FINDING YOUR VOICE

AUTHORIAL VOICE
The word synergy is defined as the “the interaction or cooperation of two or more organisations, substances or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects”. (My bold and italics.)

Voice is the synergy of your syntax, vocabulary, punctuation, grammar, phrasing and – the unique, individual, one-of-a-kind, cannot-be-duplicated part: you.

The following is my contribution to FINDING YOUR VOICE, one of our many writing Craft Chat discussions on colony.litopia.com. Read the full feature, and enlightening comments, on Litopia’s Craft Chats.

“It was about eleven o’clock in the morning, mid October, with the sun not shining and a look of hard wet rain in the clearness of the foothills. I was wearing my powder-blue suit, with dark blue shirt, tie and display handkerchief, black brogues, black wool socks with dark blue clocks on them. I was neat, clean, shaved and sober, and I didn’t care who knew it. I was everything the well-dressed private detective ought to be. I was calling on four million dollars.”

That’s voice.

I can almost hear the sharp intake of breath from some of you: oh, dear me, he started with show, not tell. And carried on with show show show. Every sentence in the first paragraph starts with It was, I was, I was, I was…. And oh, pass the smelling salts, he even mentions the weather in the second sentence, and tells us what it wasn’t instead of what it was…He’s doomed…

All writers feel this. Don’t let it stop you.

Yeah, right. Doomed to be so iconic every crime fiction writer reads him in the hope something of his genius will rub off on them.

For me, that first paragraph doesn’t just give us the voice of iconic character, Philip Marlowe, created by the excellent Raymond Chandler in The Big Sleep, it also gives us the voice of the author – something much harder to pin down. Not in the punctuation, although that’s fine. Not in a high-action beginning (there isn’t one), not even in the vocabulary, because there is nothing remarkable about any of those words. It’s in the rhythm and cadence of the sentences, the down-to-earth, take-me-or-leave-me-it’s-your-loss observations, and the obvious humour and intelligence of the character (and, hence, the writer). We feel in safe hands. He was neat, clean, shaved and sober, and didn’t care who knew it. Those last six words rounded off that character for me, giving him a wry humour that I loved. And while the voice coming across loud and clear is the character‘s voice, the energy of the writer’s voice is also strong. Would you read on? Millions of readers have. Millions. Me included.

I know it was written before the middle of the last century, before the rise of the professional pedant and the inundation of writing classes and courses on how-to, and what-not-to, and ohmygod-don’t-start-with-a-dream it’ll be the end of civilization as we know it…but I am SO not bothered by any of the was and were and past continuous, or by Chandler describing his surroundings, rather than laboriously taking us with him and showing the character “patting down” or “putting something in the pocket of” his powder-blue suit. You do not always have to “show”. This no-nonsense private eye is telling us, accurately and with humour, what’s going on, and that works.

It may not work for every genre. As a writer, it’s your job to read enough to know which authors (and styles) are most popular with readers: first or third-person, rich detail or spare, a lot of telling, a lot of showing or a mixture. That’s style, and you need to understand it. But it’s not voice.

Voice is different. It’s like your literary fingerprints, or DNA – it’s unique to you.

The words used in Chandler’s opening are the words of the no-nonsense PI character, and they show us his character. But the voice behind it all, giving rhythm and cadence to the sentences – the sky behind the scenery, if you like – that’s the writer.

Vive la difference
There are the voices of characters, and then there is the voice of the writer – much harder to pin down. Some say voice is the mix of vocabulary, tone, syntax, rhythm, cadence, humour, etc that creates a certain flow in the order in which we write our words and sentences. Reading work out loud helps us hear that flow (cadence).

Although authorial voice can often be mistaken for the main character’s voice, and vice versa, I believe the two are different. The first is innate to a writer (and, I believe, cannot be taught, although it can be found); the second is vital to a story (and, I believe, can be enhanced with learned techniques).

Voice can come across in how confident a writer is in what they have to say, whether that’s a piece of well-researched journalism or a piece of fantastic fiction. It’s not whether you use adverbs and adjectives – or not. It’s not whether you write about high or low fantasy, romance, God/s, crime, mystery, or even hard-core, quantum physics-led sci-fi. It’s you. It’s what many lecturers in the MA in writing say is the most important aspect of writing for a writer to “find”. Find your voice.

Which can be a wee bit like handing you some sandwiches, a bottle of water and a chocolate biscuit and saying, “Off you go and don’t come back until you’ve found the Holy Grail.” That would be daunting if you had to head off into the unknown – out there – to look for it.

But it’s not out there. It’s in here. Inside you. Boiled down to its essence: voice is you.

And don’t you forget it.

That’s why one of the most important lessons we learn as writers is Be Yourself. Because no one else is better qualified (to paraphrase Frank J Giblin). YOUR voice is unique. I’m not saying it’ll make you a fortune, as it did Agatha Christie or J K Rowling, Raymond Chandler or Neil Gaiman. I’m saying be true to yourself and write with your own unique, individual voice – whatever that is – because then readers will know what they’re getting when they pick up one of your books. And, if they like it, they’ll come back for more.

