Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation

Writers Are Promise Makers

Writers are promise makers. We tell our readers that we’re going to give them something just because of the cultural expectations that happen when someone opens our books.

What do we promise them?

The book is about someone. We reveal different aspects about that character as we show them act or react to the things that go on in the book.

The character will likely have something they want and something they yearn for and there will be things that keep that from happening.

You can call this the plot if you’re into it. You don’t have to.

You can call this cause and effect or an action sequence. You don’t have to do that either.

But stuff happens in your story. That’s what makes your story a story.

To show the character and put them on a journey, we have to have things happening to them. Usually those things involve a problem for our character as they trudge forward and try to get their wants.

The character makes choices. Those choices have ripple effects. Sounds like life, right?

You can call this point of view and it has a lot to do with that.

You can call this voice and it has a lot to do with it.

You can call this mood even, but that’s a little reach.

The voice of the story creates an atmosphere. It tells the reader if they can trust the narrator or not. The word choice of the narrator and voice can tell the reader about the characters.

The point of view is all about how immediate the relationship between the reader and the narrator is. If it’s first person, that I point of view, then it’s going to be pretty immediate. Third person omniscient? That all knowing voice? Usually not so much.

There needs to be a world where all of this takes place. Setting. Details.

And there’s one more big thing.

An old editor’s blog post by Beth Hill puts it out there pretty succinctly.

“You promised an entertaining story.

“You promised a believable story.

“You promised a story that fits a genre if you write genre novels.

“You promised something different—a new character, a different world, a different dilemma. A different outcome.

“You promised cohesion and logic.”

We promise so much, don't me?

Pogie says that if you tell someone you're going to take them for a walk, take them for a walk. Or, you know, they might not believe you any more about things--like that cats are not demon furballs from Oklahoma or whatever.

This one comes from IndieReader.

In an episode of Friends, Ross enlists Chandler and Rachel to help get a new couch up to his apartment. They struggle to carry the hefty couch, to which Ross continuously yells “PIVOT!” as though if he exclaims this enough, the couch will glide on up the staircase. By the time they’re done, the couch has been chopped in half.

Don’t mangle your story to get it from your desired point A to point B. When you reach a point in the plot where the path seems irrevocably blocked, PIVOT on your heel and find another way. It doesn’t mean you can’t come back to this spot and try again later, but as Ross proves, kicking and screaming is not the best way forward.

For this exercise, go to the point of your story that’s troubling you and take it in a completely opposite direction. And go wild with it — introduce dragons and have the sky fall down and start writing in second person POV. You might just find that taking the strangest path helps you recalibrate your story’s compass.

Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction

Learn about the screech owl in Connecticut here. Photo courtesy of the Town of West Hartford Police Department/Facebook.

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

There’s a lot of ways that trope is defined, but for us here on DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE, we’re going with the Grammarist’s definition, which is:

“A trope is simply a common or recurring theme or method used in storytelling across all forms of media. Tropes serve as a way for creators to convey certain ideas and messages to their audience in a familiar and recognizable way.”

They go on to write,

“Think of the last book you read or a movie you recently watched. Did you reach a point where you could predict what was going to happen? Or did a character arise, and you immediately know it was the villain? That’s because the creator used tropes to build up the idea or the character.”

So, tropes create expectations in the reader, right? They are things that reoccur across films or books or songs or art that create an expectation and often have a symbolic meaning (but not always). Those who hate them say that they are overdone, so passe, boring. Those who love them say that they give comfort and can be used to powerfully convey referential meaning.

 Or as ThePleasurePen writes, “Tropes are not just narrative tools; they are also key in setting and sometimes subverting the expectations of your audience. Mastering this dynamic can elevate your storytelling, making your tales both satisfying and surprising.”

Tropes can create those expectations and subvert them or twist them or use them to shape stories. That’s because story doesn’t stop at the writer, right? Story is communication between the writer and the reader and tropes help the reader understand what you’re putting down there. Tropes are patterns. Patterns light up the readers’ brains in certain ways.

Here’s a way to think about it:

You’re watching a horror movie. There’s ominous music, a woman looks over her shoulder and then a man appears in front of her on the sidewalk. She jumps. We jump. The music and look over her shoulder create that expectation. The frame of the camera also helps create the suspense for a potential shock. It’s a jump scare.

