Friday, 24 October 2014
Office closure
The offices of Inscribe Media are closed until Oct 31 - we can answer any queries about the Global Short Story Competition then.
Of J D Salinger
I know I talk about first lines a lot in my blogs but they are so important.
One of the best ways to start a story is to instantly introduce the reader to a character who addresses us directly in a voice that is distinctive and compelling. What do I mean? Try this: “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” — J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
The voice is distinctive, you are challenged and want to learn more about this person. It was the same with the story over the weekend, creating a character that talked directly to the reader.
And if the character is talking to the reader, the writer has a great platform on which to work.
Still 7 days to enter our latest competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
One of the best ways to start a story is to instantly introduce the reader to a character who addresses us directly in a voice that is distinctive and compelling. What do I mean? Try this: “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” — J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
The voice is distinctive, you are challenged and want to learn more about this person. It was the same with the story over the weekend, creating a character that talked directly to the reader.
And if the character is talking to the reader, the writer has a great platform on which to work.
Still 7 days to enter our latest competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Don't make these mistakes!
ave been talking recently to one or two writers about the challenges of getting published. It can be a dispiriting business so perhaps this will help. There’s a terrific survey that came out some time ago about the mistakes that aspiring writers make when approaching literary agents.
Based on responses from more than 50 agents, it included the following no-nos when submitting manuscripts to agents (and publishers, I would suggest):
* Saying ‘Go to my website for a sample of my work”
* Talking about the book’s sequel
* Pitching more than one book at a time
* Writing a submission that lacks confidence
* Writing a submission that is over-confident or pompous
* Sending a submission that has clearly not been proof-read
* Queries addressed to "Dear Agent" (or anything similar)
* Vague letters.
* E-mailed submissions with more than one agent listed in the "To" field
* Submissions that have no clue what the agent represents, or that have no clue what the agent's submission guidelines are.
Avoid these pitfalls and at least you give yourself an edge. One I would add relates to the covering letter. Do try to avoid the words ‘my mum read this and she reckons it’s the finest novel she has ever read’ or something similar. That’s a good way to get your manuscript heading its way bin-wards!
John Dean
Based on responses from more than 50 agents, it included the following no-nos when submitting manuscripts to agents (and publishers, I would suggest):
* Saying ‘Go to my website for a sample of my work”
* Talking about the book’s sequel
* Pitching more than one book at a time
* Writing a submission that lacks confidence
* Writing a submission that is over-confident or pompous
* Sending a submission that has clearly not been proof-read
* Queries addressed to "Dear Agent" (or anything similar)
* Vague letters.
* E-mailed submissions with more than one agent listed in the "To" field
* Submissions that have no clue what the agent represents, or that have no clue what the agent's submission guidelines are.
Avoid these pitfalls and at least you give yourself an edge. One I would add relates to the covering letter. Do try to avoid the words ‘my mum read this and she reckons it’s the finest novel she has ever read’ or something similar. That’s a good way to get your manuscript heading its way bin-wards!
John Dean
Time running out in short story competition
Into the last 7 days of the latest quarterly Global Short Story Competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk £100 first prize Please RT
Tuesday, 21 October 2014
Great first lines
The opening lines of any story need to be good, compelling the reader to read on whether through a strong idea, a great character or the sheer quality of the writing.
These are some of my favourites
“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” — William Gibson, Neuromancer
“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.” — C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
“Justice? — You get justice in the next world, in this world you have the law.” — William Gaddis, A Frolic of His Own
.
“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” — George Orwell, 1984
“Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person.” — Anne Tyler, Back When We Were Grownups
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” — L. P. Hartley, The Go-Between
“In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing. We lived at the junction of great trout rivers in Montana, and our father was a Presbyterian minister and a fly fisherman who tied his own flies and taught others. He told us about Christ’s disciples being fishermen, and we were left to assume, as my brother and I did, that all first-class fishermen on the Sea of Galilee were fly fishermen, and that John, the favorite, was a dry-fly fisherman.” — Norman McLean, A River Runs Through It
“There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands’ necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.” —
Raymond Chandler, Red Wind
“He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.” — Raphael Sabatini, Scaramouche
“If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” — J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
John Dean
These are some of my favourites
“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” — William Gibson, Neuromancer
“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.” — C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
“Justice? — You get justice in the next world, in this world you have the law.” — William Gaddis, A Frolic of His Own
.
“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” — George Orwell, 1984
“Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person.” — Anne Tyler, Back When We Were Grownups
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” — L. P. Hartley, The Go-Between
“In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing. We lived at the junction of great trout rivers in Montana, and our father was a Presbyterian minister and a fly fisherman who tied his own flies and taught others. He told us about Christ’s disciples being fishermen, and we were left to assume, as my brother and I did, that all first-class fishermen on the Sea of Galilee were fly fishermen, and that John, the favorite, was a dry-fly fisherman.” — Norman McLean, A River Runs Through It
“There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands’ necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.” —
Raymond Chandler, Red Wind
“He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.” — Raphael Sabatini, Scaramouche
“If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” — J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
John Dean
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Getting characters right
Characters can make or break a story. You can create the finest landscapes, the greatest stories, the most remarkable writing but you cannot make your stories live unless you have characters.
This came to mind with some entries into this quarter’s Global Short Story Competition. Here’s some thoughts on how those writers got it right.
They described their physical characteristics but picked only the salient information
They made the reader visualise the person by thinking about the small things which make them stand out, make them live.
They captured their demeanour.
They described their views, their emotions, they type of character.
They did not pack the information in all at once, rather revealing the character as the story progressed.
They made sure the main characters are strong enough to carry the story on their shoulders.
And they made sure we care about them - not necessarily like but care.
Above all, their characters were REAL.
Still time to enter this quarter’s competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
This came to mind with some entries into this quarter’s Global Short Story Competition. Here’s some thoughts on how those writers got it right.
They described their physical characteristics but picked only the salient information
They made the reader visualise the person by thinking about the small things which make them stand out, make them live.
They captured their demeanour.
They described their views, their emotions, they type of character.
They did not pack the information in all at once, rather revealing the character as the story progressed.
They made sure the main characters are strong enough to carry the story on their shoulders.
And they made sure we care about them - not necessarily like but care.
Above all, their characters were REAL.
Still time to enter this quarter’s competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Try this for inspiration
Stuck for an idea for a story? Well here’s a useful way to get yourself going. Take a break from the hectic pace of life and imagine yourself in a darkened house, walking from room to room.
In the final room, the darkness is illuminated by a single shaft of light, forming something akin to a stage. Who steps into the light? You’ll be amazed what happens next. Just follow the character wherever he/she takes you.
I did this exercise with the Inkerman Writers, of which I am part, and the result was a cracking examination of the power of imagination in the anthology Out of the Shadows, published in 2013. Incidentally, the book is still available at
http://www.blurb.co.uk/b/4204019-out-of-the-shadows
John Dean
In the final room, the darkness is illuminated by a single shaft of light, forming something akin to a stage. Who steps into the light? You’ll be amazed what happens next. Just follow the character wherever he/she takes you.
I did this exercise with the Inkerman Writers, of which I am part, and the result was a cracking examination of the power of imagination in the anthology Out of the Shadows, published in 2013. Incidentally, the book is still available at
http://www.blurb.co.uk/b/4204019-out-of-the-shadows
John Dean
Monday, 20 October 2014
Writing for theatre
I was discussing writing for the theatre with another writer the other day. Here are some thoughts on getting it right
The power of words is crucial when writing for theatre, as is a technical understanding of the staging process. Writers need to do the following:
* Think where the person was before entering the stage and where he/she goes to eg if he/she has come in from the cold remember to write cold references of actions (stamping feet etc )
* The writer needs to consider what the characters are doing as well as saying - a walk across a stage can take a long time as can a passage of speech. Find something for them do, making tea, putting the kettle on etc. It gives the scene more movement and avoids problems for actors who feel all they can do is stand like a plank and spout their lines
* Think how long words take to say and how they will play in an audience. An intimate aside in a small room can fall flat in a large theatre
* Comedy needs to big and bold, drama can be more subtle and considered (in drama, the actor can be more introspective, address the audience, reveal much about what they are thinking)
* Dialogue is crucial. The actor will make much of the business up themselves but they need guidance and that comes from the words.
A recap of dialogue rules:
A lot of the time, we do not speak in correct sentences/We often use short sharp phrases
We assume the listener knows a lot about us
Dialogue can impart information but we try to make that information interesting, lacing it with humour, personal interpretation etc
We can tell a lot about a person in a short snap of conversation - a few words of dialogue can say a lot about a character.
Dialogue needs to be crisp (and humour needs to hit the gag and move on, good comedy relies on timing and pace)
Needs to be in character
Must take the story on
Be not packed with extraneous information.
If you need to slot in information, find a way of doing it subtly
John Dean
The power of words is crucial when writing for theatre, as is a technical understanding of the staging process. Writers need to do the following:
* Think where the person was before entering the stage and where he/she goes to eg if he/she has come in from the cold remember to write cold references of actions (stamping feet etc )
* The writer needs to consider what the characters are doing as well as saying - a walk across a stage can take a long time as can a passage of speech. Find something for them do, making tea, putting the kettle on etc. It gives the scene more movement and avoids problems for actors who feel all they can do is stand like a plank and spout their lines
* Think how long words take to say and how they will play in an audience. An intimate aside in a small room can fall flat in a large theatre
* Comedy needs to big and bold, drama can be more subtle and considered (in drama, the actor can be more introspective, address the audience, reveal much about what they are thinking)
* Dialogue is crucial. The actor will make much of the business up themselves but they need guidance and that comes from the words.
