Tag: first draft tip

The Perfect Ending

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Image Credits:-
All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated with many created in Book Brush. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes.
Hope you have had a good weekend. Nice one here including a pre-birthday celebration meal out with immediate family. Lovely time had by all. Lady had a great weekend too – plenty of walkies though there is also still plenty of mud. Not that she cares…

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Hope the day has gone well. Hectic here and am glad to be at my desk, sitting down to write. Lady saw her Hungarian Vizler and Rhodesian Ridgeback pals and even Daisy the gentle spaniel. Good time had by all.

Writing wise, I’m looking forward to the Association of Christian Writers Flash Fiction Group meeting next week. Always fun. Am not looking forward to a visit to the dentist tomorrow even though said dentist is lovely (but it is never a fun visit, is it?).

Need to start work on some stories for competitions I always enter but won’t get much chance before Sunday but I can at least be “brewing” some ideas before then. Thinking time is never wasted.

Hope your Monday has gone well. Busy as ever here but it was lovely to see Lady having a good time in the park with her Hungarian Vizler and Rhodesian Ridgeback pals.

Writing wise, I’ll be catching up with a few writing odd jobs. I’ve long found it’s the best use of my limited writing time on a Monday night.

Don’t forget my next author newsletter will be out again before long. To sign up for news, tips, and stories, do head over to my landing page at https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com

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Hope your weekend has gone well and you enjoy the rest of it! Busy one here but good.

Writing wise, I’m back to editing again and enjoying that. Shortly, I’ll be getting on with my flash fiction Sunday afternoon, always a nice way to wind up the week. I’m focusing on 100 word stories at the moment. I do love the form, especially since they were my introduction to flash fiction in the first place. This length of story makes for a great warm up writing exercise too.

Character Tip: Think about what you like and dislike most in a character you’ve read. Think about why you have these likes and dislikes. Especially if you dislike the character, look in more depth as to why and then work out how you would’ve written the character. You learn a lot by thinking things through like this. I know I don’t like characters who come across as wishy-washy. I won’t write them. But I had to know the character type I disliked here to work out what it is I do like.

Hope the weekend has got off to a good start. Nice weather here.

Writing wise, I’ll be sharing Setting Writing Exercises for Chandler’s Ford Today next week. I’ll be sharing tips here and this post will tie in nicely with my Getting The Hooks In one too as the best writing exercises “hook” the writer in to want to give them a go. Link up on Friday.

First Draft Tip: I’ve always found it useful to just get the first draft written, rest it, and then edit it later. But if that isn’t your way of doing things, I’d still recommend getting as much of your story down before polishing up anything. It has been my experience better ideas can come as I write my first draft (and the further I get on that first draft the more ideas come) so I note these down separately and look at them later when I’ve had a proper chance to evaluate them all.

But if something really does grip you get that down fast before you forget it (and you do, trust me I’ve made that mistake). You can worry about the exact placing of that idea in your story later. Also the time break once you have got your draft down does give you a chance to decide whether that red hot idea was so red hot after all. They’re not always.

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Flash fiction is especially cheering for me on those days when I seem to be chasing my tail all day because I at least get something creative drafted and when time is very short I go for the 50 or 100 worders.

But it is amazing on looking back at where I’ve used pockets of time like this for odd bits of writing just how much I’ve been able to get done. It does mount up so is worth using these times and if you’re not sure where to start when you have pockets of time like that, why not give flash fiction or flash non-fiction a go?

It has been another hectic Monday. Time to wind down at least a little with a story. Hope you like my latest on YouTube – Bells.

What does the ringing of the church bells mean for my character? Do her memories help her? Find out here.

 

Will be beginning flash fiction Sunday shortly, a bit later than planned but life gets like that at time. What was meant to be a quiet day suddenly isn’t. But the nice thing with flash is I know I can get something written (which always makes me feel better in myself) precisely because I am committing myself to short form writing. I will get something done.

I find topics for flash fiction in various ways. Sometimes I will use the seasons, anniversaries (personal or national etc) and, at other times, I know I will want to write something light/funny so then figure out the best way to do that and which kind of character would suit me best here. I like to have a variety of ways in to writing stories. It keeps things interesting for me, and I hope my readers, and it is good to be able to respond to different writing challenges in the form of prompts etc. It means I’m not stuck. It is a question of working out which idea I want to write up on what day. Always good to have something in hand there.

As ever, I’m looking forward to flash fiction Sunday tomorrow. I like putting time aside specifically to write flash (though if I get the chance to write some at other times, I do. That doesn’t happen as often as I’d like. It’s always a case of not having enough time to write as much as I’d like to but I know I’m not alone with that issue).

Am currently catching up with reading a flash anthology and am enjoying that. I love those moments when a story has an emotional impact on you and I am getting plenty of those moments with this book. I love to then re-read these and figure out how the author did it. It makes me up my game for sure. Nothing to dislike about that and I get more reading done.

Naturally, I always think about the impact I’d like my own flash pieces to have on readers. It does affect how I present my characters, indeed even the character types I need to have to successfully bring about that impact.

Writing also includes thinking time and, yes, it is useful for flash fiction too.

Goodreads Author Blog – The Perfect Ending

The perfect ending for any story or book I read or listen to must leave me feeling the characters did get what they deserved. I must also feel that not a word could be added to or taken away without it spoiling the story somehow. Those are good challenges for the writers and I’m so aware of these when writing my own stories.

The perfect ending doesn’t have to be a happy one though I admit I prefer those. But it should be appropriate to what the characters have gone through. It shouldn’t come out of nowhere. When you look back at a story, you should be able to spot the clues which indicated this ending was likely. The skill of the writers here is when you don’t see those clues the first go around or, if you do guess at it, they are still able to wrong foot you another way in that yes, the ending was X but it happened via route Y rather than route W.

Twist endings are great here and I still think you can’t get better than Roald Dahl’s short story, Lamb To The Slaughter. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it and I suspect some of you may well remember it when it was adapted for the TV series, Tales of the Unexpected. I also love this story for another reason in that you have a great plot here but also not a word could be added to or taken away from this one.

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