To make up for it I have a little challenge. Post in the comments a interview that you've had with a character. I've mentioned before about interviewing your characters to have a better understanding of them. I'm encouraging you now to try it, and to
I apologize for my week and a half long absence my total of maybe four readers. I was unable to edit the website the one time I had a chance to actually log on. It's not easy being a writer/server/barista/student/girlfriend/yogi let me tell ya. Too many hats, if I was just a writer, we wouldn't have ran into this problem.
To make up for it I have a little challenge. Post in the comments a interview that you've had with a character. I've mentioned before about interviewing your characters to have a better understanding of them. I'm encouraging you now to try it, and to
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For this weeks prompt you have to have your character accidently read a character out of a book. This is a difficult prompt in the way that you not only have to develop your own character, but you have to understand another author's character well enough to involve them in your story while accurately portraying them.
My advice for this week is to really understand both your story and your characters before you begin. Who does your character accidently read out? What happens? Does the character run away, does the character want to go back? Have a clear idea of what's going to happen. Next is to understand both of the characters. The best way to do this is to "interview" the characters. When I was reading about this method instantly one of my characters that I've been thinking about for a long time spoke up to answer the questions. I thought to myself, Heidi when did you get so feisty? And just learned that Heidi is tired of sitting on the side and maybe I should keep writing her story. Laurie Campbell has a great page with interview styles and questions to ask your characters. The different methods include: 1. 20 Questions: asking your character open ended questions that have to have a full and specific answer. 2. Basic Inventory: questions as simple as their name and how old they are. 3. Gloves off Questions: Questions that really make your character think about the answer. 4. Free Style Interview: Basically having a conversation with your character about how they feel the story is going. I personally like the Gloves off interview. Heidi spoke up when I read the question "what do you want?". Now, I also find the interview method a little disturbing. You are, technically, asking the voices in your head how they feel about this or that, and they have to answer. But remember that characters are people that you have created, and they only way they can escape your head is for you to tell their story. For this prompt I recommend doing this for both characters. Especially for the character that's being read out of the book, since they aren't yours to begin with. If you're really interested in character development then I recommend The Writing Practice . Which by the way, you could totally leave me for this guy and grow just as much as a writer. But don't do it, because I would be really bummed. Drum roll please for my very first Writing Pick of the Week! Jonah Ryan's Apocalypse Now and Then written for our apocalypse prompt in January. Jonah did such a great job putting you in his character's shoes as he experienced a zombie apocalypse. A short story about a 28 year old guy who gets to watch the apocalypse from a balcony thirty stories high and spends a good portion of it drinking whiskey. Worth reading when you have the time, thanks Jonah for putting in such a fantastic effort! Just wanted to take the time to remind anyone who is out there that this is for everyone and anyone who would like to join. My goal is to encourage writers to practice every week. You can post whatever: short or long, poem or novel, and I will gladly read it for you. The prompts are just exercises to help motivate you. I started this so that I can make sure that I write every week, and figured there's other writers out there who would like a little motivation too. You can't be a painter if you don't paint. You can't call yourself a writer if you never write. This week's prompt is the simplest one I could think of: it was a dark and stormy night. The cliche of cliches when it comes to writing. I chose this one out of laziness at first, and then the more I thought about it, the more it made sense: turn a cliche into something worth reading. The first author to coin this phrase was Edward Bulwer-Lytton in his book Paul Clifford: "It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents — except at occasional His first line became iconic, and generations later one of his descendents opted to defend his name by creating the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which features stories with lines like "it was a dark and stormy night."
Sometimes an author dealing with writer's block will have an idea but have no clue how to start their story. Sometimes getting past the beginning is the hardest part! Here's an article from Writer's Digest that discusses starting a novel. They make a point that your story should begin with a hook. Every good writer knows that you can't expect people to read your work unless you pull them in right away. If you think that a cliche is a good way to do that then go for it! This week's prompt might not be an easy one for you. I know that a lot of my characters are just a different version of myself. Most of the time I just give them a quirk that one of my friends have and call it a totally different person. If you're totally stumped like I am, here I have some interesting things to read while you're trying to get over your writer's block.
I was able to find a really interesting page called Writing a character you don't like, which goes over exactly what we need to help along with this week's assignment. The author made a few really good points when it comes to writing an unlikable character:
On the opposite spectrum, if you've noticed other people don't like your characters, I found another page called The Basics of Creating a Likeable Character, which goes over a few tips on how to make any character likeable. This page includes topics as simple as why a good name is important to remembering that flaws are what makes a character real. Another interesting page I Just Didn't Care: Unlikable Characters in Fiction is worth the read on why a character doesn't have to be likeable or unlikeable at all. His point: a character should be compelling. In my opinion, a character is a person. They grow and change and develop sometimes on their very own and you may have no control over it. It is your job to tell this person's story, to help the world understand their pain and their joys. It isn't your job to change them and mold them, it's just your job to flesh them out. This week I'd like to start off with a little writing advice from J.K.
Rowling. Found on kevinkruse.com is some tips on writing: 1. Kill the adverbs. 2. Writing is work; don't wait for inspiration to write. 3. It's okay to juggle multiple book projects. You can find the full list here with explanations behind each piece of advice. I found this list interesting because that is exactly the point of this site. Even when we aren't inspired, or are too tired to write, we take the time despite that and write something every week. You may be working on your novel while challenging yourself to write something short to submit. Sometimes taking a step back and trying something different will help you get further in your novel. You can't wait for inspiration to strike, you have to look for it. If you're a huge Harry Potter nerd like I am and would like to see an interview with her, this interview with Katy Couric and J.K. Rowling is really interesting about the Half-Blood Prince. |