Traveling and Research

Well, I can't believe how long it's been since I last posted. To all of you who continue to write comments, thanks. I definitely haven't given up on the blog, in fact, soon I'll have a whole new bunch of posting ideas for us to discuss.

As far as the novel goes, I'm on track to finish the revision by my deadline of 12/31. I have one more minor change to make then truthfully, just the final read through. Soon it will go back to my agent.

Which brings us to the new and exciting stuff and why I've been gone so long. You've all heard the adage "write what you know." Well, in truth, the adage should be "write what you can learn about." We can't all write about what we know and make it interesting, but we can all do research and bring new and interesting ideas and information into our lives and writing. To that end, I intend to do several posts coming up on research, how, where, when and why.

As for me and why it's been so long between posts? I've been doing my own research, in Istanbul. My next medical thriller will take my hero there so I went away for a few weeks to live in the City and gather the vibe. Details, sights, sounds, smells, sensations. People, places, foods, drinks. Tourists and locals. I have detailed notes and images to lend veracity to the next novel.

That one, we'll write together.

The Eleventh Point - Kill the Clunkers

As I'm finishing up this (hopefully) final revision of the book, another revision strategy point has come to mind so frequently that I've been tempted to add it as the eleventh point on our Ten Point Revision Strategy.

Unfortunately, it's so simple and basic, I'd be embarrassed to have to remind myself to do this.

Yet, time after time, reviewing the book that I'd worked on, slaved on for such a long time; woke up at 4 am daily to squeeze more hours out of my exhausting day; obsessed over in the waning hours of night, story ideas coming to me instead of dreams, I've realized I don't always do this one particular thing.

What is it you ask? What daunting discovery have I made that could have such magnitude that it deserves consideration as the 11th point of our strategy?

It's really very simple.

Write well.

Yes, that's it. The new 11th point of our revision strategy. Write Well. Or as I'll rename it and gussy it up; Kill the Clunkers.

It's stunning to think that after all the times I've gone through the novel, how many clunkers remain hidden in the text. What happens is that our eyes get immune to our own bad writing. When we re-read it, our brain nods "yes, that's what I wrote. That's what I intended to write," without ever realizing that what we wrote was bad.

Sometimes it takes an external eye, like a writing group, to help point out these bastards of the English language. If you don't have a group, then the best thing to do is to read your book out loud to yourself. Not in your mind or in a whisper, but out loud. Belt it out. Imagine you're giving a book reading in front of 1,000 of new, unfamiliar readers. Talk loud, with emphasis, and listen to your own words. See how they hang together in this context.

You may find a few clunkers.

What's a clunker? Simply a really badly written sentence. It may be cliche. Melodramatic. Flat. Overly reaching. Whatever, it clunks when it should purr. It's a clunker.

Since I've never been embarrassed to show the horror of some of my own writing, I'll offer a few examples of clunkers I found on this draft that somehow survived all my other reads.

1) What are you going to do?" she asked, drawing on her cigarette. (how can you ask something when you're sucking on a cigarette? You either ask, then suck, or suck then ask. Not at the same time.)

2) Malcomb's eyes widened like a terrified doe's. (that's just bad)

3) Memories he'd spent his entire life running away from were now chasing after him, like a rabid dog biting at his heels. (What? Doggy memories biting me? Ouch!)

4) A tear fell onto her cheek. (cliche)

Other things I've noticed is using the same word too many times in short bites of the book. For example, I have a character who has a "familiar toothless grin." Darn if I didn't write toothless three times in three paragraphs.

These are all clunkers. Examples of bad writing. I found them in my book. I killed them.

Now I'm hunting for more.

Getting Back to Revisions - Rewrite or Start Over

Time to get back to revising.

Heard from my writing group in a fillet session, er. . . constructive criticism session. Actually, they were quite kind and actually very complimentary, which was unusual. Must have been the wine.

But their comments brought up one very important point that's worth discussing and getting your thoughts. Rewriting or Starting Over.

Before we get there, let me explain. My current novel is actually a revised version of a revised version of an earlier work. Essentially, I took concepts and basic plotlines from an earlier work and deconstructed the novel, re-concepted the plot and characters, wrote new story arcs for each character and wrote a new outline for the new story. I did however make one major mistake that has come back to haunt me over and over, which is the title of this post.

Whenever possible, in order to save time, energy and writing, I reused some of my old book parts. At the time, I thought I was being clever. If I could reuse a chapter here or a plot line there, make some minor changes, I'd make my writing faster. Turned out to be wrong.

Here's the problem. In reusing some of the old stuff, I ran into a few instances where the character motivation for doing a certain thing was actually no longer valid. Since I wanted to reuse the part, I simply changed the motivation in my current form, thinking it would solve the problem, but it didn't, it created new problems.

