GUEST POST: The Fermentation of a Writer

Susan Kaye Quinn is at-home-mom, environmental engineer, rocket scientist, writer, elected official, and the proprietress of Ink Spells, where she discusses her adventures in motherhood, writing, and the best books for children ages 8-12. She is getting ready to query a middle-grade science fiction novel called BYRNE RISK, and is digging her way through the second draft of OPEN MINDS, a young adult paranormal story (no vampires!).

Story ideas require a latency time, to sit and stew and form in your mind. Whole manuscripts are better left fallow for a while, before coming back to them with the revisionist scalpel. But I believe a writer also needs to ferment, to age and mature their craft. Just like the tiny microbes attacking the complex sugars in a fine wine, this is not a passive process. Writers need to actively push their maturation forward, or they might write much, but learn little.

A while ago, I came across a blog posting by agent Rachelle Gardner, talking about the three things agents look for in order to say “yes” to a novel: Story, Craft, and Voice. This post resonated with me as I was searching for a way to push myself to the next level of writing.

Story was something that I felt I had a reasonable handle on, although I still struggle with endings and delivering on the promise of my premise.


Voice seemed elusive for the longest time. A muse would show up on occasion, sprinkle something resembling voice into my story, and then disappear on a vaporous wind.

I hate muses.

They never come when you call, and they mess with your head, alternately making you think you’re a genius or capable only of dreck. So, late last year I set out on a 50,000 word adventure in voice, otherwise known as National Novel Writing Month. Phase One of my discovery of voice occurred then, when I found that the frenetic, nearly free-form writing required by wild word output is conducive (for me) to finding an authentic voice for my characters. Phase Two of voice discovery came later, when I tried to amp up my craft.


Craft is beguiling. You think your craft is moderately acceptable, only to find later, after the fermentation process has matured your writing process a little more, that you are capable of writing oh so much better. I blogged before about my Tale of Two Pants adventure in discovering the mechanics of craft, and I highly recommend Joseph Williams’ Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace: "How you begin a sentence determines its clarity; how you end it determines its rhythm and grace."

Having spent a lot of time writing non-fiction before ever attempting fiction (which is harder!), I felt like I had just enough competence in putting a sentence together to be dangerous. I could write something that was passable, possibly even good, and occasionally great, but not with any regularity. But if I were to be a writer, I needed to have a toolbox and to know how to use the tools intentionally, without mangling my manuscript. After a three-month intensive discovery of craft, I now feel more competent in putting those sentences together.

I now understand how to put your emphasis on the stress position of a sentence. I see the power of ending your sentence with a noun. And I feel competent playing with the delicate arts of breaking rules, splitting infinitives, and earning the trust of your reader through clarity.

But I didn’t expect that Craft would help me find, keep, and enunciate my Voice. Ah, Serendipity, we meet again!

I’m a long ways from being a fine wine (or writer!), but a year+ of writerly growth has taught me that I will continue to improve as long as I keep striving to learn.

Which of the three columns of craft, voice, and story is your weakest? And what techniques have you used along the way to improve them?

Cause & Effect

I'm on to a new writing book this week, one recommended by Gary Corby. Scene and Structure by Jack Bickham is full of all sorts of writerly advice and since I'm a teacher and firm believer that we don't remember much unless we less teach it, I've got a little lesson for you today on Cause and Effect.

According to Bickham, fiction must make more sense than real life. If it doesn't, the reader isn't going to buy into it. How many times have you read a book and thought, "Oh yeah, isn't it a nice coincidence that the vampire hunter just happened to bump into the evil vampire henchman at the grocery store so he could chop off his head?"

Okay, maybe that's a bad example.

Point is, you can't use the easy way out when you write. I distinctly recall a YA novel I read a while back where the heroine and her boyfriend went to fight the bad guy at the end. The boyfriend went into the school and told her to stay in the car. After a while, the girl went in after him, found the bad guy, and beat him. The boyfriend had just disappeared for half an hour in an easy ploy to let the heroine kick the protagonist's eternal tush.

I was not impressed.

