Picturebook Prompt ~ Dialogue is Sriracha Sauce

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Howdy, Campers, and welcome to another of our occasional Wednesday Writing Workouts!

 

Next Monday is the last class of this quarter for my Picture Book course...and on Saturday, January 26th, I begin my 20th year of teaching in UCLA Extension's Writers' Program. (HOW CAN THAT BE when I'm only 26 years old?)

We're trying something new next quarter: 10 Saturday classes beginning January 26th from 10am-1pm. (I'm already dreaming of less traffic on Saturdays! Please spread the word to your friends in the LA area: here's the link)

In last Monday's class, we talked about the use of dialogue in picture books and how much fun it is to read these books aloud. I learned early on that including dialogue is like pouring Sriracha sauce on oatmeal. 

image from Pixabay

My first book, To Rabbittown, written in free verse, contains no dialogue. But my second (The Night Horse), third (It's Not My Turn to Look for Grandma!), fourth, (Girl Coming in for a Landing ~ a novel in poems), and fifth books (New Year at the Pier) do.  

I needed a writing exercise to reinforce my lecture. Creating it was like putting together a two-piece puzzle.

image from Pixabay

Here's what inspired this exercise:

1) I heard an excellent presentation at SCBWI's conference in L.A. this August by the always wonderful Candace Fleming about how she wrote the multi-award winning book, The Giant Squid.  One of the things that struck me was that she chooses a word or phrase as her guiding light before she begins researching or writing any book. She calls it the Vital Idea. This isn't a new concept, but the way she presented it helped me understand how crucial this is. The Vital Idea she chose for The Giant Squid was Mystery. Every page, every verb reflects this idea.

2) My friend Ellen recently took an improv class. She reminded me that every idea in improv is answered with "Yes, and..." (For example, if someone is pantomiming and says, "I'm carrying my mother's alligator." the response must be, "Yes, and..."  It's never "No, but...").

So here's my DIALOGUE IS SRIRACHA SAUCE exercise:
1) come up with a Vital Idea (the guiding principle of the story).  

and

2) write a story completely in dialogue. 

A further suggestion, which you can take or leave, is to have one character always start by saying "Yes, and" or "No, but."

As my students settled down to write, I wrote, too. The Vital Idea I chose was: This world is not safe. (That was the first thought that came to my mind...which is just sad). Here's my very raw draft:

NEVER GO TO Z STREET
by April Halprin Wayland
.

A: Never go to Z Street: there are tigers.

B: Yes, there are tigers and lobsters with ginormous claws on Z Street.

A: Lobsters with ginormous claws?

B: Yes and poisonous carrots!

A: Poisonous carrots?

B: Yes and they kill you after six bites!

A: Couldn't you just not eat the poisonous carrots?

B: No—poisonous carrots sing to you and you can't help but sit down and lean against them and then they encircle you and all is lost.

A: All is lost because they make you eat them?

B: Yes.

A: They want you to eat them?

B: Yes.

A: Okay. Never go to Z Street: there are tigers and lobsters and poisonous carrots.

B: Yes and also there is a little kid with dangerous and sticky fingers who takes your hand and is forever glued to you.

A: Forever?

B: Yes, except when you're eating a poisonous carrot.

A: Okay, so: never go to Z Street, for there are

B: tigers

A: and lobsters

B: and poisonous carrots

B and a little kid with sticky fingers

B: like mine

A: forever glued to mine.

poem (or whatever this is) © 2018 April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved

so...

DIALOGUE IS SRIRACHA SAUCE
.

if you

just use a

teeny bit

or if you use

too much
of it

poem © 2018 April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved

Try this exercise, and if you have any suggestions on how to make it better, please let me know! 

April Halprin Wayland

Basic Rules for Punctuating Dialogue

In honor of last weekend's National Punctuation Day, we've been running a short series of posts on punctuation. JoAnn kicked off the topic by sharing some great links, one to a site I've never seen: Khan Academy. If you didn't follow that link and you have difficulty identifying run-on sentences, I encourage you to head over there as soon as you finish reading this post. Next, Carla shared a terrific example from her own work of how wise punctuation choices can help engage the reader. Before I wrap-up this series, I want to thank everyone who entered our giveaway of Cheryl Klein's The Magic Words, and to congratulate our winner, Cathy M!

