Posts Tagged writing

Wisdom from the Second Grade: Writers’ Tools

By on March 7, 2013   /   Book Lists, For Kids, For Librarians, For Teachers  

One of the things I love about school visits is that I get to go to classrooms all over the country and meet wonderful students and teachers. There are some comforting universals to a grade school classroom: a certain amount of clutter, a map, the alphabet along the wall. And then there are delightful surprises: a pet iguana, a stunning view of the wilderness, a reading loft, a tank of salmon fry to be released in a local stream, a flag flown by a student’s father over his army camp in Afghanistan. It’s a window into the thoughts and values of the community I’m visiting.

I recently visited a second grade classroom where I saw two student made posters on the wall. The first was titled Writer’s Tools in the Hand. Underneath was an illustrated list: paper, pencil, eraser, dictionary, word list, and illustration tools. It was a good reminder to take a moment before I begin my writing session of the day to have all the tools I need at hand. I especially liked the word list idea. I know many teachers help their students brainstorm a list of likely words before they start a writing assignment. Though I don’t need that technique, I have used a variation of it. Every writer has word habits, words or phrases that pop up more often than they should. I have about a half dozen that I lean on more than I should, so I make a word list of them and post it over my workspace to remind me to make stronger word choices and not lean over much on the familiar.

It was the second poster that really struck me though. It was titled: Writers’ Tools in the Head and Heart. The list included: thinking, good ideas, awareness, fun attitude, information, concentration, quiet or silence.

There are so many things to love about that list, and perhaps most importantly that writing well engages both the head and the heart. I love it that thinking comes before good ideas, an excellent reminder. Sometimes I have to think about a scene for days, even months, before I have a good idea about how to fix it.

Awareness is a tricky idea, I asked a group of the 2nd graders who had made the poster what they thought awareness meant. They said that it meant you should pay attention to all your ideas about a story not just the shiny, easy ideas that were in the last story you read. Excellent advice!

Fun attitude might just be the best advice of all though. If my writing isn’t going well, it’s almost always because I’ve lost the joy of it. Loss of joy may not be the cause of bad writing, but it is at least the reliable companion of bad writing. And when I change to a more positive and playful outlook, the writing reliably improves.

Information and concentration are ideas I’ve been learning to use as a pair. I love research so much, I could spend all my time chasing the next dazzling fact and completely lose track of my story in my zeal to fill it up with the amazing details I’ve learned. But sometimes what I need is not more information but concentration on the research I’ve already done.

Finally I love it that quiet and silence are not the same thing. Sometimes I need absolute silence for a particular task. Reminding myself to turn off the music for the duration of the task helps. Other times I just need the quiet of my brain focusing on just one thing, not email, not social networks, not housework or snacks but simply the quiet of letting myself be a writer and nothing else for a few hours–a true gift!

So how about you? Do you have a favorite tool of the hand, head, or heart? I’d love to hear about them in the comments.

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The Longhand Writing Challenge

By on January 18, 2013   /   Book Lists  

Back when I spent a lot of time on the (wonderful) Absolute Write forums, I loved it when someone would mention a writing program like Scrivener or StoryMill. Because comments like these would inevitably follow:

Writing Longhand

Credit: Abizern

“Pshh…Hemingway didn’t have Scrivener. He got along just fine.”

“All those extra features are so overwhelming! Give me good old Microsoft Word any day.”

“Word processor? Please. I write by hand.”

At which point I’d come in with something like:

“Pen and paper? Ha. I “penned” my first novel with stone and chisel.”

My passive aggressive point being that every writer has his or her own method, so let’s not judge someone for wanting to use a high-tech option. And yes, it was a bit defensive of me, because my love for Scrivener knows no bounds.

But I have a confession: I never write by hand. In fact, I think I can count on one hand the number of times I wrote by hand last year (and of course I mean wrote creatively, not signed documents and filled out forms).

And I want to try longhand.  Maybe not an entire novel, but just a little something every week. I think writing this way engages the brain a little differently – I’ve even heard some writers claim that their prose is more natural when they write by hand because they use smaller and/or simpler words (or maybe they’re just not constantly clicking open the thesaurus).

Of course, then you have writers like me, with handwriting so godawful it’s practically undecipherable. But what’s really stopping me from writing longhand? The following are the embarrassing but true reasons why:

  1. It physically hurts. That’s how out of practice I am. When I write solidly for longer than five minutes, my hand actually begins to cramp up. (And I’m a percussionist – you’d think some of those developed muscles would help me out a little bit.)
  2. I’m so lazy it’s ridiculous. Every time I glance at a notebook, my brain is all “come on, you’re just going to have to type it all into your laptop eventually anyway…just skip this step.”
  3. Seriously – if my handwriting were a font, it would be called “drunk chicken stepped in paint and did the conga.”

The funny thing is that if I could just get over number 2, I could probably fix numbers 1 and 3 with time and practice. So that’s what I’m going to do.

