Change Your Clock and Your Batteries by Vonnie Davis

In our part of the country, we move our clocks back an hour tonight. Sixty minutes of sleep gained for many of us. Safety experts use this time to remind us to also change our batteries in our smoke alarms. A great idea. Checking our batteries in other parts of our lives can be a good idea too--like in our writing lives.

What perfect timing for this reminder since November is NaNoWriMo and many of you are diligently producing word count daily. Not me. No, I'm still trying to work my way out of a writer's slump. I write a few hundred words and lose interest, so I hop over to another story and fiddle with it for a while. Yup, I'm in a funk...and the migraines aren't helping. So I thought I'd take some time to read books on craft, refresh my zeal for writing and maybe learn some things along the way. You see, I'm hoping to re-energize my writerly soul. So I'm sharing some facts I'm rediscovering.

I'm calling them Vonnie's Half-Dozen.

1. Think like a professional. Writing is an art. Publishing is a business. To present anything less than your best to an agent or editor is like shooting yourself in the foot. Editors are too busy to hold your hand and teach you. If you send them a manuscript that requires few edits on their end, your story looks more appealing to them than one with some technical or grammar issues. Learn your craft. Learn it so well it becomes second nature to you.

2. Begin writing and keep going until you're through the rough part. (Can I stop for a few minutes and sob here?) All beginnings are tough. The beginning of a novel...the beginning of a chapter...the beginning of each day's work are all tough. Accept that, grit your teeth and get past those beginnings.

3. Call writing what it is. WORK! Give your labor the dignity of a title. Tell yourself you have to work now, even if you can only carve out thirty minutes from the kids, the housework and the outside job to write. If you respect your craft with a title--work--it makes it easier for your family to eventually see it that way, too. Take this piece of advice from a person who has fifty years experience at finding excuses not to write. I started writing at the age of eleven, but there was homework, then dating, then marriage, babies, kids growing up, mom's taxi service, a full-time job, college...oh, the list was endless. Until I turned sixty-two and Calvin took me by the arm, led me into the little bedroom where my computer desk occupied a wall and pointed to the chair. "Sit. Write. Make magic happen."

4. Write for yourself, not the market. Write what you love to read. Because here's the thing, if you write what's in vogue now, by the time you edit it a couple times, have it beta-read, tweak it some more and send it off, more than likely the topic has faded in popularity or the market might simply be saturated with this particular trope. "Gee, I like your writing, but we just contracted a book about this very topic last week. We don't need another." Write what you like to read. Then your passion will shine through and make your story magical.

5. Don't ask whether you're good enough. I think this is the bane of most writers' existence. I know it is mine. I have a great deal of self-doubt. I'm beta-reading a book right now and am so pea-green with envy over her talent. I read it and am swept away. Why can't I write like this? Why aren't I this good? Why? But folks, self-doubt can be a crippler. It truly can. We have to stop comparing ourselves to other writers...and simply be ourselves. Write in our own voice with our own style of turning a phrase. And keep writing. The more we write, the better, the stronger, the more engaging we'll become. Write, dearhearts, write. Stop saying I want to write like her one day and start repeating a new mantra: I want to be the best writer I can be. Then work toward that goal.

6. Stop paralyzing your first draft by searching for the perfect word. In fact, give yourself permission to write a shitty first draft. (Let me pause again to take a deep breath because I don't do this at all and this might be part of my problem.) In books I'm reading, I'm seeing over and over your prime objective in writing a first draft should be to get the story down. As THE Nora says, "You can't edit a blank page." But my rebellious mind growls, "Sounds too much like a long outline to me. Then I'll have to go back and rewrite the entire darn thing. I won't be able to send my critique partners a chapter until the book is finished and edited." I know me. I won't do it.

But...but I can try to force my inner editor to take a hike while I write a chapter...okay, okay, a scene. I can start by striving for writing a crappy scene before I nudge my inner editor to take over. Lately she's been correcting every stinking sentence. She and I are at odds more often than not. Lawd, I hate a grumpy woman.

So these half-dozen truths are my goals to conquer. What are your goals? Do you have any writing tips to add to the list?

I'm in "H" Heaven...

Random House, Harper Collins and Holy Cow, I can't believe it!