The biggest punctuation challenge for my beginning students--both adults and children--seems to be dialogue. When I was a novice writer trying to understand how to punctuate dialogue, I studied examples in published works. Since I started out as a freelance newspaper writer (aka "stringer"), those early examples were quotes in newspaper and magazine articles. Later, when I turned to fiction, I modeled the punctuation I used on that in the novels on my shelves. Fortunately, they were all American publications, so the use of punctuation was consistent. I later discovered that British publications follow different rules, rules that are almost the direct opposite of ours. No wonder so many of my students were confused!  For a brief overview of the differences, see this page of The Punctuation Guide.

quinn.anya via VisualHunt.com

When I teach dialogue, I give my students a handout with some basic rules and corresponding examples. Here are the first three:

1. All dialogue should be set off with beginning and ending double quotation marks.

          “Come here, Lassie.”

2. Make sure you start a new paragraph whenever a speaker changes.

          “Where’s the barn?” I asked. “The river? The swimming hole?”
          “Oh, Sal,” my father said. “Come on. There’s Margaret.” He waved to the lady at the door.
          “We have to go back. I forgot something.”    

(Can you tell me what book the above example is taken from?)

3. If the dialogue is preceded by text, put a comma after the introductory text:

          Dad shouted, “Put that down now!”

As time went on, I kept adding more rules and examples. Then I found this page at The Editor's Blog. I've listed the site as a reference at the end of my handout so I don't have to update it anymore.

quinn.anya via Visualhunt

If you're looking for lesson plans on teaching punctuation, check out "And I Quote: A Punctuation Proofreading Minilesson" and "The Passion of Punctuation", both at Read. Write. Think. Both also contain links to additional punctuation resources.

To wrap us this celebration of National Punctuation Day, I suggest you read these Top Ten Tips at The Punctuation Guide.

Also, before you head over to check out this week's Poetry Friday roundup at Karen Edmisten's blog, you might enjoy reading these children's poems about punctuation.

And don't forget to:

Write with Joy!

Carmela

Reminder: There are only a few days left to enter the Goodreads giveaway of my middle-grade novel, Rosa, Sola.

Wednesday Writing Workout: Characterization (Encore Presentation)

As a follow-up to last Friday's Guest TeachingAuthor Interview with Sherry Shahan, I'm repeating the Wednesday Writing Workout she shared with us in July 2014. After reading this post, I'm sure you'll want to enter for a chance to win a copy of Sherry's Skin and Bones (A. Whitman), if you haven't already entered the contest.

Sherry's young adult novel is a quirky story set in an eating disorder unit of a metropolitan hospital. The main character “Bones” is a male teen with anorexia. He falls desperately in love with an aspiring ballerina who becomes his next deadly addiction.

The novel was inspired by a short story Sherry wrote years ago, “Iris and Jim.” It appeared in print eight times worldwide. Her agent kept encouraging her to expand “Iris and Jim” into a novel. Easy for her to say!

                                                               *          *           *

Wednesday Writing Workout 

Tell It Sideways

by Sherry Shahan

During the first draft of Skin and Bones I stumbled over a number of unexpected obstacles. How could I give a character an idiosyncratic tone without sounding flippant? Eating disorders are serious, and in too many instances, life-threatening. 

Sometimes I sprinkled facts into farcical narration. Other times statistics emerged through dialogue between prominent characters—either in an argument or by using humor. Either way, creating quirky characters felt more organic when their traits were slipped in sideways instead of straight on.

There are endless ways to introduce a character, such as telling the reader about personality:

"Mrs. Freeman could never be brought to admit herself wrong on any point." —      Flannery O'Connor, "Good Country People."

Or by detailing a character’s appearance:

"The baker wore a white apron that looked like a smock. Straps cut under his arms, went around in back and then to the front again, where they were secured under his heavy waist ."   —Raymond Carver "A Small, Good Thing"

The art of creating fully realized characters is often a challenge to new writers of fiction. As a longtime teacher I’ve noticed:

1.) Writers who use short cuts, such a clichés, which produce cardboard or stereotypical characters.

2.) Writers who stubbornly pattern the main character after themselves in a way that’s unrealistic.

3.) Writers who are so involved in working out a complicated plot that their characters don’t receive enough attention.

In Skin and Bones I let readers get to know my characters though humorous dialogue. This technique works best when characters have opposing viewpoints. 