A recap of dialogue rules:
A lot of the time, we do not speak in correct sentences/We often use short sharp phrases
We assume the listener knows a lot about us
Dialogue can impart information but we try to make that information interesting, lacing it with humour, personal interpretation etc
We can tell a lot about a person in a short snap of conversation - a few words of dialogue can say a lot about a character.
Dialogue needs to be crisp (and humour needs to hit the gag and move on, good comedy relies on timing and pace)
Needs to be in character
Must take the story on
Be not packed with extraneous information.
If you need to slot in information, find a way of doing it subtly
John Dean
Triggering that all-important reaction
A reminder that key to good writing is making the experience feel real for the reader, a major part of my teaching of authors.
You need to evoke a reaction in your reader and this is done through triggers, using your reader’s associations to evoke a reaction. How do you do that?
Well, why not start by playing on:
Their memories
Their connections to places and people
Their prejudices and preconceptions?
Their response to weather conditions - snow, rain, heat etc
Their deeply felt fears and phobias?
All this came to mind in one of our entries to the latest Global Short Story Competition which did it beautifully. You can enter at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Now that's funny
We get the odd humorous story submitted to the Global Short Story Competition and, as I am about to teach some classes on humour, I thought a recap would be useful.
Writing humour is very tough: people can listen to your short story without a sound and at the end they can say ‘that was terrific’ - with humour, if they ‘aint laughing or smiling at all you have failed!
Here’s some golden rules.
* Humorous characters needs just as much characterisation as others. Look at your character, work out where the humour lies. Do you have a character who is egotistical, vain, clumsy, stupid? Whatever the strong character trait is, play on it.
* Observe, write down funny things, quips, things people say etc
* Develop humour within situations - maybe take a sideways glance at life and situations
* Dialogue is crucial - keep it sharp
* Whatever you do, a light touch usually needed - sledgehammers not required. If a joke needs explaining, it has not worked
* Use pace - move on from gag to gag
* Try out your jokes - if you laugh, others may not. I always reckon if I laughed first time, it was good.
* Be brutal, if a gag does not work - or is in the wrong story - ditch it!
John Dean
Writing humour is very tough: people can listen to your short story without a sound and at the end they can say ‘that was terrific’ - with humour, if they ‘aint laughing or smiling at all you have failed!
Here’s some golden rules.
* Humorous characters needs just as much characterisation as others. Look at your character, work out where the humour lies. Do you have a character who is egotistical, vain, clumsy, stupid? Whatever the strong character trait is, play on it.
* Observe, write down funny things, quips, things people say etc
* Develop humour within situations - maybe take a sideways glance at life and situations
* Dialogue is crucial - keep it sharp
* Whatever you do, a light touch usually needed - sledgehammers not required. If a joke needs explaining, it has not worked
* Use pace - move on from gag to gag
* Try out your jokes - if you laugh, others may not. I always reckon if I laughed first time, it was good.
* Be brutal, if a gag does not work - or is in the wrong story - ditch it!
John Dean
VIewpoints in fiction
Yesterday we received an entry into the Global Short Story Competition which was written in first person and brilliantly so.
Traditionally, there are three main categories of viewpoint, first, second or third person. First is when you use refer to I, second person is you (as is in ‘You might have thought I would have liked that‘) and third is he, she, they, their, his, hers, him, her, etc.
Most stories tend to be written in third person but first person has its advantages as this story showed.
First person is a great choice when you intend to write informally or casually. It can be chatty, relaxed, and intimate. In this case, the narrator spoke directly to the reader as if no one else existed. There were questions, challenges and it all made for a powerful mix indeed. It was like a conversation.
However, many writers would still go for third person. Why? Well, third person creates a sense of objectivity and distance and allows the writer to get on with telling the story. Some would say that third person means the writer's feelings and personality become peripheral and that the author can simply tell the tale.
It’s all a question of choice but yesterday‘s entry showed how powerful first person can be.
Still time to enter this quarter’s competition through www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Traditionally, there are three main categories of viewpoint, first, second or third person. First is when you use refer to I, second person is you (as is in ‘You might have thought I would have liked that‘) and third is he, she, they, their, his, hers, him, her, etc.
Most stories tend to be written in third person but first person has its advantages as this story showed.
First person is a great choice when you intend to write informally or casually. It can be chatty, relaxed, and intimate. In this case, the narrator spoke directly to the reader as if no one else existed. There were questions, challenges and it all made for a powerful mix indeed. It was like a conversation.
However, many writers would still go for third person. Why? Well, third person creates a sense of objectivity and distance and allows the writer to get on with telling the story. Some would say that third person means the writer's feelings and personality become peripheral and that the author can simply tell the tale.
It’s all a question of choice but yesterday‘s entry showed how powerful first person can be.
Still time to enter this quarter’s competition through www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Talking of dialogue
I am thoroughly enjoying a novel at the moment. Its sense of place and people has drawn me into the narrative and you can see why the writer is so celebrated. Venerated, even. Except, for the dialogue, which is stilted and clunky.
It got me thinking about the rules of dialogue. Dialogue is crucial to the success of any story. Good dialogue can make a story, bad dialogue can wreck it, so it is worth bearing in mind some of these rules of conversation and reflecting them in the dialogue that you write. If people talk that way in real life then so they should in your work.
* A lot of the time, we do not speak in correct sentences/we often use short sharp phrases.
* Keep your dialogue crisp - we can tell a lot about a person in a short snap of conversation.
* We interrupt a lot.
* We assume a lot. Not ‘Your brother has been murdered.’
‘What, my brother Brian?’
‘Yes, that’s him. Your only brother. The younger one.’ Keep it realistic.
* Dialogue must take the story on. Only write small talk if you need to, ie showing how tedious a person can be. If you don’t need it, don’t write it. Make sure each word does a job.
* Do not pack dialogue with extraneous information. Don’t write like this:
‘I saw William, although everyone calls him Bill, my neighbour of ten years in Acacia Avenue, in Darlington, and observed that he was his normal glum self, to which we - that is my wife, Edith, and I - have grown accustomed in the weeks since his wife left him for a younger man and filed for divorce. I assumed that the darkness which seems to have assailed him since then has not lifted.’ If you need to slot in that information, find a way of doing it more subtly: ie “Saw Bill this morning. His usual gloomy self. The divorce really has knocked him backwards.’
John Dean
It got me thinking about the rules of dialogue. Dialogue is crucial to the success of any story. Good dialogue can make a story, bad dialogue can wreck it, so it is worth bearing in mind some of these rules of conversation and reflecting them in the dialogue that you write. If people talk that way in real life then so they should in your work.
* A lot of the time, we do not speak in correct sentences/we often use short sharp phrases.
* Keep your dialogue crisp - we can tell a lot about a person in a short snap of conversation.
* We interrupt a lot.
* We assume a lot. Not ‘Your brother has been murdered.’
‘What, my brother Brian?’
‘Yes, that’s him. Your only brother. The younger one.’ Keep it realistic.
* Dialogue must take the story on. Only write small talk if you need to, ie showing how tedious a person can be. If you don’t need it, don’t write it. Make sure each word does a job.
* Do not pack dialogue with extraneous information. Don’t write like this:
‘I saw William, although everyone calls him Bill, my neighbour of ten years in Acacia Avenue, in Darlington, and observed that he was his normal glum self, to which we - that is my wife, Edith, and I - have grown accustomed in the weeks since his wife left him for a younger man and filed for divorce. I assumed that the darkness which seems to have assailed him since then has not lifted.’ If you need to slot in that information, find a way of doing it more subtly: ie “Saw Bill this morning. His usual gloomy self. The divorce really has knocked him backwards.’
John Dean
Friday, 17 October 2014
Google ranking
Delighted to say that if you key ‘short story competition’ into Google, the Global Short Story Competition comes up third out of 2.8 million listings. Thank you to everyone whose visits make that possible.
You can check us out at www.inscribemedia.co.uk - 15 days to enter this quarter’s competition, £125 in prize money up for grabs.
John Dean
You can check us out at www.inscribemedia.co.uk - 15 days to enter this quarter’s competition, £125 in prize money up for grabs.
John Dean
Truly global
Our current stats for readers reading these blogs show the top ten at the moment is people from:
The United States
Russia
Netherlands
Germany
United Kingdom
Ukraine
Australia
India
Poland
Brazil
John Dean
The United States
Russia
Netherlands
Germany
United Kingdom
Ukraine
Australia
India
Poland
Brazil
John Dean
So does your character like pizza?
Good writing, as I have mentioned before in my blogs, is about details, the little things that add grit and reality to your stories.
Here are some thoughts:
Ask questions about your character. What does your character look like? How does he/she walk or talk? Does she part her hair? What kind of clothes does he wear? What nasty habits etc? And which facts are relevant?
Ask yourself questions about your character's tastes, his/her attitudes toward life. What type of music does she like? How does she feel about work, religion, politics etc? By asking your characters these questions, you’ll have a better sense of the type of details you'll want to include in your story.
Create details about your settings. What does your character's living room look like? Is it messy or is it tidy? Are there paintings on the wall etc etc? Create details that bring the settings to life.
Remember, though, don't be excessive in using details. While these details can be helpful in creating a world for your story, most readers today simply don't have the patience to sit through five or six pages of these details. Use only what is necessary.
John Dean
Here are some thoughts:
Ask questions about your character. What does your character look like? How does he/she walk or talk? Does she part her hair? What kind of clothes does he wear? What nasty habits etc? And which facts are relevant?
Ask yourself questions about your character's tastes, his/her attitudes toward life. What type of music does she like? How does she feel about work, religion, politics etc? By asking your characters these questions, you’ll have a better sense of the type of details you'll want to include in your story.
Create details about your settings. What does your character's living room look like? Is it messy or is it tidy? Are there paintings on the wall etc etc? Create details that bring the settings to life.
Remember, though, don't be excessive in using details. While these details can be helpful in creating a world for your story, most readers today simply don't have the patience to sit through five or six pages of these details. Use only what is necessary.