Let me give an example. In my first version of the book, after the police come to the lab and my hero and his research partner make a daring escape, they go back and meet at the hero's apartment. At the time, this was crucial, because my hero desperately needed to do something with their research project and time was of the esscence. It had to be done right then. Afterward, they went on the run before the police found them at the apartment. Are you following this?

In the new version, after they escape the police I decided they would still go back to the apartment and do the same repair of the research project. The problem is, the reason they desperately had to do it before, no longer existed. Now, they just did it, to which my entire writing group could only ask "why?" And my answer? Well, there really isn't one, is there. My characters did it because I was lazy and wanted to keep some old scenes rather than rewrite them. Seemed like a good idea at the time.

I violoated one of my own ten immutable laws of revising: Know each character's motivation.

My advice then, when confronted with a similar situation in your rewriting, is not to reuse old scenes. Rather, it's always best to rewrite them. When you rewrite them in the flow of your current writing, the character's motivation is more organic from the story, not contrived by the author just to be able to reuse some segments. And this is the key lesson from this experience. Each action that the character performs, each motivation, has to be organic to the current book. If you're going to reuse some scenes, make sure that the motivation and action still makes sense in your current writing. If there's any question, it's probably best to just rewrite it.

I'm doing that now. Fortunately, I'm very near the end of the novel, and this is a quick fix for me, but I'm going through each line, making sure that any old vestiges from the last novel still make sense now, that the reasons are organically grown from the current state of the characters.

Then I'll be done and it's off to the agent!

We'll write about query's and synopses then.

I'm Back!

Wow! Hard to believe so much time transpired since my last post. But it did.

In case you were wondering, I've been fine. In fact, your great comments of encouragement and the growing number of readers who've found some value from this blog keep me motivated to keep on going forward.

Over these last three weeks, I simply took a break. After completing the novel and waiting for my writing group to come back to me with their final recommendations (which will happen this Thursday) I decided to take some well-deserved time away from writing or writing about writing. Instead, I focused on The Ripple Effect, which has been incredibly busy of late.

But with my writing group meeting coming later this week, soon I'll be launching back into the novel. And with that, I'll begin updating here again as well.

I intend to finish our discussion of outlining. And with the novel just about ready to go back to my agent, I thought I'd write about the all-important query letter and the extremely difficult novel summary. Both essential topics if you hope to get published.

Please keep your comments coming. It's nice to know that all of my blabbering may actually be helping some body.

Back to the updating and novel after my meeting Thursday!

Revising the Novel - Performance Update

I may not have been quite as sequestered as the monk in this photo, but it's been pretty darn close, hiding myself away, working feverishly to finish the revision of Deadly Vision. And, after about 6 months of mostly concentrated work, I'm thrilled to say, that I've finished! Yea! Much applause and fanfare (and hopefully some much needed sleep!)

Sunday, I went through the last chapters, made the final cuts and got the novel down to about 100,000 words, which was my goal. Without a doubt, this is the cleanest, tightest, most aggressive version of the novel ever.

Keeping the Ten-Point Revision Strategy on my desk the whole time, I found the points useful in constantly reminding me of what I needed to do. One thing that I realized is that during all of my previous revisions, I didn't really revise the book. instead, I would really just read the book. Sure, I'd make a few changes here or there to wording, expand a small scene to add more detail, fix a grammatical error, but that's about it. It's so easy to get into the pattern of reading our writing, not really revising our writing.

To that end, the Ten-Point Revision Strategy was really helpful.

Particularly:

1) With each chapter, I asked myself consciously, what are the character's motivations here. What does each character (not just my main hero) really want to happen? This brought up lots of previously unseen opportunities for conflict.

2) Does this scene move the story forward. Wow! That one was really powerful for me. I can't tell you how many times I read a scene that I really liked, but on close scrutiny, realized it wasn't necessary to move the story forward. Here's the latest example.

In one scene, my hero needs to use the internet to contact someone. He can't connect from the place he's hiding for fear of it being traced back to his location, so he has to go to the public library to use their computer. In that scene, I loved writing about the elderly librarian who ran the library since our hero was a school boy. I loved the descriptions of the library itself, really imparting the small town feel I was reaching for. I loved the tension, our hero felt by connecting from such a public place.

There was only one problem. None of it was necessary.

The Librarian never appears again. I'd already described the small town. Our hero has been nervous and in fear of being caught for the last several pages. In the end, the whole point of the scene was to mention that he connected with his lab partner to set up an important trial, then steps to the payphone and calls the police officer that's been chasing him. That's it. I wrote 3 or 4 pages to describe what I just wrote to you in one sentence.

So I cut it. All of it. Kill your babies, they say. Librarian, gone. Library in small town, mentioned in passing. The scene now starts with my hero stepping out of the library where he'd just connected with his lab partner and walking into the phone booth. I still have all the tension of him getting caught while he's standing there, fully exposed, making the phone call. I mention in brief back story, that he'd just connected with the lab. Now, I'm moving directly on to the conversation with the cop. Saved 4 pages. probably 700 words.

