Spinning Perspectives Part One

It’s time for another revision.

I’ve been considering plot points for the rewriting by spinning new story threads. Bulky woolen to silky threads that slip through my mind. This break from the novel calls for a strong new perspective to move forward. And even more persistence. I’ll add thoughts here as I struggle to pull on the right yarn.

 

In finding my way back to my novel, I’ve taken a break to read and watch recent documentaries and movies, like 20 FEET FROM STARDOM, FAR OUT ISN’T FAR ENOUGH: THE TOMI UNGERER STORY, SAVING MR. BANKS, and HOW I LIVE NOW (from the novel by Meg Rosoff). And to live, pulling on real and unseen cobwebs, trying to resolve in my mind the struggles unspoken of in a one’s childhood family, the undercurrents left by the dysfunction on the children.

I looked for fragments of space where truth hides. The interstices. Spaces between woven threads. The yarns I am trying to spin, then weave together again. A story that makes more sense than life. A story with resilience that can leave hope for the reader. A . . . .

I’m still spinning.

 

A summer’s end, I attended a nonfiction writing workshop. The Q&A consisted of strongly worded questions about getting financial support for WIP writing and research. I don't hear this question in fiction workshops. Why?

 

Part Two posted November 2014.

 

Literacy Resource Place

The National Children’s Book and Literacy Alliance is a not-for-profit organization founded by award-winning young people's authors and illustrators. Their website is filled with activities and information for teachers, parents, and students to access. Of note is the Our White House section on American history.

THE NATIONAL CHILDREN’S BOOK AND LITERACY ALLIANCE

http://www.thencbla.org/

 

Story Map: Story Deconstruction Notes II

The first part of Story Deconstruction Notes left off with the saying that real writing arises during the rewriting. This was so true for my first novel.

In summary, I developed a story deconstruction process to guide a complete novel rewrite. As discussed in part one, notes included writing the major conflict of the story in one sentence. And making notes on the story’s genre, setting, narrator, point of view, tone, and tense. All obvious, but the act of writing down details allows your story to crystalize.

Writing down theme, motif, symbol, and keyword notes forced me to focus in on story. In searching for a concise story line, I considered if each word in my notes was accurate and clear. Then, how the words, or concepts, connected in the story. All of the words/concepts sorted into groups of words reflecting plot and subplot points. The concepts honed with story informed the notes under problems, solution tools, or resolutions.

I organized the words/concepts driving the storyline further into tide words or anchor words. Tide words, my made-up ideas, move back and forth, like the tide, in the story and create movement in the main character. Tide words align with the story’s problems and resolutions. Anchor words grab, like an anchor thrown into the sand, at the main character as he or she faces transformation by new understandings. Anchor words belong in solution tools as key moments or plot points to push story along. Examples: “missing” is a tide word; “dog” is an anchor word. The tide words can flow through the manuscript, weaving a lyrical story. Plot points surface with reoccurring anchor words moving to resolution.

Novels for younger readers have fewer subplots. But in writing a first novel, I found that minor character arcs created the subplots that merged into the main character’s journey. In a sense, the subplots nudged the overall plot toward the inevitability of resolution.

Once again, the serendipity of life journey mirroring writer’s journey during my rewriting effort created for another “in flow” opportunity. However, for a successful rewriting to connect all details and plot points, I needed to develop the tide and anchor concepts. One could say that I outlined after writing a first draft, but a more fully realized outline.

Story deconstruction notes for rewriting, the real writing.

FINDING FLOW: THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ENGAGEMENT WITH EVERYDAY LIFE by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (Basic Books/Perseus, 1997).

 

Note earlier LIN posts:

Story Map: Story Deconstruction Notes I, with story structure notes, November 2013

Story Map: Gold Vein, September 2013

Story Map: Edge and Hope, November 2011

Story Map: The Journey, March 2011