“I want to talk to you.” “Hi, Maggy. How are you?” “Don’t ‘how are you’ me! I can’t believe that you came back to take away Cole’s land.” Okay, I admit it. Dialogue is my favorite part in the book. I just love to hear people get into arguments, dodge questions, tell it like it is, and most of all, give each other the what for. Sometimes (and this is the schizophrenic writer side of me) I will even talk out loud as I’m writing dialogue, just to get the inflection. (Besides, I can say anything to myself and not get into trouble!) But what is the secret to sizzling dialogue? What’s the difference between writing conversations that zing or mind-numbing dialogue that causes a book to end face down […]
Read the RestArchive | April, 2008
Voice of Reason/Passion winners!
Hey all! After five days of internet, uh…let’s call it CHAOS…I am finally able to get back online. Something involving a burned out router, and a settings glitch, and I don’t know…but WOW, did it bring out the VOICE OF PASSION as I stared at my “cannot connect to the internet” windows screen. I wanted to hurl something at the monitor. But a smart, rational girl listening to her Voice of Reason husband, (who calmly reminds her that it’s NOT the new Dell Monitor’s fault) refrains from acting out. Even though the wildly frustrated girl wants to embrace her Voice of Passion and call up her computer guy and threaten bodily harm if he doesn’t show and I mean Right Now to fix it. There you have it, the Voice […]
Read the RestThe Power of Point of View Part 2
Yesterday, we talked about Point of View, and started a discussion over on Voices. Be sure to let us know if you have any POV questions. To recap, point of view refers to the character “telling” the story. We can only know what he/she sees, hears and feels. If the story is being told in first person, then the protagonist does most of the talking. 🙂 A story can have more than one POV in first person, but the character voices must be unique. In third person, the author has more opportunity to open up the story and allow the reader to see the action from different “angles.” Talking to my Thomas Nelson editors once, I learned they like third person because of the versatility where sometimes first person can […]
Read the RestThe Power of Point of View Part 1
Continuing on our “Hero’s Journey” today we’re going to talk about Point of View. Why is point of view important, and how does it effectively help or harm our work? Today I’m going to talk about “why” and tomorrow I’ll go into “how” of POV. First, for any newbies, WELCOME to MyBookTherapy! Glad to have you. Join Voices and hang out on the forums for interactive writing help. Second, the acronym POV stands for Point of View. Point of View – what is it? It’s the view or perspective of the protagonist or secondary characters. Perhaps the story view of the hero or the heroine. There are several types of point of view writing. Limited Third Person, Omniscient, Narrative, First Person, even Second Person. Now, some of this goes to […]
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