Seven Steps for Writing Short Stories

For those who follow my twitter, you may have noticed that I’m struggling to come up with blog subjects. I’ve got a busy life and of course that leaves little time for writing, even less for blogging.

HOWEVER. I have decided to plough through and instead of doing another update, I can give you guys some tips on writing short stories.

So, why would you want to write a short story?

Well, you might be an undewriter. (Like myself). And you might find it quite hard to reach AT LEAST fifty thousand words, so short stories are much better.

You might only have a little idea, that you don’t want to make a big fuss of to make into a novel, so a short story is perfect.

You think it will be more impactful if it’s compact.

There are countless other reasons.

My reason is that I’ve never completely revised a novel. You guys know that I’ve been writing a novel lately, and revising it has been a pain. Why? Becauase I didn’t know where to start. And I’ve come to the conclusion that short stories are great for getting some experience, without having to spend years on screwing up and trying again. It’s basically the work experience of a job.

So, tips for writing a short story. I’m going to take you through the entire process that I hope to follow.

One. Brainstorm.

Get a notebook and BRAINSTORM EVERYTHING. Like I mean EVERYTHING. If an idea comes into your head, write it down. This one has only taken me about three days, but it’s perfectly fine if this part takes a week or more. Find the places that you find the most inspiration from, and brainstorm from that. For me I’ve got a whole pinterest board dedicated to this brainstorm idea that I have (and no, it isn’t a private board. Here’s a game. Go stalk my pinterest https://au.pinterest.com/jessiegrace3/ and see if you can work out which board is the current brainstorming board, and comment below!)

I find pinterest, google images, movies, tv shows, pictures, anything, can be really useful during this phase. Brainstorm as much as possible.

Two. Outline.

(Not everyone outlines. If you’re a pantser, you can skip this step)

Now you’re still brainstorming in this part, if you want, but now we’re going to outline. You need a beginning, a middle, and an end. Now try and put together a little summary of the plot of your novel (this will make creating the overall summary later on that little bit easier). An orphan goes to wizard school, a poor girl volunteers to partake in a fight to the death, a regular girl meets a vampire. One sentence lines that describe the PLOT (not outline) of your story. The part that won’t change.

Now, everyone outlines differently, so do your own research, but here’s how I went about it. I suggest taking all the scenes and all that you brainstormed, and put them in chronological order (don’t worry if there are holes or things you’re not sure of, this is FAR from the final draft) and then I try to fit them into my outline, which looks like this.

ACT ONE

Block One; Intro

Block Two; Inciting Incident

Block Three; Act One Climax

ACT TWO;

Block Four; Fun and Games

Block Five; Midpoint

Block Six; Protagonist is either taking control or losing control of the plot

ACT THREE

Block Seven; Converge

Block Eight; Climax

Block Nine; Resolution

That. Is a super duper rough idea of my outlines. Check out Katytastic’s outlining videos if you want more information. Also, depending on how many scene ideas and plot points I have, I will usually either rename the blocks to chapters, or put three chapters in each block. Your choice.

Now revise your outline. There may be notes of cool things you want to happen, that aren’t actually scenes. Mary flips her hair is not a scene. It’s something that happens in a scene, so list it under the scene it has to happen in. Also try and make sure that all of your scenes are advancing the plot in some way or another. Short stories are short (wow can I get my stating the obvious award now) and usually flow quite quickly, so maybe don’t bore the reader with a scene of the character brushing his teeth and nothing else happens.

Three. Write.

Using your wonderful outline (or not) write your short story. Short stories are usually one thousand to ten thousand words long, but you can go longer if you want. I’m aiming for a 25,000 word story (which may be classified as a novella) This may take a week, more or less. Don’t try to do it all in an hour, you will get burnt out.

Four. Revise.

So while you were writing I hope you had your handy dandy little notebook next to you. That is where you should write all the revision notes as you go. If there’s something you wrote, and then realised didn’t make sense, make a note. Also maybe print out the manuscript, read through the plot, and make notes about that too. Make all the notes. All the notes. Things like dialouge, world, character, all that good stuff.

Five. Rewrite.

Write a second draft that conforms to all the notes.

Six. Repeat steps Four and Five until you are happy with your story.

Seven. Edit.

You can do this yourself, or hire a professional, or both. I’m probably going to use Hemingwayapp.com because I’m not too serious about my story, and it’s probably going to be small enough to do the whole thing in the website.

And there you have it! Slap a name on that baby, publish it on ebook, email it to family and friends, whatever. You did it! You wrote a short story! No one will ever be impressed by the amount of hard work and effort you put into creating it simply because it’s short!