If all a reader finds within your pages is a writer who has studied “techniques” and “advice” to the detriment of their own unique style, then the reader might carry on down the shelves looking for authors who are distinctive. Sure, if you’re in the game purely to make money, churn out those formulaic thrillers, romances, mysteries, sci-fi adventures. Go for it. But even there, if you want casual readers to become returning clients, give them what no one else can: give them you.

So, enjoy the sandwiches, water and chocolate biscuit, and then sit down and be yourself. Easy-peasy. Want to use adverbs? Use them – but be sensible: use them properly. Love adjectives? Well, a crimson sun sinking into violet and gold streaks will always evoke more images for me than “the sun went down”. Unless, of course, you want to be symbolic. In which case, KISS…

Finding your voice doesn’t mean ignoring good advice about craft. It means incorporating the advice into your work seamlessly, while retaining the most important aspect of it, which is you.

Some writers don’t find their voice until they’ve lived a bit, have made and lost a few friends, won and lost a few battles and learned that – who knew? – punctuation matters. If you truly don’t know where to start to discover your voice, the only way to find out is – surprise surprise – to write. There is no short cut to voice. There is no magic formula to voice. There is no Voice for Dummies manual.

Sounds odd, I know, but the only way to find your voice is to write.

Write short stories, long stories, novellas, novels, tomes. Hell, write a shopping list and make someone smile, if you want. A man wrote me a small shopping list forty years ago. He needed a few things for his shoes, which he took great care of. He wrote the brand of shoe polish he needed. That he needed black polish, brown polish, a tan polish and some colour I can’t remember. At the end of the wee list he wrote a PS: “sorry I had to write this note in Polish”.

Could I hear his “voice” come through in that last silly sentence? In a shopping list! Yes, I could. It made me smile because I heard his voice, his humour and his sense of the completely ridiculous. I still have that note; and him.

You, too, can make a sky
Write and read and keep studying the craft. Some techniques are clunky, some will improve your prose; take what works for you but remember: this is your voice. You decide the flow of the words, the cadence of the sentence, the gravitas of the vocabulary, and the simplicity or density of the prose. That is your voice.

Some writers are very spare, like Cormac McCarthy; some are rich: Stephen Donaldson, Sir Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, Brandon Sanderson, N.K. Jemisin…There is no right or wrong here, just different voices. If you don’t like fantasy, or religious writing, or romance, that’s fine, but don’t denigrate anything because of its genre. That’s as crazy as saying Mozart was rubbish because classical music doesn’t appeal to you. Voice is separate to genre. There are great voices in every genre.

Sir Terry Pratchett’s work can come across as absolutely bonkers. I love it. He was a genius. Neil Gaiman – brilliant. His Neverwhere is a masterclass in character creation and world building, not to mention dialogue, character arcs and how to create gut-wrenching betrayals.

Gaiman’s voice, as with Pratchett’s, McCarthy’s, Donaldson’s, Jemisin’s, Sanderson’s et al, is like the sky: it’s always there, behind everything, even when we can’t “see” it. We can see the scenery: the mountains and people (world and characters); rivers and trees (rhythm and cadence); flowers and bushes (adverbs, and adjectives). Your voice – style, phrasing and syntax – becomes the sky, setting it all off beautifully and holding it all together.

Listen…
Reading for Litopia’s Pop-Ups has shown me how some writers have a wonderful rhythm to their sentences, no matter what the genre. Even submissions where there’s too much telling, not enough action, too much exposition too soon, story starting in the wrong place, poor dialogue…All these things can be mended, techniques learned to improve them. But if the writer has a voice, I know they’ll make it if they work at the craft.

Reading work out loud reveals a multitude of sins. And virtues. If you don’t already read your work out loud, start. Listen, and you’ll hear the rhythm and cadence of your own work and can adjust it as you see fit. That way, you’ll hear your voice.

Read the full FINDING YOUR VOICE feature, with YouTube links, more great advice, fantastic Litopian comments and more.

Kay Leitch
Treasure This

SELF-PUBLISHING -V- TRADITIONAL PUBLISHING

Wondering whether to invest in yourself and your talent by self-publishing, or whether to try for a traditional publisher? 

I discuss the pros and cons of both here. This is my contribution to a thread in CraftChats, which is part of Litopia writing forum. There’s a LOT more information on this vast subject in the full CraftChats thread, including marketing advice and information.

Litopia writing forum has free CraftChats on this subject, and more. Head over there and take part in the discussion – it’s open for a few more days. Or leave a comment here if you prefer.

All opinions and experiences are welcome.

THE MOVING FINGER WRITES AND HAVING WRIT MOVES ON…
Twenty years ago, if you told me you were considering self-publishing, I’d have made a twisted wee face and said, “Are you sure?” Now, I try hard not to show that face when someone tells me they’re “holding out” for traditional publishing. The world is not what it was twenty years ago. Publishing isn’t what it was twenty years ago; writers’ earnings aren’t what they were twenty years ago; and God knows, technology is frighteningly ahead of where it was twenty years ago.

