Putting the "New" in the New Year

Happy New Year! We're kicking off 2026 here at TeachingAuthors with a series of posts about something new we're doing this year.  

My "new" goal is to incorporate more humor into my poetry. Lucky for me, shortly after deciding that I wanted my poems for young readers to be more playful, I learned about The Poet's Studio's online workshop "How to Write a Funny Poem with Chris Harris" this coming Monday, January 12, 2026. 

I was familiar with Harris's work from reading his 2023 title My Head Has a Bellyache: And More Nonsense for Mischievous Kids and Immature Grown-Ups illustrated by Andrea Tsurumi. You may recall that I blogged about reading Bellyache back in 2024. But I didn't mention then that the book has the most entertaining glossary of poetry terms I've ever seen--and the glossary is itself a poem! Here are the opening stanzas:

          GLOSSARY OF TERMS
          (from My Head Has a Bellyache)

     A simile flits like a songbird.
     A metaphor struts—it’s a bear.
     Personification
     Says, “There’s a gradation
     Of human in things everywhere.

     Alliterative language looks lovely.
     Consonance crackles and creaks.
     Assonance has
     A class-act pizzazz,
     While sibilance slithers and sneaks. 

          © 2023 Chris Harris. All rights reserved. 

You can read the whole glossary online, where Harris shared it as a series of posts on X. 

When I registered for the workshop, I discovered Bellyache was actually the second in a series that began with a book illustrated by Lane Smith called I'm Just No Good at Rhyming: And Other Nonsense for Mischievous Kids and Immature Grown-Ups. Both books are published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. 

Since rhyming is not my strong suit, I find the title especially appealing. But it's obviously not true, given the book's abundance of rhythm and rhyme. Booklist even called it "A magnificently wacky romp through verse." 

I don't know if writing poems like the ones in these two anthologies can be taught, but I'm looking forward to Monday's workshop. An extra plus: all the members of my poetry critique group will be there, too. Are any of you TeachingAuthors readers planning to attend? If you haven't registered yet, there may still be a few openings. You can learn more at Georgia Heard's The Poet's Studio website. 

Don't forget to check this week's Poetry Friday roundup by Ruth at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town. 

Happy writing!

Carmela 

Celebrating a New Anthology Featuring Poems by Two TeachingAuthors!

Our current TeachingAuthors topic is "Something New I Learned and Can’t Wait to Share." I've been learning lots of things this year and am pleased to share a few with you today! You'll also find a link to this week's Poetry Friday roundup at the end of this post.

I'm especially pleased to announce that today we're celebrating this week's release of Clara's Kooky Compendium of Thimblethoughts and Wonderfuzz edited by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong and illustrated by Frank Ramspott (Pomelo Books).

This new anthology includes poems by me and my fellow TeachingAuthor, April Halprin Wayland. I include samples of our poems below. But first, here's a bit about this amazing new book for grades 3 and up. Clara's Kooky Compendium is a "fun-filled journal-style book featuring a mixture of dandy doodles and drawings, fun facts, quirky questions, and 150+ poems that will get your kids giggling and guffawing while they learn about language arts, science, math, research skills, writing techniques, and more." No wonder the book has been named a Children's Book Council "Hot Off the Press" Selection for October 2024! You can see the list of the over 100 poets who contributed to the anthology on the Pomelo Books website. That page also includes printable activity sheets to go with the book. (While you're there, you may notice that a portion of the profits from this book will be donated to charities that bring joy to children in hospitals.) If you'd like to learn even more about this anthology, watch this video from Pomelo Books posted on Twitter/X.

I am honored to have two poems in Clara's Kooky Compendium, both of which came out of a course I took with Sylvia and Janet on Writing Humorous Poetry. In that course, I learned that a poem doesn't always have to make the reader laugh out loud to be humorous. Instead, it can employ rhyme, repetition, sounds, wordplay, etc., to simply invoke a smile. And when Sylvia sent me the final images of my poems in the book, I also learned how much art can add to the fun! You can see that for yourself from the page featuring my poem "Pasta"!  