3) I really loved the "end each chapter earlier," point. I really recommend you try this one. Something so simple, often times had a really powerful effect of increasing tension and drama. Sometimes I just eliminated the last sentence of the chapter, sometimes the entire last paragraph. Either way, what I found was all those cut little pat endings I'd written, the final chapter summary or forced dramatic ending, were usually hampering the drama. By cutting them, and ending the chapter with an earlier sentence, I often felt there was actually more tension. More of a cliffhanger.

4) I paid lots of attention to word choice, avoiding overused words, and overall tightening my word selection. I eliminated writing "he paused," instead, creating the pause. And adverbs became an endangered species in my book. Or as Metallica once said, "Kill em all!"

5) Tightening dialog also worked well. In truth, we tend to never speak more than 3 sentences during a conversation before the other person interrupts us with a comment. Yet, when we write, we have no problem with one character going on for whole paragraphs. I've even seen some characters in books going on for a whole page, or more!!

This doesn't happen in real life, and shouldn't happen in your novel. Keep the dialog tight, brisk. It flows faster, the book flows faster and the dialog feels more natural, less forced.

So now, I just need to let my two writing groups catch up with me, give them a chance to destroy . . er, I mean critique my work, then one more final read through and it's back to my agent.

Just so you know, Warner Books and Bantam had both expressed an interest and both requested this revision, so hopefully we'll hear soon. Either way, I'll keep y'all posted of the developments as we move through this publishing experience together.

As always, you comments are most appreciated. They've kept me motivated to keep this blog going when I felt like stopping.

In the future, we're going to finish up outlining, move to query letters, novel summaries, plotting and other points. Let me know what you'd like read about.

Writing the Novel - Outlining Part 2

Back to outlining.

A while back, when I started the first outlining post I answered the question, "Should I outline?" with a flippant, but honest answer.

Yes, if it works for you. No, if it doesn't.

In truth, very few people are capable of writing a successful novel without some sort of outline. Even the most free-flowing of us has some idea of what the novel is about. And even if they never commit this to paper, in their mind, if asked, they'll have an idea of where the story starts, who the characters are (at least some of them) and a vague idea as to what will happen in the book. Even if it's a totally vague idea, they'll at least know that their novel is a story about Mandy and Mike, growing up in a small town in Oklahoma, and they fall in love, but as economic hardship strikes their town, they break up and have to deal with the question of whether or not to have their unborn child or abort it. Etc.

This little sentence may be all the author knows about his/her book, and they may intentionally say, "I never outline because I want to be free to explore the story where ever it goes." But they're wrong. That little sentence is an outline. Even if it's only in their head, it's still an outline.

An outline is a basic structure for a story. A preconceived notion of a beginning and various events that will happen as the novel moves towards the end. Notice I didn't say that an outline includes an ending. It doesn't have to. If you really want to live the "mystery" of writing and see how the story ends for itself, that's fine. You've still outlined in your head how the story will go.

Let's look at that for a moment, as loose as this "outline" is.

There's a story start; characters and a location.
Story points are laid out; economic hardship, a romance, a break-up, a pregnancy.

That's an outline. Now to take this basic idea and turn it into a more structured outline, one that won't cramp your "creative freedom," all you need to do is add a timeline and vision the obligate scenes that are necessary to make these events happen.

In other words. The beginning. You may start by introducing the town, the characters, the economic setting, what have you. But you've identified your beginning.

At some point you must introduce the characters. So you will need obligatory introductory scenes to bring in Mandy and Mike.

They need to have a romance. It can be already started and we're catching it in the middle or we can watch it start and grow. It's up to you. But either way, there are some obligatory scenes you must have to show a romance growing or maintaining.

She becomes pregnant. Her discovery of this is a pretty obligate scene.

Economic hardship strikes. Another obligate scene (or several)

They breakup. Many obligate scenes here to show how the economy has affected their relationship.

They need to decide what to do about the baby.

Where you go from there is anybody's guess.

It may not seem like much, but you've just outlined the basis of your novel. Now, once you really start to think about this and add a timeline, you'll see that there are really several obligatory scenes that need to happen to connect these scenes. As you fill those in, the outline becomes more clear. And you haven't necessarily written anything yet.

Tess Gerristen, the best-selling author, states that she never outlines. But this isn't true. What she means is that she never commits an outline of her novel to paper. But she knows from before she starts writing at least some of the obligatory scenes she'll be telling. She's also already done a ton of research, which in and of itself, dictates some scenes. By the time she sits down, with all her research, she's ready to start writing. She may not know everything that will happen as the novel unfolds, but she certainly knows where the book will start, the major events that will happen, how the research will factor in, and the obligate scenes she'll need to have those events unfold.

