GIVEAWAY!

No, I'm still on hiatus, but I wanted to share a little something.  

An Alleged Author

is holding a GIVEAWAY!

Just hop on over to her blog and comment on this post and

you will automatically be entered to win a FREE

PRINT or Ebook copy of

The Mistaken!

How easy is that?!!

a Cover RE-Reveal and a SALE!

Dropping in for a quick post, a RE-reveal of my very dear friend, Julie Richman’s debut,

Searching for Moore

Julie decided to give the dashing Schooner Moore a makeover, of sorts.  Isn’t he purty?!!  Yes, those bare-chested cover boys get me every time. 

But Julie’s not done yet.  Along with a little primping, Julie’s slashed her price down to

99 cents

for a few days only!
So you can get your Schooner on for less than a buck! 

Find Searching for Moore on:

Amazon Kindle   B&N Nook   Goodreads

Here’s the low down: 

Attended by reality TV star wannabes and Southern California social climbers, Schooner Moore knows the party his wife is throwing for his forty-third birthday has little to do with him and everything to do with her social standing in Orange County. The evening turns out to hold more surprises than just his wife's Botoxed friends groping at his privates, when a conversation with his old college roommate, Beau, reveals the biggest surprise of the night.

Beau has had contact on Facebook with Mia Silver. Just hearing her name sends Schooner into a tailspin, as he is now just a Friend Request away from the one who got away when she disappeared without a goodbye, leaving him wondering why she left.

A serial failure at romance, Manhattan boutique ad agency owner, Mia, gets a blindside of her own when a Facebook Friend Request from first love, Schooner, appears in her email. Going with her gut reaction, Mia hits accept, propelling her past to catch up with her in a New York minute, as a forceful Schooner is determined to understand what tore them apart and to explore the possibility of a second chance at love.

From a 1980's Southern California college campus and a devastating first love to present day New York City, Searching for Moore explores how technology has eradicated the divide between our past and our present, and asks whether you would give up everything to reconnect with The One in a single keystroke?

And a little sumpm sumpm about my girl, Julie: 

Author Julie A. Richman is a native New Yorker living deep in the heart of Texas. A creative writing major in college, reading and writing fiction has always been a passion. Julie began her corporate career in publishing in NYC and writing played a major role throughout her career as she created and wrote marketing, advertising, direct mail and fundraising materials for Fortune 500 corporations, advertising agencies and non-profit organizations. She is an award winning nature photographer plagued with insatiable wanderlust. Julie and her husband have one son and a white German Shepherd named Juneau.

Find Julie on:

Goodreads   Website   Facebook   Twitter

Aberration Book Launch and Bloghop!

Today’s the big day, the release of Lisa Regan’s

second novel, the super creepy crime thriller,
Aberration.

I LOVE this book, and actually had a bit of a hand in it, working extensively with Lisa over the last couple years to help her get it just right.  And oh, how right it is!!  Go read my Amazon review here.

And now, to celebrate this momentous occasion, Lisa is hosting the Aberration Bloghop.  On June 6^th  & 7^th, participants will list their top 5 choices for the most aberrant characters in fiction, television, or movies.  If you're a writer, feel free to include a short paragraph about your own aberrant character.

Participants will be entered to win an Amazon gift card for either $25, $15, or $10, plus, 1 of 3 signed copies of the Aberration paperback and 1 of 5 ebooks.  How cool is that?!

Here’s my entry:

#5 - Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey

A cold, heartless monster who revels in her power over those in desperate need of compassion.

#4 - Max Cady in Cape Fear (formerly The Executioners) by John D. MacDonald

I love revenge stories, but this guy is insanely twisted and obsessed.

#3 - Tom Ripley from The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith

A seriously insecure and manipulative psychopath who gets away with murder.

#2 - Professor Joe Carroll, from the FOX television series The Following. 

Played by deliciously sexy Brit, James Purefoy, Joe is a diabolical serial killer who creates a cult of serial killers, and turns the act of murder into a pseudo-sexual experience for himself and his followers. 

