Putting Yourself in the Right Environment: Time

Time is an indispensable component of setting, and it's often portrayed in the things the writer chooses to describe. Be too specific about a particular technology and you might wind up dating your story. Envision some aspect of a future world and you might get it wrong. The present and the future are fairly forgiving, I think. The past is trickier if it's based on events that actually transpired, although some leeway might be granted if the author is reimagining events. Once again, portraying time properly has everything to do with the work in question.

The Show, Don't Tell rule applies to all of these scenarios though, and if it isn't something you're already doing, it would benefit you to practice it. In my opinion, it's one of the things that's most effective at drawing your audience in.

Think about the last time a friend was telling you about an exciting trip. Consider the two examples below for an illustration of the difference between the Tell and Show methods of exposition.

I went to the beach. I walked along the shore close to the water. I felt the water tug on my toes. The sun was rather high in the sky. It was very warm. After only a few minutes, I had to stop to reapply my sunscreen. 

A gull cried out in the distance. The salt was thick on the air as I felt the warm sand beneath my feet. A few beads of sweat appeared on my brow as I walked along, rejoicing in the coolness of the water that splashed my ankles. After only a few minutes, I had to make my way back to my multi-colored towel. It was time to reapply my sunscreen.

Notice how the first example relates facts while the second makes the facts known without stating them explicitly. Description is essential to the Show method. Getting a feel for what to describe, how to describe it, and how long to spend describing it takes time. A consideration of your audience will give you a bit of guidance here. What do they know already? Conveying an unfamiliar concept will go over better if you can relate it to something familiar. This is particularly useful for writers of science fiction and fantasy. Another idea is to imagine the feeling you want to leave your audience with and to envision events, motions, objects that convey what you're trying to convey.

Now try this exercise:

Think of a place. It can be real or imagined, specific or general. Don't use any of the words in the place name or type of place. Describe what's going on. Think about your senses as you describe. What do you smell? See? Taste? Hear? Feel? You might also think about how the place makes you feel. 

Now give your description to a friend. Can he or she guess the place you've described?

If the answer is no, consider taking a look back at the entry on Place. You might want to visit the place you're trying to describe.

You can also try this exercise with things, people, anything really. Remember: if it can be stated explicitly, it can be conveyed through description. Even concepts that are difficult to convey can be conveyed through description and occasional referencing of familiar concepts. Play with word choice and try thinking outside the box when it comes to your reference objects and experiences. Cliches aren't as unavoidable as you think.

Putting Yourself in The Right Environment: Place

Some have suggested that there is only one story, structurally speaking. Others claim that there an infinite number. One thing is for sure-setting is one of the most important elements of a good piece of writing. The right details about a particular time and place draw the reader into your world and make them forget they're an innocent bystander. The wrong ones keep your audience on the outside. Want to represent your world authentically? Go there. Think you can't go there? Guess again. 

Now, things are pretty straightforward if you're writing a work of nonfiction. The time and place you're seeking to portray is a real one. That means you can visit it, or somewhere like it. You can also talk to others who have visited, read first-hand accounts from tourists. Your outlets for gathering information are numerous in most cases. 

Yes, the setting research process is work, and it's work for which you may never receive any thanks. Many won't stop to analyze the impact your setting had on their reading experience, but it will improve that experience drastically. Take my word for it. Just give thanks that your path forward is fairly straight-forward. 

Fiction-writers: you may very well have your work cut out for you. You're likely to know what kind of research you'll be doing in order to tackle the nuances of your setting if you're writing a historical romance or a fictionalized travelogue. But what about that sci-fi or fantasy novel? You can't visit an alien world or other dimension. You can however envision what you'd like to create and visit places that might give you some feel for how to portray your made-up place. Believe it or not, an overwhelmingly large amount of speculative fiction has some basis in what we know or can find out. If it didn't, readers would get lost on the journey and throw down the volume in rage. The Shire isn't a real place, but there are certainly places in the United Kingdom that are likely to remind us of it. World-building is hugely important, and it all begins with the act of exploration. 

We've talked a great deal about place, and not much about time. How do you write about the future? The past? The present for that matter? Get ready to brush up on your "Show, Don't Tell" skills. Believe me when I say you're going to need them. 