That's an outline.

In truth, I'm a big fan of outlining. And I'll go over my outlining process next post.

Revising the Novel - Nearing Completion

Autumn is almost upon us.

My favorite time of the year, I love it when the temperature cools, the leaves change, the sweaters come from storage.

And my novel is finished. Or will be.

My goal was to finish my final revision by the end of August. So far I'm near my target. I have, what, five days left. Hmmm, I'm on page 320 of 478 in the revision and I still need to remove 6,000 words or about 20 pages.

As I'm going through the book, I try to keep the Ten Point Revision Strategy in mind (for those who've asked, I have already written the Ten Point Revision Strategy as an article and submitted it to Writer's Digest and The Writer. I'll keep you posted on the results). Each day, before I write, I re-read the ten points, trying to concentrate on what each point really means in terms of what I need to accomplish. Character Motivation. Dialog tightening. Word Choice. And especially, Ending Chapters Earlier.

I continue to find the strategy to be useful for me, and as I get closer and closer to finally completing this draft, I'm taking the time to really focus in on each of these points.

I believe, in the end, the writing is sharper, tighter and more dramatic than ever. I hope you'll find that to be the case for you as well.

As always, please send me your feedback/thoughts on the Ten-Points.

I think we'll start an outlining section next.

Revising the Novel - Sex Scenes - the Final Hitchcockian Word

We've had a few posts recently about writing that all important sex scene. Now, I'm not saying that every novel needs a sex scene, mine doesn't. But I have struggled over writing sex scenes before, so I wanted to bring it up here for discussion.

Previously, I've made two points about how to successfully navigate your way around this rather sticky subject.

1) Avoid cliche. Be very careful of cliche in every aspect of the scene, from the terms you use for male and female anatomy, to emotions, to setting, to tone. With so much bad daytime television and trashy novels, a sex scene will only work if it's novel.

2) Only introduce the scene if it a) doesn't interfere with the flow of the plot, and b) like all scenes, it must serve the story and move the plot forward.

So for our final discussion, I wanted to make one final point. Over at blogcatalog.com, I'd posted a thread in my favorite writing group, searching for opinions from fellow writers on how they handle this subject. After reading the responses, I was pleased that the general consensus matched my opinion and even gave me a great term to describe the best way to handle the scene.

Hitchcockian.

What I mean by this is that the best way to write a powerful, dramatic sex scene is to think like the famous director, Alfred Hitchcock. What made his movies so compelling was the tension in the scenes. The lead up to the violence. The implication of violence. He usually avoided showing the violence itself. Instead, the viewer was left to fill in the holes with their own imagination, which can often be far more frightening than anything Hitchcock could have put on the screen.

I believe a great way to handle a sex scene in your novel is to follow that same advice. Really, unless you're writing erotica, it's not the sex in the scene that will interest your readers. It's the implication. The build up. The tension.

And just as importantly, never forget the ramifications. The post-sex scenes can be just as powerful or more so than the pre-sex scene. You simply can't (or shouldn't) have two characters fall into bed together without their relationship and possibly lives being irrevocably changed. Unless the point of your story is to show how a character can have sex and remained totally unchanged, don't pass up this opportunity to explore your character's feelings after sex; the embarrassment, the confusion, the insecurity, the building romance/love.

The possibilities are endless.

So my final advice on writing a great sex scene is maybe you don't need to write the scene at all.

Revising the Novel - Intention

When I first started this blog, my original intention was purely to get my thoughts on the revision process down on paper to help me with my current work. I wanted to use this as a think pad, a guide book, to direct and focus my thoughts on what I needed to do.

The results so far, based on your feedback, has been greater than I ever expected. Thanks to all who've written with your encouragement and thoughts.

Now the reason I mention all this is that my intention directed my actions, and those actions led to results, perhaps even results I didn't anticipate.

That's a powerful statement and one that needs to makes its way into our writing. Knowing the intentions of your characters, in each scene, can be a vital tool to drive the drama and power of your writing. I mentioned this earlier in the Ten-Point Revision Strategy under "Know your Character's Motivation," but it's worth exploring deeper.

I don't know about you, but when I write, I often like to get into the feel of writing, the cadence, the appearance of the words on the screen. I have scenes set that I know are necessary to move the story forward; plot oriented scenes that bring conflict and drama. But quite honestly, I don't often step back and ask myself a simple question, "What does each character want out of this interaction/situation?"

Think how powerful those words are. From the main character to a bit player, the story will change if you spend some serious thought on what each character really intends to happen in that scene.

Say you have a big scene happening in a restaurant, I don't know, a meeting between two lovers on the verge of divorce. This is their last stab at trying to stay together. They arrive in different cars and flip their keys over to the valet. Now, in this scene, the valet obviously has little importance in the lives of our characters. But say for example, that you wanted to have the valet say something, just a sentence in passing, to build the scene. How can this affect the story?