Writers have moved on. We have choices. An entire generation has grown up using online tools to earn a (good) living from their creativity. It’s worth looking at some industry figures before you make up your own mind.

The Authors’ Licensing & Collecting Society (ALCS), Published December 2022, showed that “earnings from writing alone for authors with third-party publishers [that’s traditional publishing to you and me] stood at approximately $8,600 (£7,000).” I think we can assume that’s per annum. Most of you know how long it takes to write a (decent) book so you can work out an approximate hourly rate from that figure.

Compare that with the “median revenue” for independent authors in 2022, which stands at about $12,749 (£10,229). [NB: as with these industry reports, I’m using the term “independent author” to mean the same as “self-published author”. Check out the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), who “represent, advance, promote and support independent (self-published) authors globally”. This term is not to be confused with a small, independent press / publisher, which is a tiny publishing house dedicated to traditional publishing. Nor is it to be confused with the hybrid publishing houses who offer to edit etc and publish your book for half, or more, of the book’s lifetime earnings. In my view, those hybrids are not traditional publishers, though they may be affiliated to one. They are new / hybrid companies set up to take advantage of the independent / self-publishing boom.]

Most of this ain’t goin’ to traditionally published authors

The ALCS 2022 report showed “a sustained fall in professional writers’ real terms income from writing over the past 15 year of around 60%.”

ALLi suggests indie / self-publishing authors are bucking that trend: “Average incomes of self-published authors are rising, with a 53% increase in 2022, over the previous year.”
SOURCE

Okay. So what?

Here’s another couple of statistics, and then I’m done with the figures:

Hachette Book Group (parent company Lagardére): Revenue for UK branch, 2022, grew 3.4%. Group revenue for the year totalled €6.9 billion “UP 28.3% from 2021”.
Average executive compensation is around $235,000 pa.

HarperCollins (owned by News Corp): profits have been falling recently. However, stats for 2022: HC operates “with an annual revenue of $2.19 billion The company increased its publishing revenue by 10.5% compared to the 2021 fiscal year”. SOURCE
Average executive salary is £200,000 pa; (highest is $430.000 pa; smallest is $57,000).

I won’t bore you with the rest – you know how to use Google to check traditional publishing houses’ profits. All I would emphasise is that one billion in the US and UK = one thousand million (as far as I know, a billion in the EU = one million million. Please correct me if I’m wrong). Whether it’s in £, $ or € that is a lot of money. It is not going to (most) traditionally published writers.

Edited to add: Penguin Random House, Hachette and HarperCollins have all seen reductions in profits in 2023 and are reducing staff to cut costs. Nonetheless, profits remain in the millions. Here is another great site for keeping up-to-date on information and news for indie authors and traditionally published authors: killzoneblog.com – a fantastic, professional resource for all writers.

Don’t misunderstand me here. I have no problem with anyone earning a lot of money. Good luck to you! Earn as much as you can. Just don’t do it by ripping the piss out of someone else, especially creative people who barely earn enough to scrape by. Compare the salaries the executives of the big publishing houses take for themselves, with what they pay the vast majority of their writers – writers without whom those executives would not have a job.

NB: Smaller publishers, the independents who are not affiliated to what’s known as the Big Five (HarperCollins; Penguin Random House; Macmillan; Simon & Schuster; Hachette (Lagardére)…and all of their many subsidiaries) will be struggling as much as any other small business these days. So, if you’re picked up by a small “independent” traditional publisher they probably won’t be able to offer you much in the way of an advance. That’s not greed; that’s tough economics. For those companies, “Independent” means just that: they are independent of any big company and so they don’t have a big pot of money to dip into whenever they want. I applaud those small independent publishing houses. We need them.

I can hear you say Ah, but it was ever thus: greedy companies take all the money, and poor writers starve in garrets.

Not any more. Not since the IT revolution. And I know we all love to hate Amazon, but it has altered the playing field. Many creatives are taking advantage of that.

So where does that leave writers?

PROS AND CONS
It leaves you with choices.

If you prefer the traditional publishing route, that’s fine. You submit to agents and/or publishers. If accepted, you’ll be offered a deal. They edit your book, ask for rewrites, take you through it all, handle the proofreading, pay for the cover and the print run etc, and sort out distribution (a biggie)…

They may offer you an advance. If your book sells enough copies to recoup that advance for the publisher, that’s great. Once the advance is covered / paid off, you then begin to reap the benefit of any subsequent sales. Those are your royalties. The publishing house may also take a cut of those subsequent sales, depending on your contract with them. If you don’t “earn out”, ie if your book doesn’t sell enough copies to pay back the advance the publishing house gave you, they may not accept any more of your work. Again, it depends on your contract.

Of course they hope you will make them money; they’re a business, not a charity. If your book takes off and starts earning a lot of money, you should start making a lot more money too. At least, that’s the theory.