YAY!

So currently I’m on chapter three of my short story’s first draft. I’ll let you guys know how it goes when I finish, hopefully in a month or something.

Follow me on social media! (Particularly twitter). Leave a comment, leave a like,they really help! Until next time. Byeeeee.

Dealing With Writer’s Block

Hey guys!

I’m sorry, there really isn’t a consistent schedule for blog posts, is there? I’ve been kind of busy with work. And when I’m not working, or doing something else productive, I’m writing.

Segway.

Writer’s Block! Some believe in it, some don’t. That’s okay either way, but sometimes we just don’t feel motivated, or just have no idea what to writer, or have gone completely braindead.

Firstly, I think that there are three types of writer’s block. The 48 Hour Bug, The Dead Inside, and The Premature Failure.

The 48 Hour Bug; Do I HAVE to write today? No. I wanna play video games.

The Dead Inside; Why am I doing this. Why am I writing this story. What is the point of slaving over something if people will hate it anyway.

The Premature Failure; Okay, I’m definitely going to write a book. Someday. Just not today. Today I’m going to marathon danisnotonfire videos. Aaand . . . maybe some AmazingPhil.

Oh dear.

Each of these can bleed into the next, which is why you should try and catch the writer’s block early. Otherwise it’s going to be harder and harder to get out of it. Another thing I should mention is that this doesn’t just apply to WRITING writing. This also applies to revision, editing, anything. It doesn’t matter what part of the writing process you’re in. Writer’s Block can creep up at any moment. So now, here are some times on how to deal with each kind.

The 48 Hour Bug

 Okay. Firstly, think about whether or not you have a good excuse to not write. If you’ve just worked long hours for three days in a row, sleep. It’s okay. Your health is important.

If this is not the case, try to work out what is bothering you. Is it the fact that you don’t know what you’re doing? I have this maybe once a week. No joke. Firstly, calm. Down. I don’t think you should ever assume that a draft will be the one hundred percent done draft. (That is, when you are trying to perfect everything at once rather than build your way up) And this takes a lot of weight off your shoulders. You can even do what I’ve done and make yourself a little instruction list. Right now, I just have to worry about getting everything plot related fixed. Worldbuilding, character development, all that, can wait.

If you have been sitting at the keyboard for twenty minutes and you’ve only pumped out about five words, then you’re uncomfortable. Firstly. Calm. Down. I find mindset helps. Rather than think about the two thousand words, or the fifteen chapter outline,that you have to revise, think; I’ll just do a little bit until dinner is ready/it’s time for bed. Secondly, take a look at your ambience. I find that if I’ve been listening to the same cd/same artist for too long, the sound just drones on and on. So maybe try a new cd. Try Rainymood.com. Try not even having sound, just try quiet. Also check your posture. I’ve found that I have a habit of finding myself in some damn strange positions when I’m trying to work. Squish yourself in an upright and uptight position between the chair back and the table. I find the more it feels like I’m being tortured, the better.

And if you’re lying on your bed thinking; why the hell do I have to write today? Just think. A book requires a certain amount of work to be half decent. And it’s not getting that work done while you’re sitting there procrastinating. Maybe if you spend an hour working on your manuscript, you get to waste twenty minutes on youtube.

The Dead Inside

Why. Why am I here. Why am I writing this book. WHYYYY!!!!

Relax.

This phase is similar to The 48 Hour Bug, but it’s a little more severe, and it’s not as severe as The Premature Failure.

Firstly. What part of the writing process is stumping you? I found myself in this rut in the Researching phase. I’m writing a contemporary, and I thought I should probably gather as much research on the topic of the book before I started to revise the outline. Aaand this killed my motivation. Why? Not creative enough.

Try to think of other ways to approach what you need to do right now. Start with the basics of whatever is troubling you and work up. A lot of writers can also get this stuck during the outlining phase (psst. check out any Katytastic video on outlining.). I’m not going to get into it, but if this is the case, put all of your scene ideas into chronological order, every snippet of an idea, every big plot twist, and THEN find an outline to fit around it.

The dead inside is hard to overcome, but if you reevaluate how you’re looking at things, it can be somewhat easier to overcome. Just power through. It’s so hard but it will be worth it when you get a crapton of work done in three hours, you’ll feel so good.

The Premature Failure

Apparently that was the best title for this phase that I could think of.

This one could apply to writers who have never actually written anything, but I think it applies to writers who have either finished a book or given up on a book a little more.

