Giving secrets to our characters sets up plot points for our stories. But secrets do more than that. They add dimension and richness to our characters. Those secrets become the source of our characters’ vulnerabilities, and often their strengths as well. They get in the way of relationships; or they enhance them. They can put the lives of our characters in danger; and they can enable our characters to escape those perils.
Today’s Quick-Tip Tuesday post at Magical Words grows out of a course I’m teaching for Odyssey Online. The course is called “Point of View: The Intersection of Character and Plot,” and I’m having a great time teaching it.
The post that went up this morning is on giving secrets to our characters as a way of making them deeper, richer, and more interesting. I hope you find it helpful and interesting. You can find the post here.
The first step is to remember that despite the way the “Plotter v. Pantser” debate is usually framed, we don’t have to approach this decision as an either-or proposition. I know people who don’t outline at all; I know people who don’t feel comfortable writing a novel with anything less than a fifteen to twenty page outline. I usually work somewhere between these two extremes. As most people do. Again, it’s not either-or; rather it’s a choice that exists along a continuum.
It’s Quick-Tip Tuesday, and in today’s post over at Magical Words I take on the Plotter v. Pantser debate, with what I think might be a third way. This post is personal for me this time around, because I’m dealing with the issue in my own writing. I hope you enjoy the post and find it helpful. You can read it here.
Best of luck, and keep writing!
With that in mind, I would like to suggest that you use the idea of the narrative theme to stir your imagination.
It can be really hard to come up with an idea on demand for just a generic a story. On the other hand, it can be much easier to come up with a story idea with a little bit more of a hint. In other words, create your own prompts.
Today’s Quick-Tip Tuesday post is up at Magical Words. This week’s unsolicited, free, you-get-what-you-pay-for advice is on the subject of story ideas. I hope you find it useful.
Keep writing!
To repeat something I have said many times before, there is no single right way to do any of this. You have to discover your own creative path. My purpose in writing these Quick Tips each Tuesday will be to help you find that path.
Happy 2016! I’m excited for a new year, filled with new challenges and opportunities. And one of the things that has me most excited is my return as a regular at the Magical Words blog site, with a feature I’m calling “Quick-Tip Tuesdays.” Every Tuesday, I’ll be at the site with a short post highlighting some writing tip.
The first post is up today and can be found here. I hope you enjoy it!
Books, stories, writing ephemera