John Dean
Indian writers
We receive the occasional entry from Indian writers. Indian writers have enjoyed quite a bit of success in the Global Short Story Competition over the years and their stories so often provide a beguiling mix of fine writing and powerful emotion.
That we receive stories from India is not surprising. Researching this blog, I came across an article published in the Guardian and written by writer Anita Desai, in which she said: “By the number of manuscripts that arrive daily and hourly from India on the desks of British and American agents and publishers, I would guess no country has more aspiring writers than ours.”
Here’s to hearing from more of them. You can enter at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
That we receive stories from India is not surprising. Researching this blog, I came across an article published in the Guardian and written by writer Anita Desai, in which she said: “By the number of manuscripts that arrive daily and hourly from India on the desks of British and American agents and publishers, I would guess no country has more aspiring writers than ours.”
Here’s to hearing from more of them. You can enter at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Thursday, 16 October 2014
Writing ghost stories
The Open Mic nights for authors in North East England continue on Thursday October 30 and, since the event is so close to Halloween, we are hoping for some ghost stories.
So how do you write a ghost story? It is, of course, a classic genre but one that seems less popular today. Pity, because it is immense fun to write.
Ghost stories need subtlety. The golden rule is that less is definitely more when it comes to ghost stories (not a bad maxim for most writing, actually). None of those characters clad in flowing white sheets going ’woo, woo’, more about making the ordinary scary.
Take an example. My grandmother was not scary but she would be if she walked into my office now because she had been dead for 20 years. I’m not being disrespectful about her but it does make the point.
Similarly, I hope I am not frightening but I sure as Hell would be if I turned up in your living room at midnight with a strange smile on my face. The ordinary in the extraordinary setting works well in ghost stories.
You also have to understand the psychology of the reader and what scares them. With me, it’s mirrors at night (who is standing behind me, dare I look?) with others it may be darkness, empty houses etc. You are teasing the reader.
There are some other considerations:
* The impact of media - what scared once does not scare now. In a world of the Chainsaw Massacre and its modern cousin Saw, we are less scared by that kind of material. Ghost story writing has to be more subtle - it is why the Blair Witch Project worked, it played on the viewer‘s mind. So should ghost stories.
* Ghost stories tend not to work if you go for shock horror. A man wielding a weapon may be scary but which sends more shivers down the spine out of the following two examples? Again using a movies theme, which frightened you most in The Shining - the mad Jack Nicholson punching his way through doors or the spectral children glanced only briefly at the end of the corridor? Yes, I know we are blurring the distinction between ghost stories and horror but you get the point. Same rule is true for writing ghost stories.
* So go for normal and contrast it. My office is fine but put the lights off, have a breeze running through it, a strange voice which I can’t quite make out, and it changes. Then I’m anybody’s. In fact, I wish I had not just written that sentence.
* Build tension in the story by hinting at something horrible to come. Good ghost stories begin with normality, and gradually let things develop. It is a gamble: you have to keep the reader interested with the quality of your writing.
Ghost stories need so much to work well - strong characters, great sense of place, use of darkness, weather, sound, phobias, psychology etc - but when they do, they leave the reader glancing over their shoulder for the rest of the day.
* The open mic nights, supported by Darlington for Culture and which offer a forum for writers to read their material and audiences to enjoy it, run at Voodoo Café/Cantina, 84 Skinnergate, Darlington, on the last Thursday of the month. Each session starts at 7pm and the cost of entry is £3 paid on the door. More information is available from Inscribe Media Limited at deangriss@btinternet.com
John Dean
So how do you write a ghost story? It is, of course, a classic genre but one that seems less popular today. Pity, because it is immense fun to write.
Ghost stories need subtlety. The golden rule is that less is definitely more when it comes to ghost stories (not a bad maxim for most writing, actually). None of those characters clad in flowing white sheets going ’woo, woo’, more about making the ordinary scary.
Take an example. My grandmother was not scary but she would be if she walked into my office now because she had been dead for 20 years. I’m not being disrespectful about her but it does make the point.
Similarly, I hope I am not frightening but I sure as Hell would be if I turned up in your living room at midnight with a strange smile on my face. The ordinary in the extraordinary setting works well in ghost stories.
You also have to understand the psychology of the reader and what scares them. With me, it’s mirrors at night (who is standing behind me, dare I look?) with others it may be darkness, empty houses etc. You are teasing the reader.
There are some other considerations:
* The impact of media - what scared once does not scare now. In a world of the Chainsaw Massacre and its modern cousin Saw, we are less scared by that kind of material. Ghost story writing has to be more subtle - it is why the Blair Witch Project worked, it played on the viewer‘s mind. So should ghost stories.
* Ghost stories tend not to work if you go for shock horror. A man wielding a weapon may be scary but which sends more shivers down the spine out of the following two examples? Again using a movies theme, which frightened you most in The Shining - the mad Jack Nicholson punching his way through doors or the spectral children glanced only briefly at the end of the corridor? Yes, I know we are blurring the distinction between ghost stories and horror but you get the point. Same rule is true for writing ghost stories.
* So go for normal and contrast it. My office is fine but put the lights off, have a breeze running through it, a strange voice which I can’t quite make out, and it changes. Then I’m anybody’s. In fact, I wish I had not just written that sentence.
* Build tension in the story by hinting at something horrible to come. Good ghost stories begin with normality, and gradually let things develop. It is a gamble: you have to keep the reader interested with the quality of your writing.
Ghost stories need so much to work well - strong characters, great sense of place, use of darkness, weather, sound, phobias, psychology etc - but when they do, they leave the reader glancing over their shoulder for the rest of the day.
* The open mic nights, supported by Darlington for Culture and which offer a forum for writers to read their material and audiences to enjoy it, run at Voodoo Café/Cantina, 84 Skinnergate, Darlington, on the last Thursday of the month. Each session starts at 7pm and the cost of entry is £3 paid on the door. More information is available from Inscribe Media Limited at deangriss@btinternet.com
John Dean
Fair to middling
Another excellent example of the storyteller’s art came into the Global Short Story Competition yesterday.
It started in the middle of an event, things had already happened, momentum was already building and the reader’s task was pick things up as the narrative unfolded,
By plunging the reader into the story from the off, it kept the reader hooked. Done right, it can be an effective way of beginning a story.
Plenty of time to enter the competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk - closing date October 31.
John Dean
It started in the middle of an event, things had already happened, momentum was already building and the reader’s task was pick things up as the narrative unfolded,
By plunging the reader into the story from the off, it kept the reader hooked. Done right, it can be an effective way of beginning a story.
Plenty of time to enter the competition at www.inscribemedia.co.uk - closing date October 31.
John Dean
Wednesday, 15 October 2014
Hints on show and tell
This is the last of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . The full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
Show and tell
There is a growing debate within writing circles about what has become known as ‘show and tell’.
No, this is not about small children excitedly showing manky things found on the beach to their classmates, rather an important writing technique.
The argument goes like this: for you to truly engage your reader, you must make them feel that they are there when the action is happening.
It matters because if you fail to draw your reader into the story, your tale will lack something, an immediacy, a sense of drama, a sense of narrative.
How do you do it? Think of it like this: reach out a hand to your reader and say ‘come into my world, walk alongside me.’ Do that and they are hooked.
John Dean
Show and tell
There is a growing debate within writing circles about what has become known as ‘show and tell’.
No, this is not about small children excitedly showing manky things found on the beach to their classmates, rather an important writing technique.
The argument goes like this: for you to truly engage your reader, you must make them feel that they are there when the action is happening.
It matters because if you fail to draw your reader into the story, your tale will lack something, an immediacy, a sense of drama, a sense of narrative.
How do you do it? Think of it like this: reach out a hand to your reader and say ‘come into my world, walk alongside me.’ Do that and they are hooked.
John Dean
Handy hints on writing humour
#These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the days to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
Humour
There’s an old saying that if you are not a humorous person, don’t try to write humour.
Well, it is only part-true. It is certainly the case that a straight-laced, humourless person might well struggle to write side-splitting comedy but if you are an author, that might not be a good enough excuse.
Why? Because humour is vital to creating good fiction. Even if you are not writing an out-and-out comic piece, humour has a role to perform.
For a start, it can create light against the dark. Take an example: you are writing a sinister piece with the tension building as the tale unfolds. You might decide to keep the tension going right to the end, which would be one way of writing it.
However, you might decide that a flash of humour, a single line of dialogue by a character, could momentarily ease the tension, cause the reader to relax slightly, and provide an even greater impact when you suddenly strike with the next piece of drama, or horror or fear. Ghost and horror writers know that trick well - they are past masters at toying with their readers.
Humour also works well with novels because a relentlessly heavy theme in a story can benefit immensely from the odd break for something a little lighter.
There is another good reason for using humour in your writing because it reveals things about your character and can show another side to them that the reader might not have seen before. Or it can reveal in a brief conversation the depth of two people’s relationship.
And it does not need to be side-splitting humour, that is not the intention: it has other roles to perform.
As one critique of the great William Shakespeare said: “Humour is a tool that allows us to see the subtle details of their minds; a glimpse at the inner workings of each character’s personality. It is through the humour that Shakespeare employs that we are able to see “roundness” in characters that could be otherwise doomed to exist as “flat” characters. Shakespeare uses humour to give his players new life, to help them expand beyond the bounds of mere characters and turn into real people.”
And look how well he did!
John Dean
Humour
There’s an old saying that if you are not a humorous person, don’t try to write humour.
Well, it is only part-true. It is certainly the case that a straight-laced, humourless person might well struggle to write side-splitting comedy but if you are an author, that might not be a good enough excuse.
Why? Because humour is vital to creating good fiction. Even if you are not writing an out-and-out comic piece, humour has a role to perform.