Here’s a little story. At the beginning of the year, I had a lot going on. We did some holidaying. Then I came back home, tried to get back into my manuscript, and sort of let the 48 Hour Bug become the Dead Inside, which eventually become The Premature Failure. You have failed to create/finish a new book, because you can’t start. Hence, failing prematurely.

I’m . . . really hating that name.

So, what do you do? You write. You find a new idea. Or you let yourself get distracted by a new idea. And write that idea. It doesn’t matter. You need to write because you love writing. Ninety percent of the time I find myself feeling like this  because I’m only writing a book to publish it. Getting emotionally involved in a book is messy. You will soon have about half a dozen computer files, notes everywhere in every notebook or scrap of paper that you could reach when you had an idea. With a forced idea, you don’t care. And if you don’t care, it’s highly doubtful your readers will care.

Basically, just try to find SOMETHING to write. Write fanfiction. Write a short story. Write anything, and do it because you love it.

So, yeah. That is my pathetic little attempt to help those experiencing writer’s block. If there are phases I missed, please tell me what they are in the comments below. If you enjoyed this post, there’s a little star down there and if you click it, it will tell me that you liked it and that is awesome and really motivates me to keep posting. There’s also a big button over to the right, and if you click that and enter your email address, you’ll get told when I post new posts. All of these things are free too, and they make me really happy. If you like social media, I’ve got links to that in the About page. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me through the blog, twitter, facebook, etc.

I will see you guys next time. Ciao

Writing Motivation: The Perfect Novel

Hey guys!

I wanted to talk about something that I’ve recently realised. That is; Obsession over creating the perfect novel.

I have one story, not the current story but definitely one that I will hopefully go back to, that has about a dozen half finished drafts. Why? Because I was adamant on creating the perfect novel. The perfectionist in me was sucking up as much knowledge as possible from every source available, trying to apply everything at once to the writing. And it was overwhelming. And it wasn’t working.

So today I’m going to tell you guys something. Remember that this is my opinion, and that you can’t take it as gospel, but it’s something I’m attempting to come to terms with.

You can’t write the perfect novel.

It won’t happen.

Let’s talk about some of the most famous stories today. Harry Potter, for one example. There are millions and millions of fans who absolutely adore the boy wizard. Why? Because it’s wonderful!

But. There are plotholes. Hermoine’s time turner, for example, has caused major problems. Even with all of J.K. Rowling’s planning, she still managed to make SOME mistakes.

Then we have Twilight. Millions of people adore it. About a million others, however, see the flaws in the relationship, the plot, the entire thing.

I have, to date, written about six novellas, and a couple of first drafted novels. But this is my first time revising a finished first draft. I have never revised before. I know a lot, but at the same time I know so little about it. And in the last few days I’ve caught myself trying to turn this thing into the ultimate perfection thing. Trying to find ways to make sure there won’t be any screw ups, nothing for people to point fingers at.

However. What I, and I think so many other writers, don’t realise, is that writing is an expression of creativity. Yes, there are things we can do to make it more appealing to a larger variety of people. But we can’t perfect everything.

Let’s compare writing a novel to being a ballerina. There are a million different ways to write a novel, and some people will like it and some people won’t. With being a ballerina, there is only ONE way to do a plie. Of course, it is still a fairly creative form of expression, but you have a set way of doing every little thing. Every toe turn, every point.

Imagine if we applied all those rules to writing.

That’s right. Every book would be the same. Wouldn’t that be boring as hell?

Another thing that I’ve been coming to terms with is that some people aren’t going to like my book. I’ve recently looked up reviews for one indie book that I wasn’t fussed on. I found that it has an incredible rating on goodreads, but there are people that agree with me. Someone ripped apart the entire book and picked out every little thing they hated about it.

 

Ask yourself. What am I trying to accomplish here? If you’re trying to write a book that everyone will love and pat you on the back for and praise you on, I’m afraid your motives aren’t the right ones.

But if you’re writing this story because you care about the characters, the story, because you love writing, then yes. Do it. And if you feel like you’d like to publish, you’d like to submit this to the rest of the world to read, do it. There will be people who don’t like it. But there might also be one person in the world who enjoys it.

Bottom line is write  because you love writing. Not to publish and get praise or become the next best seller. Write to tell a story, don’t try and make everything perfect. Try to make it as perfect as YOU can make it, sure, and tell your story in the best way, but don’t get so caught up and overwhelmed in the tweaking that you never finish. Writing a story is meant to be something you love, and an incredible experience. Not a burden, or something to loathe.