But how do you do this in a book? That’s the question, right?

Usually, that’s done via suspense. In the book, THE TWISTED ONES, author T. Kingfisher has a woodpecker that the main character, Mouse, hears every night. Mouse hears that damn woodpecker every time she’s trying to fall asleep. Night after night. And then . . .  as  Ferrett Steinmetz writes for Tor . . .

“she realizes the things moving about in the night are living effigies, piles of bones tied together and somehow animated, and what she’s hearing is not a woodpecker but the stones hanging from the effigy’s ribcage knocking together as it’s been lurking outside her window this whole time.

“The delight of The Twisted Ones is how much the narrative implies, and how cunningly, without filling in all the blanks—it’s packed with subtle horrors left to fester as you take the thought further than the protagonist does.”

Other examples of tropes in horror are found footage or creepy clowns or the group splitting up to investigate or whatever when there’s a serial killer outside (or inside) the cabin in the woods. A trope in romance might be, oh no we have to share a hotel room. That sort of thing.

Paul Jenkins writes on Brilliantio,

“Moreover, Trope Evolution plays a significant role in establishing these norms over time. As cultures change and evolve, so do our stories and the tropes within them. For instance, the ‘damsel in distress’ trope has evolved significantly with societal changes reflecting stronger female characters who save themselves.

So remember this: every time you see a familiar plot twist or character type crop up in your reading journey—it’s not lazy writing but rather an intentional use of trope to craft a predictable narrative arc satisfying your innate longing for patterned storytelling. Understanding this helps deepen your appreciation of literature’s artistry and complexity.”

There are a zillion cool plot twist ideas and exercises here: Plot Twist Ideas and Prompts for Writers.

Pogie the Dog: Jump scares and cats are the greatest thing of all time.

L the Cat: Agree to disagree.

We are looking for stand alone speculative fiction novellas explaining or exposing the root of a real life supernatural mystery, urban legend or folklore, to include in a series we are building. (Please note, we don’t want a whole series by one author. At least not yet)

Submissions Open November 7 and close February 7

If we don’t find what we want, we may extend this deadline or reopen submission later

Please read and Follow All Guidelines Carefully or your story may be discarded without being read.

Novellas should be 20,000 - 35,000 words

Send a query with a story summary and a bio in the body of the email to:

[email protected]

Payment is a signing bonus and royalty split to be discussed upon offer to publish.

Send full manuscript as a separate .doc or .docx attachment, Formatted in Shunn format style (Standard Manuscript Format)

Speculation Publication’s Utter Speculation Series is accepting novellas dealing with myths and legends until February 7th. Check it out.

It's all about pretend aliens!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

At the same time, a lot of the writers I work with are having BIG DOUBT MOMENTS as they query and read Twitter/X and see authors behaving badly or agents behaving badly or people getting yelled at for sucking at something.

And they are scared.

Now, there’s one part of this in that you need to put stuff into perspective. Losing your reputation isn’t the same as being in a war zone or in natural disaster or having someone violent in your own home, right?

We act like it is though.

Same thing about money. We act, sometimes, like it’s the only thing that gives our lives value. We all need to unlearn that.

What gives your life value is what YOU determine gives it value. That might be money if you’re into that. It might be family. It might be friends or having a sense of purpose. The point is that YOU get to determine that, not society, not TikTok viewers or literary agents.

When we go in to build or remodel or decorate a room, one of the most important questions is: What is the purpose of this room? What do I want it to feel like? What do I want to feel like when I’m in it?

When we go in to build a scene of our story, we ask those same questions: What is the purpose of this scene? Is it to show conflict, move the plot forward, dive more deeply into character, make a new obstruction? And more importantly, what do I want the reader to feel?

When we go in to build who we are as a person and our life, we can ask those same questions, too: What is the purpose of what I’m doing right now? What does my choice make me feel like? Who do I want to be here, right now, in this moment?

Kind of amazing but simple, right?

Who do we want to be? Are we making the choices to be that person?

I’ve lost that a bit lately. But I’ve made a list to start getting that back. I hope you will, too!

Be the dog you want to be.

This is from “What If,” which is a book of writing exercises. You can learn more about it here.

“Image Notebook

“Keep an image notebook and write down one image every single day by asking yourself “What’s the most striking thing I heard, saw, smelled, touched, or tasted today?”

