit Meet Your Muse, Jennie’s blog about creative inspiration.

Other books by Jennie Nash:

The Last Beach Bungalow, a novel about a breast cancer survivor who falls in love with a house.

The Victoria’s Secret Catalog Never Stops Coming: And Other Lessons I Learned From Breast Cancer, a memoir about love, loss and lingerie.

10 Tips to Improve Your Fiction Writing Skills

This post was contributed by Kelly Kilpatrick, who writes on the subject of distance learning universities. She invites your feedback at kellykilpatrick24 at gmail dot com.

Writing fiction, whether short or long, can be a very trying experience indeed.  So many writers of fiction have different processes for achieving their writing goals that it’s hard to sift through what works and what doesn’t.

Writing is a process that requires skill, determination, adaptability, and plenty of time.  Here are some suggestions for improving your fiction writing skills, gleaned from trial and error over time.

1. Start With a Seed

Some great fiction books are simply a product of asking the question, “What if…?”  Starting a new work of fiction requires just a small seed to get you going.  Beginning without too much baggage can really help get the ball rolling.

2. Let the Story Tell Itself

Think of yourself as a medium, or a vehicle, for a story that wants to be told.  You may have some idea about where things are going, but don’t create too many constraints for yourself.  The story will unfold if you are ready to work hard on keeping up with what it has to say.

3. Use Realistic Characters and Dialogue

This is accomplished through many different approaches.  As a writer, you must learn to hone your powers of observation and watch people and how they interact.  Research can come in a variety of forms, from reading other authors to watching movies as well.  Keen observation skills and personal experience will help guide you through this aspect of fiction writing.

4. Write What You Know

This is a well-known mantra for fiction writers, yet many fail to adhere to this simple principle of fiction writing.  When you write about things you know and experiences you’ve had, the writing is easier to read and comes across as more authentic.

5. Close the Door

When you’re ready to get down to business, find a place where you can go to tune the rest of the world out.  If you are planning on writing a long work of fiction, you will essentially be “living in the story.”  Be prepared to shut yourself in as you work on bringing your tale to life.

6. Keep Pushing Forward

Don’t get caught up in the past; keep writing each day without taking time to go back and reread.  The time for reading what you have written will come, and that’s when you can fix any inconsistencies.  Keep writing and worry about the minute details during the revision process.  Dedicating specific amounts of time regularly will help you to get the project finished sooner rather than later.

7. Put it Away When You’re Finished

When you feel your story has come to a close, put it away.  Get it out of your sight and try your best not to revisit the work while the story is fresh in your mind.  Putting some distance between writing and editing will do you and your story some good.

8. Start a New Project

Get started right away on something new to increase the distance between you and your previous work.  This will help you to come back with a new perspective and keep your productivity level high in the process.


9. Return to Your Finished Product

After some time has passed, pull out your manuscript and read the piece with a pair of fresh eyes.  Chances are you will find ways to improve upon and revise the story to make it flow more smoothly.

10. Revise and Edit

Cuts will have to be made and the revision process can be time consuming, but will help out when you’re ready to share your work with another reader for their opinion.  Make sure that you polish your work as much as possible before giving it out to others for their opinions.  Eliminating clutter and proofreading errors will help to get honest feedback without trivial details getting in the way.

If you have any fiction writing tips to share, feel free to post them in the comments or send them in as a guest post.

What Can Fiction Writers Learn from Poetry?

The following is a guest post by William Womack who also blogs at Words for Writers.

Fiction writers are scavengers. We scour daily life collecting faces and names, sharp words and longing glances, then hunker in our caves to weave tapestries from the pretty bits we’ve found. It isn’t just ideas and images we pilfer; techniques and craft are fair game too. Some of our most potent writing tools are borrowed from our poet friends.

A well-turned poem often seems close to magic in the way it telegraphs strong emotion and vivid imagery in a compact space. Fortunately for poets and fiction writers alike, magic has little do to with it. We can dissect poetry, lifting out the parts that are most useful to us. Take for example a passage from my most recent manuscript, Last Thursday. The main character has gone for a walk along the river in Portland to sort out his thoughts when (surprise!) it starts to rain.

A pellet of water slaps the bridge of my nose. I frown at the heavens. Crap. Jerking to my feet, I scramble down the path toward my bike. The brambles around me quiver with a steady piff, piff, like bullets grazing, as random raindrops fall to Earth.

One poetic device this paragraph employs is the recurring theme. Outwardly, the passage is simply describing the onset of a storm. On closer inspection, the subtext created by the choice of words indicates something more-an antagonistic relationship between the main character and fate (or life, or God). He doesn’t just frown at the sky, he frowns at the heavens. His argument with the almighty is an ongoing motif in a number of the early scenes.

Simile and metaphor offer shortcuts to understanding by comparing one thing to another (often unrelated) thing. This is no simple rainstorm beginning, but a personal affront. Somebody’s out to get him! His choice of simile, like bullets grazing, underscores his belief that he’s being targeted by an uncaring fate.

Although it’s subtle, there’s also a bit of assonance, the repeated use of a vowel sound. Crap, scramble, path, brambles, random, the a’s set up a backbeat that draws the eye along. It’s fun to read aloud, too. A little alliteration also rears its head with random raindrops. As with any of these techniques, a dollop goes a long way.

Another thing you might notice on reading this bit aloud is the rhythm. The first two sentences are structured in deliberate groups of three syllables da da da – da da da – da da da – da da da. Again, this is subtle, but it makes for sentences that roll along at a pleasing pace.

And finally, there’s a bit of onomatopoeia, that clunker for words that sound like their meaning. My favorite from above is slaps. Not only is it visceral and sharp, but it repeats the persecution theme. I’ll make the case for the non-word piff as another example, although it invokes a bit of poetic license.

I’ve only slightly scratched the surface with these examples. There are countless other ways we can raid the poet’s toolbox to build fiction. The next time you’re casting about for an inspirational novel to get your head set for writing, try grabbing a book of poems instead.

About the Author

William Womack is a writer and graphic designer living in Portland, Oregon. He is currently working on his second novel, Last Thursday, a tale of murder and intrigue set against the backdrop of the Portland arts scene. For more of his thoughts on writing and the writing lifestyle, visit www.wordsforwriters.com.