Writability

Fixing the First Page Giveaway #23

Photo credit: Rodger_Evans on Flickr

We're halfway through May! Which means it's time for the next Fixing the First Page feature—yay!!

For those who’ve missed before, the Fixing the First Page features is a public first 250 word critique. Using the lovely rafflecopter widget, anyone interested in winning a PUBLIC (as in, featured in a post on this blog) first page critique can enter.

For an example of what this critique will look like, here's the last Fixing the First Page post.

Rules!

ONLY the first 250 words will be critiqued (up to finishing the sentence). If you win and send me more, I will crop it myself. No exceptions.

ONLY the first page. I don’t want 250 random words from your manuscript, or from chapter 3. If you win the critique and send me anything other than the first 250 words of your manuscript, I will choose someone else.

I will actually critique it. Here. On the blog. I will say things as nicely as I can, but I do tend to be a little blunt. If you’re not sure you can handle a public critique, then you may want to take some time to think about it before you enter.

Genre restrictions. I'm most experienced with YA & NA, but I will still accept MG and Adult. HOWEVER. If your first page has any erotic content on it, I ask that you don’t enter. I want to be able to post the critique and the first 250 in its entirety without making anyone uncomfortable, and if you win and you enter a page with erotic content, I will choose someone else.

You must have your first page ready. Should you win, you need to be able to submit your first page within 48 hours of my contacting you to let you know you won. If 48 hours pass and I haven’t heard from you, again, I will choose someone else.

You’ll get the most out of this if it isn’t a first draft. Obviously, I have no way of knowing if you’re handing me a first draft (though I will probably suspect because it’s usually not that difficult to tell). I won’t refuse your page if it’s a first draft, but you should know that this critique will likely be of more use if you’ve already had your betas/CPs look over it. Why? Because if you don’t, the critique I give you will probably contain a lot of notes that your betas & CPs could have/would have told you.

There will not be a round 2 (unless you win again in a future contest). I hate to have to say this, but if you win a critique, it’s NOT an invitation to send me a bunch of your revisions. I wish I had the time available to be able to look at revisions, but sadly, I don’t. If you try to break this rule, I will nicely say no, and also remember to choose someone else should you win a second contest. Which would make me sad. :(

So that’s it! If you’re okay with all of the above and would like to enter to be the twenty-second public critique on Writability, do the thing with the rafflecopter widget below. You have until Wednesday, May 25 at 11:59 EST to enter!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

How to Get Productive

Photo credit: J Dueck on Flickr

So if there's one thing I've learned about setting myself up to have a productive day, is it doesn't just happen on it's own. Productivity is something you have to dedicate yourself to, but sometimes it can be a little hard to focus or hold on to your motivation.

Given that it's important for writers to learn how to make the most of their time, I thought I'd share some productivity tips to help you reach your goals, whatever they may be.

Figure out your zone. One of the best things I did for my productivity was figure out when I work best—which for me is early in the morning. I changed my schedule around and became a morning person so I'd have more early morning hours to get things done, but maybe you'll find your best hours are late at night, or at two in the morning (which isn't uncommon!). The key is to experiment a little and listen to yourself to see generally when you work best.

Establish accountability. As distracting as social media frequently is, it can also be really useful in terms of establishing accountability. This week on Twitter, for example, there's #YAGetsStuffDone in which YA writers of Twitter are announcing their goals for the week and cheering each other on. More consistently, there's myWriteClub, a (free) site with customizable graphs so you can keep track of your goals with various projects and cheer with others as you progress. Even just tweeting a goal you want to get done on Twitter can often bring a little extra motivation, both because you've made your goal public, and because sometimes people will jump in to cheer you on, which is awesome.

Cut out distractions. How you do this is up to you. I usually just close my internet browser and leave it at that (unless I'm using myWriteClub, which I'll explain in the next step), but some people use Self Control to block their access to internet for a given period of time. There's also Forest, which is a mobile app for $1.99 that keeps you from using your phone when you're supposed to be working, which I'm very much considering getting because while I'm good at not opening Twitter on my browser when I'm supposed to be working, I'm not quite as disciplined with my phone. (Forest also has a Chrome version, which I didn't know until just now.) Alternatively, turning my phone face-down on my desk sometimes helps.

When drafting, try writing sprints. If you've never participated in a writing sprint before, it's basically an established chunk of time (sometimes thirty minutes, sometimes an hour), where you try to write as many words as possible. Sometimes if you participate with other people, it can become a competition of sorts, which can be pretty motivating and fun. myWriteClub recently set up a writing sprint section on their site which allows for global sprints that I've really come to love and I wrote about here.

So that about covers my productivity tips. What would you add to the list?

