What I've learned so far.

king, I highly recommend a book called Immediate Fiction by Jerry Cleaver.

I've read a lot of books and blogs about the craft of writing. Most of them make my brain hurt. I mean, they do a great job of breaking things into pieces, but they don't really show you how to turn around and do the great stuff all by yourself.

Cleaver keeps it very simple and very immediate (just like the title). You can get right to work with his ideas, and then build on what you're learning. It doesn't seem so overwhelming!

Here's his basic premise; Conflict + Action + Resolution = Story.

"To create conflict, the kind that's needed to move a story, you must have two elements--a want and an obstacle. Someone must want something and there must be an obstacle to be overcome to satisfy that want." (page 27)

That's where I always start, whether it's with the overall plot or a short scene/chapter. What does my POV character want? What's in the way?

So, for example, I had a chapter where my MC was on her way to do something very dramatic--but the getting there wasn't so exciting. So I added another character, a friend who was trying to talk her out of doing it. Now there's tension in that scene, plus a chance for her to explain to him (and therefore the reader) why she's going to do it. Beginning--he sees her and tries to stop her. Middle--they argue. Ending--she convinces him she's doing the right thing, and he realizes he can't wait to see what happens next.

Go back and look at those books again--you'll see the structure holds up most of the time. We were talking in the Harry Potter thread about that first chapter... What do the Dursleys want? To be normal. What is the obstacle they have to overcome? The crazy sister and her wizard son. Then we get chapters of their struggle to keep Harry from turning their lives abnormal.

I haven't read Immediate Fiction. I'll have to check that one out.

What I have learned so far?

The best lesson I ever took from this message board is never write anything I have not thoroughly researched. Easy to remember, hard to implement.

The second was develop your author's platform: it's a combination of writing, reading, teaching, going to workshops, lectures, book signings, creating a website, and my least preferred avenues of blogging and tweeting. There's more, but it gets into territory I like less than blogging.

Books read in the last 24hrs...Memoirs of a Gold Fish, Duck at the Door, and Walter the Farting Dog. I am a fast reader

One of the most important things I learned early on was about purpose. A writing coach kept asking me, Why? Why does that happen? Why did the character do that? How could we give this secondary character his own reason to be in the story?

My life so often feels really random. My first books were that way. Things happened to my characters, and then they reacted.

That may be how life goes sometimes, but not fiction. Everything in a story needs to have a motivation, a reason, a purpose and a goal.

Look at Harry Potter. One of the things that makes all those dozens of secondary characters so real and unforgettable is that every single one of them has his or her own story. They have a reason for what they do. They are all the heroes of their own adventures. It's never just, Oh, how convenient, Neville just happens to be in the right place at the right time. He's there because he's decided to be there.

I'm pretty sure I need to get that book. Thanks, Judy, for the info.