#1 - Hannibal, from the NBC television series (based on Thomas Harris’ character in Red Dragon,) 

This character is suave, charismatic, and brilliant.  He loves the culinary arts, and, when not assisting the FBI in solving serial murder cases, prepares extraordinary carnivorous meals for his friends and colleagues.  Trouble is and unbeknownst to his guests, the main ingredients are harvested from his many victims.  The food preparation and dining scenes, while beautifully choreographed and filmed, totally gross me out.  

Those are all long-standing villains, of course, but if you want to sink your teeth into a few new members of this elite Club Aberration, check out Lisa’s books.  

Finding Claire Fletcher has the worst kind of monster, one who preys on children.

  

And in Aberration, you’re dumped deep into the psychopathic mind of an obsessive creep who’ll have you constantly looking over your shoulder for crazed stalkers.

Powered by Linky Tools
Click here to enter your link and view this Linky Tools list...

IWSG: Blazing a New Trail and Meeting a New Friend!

It’s the first Wednesday of the month.

Time for Alex J. Cavanaugh’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group.

This last month has been a mixed bag for me.  Some ups.  Some downs.  It all levels out in the end.  At least, I hope it will.  My worst bit of news is something I can’t really share, not without possibly hurting those who’ve been good to me thus far, even if I now find myself in a big, dark, black hole of insecurity. 

What I can share is that I sold the audio rights to my novel, The Mistaken, to Cherry Hill Publishing.  Just look, The Mistaken has been added to their website's homepage as “In Development”. 

Pretty cool, right?  Now, I’ve never listened to an audio book before.  But then again, I’d never read an ebook before I was published either. 

Anyway, before signing, I found out a few interesting facts about CHP.  In the past, their catalog has consisted primarily of public domain titles—think Moby Dick, War of the Worlds and Pride and Prejudice.  Because of this, they have 100% coverage of the US public library market.  That’s huge!  100%! 

Now, CHP is venturing into the world of private titles, such as my own.  Besides physical forms (CD), they distribute electronically via Audible and iTunes, where most people purchase from these days.  Best of all, out of the blue, this publisher came to me, instead of me querying them.  That was very gratifying, let me tell you, and definitely helped relieve some of my insecurity.

So now, in 7 or 8 months, barring any problems, I should have an audiobook version available of The Mistaken!  That’s very exciting to me and helps make up for the rather devastating news I received a couple weeks ago.  Like I said, it all kind of levels out.

In addition to that good news, I got to meet one of my online bloggy buddies & Facebook friends.  None other than the vivacious Tammy Theriault!  We’d been emailing and FB messaging and texting a lot lately, and have grown to be good friends, though only virtually, as in the Internet, even though we only live about an hour or so apart, something I only recently discovered.

Well, on Saturday, I noticed Tammy had posted a picture of a Bellevue, WA landmark on her Facebook page, so I suspected she was very near my home.  I commented on her photo, and the next thing I knew, like an hour later, we were having lunch together at Outback! 

And you know what, we clicked.  Just like that.  Very natural.  Very easy.  Very comfortable.  I had a blast!  My only regret was that she had to run home after only 90 minutes—long drive and all.  But I’m thrilled to have met in person yet another “virtual” friend, and another writer, not to mention one so genuinely sweet and terribly funny!

That’s just the kind of fuel I need to get me through those insecure days.

Happy June, you guys!

Donna K. Weaver's "A Change of Plans" Blog Tour!

When twenty-five-year-old Lyn sets off on her cruise vacation, all she wants is to forget that her dead fiancé was a cheating scumbag. What she plans is a diversion uncomplicated by romance. What she gets is Braedon, an intriguing young surgeon. He's everything her fiancé wasn't, and against the backdrop of the ship's make-believe world, her emotions come alive.

Unaware of the sensitive waters he navigates, Braedon moves to take their relationship beyond friendship—on the very anniversary Lyn came on the cruise to forget. Lyn's painful memories are too powerful, and she runs off in a panic.