Twitter-sized bites:

Need to boost your daily productivity? @Ava_Jae shares her top productivity tips. #writetip (Click to tweet)

Accountability, reducing distractions, & more make @Ava_Jae's list of productivity-boosters. What would you add? (Click to tweet)

Vlog: On Creating Fantasy Languages

Considering whether or not to create a fantasy language for your book? Not sure where you'd even start? Here are some tips for incorporating a made-up language into your WIP.

RELATED LINKS:

World Building Part 1
World Building Part 2
World Building Part 3
World Building Part 4
How to Make Up a Language for Your WIP (blog post version)

Have you ever created a fantasy language for a WIP? What book has your favorite treatment of made-up language(s)?

Twitter-sized bite:

Want to create a language for a WIP but not sure where to start? @Ava_Jae vlogs abt her language-creation process. (Click to tweet)

5th Blogoversary Giveaway Winners!

Photo credit: lisbeth.k on Flickr

Firstly! The giveaway was a huge success—thank you so much to all of you who entered! My favorite part of the giveaway, AKA the time to make lots of people happy is now here. Behold the winners!

Query critique from Rebecca Donnelly: Aimee Lim
Query critique from Tara Sim: Mary Mount Dunbar
First ten pages critique from Mia Siegert: Isabel
First chapter critique from Rena Olsen: Briana Morgan
Query + first ten pages critique from Amy Trueblood: TJ Ohler
Query + first chapter critique from Emma Adams: Bridgette Johnson
Query + first chapter critique from Kaye Callard: Kira Budge
Query + first chapter critique from Lauren James: Enricoh Alfonzo Naidu
Query + first chapter (up to 10 pages) + 3-page synopsis critique from Lydia Sharp: Andrea D'Eon
Submission Package: query + synopsis + first chapter critique from Phil Stamper: Layne
Submission Package Lite: query + synopsis + first chapter critique from me: Katherine Bogle
Query + first three chapters critique from Shelly Zevlever: Mary Kate
Query + first 50 pages critique from Sarah Glenn Marsh: A.G. Young
First 100 pages critique from Nicole Frail: Quiana Howard
Full MS critique (up to 80,000 words) from Alex Yuschik: Sam Taylor
Full MS critique OR LGBT/Mental Health sensitivity read from Julia Ember: Roxanne Lambie
Full MS critique from L.S. Mooney: Ann Smith
Full MS critique from Kisa Whipkey: Amelia Luke

And the winner of ALL of the books below...

Sword and Verse by Kathy Macmillan
Signed The Last Great Adventure of the PB&J Society by Janet Sumner Johnson
Signed Emerge by Tobie Easton
Signed The Last Cherry Blossom by Kathleen Burkinshaw (releases in August)
Devil and the Bluebird by Jennifer Mason Black
Signed Assassin's Heart by Sarah Ahiers
ARC of The Girl Before by Rena Olsen
Signed Beyond the Red by Ava Jae
Love, Lucas by Chantele Sedgwick
Life Before by Michele Bacon
The Wanderers by Kate Ormand
Divah by Susannah Appelbaum
The Fix by Natasha Sinel
Life Unaware by Cole Gibsen
Love Me Never by Sara Wolf
Cinderella's Shoes by Shonna Slayton

is also Roxanne Lambie!

Thanks again to all who entered and massive congratulations to all of the winners! To those who see their names here, you should be receiving an e-mail very shortly (if it’s not already in your inboxes!). Keep an eye out today!

Finally, if you entered to win a critique but didn't win, I will say I have some openings available for big and small critiques alike, and the grand opening 10% discount is running until May 31st—so feel free to take a look at your options.

That’s it! See you all tomorrow with a new vlog. :)

Discussion: When the Muse Spontaneously Answers

Photo credit: Luke-of-Kondor on Flickr

So while I don't typically subscribe to the writing when you feel like it thing, or only writing when I'm inspired, or anything along those lines, very occasionally I do get spontaneous inspiration. Sometimes it's a line, or a partially developed character, or an image, scene, or potential idea. Or sometimes, like was the case on Tuesday, I'll try to drum up inspiration for one thing and get it for another.

It doesn't happen often or anywhere near reliably. But sometimes giving my brain some focused space to explore leads to some cool results.

Me: *takes a shower to see if it'll help launch plotting ideas for new WIP*
Me: *gets first three paragraphs of new WIP instead*

okay
— Ava Jae (@Ava_Jae) May 10, 2016

In this case I hadn't made any progress on the plotting itself, but I did get some opening paragraphs in third person past tense, which was a surprise because I haven't written third person or past tense for any length in actual years, but given I'm tackling more POVs than I have before with this project, and given the already large cast of characters I have even in these early stages, it makes a lot of sense in hindsight (thanks, brain!).