If the valet is miserable at his job, just wasting his time away, pissed off that his big audition at the Broadway musical was a bomb, his demeanor, body language and sentence may be very different than if he's had a brand new baby boy and his wife is home waiting for him.

A minor character for sure, but it's easy to see how his one sentence, based on his intentions, can have a dramatic impact on our lead characters, setting the scene for their meeting. Say the valet is a snippy twit, sarcastic and angry as he takes the car keys. Now compare that to a happy, bubbling new daddy, spreading joy and love with every word. How could that impact the moods of our main characters as they step into the restaurant?

Now, I've just described how a bit character's motivation can impact a scene, imagine if you spent the time to really think about each of the main character's motivations as they enter the restaurant. There's a big difference between the male lead dying to get back together with her because she's the love of his life, and just going through the motions because he's head over heals in love with a waitress at the very restaurant at which they're meeting.

Character Intention. Motivation. Spend the time as you're revising each scene to make sure that you know exactly where each character is coming from.

Novel revision update

Thanks to everyone for your kind comments on this blog. I'll keep it, trying to publish 3 times a week until we all get our revisions done, and beyond.

Right now, however, I'm recovering from some abdominal surgery that has me laid up on the couch.

We'll get right back into the meat of our revision strategies next week, when I'm a little farther down the road of recovery.

In the meantime, please send me your suggestions on topics you'd like to see covered in the pages of this blog.

Upcoming topics include:

Plot structure
The heroic quest
outlining, yes or no
character arcs
story structure
how to research
theme
drive the story forward
querey letters
novel synopsis

Please send me your suggestions for topics you'd like covered.

Revising the Novel - Best Word Choice or Big Guts and Belly Fat

Just finished a meeting of Mimi's Boys on Thursday night (don't worry, my bruises will heal) and a very important lesson came up.

Best word choice.

Now, I've already touched on this subject in the Ten-Point Revision Strategy, but it came up again in a way that was slightly different, and my writing was to blame.

In one scene, I have my character, the ER Department Chairman, a rather big man (or Jabba Browne as one of my group members calls him) lean back in his chair and rest his hand on his stomach. In that sentence I said something to the effect of "leans back and rests his hand on his large gut."

Doesn't necessarily seem like the that should be the focal point of a long discussion, but believe me, it was.

As we'd discussed before, each word, every single word, that we commit to paper (printer) has to be exactly what we wish it to be. It must convey exactly what we want it to convey. But more importantly than just conveying information, it has to be entertaining. After all, isn't that the point? To entertain? That's what reading is. Certainly reading a novel, particularly a thriller.

Les, one of Mimi's Boys, stated emphatically that we have to strive to make each sentence as entertaining as possible. That' right, our responsibility isn't just to write an entertaining book, but to make sure that each and every sentence in that book is entertaining in and of itself.

To be honest, I hadn't ever thought of it that way before. But he's right.

We can't rely on 2nd or 3rd tier adjectives or descriptors or cliches to finish our sentences. There are no "throw away" paragraphs, or sentences or words. Each word must count. And we need to make sure that each word conveys the information we need it to in as entertaining a way as possible.

Case in point, my large gut.

Sure it emphasizes Dr. Browne's large mass, but is it said in as entertaining a way as possible?

Les jumped all over that one, giving me his sly, one eyebrow raised look that states so clearly, "you can do better than this." And again, he's right. With effort, we can all remove these rather efficient but bland modifiers and interject some personality, some deeper level of description, some humor and some entertainment.

It's a lot of work. It means going back over the novel, word by word, sentence by sentence, and continually asking yourself, does this say what I need it to say? Is there someway I can write this better? More descriptive, more original, more entertaining?

In the margins, Les crossed out my large gut and interjected, "placed his hand on the roll of fat above his belt." Damn if that isn't better. More descriptive, certainly more original and even slightly humorous.

Do you agree? Do you feel that each and every word/sentence has to be polished as much as possible for maximal entertainment? Send me your thoughts.

Now I'm going back to work. I'll bet there's quite a few large guts in my novel that could stand being replaced by some rolls of belly fat.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #10 Move the Story Forward

In the end, this is what it's all about.

Move the Story Forward.

Everything we've discussed so far, each of the previous 9 points, have all been aimed at this goal. Keep the story moving, keep the reader involved, or to paraphrase, Elmore Leonard, cut out the parts that readers skip.

Sometimes, in order to be true to this principle, we have to be cruel. In this current revision, I've cut out two of my favorite scenes, what were in my mind grand displays of my writing, because quite honestly, they weren't necessary.

