Gooooaaaallllll!!!!!

Do you remember Pretty Woman?  In the beginning, Angel is interviewing roommates and she says "You gotta have a goal.  Do you have a goal?"  That's true about everything isn't it?  Yesterday my boss emailed me and tells me that I have to do my annual goal setting worksheet for work.  Every year, we have to fill out a little sheet that lists our goals - what we hope to accomplish in our jobs by the end of the year.  When we wake up in the morning, whether we realize it or not, we have goals.  A list of tasks we hope to get accomplished by the end of the day.  It may be getting the house clean, getting the grocery shopping done, doing a load of laundry, or simply making it through the day without having a nervous breakdown.  Regardless, we all have our goals.

Well, our characters, and our stories have to have goals to.  Something that we hope to accomplish by the end of the book.  If those goals are left undone, the reader is let down.  Worse, if the story doesn't have a set of clear cut goals, we probably lose our reader before they get to the end of the story simply because they don't care.  This is something I've been struggling with in my writing lately.  What are my characters' goals, and more importantly, what is my story's goal?

First and foremost - to entertain your reader is definitely not a story goal.  LOL.  A story goal is something that your characters are trying to accomplish.  To save the world for instance, might be a nice story goal.   To fall in love is also not a really good story goal if you write romance.  In fact, I've found that in most romance books, the characters don't set out to fall in love, it just sort of happens.  Then, if you find a goal for your characters, it a) can't be something mundane - i.e. doing the laundry, it has to be something that your reader wonders whether they will be able to accomplish b) it has to be believable - i.e. it has to be within their character and c) it has to be clearly communicated to the reader on some level.

I've actually been through several iterations of my story goals for my sequel and finally think I hit upon something that works.  It gives all of my characters goals that fit with the story, their characters, and also provides the conflict that is so desparately needed to keep the story moving.

Now...I'm on to the three act thingee.  I started out with my first act BAM - wanted to get the reader's attention, so now....huh.  Gotta put my thinking cap back on for a while, but the story is slowly coming together, I think...maybe...I don't know...hm....

I am OZ...the great and powerful...

So I read something really interesting in Dummies last night.  I was reading about POV.  You know, whether you write in the 1st person, 3rd person, or that ever elusive 2nd person POV (I know, right?  Who's ever read anything in the second person POV...except maybe cookbooks or instruction manuals - apparently, there are one or two authors out there who do it quite successfully <grin>)  Anyway...so then there's this omnipotent POV that you are *never* supposed to use but...yup; you guessed it, most of us newbies use constantly. 

So, what you might ask, is this all powerful, all knowing, omnipotent POV that is so bad, and do I do it (you ask yourself) - see how I used 2nd person there? <poke poke>  Well, I definitely do it.  It's that thing you do where you are trying to add sufficient detail to your writing - when you are trying to give your reader a look inside your characters' heads, so after every line you add some little phrase like

As he thumbed through the records on the rack he looked at the woman standing behind the register and wondered if she was available for lunch the next day.  Grabbing a record without looking at the title, he wandered to the counter.  As he watched her delicate fingers tap the keys he asked in his sexiest voice "Would you like to go to lunch with me tomorrow?"

Point here being that - we didn't need to know that he was wondering about asking the cashier to lunch the next day *when he was going to ask her in the next breath!*  Geez y'all!  Leave some mystery.  Let him leaf through the records (for any of you  young'uns out there - those would be these big giant vinyl CD like thingies that plop on a stick and spin round and round(like a record baby right, round round round <cough> excuse me) and play music with kind of an odd scratchy sound using a needle made of diamond - sounds romantic doesn't it?) ummm....what was I talking about?  Oh yeah, let him leaf through the records and stare at the cashier, but you don't have to let the reader know his every thought.  Just because you are omnipotent doesn't mean the reader has to be.  Let the reader wonder at what he might be thinking, then BAM!  Have him grab a record and check (her) out.  Isn't that what reading is all about? It's about filling in the blanks.  I mean seriously, that's one of the reasons I hate movies is because they fill in the blanks all wrong.

