What are your characters' gestures saying about them?

"The features of our face are hardly more than gestures which have become permanent." ~Marcel Proust

In order to create multidimensional, life-like characters, we as writers need to not only understand the people who populate our pages but also know how to portray their emotions. We've all heard about the show don't tell rule. It's vitally important to show how a character is feeling without coming right out and saying Bob was sad. One way to do this is by using gestures, such as slouched shoulders, frowning mouths or teary eyes.

Two amazing resources

The Bookshelf Muse - This site is a true gem. They provide an emotion thesaurus, a physical attribute thesaurus, a character trait thesaurus and more.

Body Language Expert - Tons of useful information about gestures and what they indicate. 

Gestures around the world


Pay attention to cultural influences when creating your characters.  Gestures have different meanings in different places. For example, in Middle Eastern countries it's not uncommon for men to hold hands as a show of great friendship. In Nigeria, a thumbs up is seen as an obscene gesture. Be sure to do your research when your characters live in unfamiliar places or are visiting them. There could also be opportunities for conflict here.

The larger gestures

Body language can be very telling, but don't forget to use larger gestures as well. Is your character the type who always brings flowers to dinner or the type who always expects someone else to pay for the meal? Do they offer to help others or expect others to help them? thoughtful gestures - or selfish ones - go a long way to let readers know who your characters are.

Using gestures for structure

Dialogue tags get old fast. It's often best to use action or body language to show readers who's speaking rather than telling them. That's were the resources above come in handy. It's important to use an assortment of gestures so our writing is realistic and vivid. Sure, there might be some characters who have habits, like biting their nails, that they repeatedly do throughout a story, but in general, variety is best.

Tomorrow's post - Adding humor to your writing

Fiction teaser

"Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life." ~Simone Weil

Today I'm posting a teaser from my short story, Call Me Crazy. It's available in an anthology titled I'll Never Go Away (Volume 1), published by Rainstorm Press. 

 

CALL ME CRAZY

My shadow wears red mittens

Waving to all that pass

My shadow dances and sings

And stops to look at beautiful things

While I am trapped and bitten.

Joshua sits at the dining room table with every single window in his apartment covered. It's not the darkness he's afraid of. He never opens the blinds anymore, even during daylight hours.

On the table in front of him, his cell phone lays in pieces. It's his fifth phone in five months. They've all broken. Bad luck? Maybe, but he doubts it. He positions one of the miniscule screws into place and, as he's about to twist it home with a tiny screwdriver, his entire upper body jerks against his will. The screw falls to the floor, surely lost. He plucks up another one from the table, but the same thing happens.

"Damn it!"

A rapping at his door startles him and jolts his heart. It doesn't take much these days. Fear is his continuous and only companion. His few friends drifted away months ago.

He isn't sure if he should answer the door. He has no idea what to expect, but whatever it is, he knows it won't be good. Bad things plague him constantly. He anticipates them at every turn.

As he crosses the room, someone in the upstairs apartment follows him, stomping directly above. This has been happening for a while now.

His apartment building is old and low budget. No peephole graces the door.

With caution, he opens it, just a crack, and peeks out.

Sarah, his ex-girlfriend, stands on the other side. She shoves the door open and barges in as if she owns the place.

"Hey, babe. I got your note." She lets her purse slide off her shoulder onto the couch. Her skirt barely covers her ass. She looks around. This is the first time she's set foot in this apartment. He can't recall ever giving her his new address.

"What note?"

Her eyes are dark, like coffee grounds. She stares at him as though he's just recited a mathematical equation or made some other absurd outburst.

"You look like hell," she says. "Are you drinking again?"

"No. And I didn't leave you a note."

"Don't screw with me." She crosses her arms, moves her weight to one leg. "Are you sick or something?

You're, like, all emaciated."

"I'm fine." Except he's not sure that he is. "Someone else must've left you the note. What'd it say?"

"Okay. I can get into that." She peels away her tight sweater. As usual, she isn't wearing a bra.

"No, you don't understand." Joshua can't help but stare. One thing Sarah has going for her is her body. Even a young man with problems has libido.

"We can play your game first," she says.

"I'm not role playing."

She pulls a bottle from her purse. "You're right. Let's loosen up first."

Saliva pools under Joshua's tongue at the sight of the dark amber liquid.

Sarah chugs some and offers him the bottle. "You'll be okay with this, right? You won't, like, end up in AA again or anything, will you?"

He takes it. "Just a taste. I could really use it." The scent intoxicates him, makes him tremble.

For the first time in almost a year, he feels like he might have a moment of reprieve, one little pleasure in an otherwise tormented life.