In one scene, my hero has just finished a grueling Grand Rounds conference to get his research approved. In this scene, I have him working with a nurse, Mary, repairing a head laceration on a construction foreman, while he and the nurse discuss the Rounds. I loved that scene. It showed my hero in action, being very competent in the ER. It showed Mary's enthusiasm, and therefore all the hospital's support staff's, for the project, and the construction guy's random comments added a quick touch of humor into a scene that normally wouldn't be funny. I loved that scene.

There was only one problem. It wasn't necessary.

I'd already shown my hero in action in the ER, in a much more tense, character revealing scene. Chapter One to be precise. I'd already alluded to the fact that the hospital was abuzz over this pending research project. And as cute as the construction guy was, he was not a part of the story. In the end, after careful analysis, I realized that the only new bit of information the scene revealed was that the research project was being sent to a Bioethics Committee meeting for another review. This meant that our hero only had 48 hours to show results of his project before the Bioethics committee would cut him off.

Now that's a big point. Adding a time deadline always adds drama and tension to the story. We've got to get something done and we've got to get it done now. But I didn't need a 5-page scene of my hero sewing up some guy's head laceration to show this.

So I cut it.

I took that one simple necessary paragraph and inserted it into a brief memory flash our hero has while he's speeding in his car to his lab. He's got to get his work done because. . . And now the car is in motion, describing through movement, so the story is launching forward while I reveal this one point.

I hated to do it, but I think you can see just from this description that it makes the story better. The reader doesn't want to see another ER scene, they want to see the experiment. The whole book so far has been leading up to the moment this research begins, why would I want to stick another chapter in there, acting as a roadblock to what the reader wants?

Move the story forward. Kill off your favorite writing if it isn't doing that. Cut out the parts the reader's skip.

P.S. For those interested, I've taken the Ten-Point Revision Strategy and created an article for Writer's Digest. I'll let you all know when it's published. But in the meantime, keep moving your story forward.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #9 Shorten as Tension Increases

This little tip is a must for thriller writers.

Shorten as Tension Increases.

By shorten, I mean shorten the length of sentences, shorten the length of words used, shorten the paragraphs. Essentially, shorten anything that can be shortened.

This is a neat tip, because it's not just referring to the act of writing, but how that writing looks and is read on the printed page. Shortening the sentences as the tension is mounting creates a staccato feeling for the reader, a bop, bop, beat that automatically makes them read faster. Using shorter words and shorter paragraphs, intensifies this effect, so as you story is moving faster, so is the reader's eye and hopefully the reader's heart.

Here's a quick example from Robert Dugoni's best-selling The Jury Master. In this scene, our hero arrives home to find his house ransacked, his cat Bud running across the kitchen.

"Sloane looked down at the broken plate at his feet, which a moment earlier had been on the leaning stack amid the contents of his cupboards. Bud had apparently been standing on the stack, licking at a puddle of syrup that had overflowed the counter. That explained the shattered glass. It didn't explain the destruction. That thought came simultaneously with the sound.

Soft footsteps behind him.

Too slow to turn, Sloane felt something hard slam against the back of his head."

Notice the pacing. Two fairly long sentences, establishing scene, placing the hero. Then it gets fast. Shorter sentences. A one sentence paragraph, then POW, the violent conclusion.

Reading this passage, you can't help but get swept up in the pacing as the tension builds.

Shorten as the Tension increases. As I'm doing now.

To get back to writing.

My book.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #8 Describe Through Movement

Another one of my favorite points on the Ten-Point Strategy and one that has had the biggest impact on my writing.

Describe Through Movement.

Back in the day of Melville and Dickens (before television, MTV and Youtube, when reading was the only form of entertainment) it was perfectly acceptable for authors to expound endlessly on the weather, the flow of grass across a hillside, the decor of a room, the fall of a woman's dress.

Not any more.

In today's world of short-attention span theater, things need to be speeded up, and particularly for thrillers, they need to be in constant motion. Now I don't mean a swirling maelstrom of nonstop action, and I don't mean to say that description and setting aren't important to a story, but never underestimate the power of movement as a technique to get a point across.

One of the simplest ways I incorporate this in my writing is in describing a new setting. Say my character Taylor enters a new room, like his lab for the first time. While I'd love to go into vivid description about the chaotic mess that is his basement laboratory, stressing certain details to show how bare-bones, low budget their funding is, in truth, I'd lose the reader right away. They don't want a long dissertation on the room, they want the story. Yet, some details need to be shared, to place the story, to set the tone and to show that these guys are broke. The way to do it is through movement.

Rather than having the narrator jump in and give a quick info dump on the room, I need to show Taylor walking through the room. Describe the furniture as he walks by it or trips over it. Describe the chaos as he steps over piles. Let his gaze shift to the crumbling plaster on the walls or brush the pile of chocolate wrappers off the desk. Subtle movements like this allow the author to include all the detail necessary to tell the story, without stopping the story to do it.

