Are you lookin' for a fight?

If you're a writer, you'd better be looking for a fight.

Why?

Because every good story needs conflict.

If you want your reader to care about what happens in your story, the reader needs a reason to care. Conflict forces your character to choose sides. Conflict makes your reader think about what side she would choose if she were that character. It gets her involved in the story and makes her want to turn the page to find out how the character is going to handle the problem.

Life is all about conflict. If your story doesn't have meaningful conflict, it's not going to be relevant.

Don't shy away from conflict. There are conflicts in friendships, conflicts in families, conflicts in communities. It may be hard for us to write about conflict when we have been taught all our lives to be peacemakers. But if we don't allow conflict to occur in our stories, we're essentially removing our character's agency, allowing them to exist in a world where we save them from unpleasant outcomes. (Does this sound familiar?)

I've had many opportunities as a newspaper staff writer to observe conflicts from different points of view. It might be helpful to you to attend city or county government meetings or court sessions just to listen, observe, and take notes. When parties disagree or there is a problem to resolve, how do the parties involved handle it? How visible are their emotions? Did the outcomes meet their expectations?

Some conflicts have a polarizing effect. Take the meeting I attended today, for example -- a discussion about whether or not a board of health has the authority to enact a community smoking ban.

County government leaders say the board of health should not enact the ban, believing it's a job for elected officials. However, the elected officials don't talk as if they want a ban; squeaky wheels in the community say it's just another example of government trying to strip away the rights of the people.

On the other hand, you have the board of health. The members are convinced second-hand smoke is bad for the community, and can back that up with scientific evidence. They've been reluctant to act, or maybe just taking their time, exploring all avenues before making a decision.

This brings us to the critical point. At today's meeting, a state health official told the board that according to a legal opinion, health boards do have legal authority to enact a smoking ban.

Naturally, county government wants the board of health to back off, to say they're not going to enact a ban but allow the magistrates to decide.

The board of health can be pretty certain if the ball is put back in the fiscal court, the court won't pass the ban, considering there are some very vocal magistrates listening to a few very vocal constituents.

But, really now, why should the board do this? They're convinced of the dangers of second-hand smoke; 14 counties in the state have already gone smoke-free; and, in one of the most recent situations, the ban was enacted by that county's board of health, has not been contested in court -- and that county's ban, according to the legal opinion, is lawful and valid.

In that room today, there was no middle ground. People spoke either for or against the ban. But I'll be honest -- I'm eager to find out what happens next. Will the board decide to enact a ban or not? Will they cave in to the elected officials or will they do what they know is best for the community?

Someday -- I hope sooner than later -- our newspaper readers will be turning the page to find out.

Put your characters in a meaningful, relevant conflict, and readers will be turning the pages of your book -- not so they can skim to the end, but so they can savor your story, eager to learn the outcome.

With These Words

By Terrie Lynn Bittner

Yesterday, for no apparent reason, I found myself reading about the Tower of Babel. I think this event is the stuff of nightmares for writers. What is worse than the confounding of the language that is our life's work?

I wonder, though, if it made people appreciate the language they had. The Jaredites were spared, and I can imagine words became far more meaningful to them when they saw what happened to those who weren’t spared. Did they speak more carefully, making a special effort to use the most wonderful words they knew to communicate their thoughts? Did they use words sparingly, so as not to waste them, or did they use as many as they possibly could, anxiously afraid the words would disappear from memory if they didn’t?

And what of those who did lose their language? Did they ever look back longingly and regret all the times they took words for granted, never giving a thought to the wonderful gift they’d been given? When they gathered with their friends and family and tried to build a new language, they naturally started with the practical, but once the practical words were taken care of, what did they create next? What words were so important that they took the trouble to create them even though they weren’t essential for survival?

I love you.

I’m sorry.

I’m happy today.

Come watch the sunset with me.

I testify.

Dear Heavenly Father...


What words did they find they had to have to be human? When they figured out how to put those new words on paper, those few who knew how to write, did they choose the words they put down with reverence, knowing now how important it was to save the words and to make them matter?

Today, I’m sometimes shocked by the lack of concern for words in the world of writing. A teacher once told the class that using swear words was too easy. Any lazy writer could fill her book with swear words and pretend it was real writing, but the true challenge was to come up with words so interesting no one would even notice the characters weren’t swearing. I’m sure that wasn’t original advice, but where are the teachers who know that lesson today?

In the Phantom Tollbooth, by Justin Juster (certainly required reading for any writer), Milo is told, "In this box are all the words I know," he said. "Most of them you will never need, some you will use constantly, but with them you may ask all the questions which have never been answered and answer all the questions which have never been asked. All the great books of the past and all the ones yet to come are made with these words. With them there is no obstacle you cannot overcome. All you must learn to do is to use them well and in the right places."

What words would you invent first after the necessities were done?

Tips to avoid scams

By Patricia Wiles

There was a post on the latterdayauthors forum recently about identifying poetry scams, so I thought this topic of literary scammers deserved a bit more attention. There are lots of unscrupulous scammers out there who make a pretty good living by emptying the wallets of newbie writers.