I even learned something from the Thimblethought that accompanies my poem--I had no idea the first U.S. pasta factory was built by a Frenchman! My other poem in the anthology is also in free verse, but it's quite different from this one. You'll have to get the book to read it for yourself, but I'll tease you with two facts about it: The poem is called "Invention" and it's related to math.

My fellow TeachingAuthor April Halprin Wayland also has two poems in the Compendium. Here's the first one, called "Errand Dog:"

Don't you just love April's poem? Her second poem is also about a dog, but again, you'll have to get a copy of the book and read it for yourself.

Just this week, I also learned that April has a poem in another anthology that released on October 1: The Mistakes That Made Us: Confessions from Twenty Poets edited by Irene Latham and Charles Waters and illustrated by Mercè López (Carolrhoda Books). Congratulations, April!

I'm looking forward to learning a lot more from the posts in this week's Poetry Friday roundup hosted by Tabatha Yeatts at The Opposite of Indifference

Happy Writing!
Carmela

Jill Esbaum Interview and Book Giveaway!

Happy summer! I'm glad to be back for one more visit to share an interview with our dear friend Jill Esbaum, who is a brilliant writer, a former Teaching Author, and a genuinely nice person. Jill lives on a family farm in eastern Iowa and is the author of nearly 50 fiction and nonfiction books for kids. Please visit her website for more information or follow her group blog, Picture Book Builders.

Jill Esbaum

We're giving away a copy of the first book in Jill's delightful new graphic early reader series, Thunder and Cluck. You can enter below, but first, find out more about Jill and her books.

***

Who or what inspired the characters Thunder and Cluck?

The opening scene sort of fell into my head one morning in that fuzzy period just before you wake. When these two kooky prehistoric characters started talking, I thought the best thing to do was take notes and hope they kept it up.

Friends Do Not Eat Friends is the first book
in Jill Esbaum's new graphic early reader series.

How is planning and writing a series different from writing a stand-alone book? Can you give us any hints about other books in the series?

This is the first time I've done any kind of fiction series, and it wasn't planned, so an expert, I am not. I first wrote Thunder & Cluck as a picture book, a funny story of how they became unlikely friends. That was rejected a few times. My agent suggested I use these characters to write a 3,000 word young chapter book. That manuscript had a nibble, but was ultimately rejected, as well. My agent then suggested I try the duo in an early reader--a pair of manuscripts she could submit together. 

Too invested in these characters to throw in the towel, I cut and cut and cut until nothing was left but a 500-word, all-dialogue story. My stubbornness paid off when we got the call that Simon & Schuster wanted Thunder & Cluck - Friends Do Not Eat Friends as one of the lead titles in their new graphic early readers line. A happy dance moment, for sure!

They wanted to release three books quickly, so then came the frantic planning of book #3. Fortunately, I had that chapter book to pull scenes from. Guess it's true that nothing you write ever goes to waste. Book #2, Thunder & Cluck - The Brave Friend Leads the Way, will release in late August. In that story, the duo clashes over which of them is braver. Next spring comes Book #3, Thunder & Cluck - Smart vs Strong.

Did you have to learn any new techniques to write in the graphic format? Did you have to modify your usual writing process? If so, how? 

No, I wasn't even aware it would be a graphic format until the manuscripts sold. After the first book's art was in, I learned my series would be a Level One, which meant I had to eliminate all contractions. That, I learned, was easier said than done -- tough to keep characters sounding natural when every can't becomes cannot, etc. But I'm a word nerd, so revision is my idea of fun.

Inside the first book: Thunder meets Cluck.

You’ve written a number of funny books. Does humor come naturally to you, or do you have to work at it?