But it's hard to get away from someone when you're stuck on the same ship. Things are bad enough when the pair finds themselves on one of the cruise's snorkeling excursions. Then paradise turns to piracy when their party is kidnapped, and Lyn's fear of a fairy tale turns grim.

Find it: Amazon | B&N | Goodreads | Rhemalda Store

Genre: New Adult / Adult Contemporary Romance

About Donna K. Weaver:

Donna is a Navy brat who joined the Army and has lived in Asia and Europe.

Because she sailed the Pacific three times as a child, she loves cruising and wishes she could accrue enough vacation time to do more of it with her husband.

Donna and her husband have six children and eight grandchildren who live all over the world.
At fifty, Donna decided to study karate and earned her black belt in Shorei Kempo.

After recording city council minutes for twenty years, Donna decided to write something a little longer and with a lot more emotion--and kissing.

Facebook | Goodreads | Twitter | Website

What people are saying about A CHANGE OF PLANS...

"A Change of Plans will keep readers up way too late in this fast-paced tale of love lost and found again." ~Melanie Jacobson, author of The List, Not My Type, Twitterpated, and Smart Move

"A Change of Plans is lots of romance sprinkled with pirates, shipwreck and adventure. Donna Weaver spins a tale that you will fall in love with, think about for days afterward, and then go back and read again. I laughed, I cried, and I couldn't put it down." ~Betsy Love author of Identity and Soulfire

"A captivating tale of love, grief, and hope that will tug at your heartstrings until the very end." ~Laura Josephson, author of the Rising series and Confessions from the Realm of the Underworld

"When someone says pirates and novel in the same sentence, I usually say, "Thanks, but no." Not in this case. Ms. Weaver brings a warm humor to her story of romance, travel and overcoming skeletons in one's past with her vivid characters and delightful scenes." ~Shaunna Gonzales, author of Dark Days of Promise

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Rafflecopter Grab-it link

Add to Facebook

Happy AND Healthy!

Hey, I’m back!  No, not really, but I do have a couple things on the calendar today.

First, Alex Cavanaugh, Stephen Tremp, L. Diane Wolfe, and Michael Di Gesu have teamed up for a Blog Hop that focuses on health.

This is an issue with many bloggers who have expressed gaining weight over the holidays and other negative health issues that they are dealing with. Here is a Blog Hop that can help us make 2013 a year that we can help turn the tides!

The Objective: Share with everyone something you have done that affected your health in a positive way. You can share an awesome low cal low fat tasty recipe. Post simple tips to lose weight. Or a testimony on what has helped like joining Weight Watchers. Recommend a routine like P90X or Insanity. Or stretches one can do while sitting in their office chair working or writing. We’re sure people have countless great tips and ideas they would love to share. 

Well, I can’t say I’m the healthiest writer on the planet, ‘cause I’m so NOT, but a few years ago, before I started writing, and after I’d gained too much weight to be comfortable with, I joined up with Positive Changes to help get my head back into proper perspective.  PC is a hypnosis center, and before you scoff, it really, REALLY works!

My father used hypnosis to get over a 30 year smoking habit.  He did so in two weeks, cold turkey, without any problem whatsoever.  So I decided to give it a try for weight loss, since that’s what PC specializes in and is most noted for. 

I went in for monthly hypnosis sessions, about 30 to 45 minutes each, which were recorded to a CD that I uploaded to iTunes and put on my iPod.  I listened to that recording every single day.  Plus, I attended weekly classes they offered on nutrition and exercise.  That’s what the sessions focused on, as well.  From there, I found it easy to focus on my diet and exercise and I lost over 50 pounds in 8 months. 

So if you have a problem committing yourself to eating better and exercising everyday, consider hypnosis.  I really does work!  During your sessions, you are always in total control and are completely aware.  It’s all about relaxation and being open to suggestion.  That’s it.  Of course, you have to stay vigilant, even after your program is complete.  I’ll always have my session recordings to listen to whenever I want or need to.