We often talk about the business of writing, and writing is a business -- it's a lot more than pouring your creative soul out onto the page. And as with any other business, you will find those whose practices are less than ethical. It behooves new writers to take as much time learning and understanding how the business operates as they do learning how to craft a good story.

Here are a few tips and links I hope you'll find helpful.

1. Poetry and self-publishing scams: http://windpub.com/literary.scams/

There are legitimate poetry journals, then there are scam anthologies. A legitimate journal will not expect you to purchase a copy of their "anthology" if your poem is accepted for publication. A legitimate journal will, at the very least, pay you in copies. This link will take you to other links that expose some of these anthology-producing publishers for what they are: scammers. Also included are links explaining why some self-publishing outfits are less than trustworthy.

2. Legitimate agents and editors do not charge reading fees. http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/;
http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/; http://www.sfwa.org/beware/

When you begin subbing your work to editors or agents, it pays to spend some time online at these sites. I've heard stories of "agents" emailing a writer, saying they'd read her work online and wanted to discuss representation. In most cases you will not get an unsolicited email from an agent or an editor. It may have happened in a rare instance or two, but most have too many submissions to spend time searching the web for new clients.

Before you submit to an agent, check Publisher's Marketplace to see what they've sold. Check AgentQuery.com or the AAR website to see if they're listed. Not all legitimate agents belong to AAR, but it's still worth a look.

Agents do NOT charge reading fees. They charge a commission after they sell your work, and most will expect reimbursement for office expenses, i.e. copies. Again, a good way to learn how real agents operate is to visit the blog of a real agent. One I especially like is Pub Rants.

It is common for agents and editors to attend legitimate writer's conferences and accept an honorarium for speaking as well as payment for one-on-one sessions with writers. These private sessions are educational tools to help writers know how to improve their manuscripts. Sometimes an agent or editor may request to see more of the writer's work because of this session. However, there is never any promise of representation or acceptance implied in these activities. They are critiques, not American Idol tryouts.

Real editors and agents will not read your submission, then suggest a friend who's a good freelance editor who can help you whip your work into shape. They can suggest you find one on your own, but they won't point you to one specifically.

3. When it comes to networking, take advantage of writers groups.

I am a believer when it comes to writers organizations. I am a member of SCBWI (The Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) and over the years I have found it to be worth the cost of membership many times over. I have had more opportunities through SCBWI to network, meet real editors and agents, and learn more about the business of children's writing than I could have ever done on my own. If you have at least one published book under your belt (with an advance by a royalty-paying publisher) you can join the Author's Guild. There are also organizations for science-fiction/fantasy writers, romance writers, mystery writers and etc.

But if you're not at the point where you're ready to join an organization, there are many online resources you can turn to, such as those listed above. And of course, you can visit our latterdayauthors forum (the link is on the right) and ask there.

The process of writing, for all the creativity it entails, also requires a practical approach. Be sure you're prepared to deal with both. As the editor I work for at the newspaper says, "If your mother says she loves you, check it out before you believe it."

Guardians of the English Language

By Terrie Bittner

I am the training manager at BellaOnline.com and select new columnists. One of my greatest challenges is finding people who know how to use commas. In fact, I’ve become positively obsessed with commas lately. Some applications have none. Almost worse are those in which the applicant grabbed a handful of commas and threw them at the article.

The very worst applications are those with a single sentence article. We require four hundred words. Have you ever tried to read a four hundred word sentence? There are applications written in text message style, those that have every word misspelled, and the ones with no capital letters—or nothing but capital letters. There are days when I threaten to only select writers from England. I’ve yet to receive an application from England with any of these problems.

Sometimes rejected applicants will ask why they weren’t accepted. They will explain they are the next Shakespeare, and they need this column to get started, and won’t we be sorry when they’re famous and they tell everyone we turned them down? At first, I tried to be helpful and explain they were rejected because their grammar, punctuation, and spelling weren’t at a professional level. I soon learned, though, this extra step was pointless. Nearly all responded, “But I just want to write great stories. I don’t need all that junk.”

A carpenter needs a hammer. A teacher needs chalk. A doctor needs a stethoscope. A writer needs words, spelling, punctuation, and grammar. They’re the tools of our trade. Years ago, when I read that the Internet was destroying writing skills, I laughed it off. My own children, who homeschooled, wrote better after their writing was placed on the Internet and people commented on their skills. However, in the past few years, I’ve begun to be worried about the future of writing. Are we destined to read books written in text messaging style? Will “are” be permanently replaced with a single letter? Will capital letters go out of style? The new Shorter OED says the hyphen is going out of style because of Internet and designers. They’ve removed it from many words. Is the capital letter next?

I read recently that many old languages are dying out. As writers, we’re perhaps the last protector of another dying language—good English. It’s up to us to safeguard capital letters, periods, and the proper use of commas.

Soldiers…take your posts.