For a start, it can create light against the dark. Take an example: you are writing a sinister piece with the tension building as the tale unfolds. You might decide to keep the tension going right to the end, which would be one way of writing it.
However, you might decide that a flash of humour, a single line of dialogue by a character, could momentarily ease the tension, cause the reader to relax slightly, and provide an even greater impact when you suddenly strike with the next piece of drama, or horror or fear. Ghost and horror writers know that trick well - they are past masters at toying with their readers.
Humour also works well with novels because a relentlessly heavy theme in a story can benefit immensely from the odd break for something a little lighter.
There is another good reason for using humour in your writing because it reveals things about your character and can show another side to them that the reader might not have seen before. Or it can reveal in a brief conversation the depth of two people’s relationship.
And it does not need to be side-splitting humour, that is not the intention: it has other roles to perform.
As one critique of the great William Shakespeare said: “Humour is a tool that allows us to see the subtle details of their minds; a glimpse at the inner workings of each character’s personality. It is through the humour that Shakespeare employs that we are able to see “roundness” in characters that could be otherwise doomed to exist as “flat” characters. Shakespeare uses humour to give his players new life, to help them expand beyond the bounds of mere characters and turn into real people.”
And look how well he did!
John Dean
Why the short story exists
One of the beauties of the short story is the way it allows you to tell stories which would not exist but for the genre.
What do I mean? Well, a story came into the Global Short Story Competition overnight which illustrates the point perfectly, dealing as it does with the interaction between two people on a bus trip and the way the experience profoundly effects one of them.
It’s an episode, a fragment of a life, and deftly told in just under 1,800 words. Wouldn’t work in a novel, or at least not on its own, but works beautifully in a short story. It’s why the genre was created.
Plenty of time to enter this quarter’s competition (closing date October 31, first prize £100) at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
What do I mean? Well, a story came into the Global Short Story Competition overnight which illustrates the point perfectly, dealing as it does with the interaction between two people on a bus trip and the way the experience profoundly effects one of them.
It’s an episode, a fragment of a life, and deftly told in just under 1,800 words. Wouldn’t work in a novel, or at least not on its own, but works beautifully in a short story. It’s why the genre was created.
Plenty of time to enter this quarter’s competition (closing date October 31, first prize £100) at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Tuesday, 14 October 2014
More hints on engaging your reader
These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the days to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
Keeping it short
All writing is about every word doing its job but that becomes an even more pronounced skill when you are writing something short, like a poem or a story.
We do receive entries which are not 2,000 words long but 200 words instead - and that is an art form in itself.
The length means that the writers had to make every word do its job and discard every word, every thought, every element of the story that slowed it down. Those stories were stripped to their basics.
Did they lose anything for that? Not really. They may have left the reader to work out a lot, think through what they were being told and where it was happening, but many of them remained powerful pieces of writing for all that.
So when people send in requests asking how long their story should be, we always remind them that our top limit is 2,000 words (for ease of reading by our judge) but as to the bottom limit? Well, it is how many words you need to tell the story. That’s the true of storytelling and always will be.
Tackling the difficult subjects
One of the things apparent in the stories that come in to our competition is the way writers tackle difficult subjects.
There are various reasons for this, one of which is, of course, that difficult subjects make for dramatic stories. A story about two people getting on really well for 2,000 words can tend to be a touch on the boring side. Introduce something spiky into the narrative and your story comes alive.
Another reason writers tackle tough subjects is because their words can have an effect on those who read them, that they can, in some small way, challenge the way people view the world.
It is not the same for every writer - some stories are there purely to entertain, to make the reader laugh, to make the reader smile, without challenging them at all.
But for those who do tackle difficult subjects, there is one rule above all: keep it real. It makes sense to write about what you know. If you have not got that experience, research you subject before you start writing.
John Dean
Triggering a response from your writing
Continuing my theme of evoking reactions in your reader, I think that good writing is about triggers - words, phrases, images, places, sensations - that reach deep into the reader’s mind.
That reaction will be based on something the reader has actually experienced, or maybe something that the reader dreads ever having to experience. It is why horror and ghost stories work so well.
Yes, you are messing about with the reader’s head, yes, you may be forcing them to confront difficult truths, but isn’t that sometimes what writing is about?
If every story, every book, was about sugary-sweet people in lovely situations, then writing could never really move the reader as it should.
So, yes, writing can, on occasion, make the reader feel uneasy, uncomfortable, scared even, but, let’s be honest, isn’t that sometimes the way we feel in our daily lives anyway? It’s simply art reflecting reality.
Keeping it short
All writing is about every word doing its job but that becomes an even more pronounced skill when you are writing something short, like a poem or a story.
We do receive entries which are not 2,000 words long but 200 words instead - and that is an art form in itself.
The length means that the writers had to make every word do its job and discard every word, every thought, every element of the story that slowed it down. Those stories were stripped to their basics.
Did they lose anything for that? Not really. They may have left the reader to work out a lot, think through what they were being told and where it was happening, but many of them remained powerful pieces of writing for all that.
So when people send in requests asking how long their story should be, we always remind them that our top limit is 2,000 words (for ease of reading by our judge) but as to the bottom limit? Well, it is how many words you need to tell the story. That’s the true of storytelling and always will be.
Tackling the difficult subjects
One of the things apparent in the stories that come in to our competition is the way writers tackle difficult subjects.
There are various reasons for this, one of which is, of course, that difficult subjects make for dramatic stories. A story about two people getting on really well for 2,000 words can tend to be a touch on the boring side. Introduce something spiky into the narrative and your story comes alive.
Another reason writers tackle tough subjects is because their words can have an effect on those who read them, that they can, in some small way, challenge the way people view the world.
It is not the same for every writer - some stories are there purely to entertain, to make the reader laugh, to make the reader smile, without challenging them at all.
But for those who do tackle difficult subjects, there is one rule above all: keep it real. It makes sense to write about what you know. If you have not got that experience, research you subject before you start writing.
John Dean
Handy hints on writing conflict
These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the days to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
Conflict - why does it matter?
Why is conflict important in writing? Because stories need things to happen and that usually comes out of conflict - characters argue, fight, feud etc.
It is through seeing characters in conflict that we see them at their truest, when their guard is down, when they are fighting something.
You can develop a character through conflict: the meek little parlour maid suddenly becomes the towering heroine of the story
Conflict takes the story on: a school is to be closed, two friends fall out, a community is torn apart by an event. All these types of conflict are a rich hunting ground for the writer.
Conflict can evoke a strong reaction in a reader
Conflict makes for good drama - and if that is happening then writing is easier.
It also gives you a structure for your story, a story to tell
Writing from the heart
Emotion is something of which some writers are wary, preferring to produce work without revealing too much of themselves.
However, for many other writers, there cannot be fiction without a sense of themselves in it.
For some authors, there is always part of them peering through, their fears, their hopes, their aspirations, their take on life. They may not say ‘and this is me’ but it is there all the same. For many authors, writing has to be a deeply personal art.
Of course, it is not all autobiographical - many writers write characters and scenes which readers find abhorrent and use language and ideas with which readers might not agree but which need to be there because they reflect the world about us.
However, in there somewhere are also tantalising glimpses of what the writer really thinks of the world.
John Dean
Conflict - why does it matter?
Why is conflict important in writing? Because stories need things to happen and that usually comes out of conflict - characters argue, fight, feud etc.
It is through seeing characters in conflict that we see them at their truest, when their guard is down, when they are fighting something.
You can develop a character through conflict: the meek little parlour maid suddenly becomes the towering heroine of the story
Conflict takes the story on: a school is to be closed, two friends fall out, a community is torn apart by an event. All these types of conflict are a rich hunting ground for the writer.
Conflict can evoke a strong reaction in a reader
Conflict makes for good drama - and if that is happening then writing is easier.
It also gives you a structure for your story, a story to tell
Writing from the heart
Emotion is something of which some writers are wary, preferring to produce work without revealing too much of themselves.
However, for many other writers, there cannot be fiction without a sense of themselves in it.
For some authors, there is always part of them peering through, their fears, their hopes, their aspirations, their take on life. They may not say ‘and this is me’ but it is there all the same. For many authors, writing has to be a deeply personal art.
Of course, it is not all autobiographical - many writers write characters and scenes which readers find abhorrent and use language and ideas with which readers might not agree but which need to be there because they reflect the world about us.
However, in there somewhere are also tantalising glimpses of what the writer really thinks of the world.
John Dean
Monday, 13 October 2014
The clock counts down
The latest quarterly Global Short Story Competition has 18 days to run.
Begun more than six years ago, the competition has until now run on a monthly basis but has switched to one which runs for three months at a time, with the new one running from August 1 to October 31, 2014.
The prizes continue to be £100 for the first prize and a £25 prize for highly commended writers. The entry fee remains £5.
The competition, which has topped £11,000 in prize money handed out, has had entries from more than 60 countries over the years.
Each competition is judged by Fiona Cooper, an author in North-East England, where the competition’s organisers Inscribe Media are also based.
The competition, which has been supported by best-selling author Bill Bryson since it was established six and a half years ago, can be entered at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Begun more than six years ago, the competition has until now run on a monthly basis but has switched to one which runs for three months at a time, with the new one running from August 1 to October 31, 2014.
The prizes continue to be £100 for the first prize and a £25 prize for highly commended writers. The entry fee remains £5.
The competition, which has topped £11,000 in prize money handed out, has had entries from more than 60 countries over the years.
Each competition is judged by Fiona Cooper, an author in North-East England, where the competition’s organisers Inscribe Media are also based.
The competition, which has been supported by best-selling author Bill Bryson since it was established six and a half years ago, can be entered at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Tips on conflict
These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the days to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
A word to the wise - creating good dialogue
Dialogue is crucial to the success of any story. Good dialogue can make a story, bad dialogue can wreck it.
Bear in mind some of these rules of conversation and reflect them in the dialogue that you write.