Consider the following scene. (Note: Lard is a compulsive over-eater; Bones is anorexic.)

“I’ll never buy food shot up with hormones when I own a restaurant,” Lard said. “Chicken nuggets sound healthy enough, but they have more than three dozen ingredients—not a lot of chicken in a nugget.”

Bones put on rubber gloves in case he’d have to touch something with calories. “Can’t we talk about something else?”

“That’s the wrong attitude, man. Don’t you want to get over this shit?”

“Not at this particular moment, since it’s almost lunch and my jaw still hurts from breakfast.”

Lard shook his head. “I’m glad I don’t live inside your skin.”

“It’d be a little crowded.”

Exercise #1: Choose a scene from a work-in-progress where a new character is introduced. (Or choose one from an existing novel.) Write a paragraph about the character without using physical descriptions. Repeat for a secondary character.

Exercise #2: Give each character a strong opinion about a subject. Do Nice Girls Really Finish Last? Should Fried Food Come With a Warning? Make sure your characters have opposing positions. Next, write a paragraph from each person’s viewpoint.

Exercise #3: Using the differing viewpoints, compose a scene with humorous dialogue. Try not to be funny just for humor’s sake. See if you can weave in a piece 

of factual information (Lard’s stats. about Chicken Nuggets), along with a unique character trait (Bones wearing gloves to keep from absorbing calories through his skin.)

I hope these exercises help you think about characterization in a less conventional way. Thanks for letting me stop by!
Sherry
www.SherryShahan.com

Readers, if you haven't already done so, head on over to Friday's post and enter for a chance to win your own autographed copy of  Skin and Bones (A. Whitman).

Good luck and Happy writing!
Carmela

Wednesday Writing Workout: Charactization: Tell It Sideways, Courtesy of Sherry Shahan

Today's Wednesday Writing Workout comes to us courtesy of the talented Sherry Shahan. Sherry and I first met virtually, when she joined the New Year/New Novel (NYNN) Yahoo group I started back in 2009. I love the photo she sent for today's post--it personifies her willingness to do the tough research sometimes required for the stories she writes. As she says on her website, she has:

 "ridden on horseback into Africa’s Maasailand, hiked through a leech-infested rain forest in Australia, shivered inside a dogsled for the first part of the famed 1,049 mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Alaska, rode-the-foam on a long-board in Hawaii, and spun around dance floors in Havana, Cuba." 

Her research has led to more than three dozen published books, fiction and nonfiction. To keep from becoming stale, Sherry likes to mix it up—writing picture books, easy readers, middle-grade novels, and YA. She holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts and teaches a writing course for UCLA extension.

Her new young adult novel Skin and Bones (A. Whitman) is a quirky story set in an eating disorder unit of a metropolitan hospital. The main character “Bones” is a male teen with anorexia. He falls desperately in love with an aspiring ballerina who becomes his next deadly addiction.

The novel was inspired by a short story Sherry wrote years ago, “Iris and Jim.” It appeared in print eight times worldwide. Her agent kept encouraging her to expand “Iris and Jim” into a novel. Easy for her to say!

                                                               *          *           *

Wednesday Writing Workout 

Tell It Sideways

by Sherry Shahan

During the first draft of Skin and Bones I stumbled over a number of unexpected obstacles. How could I give a character an idiosyncratic tone without sounding flippant? Eating disorders are serious, and in too many instances, life-threatening. 

Sometimes I sprinkled facts into farcical narration. Other times statistics emerged through dialogue between prominent characters—either in an argument or by using humor. Either way, creating quirky characters felt more organic when their traits were slipped in sideways instead of straight on.

There are endless ways to introduce a character, such as telling the reader about personality:

"Mrs. Freeman could never be brought to admit herself wrong on any point." —      Flannery O'Connor, "Good Country People."

Or by detailing a character’s appearance:

"The baker wore a white apron that looked like a smock. Straps cut under his arms, went around in back and then to the front again, where they were secured under his heavy waist ."   —Raymond Carver "A Small, Good Thing"

The art of creating fully realized characters is often a challenge to new writers of fiction. As a longtime teacher I’ve noticed:

1.) Writers who use short cuts, such a clichés, which produce cardboard or stereotypical characters.

2.) Writers who stubbornly pattern the main character after themselves in a way that’s unrealistic.

