Sins of Our Fathers | Author Blog

Almost every writer I know, or know of, utilizes a special work area for writing. In general, it’s an area where the craft of writing is solely done.

There is of course no commandments to this space. Each writer must blaze a new path for themselves, but there are some suggestions.

• Keep the area clean of distracting debris (Does anyone else find this word incredibly frustrating in the way it is spelled?)
• Only use your writing workspace for…. duh – writing!
• When in your work space, you are WORKING and everyone needs to know this.
• Make a routine out of it.

For myself, I have a number of writing work spaces. Well, in reality it’s just one: my laptop. For others it may be a spiral notebook, the back of Chinese Take-Out menu, or a desktop computer better prophesied be a boat anchor in another life.

I pretty much can work anywhere my laptop is, though some areas are better places for meeting my muse than others. I love to sit at Panera Bread restaurants and work because I find the atmosphere incredibly suited for my style of writing. Much of my novel, Sins of Our Fathers, was written and edited in a Panera Bread restaurant.

I do have a special place in my bedroom all set aside for writing too. Though at this moment it is breaking the first suggestion on the list above. Actually, it’s more like that suggestion slipped and fell into the paper shredder. I’ve got piles of books, winter clothing, and papers stacked one upon another creating a mountain of distraction on the precipice’s edge.

Hey, I’m not perfect.

Hey, I’m far from perfect.

Hey, I’m an artist. Get off my back.

Okay, that’s why my writing space is my laptop. I can go pretty much anywhere and work. For instance, right now I am composing this missive outside here in Florida on a stunning spring day. A leaf just struck my keyboard, blown some twenty feet by strong March winds. Here’s a pic of the work space I’m utilizing right now. Yeah, I know. It’s a rough work day.

Those hanging plants in the background are orchids. A plant you will find mention of a number of times in my novel, Sins of Our Fathers.

So, if you’re a writer, what’s your work space and do you have any suggestions for other writers?

I’d love to hear them.

Until next time,
Hal

In writing any fictitious characters it is necessary to know those characters inside and out.

Every writer will have a special method of discovery when it comes to the people who inhabit the world in his head.

A method I use is something I picked up from college; a Character Bio-Worksheet. Each major character I write gets one of these worksheets and so do some of the minor characters. Some will even argue – and I won’t argue against them – that every character should have a worksheet. For my [tippy title="novel"]Sins of Our Fathers.[/tippy] I have twenty-five worksheets.

The worksheet goes into detail on three areas concerning the character.

• Sociology
• Physiology
• Psychology

Those sections are further broken into various characteristics. For example, “Psychology” would include such subjects like fear, secrets, and superstitions.

In [tippy title="Sins of Our Fathers,"]My novel of course.[/tippy] Detective Brooke Simmons is claustrophobic. A characteristic which falls under “fears.” She’s also afraid of the dark. These are two fears which take hold and thrash her at one point in the book. I have to say it’s a section in the book I’m rather proud of because of how gripping it is for readers.

It was read at a readers conference in a room full of women and fellow writers and I, though very nervous, was excited by the visceral reaction of the women in the room.

Anyway, I’ve gotten off subject.

Not all the info. will be used in the writing. Maybe very little will be used. But the point is that the writer will have a very good image of that character in his mind.

Will that image change during writing? More than likely. And there is nothing wrong with going back and changing the worksheet. Some of my pages have multiple additions and subtractions, not necessarily making for a pretty page, but then it’s for my eyes only.

Here is a blank PDF copy of the worksheet I put together and use. Right click on the file and select “Save as” or whatever it is your browser tells you to select for saving the file to your computer.

Character Bio-Worksheet

If you have any questions, or better yet examples of how you create your characters, I would love to hear about it.

I just upgraded the WordPress blog software to the latest version, 2.1.2. That sort of thing always makes me nervous.

Everything looks to be functioning correctly on my end.

But should anyone find something weird, let me know. I would appreciate it.

Thanks.

More difficult than bleeding upon the page and birthing your novel is the book proposal.

Well, maybe if it’s your first time writing one, as in my case. But I think that for most writers of an artistic bent this part of the bug infested journey through dark jungles on lost continents to store bookshelves is probably always a struggle.

For me it is because of the analytical side of it. And the need to boil down into a powerful concentration the characters, plot, and story.

Not to mention the ugly creature lurking in that black lagoon, the “Marketing Section.”

That’s where I am at the moment. Working on the marketing section of the proposal. Not that the other sections are stellar. They are not. They need honing too. But I’m in the marketing section.

I want to share a couple of resource I’ve been using. Please feel free to share any sources or suggestions you have too.

For writing a fiction proposal I’ve been using as a guide Karen Wiesner’s article Preparing a Killer Fiction Proposal.

Also a good resource for understanding the process of publication and developing a proposal is Terry Whalin’s book, Book Proposals That Sell. The only thing with this book is that it is geared mostly toward non-fiction, but the info is helpful and instructive.