Second, I’m way out of practice on this sort of thing but…I was tagged by the effervescent Tammy Theriault in the Happy Meme and have been nominated for the Happy Award!  

Must be all that happy dancin’ I’m always doing on Facebook every time someone posts an awesome review! 

Not much to this one, really, just thank the one who tagged you—THANKS TAMMY!!—list 5 things that make me happy, and tag five more shiny, happy people.  So here goes…

5 things that make me happy:  having my son back home for college, watching my 125-pound  submissive snow dog play with my 7-pound alpha cat, having writer friends who understand the joys and pitfalls of publishing, selling the audio rights to my book, when readers tell me how much they enjoyed my story.

Tag, you’re it:

• Alex Cavanaugh, who, I know, never does these sorts of things, but come on!  Who else do you know who always seems so happy?  

• Donna Weaver, who’s only days away from releasing her debut!  How could she NOT be happy?

• Heather M. Gardner, another happy, soon to be published author!

• Mary Pax, who’s the most prolific author I know.  No wonder she’s always smiling!

• L. Diane Wolfe, who always seems to have her act together, which = happiness

I'll be back on Monday for Donna's launch, next Wednesday for the IWSG, and then on Thursday for Lisa Regan’s Aberration Bloghop which has lots of cool prizes!!  Until then...

IWSG: My Daily Addiction

It’s the first Wednesday of the month, time for

Alexj J Cavanaugh’s Insecure Writer’s Support Group.

Hi, my name is Nancy and I am an addict…

I never wrote my novel with publishing in mind.  It was simply a lark, something I wanted to accomplish.  Once I got into it, though, I found I loved it.  Keep in mind, I knew nothing about writing fiction, but I did have a good education and was an avid reader.

I was fortunate enough to have all the critical plot points, so once I was finished and thought, “Hey, I might have something here,” all I needed to do was research what it takes to get published.  Trouble was, there was a lot on that list.  But I did it.  I jumped through most of the hoops.

I found querying to be an especially brutal one, demoralizing, really.  But I made it through, not the wholly traditional way—I bypassed the agent—yet I still managed to snag a book deal.  I thought, after edits are done, I’ll have all the hard parts behind me.  Yeah, not so much. 

I always thought publishing would bring me this huge sense of accomplishment, that I’d be nothing but happy, happy, happy.  But then I became obsessed.  Addicted.  It’s a daily struggle really.  They don’t tell you that once you’re published it’s all about selling.  But I didn’t know how to do that.  Marketing is not in my tool belt.  I’ve had to learn as I go, and I’ve learned I suck.  But still, I make progress, even though it is a struggle.

To gauge that war, I check my rankings on Amazon, constantly, both US and UK.  I hop on Goodreads to see how many people have added my book to their TBR list, how many new ratings, new reviews.  Same with Amazon.  I’m always worrying about where the next review will come from, will it suck, will it be amazing?  Will it spike my sales? 

So, as you can imagine, each day brings either a huge high of happiness or a face-planting low of failure.  One day, I’m up, the next, I’m down.  Some days, it’s up and down and up and down all within a few hours.  Oh cool, a great 5-star review on Amazon, YAY!  Let’s watch my book climb up Amazon’s Top-Rated in Romantic Suspense list, or Mysteries and Suspense, where it can really be seen.  Happy dance time!  Then I watch as my ranking gets higher and higher, which, of course, means no one has bought a copy that day.  When it goes above a certain threshold, I practically have a coronary. 

It’s driving me CRAZY!!!  I feel like an addict who craves the bottle or the needle or the pipe.  The information on Amazon and Goodreads is my drug.  I have to know.  I have to know!  Now, now, now! 

