Work Room - Week 14

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

There is a Results thread: http://community.livejournal.com/therealljidol/428444.html
a Second Chance Idol announcement: http://community.livejournal.com/therealljidol/428754.html
and a new topic http://community.livejournal.com/therealljidol/428897.html

Tuesday nights are busy here in Idol!

We also have the Work Room.

I've said this before (and I will likely say this again knowing me) this is your space to hash out ideas and thoughts about writing in general.

Last week we will lucky enough to have alexpgp stop in as a Guest Mentor. I hope everyone enjoyed that.

This week - well, we have another treat. Someone else who has been there, done that - from a different perspective, and I know she has a lot to say and share.

Again, you know her - you love her.

Arguably, the hardest working contestant in Idol history (I think making sure that you have a wifi connection in your recovery room so that immediately after giving birth you can get out an entry - thankfully she didn't have to do that - qualifies you for that title)

alycewilson!!

***

Good evening/morning/afternoon, class (depending on when you're reading this)!

My name is (WRITES ON THE BOARD) alycewilson, but you can call me Alyce, or Miss Alyce if you're nasty (or under 6 years old, or non-human). You can find out more about me (and my books, including my recent collection, The Art of Life which includes some pieces I wrote for LJ Idol seasons 5 and 6) at my home page. I will be your mentor this week. Your regular instructor, Mr. Gary, has left me a few notes, but (FLINGS THEM OUT THE WINDOW) we're going to just wing it, OK?

Actually, that's not entirely true. First of all, Mr. Gary didn't give me any notes (and if he had I wouldn't have thrown them out the window), but he did give me an idea of what he'd like me to do. Secondly, I do have more than a gut instinct when it comes to helping to shape writing. I don't usually do this, but permit me to whip something out (PULLS OUT HER MFA IN POETRY) -- who's giggling back there??? Anyway, while studying for my master's in poetry writing, I participated in many workshops in both poetry and fiction. I also taught an Intro to Poetry course for underclassmen at Penn State while pursuing my master's. In addition, I've often provided constructive feedback to contributors to my online literary quarterly, Wild Violet.

As I've learned from those workshops, the most productive way to give feedback is to focus on key elements. I won't be overwhelming you by correcting every grammatical error or spelling mistake. Instead, I'll be evaluating what I think the piece is trying to do and how well it does it. Then I'll give you feedback designed to help you make it better.


In addition, I'll make myself available for brainstorming or any other questions related to writing, poetry, or the nuances of baby language (in which I am becoming quite proficient, thanks to my 8-month-old). I apologize in advance for the fact that I may need to pause while answering a question in order to handle a diaper change, and I hope you don't mind if your papers are returned with baby drool on them.

Comments

[lawchicky.livejournal.com]

What great mentors we're getting this season!!

I wouldn't notice the baby drool. I see enough of it here that I'm now blind to it. I'm wondering if we'll see some more poetry this week with your assistance. It won't be from me, mind you, but perhaps from other brave folk.

I need to sleep on the topic and then try to pick my best idea/angle. I'm already imagining I'll be reading a lot of entries about eggs.

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

I'm glad that you don't mind the baby drool. We have tons of it. I'm thinking of collecting it and marketing it.

Sleeping on the topic is always a great idea. Good luck!

[creature-girl08.livejournal.com]

Hey Alyce, Gary chose good in picking you.

I'm home gaming it now but still like reading what is happening in the work room. Ok, off to see what the topic is. Something about eggs I hear? Hummm!

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Cracks, actually. lawchicky thought that might lead to a lot of entries about eggs. That's certainly possible. I can think of a number of other ways to take that topic, but I'll remain mum until somebody has an idea to run by me.

I'm glad Gary asked me. I'm happy for the chance to coach from the sidelines.

[phoenixejc.livejournal.com]

Your thoughts on fiction entries? My brain is stirring that way again for this topic.

