On the “Insecure Writer’s Support Group”‘ blog, C. Lee McKenzie posted a list of 10 literary devices to master. I found this post on The Story Reading Ape’s blog. Thank you very much for all your hard promotion work, Chris!
on The Insecure Writer’s Support Group:
James Joyce’s Ulysses takes place over the course of a single day, but it’s notoriously chock-full of literary devices. Weighing in at over 700 pages long, it’s a masterclass in writerly tricks, with the intimidating heft of a brick.
oyce seems to have never met a literary device he didn’t love, a fondness that made him the bane of many English majors’ existences — but also a celebrated genius.
The good news is, we don’t all have to be James Joyce.
Still, it’s good to have a handful in your bag of tricks — they can punch up your prose, and make your readers unable to look away from your skillful weaving of plot and theme. Just don’t overdo it.
If you’re only going to master 10 literary devices, let it be these ones!
Melissa Donovan published a very educational blog post about the elimination of redundancies in our writing. Thank you very much for your hard work, Melissa. That post is very helpful!
Writers are human, and sometimes we make mistakes. You’re probably aware of the most common mistakes in writing: comma splices, run-on sentences, mixing up homophones, and a variety of other broken grammar, spelling, and punctuation rules.
In my coaching work, I’ve noticed another common mistake: redundancy. Sometimes we use repetition effectively, but most of the time, by saying the same thing twice, we’re littering our writing with unnecessary language, or verbiage. If we remove the excess, we can improve our writing by making it more concise.
Understanding and Identifying Redundancies in Writing
Dictionary.com defines redundancy as a noun meaning “superfluous repetition or overlapping, especially of words.” Its cousin, the adjective redundant, means “characterized by verbosity or unnecessary repetition in expressing ideas” or “exceeding what is usual or natural.”
I found a really fascinating blog post, written by David Kudler, where he writes about book covers. Thank you very much David.
While the truism “You can’t tell a book by its cover” holds true in most of our lives, one place where it doesn’t, ironically, is in publishing.
Oh, it’s still true — the cover doesn’t necessarily communicate what’s inside (though it should). But potential readers ignore it almost universally — especially when it comes to ebooks.
The cover is the first and (in many cases) most important piece of information those readers get about a title. This time out, I’m going to look at what should go into designing a cover that works for, rather than against, your ebook.
The Cover’s Job
Whatever format a book is in (print, audio, or ebook), the cover has a very important job — apart from and in addition to being visually attractive. As readers of TheBookDesigner.com probably already know, that job falls into several very important parts. It must communicate:
The genre/subgenre of the book
The tone of the book
The subject matter of the book
A cover makes a promise. It tells the reader very clearly — through words, but also through design — exactly what they’re going to read.
Kristen Lamb, in her own inimitable way, published a blog post comparing authors with serial killers. I love Kristen’s posts, her fantasy, her creativity, and her humor. Wonderfully done, Kristen!
Writers really are a strange breed and just so y’all know? The normal ship sailed without you a long time ago so relax. Your family or friends might not ‘get’ you but your fellow writers do.
I love being a writer. It’s a world like no other and it’s interesting how non-writers are simultaneously fascinated and terrified of us. While on the surface, people seem to think that what we do is easy, deep down?
There is a part that knows they’re wrong. That being a writer, a good writer, is a very dark place most fear to tread.
Happy Friday the 13th! *evil laugh*
In fact, I believe somewhere at the FBI’s BAU (Behavioral Analysis Unit for the non-writers), there’s a caveat for the profilers. If they think they’ve profiled a serial killer, they need to stop and double-check to make sure they didn’t just find a writer.
Hint: Check for empty Starbuck’s cups and candy wrappers.
Writers, if you are NOT on a government watch list? You’re doing it wrong.
Seriously. I once spent an entire afternoon googling Fort Worth hotels to find the right one with a balcony to toss someone off of. I was like the Goldilocks of Murder.
Nope doesn’t face a street.