Well, I’ve reached my breaking point, I think.  I can’t do it any more.  I’ve had a lot of highs in the last week.  One of them was that my fans expect another book.  My readers message, email, text, and Facebook me, telling me this, yet I sit on my ass and obsess over numbers and rankings, and I’m getting nothing done.  I’ve been told, it’s easier to sell if you have multiple titles.  Well, that’s what I want to focus on, giving my readers another roller coaster to ride.

So I’m disconnecting, pulling back from the Internet.  Not completely.  But a lot.  I’ll still try to post to my blog on Mondays, but only if I have something important to say.  I won’t be around as much, to chat and comment, but I’ll be lurking.  I don’t want what I’ve been experiencing to be what publishing is all about for me.  I want that feeling I had way back in the beginning, when I sat at my desk, writing my book, living with my characters, creating a brand new world.

My name is Nancy, and I am a writer.  So watch me write.      

A to Z Challenge: Z is for Zealous

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s an emotion day!  Or, perhaps, more accurately, an EMOTIONAL day, ‘cause it’s over.

This is the end.  The letter Z.  The Omega.  And just like last year, I am tired.  Beyond tired.  So much so, I can barely think.  So have a little patience with my very last A to Z Challenge post.  Okay, here goes…

__________

Z is for Zeal:  fervor of a person, cause, or object; eager desire or endeavor; enthusiastic diligence; ardor       

Yesterday, I wrote about yearning and how to effectively convey a character’s yearning, no matter how despicable, in such a way as to make the reader not only sympathize with him, but empathize, as well, even going so far as to want the same thing.

One of the best attributes a character—and his author—can employ to indoctrinate the reader in this way is with zeal.  A character, and again, his author, must utilize their confidence and utter conviction in whatever cause or yearning they are fighting for. 

Of course, zeal requires knowledge, but knowledge without understanding can come off as madness.  Just look at the very definition of a zealot—one who is excessively enthusiastic, a fanatic.  It’s what we call those crazies who protest war by bombing the innocent. 

So while your characters, and you, as their creator, should express a certain amount of zeal in order to impress your reader with the characters’ cause, make sure you not only believe it, no matter how awful it is, but understand it, as well.  Readers can detect a writer who simply phones it in.

With that said, I hope you have enjoyed my A to Z Challenge series.  I think it will probably be my last one.  Thanks to all of you who dropped by for a visit and left a comment.  You are the reason I saw it through to the end.  I will be back tomorrow for another IWSG entry and next week for my A to Z Reflections post.  

Until then...Goodbye and God bless!

A to Z Challenge: Y is for Yearning

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s an emotion day!

__________

Y is for Yearning:  a deep longing, especially when accompanied by tenderness or sadness

I think yearning is likely at the core of every plot ever imagined.  It’s what drives the characters, their yearning for whatever it is they want or need.  It’s at the heart of every human being.  We each have our own dreams, our own desires, and we yearn for them to come true, to be made whole, to be fully realized. 

The key to making your reader accept your character’s yearning is to not only have them sympathize with his underlying belief system, but fully empathize, as well.  That which makes us each unique also forms our personal mythos, and those internal principles define not only how we perceive the world, but how we react to it and the choices we make.

So the writer must indoctrinate the reader to a certain extent, temporarily instilling the character’s ideology into the mind of reader.  For that to happen, the yearning, his choice, his desires, must make sense, or at least the author has to make it seem like it makes sense. 

I believe a strong and very close POV helps with this difficult task.  It’s why I write in first person and not third.  I deal with some pretty horrific human flaws and frailties in my novels.  Hard for most people to comprehend and commiserate with.  But if I can get the reader to live in the protagonist’s head, she’s more likely to understand where he’s coming from, to accept that’s what’s best, to hope and pray he achieves it, even yearn for it herself.

How do you make your readers understand your characters’ yearnings?      

A to Z Challenge: X is for Xenophobic

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s an emotion day!

__________

X is for Xenophobic:  Unreasonably fearful of or hating anyone or anything foreign; irrationally fearful of that which is strange; intolerant, prejudice

Oy—X!  What to do for X.  There are no grammar topics for X, and xenophobia is the only emotion word I could think of.  I’ve never had to deal with it myself in any of my own writing, but after last week’s bombings during the 2013 Boston Marathon and the revelations since, I thought it relevant.