 

With each new contract, I seem to go into I-don't-believe-it mode. Old insecurities, I suppose. Even so, I never lose the wonderment that someone likes what I write. For, in an odd way, with every contract I doubt my writing abilities even more. Why is that?

 

A few days ago, a writer friend asked me to read a few of her chapters to double check the strength of her hero's motivation. I read her work in awe. The descriptions, the emotions, the comedic timing were a lesson...a lesson prompting me to go back and redo everything I'd written on my current WIP. I love it when that happens. You see I fear growing stagnant. I fear going backwards in skill--if that's possible. I love being surrounded by talent. Talent propels us to do better. To examine. To grow. To shine.

 

 

My grandson taught me a bit of that over the weekend. Ryan, who was born on my 50th birthday, is a scholar athlete. A high school wrestler who gets all A's, even though he's taking honors courses. Guitar is his new favorite instrument with his trumpet running a close second. He's been wrestling on a summer league. Few kids want to spend their vacations doing conditioners and drilling new moves...only those who are truly into the sport. Hard core. Talented. Skilled. Being around them has improved his moves on the mat, his concentration and his out-put.

 

 

He also claims it's bolstered his confidence. Gee, I could use a touch of that.

 

Ryan works out every day. I write every day. He sacrifices time with this friends to spend time doing drills on the mat, just as I sometimes miss out on lunch with the girls to finish a chapter. He runs through moves with other wrestlers, paying close attention to the movement of each muscle, while I read good authors to study what about their writing draws me in. We both want to grow, to improve, to excel. It's in our genes.

"IS THAT A SAID TAG?" SHE ASKED.

I read a lot. I always have. Granted, I read less now since I'm writing full time, but my Kindle still gets a fair workout every night. And although I normally read romance, I'm currently rereading works by David Morell, author of the Rambo series and The League of Night and Fog. He writes action and espionage thrillers. I tend to take time like this to reread old favorites when my creative spirit needs rejuvenation. Books by Linda Lael Miller, Jill Shalvis and others are often reread simply because keepers, like old friends, tend to calm and soothe.

Every author I read teaches me something. Either a skill they do well or ones they don't. And it's interesting to see how publishing standards change over time. Remember when books began with paragraphs about the weather or detailed description about a house or a room? Ah...back in the day, some thirty or forty years ago. We've steered away from that. Now we start our stories with an action scene and keep on running.

If only we'd veer away from "said tags."

I find them annoying. And I get aggravated with writers who use them. A pet peeve shared only by me, I know. But there you have it. I blame my agent, Dawn Dowdle, for this. "Do you hear me, Dawn?" Vonnie asked.

 

The "asked" said tag is my biggest peeve. Don't we all know the meaning of  a question mark? It has only one legitimate use--to indicate a series of words is a question. So why would a writer insult our intelligence by adding "he asked" afterward, as if we were too dumb to know what that question mark indicated? Drives me bonkers. Simply bonkers.

 

Like all good agents, mine does a strict edit of her clients' manuscripts. The usage of the words "that" and "just" and "up" and "back" are seriously slashed. Also removed are "said tags."

 

Experts claim using "said" or "asked" are non-intrusive and do not annoy. Bet me, buddy!

 

From a reader's standpoint, "said tags" are like rubber soles skidding on a highly waxed floor.

 

They slow movement and reduce enjoyment of the story. 

 

If we are to believe the adage, show, don't tell, then said tags should be avoided. Said tags tell. They tell who is speaking. Action beats show.

 

"Are you serious?" Jefferson asked.

"Quite," Martha said. "Two years is long enough to keep a car. I want a new one."

 

"Are you serious?" Jefferson's stomach clenched. Her demands on his finances was increasing.

"Quite." Martha studied her manicured nails and then arched one finely waxed eyebrow. "Two years is long enough to keep a car. I want a new one."

Cole held her close, his warm lips kissing her neck. "Tell me you don't want this," he whispered.

 

Cole held her close, his warm lips kissing her neck. "Tell me you don't want this." The breath from his whispered words feathered across her skin like a slow, sultry breeze.

 

 Can you see the difference between being "told" who is speaking and being "shown?" Yes, as a writer it takes more work. It takes developing a new skill in our "author arsenal," but the results are so worth it. Our writing becomes more polished. And picky readers, like me, are less annoyed.