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

With fiction, as with anything else, it comes down to execution. Is the story compelling? Are the characters well-drawn, the story well-told? In general, I'd recommend trying to keep to a reasonable length (since long entries become tedious for readers to work through) and keeping the number of characters down to fewer than five (even less if it's a super-short "flash fiction" piece). Keep in mind, as well, that dialogue-heavy stories can be difficult for the reader to follow. If there is dialogue in the story, make it relevant to character development and plot, not just idle chit-chat.

In addition, keep in mind that fiction entries compete against personal stories in this competition, which provides both challenges and opportunities. On the one hand, fiction must compete with the emotional impact of a personal story. In order to do so effectively, the fiction story must make an impact on the reader, as well. The advantage is that, unlike non-fiction, you get to create your entire world. You develop a setting, characters, and plot that are to your liking. Maybe this is also why LJI voters can sometimes be more critical of fiction: they know that all the details are created, so they expect more cohesion, more effective storytelling, whereas they may be more permissive of a meandering personal story.

That said, I think that fiction, if done well, can be a great choice. Where are you thinking of taking it?

[momebie.livejournal.com]

So, last week I learned the lesson of not going with my gut. I worked through two or three ideas for posts before I settled on one that I thought was more engaging than the others, but it didn't seem to interest as many people as past posts have. This week I'm going to try going with the first idea. It's kind of coming out in second person though, which I don't usually write in. I'm going to roll with it, because I'm trying to use this competition to broaden my horizons and teach myself about different styles.

Do you (oh great mentor, or anyone reading) have any pointers for maintaining voice in an unfamiliar style, setting, or circumstance?

[joyfulfeather.livejournal.com]

I love second person, both as a writer and as a reader. It's unusual, but when a story comes out that way, it's almost always compelling.

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

First of all, you beat 21 people in your tribe, so you didn't do badly last week! Secondly, I read through your post, and I think that, if it didn't get the vote totals you were expecting, it might have been because the connection to the topic, "Inside Baseball," might not have been clear enough. Also, don't forget that, even if your post is part of a longer story, it should be capable of standing on its own. I'd be interested in hearing what your original idea had been and why you went with the approach you used. It might be helpful when you develop your next topic idea.

As far as your question about voice in an unfamiliar style, setting or circumstance is concerned, I would say the first thing you need to do is become more familiar with your setting. Some authors like to sit down and write out details of their setting, characters, etc. ahead of time, to become more familiar with them. This could come in the form of freewriting (writing whatever comes to mind, without editorial constraint) or by playing a sort of improv game, where you ask yourself questions and answer as the character. These details may not actually come into the piece, but your knowledge of the character will inform it.

Of course, you can get to the same place by a more intuitive form of writing. Alice Walker claimed to have channeled her characters from "A Color Purple", almost like a medium, allowing them to speak through her words. I would argue that Walker probably had a good internal feel for who each of those characters was ahead of time, even though she might not have put it down in note form.

Of course, if the voice you're writing in is very different from your own (for example, clinical and detached, whereas you might personally be more emotional), it can be harder to maintain that voice. Perhaps the best way to maintain it is to work on it in portions. Many writers feel that their best work comes within the first hour of sitting down. You could work on the piece for an hour, then take a break. Come back, read through what you've written, and write some more. When you get to the revision stage, try reading the piece backwards, one paragraph at the time. This will help you to ascertain whether the voice you're using at the conclusion of the piece matches the beginning.

Now, as far as writing in second person is concerned, I think you need to work to make certain all the story elements are there. Using second person makes the reader almost the implied protagonist of the story. You've got to be careful not to take on a "choose your own adventure" sort of storytelling, where the main character is essentially a cipher. Help us, the reader, understand who the protagonist is.

I think you've set an interesting challenge for yourself, and if you'd like more feedback, I'd be happy to hear more!