Since I've learned this technique, from Tess Gerritsen, I've gone back to quite a few of my static descriptions and simply put them into movement. And the results have been dramatic. Try it in your own story at any point of static description. When describing a person, have them in movement. When describing a setting, have someone or something moving in or through that setting. See if it doesn't make your writing more lively.

And that's the way I think of my novels today, one beautiful, flowing, moving story. Hopefully one where the movement will sweep the reader up and carry them along for the ride.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #7 Tighten Words

This is where I really go over the manuscript with a surgeon's scalpel cutting out any unnecessary or ineffective words. This can be a fun process as it involves our creative use of the English language.

As I'm reading each sentence, I ask myself, "Does it relay exactly what I wish for it to relay?" Can I find a better word to describe what I need to describe? Can I find a better word to convey a sense of movement, of drama, of tension?

In the prologue of my novel, my character, a young boy, is staring at the ceiling, watching the interplay of light and shadows. Inside this spectral drama, he knows hides the dark spirits of his grandmother's tales. Yet, the word 'hides' while appropriate, doesn't quite convey the fear a young child would experience, alone in his room at night, searching for malevolent ghosts. Sure, the spirits may be hiding in the shadows on his ceiling, but the word, 'lurking' is much more chilling, much more full of the ominous presence that I needed for the scene.

Another little trick that I learned from John Hough Jr., that I like to include here has to do with a very common tendency of mine. Often I'll write, "he paused," or something similar. I use this to create a beat, to give the character time to think, to build tension. For example, "he stepped to the doorway and paused." John taught me that rather than use the word 'pause,' create the pause. Instead of stepping to the doorway and pausing, he should step to the door and give a backward glance at the photo on the table or such. This still creates the beat but is much more evocative, descriptive and revealing of character than simply pausing. Used effectively, I can turn what was once just a pause into a powerful moment for the story.

In truth, Tightening Words is a difficult step for me. Some authors have a tremendous command of the English language. I can barely remember the word 'hello' when someone approaches me on the street, so I really have to stretch my mind. But I do, using that scalpel, searching out the bad words and excising them.

In the end, my patient, the manuscript, will be healthier because of it.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #6 Kill Adverbs

This is an easy one.

Kill adverbs.

You've all heard this before. Adverbs are, by and large, an unnecessary aspect of writing. They are the sign of a sloppy writer, too lazy to think of a more creative way to say something. And almost always, they are clumsy.

In an earlier post I mentioned Iris Johanson's use of the phrase, "she nodded her head jerkily," three times in the first sixth of one of her books. As a quick writing exercise, I bet we could all write down three ways that we could convey the same message more elegantly, more clearly, more creatively. Better yet, I bet we could think of three ways that the same information could be conveyed that do a better job of revealing character or moving the story forward with more drama or tension.

Yes, one little phrase can do all that, if we stretch our minds and think creatively.

One place that adverbs tend to creep in is as a dialogue tag. This is a practice we need to stop. People don't shout angrily. They shout. The anger should be conveyed in their choice of words, body language or action. Not with a clumsy tag.

At this point in my revision, all adverbs need to be removed. They served a purpose in the early drafts, holding space, telling me what I wanted to say. But now it's time. I am an adverb hunter. I simply put the search tool on --ly and search them all out and destroy them.

It is almost aways better to replace a weak verb/adverb combination with a stronger verb. Don't have your character walking quickly, have him rush. This conveys a better sense of action and movement.

Now, every once in a while, I'll find one adverb that I'll keep. In one scene, my character the Senator looks directly at the camera. I believe that adverb does reveal information on character and intent; it takes a certain type of person to look directly into the camera, rather than avoid its peering gaze. Besides, it's hard to have someone looking directly at the camera without using the word 'directly.'

But none of my characters will nod jerkily. I promise you that.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #5 End Chapter Earlier

This is probably my favorite item on our ten-point list, because it's so simple and can be so effective. End Chapter Earlier.

This is a tip I picked up from Robert Dugoni, best-selling author of The Jury Master and a fantastic writing teacher. If you ever get a chance to take a course from him, do it. He's extremely talented, very enthusiastic and an incredibly nice guy. You can learn more about him www.robertdugoni.com.

End Chapter Earlier. We've all heard the axiom, "Start after the beginning and end before the end." While I find this to be a powerful truth for plotting the novel, I need to remember that this applies to each individual scene also. Often times, I find myself ending the chapters with what I think is an excellently written summary, detailing the heroes tension or fear, setting up for my big final sentence. It usually feels good when I'm writing it, but in revising, I've learned to cut it out.

Bob's advice was to go to each chapter and cut out the last paragraph. While that may sound frightening, especially after I've performed one of my beautiful summaries, he's right. It may not apply to every chapter, but more often than not, after I've gone through the chapter, I find that by simply cutting out that last paragraph, the scene ends better. More drama. More tension.