Wikipedia says “Xenophobia can manifest itself in many ways involving the relations and perceptions of an ingroup towards an outgroup, including a fear of losing identity, suspicion of its activities, aggression, and desire to eliminate its presence to secure a presumed purity.”

I think this can be applied to both the young terrorists as well as those in this country who automatically jumped to conclusions about who they were and why they did what they did.  It’s about being conditioned, either by those we are closest to or by events that have somehow affected our lives and shaped our worldview.

Xenophobia is about mistrust and fear, anger and hatred, anxiety and worry.  It’s more than just being prejudiced.  It’s having a totally biased opinion of an entire culture and is a relatively new phenomena since the media has made our world a very small place. 

We are fully aware now, and that awareness sometimes makes us uncomfortable, because awareness does not mean we understand. In fact, this awareness makes many feel threatened because they do not understand; they do not agree with that culture’s way of life, whether that life is defined by race, creed, or sexuality. 

None of us like to think that we share or exhibit any form of xenophobia, but think about it for a moment.  When those bombings happened in Boston, did you instantly point to any one group as responsible?  Did you believe religion to be at the core?  Were you surprised by who the culprits really were and why they did it?  Truth is, it’s human nature to be suspicious of those we do not understand, because we are tribal and feel the most comfortable around those most like ourselves. 

I think what’s relevant here is what is reasonable, and while we all might exhibit tribal tendencies from time to time, we also know right from wrong, what is rational and what is unacceptable.  That’s the big difference between xenophobes and the rest of us.

A to Z Challenge: W is for Worry

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s an emotion day!

__________

W is for Worry:  to torment oneself with or suffer from disturbing thoughts; to torment with cares or anxiety; plagued by fret.

We’ve all experienced that dreadful feeling of anxiety eating at our gut.  It’s kind of like fear, but more about what we don’t know, what might happen, expectation.  Anticipation.  When including it in our writing, I think it helps to show the entire process, from the first nagging thoughts to full-blown terror, if that’s where the situation leads. 

But try not to hit your reader over the head with it all at once.  Worry calls for a bit of subtlety, easing into it at first, antagonizing the anxiety with outside forces, then ratcheting it up until the character breaks into a more extreme emotion, like fear, or somehow finds relief. 

There is a plethora of ways in which to show the reader how a character experiences worry.  I bite my nails, chew on the inside of my cheeks, or pull my hair out, strand by stand.  Others pace or chain smoke, rub hands through their hair or scrub down their face, they blink and fidget, or just stare out into space with a furrowed brow, their lip drawn in between their teeth as they wring their hands or crack their knuckles. 

The list is extensive, and I do think a few should be employed to reinforce the feeling, but since worry is such an internalized emotion, a lot of the wordplay might be better suited to the character’s internal monologue, the questions that plague him, what might happen, the consequences, and how he will handle it. 

But when the worry is being shared between two or more characters, the best way to express it is with dialogue that barks back and forth, snapping questions, demanding answers, challenging accountability, even to the point of quarreling or perhaps an awkward silence.

In The Mistaken, I have one scene where the main character anxiously awaits a call from his wife after a day of bickering. He answers every call, hoping it might be her.  When he discovers she’s been in a horrific accident, he barges into the emergency room, calling out her name in high-pitched hysteria.  Then, as he watches the medical team futilely attempt life-saving procedures on her, he reacts internally as if each maneuver is being performed on him instead.

The book is packed with anxiety-riddled scenes where the characters worry about who’s out to get them, how close they’re getting, and how they’ll ever manage to stay alive against unimaginable and insurmountable odds. 

Have you ever written a worry-filled scene?  What imagery did you depend on to bring that anxiety to life?

A to Z Challenge: V is for Verb

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s a grammar day!