The major thing to remember about a bona fide traditional publisher is they do not charge you a penny. Nothing. Ever. They pay for it all, and they help you grow as an author by investing their money, time and editorial staff in you. They don’t charge you any money before or after taking you on.

THE PROS of traditional publishing are obvious: they do all the heavy lifting with regard to the technical side of publishing. You don’t have to worry about where the hell you find someone to “make” a cover. And formatting – what’s that? Don’t worry, you can leave all that to the traditional publisher. You don’t have to do anything except sit back and wait for the money to roll in, right?

Wrong. (See under.)

The biggest PRO of all, though, for many writers is being able to say to friends and family “I’ve found a publisher!” Which is code for “See! I AM good enough.” That tacit validation is what drives so many writers to hold out for traditional publishing – it sure isn’t the expectation of making a liveable annual salary. Of course, that is absolutely their choice.

Interesting how the term “vanity publishing” has changed over the decades, too.

THE CONS: traditional houses are less likely to take a risk on new writers. They prefer writers with their own website / blog / vlog / FaceBook followers / TikTok followers / Threads followers etc. Traditional publishers, quite rightly, expect writers to be professional, to be committed to growing as a writer / business, to produce consistently good work, and to work hard at the marketing, too.

Even as an unknown, you will be expected to know about social media and you’ll be expected to help market your own book. Don’t think your traditional publisher will do all that while you sit back, drink coffee and dream up the plot for your next book. Like I said: That World is Gone.

You’ll still be expected to do your share of marketing, from book-shop readings and “events” (if you can get them), to social media followers (if you can get them), to selling at your local market, if need be.

They will also expect you to be marketing your book LONG before it is published. They’ll want you building a buzz around it, perhaps doing some short TikTok videos, organising reader reviews etc. This all takes time and effort. Most of it will be yours.

AND IF I DO IT MYSELF?
Publishing independently / self-publishing, means you do it ALL yourself. You write the book. If you can, you have it professionally edited. You have a cover professionally made. You do research on what’s the best way to format your book for different online retailers (Amazon; Apple; Barns & Noble etc). You upload the book online to Amazon etc either formatted as an ebook file or as an ebook plus print on demand (POD).

You need to know all this. As an independent / self-publishing author, you are essentially making a commitment to yourself and your work. You become a small business dedicated to YOU, promoting you and your creativity. For that risk, and hard work, you will reap all the benefits, because all the profit you make (minus the small fee Amazon et al charge for uploading your book) will be yours. All of it. You do all the work, you keep all the money you make (minus expenses, if you delegate, and minus any tax owed).

That’s why, when I hear about hybrid publishing houses that offer writers a “deal” where the house takes 50 or 60% of the writers’ life-time earnings on a book, for giving the book a light edit, a proofread, a cover and an upload, I get incensed. THAT is just one reason why the big publishing houses, and others, are making millions of dollars, pounds or euros in profit out of creatives. Yes, of course, some of those hybrid publishing companies might have decent standards and may accept manuscripts that are pretty good to begin with. Some may be good to deal with. But many won’t. They’ll publish just about anything, and then make sure they take the biggest cut of any profit cake, forever. Multiply that by the thousands (millions?) of writers who will use them and you can see why it’s an attractive side hustle for so many publishing companies.

Those hybrid companies, no matter how they sell it, are still there to make money out of all the writers in the world who want to say those magic words: “I’ve found a publisher!”

To be clear: those hybrid companies are not traditional publishing houses (even though they may be affiliated to them). A traditional publishing house will not charge a writer anything to publish their book, either before publication or after it.

CAVEAT EMPTOR
Whether you pay a company before publication (sometimes known as vanity publishing – which is fine if that’s what you want); or whether you pay a company after publication (as in the hybrid companies who will “edit, proofread, provide a cover and upload the ebook” for a big percentage of your earning on that book forever), my warning is the same:

Know what you’re getting into.
Check the small print.
Check for hidden fees. For example, who pays Amazon’s small fee for uploading digital work – them or you?
Is the total amount you get GROSS or NET? Ask them what that means. Exactly.
Work out the finances before you sign anything over to a hybrid publishing company.

If a service takes 55%, that means for every 100 pounds, dollars or euros, that’s 55 to them and 45 to you. But they will probably take Amazon’s (small) fee out of YOUR slice of the cake, so that’s even less than 45 to you. Is there anything else they deduct? Ask them. Get it in writing.

If you make 1000, they will take 550 and you will make 450, less whatever fees they put in your contract. But you wrote the book! You spent months / years trying to make it the best book you could, writing and rewriting and … and they take the biggest slice of the cake forever, on the book you signed over to them. Excuse me while I go wash my mouth out with soap.

If you think that’s a good deal, then go for it. It may suit writers who don’t mind paying a publishing company for that service. If you can, check with The Society of Authors about any contract from a company that wants to take a cut of your earnings.

ALTERNATIVELY…
Rather than pay a company more than half your earnings for the rest of the book’s life, you could invest in yourself. Delegate the things you can’t do. Check online for designers and illustrators who make covers, either for ebooks or for ebook plus POD (prices vary. Check online. Join forums and ask questions. There is a whole community of indie authors out there and they are incredibly helpful).