Both. Lines that make me laugh out loud the first three or four times I read a manuscript quickly lose that element of surprise. By the 50th read, those funny bits are stale, stale, stale--or maybe I've tweaked the story structure so they no longer even work. But the revision process, when I'm honing the voice and really knowing, finally, what I want the story to sound like, often leads to serendipitous moments, when lines pop up I never would have thought of the first 50 times through. 

Many early readers have strict requirements, such as using specific vocabulary, avoiding contractions, and defining new words in the text, all of which could add more words. It seems to me that the graphic format would require a writer to be very brief. How do you balance those requirements?

Parameters are imperative, of course, but I don't have any in mind while creating. I've perused K-2 word lists, so those are likely stuck in my head. Or it could be that my writing spills out at a 1st-grade level because of the many books I've written for National Geographic over the years. 

Or maybe I just think/talk like a 6 year old. 

All I know when I begin is that I have about 500 words and 64 pages to play with. One of the most enjoyable things about writing these is that I get to add very detailed art notes that include body language, attitude, facial expressions...that's a blast and an ENTIRELY different mindset from writing picture books. Once I saw the kind of magic brilliant illustrator Miles Thompson was capable of, the writing/cutting process became a lot more fun. 

Here's another sneak peek.

Do you have a favorite piece of advice for writers? 

Learn to critique your own work as an editor would. You can develop your critical eye by 1) endless reading and writing, and 2) critiquing other people's manuscripts in a crit group or some kind of manuscript exchange. There's nothing like critiquing other people's writing to help you zero in on your own problem areas. 

***

Thank you so much, Jill! We're all looking forward to reading more of your work, and we wish you the best of luck with this series!

And now for the giveaway! To enter our drawing, use the Rafflecopter widget below. You may enter via 1, 2, or all 3 options. (Note: if the widget doesn't appear, click on the link at the end of this post that says "a Rafflecopter giveaway" to enter.)

If you choose option 2, you MUST leave a comment on TODAY'S blog post or on our TeachingAuthors Facebook page. If you haven't already "liked" our Facebook page, please do so today!

If you prefer, you may submit your comment via email to: teachingauthors [at] gmail [dot] com.

Note: if you submit your comments via email or Facebook, YOU MUST STILL ENTER THE DRAWING VIA RAFFLECOPTER BELOW. The giveaway ends July 9, 2021 and is open to U.S. residents only.

If you've never entered a Rafflecopter giveaway, here's info on how to enter a Rafflecopter giveaway and the difference between signing in with Facebook vs. with an email address.

Good luck!

Posted by JoAnn Early Macken

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Persistence, Patience, and Perseverance in a Child-Centric World

Persistence, patience, and perseverance are all lofty goals that many have for our children.  Virtues that we extol.  Virtues of which we moralize to our youth. Virtues that we hope we will impose upon them. Virtues that we hope we will inspire them to aspire to. Sometimes we even write books that encourage children to learn to be persistent, demonstrate patience, and grow to persevere. 

                                                                              

Even in my own debut picture book, Hello, Little One: A Monarch Butterfly Story, my protagonist impatiently can’t wait to grow up.  The implied message is, “all in good time.”  While the little caterpillar does finally grow up, it ironically does not get to do what  it spends the entire story longing to do once it’s grown.

                                                                                

I have mixed feeling about these three words that pack such a punch.

                                                                                   

I often live in two worlds. Sometimes separately.  Sometimes simultaneously.  I can immerse myself in the adult-centric world just as easily as I can, the kid-centric world.  I love when contradictions live side by side and am a great fan of irony.

In the adult-centric world that tries to train its youth to grow to be the best people they can be, persistence is the capability to keep at something until you get it.  Patience is the ability to suspend your expectations and allow time to pass before you get what you want or have your needs met.  In essence, it’s the acceptance of a restructure of time. Perseverance is the drive to keep at something until you’ve achieved or experienced the desired goal.

                                                                           

   

I realize that these definitions are limited.  I am not trying to preach or moralize.  I do love to flip the perception just to experience what it might be like on the other side. .  