Gemini Magazine Fourteenth Annual Poetry Open Contest.

Unpublished poetry. Poems on personal blogs are accepted.

Entry Fee: $9 (three poems), $18 (six poems), $27 (nine poems), and $36 (twelve poems). Prize: $1,000 + publication, 2nd Prize: $100 + publication, and $25 + publication for four honorable mentions.

Deadline: January 2, 2024.

The 2023 Exeter Novel Prize is open to unpublished and published writers worldwide who are not represented by a literary agent. Entrants submit the first 10,000 words of their in-progress novel and a 500-word synopsis.

Entry Fee: £20.

Prize: £1,000 + a trophy, 2nd Prize: £100 + a paperweight (five winners).

Deadline: January 1, 2024.

We’re taking next week off! So, no posts or podcasts for the last week of December 2023! Happy new year and holidays to all of you!

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

A lot of time, a writer will get feedback and it’ll say something vague-ish like, “Dig deeper.”

And then the author cries or gets angry or feels an emotion that no author wants to feel.

The thing is that this advice is sort of vague, but what it usually means is:

1.     You have no setting in your scene or chapter or story;

2.     Your character doesn’t react to things and then act on things;

3.     When your character does act and react to things, it doesn’t seem to be who the character is. Like you can’t have your introverted hamster making a flash mob dancing disco through the streets unless there is a lot of motivation;

4.     There are no stakes going on.

A way to fix this is to realize it’s happening. At the first part of each scene, write:

1.     What you want the reader to feel;

2.     What you want your character to feel;

3.     What the antagonist would think about this scene;

4.     What senses are happening in the scene;

5.     Look for words that distance the reader from what’s happening (see, looked, smelled, felt, noticed are a good start).

Now, here’s the thing. This works for life, too. Maybe you’re not feeling super fulfilled and you need a boost. Think about those questions about you and your choices. Can you figure out what you want to feel and how to get there?

Author Nicole Bianchi has a really, really great post with five writing exercises, and I’m kind of in love with it.

It’s here. And here’s an excerpt

“The Ernest Hemingway Exercise for Sharpening Your Observational Skills

In the 1930s, a 22-year-old aspiring writer named Arnold Samuelson traveled to Florida to see if he could get some writing advice from the author he idolized: Ernest Hemingway.Hemingway ended up inviting Samuelson along on a fishing trip and sharing writing advice during their time at sea.

In this video, I detailed the three-step writing exercise Hemingway gave Samuelson.Essentially, Hemingway challenged Samuelson to pick a situation to observe and then try to retell it on the page.

For Samuelson, this was fishing.

For you, it might be an event that happens when you’re commuting to work or shopping at a store or eating at a restaurant or playing with your kids.Pretend you’re an artist heading out with your sketchbook to capture what you see and feel. Pay close attention to everything that is happening and the emotions that you experience.

Hemingway said,‘Watch what happens today. If we get into a fish see exactly what it is that everyone does. If you get a kick out of it while he is jumping, remember back until you see exactly what the action was that gave you that emotion. Whether it was the rising of the line from the water and the way it tightened like a fiddle string until drops started from it, or the way he smashed and threw water when he jumped.Remember what the noises were and what was said. Find what gave you the emotion, what the action was that gave you the excitement.’”

You should check her out.

Owl Story

MenagerieIt accepts fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. “We believe in sentences so sharp they draw blood, the strange and inexplicable, the wild and weird and uncanny, words in thickets, clusters, and flocks, pieces that move us beyond caring what others think about said pieces.” You can read about them a here.Deadline: Open nowLength: Up to 5,000 words for prose, 3-5 poemsPay: $50Details here and here.

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

When I was a baby newspaper reporter, one of my editors, Grady Holloway, used to call me over to his desk. A lot.

I loved Grady. He had this great, grizzly beard before it was cool, wore a dirty hat, had been married to an ambassador’s daughter, rode horses, drove cab in Colorado when all the beat poets and journalists were out there, and liked noir mysteries.

But whenever he pulled me over to his big metal desk in the newsroom, I knew that I was about to get advised.

“Cici,” he’d say with this perfect, gruff whiskey voice, “you’re a great writer, but have you ever thought about . . .”

And then he’d tell me something I hadn’t thought about.