A lot of the time, we do not speak in correct sentences/we often use short sharp phrases.
Keep your dialogue crisp - we can tell a lot about a person in a short snap of conversation.
Dialogue must take the story on.
Do not pack dialogue with extraneous information. Don’t write like this:
“I saw William, although everyone calls him Bill, my neighbour of ten years in Acacia Avenue, in Darlington, and observed that he was his normal glum self, to which we - that is my wife, Edith, and I - have grown accustomed in the weeks since his wife left him for a younger man and filed for divorce. I assumed that the darkness which seems to have assailed him since then has not lifted.”
If you need to slot in that information, find a way of doing it more subtly: ie “Saw Bill this morning. His usual gloomy self. Not sure he’ll ever recover. The divorce really has knocked him backwards.”John Dean
A word to the wise - creating good dialogue
Dialogue is crucial to the success of any story. Good dialogue can make a story, bad dialogue can wreck it.
Bear in mind some of these rules of conversation and reflect them in the dialogue that you write.
A lot of the time, we do not speak in correct sentences/we often use short sharp phrases.
Keep your dialogue crisp - we can tell a lot about a person in a short snap of conversation.
Dialogue must take the story on.
Do not pack dialogue with extraneous information. Don’t write like this:
“I saw William, although everyone calls him Bill, my neighbour of ten years in Acacia Avenue, in Darlington, and observed that he was his normal glum self, to which we - that is my wife, Edith, and I - have grown accustomed in the weeks since his wife left him for a younger man and filed for divorce. I assumed that the darkness which seems to have assailed him since then has not lifted.”
If you need to slot in that information, find a way of doing it more subtly: ie “Saw Bill this morning. His usual gloomy self. Not sure he’ll ever recover. The divorce really has knocked him backwards.”John Dean
Saturday, 11 October 2014
Hints on character and place in fiction
These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the days to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
A sense of place
It is crucial if you write about a place that the reader can see it.
You have choices: do you write rich and vivid prose to paint a word picture or do you keep it minimalist - describe a tree in a park and we all see a different tree and a different park? Perhaps we only need to say it is a tree in a park?
Whatever you do, do not make it too long, you do not have a lot of words to play with in a short story.
If you seek to describe the setting, and the reader does need something to focus on, seek to use the following components:
1 Physical characteristics - what does it look like, any quirks which bring it to life?
2 Use your reader’s senses - what does the place smell, taste, sounds like?
3 What does it feel like to be there?
A sense of being
Creating characters
You can create the finest landscapes, the greatest stories, the most remarkable writing but you can not make your stories live unless you have characters. They are your vehicle to tell the story.
Characters have jobs to do within the story, making things happen, imparting information, allowing other characters to react to them etc
They should also be realistic (unless in over-the-top comedy where stereotypes can sometimes work) - your reader should feel that your characters can actually walk into the room.
When creating a character, describe what they look like and how they move, speak, react, dress etc but also try to get into their head - how do they think?
Keep secrets, reveal the character as the story progresses.
John Dean
A sense of place
It is crucial if you write about a place that the reader can see it.
You have choices: do you write rich and vivid prose to paint a word picture or do you keep it minimalist - describe a tree in a park and we all see a different tree and a different park? Perhaps we only need to say it is a tree in a park?
Whatever you do, do not make it too long, you do not have a lot of words to play with in a short story.
If you seek to describe the setting, and the reader does need something to focus on, seek to use the following components:
1 Physical characteristics - what does it look like, any quirks which bring it to life?
2 Use your reader’s senses - what does the place smell, taste, sounds like?
3 What does it feel like to be there?
A sense of being
Creating characters
You can create the finest landscapes, the greatest stories, the most remarkable writing but you can not make your stories live unless you have characters. They are your vehicle to tell the story.
Characters have jobs to do within the story, making things happen, imparting information, allowing other characters to react to them etc
They should also be realistic (unless in over-the-top comedy where stereotypes can sometimes work) - your reader should feel that your characters can actually walk into the room.
When creating a character, describe what they look like and how they move, speak, react, dress etc but also try to get into their head - how do they think?
Keep secrets, reveal the character as the story progresses.
John Dean
Debut novel wins prize
Paul Kingsnorth has been announced as the winner of the second annual Gordon Burn Prize for his debut novel The Wake.
The announcement, made at a special event at Durham Book Festival in North East England, came after deliberations by a judging panel which comprised actor Julian Barratt, poet John Burnside, artist Sarah Lucas, and last year’s inaugural prize winner, novelist Benjamin Myers.
Set in the three years after the Norman invasion of 1066, The Wake tells the story of Buccmaster of Holland, a man from the Lincolnshire Fens, who, with a fractured band of guerrilla fighters, takes up arms against the invaders. It is a post-apocalyptic story of the brutal shattering of lives, a tale of lost gods and haunted visions, narrated by a man bearing witness to the end of his world.
Judge Benjamin Myers said: “The ‘shadow tongue’ vocabulary that is the novel’s architecture automatically makes The Wake a unique entity, yet it is so much more than a dazzling display of linguistic flair.
“Paul Kingsnorth creates his own world – that of an old England that is both familiar yet utterly alien – and pulls you in to bear witness to our own bloody history first hand. Poetry, landscape, mythology and language are shot through with fleeting flashes of violence on which modern society is founded. Months after first reading it, part of me is still within this novel, and I truly believe future generations will regard The Wake as a classic.”
Paul Kingsnorth is the author of two non-fiction books, One No, Many Yeses (2003) and the highly acclaimed Real England (2008), as well as a collection of poetry, Kidland (2011). A former journalist and deputy editor of The Ecologist magazine, he has won several awards for his poetry and essays. In 2009, he co-founded the Dark Mountain Project, an international network of writers, artists and thinkers in search of new stories for troubled times. Much of his writing can be found online at www.paulkingsnorth.net. The Wake is his first novel.
The Wake is published by Unbound, a crowdsource funding platform, whose investors include actor Mark Rylance.
The Gordon Burn Prize, run in partnership by New Writing North, Faber & Faber, and the Gordon Burn Trust, was conceived to pay tribute to the legacy of the late author. Newcastle-born Gordon was a literary polymath, writing on subjects ranging from celebrity to serial killers, politics to contemporary art, sport to the media.
The shortlist for the prize this year was: The Valley by Richard Benson (Bloomsbury), The Kills by Richard House (Picador), The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth (Unbound), The Trip to Echo Spring by Olivia Laing (Canongate), American Interior by Gruff Rhys (Hamish Hamilton), and The Free by Willy Vlautin (Faber & Faber).
The announcement, made at a special event at Durham Book Festival in North East England, came after deliberations by a judging panel which comprised actor Julian Barratt, poet John Burnside, artist Sarah Lucas, and last year’s inaugural prize winner, novelist Benjamin Myers.
Set in the three years after the Norman invasion of 1066, The Wake tells the story of Buccmaster of Holland, a man from the Lincolnshire Fens, who, with a fractured band of guerrilla fighters, takes up arms against the invaders. It is a post-apocalyptic story of the brutal shattering of lives, a tale of lost gods and haunted visions, narrated by a man bearing witness to the end of his world.
Judge Benjamin Myers said: “The ‘shadow tongue’ vocabulary that is the novel’s architecture automatically makes The Wake a unique entity, yet it is so much more than a dazzling display of linguistic flair.
“Paul Kingsnorth creates his own world – that of an old England that is both familiar yet utterly alien – and pulls you in to bear witness to our own bloody history first hand. Poetry, landscape, mythology and language are shot through with fleeting flashes of violence on which modern society is founded. Months after first reading it, part of me is still within this novel, and I truly believe future generations will regard The Wake as a classic.”
Paul Kingsnorth is the author of two non-fiction books, One No, Many Yeses (2003) and the highly acclaimed Real England (2008), as well as a collection of poetry, Kidland (2011). A former journalist and deputy editor of The Ecologist magazine, he has won several awards for his poetry and essays. In 2009, he co-founded the Dark Mountain Project, an international network of writers, artists and thinkers in search of new stories for troubled times. Much of his writing can be found online at www.paulkingsnorth.net. The Wake is his first novel.
The Wake is published by Unbound, a crowdsource funding platform, whose investors include actor Mark Rylance.
The Gordon Burn Prize, run in partnership by New Writing North, Faber & Faber, and the Gordon Burn Trust, was conceived to pay tribute to the legacy of the late author. Newcastle-born Gordon was a literary polymath, writing on subjects ranging from celebrity to serial killers, politics to contemporary art, sport to the media.
The shortlist for the prize this year was: The Valley by Richard Benson (Bloomsbury), The Kills by Richard House (Picador), The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth (Unbound), The Trip to Echo Spring by Olivia Laing (Canongate), American Interior by Gruff Rhys (Hamish Hamilton), and The Free by Willy Vlautin (Faber & Faber).
Friday, 10 October 2014
Structuring your story
#These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the weeks to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
Beginning your short story
However you start your story, the beginning should have The Question, something that hooks your reader. You need to grab them from those first lines.
One way do to this is intrigue the reader. For instance, “Bill Bloggs was dead” may give the end away but the readers wants to find out why he died and if he deserved it.
The dropped introduction can also work: “Betty was a pleasant woman. She would do anything for anyone. Everyone liked old Betty. A true angel, they used to say. Which was why it was such a shock when she was killed by a Mafia hitman.”
There is another way of hooking readers, in which the writer can draw us in with the sheer quality of their writing, as in books like Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee.
Whatever you do, remember that all stories begin in the middle - the people you write about have already plenty of history. What you are doing is catapulting the reader into their life.
The middle of the story
The middle is there to keep the story going, fill in gaps, create tension and allow the story to develop but it should only be as long as if needed, not overwritten or underwritten.