As soon as the cool glass touches his lips, though, another involuntary jerk seizes him. Rum sloshes from the bottle and splatters onto the linoleum.

Sarah grabs it back. "What're you doing?"

"Give me the bottle."

Her look of disgust doesn't faze him. All he cares about is getting the rum into his mouth, feeling it burn his throat, its warmth wash into his veins.

"Why are you acting so weird?" she asks.

"You think this is weird? You don't even know the half of it."

So many unexplainable things have been happening to him for so long that they fail to shock him anymore. But the terror never goes away; it's his shadow.

"Are you taking drugs?" Sarah asks.

"You're the druggie, not me."

"I'm clean now. But you, you're a mess."

"I wish it was drugs. That would make sense. I have no explanation for what's happening to me."

His fear comes from not knowing. Maybe if he knew why these things happened, who was involved, then he could deal with it, do something about it.

He wiggles his fingers at Sarah. "I need that drink."

She extends the bottle to him, but he doesn't take it.

"Maybe if you hold it to my mouth it won't spill."

Grimacing, Sarah lifts the bottle to his lips; he jerks, can't get a drop.

"Geez, you're really messed up, aren't you?"

He looks into her percolating eyes, contemplating, then, "I'm being harassed, or something." He shakes his head, runs his fingers through his uncombed hair. "I don't know."

"You're, like, all sweaty."

"Yeah, I could really use that drink."

Sarah pulls down the hemline of her tiny skirt, still topless, and looks uncomfortable.

"Watch this." Joshua points to the ceiling and walks across the room. The creep upstairs chooses this moment to ignore him.

Sarah stares at the ceiling. "I don't see anything."

"Someone upstairs thuds across the floor in sync with my movements."

Sarah bites her lip.

"A horn honks every time I flush the toilet." He runs to the bathroom and flushes. Nothing.

"Joshua?"

"Look at this." He pulls a box of cereal from the cupboard, opens it and displays its contents. "This was full just yesterday when I bought it. Now it's almost gone."

"You must've been hungry."

"I haven't had any yet."

"Joshua." She inches toward the couch.

"They do shit to my mind, too. They talk inside my head."

Sarah wiggles into her sweater. "Have you gone to see anyone about this? A psychiatrist?"

"I'm not crazy."

She shakes her head at him. "God, Josh, you used to be the one I'd come to when I needed stability. You were the most together guy I knew."

Her words sting, not because he cares what she thinks of him, but because she used to be the messed up one between them, so screwy that he ditched her. How could he have sunken this low?

"I'll see you around, okay?" She heads toward the door.

"Wait. Please stay." Whoever's harassing him, for whatever reason, doesn't seem to want to play when she's around.

"Sorry." And she's gone.

As soon as she walks out the door, the creep upstairs starts up again.

Joshua collapses onto the couch, covering his face with his hands, still thinking about the rum. To divert his mind, he recalls the expression on Sarah's face. Despite himself, he laughs.

Monday's post - What are your characters' gestures saying about them

Endearing endings

"Maybe my fairy tale has a different ending than I dreamed it would. But that's OK." ~Kim Kardashian

I'm sure we've all been there before. We're reading a good book, we're excited to see how it all plays out, we have expectations, and then the end flops. It's enough to banish an author from your reading list. All writing is subjective to individual readers' tastes, but in general I think the best endings tie up all loose ends (unless it's a series that leaves questions to be answered in other books) and answer the story question(s) in a satisfying way.

Chapter endings -  

Chapter endings should propel readers forward. Whatever you do, be sure to mix things up. Never use the same technique too often or too frequently. That makes it less effective. Here are a few ways to accomplish great chapter endings.
Cliffhangers:  End the chapter right in the middle of some outrageous action. Your character might be hanging by her fingertips from an actual cliff, staring down the throat of a gun or any number of scenarios. The idea is to make the reader turn the page to find out what happens. 

Deepen conflict:  End the chapter by adding a new layer to the current conflict or adding an entirely new problem for the character to overcome. In short, complicate things even more. 

Dialogue: End the chapter by having someone say something that makes everyone, including the reader, gasp. 

Scene endings -

One good rule of thumb is to end scenes while they're still strong, not letting them trickle out. Scenes can end in the same ways as chapters. Another way to end a scene is to make things seem like they're going along smoothly, but of course it's only a lead-up to some major problem and action. Cliffhangers should be used sparingly for scene endings, but work well when you want to fool readers. You might leave them thinking a character possibly died (she was, after all, hanging by her fingertips from a cliff) and then have her show up later.

Story endings -

May we never disappoint our readers with unsatisfying endings. Here are few ways to end a story.  

