Learn Writing with Uncle Jim, Volume 1

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gp101

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LeeFlower said:
This might be a bad idea, but my first instinct would be to open chapter two with the classic "FIVE YEARS LATER..."

That's actually the one option I wanted to avoid most.
 

Allynegirl

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UJ, I would turn the page too.

Okay, Assignment Fifteen
Diagram a sentence from A Visit From St. Nicholas.

Away to the window I flew like a flash, tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

I think I did this right, but it has been 20+ years since I diagramed a sentence. Unfortunately, I cannot get the diagram to show up here.

"I" was on the line alone in front of the separation bar between a 3-pronged verb: "flew," "tore" and "threw."

"Away" was on a diagonal line under "flew" and the preposition "to" was on another with "window" on the horizonal and "the" on a diagonal under "window." "Like" was on a diagonal under "flew" with "flash" on a horizonal and "a" on a diagonal under "window."

"Open" was on a diagonal under "tore." After "tore" was a vertical with "shutters" and "the" on a diagonal under "shutters."

"And" was on a vertical, dotted line connecting "tore" and "threw."

"Up" was on a diagonal under "threw." After "threw" was a vertical with "sash" and "the" on a diagonal under "sash."


Am I right? My head hurts.
 
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James D. Macdonald

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A far more interesting sentence from A Visit From Saint Nicholas is:

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of toys, and St. Nicholas too.
 

Allynegirl

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Mid-book of my YA has arrived <sarcasm on> YIPEE! <sarcasm off>

My BIC time is taken up with staring at the screen and saying "type something, anything, even crap" over and over again - fingers don't move, previously written paragraphs call to me longing to be re-written over and over.

I tell the kids - Mom's working on her book, don't bother me except for emergencies. Every 10 minutes or less, one of them shows up to see "how I am doing," "I want to be with Mommy," "Can I read what you've written?" With grace and finesse (screaming and threats), they finally get the hint. Then the dogs start barking wanting to go out and do their business and the kids are either deaf to it or wanting to see how long Mommy will let it go on before she goes on a rampage.

I can't even enjoy my current UJ Assignment: "Twenty-Three - Pick a genre and read award winning novels for the last 10 years." The current book I am reading (Cimarron Rose by James Lee Burke) has so many similies and metaphors (obscure ones at that) and confusing dialogue that I am constantly being thrown out of the story.

I just want to:flag: .
 

James D. Macdonald

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I have a sign on my office door:

No, I don't know what's for dinner. I don't care what's on TV. Unless someone is actively bleeding, vomiting, or unconscious, I don't want to hear about it.

A change of scene sometimes helps. Is there a coffeeshop or library nearby where you can go plunk yourself down, either for reading or writing?
 
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LeeFlower

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Back at school, I used the 'sign on the door' trick too. The only problem with that in my case is that it occasionally backfires. I'll come out of my room for a snack break and one of my hallmates will go "what are you doing? go finish your book."

Allynegirl, I don't know if this will help, but when I get really stuck like that, I find that allowing myself to rewrite/revise only the last page (or scene) of the MS can help. I read it and revise as I go, and then once I get to the bottom, I start adding new content.

Good luck getting going again!
 

Allynegirl

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aertep said:
By the way, "The Historian" is told in the first person, but there are several "first persons" telling the story, and most of them are not female.

Here I am trying to catch up to the end of this thread and I come across this lightbulb moment. I don't ever remember reading a book in first person that ever moved that 1st person view to someone else. hmmm, interesting. I had already thought about changing my YA WIP from 3rd person ominscient (sp?) to 1st person, since the 3 books I have read in the Mystery genre (Assignment 23) have all been in 1st person.

I so love this thread. :)
 

jdparadise

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on "Then he got a visitor," I go with UJ; "It worked great for five years," [end chapter] leaves the reader wondering "and THEN what?" which is a nice place to occasionally leave a reader at the end of a chapter.

On UJ's excerpt, alas, I would not have turned the page. It's nothing "wrong" with the writing or the setup; rather, the character and situation didn't particularly catch me, and the voicing got me thinking it was going to be too much work to get through a book that led with two pages I didn't particularly engage with.

Not to say ten million other people won't utterly groove on it; just didn't catch -me-...

-j
 

allenparker

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I'll turn the page.

The first two pages engaged me for a different reason. The writing was definitely Northern bent. it had a feel and sound of a Yankee telling the story.

Living most of my life in the South, it first raised the small hairs on the back of my neck, but I later decided that there is too little time to argue.

I did have a hesitation with the ship names and the dates. Jim's explanation was sufficient to cause me to want to see the rest.

ETA:

Sign on my door reads: Grumpy Infantryman. Knock if you are done with life.
 
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James D. Macdonald

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Allynegirl said:
I don't ever remember reading a book in first person that ever moved that 1st person view to someone else.

You might check out Frankenstein: It's first person, but it's three nested first persons: [SIZE=-1]Robert Walton ([/SIZE]the Arctic explorer) in first person relating the first-person narrative of Victor Frankenstein, who relates the first-person narrative of the Creature.