__________

V is for Verb:  in language, a class of words that typically express action, state, or a relation between two things, and that which may be inflected for tense, aspect, voice, mood, and to show agreement with their subject or object.

There are a dozen topics I could discuss in regards to the almighty verb.  Just look at this list of verb types: Causative, copula, ditransitive, dynamnic, finite, inchoative, intransitive, irregular, modal, non-finite, performative, phrasl, regular, stative, and transitive.

I even hit on one type in my discussion of tense last Tuesday, but I think I’ll keep this limited to the issues I see most often when editing.  Primarily—and, as writers, we’ve all been warned against this—the biggest issue I see is the use of passive verbs versus active ones.  

First, allow me to show the difference. 

• Active:  I threw the ball.    The subject (I) performs the action (threw) on the object (the ball)
• Passive:  The ball was thrown by me.  The subject (ball) receives the action (was thrown) instead of performing it and is typically aided by a helping verb (is, was, been, are, were.)
• Inert:  The ball is round.  The verb “is” describes a state of being and is neither active nor passive.

Now, allow me to say one more thing—passive verbs are not necessarily wrong, but they do weaken the sentence.  And a sentence with a passive voice uses far more words than one with an active voice.  Compound this by every sentence in your manuscript, and you’ve got a lot of space taken up by wasted words, space where you could explore plot and character more deeply with active verbs.

There is another form of passive verb I see quite often.  And honestly, I use it myself.  Everyone does.  For the most part, it’s not too egregious, that is, if you don’t overuse it and if revising it to the more active form changes the meaning or doesn’t quite fit.  I’m talking about the use of gerunds or –ing verbs. 

Why say her shoulders were shaking when her shoulders shook will work?  But if you say her life was unraveling at the seams, it really doesn’t work to revise it to her life unraveled at the seams, because you’re trying to show something currently happening in the moment, not in the past, even though the story is told in the past.  Make sense?  I know, it’s confusing, and that’s why so many writers have a problem with it, including me.

Do you overuse passive verbs or have a hard time identifying them in your own writing? 

A to Z Challenge: U is for Unnecessary Words

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

I’ll be sharing mostly what I’ve learned about writing emotion into a novel, but I’ll also be throwing in a few key grammar lessons, pet peeves I’ve picked up while working as an editor.

Today’s a grammar day!  (Sort of.)

__________

U is for Unnecessary words:  words that are not essential or requisite; indispensable

Thomas Jefferson once said, “Don’t use two words when one will do.”  After missing commas and the overuse of present participle phrases, the use of unnecessary words is probably the third most common mistake I see as an editor. 

I think this is because, as writers, we love words—our words—and if we happen to compose a beautiful string of them, we loathe deleting a single one.  We believe it’s perfect just the way it is, so eloquent, so clever, so impressive.  But if you can remove one of those words and have the meaning remain intact, then it’s unnecessary. 

George Orwell once said, “If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.”  Less is always better, because words that don’t contribute meaning to a sentence actually weaken it instead. 

Orwell also said, “Never use a long word where a short one will do.”  When William Faulkner criticized Ernest Hemingway for his narrow use of words, Hemingway replied, “Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words? He thinks I don’t know the ten-dollar words. I know them all right. But there are older and simpler and better words, and those are the ones I use.”

I could go on and on, but that would be counterintuitive, wouldn’t it?  So I’ll leave you with this:  Read each and every sentence you’ve written again and again.  If there is a simpler way to write it with shorter and fewer words, do it. 

Do you find you can often delete a certain amount of words in your own writing without altering the meaning?  Do you do it or leave them because you find them pretty or witty?

A to Z Challenge: T is for Tense

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s a grammar day!

