but whose counting.. Whose sounds the same as who's but not the same. English is just full of little traps like that. sounds right but mean something else. Falling into traps like this expose the fact that you did not do a proper edit. Edits can be a pain but are very necessary to keep your reader where you want them.
An author has an unwritten contract which their readers, to open their souls when telling a story. You invite a reader to walk through your mind where this story lives. It is much the same as a realtor showing a house. You wouldn't expect a prospective buyer to peek through smudged windows at important rooms and then be satisfied with just a glimpse. Your job is to open the doors, invite them in and show them around. Sometimes a story is such that we can only let our readers look through the windows, it is much too painfull to invite anyone all the way inside, Then we have to settle for letting our readers look through our windows. In this case it is very important to make sure they are as clean as posssible so our readers can see just what we want them to see. Writing is about communicating, That is it's purpose.
It is always best to have a clear idea, what do I want to share with my reader? How much, or how little you share determines how your reader feels about the experience. When they finish, does your reader know just what you want him / her to know? Can they feel your story? Did you make them experience cold, hot, hard, soft, does the dust in the room make them sneeze? Those sensory clues put you reader right beside you in the middle of your story. Take them by the hand, make them experience your story. That is what separates a (so so) story from one that lives in your readers mind in the same form it lived in your mind.
You can look at editing as a drudgery, or you can embrace the opportunity to experience the story as a reader. That step outside yourself and looking back in is not easy. It is normal to be so caught up with the story in our mind, that we do not see what we have placed on screen or on the page. This is all your reader has to hold on to. Editing is looking through the eye of your reader. If you can do that you will grow rapidly from a word writer into a story writer.
You obviously have a lot more to show us floating around that wonderful mind of yours. Please take that little extra time to help us experience the same story as in your mind. Do not cheat us out of that wonderful experience.
Becoming a terrific writer is time consuming, some people have better vocabularies than others, more education, a better way of touching readers. No matter where you start, each story is an opportunity to grow. Reach as high as you can stretch, get the best sun ripened fruit way up in the tree, do not be satisfied with shadow grown fruit, The sweetest grow as close to the sun as they can get.
This comes with experience, practice, and being patient with yourself when you must do over a story so that you share as much of your self as you can bear. Sometimes it hurts, sometimes it is a joy, a breath of fresh air filled with the scent of blossoms or that electric quality of a gentle spray washed breeze that fills you with expectations just breathing it. Whatever you experience in your mind will become the shared experience of your reader, and you my friend, will find yourself on the Best Seller list, Touch your readers let them know you were there with them.
Keep writing daily. even if it is just a paragraph. Describe a tree, or a house, or a broken swing dangling by one worn rope from a tree. Make us feel the wind in our hair, make us hear the laughter of generations of children than swung from sky to sky. Make our hearts stir with the joy of almost touching the sky and then passing close to the earth and then flying high again. It is almost flying! Share it with us.
I hope that this review is not too long or repetative, I can not sleep tonight. I am spending time with you, because spending time alone waiting till I have surgery is scarey. I have no hand to hold for reassurance, so I reach out to you. Hold mine that you may be assured the place you will earn in the minds of your readers. Enjoy your life, share it with others every day. Look ahead with expectations, Let your life be filled with wonder and joy.
Leave no story untold for you are a writer. |