[shadowwolf13]

Could you possibly take a moment and give a bit of feedback on my entry?

http://shadowwolf13.livejournal.com/890277.html

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Wow! This is such a powerful experience, and I'm sure it was difficult to write about. Kudos to you for taking on such a personal, dark moment of your past. I'm glad to hear that you're doing better.

I think this draft tells the bare bones of the story, but I also think you could make some improvements to get it across even more compellingly. First of all, I think the two-paragraph introduction is a bit of a distraction from the main story. While the language in it is vivid, I'd suggest working the best of those phrases into the actual storytelling, rather than delaying your story.

For me, your story really began to come alive about halfway through. Just for fun, see what happens if you begin with the paragraph "It was a hurt that speared through me and took my breath away." That would have you beginning with the real "meat" of the story. Then you could take the relevant details from what came before and work that in as flashbacks.

Even if you don't go that route, I would recommend being more specific about exactly what was going on between your (ex?) husband and this girl. It's not clear to the reader the nature of the problem. Lots of people have opposite-sex friends. Why was this friendship such an obvious cause for concern?

For me, the ending is problematic. How was the decision made to enter into a polyamorous relationship? How do the wedding vows come into the story? I found myself wondering if the "Lynn" mentioned was a different character from the husband or if they were two separate marriages. Also, the assertion that you've moved on and healed the cracks is not as powerful as it might be if you showed the reader, through specifics, how you had healed.

One of the most difficult things about writing from life is selecting which elements of the story to include. Perhaps this story doesn't need all of the details you've included in this draft, and perhaps that's what is leading to the confusion. I think you need to ask yourself "What's the essential story here?" and then focus on telling just that portion of it. The other aspects of your relationship/life experience can be told at another time.

I hope this has been helpful. Feel free to ask me follow-up questions or to run another draft by me.

[locknkey.livejournal.com]

My first thought was "step on a crack, break your mother's back."

I've written mine, but am not at all certain of it. I took the approach of cracking up - mental break down.

My uncertainty stems form a couple of things. I've worked the personal angle heavily in this competition and I think people get tired of the whole, "woe is me," thing.

additionally the voice is bitter and angry, which is probably not going to inspire positive feelings.

On the moon hand, it had to be written, even if I decide on something else or take a bye, this needed to come out, so there's that.

I'm hesitant to ask for criticism - showing weakness, fragile ego and all that, but you can't really improve if you don't ask for help, right?

http://locknkey.livejournal.com/110685.html

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

I can tell that writing this was therapeutic for you. It's always difficult to write about such raw feelings.

Your worries about the tone of the piece are valid concerns, because you don't want to alienate the reader. However, I think in this case, more than the tone, my observation is that it is very "inside." You need to open it up more for the reader: make it more clear what's going on. It's implied that there's marital strife, but it's not clear the source of it. Also, the title comes from the children's game, "step on a crack, break your mother's back," but it's not clear what role the child plays in this entry.

Much as I would normally caution against a meta-entry, where you reference the act of writing the entry, I actually think the few paragraphs at the end speak more powerfully than much of the rest of it. Perhaps that's because, as the child comes home, the feelings become more focused, more directed and factual.

If you want to be sure people don't dismiss this entry as another "woe is me" tale, my advice is to give the readers something that can bring the story home to them, to help them to feel what you felt as you wrote it. The last few paragraphs seem to indicate that your child does that for you. Perhaps you can focus more on the mother-child relationship throughout the piece and about how what's happening in the marriage could "break" it.

[comedychick.livejournal.com]

My first thought was "step on a crack, break your mother's back."

That was one of the first things I thought of, too! I had so many ideas for this prompt, it was hard deciding what to go with.

[mstrobel.livejournal.com]

Do you think a piece has to be first person to have the most impact? Can third person work as well? I have an idea for this week but am not sure whether to have it first person or not. I suppose the best way is to write it in one and then read through it and mentally change the perspective, but I am curious to know what you think in general.