3.) Writers who are so involved in working out a complicated plot that their characters don’t receive enough attention.

In Skin and Bones I let readers get to know my characters though humorous dialogue. This technique works best when characters have opposing viewpoints. 

Consider the following scene. (Note: Lard is a compulsive over-eater; Bones is anorexic.)

“I’ll never buy food shot up with hormones when I own a restaurant,” Lard said. “Chicken nuggets sound healthy enough, but they have more than three dozen ingredients—not a lot of chicken in a nugget.”

Bones put on rubber gloves in case he’d have to touch something with calories. “Can’t we talk about something else?”

“That’s the wrong attitude, man. Don’t you want to get over this shit?”

“Not at this particular moment, since it’s almost lunch and my jaw still hurts from breakfast.”

Lard shook his head. “I’m glad I don’t live inside your skin.”

“It’d be a little crowded.”

Exercise #1: Choose a scene from a work-in-progress where a new character is introduced. (Or choose one from an existing novel.) Write a paragraph about the character without using physical descriptions. Repeat for a secondary character.

Exercise #2: Give each character a strong opinion about a subject. Do Nice Girls Really Finish Last? Should Fried Food Come With a Warning? Make sure your characters have opposing positions. Next, write a paragraph from each person’s viewpoint.

Exercise #3: Using the differing viewpoints, compose a scene with humorous dialogue. Try not to be funny just for humor’s sake. See if you can weave in a piece 

of factual information (Lard’s stats. about Chicken Nuggets), along with a unique character trait (Bones wearing gloves to keep from absorbing calories through his skin.)

I hope these exercises help you think about characterization in a less conventional way. Thanks for letting me stop by!
Sherry
www.SherryShahan.com

Thank you, Sherry, for this terrific Wednesday Writing Workout! Readers, if you give these exercises a try, do let us know how they work for you.

Happy writing!
Carmela

Wednesday Writing Workout: Dialogue Secrets You Don't Want to Miss, courtesy of Kym Brunner

Today I'm happy to share a guest Wednesday Writing Workout from the amazing Kym Brunner, who is celebrating the release of not one, but TWO, novels this summer.

When I met Kym at an SCBWI-IL conference a few years back, I couldn't get over her enthusiasm and energy. I had no idea how she found time to write, given that she was a busy mom with a full-time teaching job (teaching middle-schoolers, no less!).

According to her bio, Kym's method of creating a manuscript is a four-step process: write, procrastinate, sleep, repeat. She's addicted to Tazo chai tea, going to the movies, and reality TV. When she's not reading or writing, Kym teaches seventh grade full time. She lives in Arlington Heights, Illinois with her family and two trusty writing companions, a pair of Shih Tzus named Sophie and Kahlua.

Kym's debut novel, Wanted:  Dead or In Love (Merit Press), was released last month. Here's the intriguing synopsis:

Impulsive high school senior Monroe Baker is on probation for a recent crime, but strives to stay out of trouble by working as a flapper at her father's Roaring 20's dinner show theater. When she cuts herself on one of the spent bullets from her father's gangster memorabilia collection, she unwittingly awakens Bonnie Parker's spirit, who begins speaking to Monroe from inside her head. 

Later that evening, Monroe shows the slugs to Jack, a boy she meets at a party. He unknowingly becomes infected by Clyde, who soon commits a crime using Jack's body. The teens learn that they have less than twenty-four hours to ditch the criminals or they'll share their bodies with the deadly outlaws indefinitely. 

And here's the blurb for her second novel, One Smart Cookie (Omnific Publishing), which came out July 15:

Sixteen year old Sophie Dumbrowski, is an adorably inept teen living above her family-owned Polish bakery with her man-hungry mother and her spirit-conjuring grandmother, who together, are determined to find Sophie the perfect boyfriend. 

But when Sophie meets two hot guys on the same day, she wonders if  this a blessing or a curse. And is Sophie's inability to choose part of the reason the bakery business is failing miserably? The three generations of women need to use their heads, along with their hearts, to figure things out...before it's too late.

Today Kym shares a terrific Wednesday Writing Workout on dialogue.

Wednesday Writing Workout: 

SHH! DIALOGUE SECRETS YOU DON’T WANT TO MISS!

by Kym Brunner 

Quick! After a person’s appearance, what’s the first thing you notice when you meet someone? If you’re like most of us, it’s what comes out of their mouths. First impressions and all that. But when you read, you can’t see the characters, so your first impressions are made based on what the characters say, not how they look.