The example Bickman uses is having a character fall ill. While this could happen suddenly and without reason in real life, it will feel like a cheap trick if it happens in a novel. The writer needs to give cues that this character is ill before he kicks the bucket.

Truth is stranger than fiction. Heck, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on the 50th Anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. But that doesn't mean a reader would have bought that if they were reading a novel about the Revolution.

The Benefits of Planning

"Writing is easy; all you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein." -- Red Smith, sportswriter.

We all know writing is hard. There's a minimum of seven* things you have to consider when writing a novel, short story, etc -- Plot, Character, Setting, Consistency, Timeline, Accuracy, and Pacing. If one is even the slightest bit off the mark, then the entire story goes off-kilter and you lose time trying to figure it out. If you don't know your character inside and out, for example, you might have them act a way they normally wouldn't simply because they have to in order to move the plot forward. If your timeline's off, then you might state something happened Tuesday in one section when it needed to actually happen on Thursday. If you're inconsistent, then you have Character A say something on page 26 which they completely contradict on page 246.

You get the idea.

So what's a writer to do? You can write and rewrite and go over each new draft with a fine tooth comb, or you can plan things out ahead of time. Planning's not for everyone, not by a long shot, and woe be to anyone who tries to change your style to fit theirs. However, it works for me, and I'll tell you why: I lose my place much less often.

Case in point: Work's in one of its busy seasons now, and had been steadily getting more intensive prior to that. Because of this, I've not had as much time to work on CALLARION AT NIGHT during the workday like I did last year. Which has necessitated that I do a lot of work on nights off from the part-time job and waking up early on weekends to get writing in. I took it upon myself then to compose a Scene Development document for each chapter of the story. It's not done yet, but my goal is to have these different areas figured out for each scene in each chapter of the novel. This serves a twofold purpose: one, I get a deeper picture of the scene, and two, because I have the scene scripted out I know what to write simply by looking at it.

This Scene Development document is not an outline. That's important to note, because I know some of you might be thinking that already. No, what it tells me is the major motions of the scenes -- the turning points and the character goals and whatnot -- those background moves that influence the on-screen action. By knowing those, I know the scene. And when I know the scene, I can write it much smoother and be free from the concerns of "what comes next?"

That's the big benefit of planning, I think. You lose that pause in momentum from wondering what comes next because you already know what comes next. You planned it out; looked at it from all sorts of angles, and made 100 percent certain that your characters are being logical and acting in the way they would act. The end result of this, I think, is a tighter story with leagues more impact simply because you the writer have a better handle on the action. That's what I think at least.

What say you, fellow wordsmiths?

* EDIT: Because Adam pointed out that I miscounted.

How Many Words

If you're a writer, you've probably heard that adage about needing 1,000,000 words (give or take) to really get a handle on your writing (this links to Kidlit.com, a blog run by Mary Kole of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency... it's geared toward MG/YA authors, but she gives some pretty good advice for writers across the board).

A decade ago, I would have laughed (internally of course) at someone who told me I needed that many to find my style, voice, all that good stuff. Now I wonder if it might require ten million for me to get to that place where confidence and ability go hand in hand. Hope not, otherwise I've got a long way to go. I'm guessing I'm somewhere between 1.2 -1.5M (No, I'm not counting my WWIII stories - complete w/ fiery pictures - from 3rd grade).

Counting short stories, novels+revisions, writing exercises, and anything else writerish, how many words you got, and as you've written more, do you find yourself yearning for those days when you didn't know what you didn't know?

PS - Matt, the one who does most of the legwork for the blog, enlarged the font size. Please let us know if it works or if cross-eyed blurrage still occurs.

Guys (and gals), it's time we talked about something: the voices in my head.

My character's voices, that is.

Right now I'm working on two projects at once. And my main characters are warring for attention in my head. There's the part of me that really wants to work on the project I had already started, because it is a powerful story, and it compels me. Then there's the new story. I like to think of this one as an annoying little sister, constantly pestering me and following me around. It's a much more fun and lighthearted project, and I want to write it just as much as the other one, only for different reasons.

The bad part is that the two projects are drastically different. It's work to switch between the voices of the two MCs.