I encourage you to give it a try. Go to each chapter and cut out the last paragraph. Just do it. You can always put it back if it's not right for that scene, but try it. You just might find that it ends a little better.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #4 Tighten Dialogue

Moving on down our list, today's entry is Tighten Dialogue.

Now, we're not going to do a whole, big dialogue entry today. Book's have been written on that; listening to how people speak, making sure each character has their own voice, etc. We're in revision mode remember. (By the way, I'm up to chapter 11 now. Had a great day yesterday. Plenty of time to write and got a lot of work done. Good work. You know the kind; when you finish you really feel like you accomplished something).

Back to the post. Tighten Dialogue.

To me, this means two things.

1) No direct answers. We do it all the time in our writing. Bill asks, "Did you see the paper yet?" and his boss replies, "No. Not yet." Technically, there's nothing wrong here, but it doesn't do anything either. To tighten dialogue, add tension and reveal character, try never to have your character answer a question directly. In real life, we rarely do. We're always to busy thinking about our own stuff to answer someone's question directly.

So how about if we change the above to:
"Did you see the paper yet?"
"That's what I pay you for."

Now we've got something. Bill's boss is revealing character here, impatience, domination, directness. How Bill responds can now really move the scene forward.

No direct answers.

2) Keep it short. Find the beat. Rarely, if ever have one character speak for more than three sentences. In real life, we can rarely get three sentences out (if we had that much to say) before the other person interrupts us with their own thoughts, a question, a burp, whatever.

Keep it short.

That's how I'm tightening my dialogue.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #3 Know Each Character's Motivation

Todays trip down the Ten-Point Revision Strategy lands us at Know Each Character's Motivation.

While this might seem incredibly basic, I find that at times, it's one of the hardest things to do. When we're writing a scene, we usually pay careful attention to our hero's point of view (or the POV of the main character in the scene) but we often ignore the fact that all those little secondary characters also have their own lives, ideas, desires and reasons to be in the scene.

For example. In my novel, Deadly Vision, the hero, Taylor, has many significant scenes in the lab with his research partner, Malcomb. In each scene, I know exactly what Taylor wants and why. His backstory is imprinted in my brain. And I think I know Malcomb as well. He's a little awkward, a brilliant scientist, and a touch of comic relief compared to the much more serious Taylor. But when they're in a scene together, do I really know what Malcomb wants? Or do I know how to make him say things that act as drama compared to what Taylor wants?

In order to really flesh out the novel at this point, I need the answer to be that I know Malcomb as backwards and forwards as Taylor. Sure, I've already created a character profile and history, and written Malcomb's story arc as it will evolve throughout the novel. But what I really need to focus on is that scene. What does Malcomb really want? Why? What is he afraid of?

Just because he's Taylor's partner, doesn't mean they want the same things. Even in the research, they have different reasons, goals, levels of commitment. Now, it's important that I don't drop a big info dump on the reader (see Ten-Point Strategy #1, RUE) to explain why Malcomb wants what he wants, but the point remains, he wants something. We all do. Each scene I write will be clearer if I, and therefore the reader, know what that something is.

Drama and tension comes from the conflict of two people wanting two very different things in the same situation. Not violence or anger. But desire. That is the real fuse for conflict.

Know each of your character's motivations. For each scene. Then let the drama unfold.

The Ten-Point Revision Strategy - #2 Show Don't Tell

This one is an axiom for all fiction writing, regardless of genre.

Show Don't Tell.

I fall into this trap more often than I'd like to admit, and it rears it's ugly heads in a number of ways.

Narrative exposition
Overuse of adverbs
Horrible dialogue tags

All of the above take the reader out of the story as the author insists they step in and make a point. At my writing group last night Les pointed out that three times on the first CD of the Iris Johansen book he was listening to she wrote, "She nodded her head jerkily."

I don't think I've ever nodded my head jerkily. That is lazy writing. That is the author (a mega-bestseller) not taking the time to show us an action, or create a visual through her use of action, and instead relying upon the most clumsy adverb I've ever seen.

Usually, Show Don't Tell, is a corollary to the first point of our Ten Point Revision Strategy; RUE, Resist the Urge to Explain. It is the author feeling that the reader is too stupid to understand why a character is behaving the way they are without first telling us why. It appears in situations like this.

Bill is an angry guy. He get's pissed off all the time, traffic lights, slow Starbucks lines, commercials on T.V. It's just the way he is. But rather than writing what I just did, the way to bring this into a story is to simply show Bill getting mad. It's much more effective at describing the character than telling me that he's an angry guy.

The trick for the good author is to create a situation where we can see Bill getting mad, through action or dialogue, that is actually a part of the story and moves the story forward.

In the end, that's the key to all ten points of our revision strategy. Move the story forward.