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Third person can definitely have as strong an impact as first person, particularly third person limited, which is from one person's POV. I think it really depends on the type of story being told. A more intimate, personal story might be more effective in first person or third person limited, while a story with a lot of action and moving parts might be best told as third person omniscient.

I like your idea of writing a small portion one way and then consider whether it's better written the other way. You will probably be able to tell after just writing a paragraph or two if it's having the impact you desire.

[joyfulfeather.livejournal.com]

I'm better at fiction than non-fiction - something I knew coming into this competition and which seems to have been confirmed by the responses to my entries. I like writing fiction, and I'm considering doing another fiction piece this week. However, part of why I wanted to do idol was to get better at writing nonfiction. While I've had a couple of good nonfic entries, I've otherwise fallen pretty flat. Any advice for someone like me on how to get better at nonfic?

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Reading back through several of your LJ Idol entries, I'm struck by the differences between your nonfiction and fiction pieces. I believe the best way for you to improve your nonfiction is to bring to it the same creative energy that you do with your fiction. In your fiction, it seems, you feel freer to use lyrical, descriptive language, whereas in your nonfiction, you seem driven to relate the facts.

One of my poetry instructors introduced me to a terrific book by Richard Hugo, "The Triggering Town," where he talks about the use of language in poetry. I think it relates to your situation, though, because he talks about how, when you know too much about a given place, you are compelled toward a drier retelling of it. I found one of the essays from the book (http://ualr.edu/rmburns/RB/hugotrig.html) online, and I think perhaps reading through it will help.

[beeker121.livejournal.com]

Typically, after seeing the topic for the week I check out wikipedia and dictionary.com just to see where else the topic can go. This week that may have been a mistake; I feel like I have too many ideas now, too many possible meanings of the word. I'm sitting with my page of notes for a day to see if anything starts to resonate.

Or I can use my boyfriend's idea and write a story about a plumber.

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

If anyone could write an entry about plumber butt cracks and make it worthwhile, it would be you! However, maybe you ought to see if anything else pops up to you from your notes first. I wouldn't want to be accused of sending you in a fruitless direction!

[barrelofrain.livejournal.com]

Miss Alyce, I don't usually stop into the work room, but you seem like such fun, I just might have to.

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Hi, nice to see you! I always appreciate enthusiasm. If you think of any questions, ask away. Otherwise, feel free to peruse the other conversations. I'm a big fan of group learning.

Hmm... now I'm worried that this answer wasn't fun enough. Oh, bother. (BONKS SELF ON THE HEAD WITH A GIANT HAMMER)

[team-jessie.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure there's anything to be done about this, but here goes...

I've certainly built up and then scrapped ideas in the past, but this is the first week in the competition where I finished a story, then trashed it. Wrote, edited, re-wrote, re-edited, and... pitched it.

Ugh!

After I was through the process, I realized it was WAY too personal, and I wasn't comfortable sharing it. I don't think I was expecting to hit a wall like that on LJI, but here I am! I think the whole "public post" thing has me a little weirded out for this part. It's something I've talked about in the past in locked entries, but I've never actually put this info out there.

Maybe advice on how to write stories with an emotional punch, while not putting oneself in vulnerable situations? Or maybe stories from others who ended up like I did?

I guess this is a "Where do I go from here?" post. :)

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

As I see it, there are three possibilities: write the story as nonfiction, knowing that you're putting it out to the world and letting that inform how you write it; writing the story as fiction, where it might not necessarily be the whole truth but where the truth informs the story you tell; writing something else.

In season 5, I struggled with the "Sexual Healing" topic, because I tend to not write about sexual topics. But I decided to tackle the challenge anyway. Somehow, I managed to write a piece that dealt with my sexual history WITHOUT being overtly sexual. It's a piece that I don't mind having public, because I found a way to be true to the story without writing anything I felt uncomfortable about others seeing.

One of my writing instructors used to tell us, "Write what is hardest to say." The strongest poems, and the strongest pieces, often come from such moments.