Not high enough to be fatal.
Don’t want them landing in a pool.
Apparently, ‘normal’ people do not do this, which is why being normal is totally boring and for luzrs 😛 .
So, before friends and family turn you into the FBI, here’s a handy list of ways we writers are often mistaken for serial killers.
Check out this amazing cover, created by K. J. Magical Designs and get it for your book before it’s gone!! I love it so much! If I only had a book to match that cover!
It seems there is the one or other author around who either don’t know what the job of a beta reader is. Also, some authors don’t want to pay for an editor and therefore try to ‘use’ the beta reader to get the editor’s job done.
From what I learned in my ‘long’ career of two published books (and a few lined up)… my order of ‘writing and publishing’ is the following:
Drafting
Copying out
personal editing #1
personal editing #2
professional editing (proofreading)
filing for copyright
sending the manuscript out to the beta readers
having the book cover done
possible corrections when getting the manuscript back from beta readers
publishing
At times the corrections, added paragraphs or even pages, demand a second round of proofreading or editing.
Now, what does the beta reader do?
Beta readers are helpful people around you – can be friends, co-workers, family members. They are asked to read the book pre-release. Often they are asked to review the book online, just after release. Most beta readers are very happy to do so in exchange for the book.
Every beta reader works differently. Some return a paper manuscript with scribbles all over the place…, some send an email with a few ideas, suggestions or remarks, some send texts whenever they discover something. When I beta read, I write a list and later send that list by email. So far, I never discovered a huge plot hole, but I found the one or other ‘thing’ that bugged me and that I had to let the author know about. Many other beta readers do the same thing.
There is one thing beta readers don’t do: they don’t correct typos and grammar. That’s what’s the editor is for. I’m not saying they always are perfect, and should I catch a forgotten typo, of course, I will tell the author about it. But I’m not actively looking for them.
I am lucky enough to have a beta reader who is sweet enough to actively look for typos and grammar problems that escaped my editor’s attention. The one or other author might be just as lucky. But generally, beta readers are not here for editing!
They should return your manuscript with a bit more than ‘I liked it.’ You want to get their notes. You want to hear about their feelings… when did they laugh? When did they cry? What scared them or amused them? Did they enjoy the read, and would they recommend the book? According to them, what age range is the book for (if you’re writing Young Adult), and what did they not like so much?
Did they discover something about the plot they didn’t like? Do they have questions about the story, the plot, or the characters? Is there anything they discovered that isn’t right?
Let me give you a couple examples. One of my last beta readers told me that she loves my book, and she finds ‘Sundance’ as a character very interesting. However, she misses Katie, the ‘Soul Taker’ and wishes her back. She is an exceptional beta reader and informed me about several other things that I later corrected. (I did not write more ‘Katie’ into the second book since that is ‘Sundance’s’ story).
When I was beta reading for a male author, I discovered a wardrobe flaw with one of the female character’s ‘undergarments.’ I told my fellow author about it, and he corrected that.
We all were grateful to have our beta readers. It is important to us having people with open minds paying attention to our stories. And we always hope we don’t ask too much.
Thank you, beta readers, for helping us with your time, your efforts, and your honesty. We need you!
Today I was thinking about checking out my ‘Council Of Twelve’ characters a bit more carefully and more in detail. But where to start? (I’m not necessarily talking about the names). I have twelve amazing personalities. But one blog post about the characteristics of a dozen very unique natures would end up in me still typing next Thursday and you reading until Christmas. I tried to limit the number of my Council of Twelve members to the original four. and had to re-phrase my question: “What character has which character?” Who is Raphael, how is he? How different is he from, let’s say, Gabriel. What are their characteristics based on?
The last question was quite easy to answer, considering I’m a woman… The Zodiac signs!
Yeah – great!
The four oldest members of ‘The Council Of Twelve’ were not born, they were created. Therefore, they don’t have a Zodiac sign.