Equally, you can find a formatter to make the book ready for digital upload. Or learn how to do it yourself. It’s up to you. It all depends what your budget it and how much you want to invest in yourself. Again, as an indie author, you have choices.

AVOID BURNOUT
Sometimes you just can’t do it ALL yourself. Don’t risk becoming a Moany Lisa instead of being your best Mona Lisa self. Learn to delegate. Do what you do best, and out-source the rest, if you can. I know budgets are tight but it can pay to invest in yourself.

GOING TO MARKET
Whether you publish traditionally or independently, you’ll have to know how to market your book, using every social media and technological strategy at your disposal. Preferably, begin marketing your book long before it hits Amazon or any book shelf. Be proactive.

Organise ARCS, if you can – Advance Reader Copies. Some companies provide this service. Honest reviews will help sell your work.

Create interest. Give snippets of the book, depending on your genre.

Consider TikTok, Instagram etc. Be consistent. Keep it short. Post often. Read up on other indie authors’ successes. Check what they did, which social media they used (and which they didn’t waste time on). This will also be genre dependent.

Don’t make the mistake of going on every social media outlet. That’s a sure way to burnout (it’ll turn readers off, too). Be fussy. Where do other authors in your genre advertise? Amazon or Facebook? TikTok? Threads? Should you have a newsletter? (Probably.) A reader magnet? A website? A blog? How do you plan to engage with your readers to ensure they buy your next book? How long are you going to make them wait for it?

Answers will vary depending on your genre. Ask around on forums. You’ll be surprised how many other indie authors – some very successful – are happy to help newcomers.

Communication and community are strong in the indie world.

I AM THE MASTER OF MY FATE, I AM THE CAPTAIN OF MY SOUL
Poet William Earnest Henley had it right. But you can master technicalities, too.

You can make a cover for free on sites such as Canva.com. You can format your book (Vellum.pub is a good paid-for software, as is Atticus, but there are many other free options). As an indie author you can do all, or most, of it yourself and tailor it to your own budget. It means commitment and loyalty to yourself as a writer, and to your journey as an author. Which, sadly, a lot of traditional publishers no longer offer. If you don’t earn them the biggest slice of the pie, they’ll drop you faster than an old cliché.

And yet, one road can still lead to the other. Traditional publishers are also trawling indie communities and forums, looking for the most popular authors and offering them deals. The carrot offered there is distribution. But it’s another way indie authors are taking control, so it’s good.

You see? Choices.

One last caveat: don’t think for a moment that self-publishing or traditionally publishing ONE book is going to make you a decent annual salary. If you make this your job, you have to work at it just like any other job. That means you’re writing the next book while you continue to market the one you just published. Have a deadline for finishing it. Build hype around that, too. Have LOTS of ideas ready for your next books and keep that ball rolling. And keep reading! But you do that anyway, right? You’re a business. Your words are your product. Write! Keep writing, and keep publishing. That way, you will grow as an author and hopefully your reader base will grow, too.

If you’re sitting thinking Yeah, I can do this! I’ve got a soul. I’m a captain! But, um, what should I write?

Research what sells best, at wordsrated.com

Whatever path you choose, whichever sea you sail, I wish you success.
Kay Leitch
Author of Treasure This

Here is the full thread in CraftChats

WRITING EXERCISES TO KICK-START YOUR CREATIVITY

Feeling stuck? Fed up feeling like this when you sit down to write?

Like so many things in life, taking one small step at a time can lead you to a better place. Here are some interesting – but short, easy and accessible – exercises you can play with to flex your creative muscles, either for fun or because you need something to jump-start your writing.

I originally wrote these for Litopia, and there are more great offerings there on the CraftChat thread, which has an abundance of information, advice and suggestions on writing. Litopians are great at adding their own experiences of what works for them, so all the threads are worth checking out.

So, if you’ve hit a wall in your WIP, or need something to break the boredom or the block,  try some of these ideas to rev up your creativity.

Some writing exercises can get you thinking in different ways. You can try different styles that can help you see the techniques other writers have been using to good effect. At Uni we had to write a chapter or short story in the style of one of our (preferably successful) favourite authors. It was fun. Because first, of course, we had to read and analyse their writing. Sometimes, it’s only once you try to consciously emulate a writer (as an exercise in creative writing, not as a way to rip them off or earn money from a style they’ve perfected), that you see the joins, or what specific words / phrases the writer uses to give the reader a hint of how smart, stupid, or charismatic a character is.

I wrote a short story and learned the importance of one piece of punctuation: the question mark. “Indeed, sir?” Versus “Indeed, sir” from clever Jeeves to not-so-clever Bertie Wooster gave me all the tone of voice I needed as a reader to make me smile and know exactly what P. G. Wodehouse was trying to convey about what was going on inside the valet’s head. I think that’s genius. A question mark.