Simple concept, right? Not so simple to deliver.

SO…HOW DO YOU MAKE YOUR CHARACTER MAKE A GOOD FIRST IMPRESSION?

Give them something to say that’s:

• Believable
• Fits their personality
• Consistent, yet unexpected
• Short and natural

1) Believable Dialogue

How do you know if it’s believable or not? Put on your walking shoes and get out your notebook! Head to the spot where the prototype of your character would go. Need to write teens talking together at lunch? Go to a fast-food restaurant near a high school. Want to know what couples say when they’re on a date? Head to a movie theater early and go see the latest romantic comedy. You get the idea.

***HINT: LISTEN AND TAKE GOOD NOTES. I promise you’ll forget the words and how they said them if you don’t.

2
2) Dialogue that fits the character’s personality
There’s a famous writing cliché that says a reader should be able to read a line of dialogue and know who the character is without the identifying dialogue tag.

The key is being the character when you write his or her lines. Imagine YOU are the sensitive butcher who is very observant (seriously, picture yourself looking out of the eyes of the butcher with your hands on a raw steak) and then write his or her lines. Better yet, listen to a butcher talk to customers and/or interview one to ask his top three concerns about his job. You might be surprised to learn what those things are…and so might your reader.

***HINT: SWITCH INTO THE MINDS of all of your characters (even the minor ones) as you write to create words that only THEY would say.

Image courtesy of smarnad/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

3) Consistent, yet unexpected? Huh?

Your job is to make sure your characters are real, that they speak the truth (or not, depending on who they are). In real life, characters might keep their thoughts to themselves. Not so in fiction. Characters that are pushed to the brink must speak out––to a best friend, to the cabbie, to the offending party, to the police.

Yes, we want dialogue to be authentic, but it IS a story and it does need to intrigue your readers. So let them speak their mind and propel the story ahead by providing interesting thoughts for your readers to mull over.

***HINT: TO KEEP PACING ON TRACK, use frequent dialogue to break up paragraphs of exposition.

4) Short and Natural

Cut to the chase. No one likes listening to boring blowhards, so don’t let your characters be “one of those people.” Remember tuning out a boring teacher? That’s what didactic dialogue and info dumps feels like to your readers. Only include information that’s absolutely necessary for the story’s sake and skip the rest. You might need to know the backstory, but keep it to yourself.

***HINT: READ ALL DIALOGUE OUT LOUD. Change voices to the way you imagine the characters interacting and it’ll feel more “real.” If you’re bored with the conversation, so is your reader. If it doesn't sound the way a person really talks, cut it or revise it. Listen to real people and you’ll notice most of us talk in short sentences with breaks for others to add commentary.

So there you have it. Write dialogue that’s believable, fits the characters, necessary, and natural and your readers will come back for more!

*****

Hopefully you’ll find authentic dialogue galore in Wanted:  Dead or In Love, which features two alternating POVs––one from Monroe (a modern-day teen who becomes possessed internally by the infamous Bonnie Parker), and the other from Clyde Barrow himself (who works hard to take over the body of Jack Hale, a teen male).

And if cultural humor is more your style, you’ll get a helping of Polish spirits along with a bounty of teen angst in One Smart Cookie.

Kym Brunner

Thanks so much, Kym! Readers, let us know if you try any of these techniques. Meanwhile, if you'd like to connect with Kym, you can do so via her website, Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads. And if you'd like a taste of Wanted:  Dead or In Love, here's the book trailer:

Happy writing (and reading!)

Carmela

Book Giveaway and Guest TeachingAuthor Interview with Cynthia Leitich Smith

I am interrupting our series on the second of the Six Traits of Writing to present an interview with guest TeachingAuthor Cynthia Leitich Smith. We're celebrating with her today because her most recent young adult novel, Blessed (Candlewick Press), was released just YESTERDAY. At the end of the interview you can watch the book trailer and then read about how to enter for a chance to win your own autographed copy. And be sure to check out the links I've included in the Blogosphere Buzz that follows the contest information.  

Blessed is a companion novel to the New York Times and Publishers Weekly bestsellers Eternal and Tantalize (also from Candlewick Press). Cynthia's award-winning books for younger children include Jingle Dancer, Indian Shoes, and Rain is Not My Indian Name (all from HarperCollins) and Holler Loudly (Dutton).