Write your short story in a series of episodes, maybe only a few lines long. Short stories are a series of small chapters, maybe only a few lines but representing a development in the story.
The end of the story
There are all sorts of ways of ending a short story but the most popular is some kind of twist, something that startles the reader, or perhaps makes sense of the rest of the story. On the other hand, you may go for a poignant ending.
There is also a growing trend for stories that simply stop.
Any of these is fine: the really important thing is that you do it well.John Dean
Beginning your short story
However you start your story, the beginning should have The Question, something that hooks your reader. You need to grab them from those first lines.
One way do to this is intrigue the reader. For instance, “Bill Bloggs was dead” may give the end away but the readers wants to find out why he died and if he deserved it.
The dropped introduction can also work: “Betty was a pleasant woman. She would do anything for anyone. Everyone liked old Betty. A true angel, they used to say. Which was why it was such a shock when she was killed by a Mafia hitman.”
There is another way of hooking readers, in which the writer can draw us in with the sheer quality of their writing, as in books like Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee.
Whatever you do, remember that all stories begin in the middle - the people you write about have already plenty of history. What you are doing is catapulting the reader into their life.
The middle of the story
The middle is there to keep the story going, fill in gaps, create tension and allow the story to develop but it should only be as long as if needed, not overwritten or underwritten.
Write your short story in a series of episodes, maybe only a few lines long. Short stories are a series of small chapters, maybe only a few lines but representing a development in the story.
This requires really effective writing because, whereas in a novel you might have eight or nine pages to recount an incident, that luxury simply does not exist in a short story.
If you take our competition, our limit for a story is 2,000 words. Sounds a lot but not if you let your episodes run too long.
So, how do you achieve such tight writing? Well, it might be that you describe a location in a line rather than a paragraph, produce only sparing details of your character or recount a conversation in four snatches of dialogue rather than a page.
Many winning short story authors in competitions around the world have been those who achieved such effective writing.
All of this is not to say that when you write a novel, you can waffle on to your heart’s content. Indeed, the disciplines of short story writing can be invaluable when you tackle a novel. Whatever you write, every word must do its job. it’s a good mantra to live by.
There are all sorts of ways of ending a short story but the most popular is some kind of twist, something that startles the reader, or perhaps makes sense of the rest of the story. On the other hand, you may go for a poignant ending.
There is also a growing trend for stories that simply stop.
Any of these is fine: the really important thing is that you do it well.John Dean
The narrative flow
These are some more of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the weeks to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
Where do ideas come from?
Creating the triangle
Good story writing depends on many things but can be boiled down to three factors, the triangle.
At the top is the narrative, a strong story, plenty of pace, a tale that enthrals the readers.
At one bottom corner is a sense of place, a strong sense of where the action is taking place.
At the other corner is a sense of being, the creation of characters strong and interesting enough to carry the story.
Get the triangle right and the rest flows from it.
THE NARRATIVE
Structuring the short story
Some writers opt for the beginning, middle, end approach, a traditional and proven format which has served short story writers well down the decades.
Others go for deliberately confusing the reader, creating stories which are
not clear at the start but which slowly reveal themselves. They may do it by
concealing where the action takes place, or perhaps who the central
characters are. Or keeping back the salient piece of information the reader
needs to make sense of everything.
Some writers go for the flashback approach, beginning the story with an
incident then working backwards to explain how we arrived at this moment. Knowing what happens at the end can make the events that unfold that little
but more poignant.
John Dean
Where do ideas come from?
For some writers, stories always start with a place, somewhere that strikes them so forcibly that the story unfolds around them.
Other writers start with a character, someone so interesting, so intriguing that they can almost tell the story on their own.
Other writers begin with the story itself, an idea inspired by a newspaper snippet, something someone says, a sudden sense of ’what if?’
Some write for additional reasons, to get a point over, to add to our knowledge of the world or to make us think about an issue in a different way.
Whatever your motivation - and there will be many others - one thing is certain: if it drives you to sit down in front of that computer or lift up that pen, it’s got to be worth writing about.
Creating the triangle
Good story writing depends on many things but can be boiled down to three factors, the triangle.
At the top is the narrative, a strong story, plenty of pace, a tale that enthrals the readers.
At one bottom corner is a sense of place, a strong sense of where the action is taking place.
At the other corner is a sense of being, the creation of characters strong and interesting enough to carry the story.
Get the triangle right and the rest flows from it.
THE NARRATIVE
Structuring the short story
Some writers opt for the beginning, middle, end approach, a traditional and proven format which has served short story writers well down the decades.
Others go for deliberately confusing the reader, creating stories which are
not clear at the start but which slowly reveal themselves. They may do it by
concealing where the action takes place, or perhaps who the central
characters are. Or keeping back the salient piece of information the reader
needs to make sense of everything.
Some writers go for the flashback approach, beginning the story with an
incident then working backwards to explain how we arrived at this moment. Knowing what happens at the end can make the events that unfold that little
but more poignant.
John Dean
Handy hints
These are some of the handy hints from our free writers’ toolkit . We’ll be running a few more over the weeks to come but the full guide can be downloaded from the home page of our website at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
The rules of writing
Some general rules as you develop your story
* Consider the reader - do not write for yourself, always write for the reader.
* Be disciplined - you may wish to pack lots of information in but does the reader need it?
* You may not have put enough information in - you can imagine where a scene is set but have you given the reader the information they need? You may have drawn a character but can your readers see them?
* Be brutal - if you have overwritten, chop out the fat.
Rules of the short story
1 . The best stories are the ones that follow a fairly narrow subject line: too many plotlines and you end up with a novel!
2. An effective short story often covers a very short time span. It may be one single episode that proves pivotal in the life of the character.
3. Don't have too many characters. Each new character will bring a new dimension to the story, and too many diverse dimensions dilute the theme. Have only enough characters to effectively tell the story.
4. Make every word count. There is no room for unnecessary expansion in a short story. If each word is not working towards putting across the story, delete it. John Dean
The rules of writing
Some general rules as you develop your story
* Consider the reader - do not write for yourself, always write for the reader.
* Be disciplined - you may wish to pack lots of information in but does the reader need it?
* You may not have put enough information in - you can imagine where a scene is set but have you given the reader the information they need? You may have drawn a character but can your readers see them?
* Be brutal - if you have overwritten, chop out the fat.
Rules of the short story
1 . The best stories are the ones that follow a fairly narrow subject line: too many plotlines and you end up with a novel!
2. An effective short story often covers a very short time span. It may be one single episode that proves pivotal in the life of the character.
3. Don't have too many characters. Each new character will bring a new dimension to the story, and too many diverse dimensions dilute the theme. Have only enough characters to effectively tell the story.
4. Make every word count. There is no room for unnecessary expansion in a short story. If each word is not working towards putting across the story, delete it. John Dean
Wednesday, 8 October 2014
Cracking first lines
First lines are so important in setting the scene for readers. How about these an excellent examples from our e-anthologies Global Shorts and VegemiteWhiskers?
“I met Silas in a bar called The Trickster. He was the Joker. I was the Queen of Hearts.” That’s the beginning of Heart String by S J Finn, the first story in our e-anthology Global Shorts.
Or “On the day of my grandmother’s funeral, I stopped eating.” That’s the start of Eat, Mister by John Michaelson.
“I always get away with it, I’m invulnerable, I’m the man,,” he thought, and he said it loud, right into the ear of the wimp who was lying pinned beneath his foot in a remote corner of the playground” , which is the start to I Always Get Away With It by Stuart McCarthy.
“It’s not like anyone around here actually properly celebrates Christmas.” That’s the start to Andrew Frost’s Chrissie Lights, one of the stories in our Australian e-anthology Vegemite Whiskers.
Or how about this at the start of Bella Anderson’s The Last of My Line? “I am the last of my line; my eyes will never shine from another face, no one will laugh or talk like me and my memory will not survive a careless generation.”
You can check both books out on Amazon.
John Dean
“I met Silas in a bar called The Trickster. He was the Joker. I was the Queen of Hearts.” That’s the beginning of Heart String by S J Finn, the first story in our e-anthology Global Shorts.
Or “On the day of my grandmother’s funeral, I stopped eating.” That’s the start of Eat, Mister by John Michaelson.
“I always get away with it, I’m invulnerable, I’m the man,,” he thought, and he said it loud, right into the ear of the wimp who was lying pinned beneath his foot in a remote corner of the playground” , which is the start to I Always Get Away With It by Stuart McCarthy.
“It’s not like anyone around here actually properly celebrates Christmas.” That’s the start to Andrew Frost’s Chrissie Lights, one of the stories in our Australian e-anthology Vegemite Whiskers.
Or how about this at the start of Bella Anderson’s The Last of My Line? “I am the last of my line; my eyes will never shine from another face, no one will laugh or talk like me and my memory will not survive a careless generation.”
You can check both books out on Amazon.
John Dean
Winner's stories are published
The twenty-six stories read like tales told to friends at sundown on the terrace, a glass of wine in hand, small bowls of olives and roasted almonds on the table.
They embrace almost eighty years, the earliest stories about Bert’s youth in a provincial town in the East of Holland in the thirties and forties of last century. Following these are the years at college in the fifties, studying tropical agriculture and, at the end of that decade, departure to Africa where the flags of colonial powers Great Britain, France, Belgium, Spain and Portugal still flew in most countries south of the Sahara.
The small Central African British Protectorate of Nyasaland – to become the Republic of Malawi in 1964 - is the setting for anecdotes of thirty-eight years of a tea planter’s life.
The final stories of the book are of Ibiza where Bert and Anneke live their vintage years in an old finca, surrounded by vines, and orange, lemon, fig and almond trees.
To order the book, prepared in conjunction with Anneke, you can send an e-mail to bertvelthuis@telefonica.net or write to Bert Velthuis, Buzon 48, Telepost, Paseo Vara de Rey 4, 07800 Ibiza, Spain, for information on payment.