And if you’re sitting there thinking, “Woah there, I’m no P.G. Wodehouse! Who’d want to read my book?” Here’s something just for you 🙂

Here are a few exercises I’ve learned about down the years. Please add your own in the comments over the next five days – the more we have, the more chance our members have of finding one they’d like to try. One of them (the First Line one, under) fired me up enough to write a short story, which grew from one of the first lines I came up with. You never know where small steps will lead you.

1)
Write a scene where your protagonist is in emotional turmoil (anything from fury to grief, ecstasy to despair, terror to boredom, but the emotion must be strong). Describe it without telling us anything about what the character “felt” – or exactly what has happened to cause the emotion. You can allude to it, but absolutely no full-blown exposition. We don’t need it. We only want to know what this character does – their actions.
2)
Write a scene using only dialogue to let us know something has happened. Ideally, it should be something big. But sometimes even inane dialogue can make us laugh so, or betray a character’s true intentions – it’s up to you. A tip: read this out loud if you can. That helps you spot when it doesn’t sound natural.
3)
Write ten first lines. These can be for stories you would like to write, or just first lines you think are good.
Now write another ten for books that have to be commercial.
4)
There are two ways of doing this one. The first is specific. If you have access to any children around the ages of 4-10, ask them to choose five different things:
1) an animal
2) a ghost, a demon, Angel OR Vampire (or all four if you really want a challenge)
3) A meadow, a mountain, a river OR an underground world
4) What is the worst thing that could possibly happen in any world?
5) One character from TV or movies that you think is really silly / stupid

The second way is much looser. Choose:
1) An animal
2) A character (human or otherwise)
3) A place
4) A catastrophe
5) An idiot

Weave a story from the elements they choose.

Of course you can choose the elements yourself – there’s no rule that says you can’t. But your preferences are bound to affect your decisions, and it can stretch you more if someone else decides the elements you have to weave a story from. Besides, kids can come up with outrageous, funny, off-the-wall examples so it’s worth asking any you know.
5)
A poem, prose, or letter to yourself about who is emerging from your personal story. It’s about celebrating who you are.
6)
There are lots of creative writing exercises you can find by Googling that search term. One well-known one is to write a scene without including any adjectives or adverbs. Yeah yeah yeah. I challenge you to do both: write a scene without any adjectives and adverbs and then write a scene with adjectives and adverbs. The scene doesn’t have to be FULL of adjectives and adverbs, just include them.

Your own writing style will dictate which you prefer. Write the scenes anyway. And don’t just chuck in any old adjective or adverb – choose the right ones. Take your time. Think about these words just as hard as you think about not using them.

Now, bearing in mind that everything is about balance, edit both scenes. Don’t just delete or cross out all offending adjectives and adverbs. You are Counsel for the Defence and Counsel for the Prosecution. Consciously tell yourself why these words deserve the death penalty, or why they deserve to live in that sentence. Be fair. Remember karma…

Remember what I said about small steps?

Have fun.

Kay Leitch
Author of Treasure This

WRITING GOOD BADDIES

Baddies. Don’t you just love them? In so many films and books they often look as if they’re having all the fun while the poor protagonist is run ragged trying to outmanoeuvre, outfight and outwit them.

From archetypes to stereotypes, combinations of both, and just plain nasty people, there’s a lot to choose from. The Joker; Lex Luthor; Norman Bates; Professor Moriarty; Dracula; Hannibal Lecter; Abigail Williams in The Crucible; Snow White’s evil queen; Ragnarok from Thor. Cersei Lannister from Game of Thrones. They’re all so different, even if some are old tropes and stereotypes (more on that later). And they all worked. Mainly (most Lex Luthors were cardboard stereotypes, I think).

Add your own to the list. Hell, let’s add anthrax, diphtheria, Aids, cancer, covid… or further back… Remember blood poisoning? Some poor battle-weary soldier, seeing a fine red line rising from what he’d hoped was a flesh wound. Sorry, dude. Game over. Until superheroes Penicillin and Antibiotic flew in. Too late for our battle-weary warrior, sadly, but at least we can count on them in our modern world… yeah?

Your antagonist needs to be the wolf on top…

Well, the best baddies, like the worst bacteria, adapt. They find weaknesses you didn’t even know you had. They start to outmanoeuvre, outfight and outwit you. Enter Sepsis. Blood poisoning’s bigger and badder brother. Back in 2020, The Lancet claimed Sepsis was the world’s biggest killer, beating cancer and coronary disease. Kills millions of people every year and disables many more (and that was before it teamed up with its new bestie, covid, so it could, you know, take down a few more). Took a much-loved friend last year. She was forty-nine. Yeah. Baddies. Don’t you just love them.

The point of all that is your antagonist can be anyone and anything. You can even be your own worst enemy. (How many times have you heard that?) An antagonist can be anything inside you or outside you. A person, a mountain, a boat, a whale, a whole horrifying world of hungry vampires looking for lunch (you); a religious nutcase projecting her own insanity onto another character in the hope no one will notice; or a teeny-tiny-wee bacterium that’s going to surprise you, change tack and hit your weakest flank, just when you thought you were winning, and snuff you out. Just because.