Cynthia has taught a number of writing workshops and is currently a member of the faculty at the Vermont College M.F.A. program in Writing for Children and Young Adults. Her amazing website was named one of the top 10 Writer Websites by Writer's Digest and an American Library Association (ALA) Great Website for Kids. Her Cynsations blog was listed among the top two read by the children's/YA publishing community in the SCBWI "To Market" column.

Now, without further ado, here is the interview:

Cynthia, how did you become a TeachingAuthor?
   Kathi Appelt drafted me. She's my original children's writing teacher, and I benefited greatly from taking private classes at her family ranch. From there, she asked me to guest speak at another event and then to join her in teaching a workshop. Over time, I began leading workshops, both for writing groups and out of my own home (for advanced/published participants) with my very cute husband and sometimes co-author, Greg Leitich Smith. In 2005, I joined the faculty of the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults.

What's a common problem/question that your writing students have and how do you address it?
     Of late, I've been working with especially strong students. But for both beginners and the more advanced, I'd say that "talking heads"--long sessions of character dialogue without the speaker being physically grounded in the scene--are a common pitfall.

      Don't get me wrong. There's a time to let the dialogue flow without grounding or even attribution, such as in moments of high intensity when the reader knows the characters and their voices so well that anything more would be extraneous. But for the most part, it's helpful to be able to visualize our characters in a scene. Sometimes a beat is enough: She waved. He clenched his fist.

      Sometimes, by showing a character, say, cook a meal or fix a car, we reveal more about them in a way that informs the story to come.

      What I typically suggest to my students is to physically act out a scene. Literally step into the moment and movement(s). Or to perhaps sketch out a map of the town or bedroom, so that it's easier for them to mentally move their cast around and describe that on the page.

Would you share a favorite writing exercise for our readers?
      Write a scene from the point of view of the antagonist. (This often works best if the antagonist isn't a force of nature or Fate, but it can be surprisingly useful in cases of the latter, too--especially in terms of revealing theme.)

Your new book, Blessed, is the third in a series of paranormal novels that began with Tantalize.  Did you plan all along to write a series featuring these characters? If so, how did that affect your writing of Tantalize and Eternal?

     I had hoped to write a series featuring the characters, if there was enough enthusiasm from readers and my publisher. But early on, I didn't count on it. So, I wrote Tantalize and Eternal the way I felt they needed to be written.
     Were there plot threads I desperately wanted to continue? Yes. Definitely.
     But if that didn't prove possible, I had brought both the internal and external arcs full circle, albeit with not quite as happy of endings as some might expect, given my particular optimistic take on life. (Readers, if you'd like to read more about Blessed, see this page on Cynthia's website.)

You write a wide range of fiction, from picture books to short stories to young adult novels. Do you have any suggestions for teachers on how they might use one of your books in the classroom?
      For the Tantalize series, I would suggest reading the books and discussing them along with the classics to which they pay tribute: Bram Stoker's Dracula, Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown," Charles Dicken's A Tale of Two Cities, Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery."

Would you share an interesting behind-the-scenes story about one of your novels?
      After selling my first book, Jingle Dancer (Morrow, 2000), I set to work on what would become my first novel, Rain is Not My Indian Name (HarperCollins, 2001). It had a previous incarnation, set in Chicago, as a rather horrid thematically clunky manuscript called "Two Wings to Fly," which I'd finally deleted and decided to try again from the ground up (so to speak).
      I often think of myself as a "sense of place" writer, and this time I returned to my roots, setting the book in northeast Kansas where I spent most of my childhood, and drawing on memories of small towns around the greater Kansas City area. One of the three or so places that I drew on in creating the fictional town of Hannesburg, Kansas was my mother's hometown. I didn't use the particular geographic layout, with the exception of city hall, but a fair amount of local voice and flavor proved inspiring. Still, it's a big world, and I'd nodded to German-American towns in Michigan (where I'd attended law school), too. It never occurred to me that anyone would make the connection outside of perhaps my own family.
      I took the manuscript to an SCBWI conference in Illinois, back when the legendary Esther Hershenhorn (now one of the TeachingAuthors) was serving as regional advisor. I don't remember if we read pages or if an excerpt of mine was read. But I do remember another attendee rushing to me and exclaiming, "Is that such-and-such, Missouri? My husband's family lives there. It sounds dead on."
      I was flabbergasted. She was right.