With a huge sigh, I left the Astrology up to the stars and tried to find out my own characteristics. How can I write about other characters if I don’t even understand my types of characteristics in a professional way?
And there, the first giggles started already. I started at the basics… how did personality, characteristics, and psychology even develop? Where did I start? I’m telling you, I had a good time starting with Hippocrates and his four-temperament-theory.
The four temperament theory is a proto-psychological theory which suggests that there are four fundamental personality types: sanguine, choleric, melancholic, and phlegmatic.[2][3] Most formulations include the possibility of mixtures among the types where an individual’s personality types overlap, and they share two or more temperaments. The Greek physician Hippocrates (c. 460 – c. 370 BC) described the four temperaments as part of the ancient medical concept of humorism that four bodily fluids affect human personality traits and behaviors. Modern medical science does not define a fixed relationship between internal secretions and personality, although some psychological personality type systems use categories similar to the Greek temperaments. (Source, Wikipedia)
Picture courtesy of wikipedia.com
After the history of Hippocrates and the blood-related psychology didn’t take me anywhere, I checked out different personality tests, which all ended up completely confusing. One tells me I’m an extrovert, the other tells me I’m an introvert, one tells me I’m an overcareful personality, while the other informs me that I should try to connect people. Otherwise, I could ‘end up in loneliness.’ I was about everything in between, from a hermit to a party-girl. I didn’t believe the one or other.
Then I read about the Meyers-Briggs Types. According to Meyers-Briggs, there are 16 personality types. I found that quite interesting and read a bit more about it. It seems in a way explainable and after studying the type indicator, which you can find here:
I took the free test because I was curious. I had considered myself an INFP Personality and turned out to be an INTP type, “The Thinker.” I was quite close, though.
In case you are curious, here is the personality type page I did the test on. It also shows you the type indicator and tells you exactly what the letters behind every personality means. – CONTINUE TO THE PERSONALITY TEST PAGE
Then I got one step further: since I am definitely not one of the founding members of ‘The Council Of Twelve,’ I do have a Zodiac sign. How well are the description of my Zodiac sign match the description of my ‘Meyer’s-Briggs’ personality test result? Let’s find out:
Not likely to place much value on traditional goals such as popularity and security
Spend a lot of time inside your own mind
Strong ability to analyze problems, identify patterns, and come up with logical explanations
Highly value intelligence and knowledge
Love new ideas and become very excited over abstractions and theories
Picture courtesy of Google.com
The Capricorn woman might not be very confident, extrovert, and bold. Seduction and sexiness aren’t her favorite techniques. But she is very graceful, polished and well mannered. Capricorn nature is never overly emotional and dramatic. She will remain practical, emotionally stable, and sensible, even in the most sensitive situations. She is great at learning from mistakes. Unlike many women, she is open to constructive criticism. (Sorry, when it comes to me, that sentence is totally wrong. I just left it in the description because it made me laugh loudly.)
The Capricorn woman in marriage often keeps her own desires and needs behind for the happiness of the family. She is smart, hardworking, and capable of achieving the toughest goals in life. She also has a huge appetite for physical love and lust.
Capricorn females are often so fearful of the future that they become worriers before time. Small tensions and anxieties can make them gloomy, depressed, and pessimistic.
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Now, according to these personality studies of myself (HAHA), there are, indeed, a few conformities which I had marked with colored text. These similarities might be a coincidence, or there is indeed something about Zodiac signs.
All this taught me that no personality test is going to tell me I can’t be grumpy when I’m in a bad mood, even though I’m the most balanced character on Earth.
It also taught me, that this particular analysis of myself has taken me about four and a half hours. If I have to analyze each of ‘The Council Of Twelve’ characters this way, you won’t be able to read another book in the series before Easter 2032!
I figure I will continue building my characters the way I’m used to and won’t try to make them more detailed that Hippocrates told me to. LOL
But if you had taken the Meyer-Briggs test please, let us know the results in the comments. I thought it a lot of fun.