Do bacteria feel anything when they rip the light and life from a beautiful soul and send it back into the circle? No. They don’t. Rage is a great motivating force, but indifference is much worse. Indifference is… nihilism. The emotion is all ours (the protagonist) as we deal with the loss. Bacteria (the antagonists) just look for the next host to devour. No hysteria, no drama, no emotion. Just intelligence, cunning, and an absolute determination to win.

Nurse Ratched, anyone? (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Google it. Study her. Learn.) Or Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men. Thirty years apart, but they could have been soulmates. Or Cersei Lannister, acknowledged as one of the most complex characters in GoT – a veritable amalgam of protagonist and antagonist rolled into one, dipped in poison and sent out to flay the world.

Weak baddies make things uncomfortable for the protagonist and give them a hard time. Throw in a car chase, plane fight, starship battle or cutting-edge CGI animation and you’ll win fans. Sure. But we’ve all been there, seen that, bought the hype and (mainly) forgotten them.

Strong baddies have bigger arsenals, from the psychological to the atom-sized. They bring carnage, grief, change, horror… death. They’re seismic. They take what you love. What you love. Think about that. They rupture worlds, internal or external. They destabilise. They bring suffering on a nuclear scale. Whether a person or an event, they turn your world into a wasteland. We do not forget them. And we won’t forget the protagonist who (finally, after all that pain, struggle and loss) defeats them… Or is vanquished trying.

Antagonists and protagonists need strengths, weaknesses, and secrets

For me, the worst baddie of all (or the best, depending on your tastes) is one that makes your blood run cold. Makes you feel visceral anger and fear that this loveable protagonist, who you thought invincible, might not be up to the job. That this, this – no, I’m not going to swear; trying to give it up – that this baddie might just have the power to outmanoeuvre, outfight and outwit our protagonist, after all. Our beloved protagonist who we’ve followed so far in this great story, cheering for them all the way. This baddie might actually defeat them. The antagonist might win. And, as we know, sometimes they do.

Stereotype antagonists tend not to win. Those stories of heroes and heroines winning the day, saving the world without any real loss, are all great – we need them the way we need comfort food when we’re feeling low. I’m not saying don’t write these kinds of stories – I love them – but know what you’re doing. Know why you’re writing the Lex Luthor or Snow Queen / stereotype, instead of a Nurse Ratched or Anton Chigurh / sepsis. Is it easier? Of course, it is. Old tropes follow well-worn paths for us all to travel (and they work, too. I’m not saying disregard them). But it’s the brave writer who steps off the path and cuts a new trail with only their trusty – but magical, remember – nib to show the way.

Good people / characters have flaws and bad traits. Bad people / characters often do good things. As Rachel has mentioned, if you understand your antagonist’s history and motivations, you can create a more nuanced character. Often, the reader may not need to know the antagonist’s bad history, past abuse etc – but you, the writer, need to. Drip feed it to the reader if you want, but only if absolutely necessary. Remember, what a character does is who the character is. No one knew exactly why Hitler did what he did, back then. But good people all thought the same thing: we have to stop this. That meant fighting. Losing battles and loved ones. Lives and dreams shattered. Still had to do it. Because the alternative was unbearable. Not acceptable to civilised people. That Alternative was a big mf of an Antagonist. (mf: mountain of fury… 🙂 )

Returning for a moment to the characters we don’t forget: how many people do you think read Anne Frank’s story, and the antagonist she faced, and then forgot about her (or her antagonist)? Life didn’t throw that lass any easy boulders, easily batted off. She didn’t get a contrived family drama or car chase. She got sepsis with a capital H.

But, if you want to give us a happy ending, where good triumphs over all evil (yeah, right. In which parallel universe?) at least give us realistic misery before we get there. Real adversity (not a plot device), and sharper antagonists (who cause your main character serious pain and loss) can hone clever protagonists into the sharpest of blades, finest of lasers, or the stardust of old planets, if that’s where you want the story to go… and give you real pleasure in writing them, and your reader real pleasure in reading them – and coming back for more.

Antagonists can be daft, but not too daft. Paradoxically, it can weaken your protagonist. Unless you’re writing a comedy, of course

The best characters – protagonists and antagonists – like real people, go on journeys, inner and outer, over and over. They lose as well as win. Often, the best ones lose a lot. Because, guess, what? Your reader has probably lost a lot in their life, too, and so they empathise with that realistic, damaged, heart-broken, on-her-knees-but-still-fighting protagonist, just as they recognise the realistic, cold-hearted s.o.b. nasty antagonist, and get immersed in your story, because they know bad things happen to good people. (And good things happen to bad people, dammit.) Life isn’t easy. The best stories teach us that. Don’t short-change your protagonist by giving them an easy ride with a stereotypical antagonist who is too easily defeated, and a plot you’ve twisted into a pretzel so everything looks bad… but isn’t really. Frighten your protagonist – and your readers. Horrify them. Make your baddies bad. Really bad.