Well, you must have done an exceptional job creating that town in your manuscript, Cynthia. Your readers will be pleased at the way your strong "sense of place" also comes through in the Tantalize series, which is set in Texas. 

Thanks so much for visiting with us today, Cynthia. And congratulations again on the release of Blessed. 

Readers, I invite you to watch the book's trailer below, and then enter our contest for a chance to win an autographed copy.



Now for the contest Entry Rules: to enter our drawing for an autographed copy of Cynthia Leitich Smith's Blessed:

   1. You must post a comment to today's blog post telling us why you'd like to win a copy of the book. (Will you keep it for yourself or give it as a gift to a young reader?)
   2. You must include contact information in your comment. If you are not a blogger, or your email address is not accessible from your online profile, you must provide a valid email address in your comment. Entries without contact information will be disqualified. Note: the TeachingAuthors cannot prevent spammers from accessing email addresses posted within comments, so feel free to disguise your address by spelling out portions, such as the [at] and [dot].
   3. You must post your comment by 11 pm (CST) Wednesday, February 2, 2011. (The winner will be announced on Thursday, February 3.) Note: Winners automatically grant us permission to post their names here on our TeachingAuthors website. 
   4. You must have a mailing address in the United States.

For more information on our winner selection/notification process, see our official giveaway guidelines.

Blogosphere Buzz

• For more on the release of Blessed (including additional opportunities to win copies) check out this post on the Cynsations blog.
• Many of us in the Kidlitosphere were disappointed when NBC's Today Show failed to interview this year's Newbery and Caldecott winners. I was quoted in a School Library Journal article about the Facebook campaign to get the interviews reinstated. If you're on Facebook, you can participate in the campaign here. 
• Are you a picture book writer looking for a way to jump-start your writing? The training has already begun for the 2011 Picture Book Marathon, which starts Feb. 1. You can read about it here. And even if you're not participating in the marathon, check out their companion blog for some picture book-writing inspiration (By the way, they have the coolest logo.)
• The Amelia Bloomer Project has posted their 2011 list of recommended feminist literature for birth through 18 on their blog, with their "top ten" list posted here.
• The annual Kidlitosphere Comment Challenge wraps up today. A HUGE thank you to Lee Wind and Pam Coughlan for organizing this terrific event. I found some terrific new blogs to follow. And thank you to all the bloggers who posted here as part of the challenge. We're honored to have the TeachingAuthors logo as part of the Challenge masthead.  

Happy Writing!
Carmela

The Head I'm In

I have had a toothache for a month and a half. It is amazing the amount of time, thought, and care that my brain has directed straight to my highly innervated mouth. (Would that my mouth would consequently say smarter things, but alas -- no such luck.)

As a kid, I had ten years of orothodonia. (My parents got a deal because the ortho specialized in military families who moved every three years and offered a flat rate. Surprise! He got stuck with me.)

When I was eight, I got headgear. Shortly before this, my mom had allowed me to watch a frightening vampire saga on TV. I bet I was the only child in America relieved to have an ugly apparatus wrapped around my neck because it allowed me to sleep without fear of being bitten.

In one of those sleepless pre-headgear nights, I remember becoming unusually conscious of the voice inside my head. And then I had that haunting existential thought -- where did this voice come from? How did I get trapped inside of ME?

Reading April's amazing 9/11 poem and Writing Workout, I was reminded of my childhood napping habit. I would put a pillow on the floor beneath my head, recline against the couch, and sleep with my feet straight up in the air. Increased blood flow to the brain = good. Of course, doing this now would surely give me vertigo.

My children seem to spend a lot of time upside-down, as well. I have to think that maybe we are born with a natural inclination to try to look at the world for a different persepective. And then I have to wonder -- how do so many of us lose that instinct somewhere along the way?

"Dialogue" is the word we use in the politics of life to indicate diplomacy, mediation, tense negotiation. In my day job, dialogue is everything. Nearly all soap opera scenes that don't involve disasters, cat fights, or kissing are chiefly comprised of informational recap (blah, but useful if you missed yesterday's episode) and/or verbal conflict. You may have noticed that two characters in a scene together nearly always take opposing viewpoints. "Strong POVs," as they say, are always more interesting. (Of course, nuance helps, too.)

