Words, words, words!

November 25, 2020

I love words. We couldn’t get along without them, of course, and most people don’t think anything special about words. As a reader and writer, however, I think words can be magical. I read once that every story has been told, but it hasn’t been told the way YOU would write it. Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know, especially when I think about speculative fiction, which sure seems new to me.

I subscribed to the word-a-day emails from dictionary.com recently. About 40-50% of the words they send are new to me. When I received the word-of-the-day “irenic” on November 17, it made me laugh. Are the “word-senders” keeping up with current events? Most likely everyone is aware of our recent presidential election in the States and everything that has happened before and since. Some of the words-of-the-day seem fitting. Irenic means to promote peace or reconciliation. We sure need that now!

Check out these other words:

October 31 – eldritch – eerie, weird, spooky

November 1 (2 days before election) – agonist: a person who is torn by inner conflict.

November 3 (election day) – public–spirited: having or showing an unselfish interest in the public welfare.

November 4 – tarriance: delay.

November 5 – perfervid: very fervent, extremely ardent, impassioned.

November 6 – garboil: confusion.

November 7 (the day the election was called) – ex libris: bookplate.

I was surprised to see this word; it has nothing to do with current events.

Other words for November

 duplicitous: marked or characterized by deceitfulness.

 fidelity: loyalty.

 volte–face: reversal of opinion or policy.

 willyard: obstinate, willful.

One of my favorites this month, not because of the meaning but because of the way it looks and sounds, is zeitgeber. The definition is an environmental cue, such as the length of daylight or the degree of temperature that helps to regulate the cycles of an organism’s biological clock.

My long-time favorite word is onomatopoeia, pronounced on-uh-mat-uh–pee–uh. I can never spell it correctly, but I think it’s fun to look at with all the vowels. It means a word that imitates the natural sounds of a thing, like buzz, hiss, cuckoo.

Do you have a favorite word?

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Posted by Theresa Henige

A Notepad is Essential

July 14, 2020

My stories carry me away to another place and time. When I write, reality fades and my fictional world takes over. I immerse myself in that world and I know what the characters are thinking and doing.

When I’m not writing, I think about the story. What will the MC (main character) do next? What action is needed? What drama is needed? What else should I have the MC do, think, see? I mull over the story when I’m going to sleep, and I ponder what I’ll write when I wake up.

notepad

While in the midst of creating a story, I carry a notepad with me. Ideas frequently come unbidden. Typing or speaking ideas into a phone or iPad works, too, but I prefer paper. I use abbreviations and my own form of shorthand. When I get back to my writing, it’s easier to look at the notes than listen to something I’ve recorded or pull the file up electronically.

I can doodle additions on the notes, cross things out, or save the paper for a future story. Not only do I get ideas for my WIP, I also find inspiration for new stories.

I’ve mentioned that I write longhand on unlined sketch pads. I use a certain rollerball pen. One additional necessary tool for me is a small notepad like I’ve outlined here. These elements nurture my creativity.

When ideas strike, how do you record them?

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

 

4 Comments | creative writing, inspiration | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Theresa Henige

Jigsaw Puzzle

June 30, 2020

Writing a story is like piecing together a jigsaw puzzle. All the elements fit together to form a picture. With a puzzle, one piece out of place makes it impossible to finish. With a story, one piece out of place hinders cohesiveness and flow.

jigsaw pieces

Multiple components must be included when writing.

  • Each scene must have an objective, obstacles, and outcome.
  • Character traits, features and actions only serve to move the story along.
  • Words and actions express inner conflicts with which the reader can identify.
  • Everything physical is a metaphor for what is going on psychologically.
  • What the characters do is pivotal to their personalities and motivations.
  • Every action has a motivation.
  • Dialogue moves the story, creates tension, interests the reader, and reveals character.

These snippets are from my notes taken at conferences and from books. There are many more components not listed here. When I first heard that every element must move the story along, I thought, “I’m writing. I can’t keep all that stuff in my head while I’m writing.”

jigsawputtogether

You’re determining where your character is going, why she/he is going there, and how he/she will overcome the main obstacle to reach a goal. At the same time, you need to be cognizant of the above bullet points.

I was sure that advice was wrong, wrong, wrong. Then, one day it all clicked into place. Just like the pieces of a jigsaw.

You need all the different elements to make up the whole. Some fit together and some don’t. Those that don’t connect smoothly need to be moved or removed. It’s the writer’s job to put the jigsaw together in a way that creates an entire picture. It’s now become second nature for me to put all the pieces in place and think about all the necessary components while writing.

puzzlepic

Writing a story can be arduous. When it all clicks into place, though, and your puzzle is complete, there’s an indescribable joy a writer won’t find in any other endeavor.

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Photos by Hans-Peter Gauster, Ross Sneddon and marjanblan on Unsplash.

5 Comments | creative writing | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Theresa Henige

What’s in a Name?

June 2, 2020

When I tell people I’m writing science fiction and fantasy, I’m often asked if I use a pen name or my initials instead of my first name. The premise is that a male author is more acceptable in those genres. The Bronte sisters are probably the most famous women who adopted male pseudonyms in the 1800s. More recently, JK Rowling allegedly used initials so as not to turn off her target audience of young males.

BronteSisters

Is this necessary? When I poked around the internet, about half thought men had an advantage in the publishing industry, sci-fi in particular; the other half thought it didn’t matter.

What do you think? Is a male author more acceptable in certain genres or in publishing overall? Would you read sci-fi written by a woman? How about genres aimed at women? Would you read a romance written by a man? Would young girls have loved the Nancy Drew books as much if the name on the spine was male? What about the Hardy Boys books? Would they have sold if they had a female author?

What’s your opinion or experience with this issue?

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Posted by Theresa Henige

Include or Not?

May 19, 2020

Will Covid-19 show up in your fiction writing? Writer Lynne Fisher posed that question in a comment on my last post. She touches on it briefly in her blog, which you should check out. She’s a good and thoughtful writer.

I hadn’t even considered the question. I know there are poems out on the subject, and I assume there will be countless memoirs. What about novels? I pondered a while. If we want our fiction to be realistic, then, yes, we should probably include it. But I don’t want to read about the pandemic. I decided it won’t appear in my writing, at least not for a while. Maybe 5 or 10 years from now, but not right now.

mick-haupt-pOEY_iRFg60-unsplash

That made me curious about what was written after the 1918 flu pandemic. I didn’t look for memoirs or factual accounts, I wanted stories with the pandemic as a backdrop. Goodreads lists 85 books on the subject. I looked at a handful, all of which were written in the last 20 years.

An article in Smithsonian Magazine talks about earlier works. It highlights a 1922 novel by Willa Cather called One of Ours as the first major novelist to include the pandemic in fiction. There are a host of other books, too.

Pandemics, epidemics, and viruses have been featured in multiple books and movies, many of them science fiction. We can go back further, and look at plagues in the bible.

I draw on real life to create my stories. Some aspect of our current world may appear in my upcoming work, perhaps an aspect of isolation or socialization, maybe fear or illness, but not the virus itself.

Will the Coronavirus pandemic of 2020 be a part of your fiction? Would you read a novel with the Coronavirus as its backdrop?

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6 Comments | creative writing | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Theresa Henige

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