Tag Archives: revision

Possible Blog Mini Series

Posted by Seriah Black Sheep on

I have a perfectly good blog sitting here, so why not put something on it?

Photo by Susan Q Yin on Unsplash

I’m thinking of doing a mini series on writing tropes or sub-genres that have been underrepresented.

What do I mean by that?

Previously, I blogged about how difficult it was to find articles on writing revenge romance. Recently, another writer confided how difficult it is for her to research her niche of cozy fantasy. I replied with how difficult it has been for me to research what type of plot pattern a good mystery needs to have, for my mystery subplot. In addition, there is an entire taboo category of romance and dark romance that gets ignored unless you’re in the right reader Facebook group. Yet, these are obviously categories many readers camp in.

Which would be fine, if we were actually teaching people how to write these things. But who can I approach to teach me how to drop mystery hints when my protagonist is not a self-proclaimed sleuth, or how far is too far in rawness in an erotic romance scene? Who can teach me how to keep readers from hating my antihero who wants revenge on the heroine, when she does not want revenge on him? What about showing and not telling, when showing is graphic, or how to write in rich metaphor without overusing “like” and “as”?

You were going to answer, “Find a how-to writing book or article,” weren’t you. (Or use software to nitpick individual words.)

Except, we have a problem: How-to books these days aren’t even what university teachers are recommending. That’s because they are so general that they rarely help other than making a writer sometimes feel less alone in the process. Which is what writing community is for, by the way. Find a workshop. Find a Discord. Find a local group. Something. Anything. Use an online search engine before you say you can’t.

I have several how-to books on my shelf. The issue isn’t that how-to books exist. The issue is that people describe the same elements and repackage them with a different cover. Plot, dialogue, character, and setting are staples. You cannot promise me YA-specific content, or NA-specific content, and then tell me all the generalized content about stories that I already know, and place a line at the end saying, “You should read books in this category to see what’s the norm.” No. That’s why I bought your book. Tell me what I’m looking for. Tell me something other than how teenagers might call me out for trying to be hip. I live in real life; I’ve already seen that. I’ve been that teen. Tell me how to craft voice when I have a younger character. Don’t chicken out because you’re an adult and you’re winging it.

There is a deficit on our bookshelves and online and on our e-readers. The topics that we very clearly need sensitivity readers for are the topics that I have a 10% chance of getting in a workshop once in two years, and almost no chance of getting anywhere else. DEI is not the only thing that got buried.

If you’re like me, in that hole, trying to research and coming up empty, I can’t give you expert advice.

What I can do is start a blog where I share what actually helps me from my search, as I’m searching. Maybe that will jumpstart your own blocked search. Maybe it will spark someone who actually is an expert in one of these categories to do more than regurgitate how important it is to have a plot, have three sections, and save a cat. Those books have already been written. We need your help with new specifics, please. We need your techniques.

Don’t worry; our writing won’t come out like yours if we’re using your technique. We’ve got our own quirks to apply your techniques to.

We talk about “writers lifts” on social media, but isn’t a true lift when we give each other the tools we’re missing, so the rare manuscript gems that are challenging us the most actually get into readers’ hands?

Since when was the status quo fun to write for books?

Let’s write what needs to be written.

I want to pause and say to the many workshop and webinar instructors and speakers I’ve been sitting under for the past two years, and earlier than that: Thank you. Thank you for taking the time and covering the difficult topics, for providing the one-sentence takeaways that I’d been searching three years to find, for answering a dozen questions in a row, for not turning away our difficult and messy endeavors and our crayon-drawing-equivalents of addressing writing prompts and trying out your techniques. It took me a long time to find workshops like yours, and I recommend them to many other writers. I can’t say they all step up to try to tackle such big ideas, but I hope in the future they will.

Inside of Bre

Posted by Seriah Black Sheep on

A growing concern in my mind over the years has been the increasing sense that Labriella, the semi-normal-perspectived main character, is a flat character. Most of that stemmed from having little to no interest in her. In the beginning, turning from a Damsel in Distress into a Damsel with a Kick was the main point of Bre’s origins and tendencies. Basically, she existed to show off Rome, and she was built to want to show off Rome.

But as any of my readers would readily tell you, Rome is not the type of guy to love a dunce just because she was there. Especially when she is the reason he hit rock-bottom for the second time in his long life, Rome would be more prone to kick the girl to the curb definitively than to wishy-wash back and forth with uncontrollable emotion over her exit. The magnitude of this is seen not only in Rome’s dealings with shopkeepers and employees, and with nobles, but also with the nobles’ showcases. A remote attraction to Kitiora can only be true if she has a brain, and the balls to kick him in them.

And yes, if you haven’t noticed, Bre’s concern over that last bit is grounded in reality, not jealous paranoia.

So, what is an author to do with a heroine who exists to be as unobtrusive to and un-hated by female readers as possible?