Rule #6-Putting Yourself in the Right Environment: Character Building

Putting yourself in the right environment is key, and as you do so, you should be focusing on what aspect of your storytelling you're trying to address. It all has to happen to someone, right? Let's start off by taking a look at character development. 

Having trouble coming up with good, realistic characters? Here's the best advice I can give you: Don't be blind to the people that have made an appearance in your life. The tense woman in front of you at the grocery store whose items don't seem to belong together. The vengeful ex. The cute guy who relieves you at work. The frazzled teacher who arrives to class looking like she's been running from a bear (or something even more sinister). Real people can inspire relatable characters.

Why not develop fake personalities for these memorable people? You aren't likely to know all of their life stories, and even if you do, reinventing them can be great fun. Combine some traits from two or three different people you've encountered or observed. It's even better if you can catch them in the act of conversation or convince them to allow you to record them talking or interacting with others.

Non-fiction writers can put themselves in the environment about which they'll be writing to gain multiple perspectives.  Another idea is to conduct interviews of people who will either be referenced in the work itself, or who hold occupations or viewpoints that will be described. In fact, interviewing is a great idea for all types of writers. It is one of the best sources of primary information and as such is often an integral part of the character creation process.

Your job as a writer is to bring your characters to life. That means considering them as one might consider a real person. You won't reveal everything about his or her personality or appearance at once, but knowing more details than you might wind up revealing increases the odds that you'll create characters who seem genuine, well-rounded, worth getting to know. Again, non-fiction writers are not exempt. Knowing your subject is one thing. Defining it (or he or she) in stunning detail is another. Gather enough information that you can paint a picture with your words and you will engage your audience.

Take a look at the following chart and record relevant information for each of your characters. Don't worry if there are blanks right now. Character creation is a process. Your characters and their tendencies will reveal themselves to you. Some of them are just a little more slow to open up. I know you can relate.

Think of how complicated people are. How what they've been through comes to define them. How long-held assumptions sometimes have to be questioned. Think of how relationships form and go terribly wrong. Think of how chaotic life is sometimes. A good character will know challenges, whether they be imposed by a harsh environment, criticism from others, the character's own self.

Next up: Putting Yourself in the Right Environment: Setting

Rule #5-Making a Plan-The Outline Dilemma

I want you to think back to the last research paper you wrote. A major component of your final grade was probably your outline. Did it seem like busy work at the time? Was it tedious to construct? Did it guide your thoughts as you wrote?

Writers have different opinions about outlining. It was immensely useful to JK Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. Just take a look at her visual outline for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Meg Cabot on the other hand says that, "The fun part--to me--is figuring out how I'm going to get there, and checking out the interesting sites I see along the way." One woman's preference is another's recipe for success, for as this article from Nybookeditors.Com attests, "When you head into a piece of writing without the planning, the job of the writer is to create. Your writing can exist in a mutable state for a very long time. The best writing happens when the writer is discovering what happens as he or she is creating."

But isn't Rowling's work creative? Planning her plotline seems to have benefited her in the end. Clearly, what works for one won't necessarily work for another. 

It seems to me that outlining longer works is almost necessary to keep the story on track. It may not be enjoyable, but it forces you to impose a kind of structure on the unbound creative energies begging for release. 

Necessity doesn't make it any easier for those who aren't accustomed to doing it. I'm speaking from personal experience on this one. 

A compromise might be the best approach if you're really not keen on the idea of planning before you write or type a single sentence. 

In a guest column for Writers' Digest, Brian Klems explains how to write a flexible outline by asking key questions of the story you're looking to write. A clearly defined premise, protagonist, antagonist, and conflict will keep your writing on track. It might also be handy to sketch out a few scene ideas, interview your characters, and explore your settings. After all, the best way to learn about anything is to ask the right questions. Klems' recommended "flexible" outline is a place to do just that. There's still plenty of room for creativity, but your story is less likely to get lost in itself if you take Klems' approach. It's well worth a try. 