Like that nurse Ratched. And pray she never teams up with Anton, or Cersei. They’d make Sauron and all his armies look like over-dressed drama queens out for Halloween.

And if there are any budding medical geniuses reading this over a cup of coffee: put that cup down and stop wasting time. Away and find a cure for sepsis.

Kay Leitch

Taken from full Craft Chat BUILDING YOUR ANTAGONIST on Litopia.com covering How to Build an Antagonist

SHOW AND TELL ADVICE

New Year, new writing resolutions, yeah? Yeah, me too. My first one is to sit down at the computer regularly and just write. Shocker, isn’t it! Well, the Muse won’t find me if I’m not writing…

And if one of your resolutions for 2022 is to hone your writing skills, check out the new Litopia forum: CraftChats. They chose SHOW -v- TELL as their first subject, with lots of information, opinions, civilised discussion and links for further reading or watching.

For the procrastinators among us, it’s a great way to spend a few hours, and then you can get back to writing again and use the advice and information gleaned from the Craft Chat to strengthen your writing. It’s well worth a read. And yes, I’m biased. Full disclosure: I helped put this great resource together. And there’s more coming in February, so keep checking back in to see what other gems Litopia has in store for you.

Here’s a meme for 2022, just for you:

Set your intention to write that paragraph, that chapter, that character, that book… Whatever it is you want to do. INTEND to do it. Now.

Good luck!

Kay
Author of Treasure This
Founding member of Electricink

WRITING KILLER TITLES

Whatever you’re writing, it’s going to need a title…

Hmmm…

So, before you do anything – here’s another gem of a writing seminar from Litopia.com.  Writing Killer Titles is now up and ready for you to take notes.

The wealth of information and advice for professional and amateur writers on Litopia is vast and growing daily. Well worth checking out, so I thought I’d pass this on. There will be more seminars too. Enjoy and learn!

I’ve found everyone on the site friendly and professional, so if you have any ideas for any other seminars you’d like to see, put them up on the Litopia Colony. Peter Cox, the agent and publisher who runs the site is a constant presence, so he’s bound to see them. The more we share, the better it is for all of us.

Keep writing!

Kay Leitch
Author of Treasure This
Founder member of Electrik Inc

STEPHEN KING’S TOP WRITING TIPS

Stephen King knows what he’s talking about when he’s talking about writing, yeah? So, here are some guidelines he has for writers. I’m deliberately not using the word rules, cos, you know, me and rules…

I thought I’d share these because they’re all worth reading. Good common sense advice with a healthy dose of creativity in every one. Number fifteen is my favourite. That and read, read, read, write, write, write. Oh, wait — that’s one I made up.

Here are 14 extra tips in the attached meme. No more excuses, now. Sit down and…

keep writing!

More great tips from Stephen King

Kay
Author of Treasure This
Founder member of Electrik Inc

 

 

Want a Publisher to Read Your Work?

Another door opens for writers to get their work seen by an award-winning independent publisher. This fantastic alliance between Litopia Pop-Up Submissions and Head of Zeus publishing house gives writers a direct route to the person they want to read their work – the publisher.

This exciting news comes from BookBrunch (12th July 2021):

• 

Check out Youtube.com/litopia and Pop-Up Submissions every Sunday evening (5pm UK time). And have a look at Litopia – one of the best forums around for professional and amateur writers alike. And then start honing that novel. Good luck!

Full disclosure: am I connected with Litopia? Yes, definitely. I’m delighted to be one of the readers for the great submissions we receive from writers of all kinds, from astonishingly talented teenagers (god knows I wasn’t so talented at that age) to more seasoned writers — we get all kinds. It’s great fun, and always enlightening.

Litopia Pop-Up Submissions can take you from the bottom rung,
to the top… 🙂

Keep writing.

Kay Leitch
Author of Treasure This

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DEAN WESLEY SMITH WRITING ADVICE

I like reading about successful writers, don’t you? I also like writers who buck the trends. There are so many “trends” in writing, and so much advice from so many people, most writers could be forgiven for sticking their heads out of the window and screaming into the night…

But now and then you find something worth sharing. We all know the Writing is about rewriting advice, and the Gotta show, don’t tell school of thought. I’ve always liked: Be Yourself, who else is better qualified? That one works for me.

Here’s Dean Wesley Smith giving his thoughts on writing after a successful career in the business. It’s from 2019, but all still useful today. You may not agree with everything he says, but it’s certainly worth listening to. I first saw this shared on Litopia – a great writers’ forum – and thought I’d pass it on.

Kay
Author of Treasure This
Co-founder of Electrik Inc

ALL ABOUT POP-UP SUBMISSIONS

THIS is what I was talking about – check out Litopia.com and see what you think. This is the kind of creative connection and advice I wish I’d had years ago. Great place for meeting writers of all kinds, making contacts, finding out how to improve your writing, and just generally having a good time being creative.

Kay
Author of Treasure This
Founder member of Electrikinc