Of course, I still have to plot the project. And write up to 10,000 words to see if I'm actually going to make the idea a manuscript. But it's still a really cool thing when the muse spontaneously delivers.

But now I'd like to hear from you guys: what gems have your brains spontaneously given you?

Twitter-sized bites:

What spontaneous writing ideas has your brain given you? Join the discussion on @Ava_Jae's blog. (Click to tweet)

How to Write Deep POV

Photo credit: queensu on Flickr

So I've been doing lots of critiquing for clients lately, which means I've been thinking a lot about point of view and how to delve into point of view effectively. I find that this is really essential for a lot of reasons, most importantly because oftentimes when readers find they can't connect to a character, it's because this is missing—the connection to the character on a level that feels real.

Without a connection, readers put a book down—and shallow point of view can often be a big factor into why.

So how do you write deep point of view? How do you establish that connection? While a foolproof, guaranteed system doesn't exist (because, of course, all readers are different), there are five things that play into a point of view that feels real.

Through their eyes. So I wrote a whole post about writing description through character a while back, so I won't reiterate that part in too much detail, but the thing to remember is when you're writing in either first person or limited third, everything should be filtered through the POV character's eyes. Description isn't neutral; it's an extension of the POV character's mind. What seems to be to your character, in their POV, is until later proven not to be.

Thoughts. When writing in close POV, readers should be privy to all of your POV character's thoughts. What they think about other people, their attitudes toward any given situation, how they interpret events around them, etc. Remember to think about what your character is thinking about at any given moment, so we understand what the world and events mean to them.

Emotions. Similarly, whenever something happens to your character, you want to think about how it makes them feel. Missing emotion is a pretty common reason why readers don't connect to characters; after all, it's really hard to empathize with someone who is emotionally shutting you out. This is something I've struggled with in my own writing—in early drafts of Beyond the Red, for example, Kora was so set on being strong that she shut me, the writer, out and made it really hard for me to figure out what she was feeling as the events took place. It took a lot of focused revision and prodding on my part to really delve into her character and get her to show me, and the readers, that she wasn't as cold as she sometimes to seemed to be.

Related to this, however, is making sure that you show your POV character's emotions rather than telling the readers about them. Saying "I was angry" isn't nearly as effective as showing that anger, from the ways it physically affects your character to how it tints their thoughts, dialogue, and actions. I wrote a post about writing emotion effectively a while back focused on this exactly, and I very highly recommend The Emotion Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi, which makes showing emotion exponentially easier.

Physical sensations. From the five senses, to pain, to how emotions physically affect your POV characters, physical sensations are essential to making the readers feel as though they're experiencing what your POV character does. By immersing readers in sensory images as your POV character experiences the world, you'll pull them deeper into your book.

(No) filtering. And last, but not least, removing filter phrases is a great way to strengthen writing and deepen perspective. Filter phrases like "I saw," "she realized," "he felt," "they smelled," etc. all distance readers from the perspective because it adds a layer of writer-speak that subtly reminds the readers they're reading a book. I explain in detail about this in the linked post, so I won't say much more, but limiting the amount of filter phrases you use can be a great way to further deepen POV.

So those are five ways to help forge a connection between your POV character and your readers. It can be a lot of work, and totally something you can save for revisions, by the way, but it's work that I find ultimately pays off every time.

Have you tried any of these methods to deepen character POV in your writing?

Twitter-sized bites:

Struggling to get readers to connect to your characters? @Ava_Jae shares 5 POV-deepening tips. (Click to tweet)

How do you get readers to connect to your characters? @Ava_Jae shares 5 tips. #writetip (Click to tweet)

Vlog: Self vs. Traditional Publishing

What's the difference between self and traditional publishing? Is one choice better than the other? I answer these questions and more in today's vlog.

RELATED LINKS:

On Writing and Income (vlog)
Self vs. Traditional Publishing: STOP ARGUING (vlog)
Do You Need Connections to Get Published? (vlog)
Do You Need a Degree to Get Published? (vlog)
How to Get Traditionally Published (vlog)
Why Does it Take So Long for Books to Get Published? (vlog)
What Authors Control (vlog)
5 Myths About Authoring (vlog)
Self-Publishing: Not a Plan B (vlog)
Self-Publishing: It's Not for Everyone (vlog)
My Publishing Path is My Own (vlog)
5 Publishing Myths That Need to Stop (vlog)
Failing Forward: The Leap from Indie to the Big Five by Danika Stone (vlog)

What differences (or similarities) would you add to the list?

Twitter-sized bite:

What are some differences between self & traditional publishing? @Ava_Jae breaks it down in today's vlog. (Click to tweet)