Twist endings: You lead readers to believe one thing and then throw them for a loop. These are my favorites. They surprise people in a good way if they're done properly. Done poorly, however,  readers will feel cheated. Make sure the twist is plausible.

Explicit ending: Wraps everything up and answers all the questions. This ending usually reveals what happens to each of the major characters. These endings can be used in correlation with twist endings. 

Long view ending: These endings show the characters in the future, often long after the action is over and the conflicts resolved. 

Unresolved ending: These are risky to use, but can be pulled off if done well. The main conflicts are left unanswered and readers are left to decipher the outcome. 

Tomorrow's post - Fiction teaser

Dramatic dialogue

"Dialogue should simply be a sound among other sounds, just something that comes out of the mouths of people whose eyes tell the story in visual terms." ~ Alfred Hitchcock

Dialogue serves many purposes in a story. It reveals character motivations, setting and back story. It paces, sets mood and creates or intensifies conflict and suspense.  What a character says, or doesn't say, propels the plot forward in one of the most entertaining and natural ways.

Writing believable dialogue comes easily to some, but others have to work hard to hone this ever important skill. Here are just a few tips to help and remind.

• Visualize- I still remember when my son was three and helping me in the garden. He'd scoop up dirt with his little shovel and say: "I gotta put nis dirt into my imadinason so we could eat it." Not only was this super cute, it was insightful. Putting our character into our imaginations and listening to what they say is an excellent way to flush out natural sounding dialogue. All it takes is a little time and a pair of closed eyes. And an imagination, of course. Set your characters into the scene you're working and let them perform. It's like watching a movie. When the credits start to role, you start writing what you heard. And don't forget what you saw. This is an excellent way to mine character traits and actions as well. 
•  Ditch the straight path- Characters aren't always concerned with the same things. A good way to add intrigue to a scene is to have your characters carry on a conversation that isn't in sync.

          "Love your dress, Deb. Is it new?"
          "Where is he?"
          "I saw a necklace at Downtown Boutique the other day that would go perfectly. Expensive, though."
          "I know you were with him last night."
       
         As Usual, you don't want too much  of a good thing. You wouldn't want an entire novel written with this type of dialogue.

•  Get trivial- If your characters are detonating a bomb that's about to blow, hands shaking, sweating all over, have them talk about which brand of potato chips is best. Using meaningless chatter can juxtapose tension, in some instances intensifying it, in others creating comedy. Make sure you're accomplishing the right effect for your story.
• Hush-hush- According to Thomas Carlyle, Silence is more eloquent than words. This holds true when writing dialogue. Silence says a lot. Not only can it be more eloquent, but also more powerful than anything your characters might say.
  
  "Where were you last night?"
  "Out." He shovels another bite of cereal into his mouth, crunching becoming the only sound for miles. He slows his chew.
  "Were you with Natalie?"
  He won't look her in the eye.
  "You were, weren't you? You were with Natalie."
  When he finally looks up, she catches his bloodshot eyes. The bite on his spoon pauses midway to his mouth, which is clamped shut. But those eyes have never been good at lying.
   
• Keep'n it real-  If you're characters are three years old, they better sound like three years old.  If they've matured into backwoods loggers, they better sound the part, each in his/her own unique way. Some characters will sound similar to others if they have a similar background and lifestyle and they're around each other a lot. It would make sense, for instance, for siblings to have a similar cadence and vocabulary. But even they will have at least some originality. If you've gotten to know your characters, their speech should come to life spontaneously. If you're struggling with dialogue, you might want to stop and do some character work before you continue.
• Chop-chop-chop- Something I notice a lot in critique groups/partners, and in my own unedited work, is stilted speech. Everyone starts sounding pompous and wordy. I don't know anyone who walks around saying "I have not had breakfast yet." Or, "I do not love you anymore." Contractions are legal. Use them. Along these same lines, most people speak in shorthand. 
  
  "Are you going to the dance on Wednesday?" Becomes: "You going to the dance?"
  
  "I'm going surfing. Do you want to come?" Becomes: "I'm going surfing. Wanna come?"
  
  Cutting words is often the solution to natural sounding dialogue. The best way to learn to write dialogue well is to listen. Pay attention to rhythms when people talk to and around you. Take note of how everyone's speech differs. Notice what's similar. Soon you'll have a thousand voices in your head, all waiting to be set free.  

Tomorrow's post - Endearing endings

               

Crafting conflict

"The greatest conflicts are not between two people but between one person and himself." ~Garth Brooks

Without conflict, a story wouldn't be worth reading, or writing. A story needs a protagonist coming up against their worst fear or fiercest enemy. It's about testing their character and moral choices. It's about entertainment. About exploring the human condition. Struggle. Most importantly, it's about change and growth.