-Ings are addictive like all sexy grammatical elements are. They might not be as addictive as the debonair em-dash (—) or the lovely ellipses (…) or the goddess we know as the parenthetical ( ), but they are pretty close.

When you put -ing at the end of a verb that verb becomes progressive. You feel like the verb is happening right now in the present even if your tense is the past. Like this . . .

She was running, breathing hard and fast, shallow breaths that couldn’t quite make it all the way into her lungs. Running so that he wouldn’t catch up. And the ground was breaking beneath her, dead people’s hands reaching through the woods’ surface, fingers trying to clutch her sneakers, her ankles, even the laces. Anything.

Scary, right? Or, um . . . kind of?

Now let’s see that without the -ings on there.

She ran, her breath hard and fast, shallow breaths that couldn’t quite make it all the way into her lungs. She ran so that he wouldn’t catch up. And the ground broke beneath her. Dead people’s hands reached through the woods’ surface. Fingers tried to clutch her sneakers, her ankles, even the laces. Anything.

Wait. They both kind of work, don’t they? Absolutely. Sometimes you want to use those -ings for impact. But just like the em-dash, ellipses, and parenthetical statements, there can be too much of a good thing.

Crying because of the creepy man racing after her for five terrifying minutes, Carrie raced through the woods trying to get away and breathing out heavily even as horrifying zombie hands reached through the dirt and pine needles, hoping to grasp her shoes and bringing her down beneath the surface with them.

You can see the difference now right? We have present participles, adjectives, progressive verbs and even a gerund. Those -ings are doing a lot of work here and there’s just too darn many of them.

And what happens in that passage? The reader starts to get bored. It doesn’t feel fluid. The mind sort of numbs from all those -ings. And the bleed into each other, blending.

Yes, yes, I know! Blending has an -ing.

Now, let me try to do it without -ings.

She cried. She ran through the woods, each breath a prayer, an intake of hope as her feet raced across the pine needles. He was close. Too close. The thud of his footsteps pounded after her. The dirt trembled but not from her. Hands. Dead, decayed hands somehow broke through the hard ground. One poked up just as her sneaker hit the ground. It reached for her. Missed. Another tried. Another.

Different again, right? Same scene. No -ings. It’s pretty cool when you can see the difference of tone and feel that happen just by playing with one tiny element of the language.

Notice things. Don't drop the goods when you're running away.

Rejoinder. The Archival is Political special issue. Fiction, nonfiction, poetry, comics, cross-genre, drama, graphic narratives, interviews, art, photography. No fee. Deadline: December 15, 2023.

Ploughshares. Regular Reading Period. Fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translations. $3 fee (free for subscribers). Deadline: January 15, 2024.

Burnside Review Press. Book Contest. Poetry. $25 fee. Prize: $1,000, book publication, 10 author copies. Deadline: December 31, 2023.

This one is from Reedsy,

Most of us remember “truth or dare” from childhood sleepovers. Some would bravely declare “DARE!” and wait for the inevitably embarrassing challenge. Others would hazard a “truth…?” and wait nervously in their sleeping bags while the challenger mulled over which deeply provoking and juicy question to ask.

To dive deeper into your character’s emotional depths, ask a round of questions — both probing and seemingly innocuous alike. (Hey, you never know when your character’s favorite choice of ice cream topping might come in handy!) We recommend downloading our free character profile template — with the help of this worksheet, you'll be raring to go.

Well, it's just that . . .

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

When I go to classrooms on book tour or for school visits, teachers (or kids prompted by teachers) always ask me what the most important skill is for being a writer.

And I tell them a couple things.

No, it’s not about what a comma splice is or the coolness of objective correlatives.

It’s really a two part answer:

That’s what makes a difference on the page.

I once had a reporter ask me why I have details in my book and I may have laughed, which was super cruel of me, I know, but she was oblivious thankfully. And I said, “Details are what makes strong story, what shows character, what pulls someone into the world.”

By noticing other people or setting or how the air smells near a sewer grate or under someone’s arm, you create a world on the page.

This, is also pretty important advice for life, too.

Tim Denning writes,

“Get on a bus. Zombies everywhere.

No one is looking at each other or having a conversation. It’s just a sea of bodies looking at phones that are nothing more than a distraction.