Of course, there are some writers that do the whole inner dialogue fabulously.  Look at Stephen King.  His inner dialogue *makes* the book.  I've often commented that his books don't translate well to movies because you lose so much of that inner dialogue, but hey - he still leaves so much unsaid....

Just sayin'!

Blog Hop For Japan

The Blog Hop for Japan Giveaway

April 1st through April 15th
Hosted by The Bawdy Book Blog and My Shelf Confessions

As most of you know, Japan was recently struck with an 8.9M earthquake off its coast, which resulted in a devastating tsunami that wiped out tens of thousands of homes, cut off water supply and electricity and ended the lives of many (the death toll is still rising).  It's heartbreaking that mother nature can be so cruel.  But the human spirit, in all its glory, can rebound and move forward.  Every bit of help means something.

(For "before" and "after" pictures, click here.) 

Funds will be donated to Shelterbox.  More information will be provided as I obtain it.

I will be giving away an autographed copy of my book Love Immortal by Linnea Hall. 

The wheels never stop....

So, I realize now what it means to be a writer.  The wheels never stop turning. Even when you're not working....you're working.  Forever thinking about that next step, that next moment in your book.  My daughter laughs at me because I carry around this notebook that I picked up at Books-A-Million one day when we were shopping.  I thought, I'll keep it with me, just in case.  She tells her friends that I carry it with me everywhere (guilty) and when I forget, I scribble notes on whatever I have handy (you should see the back of my checkbook). 

But let's face it, when an idea strikes, you don't want to forget it, because it just may be the most important idea in your book.  What I'd really like to do is figure out how to use the record button on my phone - (Note to self: ask daughter how to use record feature on phone).  Why do I say this?  As I'm driving down the road on my way to pick up my daughter from a birthday party, I got an idea.  An awful idea.  A wonderful, *awful* idea.

Anyway - I pulled into the McDonald's parking lot, whipped out my notebook, and wrote it down.  Then I continued on my way to pick up my daughter.  When she was in the car, I sprang it on her.  She's my sounding board after all, being in my target age group - I run all my ideas past her.  Her eyes got wide, her face drew down in a pout, and she said..."But, I thought he was a good guy." (Now I've got you thinking, don't I?)  And I nodded, and she thought about it, and finally decided that she liked my idea.

So what's my point?  Well, I guess my point is, that a writer never stops.  Sometimes, in the middle of the night, an idea will hit and you jump out of bed, open the computer and start typing furiously - even though you should be sleeping.  Because that's what writers do.

The value of outlining

So...I've never been an outlining type of person.  In all my years of writing I've always been a seat of the pants kind of writer.  I mean, even when I wrote reports in grade school I would just kind of write from my heart and do the research as I went along.  If there was something that I needed to know based on where my train of thought took me, I'd look it up and keep writing.

I guess I should have picked up on the fact that just winging it wasn't the way to go when my dad, a teacher, would take to my papers with a red pen, and my papers would end up looking like a writer's murder scene.  They would be slashed to bloody ribbons by the point of his red pen; the evidence of terror my heart felt words suffered dripping from the end of his felt tipped instrument of torture.  But, oblivious to the error of my ways, I would simply make the corrections he suggested, get an A on my paper, and make the same mistakes the next time.

Apparently, my ability to write short pieces in this manner improved over the years, but long fiction seems to take a little more finesse. Now, for my book, I believe firmly in write what you know.  Or at least write what you can ask people about.  That requires less research.  I'm not good at research.  Well, that's not exactly right.  I'm very good at research, but I do too much.  I get sidetracked, move in new directions, find exciting things, and before I know it, a whole day is gone.