Title: Shadow Stalker: Revolution Part 1 (Episode 23)
Author: Renee Scattergood
Bio:
Renee Scattergood lives in Australia with her husband, Nathan, and daughter, Taiya. She has always been a fan of fantasy and was inspired to become a storyteller by George Lucas but didn’t consider writing down her stories until she reached her late twenties. Now she enjoys writing dark speculative fiction.
She is currently publishing her Shadow Stalker serial, and she has published a prequel novella to the series called, Demon Hunt. She is also working on a new series of novels, A God’s Deception.
Aside from writing, she loves reading (fantasy, of course), watching movies with her family, and watching YouTube Videos with her daughter. Visit her site for more information and a free copy of Shadow Stalker Part 1 (Episodes 1 – 6): http://reneescattergood.com
It’s the calm before the storm, and the storm is closer than Auren thinks.
Auren is successfully using her ability to control people’s minds and actions to take over Nadiria and finally bring an end to the Galvadi Empire, but there is a catch. The more she uses that power, the more she loses herself to it.
If she can accomplish her mission quickly, it will reduce the chance of that happening. The allies she has found are helping her move things along, but there’s a lot of work to do and horrors that Auren has not yet discovered that will make controlling herself nearly impossible.
Her friends and allies are growing concerned over her unpredictable violent actions, and Auren knows her time is running out.
Logine:
Auren is finally bringing an end to the Galvadi Empire, but she is succumbing to her power in the process.
Ebook $0.99
Available on Amazon or Read Free on KU from 6 September 2019
On September 11, 2001, nearly 3,000 people were killed, 400 were police officers and firefighters, in the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center in NYC, at the Pentagon building in Washington, D.C., and in a plane crash near Shanksville, PA.
[1] 9/11 was not the first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. A bombing in February of 1993 killed six people.
[2] On any given workday, up to 50,000 employees worked in the WTC twin towers, and an additional 40,000 passed through the complex.
[3] After the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center, the rescue and recovery clean-up of the 1.8 million tons of wreckage from the WTC site took 9 months.
[4] Passengers aboard United Flight 93, heard about the previous airplane attacks and attempted to retake control of the plane from hijackers. As a result, the hijackers deliberately crashed the plane in a Pennsylvania field instead of at their unknown target.
[5] While video accounts of the WTC attack aired immediately, no video footage of the Pentagon attack was publicly released until 2006.
[6] Though both the police and fire departments of New York City had their own emergency response procedures, the two departments did not have a coordinated response plan to a major incident.
[7] In 2001, New York City fire evacuation procedures only required mandatory evacuations for floors immediately surrounding a fire. After a plane struck Building 1 of the WTC, Building 2 employees were initially told to stay in the building.
[8] The attack on the World Trade Center on 9/11 resulted in the largest loss of life by a foreign attack on American soil.
[9] 18 people were rescued alive from the rubble of the World Trade Center site.
[10] Cases of post-traumatic stress are common among 9/11 survivors and rescue workers. Respiratory problems, like asthma and lung inflammation, also developed at abnormal rates for those in and around the World Trade Center during and after the attacks.
[11] Cases of post-traumatic stress are common among 9/11 survivors and rescue workers. Respiratory problems, like asthma and lung inflammation, also developed at abnormal rates for those in and around the World Trade Center during and after the attacks.
Picture courtesy of Google.com
God, our father in Heaven
Please, let us not forget, let the sacrifice of the victims lives not to be in vain. Please, dear God, help us to remember the sadness, the despair, the helplessness, the evil – for we also remember your mercy, your support, your kindness and your unconditional love that helps us heal.
Please, remind us to stand united against the evil on this Earth and protect us from further horror as it happened that day – 9/11 – when the fire swallowed our loved ones when the terror shook our world and the smoke darkened the sky.
We pray for your love and peace to the loved ones who had to leave us that day and who still are in our memory and in our hearts and who we never will forget.
Writer's Treasure Chest 
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