Phones are dream killers. They’re full of other people’s priorities. What’s cooler is to have human conversations. It’s to look people in the eye and be present.

I had coffee with my old boss the other day. Every few minutes he kept glancing at his phone. He looked worried. He looked like he was under a spell. Or like a puppet master was pulling his strings.

He couldn’t relax or engage properly in the conversation. And this is the Great American Life that has been exported to most major nations, including Australia where I live. Sad.

Relationships are more important than notifications. And 99% of inbound phone calls aren’t urgent and can go to voicemail.

Life hack: put your phone on do-no-disturb mode, then add your family to favorites so only their calls can get through in case of an emergency.”

Julia Cameron, creator of The Artist’s Way says something similar, which is basically that by filling our time with distractions (Netflix, Wordle, Facebook, Tumblr, X, Threads, Instagram, YouTube, NYT Spelling Bee—the list goes on forever), we lose that connection to our muse—to the quiet within ourselves that creativity often springs from. We look only at a screen and fail to look at a world.

Wild, right?

Be noticed. But also notice things. Channel your inner cat.

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

Genre: New and innovative works of literary arts across all mediums and genres including cross genre work. Length: Up to 4,000 words for prose, and up to 10 pages for poetry.

Payment: Poetry: $50; Responses and department pieces: $100; Fiction and essays/nonfiction: $200; Visual art, music, and multimedia: $200. Deadline: December 1, 2023.

Our random thought is from here.

When I help writers with their stories, a lot of the times one of the things I tell them is that they need to dig more deeply.

They need to dig more deeply into the emotion and feel it with the characters.

They need to dig more deeply into the scene and see the characters there, interacting with their surroundings and each other.

And a lot of us writers in our early drafts of story, don’t dig all that deeply because we’re too busy making sure we get words on the page and plot moving forward and story right there, you know?

That’s totally okay! It’s normal. There is no judgement here, but what you want to do (if you want to make the best story you can) is dig a bit more deeply.

You go back in and look for places where:

“Find and Replace” for those nods and when you see them you can either:

1.     Cut them

2.     Use those places as a spot to show setting or physical reaction with the setting.

3.     Show a full body motion that is more grounded or telling.

Here, I’ll show you each of the examples.

The original.

Shaun nodded. “Yup. It’ll be full circle.”

You can just cut it.

“Yup. It’ll be full circle,” Shaun said.

You can use those places as a spot to show setting or physical reaction with the setting.

Shaun ran his pencil across the line of the hallway’s tile wall like he was trying to find a straight path forward. After a second, he dropped the pencil into his bag and refocused on us. “Yup. It’ll be full circle.”

You can show a full body motion that is more grounded or telling.

Students scooted by, rushing because of the bell, trying to be good, trying not to be late, not having their whole worlds randomly ripped apart. Shaun ducked back to avoid a cluster of students in goth t-shirts who were trudging quickly forward, heads down.

“Yup,” he said. “It’ll be full circle.”

Those nods and words like them are really just opportunities, placeholders for writers to go back in and make some richer setting or details to show and distinguish how each character is a bit different in how they react to the environment.

In that same scene, one character might duck his head down, shoulders slumping forward as he tries to wedge himself out of the way and out of the prying eyes of other students.

Another character might stretch and take up all the space he wants with his confident self and accidentally break someone’s nose with his elbow.

But the point is to use those moments to show the reader who the character is and what the setting is, to make it feel super immediate and real.

Take no prisoners. Don’t live a shallow life. Take control of it.

Go into your story. Do a find/search or find/replace for a word like “nod.”

Count how many you have.

Cut that number by half.

Hudson Review Short Story Contest. Genre: Short story up to 10,000 words. Prize: First prize is $500. Second and third prizes are $250. Winning stories will be published in The Hudson Review. All entries will be considered for publication. Payment at regular rates. Deadline: November 30, 2023.

J. F. Powers Prize for Short Fiction. Genre: Short fiction. Prize: $500. Deadline: November 30, 2023.

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

Two weeks ago, we started talking about how to write a book blurb for your story and began with the first step, which is a hook. You can check that out here. And the second step is here.

So, if the first step is creating that hook, the second step, according to Shayla Raquel is dangling the characters. Then our next step is what Shaun has no problem doing in real life with anyone other than his own daughter, dive into the conflict.