Anywho...that leaves the characters.  There seem to be three main parts to the book.  The storyworld, the plot, and the characters.  The characters so far seem to be giving me fits.  It seems, to me anyway, that the characters drive the plot.  Now, if you properly build your characters, give them a real life, give them depth, then your plot should follow to some extent.

That's where outlines come in.  You've got to give your character a reason for living, and something to fight against.  Now, I honestly believe that there are some writers that can do this by the seat of their pants.  But as I delve deeper into the world of writing, structure and character development, I'm finding that in order to truly build a believable situation I might need a bit more.

I think that I'll still be a seat of the pants kind of writer.  I can't work from a hard outline.  I'm not a planner. (Unlike my husband who has spreadsheets outlining every minute of our trips to Disneyworld)  But I think that maybe a rough outline might be a good idea.  Something that gives me a little direction, give me an idea about where my characters are going and what they are fighting against.  I think that may give my book the structure it needs to really work.

Why?

Okay...so going back to Black Magic Sanction by Kim Harrison.  Remember that chapter with the sprawling narrative that annoyed me so much?  Well, there's another thing that annoyed me about that scene.

So after Pierce is done explaining the whole theory behind ley line physics, he proceeds to demonstrate the theory with Rachel.  All of a sudden in pops Al because he 'felt' Rachel in the lines and wanted to make sure she wasn't being kidnapped again. Then Nick inconveniently shows up, Al snags Nick, Rachel talks him down with idle threats, and Al disappears.  Well, then Rachel really is kidnapped. 

So....I have two problems, well actually three, with that whole scene.  First - there's the narrative which I've already discussed with y'all.  The second problem I have is why the whole exchange between Nick and Al?  Who cares?  What is the purpose?  Is it to prove that Al is still a mean old demon?  To prove that he hasn't gone soft?  Or is it to prove that Rachel is really still tough as beans and holds sway over Al's decisions?  I mean, what's really going on here?  It's not moving the story forward, there's nothing going on here, and it's just really not adding anything to the story.  Who knows, maybe it becomes important later.  So then there's the third thing, when Rachel really does get kidnapped - where's Al?  I mean, first of all, he's peeved that Pierce is teaching her stuff, so if he thinks he's still doing that, he's going to pop in to give Pierce what for. If he wants to see if Rachel has been kidnapped, he'd pop in for that.  But he doesn't actually show up until Rachel calls him and then, when she does, he acts all surprised that she's calling. 

So that brings me to the question...why?  Why is that scene even there?

Is love enough?

So I'm still stuck on this GMC thing and I'm wondering...is love ever really enough?  I mean, I have all these ideas running around in my head about Jewell and Collin and this sequel of mine and well, with my initial idea for the book, Jewell would have to leave her nice safe life in New Orleans, and throw herself into incredible danger, risking life and her career in the process.  And of course, in my preconceived idea for the book, her ever present sidekick Ashley would be with her every step of the way.

But now I'm starting to wonder...why?  Why would she do this?  Collin has his people, doesn't he?  Where are they?  Why don't *they* go to his rescue?  Isn't that what they are there for?  Don't *they* protect each other?  I mean, isn't that what that whole scene in the first book was about, where they sat her and Collin down in the living room and told Jewell to take a hike because we protect our own?  So where are *they* when Collin needs help?  And I see my story line unravel - a series of slip knots pooling in a pile of string on the floor.

The point is, she wouldn't. And Ashley definitely wouldn't. And even if she would, Percy wouldn't let her.  Neither would Gladys for that matter.  So now I'm back to square one.  Love isn't always enough.  Even if she loves Collin enough to fight through the pits of Hell to save him, he has his people, and they will keep him safe.  And  no amount of love could ever make Jewell do something so idiotic as to risk everything to save him.

And so I'm left wondering, when is love enough?  And then....an idea strikes.  When would love be enough?  Well, it was enough when Jewell was in trouble...and it just might be enough if she was in trouble again.....