In order to create meaningful conflict that touches the hearts of our audience, we need to abuse our characters. This doesn't always mean throwing him into battle. It's much  more dramatic to figure out what your character is particularly afraid of, the more unconventional the better, and make him face it. What's the most important thing in the world to him? Threaten to take it away and watch what he does.

Types of conflict

Inner conflict: The character struggles with what they want and what they must do, right and wrong, personal gain and spiritual devotion, etc.

Relational conflict: The character struggles with another person. 

Social conflict: The character struggle with a group.

Environmental conflict: The character struggles the elements or wildlife.

No matter what type of conflict a story has, the stakes must be high. The outcome has to mean everything to the character.

Conflicts for the writer

As writers we face conflicts at every step of story creation. Every detail requires us to make decisions, some more difficult than others. When we come across something that really has us stumped, there are a few things we can do to help us make the right choices.

Relax: Nothing blocks creativity more than stress. 

Exercise: Studies have shown that when we move our bodies our creativity heightens. I like to take walks in nature because being in the fresh air surrounded by trees helps with relaxation.

Dream: This one might sound strange to some, but it's another one that has studies to back it. If you think about your problem right before you fall asleep, the answer just might reveal itself in a dream.

Tomorrow's post - Dramatic dialogue

Beautiful beginnings

"There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth ... not going all the way, and not starting." ~Buddha


Most of us love the idea of a new beginning. It's a fresh start, full of possibilities and wonder. Beginnings, however, don't always live up to our expectations, or those of our readers. They say you have three paragraphs in a short story to captivate an editor. In a novel you have about three pages, if you're lucky. Readers are busy these days. If the opening of a story doesn't grab readers, even non-editors, they're likely to toss it aside. Let's take a look at some things that can help us connect with our audience right from the start. 

Who does what and where

Character: Give them someone to care about. This entails creating a protagonist readers can either sympathize or identify with and easily imagine. 

Conflict: Something goes wrong for this character, or at least there's a hint of some future trouble.  Since readers care about him/her, they are going to want to come along for the ride. 

Setting: Add enough detail to help anchor readers into the story.

Set the tone: Is the story going to be comical or serious, frightening or romantic. Choose words and setting details that portray these qualities.

A word about descriptions at the beginning

While it's important to develop the character and setting enough for readers to care about and feel a part of the story, the beginning isn't the place for long descriptive passages, generally speaking. We want to start off by throwing readers into a situation and give them just enough to make them want to come back for more. More information can be sprinkled in along the way to the finish line. A few well selected details about setting and character can go a long way. 

Study and practice

It's always a good idea to learn from the masters. Pull several novels and short fiction collections from your shelves, or visit your local bookstore, and read the opening paragraphs or chapters. Pay attention to how the authors set up character, conflict, setting and tone. Then, when you're working on your own story, try several different approaches and see what works best.  

Tomorrow's post: Crafting conflict 
  
 

Creating amazing action scenes

"Never confuse movement with action." ~Ernest Hemingway



There's nothing like a good action scene to get your heart pumping and glue you to the pages. Even if a story doesn't fall into the thriller or adventure genres, it's not unusual for action to pop up from time to time. I've gathered a few tips to help make these sometimes tricky scenes work. 

• Pace: Action scenes work best when they move fast. Too much description and the excitement quickly wanes. Now isn't the time for back-story or scene-setting passages. Keep to the point and incorporate needed details into the action. 
• Setting: While it's never a good idea to spend much time on descriptions in an action scene, it's still important to ground readers in the story by using a few well chosen setting details. In an action scene, it's best to introduce setting details by incorporating them into the action. Have the characters knock over the multimillion dollar sculpture or put a fist through the dirty, paper thin wall.   
• Structure: Use short paragraphs with short or fragmented sentences to give a feeling of urgency.
• Set-up: If a character needs to be an expert at karate or have on him a certain weapon in order to survive the scene, make sure he uses those skills or that weapon throughout the book to make it believable when he pulls it out during the action.
• Stakes: The most powerful action scenes put characters in a real jam. Maybe he's not only fighting for his own life, but also the life of whomever he loves most, or the lives of an entire city or planet. Have the character desperately need to be somewhere, time is running out, or already out, and the action is delaying him. 
• Verbs: We're all familiar with the passive voice woes. Active verbs, while always a good idea, are especially important in action scenes.
• Dialogue: This isn't the place for long-winded conversations. Short powerful dialogue can often be more effective at keeping readers breathless. 

Tomorrow's post: Beautiful beginnings

Special thanks to Arlee Bird for starting the A to Z Challenge! Visit his blog at http://tossingitout.blogspot.com/