Price per copy: £ 10.00.
Postage: £ 5.50 ( outside Europe: £ 7.60 ).
Saturday, 4 October 2014
Good time to enter short story competition
With three weeks to go, the new quarterly Global Short Story Competition has had just eight entries, which means it is a great time to enter.
Begun more than six years ago, the competition has until now run on a monthly basis but has switched to one which runs for three months at a time, with the new one running from August 1 to October 31, 2014.
The prizes continue to be £100 for the first prize and a £25 prize for highly commended writers. The entry fee remains £5.
The competition, which has topped £11,000 in prize money handed out, has had entries from more than 60 countries over the years.
Each competition is judged by Fiona Cooper, an author in North-East England, where the competition’s organisers Inscribe Media are also based.
The competition, which has been supported by best-selling author Bill Bryson since it was established six and a half years ago, can be entered at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Begun more than six years ago, the competition has until now run on a monthly basis but has switched to one which runs for three months at a time, with the new one running from August 1 to October 31, 2014.
The prizes continue to be £100 for the first prize and a £25 prize for highly commended writers. The entry fee remains £5.
The competition, which has topped £11,000 in prize money handed out, has had entries from more than 60 countries over the years.
Each competition is judged by Fiona Cooper, an author in North-East England, where the competition’s organisers Inscribe Media are also based.
The competition, which has been supported by best-selling author Bill Bryson since it was established six and a half years ago, can be entered at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
The return of the novella
I have been researching the world of short novels and it seems to me that the time for them to make a comeback could be upon us because of the e-book revolution.
Folks are happy to read 30,000 words of story on their hand-helds - particularly on holiday when a book that can be finished in a day or two is welcome.
So what exactly is a novella? Well, it’s an extended short story in many ways, constructed in episodes but written in a tight and clipped way to guarantee pace.
The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards defined the novella as having a word count of between 17,500 and 40,000. Other definitions start as low as 10,000 words.
There are plenty of writers who can see the sense in the idea. I know some who would love us to run a short story competition with a word limit around that figure because they feel that 2,000 words simply does not give enough space for the story to breathe.
Why are novellas so effective? Well, an eight page scenes becomes two pages, a, 800 word passage of dialogue becomes 200, if that. It’s the mantra I teach to the many writers with whom I work across the world - does your story need those extra words, can they come out, will the story really suffer if they do?
I look at my early novels and it’s a lesson I have needed to learn on my own behalf as well. Hopefully, my writing has become crisper as a result of that growing sense of discipline.
Until recently the problem has been that there were still relatively few novella publishers but now there are plenty of examples of the shorter form in the world of e-books.
Maybe the time has come…
John Dean
Folks are happy to read 30,000 words of story on their hand-helds - particularly on holiday when a book that can be finished in a day or two is welcome.
So what exactly is a novella? Well, it’s an extended short story in many ways, constructed in episodes but written in a tight and clipped way to guarantee pace.
The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards defined the novella as having a word count of between 17,500 and 40,000. Other definitions start as low as 10,000 words.
There are plenty of writers who can see the sense in the idea. I know some who would love us to run a short story competition with a word limit around that figure because they feel that 2,000 words simply does not give enough space for the story to breathe.
Why are novellas so effective? Well, an eight page scenes becomes two pages, a, 800 word passage of dialogue becomes 200, if that. It’s the mantra I teach to the many writers with whom I work across the world - does your story need those extra words, can they come out, will the story really suffer if they do?
I look at my early novels and it’s a lesson I have needed to learn on my own behalf as well. Hopefully, my writing has become crisper as a result of that growing sense of discipline.
Until recently the problem has been that there were still relatively few novella publishers but now there are plenty of examples of the shorter form in the world of e-books.
Maybe the time has come…
John Dean
Thursday, 2 October 2014
Mentoring and online writing courses
A reminder that, in addition to the various free things we do, one of the paid-for services we offer is one supporting writers.
Why should you hire a professional writing mentor, though? Isn’t it enough to attend a class/workshop or a writing group? Or ask a friend or relative to comment?
Well, it depends what you want and need and bespoke mentoring from Inscribe Media can help some writers, providing the experience and expertise to -
• understand your work
• nurture you and your writing
• let you retain control of your ideas and your writing
* provide expert, specific advice about what is working and what isn’t.
We focus on major issues, such as how your story hangs together, what your characters are doing or could be doing, what is hurting your story’s momentum, what story elements are not pulling their weight.
We identify the differences between good and great and point out your writing strengths, so you become confident about what not to change.
We also give suggestions and help you establish good processes and writing goals and suggest markets for your work.
If long-term mentoring does not appeal, we run short writing courses as well.
You can find out more at http://www.inscribemedia.co.uk/writing-courses---bespoke-mentoring.html
You can also access our free downloadable writing guide at www.inscribemedia.co,uk and find loads of free tips on our blog here.
John Dean
Why should you hire a professional writing mentor, though? Isn’t it enough to attend a class/workshop or a writing group? Or ask a friend or relative to comment?
Well, it depends what you want and need and bespoke mentoring from Inscribe Media can help some writers, providing the experience and expertise to -
• understand your work
• nurture you and your writing
• let you retain control of your ideas and your writing
* provide expert, specific advice about what is working and what isn’t.
We focus on major issues, such as how your story hangs together, what your characters are doing or could be doing, what is hurting your story’s momentum, what story elements are not pulling their weight.
We identify the differences between good and great and point out your writing strengths, so you become confident about what not to change.
We also give suggestions and help you establish good processes and writing goals and suggest markets for your work.
If long-term mentoring does not appeal, we run short writing courses as well.
You can find out more at http://www.inscribemedia.co.uk/writing-courses---bespoke-mentoring.html
You can also access our free downloadable writing guide at www.inscribemedia.co,uk and find loads of free tips on our blog here.
John Dean
It's all in the editing
When editing your own work, it is often easy to miss or overlook minor problems. This is usually because you are so familiar with your own work that your mind automatically replaces the tiny typo with the correct word.
There are also times where your mind will completely overlook glaring holes in your plot line because you know what your story is supposed to look like.
Let's skip the simple editing problems, like typing errors, or grammatical errors, and take a look at some larger issues.
In order to edit your own work properly, you will need to go back through your story, reading it as a reader would.
Here are some things you should look for:
Plot
1. Is there a clear, believable main plot?
2. Is your plot clearly resolved, so that the reader understands the events which led to this resolution?
3. Do the subplots advance the story?
4 Writing a short story is far different than a novel. Squeezing six subplots into a short story simply does not work.
Pace
1. Does the plot move fast enough to grab the reader's attention?
2. Have you glossed over important details in your hurry to get to more interesting scenes?
3 Are action scenes written in a direct fashion, propelling the reader forward? Are more subtle scenes developed enough for the reader to catch the nuances?
Setting
1. Does the description of the setting transport your reader into your fictional world?
2. Do the descriptions drag on for pages or (much better) are they interspersed throughout the story?
Characters
1. Are the characters 'real’?
2. Do they hold the reader’s interest?
3. Are the characters consistent? Ok, let them surprise us but it has to sound like it could happen.
4. Is the character's background given in one large lump or small manageable pieces? Background needs to be unfolded, showing the reader different layers with each event.
John Dean
There are also times where your mind will completely overlook glaring holes in your plot line because you know what your story is supposed to look like.
Let's skip the simple editing problems, like typing errors, or grammatical errors, and take a look at some larger issues.
In order to edit your own work properly, you will need to go back through your story, reading it as a reader would.
Here are some things you should look for:
Plot
1. Is there a clear, believable main plot?
2. Is your plot clearly resolved, so that the reader understands the events which led to this resolution?
3. Do the subplots advance the story?
4 Writing a short story is far different than a novel. Squeezing six subplots into a short story simply does not work.
Pace
1. Does the plot move fast enough to grab the reader's attention?
2. Have you glossed over important details in your hurry to get to more interesting scenes?
3 Are action scenes written in a direct fashion, propelling the reader forward? Are more subtle scenes developed enough for the reader to catch the nuances?
Setting
1. Does the description of the setting transport your reader into your fictional world?
2. Do the descriptions drag on for pages or (much better) are they interspersed throughout the story?
Characters
1. Are the characters 'real’?
2. Do they hold the reader’s interest?
3. Are the characters consistent? Ok, let them surprise us but it has to sound like it could happen.
4. Is the character's background given in one large lump or small manageable pieces? Background needs to be unfolded, showing the reader different layers with each event.
John Dean
The Devil is in the detail
As those who read my blogs will know, I think that detail is key to good writing and I often teach classes on the subject.
Here’s some tips:
* Ask questions about your character. What does your character look like? How does he/she walk or talk? What kind of clothes does he/she wear? What nasty habits etc? What beliefs? And which facts are relevant?
* Create details about your settings. What does your character's living room look like? Is it messy or is it tidy? Are there paintings on the wall etc etc? Create details that bring the settings to life. A story comes alive when the reader can see, smell, taste, hear, and touch the world you've created.
Don't be excessive in using details. Use only what is necessary. Sometimes two or three details will do the trick, the reader will do the rest.
John Dean
Here’s some tips:
* Ask questions about your character. What does your character look like? How does he/she walk or talk? What kind of clothes does he/she wear? What nasty habits etc? What beliefs? And which facts are relevant?
* Create details about your settings. What does your character's living room look like? Is it messy or is it tidy? Are there paintings on the wall etc etc? Create details that bring the settings to life. A story comes alive when the reader can see, smell, taste, hear, and touch the world you've created.
Don't be excessive in using details. Use only what is necessary. Sometimes two or three details will do the trick, the reader will do the rest.
John Dean
Wednesday, 1 October 2014
In the beginning
Here’s some thoughts on starting short stories.
The first cardinal rule of opening lines is that they should possess most of the individual elements that make up the story.