Writing Workout

When I was teaching English 101, I adapted a playwriting exercise from college on writing dialogue. I asked my students to leave the classroom, to eavesdrop on a conversation, and to take good, quick, verbatim notes, then come back and share.

My intent was to show them how much conversation consists of "mms" and "uhs," is redundant and boring. I wanted to show them the importance of winnowing down a conversation or an event to only the most important details.

My students fanned out across campus. The class was held at time when few other activities were scheduled, so several students wound up eavesdropping on the same conversations.

Three different groups came back. There was the group that had listened to a boring conversation about allergies (i.e., informational recap). Then there was the second group, which had overheard a fight betwen a couple about whether one had given the other HIV. The third conversation described a menage a trois with identical twins. I write for a soap opera, and I thought I had heard it all. I had not.

And so the idea that an average conversation is boring was not conveyed so well by this particular exercise. But the idea of listening -- with an open mind -- of trying to put oneself in someone else's shoes, to imagine the circumstances preceding and following the slice of life you've observed -- DIALOGUE in life is everything.

Multicultural Dialogue: Please Pass the Patate

Today, I'd like to follow-up on Mary Ann's response to an Ask the TeachingAuthors question submitted by Pam. Pam asked: "In MG and YA novels, do you ever use diction from other cultures or parts of the country in your characterizations? Or do you focus more on a character's actions, behavior and gestures to define them?"

When writing my middle-grade novel, Rosa, Sola, I had the challenge of trying to portray the speech of recent Italian immigrants. Members of my own immigrant family speak with heavy accents and often intersperse Italian words, or Anglicized Italian, with English. If I tried to reproduce such speech in my novel, readers would have a difficult time deciphering it. As Mary Ann pointed out in her post, such dialogue "can be murder to read."

Instead, I used several techniques to portray my immigrant characters' speech:

1. I occasionally interspersed relatively easy-to-pronounce Italian words with English, structuring the dialogue and conversation so that those words could be understood in context.
2. As much as possible, I used cognates of English words to make it easier for readers to guess a foreign word's meaning.
3. For the characters with the heaviest accents, I tried to keep their sentences short. I also structured their speech in nonstandard ways.
4. I included a glossary of the Italian words and phrases that appeared in the text.

For example, here's how I handled the first occurrence of the word sola:

Mrs. Morelli returned before AnnaMaria did. "I'm sorry, Rosa." She took the baby from Rosa. "AnnaMaria should not have left you sola."

"But I wasn't alone." Rosa smiled up at Mrs. Morelli. "Antonio was with me."

Because many readers are familiar with the word "solo," they might guess that sola means alone. But even if they didn't, they could surmise the meaning from Rosa's response. Similarly, for the title of this post, I'm hoping you guessed that patate means potatoes. Initially, I'd planned to say "Please pass the piselli," but I chose patate because the word looks more like "potatoes" than piselli does "peas."

Like Mary Ann, I also had to be careful regarding the historical accuracy of my dialogue because Rosa, Sola is set in the 1960s. The online etymology dictionary is a great resource to help insure historical accuracy. For example, if you look up the word "groovy," you'll learn:

As teen slang for "wonderful," it dates from 1944; popularized 1960s, out of currency by 1980.

My current work-in-progress, a young-adult novel set in 18th-century Milan, presents even greater challenges when it comes to dialogue. Unlike the characters in Rosa, Sola who speak a mixture of Italian and English, my Milanese characters speak only Italian. Therefore, it really isn't appropriate to intersperse Italian words in their dialogue. While I have read books that do, I try to avoid it. For example, to me, it doesn't make sense to write:

Luigi said, "Please pass the patate."

when, technically, it should be:

Luigi said, "Passami le patate per favore."

So in my novel set in Milan, the only time I have Italian dialogue is in complete (very short) sentences, such as:

When Maria passed him the potatoes, Luigi said, "Grazie."

I still use Italian words in the narrative at times, to help remind readers of the setting, but I avoid mixing them with English in the dialogue.

I hope this discussion has satisfactorily addressed Pam's questions. If we haven't answered your Ask the TeachingAuthors question yet, please be patient. We plan to tackle our backlog in September. Meanwhile, we hope you'll use the link in the sidebar to keep those questions coming!