My personal challenge for 2013 is to write longhand. An entire book? Probably not – but I’m aiming for a scene per week or two. By the end of this year, I don’t want to glance over at the bottom of the bookshelf and see that sad little notebook I bought months ago with so many blank pages. I want notebooks – plural – filled with scribbles and scrawls and drunk chicken scratch. I want to find out for myself whether or not writing longhand changes my prose, or anything about the stories I tell. Heck – I just want to spend less time on my laptop in general.

None of this is to say I’ll give up Scrivener – never! It makes keeping track of separate drafts so ridiculously simple, and it’s very practical for keeping my books organized.

What about you – do you write by hand often? Do you want to? And for the love, if anyone has any tips on how I can improve my first grade teacher nightmare handwriting, I’m all ears.

 

Michelle Schusterman is an author, musician, screenwriter, and Vogon poet living in Queens. Her middle grade series, I HEART BAND, will be launching in January 2014 with Penguin/Grosset. You can find her on KidLit Network, Twitter, and Tumblr.

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Character Lessons from Doctor Who

By on November 1, 2012   /   Book Lists  

If I say watching a television show is a study in writing, does doing so then qualify as “work?” (More importantly, can I write off Netflix when I do my taxes?)

I watch Doctor Who for the awesome characters, creative sci-fantasy elements, and off-the-wall stories, all of which have taught me a ton about writing (and often leave me shaking my fist and screaming “MOFFAT!”). But after every episode, I feel more inspired as a writer – and more inspired to mess with my characters. If you’re a Time Lord fan, or a would be-fan, beware: ahead there be spoilers.

1. Give minor characters so much history and personality and life that they could carry their own series.

Most episodes of Doctor Who introduce new characters who are only present for that episode. They could easily be two-dimensional, but they rarely are. As an example, take the series four episode, “Midnight,” which is more psychological horror than your normal whimsical Doctor stuff. Not a single character on the shuttle (aside from the Doctor) would ever appear in another episode, but they were as real and developed as any long-time companion…making their actions and fates near the end of the episode all the more horrifying.

This isn’t to say that every single name you drop in your novel should have a five-page character sheet. In fact, that can be detrimental – “character soup” is something I often have to deal with in edits. But your story will be all the more rich and real if each character has problems and passions that drive their actions, no matter how short their page time.

2. Give everyone a chance to be a hero.

Because good heros (and good characters) are flawed, and they can’t do it all. The Doctor is all kinds of flawed (and if you don’t believe me, you clearly haven’t watched The Waters of Mars). But one of the things I love most about Doctor Who is that so often it’s those minor, one-episode characters I mentioned a few paragraphs up who really save the day, often by some sort of personal sacrifice.

This is particularly valuable in middle grade stories, where the main character is likely very internally focused. Think about Hermione accusing Harry of always trying to be the hero. Sometimes the load must be shared – a great lesson for middle grade characters (and readers). The main character can’t do it alone, and shouldn’t have to.

3. Don’t just be cruel to your characters – be creatively cruel.

Death? So not the worst thing that can happen. Take a look at some of the companions’ fates.

When I think of Captain Jack and the Face of Bo, I want to weep. (Even though Jack’s fate to live a bajillion years and die as a giant head might not be canon, I still just…ack.) Then there’s Rose and her not-quite-Doctor – a strange end to a character arc that managed to be both satisfying and devastating. Martha’s whole year just made me feel bad for her (although admittedly irritated at times). And Amy and Rory – I’m glad they had each other, but if you didn’t tear up at “raggedy man, good-bye” then you have no soul.

But let’s look more closely at Donna, because she’s my favorite companion. She doesn’t die. She doesn’t lose any family members or friends (that she knows of). She’s not physically or mentally harmed in any way. She is, in fact, the exact same person she was before she met the Doctor – a temp from Chiswick in a wedding dress. We last see her happily leaving a church with her new husband and a winning lottery ticket tucked in her cleavage.

Sounds like a happy ending, yeah? But in context it’s a more brutally heartbreaking finale than anything I could’ve possibly imagined for her. For her, Donna. That’s the key – it was an ending that wouldn’t have had the same emotional impact with any other character. It could only work with Donna, with her cutting humor masking that enormous inferiority complex, with her mother who constantly made her feel worthless, with her gradual development into becoming a woman who would quite literally save the world. Maybe it’s not a fate worse than death, but for the Doctor (and the viewers) it was gut-wrenching. And it would have been for Donna, too, if she could only remember.

What are the stakes for your characters? The threat of death is certainly motivating, but try being more creatively cruel. Think of Artemis Fowl in The Time Paradox, forced to deal with the consequences of his own regrettable actions by literally confronting his evil 10-year old self. Pinpoint what really makes your characters afraid and vulnerable, and make them face it head-on.

Any other Whovian writers out there? What lessons have you learned from the Doctor? I’d love to hear them!

Michelle is the author of the upcoming I HEART BAND series (Penguin, Fall 2013), about the thrills and spills, practices and performances, crushes and crises of middle school band geeks. She’s a screenwriter for a Manhattan-based TV/film production company and lives in Queens with her husband (and band mate) and their chocolate lab (who is more of a vocalist). She blogs, tweets, and tumblrs.

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