But first, check out this review by Literary Mania Reviews.
And please, give her a follow.
She’s an up and coming book blogger with LOTS of Facebook likers.  And if you know anything about the power of book bloggers on FB, you'll get why that's so important. ;)

__________

T is for Tense:  in grammar, a category of verbal inflection that serves chiefly to specify the time of the action or state expressed by the verb; a category that locates a situation in time: past, present, or future

Writers and readers alike have definite preferences in verb tense, typically past, which is the most common, or present, which is becoming ever more popular, especially in Middle Grade and Young Adult genres.  Keep in mind, these tenses can also be more specifically broken down into either simple or non-auxiliary verbs (I sit, I sat, or I will sit), perfect or auxiliary verbs (I have sat, I had sat, or I will have sat), or progressive or auxiliary gerund (I am sitting, I was sitting, or I will be sitting.)

Some say present tense feels more immediate, more in the moment, and I can see the logic in that.  The narrator is telling the story as if it’s happening right then and there.  Personally, I find it distracting and that it actually has the opposite effect, taking me out of the story rather than pulling me in. 

I’m not sure why exactly.  Maybe because my logical brain is telling me that the action is obviously not happening right then and there.  I find it more believable that the narrator has just come from a harrowing event and is retelling it—in the past tense.  

This is probably why present tense is more convincing in MG and YA, because young minds don’t rely on this rationale.  Everything is in the moment for them.  With very little in their personal past, it’s all an adventure.  But for adults, it’s more about escape, and past tense seems to work better in that respect.  Still, like most aspects of literature, it’s very subjective, much the same way narration point-of-view is subjective.

But no matter what you prefer, if you’re a writer, you have to be careful to maintain verb tense consistency.  That is to say, don’t waffle back and forth between present and past.  I know that might seem obvious to most of you—it certainly does to me—but you’d be surprised how often I see it when editing manuscripts, sometimes within one sentence.  So perhaps it’s not obvious to everyone. 

Which tense do prefer to write and read in?  Do you ever have trouble maintaining tense?  If so, do you have any tricks you’d like to share?

Psst…don’t forget to check out the review!

A to Z Challenge: S is for Sympathy

Welcome to the 2013 A to Z Challenge!

This year, I’m focusing on two themes:  Emotions and grammar,

depending on which letter we’re on each day.

Today’s an emotion day!

__________

S is for Sympathy:  harmony of or agreement in feeling between persons; the fact or power of sharing feelings of another, especially in sorrow or trouble; compassion, commiseration.   

Sympathy and empathy are closely related, but the difference between them is this:  When you actually experience another person’s feelings within yourself, that is empathy.  When you do not feel it, yet still experience compassion for them, that is sympathy.  This is something I use a lot in my novel, The Mistaken.

The main male character commits a heinous offense against the main female one.  You’d think she’d despise him for it, but, after learning the reasons behind his actions, she actually feels sorry for him.  But if you think about it, sympathy is a difficult emotion to effectively convey without the character coming off as simply uncomfortable with the situation. 

When you come across someone who is suffering, you feel obligated to offer a hug or a rub along the back, to spew polite platitudes of sympathy, because you feel bad for them.  “I’m sorry.  I’m here for you.  It’s probably for the best.  How can I help?”  Sounds nice, but it’s hardly comforting and only serves to make the speaking character feel more at ease with the situation. 

I think one effective way to demonstrate sympathy is to attempt to bridge that gap toward empathy.  While it might be impossible for the character to truly feel what the other is feeling, she can certainly imagine herself in that position, say, if her husband had died in tragic circumstances.  True, her spouse is alive and well, but what if he were not?  How would she feel if something she had done had indirectly led to his death? 

In The Mistaken, the female character observes her attacker’s remorse and regret.  It’s plainly etched on his face.  She sees a level of fragility and vulnerability there and it makes the mother in her ache at what has caused it. 

But what makes her truly sympathize with him is how closely her own life has paralleled his, how her husband’s betrayal had made her feel so many of the same emotions, and how easy it would have been for her to give in and give herself over to revenge.  While she feared him, her heart held a degree of sympathy, telling her to be compassionate toward his tortured soul.  “There but for the grace of God,” she says to herself. 

And that, I think, is what sympathy is all about—There but for the grace of God.