So you made it to the end of the post. Thanks a lot for reading, I’m sorry this wasn’t a hundred percent useful, but if you enjoyed it or got something out of it, please like it and drop a comment. If you would like to see more of this content, hit the follow button, it’s free. Follow me on the social medias. Admittedly I’m still trying to fix up the site to have more social media buttons, so there’s only the twitter one there right now, but I have links to my other social medias in the About page.

I hope you have a great day, get lots of writing done, and I will see you next time. Goodbyyeeee!

Character Development: Five Random Facts/Scenerios

 

One of the things I love doing with my characters is imagining them in random scenarios. Because, let’s face it, we can fill out their bios all we want. It’s not until we actually write for them that we start to get to know them a whole lot better.

I’m not sure if this will become kind of a series, with me throwing five random scenarios/facts to find out about your character every now and then, so let me know if this post is helpful guys!

Putting your character into some situations can be fun and also interesting to ponder and work out what your character might do. Please note that this is just something I do and that I haven’t heard anywhere at all that this is required for writing a novel, I’m sure it’s not. These situations could inspire your novel, or you could ever put them in your novel. I just find it fun and kind of useful to do.

Number One? Homeless.

Your character is sitting on the mouth of an alleyway, late afternoon, people are walking home from work. As they walk past he asks them for change.

Already, we’ve got some questions to ask. Like, is he asking them for change? Is he even here? Is your character way too prideful, and would he rather starve than be caught asking for money? How is he asking for money? Is he so selfish that he’s shoving the can in people’s faces or is he so quiet they can barely hear him?

People’s actions speak louder than their words (also you’ll find that I say that one A LOT, not only with writing but also in real life situations. But that’s for another post . . .)

Back to our little scene, Let’s say a higher middle class business woman strides down the street, and turns up her nose at our homeless character. The homeless character notices her disdain, and says; “Got any change, ma’am?”

Just quickly I’ll mention that this kind of dialogue could be a lot different, depending on the character.

“No. Not for your filthy lot anyway.” she spits. “It’s lazy people like you who deserve to be on the street.”

Now. How does your character react as she strides off in her pointy shoes? Does he burst into tears or get up to lob her over the head? I’ve decided to include a little piece that I thought up. The scene is completed with a character from my current story, Blue Skittles (the code name of the story. I’m going to keep mentioning this is the code name because I don’t want to confuse new readers). I’m not even going to mention the character’s name, let’s just see what happens.

Late afternoon. I glanced up at the passerbys, wearing their pressed suits and ties. A middle aged woman with her nose in the air and a bun as tight as her outward persona clicked her kitten heels down the street. When she came to me, she slowed, and looked down her nose at me,  coming to a stop.

Worth a shot, I decided. “Any change?”

“No.” her nose wrinkled, as though just talking to me filled her senses with disgust. “Not for your filthy lot anyway. It’s lazy people like you who deserve to be on the street.”

And then she strode off.

“How about you take that money and buy yourself some MANNERS!” I called after her, rolling my eyes and shaking my head. “Nasty.”

So, yes, as I was saying, this is a pretty cool way of getting straight to your character’s core. They’re scum to society, they get treated like scum from society, and then we get to see their reaction.

This was one of the more in depth ones that I wanted to look at (also don’t mind my unedited unrevised completely pantsed piece of writing, I just thought you guys would like an example). Here are the next four.

Number Two. Getting up in the morning.

Okay, I got this idea from the Pentatonix music video Starships. Someone commented what they each did in the morning at the beginning of the video. One took out her retainer, another fixed his hair, another was dancing. Etc.

When your character wakes up in the morning, what’s the one thing they usually do without even thinking about it? Something that they always do, it’s pretty much second nature?

This can say as much or as little about your character as you want, but I do find this to be one of the fun ones.

Number Three. A friend dares them to do karaoke.

Your character and his friend are at a club. Open mic karaoke night. The friend dares your character to jump up and give it a shot. Does your character jump up, eager to show the world what a star they are? Do they ponder it and then think, yeah, that could be fun. Or do they barter with the friend until the friend gives up, and your character stays far away from the stage or any kind of attention.

You can also ask why they react the way they do. Do they love attention because they were in childhood beauty pageants by their pretentious mother, or do they shy away because of one particularly bad incident at public speaking class? (I don’t even know that’s what it’s called, you know what I mean. Don’t judge me.)

Number Four. Late. Three things they would do before running out the door.

This one is so random and it varies so much that I can’t even be that specific.

I have one character who would grab his keys. Another who would draw on eyeliner as quickly as possible. So, yes, I can’t be specific about this one, because it’s a very . . . changeable subject.

AND FINALLY Number Five. The Sorting Hat.

I’m sorry for those who hate Harry Potter. But this. This is an awesome idea.