The first major recognition is that Bre lives in a world outside of my area of expertise. I do have professional ties to the medical world and service experience through prior employment. I know masseuses, nurses, and mushroom hunters. I now live in a wooded area. I grew up in a conservative religious culture. I have a family member who beat cancer post-surgery through homeopathic supplements and dietary changes. I have another family member who made burn cream in her backyard. But what do I really know about binding wounds, tinctures and tonics, poultices, and poisons? What about those “long-lost” apothecary skills? What about herbal remedies that aren’t attached to witchcraft?

Throughout (or despite, or because of) my long college career, I gradually found the opportunity to study some of these things: CPR, Wilderness First Aid, mushrooms and poisons books through inter-library loan and a co-worker, and tonics and tinctures through another co-worker, plus pheromonal experimental study results as they relate to psychology.

Today, I add to that study through a couple preliminary classes on Udemy about massage and herbs.

The amount of behind-the-scenes research we conduct, even as Fantasy or Romance authors, is amazing. Just because we can create our own world from scratch, doesn’t mean we aren’t cobbling together actual starting matter based on real-world principles.

Complex Plotting: Zero = Four

Posted by Seriah Black Sheep on

For months—maybe even over a year—I have been frustrated with my first book, because I could not find a plot in it. With all the fiction I’ve read over the course of my life, and all the stories read to me before I could even read, and all those classes where teachers made me analyze and chart plot structures, how in the world could I create a book without a plot?! The possibility had never even occurred to me. And once I began to scrutinize the possibility, I was even more disheartened to find it true. Because what else could be the problem?

But after my sixth attempt to outline my plot points—always getting stuck in the same place—I tried a new approach, and finally realized my problem. It’s not that I don’t have a plot. It’s that I have four plots running concurrently, and the primary focus is the romantic one, so no traditional plotline gets the limelight enough to emerge as the official identifiable plot. In fact, you might argue that all four of these plotlines are actually story arcs—meaning they span at least part of the series, rather than being resolved in a single book.

So if you’re a “pantser,” and you’re having trouble unearthing that plot that seems like it’s hiding or nonexistent, I suggest writing out a play-by-play outline, and then an extremely vague outline of points, and see if you can divide things up by topic.

If you can’t abide pinning down your work like that, write down your ideas in different colored pens, and then take a look at what kinds of things ended up in each color. Surprise! You’ve drawn yourself a mind map, and now all you need to do is draw up the key. That’s what I did. Sometimes you just need to look at your thoughts differently to understand what’s going on and roll with it.

These are my plots, as I discovered them when I tried separating them out into categories (as defined by the parties involved):

  • Pandora
  • Temple
  • Noble
  • Romance

I suppose I could split “Romance” again, into “Gian & Labriella” and “Rome & Labriella“…but I would actually prefer to stick with a triangular effect. I want to use Gian to enhance and/or force out a definition of Rome and Labriella’s relationship, and use the nobles (and Pandora, and the temple) to further force it out of the shadows. That probably means I need to scatter Gian’s parts throughout the timeline a bit more, instead of having so many chapters between him and Labriella in the first book.

In my case, does the solution to having four plots entail untangling those plots? Or maybe picking just one per book? Ummm….Ew. I mean, I could do that, but I wove all those plots together subconsciously for a reason; they add depth to one another. At first glance it appears that there is no plot, because you’re walking through the characters’ lives. It’s those elements in their lives that brought them together, and that make up all those plots. Each is a festering issue that needs to be dealt with–and each starts out very small.

Part of the reason I’m so set on revising my first book again, is because I want to resolve either the noble plot or the temple plot (or both) by the end of the first book. I now suspect the noble plot will be more of an undercurrent that will come to a head on several supporting occasions. So I’m fixing my attention on the temple plot. If I start book one with the temple, then I should end book one with the temple. Otherwise, Labriella being considered a “runaway” becomes old news and eventually feels buried or ignored.

Previously the first book revolved around the question of whether Rome would allow Labriella to stay with him. But a few of my readers complained that they were running so many insecure circles around one another that it was slowing down and lengthening the story. And I agree. At least one set of circumstances needs to be sealed in by the end of the first book.

I feel like I’m trying to cram in a lot of things. But maybe, if I eliminate lengthy descriptions, consolidate scenes, and get rid of reflective dialogue, I might still be able to shorten things up. After all, my goal for revising this time around is to keep the plot moving.

Let the Story Begin

Posted by Seriah Black Sheep on

So here’s what I’m thinking:

When is romance/sex most poignant in a novel: when it’s just another nail in the coffin, or when it comes like a thief in the night, sneakily riding the wave of the plot until the perfect time?

I’m going to create another version of the story. I know I’ve been talking about it, but I’m actually going to do it, instead of just moving a few things around, adding in here or there. To me, it’ll still just look like moving things around. But to you, it will probably look like a full story makeover. I’m doing this for the sake of the story. There is a time for Rome and Labriella’s relationship to be hot and heavy. But I rushed it–not because I introduced attraction too early, but because I made attraction the main event. Yes, that attraction is vital, but I don’t have to singularly focus on it for it to come to pass.

I wanted to find out if I could write abruptly instead of detailed.
I could.

I wanted to see if I could write sex scenes.
I can.

I wanted to see if I can get away with detail and gore.
I did.

Now it’s time to write a story.