If you do opt for the outline, know that the form it takes is entirely up to you. Be visual. Make bullet points. Arrange and rearrange interrelated elements on a bulletin board. Do what makes the most sense to you mind. Because, while this outline isn't graded, your audience will probably be able to tell if you don't put much effort into it. 

Rule #4: The Most Important Thing to Do as a Writer is to Write

You know you've got a knack for writing, or a strong desire to do it at any rate. You know that, while it is a creative process, it needs to be structured to be effective. You know that you've got to write with a designated audience in mind. Determining whether your writing is more about what's going on or the characters you describe (rather real or imagined) may only be possible after you've been writing for a little while.

The future will bring many challenges. Describing a scene so that it can be clearly imagined by your reader, determining the voice that does the best job of saying what you want to say, crafting dialogue that sounds genuine, presenting complicated concepts in a way that isn't confusing, using every element you create to contribute to the story you're telling, timing developments so that they occur at the right point in the story arc...need I go on?

But in the early stages of the writing process, these things need not concern you. No. The single most important thing you can do right now is write. You will revise and then you will revise your revision. Count on it. You'll start telling one story to discover that you've really been trying to tell another. 

We write for a lot of reasons. It's a release from emotional burden. It's a way of expressing something that can't be expressed in quite the same way in any other format. We want to give form to our imaginings. We feel like we know something that we want the rest of the world to know too. We might be inspired by real events but choose to pen a novel or write something that blurs the line between biography and fiction. There are as many ways to write as there are reasons for doing it. But don't let it overwhelm you. Just write. 

You might think you need to know what you want to say before you write. It's not true. Your brain knows things it doesn't know it knows. Recording the experiences of your life in a notebook is an invaluable practice that can jumpstart your inspiration, but the very act of writing can give you access to hidden treasures too. Don't believe it's true? Try out some of these writing exercises and techniques to get those creative juices flowing. 

Do a free-write
Set a timer for 10 minutes, sit down, and write! Don't correct yourself or think too hard about what you've written.
What it does:
This is one of the most tried and true ways of tapping into your subconscious.

Explore Writing Prompts

What's a writing prompt? Essentially, a writing prompt does just what it says it does-it presents you with a scenario that is meant to encourage your imagination to continue the story.

What it does:

This technique helps you to explore some scenarios when you're having trouble coming up with them on your own.
Play around with perspective

Tell a classic fairy tale from another point of view. What kinds of things does your character notice?

What it does:

This is a great exercise for putting yourself in someone else's shoes. The more accurately you can understand a character, the more accurately you can represent them in an authentic way. Whether an evil character is truly evil or not is entirely up to you.

Explore the familiar and the foreign

Go someplace you visit often. Describe it. What words do you find yourself using? Now go someplace you've never been before. What words do you use to describe it?

What it does:

We notice different things about the places we're familiar with and foreign locales. Paying attention to the way we describe each can help us to get a better handle on description. This is particularly useful if you'll be writing about a place you're not so familiar with. At the same time, it can help you to present a familiar place in an authentic way to readers who might not be so familiar with it.
Engage in a little synesthesia

 Describe something using senses you wouldn't normal attribute to it. What does a particular color taste like for instance?

What it does:

This is a great method for exploring the senses and relating them to things you wouldn't normally relate them to. Thinking outside the box lets you avoid cliches and describe things in a unique way.
Explain a process you know well as if you were instructing a novice

It's all about details!

What it does:

We rarely pay much attention to the things we've done for a long time. Muscle memory takes over after awhile. Focusing on describing a familiar process to someone who isn't familiar with it forces us to use very specific, concise language. It is important to be clear in writing regardless of the type of writing we're doing.

Practice showing rather than telling

Write a 100-word story. State the facts. Now rewrite it using the Show, Don't Tell principle. Don't worry about the length of the second version of your story. Try not to spell anything out. When you can't say something outright, what devices do you rely on?

What it does:

When you only have 100 words to work with, you can't really describe. You're stuck with stating the facts. Many books could be stated in a page or so, but what makes them book-length is the use of description. By rewriting the story in a longer version, you can practice showing rather than telling. It really is a lot more interesting to read!

