The Writer Who Could discussion

My collection of completely unorganised websites I thought were pretty useful to me:

This is some advice from Suzanne Young on how to write a series of books.

Here is information on mental health disorders, to give your characters something different.

Does anyone use the Snowflake Method for planning a novel?

I really liked this website, give you lots of different ways to plan a novel.

And if you feel like writing, but you don't know what to write about? This tumblr is full of writing prompts to use!

This was so helpful! Thank you!

This was some advice I found, on another group, on how to make your readers cry. I have no idea who wrote it, but whoever it was is absolutely brilliant!

So ask yourself, what characters, actions, and themes affect you most strongly? What are the books and movies that have left the greatest impact on you? What is it about them that you found particularly moving? After spending this past week making my own lists in answer to these questions and querying others about their responses, I’ve come to the following revelations about injecting emotion into fiction and, in turn, eliciting it from readers:

• Tragedy for the sake of tragedy isn’t enough. In the July 2009 issue of The Writer, Jill Dearman pointed out that:
One of the biggest issues I deal with from my clients is the “So what?” factor. The idea is good. Check! The form is clever or classic. Check! But so what? What the reader needs is emotional and mental engagement with the work—exactly what writers must conjure up during the writing process.

• Readers often feel the grief of the other characters more keenly than their own. The fictional deaths that have affected me most are those not only of characters I loved myself, but particularly of characters who were loved by other characters. When I asked my critters if they were affected by the death of an important character in my fantasy Dreamers Come, their almost universal response surprised me. They said they grieved most strongly for the characters who remained alive rather than for the character who died.

• Conflict in relationships can magnify loss. In expanding upon the previous point, I also realized that sometimes the most poignant separations, in fiction as in life, are those that are either preceded or caused by misunderstanding. We grieve all the more for a death if the characters cared deeply about each other but were at odds and unable to put the relationship back to rights before it was torn apart forever.

• Deliberate action by a character, leading to his own suffering, for the benefit of others is extremely powerful. Speaking for myself, the single most gut-wrenching thematic element in any story is self-sacrifice. When characters make the “hard right choice,” when they deliberately surrender their own happiness, well-being, or even their very lives for the sake of someone else or a greater cause—nothing moves me more deeply. And judging from the responses I received from others over the course of this week’s research, I’m not the only one who feels this. Making characters suffer is one thing; making them choose to suffer because it’s the right thing to do is another plane altogether.

Emotional honesty is the key. Although I could probably go on about this subject at length without exhausting its possibilities, I will end with the final thought that in eliciting any emotion, honesty is the single greatest factor in resonating with readers. In a response to a comment I left this week on her blog RX: Hope, novelist Candace Calvert said it as well as anyone:
…it… boil[s:] down to having the courage to be honest. To dig deep for the emotion, risk being vulnerable: and share it with our readers. As a reader, I’m most impressed with an author who creates flawed, human, heart-on-their-sleeves characters that make me think: “Omigoodness, she’s writing about ME!” We all want to feel understood, connected. I think that’s what we must strive for as authors, to offer that blessing as best we can.

Pasted from

That was actually really good! And I'm saving that for future....

Thank you so much for the websites Chloe! I found the snowflake method really helpful and am planning to sit down and do some proper work with it as a frame in the week. I'm hopeful it might help me keep momentum going at last :)

Lyndsey that is really interesting advice thank you. Perhaps it isn't coincidence that I find that some of my best work has been produced when I myself am going through a turbulent time.

Some advice I was once given long ago was to write about what you know and at the time I dismissed it, thinking JK Rowling couldn't know what it was to do magic and yet her books were my favourites (I was probably around 7 at the time) but I think viewing that advice through yours gives it a new lease of life for me; It's the characters who I need to write sticking to what I know (their emotions and thought processes).

I think your advice for emotional honesty is great. There are emotions I have felt in the past that have even made me feel ashamed and I have wrestled with two (sometimes more!) conflicting emotions when making a decision. These sorts of things I have kept very private in my life but if I am not afraid to allow my characters to show these things, it will add a greater depth to them and I think make them all the more believable.

If anyone is interested, a writer who I think has added real believability to his characters doing just this is George RR Martin. Reading his series, A Song of Ice and Fire, I have found myself going through emotional turbulence with the characters and I think I have had a moral epiphany with ever page! no doubt there are other writers doing this too but Martin is the one who sticks out in my mind.

A bit of practical advice for anyone looking to broaden their horizons with regard to human emotions would be to go down to your local magistrates court for a day or two. I may be biased as I am training to work in criminal law, but I have found working there a real experience.

One of the things I always say of my time in criminal defence is that I rarely had a client without some sort of addiction or mental health problem and I found working with these people really opened up my eyes to a range of emotions and a different way of thinking I may not otherwise have seen. Having said that, I think the few clients I had who weren't addicts or suffering from a mental health problem, perhaps are the best inspiration for me! If anyone does take this advice I'd be interested to hear how you get on :)

She probably already covered this in the comment above, but when creating a character, its a great thing to give him/her/it traits that the reader can relate to, and understand. One thing of making a good book isn't about using fancy words, or good literature, its about getting the reader hooked onto the book, keeping them hooked, and when its over, go out and instantly buy the next one.