An opening paragraph should have a distinctive voice, a point of view, a rudimentary plot and some hint of characterisation. By the end of the first paragraph, we should also know the setting and conflict, unless there is a particular reason to withhold this information.
You might be tempted to begin your narrative before the action starts, such as when a character wakes up to what will eventually be a dramatic day. Far better to begin at the first moment of something interesting happening, though, which is more likely to grab the reader‘s interest.
If you feel compelled to begin a story with dialogue, keep in mind that you’re thrusting your readers directly into a story in which it’s easy to lose them early on. So keep the dialogue to a minimum.
Sometimes a story evolves so significantly during the writing that an opening line, no matter how brilliant, no longer applies to the story that follows. Often a new opening is called for.
John Dean
The first cardinal rule of opening lines is that they should possess most of the individual elements that make up the story.
An opening paragraph should have a distinctive voice, a point of view, a rudimentary plot and some hint of characterisation. By the end of the first paragraph, we should also know the setting and conflict, unless there is a particular reason to withhold this information.
You might be tempted to begin your narrative before the action starts, such as when a character wakes up to what will eventually be a dramatic day. Far better to begin at the first moment of something interesting happening, though, which is more likely to grab the reader‘s interest.
If you feel compelled to begin a story with dialogue, keep in mind that you’re thrusting your readers directly into a story in which it’s easy to lose them early on. So keep the dialogue to a minimum.
Sometimes a story evolves so significantly during the writing that an opening line, no matter how brilliant, no longer applies to the story that follows. Often a new opening is called for.
John Dean
Using the right words
Words are our tools and, as with any tools, you need to select the right ones for the job. For me, it is best to keep it simple and effective: write what you want to say.
Don’t be tempted to use different words just for the sake of it. Sometimes it’s not necessary to find alternatives. It can make a piece read artificially, making a reader more aware of the writing than the subject.
Example comes often in the tabloid newspapers. Having used the word cake, they will use words like ’sugared sweetmeat‘. Don’t fall into the same trap - if cake is the right word, use it.
However, be careful not to overuse it. The repeated use of a single word can emphasise a point but be careful not to overuse it if that is not your intention.
These thoughts form part of a course I am teaching on the power of words, during the research for which I came across the following illuminating quotes:
Kurt Vonnegut: “The writing style which is most natural for you is bound to echo the speech you heard when a child. I myself find that I trust my own writing most, and others seem to trust it most, too, when I sound most like a person from Indianapolis, which is what I am.
“My teachers wished me to write accurately, always selecting the most effective words, and relating the words to one another unambiguously, rigidly, like parts of a machine. The teachers hoped that I would become understandable — and, therefore, understood.
“And there went my dream of doing with words what Pablo Picasso did with paint or what any number of jazz idols did with music. If I broke all the rules of punctuation, had words mean whatever I wanted them to mean, and strung them together higgledly-piggledy, I would simply not be understood. So you, too, had better avoid Picasso-style or jazz-style writing if you have something worth saying and wish to be understood.
“Readers want our pages to look very much like pages they have seen before. Why? This is because they themselves have a tough job to do, and they need all the help they can get from us.
“As for your use of language, remember that two great masters of language, William Shakespeare and James Joyce, wrote sentences which were almost childlike when their subjects were most profound. ‘To be or not to be?’ asks Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The longest word is three letters long. Joyce, when he was frisky, could put together a sentence as intricate and as glittering as a necklace for Cleopatra, but my favourite sentence in his short story ‘Eveline’ is just this one: ‘She was tired.’ At that point in the story, no other words could break the heart of a reader as those three words do. Simplicity of language is not only reputable, but perhaps even sacred. “
CS Lewis: ““Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don't say infinitely when you mean very; otherwise you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite.”
Wise words.
John Dean
Don’t be tempted to use different words just for the sake of it. Sometimes it’s not necessary to find alternatives. It can make a piece read artificially, making a reader more aware of the writing than the subject.
Example comes often in the tabloid newspapers. Having used the word cake, they will use words like ’sugared sweetmeat‘. Don’t fall into the same trap - if cake is the right word, use it.
However, be careful not to overuse it. The repeated use of a single word can emphasise a point but be careful not to overuse it if that is not your intention.
These thoughts form part of a course I am teaching on the power of words, during the research for which I came across the following illuminating quotes:
Kurt Vonnegut: “The writing style which is most natural for you is bound to echo the speech you heard when a child. I myself find that I trust my own writing most, and others seem to trust it most, too, when I sound most like a person from Indianapolis, which is what I am.
“My teachers wished me to write accurately, always selecting the most effective words, and relating the words to one another unambiguously, rigidly, like parts of a machine. The teachers hoped that I would become understandable — and, therefore, understood.
“And there went my dream of doing with words what Pablo Picasso did with paint or what any number of jazz idols did with music. If I broke all the rules of punctuation, had words mean whatever I wanted them to mean, and strung them together higgledly-piggledy, I would simply not be understood. So you, too, had better avoid Picasso-style or jazz-style writing if you have something worth saying and wish to be understood.
“Readers want our pages to look very much like pages they have seen before. Why? This is because they themselves have a tough job to do, and they need all the help they can get from us.
“As for your use of language, remember that two great masters of language, William Shakespeare and James Joyce, wrote sentences which were almost childlike when their subjects were most profound. ‘To be or not to be?’ asks Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The longest word is three letters long. Joyce, when he was frisky, could put together a sentence as intricate and as glittering as a necklace for Cleopatra, but my favourite sentence in his short story ‘Eveline’ is just this one: ‘She was tired.’ At that point in the story, no other words could break the heart of a reader as those three words do. Simplicity of language is not only reputable, but perhaps even sacred. “
CS Lewis: ““Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don't say infinitely when you mean very; otherwise you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite.”
Wise words.
John Dean
A month to go in competition
We are in the final month of the new quarterly Global Short Story Competition.
Begun more than six years ago, the competition has until now run on a monthly basis but has switched to one which runs for three months at a time, with the new one running from August 1 to October 31, 2014.
The prizes continue to be £100 for the first prize and a £25 prize for highly commended writers. The entry fee remains £5.
The competition, which has topped £11,000 in prize money handed out, has had entries from more than 60 countries over the years.
Each competition is judged by Fiona Cooper, an author in North-East England, where the competition’s organisers Inscribe Media are also based.
The competition, which has been supported by best-selling author Bill Bryson since it was established six and a half years ago, can be entered at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Begun more than six years ago, the competition has until now run on a monthly basis but has switched to one which runs for three months at a time, with the new one running from August 1 to October 31, 2014.
The prizes continue to be £100 for the first prize and a £25 prize for highly commended writers. The entry fee remains £5.
The competition, which has topped £11,000 in prize money handed out, has had entries from more than 60 countries over the years.
Each competition is judged by Fiona Cooper, an author in North-East England, where the competition’s organisers Inscribe Media are also based.
The competition, which has been supported by best-selling author Bill Bryson since it was established six and a half years ago, can be entered at www.inscribemedia.co.uk
John Dean
Triumph for short story writer
Lionel Shriver has won the BBC National Short Story Award 2014 for her story 'Kilifi Creek'.
This was the third time Shriver had been shortlisted for the Award, and she picked up the main prize of £15,000 at the ceremony held in the BBC's Radio Theatre in London.
Chair of judges and BBC Creative Director and presenter, Alan Yentob, said:
'From a fantastic shortlist, Lionel Shriver's 'Kilifi Creek' stood out as a wonderful evocation of life in miniature, crossing continents and generations. She is a worthy and deserved winner in an exciting year when the short story has taken centre stage. Shriver proves that short really is sweet and it's never been sweeter than now.'
An American writer who lives in London, Lionel Shriver is the author of 11 novels. She is best known for the New York Times bestsellers So Much for That and The Post-Birthday World, as well as the international bestseller We Need to Talk About Kevin. She is also an accomplished short story writer, having made the BBC National Short Story Award shortlist in both 2009 and 2013.
When asked about tackling short stories, Lionel said: “'I love working in a form that doesn't consume a couple of years. Ironically, low temporal risk can facilitate high-risk style and content. In a short story, you can try anything.“
Zadie Smith was selected as this year's runner-up, receiving £3,000 for her story 'Miss Adele Amidst the Corsets' in which an ageing American performer comes face-to-face with a multitude of resentments while buying undergarments on the East Side of New York City.
The three other shortlisted authors, Tessa Hadley, Francesca Rhydderch and Rose Tremain, received £500.
This was the third time Shriver had been shortlisted for the Award, and she picked up the main prize of £15,000 at the ceremony held in the BBC's Radio Theatre in London.
Chair of judges and BBC Creative Director and presenter, Alan Yentob, said:
'From a fantastic shortlist, Lionel Shriver's 'Kilifi Creek' stood out as a wonderful evocation of life in miniature, crossing continents and generations. She is a worthy and deserved winner in an exciting year when the short story has taken centre stage. Shriver proves that short really is sweet and it's never been sweeter than now.'
An American writer who lives in London, Lionel Shriver is the author of 11 novels. She is best known for the New York Times bestsellers So Much for That and The Post-Birthday World, as well as the international bestseller We Need to Talk About Kevin. She is also an accomplished short story writer, having made the BBC National Short Story Award shortlist in both 2009 and 2013.
When asked about tackling short stories, Lionel said: “'I love working in a form that doesn't consume a couple of years. Ironically, low temporal risk can facilitate high-risk style and content. In a short story, you can try anything.“
Zadie Smith was selected as this year's runner-up, receiving £3,000 for her story 'Miss Adele Amidst the Corsets' in which an ageing American performer comes face-to-face with a multitude of resentments while buying undergarments on the East Side of New York City.
The three other shortlisted authors, Tessa Hadley, Francesca Rhydderch and Rose Tremain, received £500.
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