And kind of a cop out because I couldn’t really think of another idea, but oh well, we’re not going to look at it that way.

Go to Pottermore or Buzzfeed or wherever to find the sorting hat quiz. Fill out the quiz AS YOUR CHARACTER. To make it extra fun, write down which house you think they’ll get beforehand and see if you were right or not.

Who wants to hear some hilarious irony? I just realised that I can hear Harry Potter on the tv in the other room (internal laughing).

 

Anyway, go and enjoy these fun random things to do with your characters (because really, writing gets too serious sometimes) And I will hopefully post again soon. Revisions are killing me right now though (this is a welcome distraction) and if anyone has any tips, then please comment below and let me know!!!

Happy writing and revising and editing and . . . this is not a good way to end a blog post.

Bye.

A Finished First Draft and Tips for Underwriters

Jessie Grace The Underwriter and the Finished First Draft

Also known as Jessie Grace and the nightmare of WHAT THE HELL DO I DO NOW HOW DO I REVISE.

But for now I’m just going to eat celebratory chocolate and blog.

It has taken me three and a half weeks to complete said novel and I have finally reached 50,000 words on it. And yes, it is finished. The first draft is, anyway.

I’m an underwriter, and I consider this a fairly impressive achievement. Most of the time I have struggled with word count goals but finally (FINALLY) I have a coherent (enough. coherent enough) novel and I can finally revise it.

Whilst I have written maybe six novels, each one is some kind of version of awful, because of my lack of outlining. This is the first one completed that used an outline I am actually proud of. And I don’t even have a title for it so we’re going to give it a code name to refer to on this blog which is . . . BLUE SKITTLES.

Yes. I am now going to refer to my novel as Blue Skittles until I have an actual  name for it. Now I think I should tell you guys a little bit about Blue Skittles, because while I am very protective of my stories and telling people about them, I think that you guys deserve to know at least a little bit about it.Blue Skittles is a contemporary.

There. That’s literally all I’m telling you. You’re welcome.

So, back to how an underwriter completed a 50,000 word novel. Also yes I am aware that there are very little novels that are just 50,000 words, and yes I will be expanding on it in revisions, but for now this is still an incredible achievement.

Okay. So, you’re an underwriter.You try writing novels but they always turn into short stories. You just want to be taken seriously. So here are my tips for how to up that word count.

One; Outline

I think every single on of my blog posts has included a promise to write on my outlining process, but I swear. I will be putting one up soon. Really.

Outlining can be great for making your word count grow. Please note, outlining isn’t for everyone, but if you’re struggling, you’ve got nothing to lose trying it out. You can divide the novel up into outlined chapters and then divide the number of chapters by the word count goal for the novel. Math. Science. Wait, not science. Math. So for example, if your novel has thirty chapters and you want to reach 50,000 words, you only need to write 1,667 words per chapter.

Two; Sub Plots

Sub plots add depth to your novel and are a good way to give the reader a break from the events of the main plot. Just make sure that the sub plots aren’t meaningless, and that they somehow tie up at the climax of your story. Admittedly I’m not a pro at sub plots (ha, I’m not a pro at anything) So I don’t think I’m well versed enough to lecture you on sub plots, therefore I am going to encourage you to use the power of google.

Three; Describe. Everything.

One thing that I’ve found is that I am fairly good at short and sweet descriptions. But as an experiment I ‘overwrote’ a scene and it turned out to be a lot better than  the underwritten kind. Even if half the description gets scrapped, it’s still useful stuff.

What if you’ve tried all of these and nothing helped?

You. My friend. Need to overwrite.

Overwrite everything. Overwrite dialogue. Descriptions. Everything. You can always cut a lot of the words that are irrelevant, but it can still be useful to have too much than too little (in my opinion). Also try to flesh out a lot of the scenes.

Okay, those are my ratchet tips for how underwriters can write novels. Just stick with it.

If anyone has links to any good revision resources, I would like to see them. And yes I am still going to document my continued struggle with writing and finishing a novel. No matter how bumpy and awful it may be, I want you guys to see the ups and downs, and I hope this will help some aspiring writer out there.

Also, I just quickly wanted to say that I have got five followers on my blog, six on my twitter, and I think four on my Facebook page. There are links to my social medias in the About page. I know these numbers aren’t a lot, but as someone who was at zero everything five months ago, they really mean a lot to me. Trying to market myself as a writer has been pretty scary, and I’m really grateful for you guys. Also if you are new, please follow, we have lots of fun here.

Hopefully I will have another blog up soon. Until then, goodbyyeeee.

(no, seriously, how the hell do you end a blog post?)