So:

It means that in that book blurb, you want to show your potential reader what the conflict of the story is.

It’s just when one force goes against another while the character tries to get their goal. The character wants something. The conflict is the obstacles that stand in her way. Super simple, right?

Or as Sean Glatch says in Writers.com,

“At its most basic, conflict is the clash of opposing forces with a character’s own pursuit of a goal. The character must overcome these opposing forces to achieve the goal. These opposing forces might take on numerous shapes, and might even exist solely within the character’s own psyche.”

Shayla Raquel has a couple great examples of blurbs that show conflict.

Frederick Starks has it all—a gorgeous wife who was his high school sweetheart, three beautiful children, a mansion and cars others envy, millions in the bank, respected in his community, admired by his employees, loved and respected by loyal friends. He revels in the hard-earned power and control he’s acquired.

As the saying goes, “All that glitters is not gold,” which Starks discovers when gut-wrenching betrayal by his wife sends him over the edge and into a maximum security prison.

—When the Serpent Bites, Nesly Clerge

This brings us to the fourth step and that’s DETERMINE THE CONSEQUENCES.

You want to show what is about to happen. It’s that formula we talked about before.

“Conflict (“Character must do this”) + Stakes (“Or this will happen”) = Consequences.”

This is basically showing the reader what will happen if the character does or doesn’t get their goal.

And the final step according to Shayla Raquel? It’s just DINE ON THE BIG QUESTION, which, of course, makes me hungry.

She writes,

“End your blurb on an intriguing question or a point of tension—something that will convince the reader to take a chance on buying your book.

Example:

Bruce the bear likes to keep to himself. That, and eat eggs. But when his hard-boiled goose eggs turn out to be real, live goslings, he starts to lose his appetite. And even worse, the goslings are convinced he's their mother. Bruce tries to get the geese to go south, but he can't seem to rid himself of his new companions. What's a bear to do?

—Mother Bruce, Ryan T. Higgins

Whew. And there you go.

Sometimes, you know, I don't think about the consequences, but it's important to or else you might get put in time-out for the dog kennel - Pogie

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

LINKS WE MENTION

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._state_foods

Last week, we started talking about how to write a book blurb for your story and began with the first step, which is a hook. You can check that out here.

So, if the first step is creating that hook, the second step, according to Shayla Raquel is dangling the characters.

What does that mean?

It means that the thing that propels your story needs to be in your book blurb.

Or as Shayla says, “Your characters are the story.”

You only have 150 to 200 words in that blurb, so you can’t tell your potential reader everything about those adorable characters, but you want to give them some details to hook onto.

She uses an example of Marissa Meyer’s Cinder to show how to do this:

Sixteen-year-old Cinder is considered a technological mistake by most of society and a burden by her stepmother. Being cyborg does have its benefits, though: Cinder's brain interference has given her an uncanny ability to fix things (robots, hoovers, her own malfunctioning parts), making her the best mechanic in New Beijing. This reputation brings Prince Kai himself to her weekly market booth, needing her to repair a broken android before the annual ball. He jokingly calls it "a matter of national security," but Cinder suspects it's more serious than he's letting on.

Although eager to impress the prince, Cinder's intentions are derailed when her younger stepsister, and only human friend, is infected with the fatal plague that's been devastating Earth for a decade. Blaming Cinder for her daughter's illness, Cinder's stepmother volunteers her body for plague research, an "honor" that no one has survived.

But it doesn't take long for the scientists to discover something unusual about their new guinea pig. Something others would kill for.

You see how it tells us a bit about Cinder and what’s wrong with her world?

You can see from that blurb what step three is, right? It’s that there is a conflict set up. Cinder vs her mom, maybe against society, and so on.

And there are stakes, which brings us to step four, which is “determine the consequences,” Shalya says, writing,

“When there’s conflict, there are consequences to a character’s actions. What hangs in the balance for your characters?

“Formula: Conflict (“Character must do this”) + Stakes (“Or this will happen”) = Consequences”

And an example from Chris McGeorge’s Guess Who blurb

“If he doesn’t find the killer, they all will die.”

Hard to get more explicit than that. Next week, we’ll have the final step.

Always know the consequence - Pogie

This is from Dabble Writer.

“Choose three objects at random, then look them up in a dream dictionary. Write down what each object symbolizes and imagine the person who would dream about them. What is the dreamer going through? Build a story from there.”