In a child-centric world, these three words hold the same definitions but look so different. Persistence is the child who won’t stop asking for that cookie no matter how many times the adult says, “no.”  Patience is the child who can watch a snail make its way across the grass for hours when the parent is dying to leave the park. Perseverance is the child intent on learning to cross on the play structure bars. Their insistence on mastery seems obsessive to the adult watching, as the child’s hands go from blistered to bloody.

It’s humorous that adults hold these virtues in such high esteem but find them so annoying when children actually display them.  I wonder if children find it humorous that adults are so serious about things kids do quite naturally.

                                                                                    

By Zeena M. Pliska

Illustrations from

Hello, Litttle One:  A Monarch Butterfly Story

Written by Zeena M. Pliska and illustrated by Fiona Halliday

Published by Page Street Kids

To learn more about me click here

Will Rogers: Actor, Trick Roper WRITER!

.
Howdy, Campers and Happy Poetry Friday! (My poem and the link to PF is below)

This time around, we TeachingAuthors are rhapsodizing about our favorite American writer's museum or home. Bobbi began with a post on Emily Dickinson's Museum, Mary Ann wrote about William Faulkner's Rowan Oak, And Carla, in her post titled "Listen My Children," wrote about Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's home.

Today I'm going to introduce you to a beloved place in my Southern California childhood, Will Rogers State Park and ranch house, just a 15-minute drive from UCLA.

But first, a bit about Will, gleaned from the Will Rogers Memorial Museum and Birthplace Ranch in Claremore,  Oklahoma:

“My ancestors didn’t come over on the Mayflower, but they met the boat.” (Will was "born to a Cherokee Nation family.")

He wanted more than anything in the world to become a trick roper, and did, touring the US and Europe in Wild West and vaudeville shows. If his rope tricks failed on stage, he made jokes, and those "jokes became better than ropes." He signed with Ziegfeld's Follies and become a Broadway star.

But Will was also a writer. He was, to put it mildly, prolific. "He put approximately two million words in print—six books, more than 3,600 [daily!] newspaper columns..." and wrote frequently for The Saturday Evening Post. His "syndicated weekly and daily columns were prized by 600 newspapers ...including at least one in every major city...and reached a potential audience of 40 million readers." In addition, he wrote"scores of magazine articles—in a span of only sixteen years, stretching from the publication of his first newspaper article in 1916 until his last one in August 1935."

"I don't make jokes. I just watch the government
and report the facts."

Are you out of breath yet? There's more:

He appeared regularly on radio through the 1920's and 30's, and went on to produce, direct, write and star in the 20-minute silent picture, "Ropin' Fool," in which he pioneered slow-motion cinema to better demonstrate his roping tricks. (Watch him do 3 minutes of rope tricks from that film.)

He went on to star in 50 silent films, and when "talkies" replaced them, appeared in 21 pictures in five years and becoming Hollwood's highest paid actor. (In fact, here's his IMDB)

He was a force of nature. My mom and dad loved that he spoke truth to power--so naturally, I did, too. What I knew of Will reminded me of Molly Ivins, who I wrote about right after the November election. But as I've read more, I was surprised to find that I disagree with some of his political views. Still, it seems he kept politicians on their toes--an important job of a columnist/political satirist.

For example (from Wikipedia):

Rogers thought all campaigning was bunk. To prove the point he mounted a mock campaign in 1928 for the presidency. His only campaign promise was "If elected, I will resign." Every week Rogers caricatured the farcical humors of grave campaign politics.  During this campaign he answered questions: What does the farmer need? Obvious: "He needs a punch in the jaw if he believes that either of the parties cares a damn about him after the election."  On election day he declared victory and resigned.

"Ten men in our country could buy the whole world and ten million can't buy enough to eat."

But my memories are of Will Rogers State Park, and more specifically, Will's 31-room Western Ranch House not far from the Pacific Ocean, with its long porch, and an expansive lawn (i.e. park) which stretched from the family's stable to their polo field.