One of them is. . . well, frankly, an ass. He's learning his lesson-- that's kind of the point-- and it's a new and exciting format for me to be writing in. This project hits me on an intellectual level as well as an emotional one, because it forces me to think about everything from a different perspective.

My other MC is strong, and female, and quippy. I quite like her even though I've only known her for about 3,000 words, and I'm already having "the talks" with my fiance about where this story is headed. (When I'm trying to work out a plot, I always bounce ideas off of him. Today he bounced one back that is brilliant, and now I'm ten times more excited about this project than I already was).

The types of stories are completely different, too. But I should be used to that part by now; just as I should be used to the completely polar voices running around in my head. The project I'm currently querying was a total departure for me, as well.

In fact, what I've learned so far from this whole two-projects-at-once thing is that I have only one certainty as a writer: uncertainty. I can no longer use "that's just not me" as an excuse not to write something because as it turns out, it doesn't matter if it's "me" or not. It's only the voices of my characters that matter. They'll tell their stories to me, and I let them out onto paper. Who am I to tell them to quiet down and go away?

So, dear, dear reader-writers, please assure me that I'm not, in fact, crazy. Do your characters come from different places, and if so, do they pester you until you let them out? Have you ever worked on two projects at once?

GUEST POST: The Blog Trap

Michelle Davidson Argyle, better known as Lady Glamis, is the co-owner of The Literary Lab (with Davin Malasarn and Scott G.F. Bailey), and also the proprietress of The Innocent Flower. She's focused mainly on Literary fiction, and is currently working on a novel called Monarch. Michelle is also an accomplished photographer.

Hey, everyone, I'm happy to be a guest blogger here today on The Secret Archives! I've noticed the running theme for the week has been blogging and social networking. Today I'd like to talk about the BORING BLOG. I've spent way too much time worrying if my blog is boring, trying to come up with frequent posts that will generate comments, driving myself crazy over follower and hit numbers.

Bad idea.

In my years of blogging, I've finally come to the realization that I'm a writer, and I shouldn't be putting more effort into social networking than I do writing. Scott Bailey did a post yesterday on The Literary Lab about blogging. He makes some good points, and I agree.

Like many writers, I've been sucked into the blog trap. Maybe you're not at risk for it, I don't know. I'm just speaking from experience. I've had days, sadly, where if a post didn't do well or get many comments, it made me depressed. Crazy. I think all of us crave attention at times, and all of us like to be liked and acknowledged. Blogs, especially successful ones, can fulfill those cravings daily. It's addicting.

So, back to the BORING BLOG.

Yes, boring - to a huge audience, anyway.

Some of the best blogs I frequent have few followers, few comments, and the posts (often infrequent) are usually specific to a certain audience - either book reviews or excerpts or something that requires a lot of effort and thought from the reader. Like Matthew states in his post earlier in the week, participation is key in building readership on your blog, but I'm not sure that a huge readership should be the goal for most us. I don't know why it has been a goal for me in the past, but my own participation has helped me gain a moderate size following. And, in a self-feeding cycle, I feel somehow guilty if I don't try and return the favor to every commenter on my blog by reading their blog and commenting, or at least responding to their comment. It's this little maddening cycle, while fun and rewarding at times, seems to have caught me in a trap to the point that blogging has become work.

The truth is, I love my blogs. I love comments and interaction and posts. The problem is I spend too much time doing it. What about you? Have you ever been caught in the blog trap?

Unplugging- Does It Work?

Right now I'm making my first attempt to unplug from my own blog, just for a few days. The only other time I've been away from my blog is when I was on vacation, and then I had pre-set posts.

Why attempt such madness?

As discussed here at the Archives all week, social networking has a lot of benefits, but it also takes a fair bit of time. When real life gets hectic, something has to give. And I'd rather give up a few days of blogging than forget to feed my daughter or dissolve into a puddle of quivering goo from too much stress. I'd also like to get some work done on my WIP.



I know some of you unplug a certain week every month, or maintain a not-every-weekday blog schedule. So now I'm asking you- do you think it helps? Do you actually get more writing done or do you find other ways to procrastinate?