You can do anything at all, provided you do it well. Your readers will tell you if you've done it well.

Epistolary novels in general have multiple first-person viewpoint characters.
 

HoosierCowgirl

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Oh, say, a lot of Dr. Doolittle books were like that ... the sea-turtle telling the Push-me-PUll-you a first-person version of what was going on, the whole punctuated like this " ' " for chapters and chapters.

Ann
 

paritoshuttam

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Allynegirl said:
Here I am trying to catch up to the end of this thread and I come across this lightbulb moment. I don't ever remember reading a book in first person that ever moved that 1st person view to someone else. hmmm, interesting.

I am not 100% sure about this, but I think Faulkner's As I Lay Dying is told in a series of chapters, and each chapter is in first-person narration of a different character. (Well, not all chapters are in different characters' voices; they have to repeat after a while.)

- Paritosh
 

Allynegirl

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Thanks UJ and Paritosh. I have added those two books to my ever-growing reading list. Now it is time to start those Assignments I hate the most -- memorization. :e2bummed:

ETA - I finally made it to the end of this thread. WooHoo for me! Now I can start BIC without the temptation to read this thread instead.
 
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Patricia

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Well, I just two days ago 'attempted' to read a novel, first person total 1853 Carolina hillbilly narrative and dialogue. The author slips into some 'proper grammar' at times, which was worse than good grammar with occasional poor.

The story premise is actually good, but I can't say for sure, because if it is possible for such a thing to happen, reading the darn thing made me tired. I just couldn't handle the single spaced small font continual narrative and dialogue jargon. I was actually curious as to what happened to the characters, but couldn't take the read. I tossed it.

The author is a celeb of sorts and claims first hand knowledge of some of the content as passed down treasures.

On the other hand, I had before that one, finished a book that the story line was fair, and the premise good, a little boring. But the seasoned author head hopped so smoothly, that I wasn't clearly aware he was doing it, until I noticed all the little sets of 3 font bullets that denoted scene and or character change. It was a good learning tool.

ETA: Sorry everyone, the point I meant to make. I don't anticipate either of these problems with Jim's book. As far as writing "time" I should have been finished long ago with WIP.
I ramble around alone in a 3 BR 2B home, with two lap tops. I've been doing fast track the last couple of weeks since my release from PA--I think that even those of us who have a lot of time, can be waylaid by some things and have to practice a certain amount of discipline. I've promised myself 6 hours a day to BIC
 
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gp101

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Thanks again, UJ and jdparadise, and the others. I've gone with that particular chapter-ending line. Over the course of the last few days, the more I read it, the more it seems the right way to end the chapter.

UJ, I read your comments as to why you no longer crit peoples' material in SYW, and can understand why. But if anyone else here would like to read it and let me know if the whole piece works with that last line, you can find it here:

http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=35854


UJ, if it's inappropriate (I hope it isn't) to post such a request of others in your thread, my apologies, and please feel free to delete this, or PM me so that I delete it, whichever is easier.
 

James D. Macdonald

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James D. Macdonald said:
Sell just the one book. That book needs to have a beginning, a middle, and an end.

If that first book doesn't sell it won't have any sequels.

I originally posted that a year ago.

Just recently I was chatting with an editor at Major New York Publisher (and not the one you're thinking of, either). The editor said, "I'm sick of trilogies! I never want to see another trilogy! If you can't tell your story in one book I don't want to see it!"

Or words to that effect.

Perhaps it had been a trying day in the slush mines. (Interestingly enough, this editor works on a line that only takes agented manuscripts. But there is such a thing as agented slush.)
 

Nangleator

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In my opinion, the first book in a trilogy should stand perfectly well on its own. (This probably applies to the other two books, too.)
 

rugcat

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James D. Macdonald said:
Just recently I was chatting with an editor at Major New York Publisher (and not the one you're thinking of, either). The editor said, "I'm sick of trilogies! I never want to see another trilogy! If you can't tell your story in one book I don't want to see it!"
I understand a lot of editors feel this way. But a "series character" where each book is a stand-alone and subsequent volumes keep the same cast of characters with a different plot is, I think, a different story. Many editors are on the lookout for a book with that potential, since readers can be very loyal to a particular cast of characters, esp in mysteries and urban fantasy.
 

James D. Macdonald

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Where have all the fantasists gone?
Long time passing....
Where have all the fantasists gone?
Long time ago....
Where have all the fantasists gone?
Gone to trilogies every one.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn.
 

Cathy C

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I laugh, because we just turned in the second manuscript in our . . . trilogy! :roll: Maybe we need to make it four books instead.

;)

Continue on, while I chuckle for a bit.
 

Liam Jackson

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I wasn't interested in a trilogy. Instead, I wanted to write a single book of approximately 412K. When the publisher nixed that notion, the story was developed to evolve over several books, exceeding the original 412k count. Eventually, the publisher decided he wanted multiple trilogies. I've always suspected marketing weighed in heavily on the idea of the trilogy.
 
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