[comedychick.livejournal.com]

Okay, I actually have a question this week!

If someone (like me) is writing about a character, or characters, from a particular time period, do you think it's important to try and make them sound like they are from that time period? What if you don't know how they talked in that time period? I've done a little bit of research for the time period, but I'm worried the language is going to be tripping me up.

Alyce, since you're on my flist, I thought I'd go ahead and make a filtered post so you can see what I'm talking about with my entry this week: http://comedychick.livejournal.com/484722.html
(if anyone else on my flist wants to provide me with some feedback/thoughts this week before I post publicly, let me know and I can add you to the filter; it's another screenplay)

[teaberryblue.livejournal.com]

I am very opinionated on this subject so I will share my non-mentor opinion! This is very general since I obviously haven't seen the post!

--Stay idiomatically within the time period. That is, don't use phrases that wouldn't exist because they reference anachronisms (like "What were you saying? I totally checked out!" in the 1700s).
--The same goes for slang.
--The only time this isn't true is if you are writing humor. Kate Beaton's humor is largely derived from using idiomatic and slang anachronisms to humorous effect.

But when you're talking about normal everyday sentence construction, there's a lot to be said for using normal, contemporary speech. It's the same as writing in accents: are you more likely to enjoy a book where a character's thick Jamaican accent is spelled out phonetically, or one where the character's speech is only peppered with a couple uniquely Jamaican idioms and you are told that he speaks with a thick Jamaican accent?

If you're writing something that takes place in a formal setting, you might want to use period formalized dialogue-- say, if it's a Regency story, having the characters speak formally to each other when they are at the Duchess' ball makes sense and can add the right feel to your story. But if it is a Regency story where the main characters are in a carriage on a stormy night, you should feel perfectly confident using normal contemporary speech.

To me, the same way that when you'd write a story that takes place in a non-English-speaking country, you wouldn't post the characters' dialogue in their language when writing for an English-speaking audience, it is perfectly acceptable to assume that period dialogue is being "translated" to make it understandable to contemporary audiences. On the other hand, if using real period dialogue adds to the flavor and feeling you want to get across in your story, it can sometimes add just the right zing!

[tijuanagringo.livejournal.com]

I find that I enjoy reading you all writing to each other. Makes me almost smell the fragrance of work and words.

It was an excellent idea to bring in a guest coach. Mix things up. Get things circulating.

Looking forward to another challenging week.
Go get it!!!!

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Nice to hear from you again! I look forward to reading what you come up with this week.

[beeker121.livejournal.com]

Grargh. I don't know how many folks are still checking into the work room this late in the week but I'd appreciate any help people are willing to extend.

I've started two different stories for the topic this week, and abandoned them both. They were each personal stories that related to the topic, and cute. But I reached the same conclusion both times, what was the point? Why would someone else want to read it? (I've noticed that if I have trouble figuring out how to end an entry it's not a good sign.)

I know I can write something for this week, but last week I went with the idea that was good enough and I don't want to do that again. Any suggestions on how to shake meaning out of an entry - or how to find it in general?

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

The first suggestion that comes to mind is to play Jerry Springer and ask yourself, "What have I learned from this?" That might help you to come up with a deeper meaning which you could then go back and work into the piece.

You could also consider whether the story you're telling reminds you of anything else, perhaps a broader concern that would be worth exploring.

Or maybe you need to go back and figure out what the purpose of your piece is: to entertain, to persuade, to inform? Then make sure your entry delivers on that purpose.

One more thought: I think too often we try to tie everything up with a neat bow. Whether it's a poem, an essay or a story, we think we need a conclusion, a summary, a punchline. Between you and me, many pieces are stronger without them. Don't be afraid to give the reader a little bit of space to draw his or her own conclusions.

If you feel, on the other hand, that you're not done telling your story, maybe you should keep writing for a while and see what develops. You can go back and trim it down later.

I would be happy to read it and critique it if you'd like.