When you've got a pretty solid framework for what you want to do, it's time to move on to organization. Not all writers favor outlining, and the length of the work will certainly determine whether it's something that warrants looking into. It's worth exploring though. Think about it. You have an idea in your head for your dream home, but you can't just wing it. You have to plan its construction. And there are certainly a lot of things that need to be thought through. When you feel you're ready to proceed, consider outlining. It's next week's topic!

Rule # 3: Plotting

Dictionary.Com defines plot as the, "plan, scheme, or main story of a literary or dramatic work." In other words, it's what's happening. As you'll soon discover, that's a lot more complicated than it sounds.

 All writing is categorized as either plot-driven or character-driven, and while neither plot nor characters can stand alone (there's always going to be something going on and it's always going to be initiated by someone and acting on someone), some authors rely extensively on one technique or the other to say what they want to say. Of course, there's nothing that says you can't find a balance between the two, and in all honesty, this is the approach I prefer to take. The choice is up to you, and really, it will be determined by your purpose in writing and audience more than anything.

Have you ever read a book with so many twists and turns that you found it difficult to describe to someone who hadn't read it? You struggled to recall the names of the characters or found it difficult to say what was so remarkable about them, but the actual events of the story were well-imagined and thought-provoking. This is a great example of plot-driven writing. If it plays out like a movie in your mind, it very likely fits in this category. That may sound like a simplistic explanation, but think about it. Movies can't really delve into the nuances of characterization like books can.

The flip side of the coin is a book with astounding characters. the plot is defined not by events unfolding outside the characters' lives. Rather, the action is tied up with the characters and their motivations, and it is these motivations that move the story forward.

The two methods can also be combined. Sometimes a book begins very plot-driven but becomes more character-driven as it progresses. Sometimes the plot and characterization work to define one another throughout.

Just because writing can take any form doesn't exempt you as author from being aware of what you've chosen to do and why.

Ask yourself these questions to get a feel for your emphasis:

1. Why am I writing?
2. Who am I writing for?
3. If I took out the current characters, would I still have the same story?

It may happen that you don't know if you've got a predominantly plot-driven or character-driven piece of writing on your hands until you spend some time fleshing out your story. Recognizing which method of storytelling you're tending to prefer can do you a favor, even as it creates extra work. Having a focus allows you to fine-tune everything in your story to your purpose in writing. And that focus shows, whether your realize it or not.

Being aware of the forces that drive your plot is important. I would argue that it's a good thing to have in the back of your head as you take those moments of inspiration and memorable experiences in hand, like the clay that they are, and work them into something usable.

Rule #2-Talent is Not Skill

If you find yourself particularly drawn to the hobby, mode of expression, art form that is writing, chances are pretty good that you've got a knack for it. You see the nuanced differences between similar words, can describe a scene with stunning detail, craft sentences that seem to flow into one another. Maybe you are bombarded by imaginative plot ideas on a daily basis. All of this is well and good, but, to quote Spiderman, "With great power comes great responsibility." And your talent is a kind of power, a stronger one that you might realize. You should hold onto that notion, no matter what twists and turns your writerly life takes. But it won't serve you as well as it can without cultivation. Talent is not skill.

Think of talent as raw ore and skill as the act of working the metal into something usable. Skill is the act of shaping, creating something that can be recognized and enjoyed by the world outside your head.

The next ten entries will focus on what can be taught and practiced-skill. I'll leave the inspiration and epiphanies to your respective muses.

• Decide if your work will be plot or character-driven and proceed accordingly. Consider how to engage your audience and keep them engaged throughout. Length and layout may both come into play.

• Plan before you write

• Do your research. 

• Don't waste a single detail

• Imagine characters/portray and place people in a particular context

• Use language appropriate for your target audience

• Come up with a plan for maintaining consistency throughout your work

• Be true to the world you've created or the perspective you've adopted

• Read the things that have been written in your genre or field. And then learn to read between the lines

• Be aware of the extent to which you write yourself into your writing

Do all of these things and you'll find you have more control over your writing. I know that research and planning have long been considered a buzzkill to artists, but I feel that they're the stones in which the road to writing success is paved. They give form to whatever it is that drives us. 

Next Up: The Ultimate Showdown! Plot-Driven vs Character-Driven