But instead, make that person, your main character. How can you weave in those images into the subtext of your story? How can you weave in their meaning?

Deadline: Year-round

Since 2005, The New Verse News has covered the news of the day with poems on issues, large and small, international and local. It relies on the submission of poems (especially those of a politically progressive bent) by writers from all over the world. The editors update the website every day with a poetic take on a current and specific headline. See the website for guidelines and examples. Then paste your non-simultaneous submission and a brief bio in the text of an email (no attachments, please) to nvneditor(at)gmail.com. Write “Verse News Submission” in the subject line of your email.

For Issue 14, Jelly Bucket will feature a special section dedicated to neurodivergent writers. Guest edited by Nathan Spoon, we’re looking for creative nonfiction, fiction, poetry, 10-minute plays, and art specifically from writers and artists who identify as neurodivergent. Submit via Submittable: General submissions ($2) thru 12/1. Special section (no fee) thru 12/15. jellybucket.submittable.com/submit

We’ll talk about the final step in her process next week.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/section-blue-ridge-parkway-closed-after-visitors-allegedly-104550600

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!

I’ve decided it’s time for a new series of podcast now that we whacked character lies down to a mush of sobs.

There are all different ways to write these blurbs and make them tantalizing to readers, but there are set steps. We’re going to focus on the first one here.

First let’s explain what a book blurb is, right? It’s just the description of your novel that goes on the sell page on Amazon or other places. It’s short. It’s sexy. It’s enticing. You use it on social media, on Amazon.

It is the ad for your book that is everywhere your book is available to be sold and some other places too.

Oh, this baby is about 150 to 200 words.

Shayla Raquel has a great post from last year where she writes,

She then gives some great and quick examples of this:

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.

Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.

—The Martian, Andy Weir

Could you survive on your own, in the wild, with everyone out to make sure you don't live to see the morning?

—The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins

The Reedsy blog uses this one as an example. It’s Uncanny Times by Laura Anne Gilman.

Huntsmen, according to the Church, were damned, their blood unclean and unholy. Yet for Rosemary and Aaron Harker, the Church was less important than being ready to stand against the uncanny, as not being prepared could lead to being dead. 

But Blurbmedic has a really lovely infographic and guidelines, which is probably why it’s Blurbmedic.

It creates a template that’s really amazing at showing how the blurb is a teaser and also organizes the story, connecting emotion and tension to make a blurb interesting.

Hooks can be opened or closed.

And that site says that the open hook is the “statements or questions that make a reader ask more questions. The reader will have to read the book to find out.”

Carrie is dying.

You’re like, “Wait, what? Why is Carrie dying? What door? Why did she open it? what happened?”

The closed hook makes you ask questions and find answers.

Carrie is dying.

First, she opened the door that let in the zombie. Then the zombie bit her, but this kind of zombie doesn’t want to eat brains. It also eats poopy.

The point here, according to Blurbmedic, is to get the reader to be afraid of missing out on knowing what happens. The hook will build up the tension and make everyone intrigued.

It’s a really big first step.

He says to write:

You put it in here, also created by Graeme. Cool, right?

“In a (SETTING) a (PROTAGONIST) has a (PROBLEM) caused by (an ANTAGONIST) and (faces CONFLICT) as they try to (achieve a GOAL).”

In real life, you don't want the question of defecation location to be open ended.

Emerald City seeks fiction for our upcoming issues. We are a quarterly online fiction magazine that publishes traditional short stories, flash fiction, and hybrid works. We believe fiction is a necessary part of life; captivating storytelling transports us to other worlds while allowing us to make more sense of our own. We’re less interested in what genre something is or its literary status than we are in how much it moves us. Whether traditional, experimental, or something else fun, we publish well-crafted stories that make us reevaluate ourselves and our place in the world. emeraldcitylitmag.org

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2023/oct/26/weird-medieval-guys-olivia-m-swarthout-art-rabbits?ICID=ref_fark

The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License. 

Here’s a link to that and the artist’s website. Who is this artist and what is this song?  It’s “Summer Spliff” by Broke For Free.

WE HAVE EXTRA CONTENT ALL ABOUT LIVING HAPPY OVER HERE! It's pretty awesome.

We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.

Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That's a lot!