Oh, that lawn. Oh, that polo field. And oh, the trails leading from the ranch to forever, which my hiking group returns to often.

And what's the first thing I always wanted to see as a five-year-old, as a ten-year-old, and today, when touring his home?  The roping calf. In his living room. His living room! 

Cool.

Here's a poem I wrote in 1995 about one of my all-time favorite birthday parties under the trees which surround the lawn of the Will's ranch house:

PARTY AT THE PARK
by April Halprin Wayland

Surrounded by shedding eucalyptus trees,
been here forever, they’ll be here forever, too.

All of my cousins, aunts and uncles
spreading table cloths, taking out potato salad,

handing me hugs and presents and long kisses,
talking to everyone as they talk to me,

big arms and bodies and laughing, laughing
Cousin Bruce, Cousin Robbie, my sister, and Cousin Franklin

running after pigeons, running after frisbees, running into me
more presents and pass the plates and did you have enough?

taste Aunt Sylvia’s kugel, yes, says Uncle Raphael, taste
Fran’s chopped liver, is it time for birthday cake? asks Uncle Moish

and we all gather ‘round for two cakes for Dad and me--mine is pink
Dad says I can have a corner flower and

Mom and Aunt Cissie are putting candles in the plastic flower
holders and sticking them in the cake and then Mom lights them with a little

match, lights the last one holding the very teeny part of the match, burning close to her fingers, but she’s fast and they burst into song and I feel full and

like bursting
full of cousins and aunts and uncles and potato salad

surrounded by shedding eucalyptus trees,
been here forever, they’ll be here forever, too.

poem © 2017 April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved. 

Here's a 2-minute video about Will Rogers:

"The man with the best job in the country is the Vice President. All he has to do is get up every morning and say, 'How's the President?'"

Thank you for reading this post. As some of you may remember, I am terribly afraid of making factual errors when writing non-fiction. It scares the dickens out of me. Do you ever feel this way?

And congratulations to Gail P, who won an autographed copy of Lisa Cron's STORY GENIUS (which Esther reviewed here) in our latest book giveaway celebrating TeachingAuthors' 8th blogiversary!

Thank you, Tara, for hosting Poetry Friday at A Teaching Life!

posted by April Halprin Wayland with the help of Will, who said: "Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip."

In Need of a Smile?

Photo by Visual Hunt

Following our incredible discussion on punctuation, I thought I’d punctuate (see what I did there?) the discussion with what others have to say about the subject. And besides, given the current air of politics, we might be in need of some smiles…

"I’m tired of wasting letters when punctuation will do, period." -- Steve Martin



“I want to change my punctuation. I long for exclamation marks, but I'm drowning in ellipses.” -- Issac Marion 


“I use a whole lot of half-BLEEP semicolons; there was one of them just now; that was a semicolon after 'semicolons,' and another one after 'now.” -- Ursula LeGuin


“If commas are open to interpretation, hyphens are downright Delphic.” -- Mary Norris


“While we look in horror at a badly punctuated sign, the world carries on around us, blind to our plight. We are like the little boy in The Sixth Sense who can see dead people, except that we can see dead punctuation. Whisper it in petrified little-boy tones: dead punctuation is invisible to everyone else - yet we see it all the time.” – Lynne Truss

“Today, I learned, the comma, this is, a, comma (,) a period, with, a tail, Miss Kinnian, says its, importent, because, it makes writing, better, she said, somebody, could lose, a lot, of money, if a comma, isnt in, the right, place, I got, some money, that I, saved from, my job, and what, the foundation, pays me, but not, much and, I dont, see how, a comma, keeps, you from, losing it, But, she says, everybody, uses commas, so Ill, use them, too,,,,” -- Daniel Keyes



“What sort of person," said Salzella patiently, "sits down and writes a maniacal laugh? And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head. Opera can do that to a man.” -- Terry Pratchett

Photo by Visual Hunt

Wishing you smiles!

Bobbi Miller

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