In your short story there will be a main character (protagonist)
always introduce him/her into the story first. The reader will then know whom the story is about. You will probably need a few more minor characters. If you have, more than four, be careful as it could get too complicated.

When you write a story you are like a stage director. With a stage play, the actors audition, and the director chooses the right person for each part. They must not only look right but must speak with the right voice. It will be the same with your short stories. You must give your characters' names that will suit their roles. Your descriptions of their looks and personality will help the reader to see and understand them. To do this you must get into the minds of your characters. Understand what makes them do certain things.

If the character is a grumpy man, show he is grumpy by the way he always moans or complains. Think about any grumpy person you know - perhaps it's a schoolteacher. Does he/she look grumpy? Does he/she frown, never smile? Perhaps the teacher is sick. Perhaps he/she has problems - many bad kids to teach. Think about what grumpy people 'say' and 'do'. On the other hand if your character were happy, he/she would probably smile or laugh a lot.

So when you write your stories think about what your particular
characters look like and how they act. Don't just say they were 'cool'. Why are they cool? Describe what makes them a 'cool' character, their looks, and the things they do. Characters make or break a story. Make sure you cast your characters well.

You will need to get into the minds of your characters if you want to make them believable. You have to understand why they do certain things and so must the reader if he's going to keep reading your story.

You must know everything about your character. To help you do this I will show you how to make a Character Profile Sheet.

Take a sheet of paper and head it CHARACTER PROFILE SHEET. You should use one of these sheets for all your main characters. I will explain why - later.

Next write a sub heading: CHARACTER'S NAME and NICKNAME. You will need to know their ADDRESS (location - city/country) so this will be your next heading.

The AGE of your character is also important so list this next.

The rest of the sheet should look something like the following: You may have ideas for your own headings. Not everything you list will be used in your story. It is only to provide background information, which will help you to understand why your characters act in certain ways.

PHYSICAL APPEARANCE:
Height/Weight/Color of eyes etc.

PERSONALITY:
Likes/dislikes/ friends/education etc.

HABITS:
Hobbies/sports

I once wrote a story about a young girl with green eyes and at the end of the story, I said she had blue eyes. A simple mistake and so easy to make unless you have a record of what your character looks like.

As a fun exercise, I will give you the name of a character. I want you to pretend you are a director looking for the right person to play this part in a play. What sort of person will BEN JONES be? Is he going to be a good guy or one of the others? Is he going to resemble Brad Pitt or someone you wouldn't want to meet in your worst dreams? You decide what he looks like, how old he is, and what sort of person he is.

Have fun and don't throw this completed exercise away. Ben Jones could be the world's next comic book hero or someone on a par with the Joker from Batman. It's entirely up to you - go for it.

Jo Hamlet is RDCP's newest columnist. Jo will appear BI-monthly at RDCP. Next column to appear August 2002.

RAINY DAY NONSENSE
An Exercise in Writing Poetry
(c) 2002 Lynne Remick

Now that school's finally out, there's more time for fun, games, and poems!! Summer brings a variety of settings in which to write poetry--the beach, camp, a lake, your backyard, horse stables or anywhere you spend your summer vacation. But what about those dismal days at home? Don't worry, there's even a poetic cure for the rainy day blues:

When there's nowhere to go but in and nothing to do but frown, you can try this nonsensical poetry exercise. While writing poems is fun, but this challenge will be more fun! Why? You get to make up your own silly words to use in your poem.

To begin, get a blank piece of paper. Fold it in thirds so that when folded and lying flat, the sides open outward like window shutters. On the outside of the first flap, write down twenty-five words that come to your mind (try to use a mix of adjectives, adverbs, nouns, verbs and sounds). Then, flip the first flap over so you can't see the words. Write twenty-five more words on the second flap. When you're done, look at the page, with both flaps folded in like closed shutters, and check out your words.

For example, here's what I came up with:

1. Lemur 1. Song
2. Gecko 2. Soap
3. Bat 3. Moss
4. Spoon 4. Music
5. Wishing 5. Stork
6. Baseball 6. Bird
7. Star 7. Poem
8. Splat 8. Cat
9. Pelican 9. Dance
10. Hat 10. Berg
11. Fork 11. Wars
12. Golden 12. Carrots
13. Leap 13. Tree
14. Flap 14. Cricket
15. Rain 15. Gator
16. Sun 16. Roots
17. Jazz 17. Candy
18. Crayon 18. Pig
19. Pink 19. Hope
20. Sky 20. Sack
21. Earth 21. Loaf
22. Sour 22. Cake
23. Cable 23. Brain
24. Mackerel 24. Foot
25. Elephant 25. Frog

To create your own nonsense words, you can either read the lines straight across, and get words like (7) star poem, (15) rain gator and (16) sunroots, or you can select a word from the first column and pair it with any of the words from column two, and vice versa. When looking at these words, remember that there are many ways to use them:

As a title-

Wishing Stork

I wished upon a "wishing stork"
Because there were no stars
Someone had collected them
And put them all in jars.


As a subject--

The Rain Came Down

It isn't raining cats and dogs,
I can't believe my eyes!
Little green "rain gators,"
Are falling from the skies.


As the words--

In this world of nonsense,
I saw things I'd never see,
I colored on a "crayon pig,"
And jumped over a "leap tree."


There's no end to the poems that can be written with your nonsense words. And, if you don't like the results of your attempt, get a new piece of paper and start again. No matter which way you decide to play, you're sure to have fun on a bleak rainy day.

Lynne Remick resides in New York with her beloved son Kevin, a darling Schipperke named Dante and Sahara-a feral cat, along with a spoiled Hedgehog named Willow and her three babies, Winken, Blinken and Nod. In the midst of this zoo, Lynne studies children's literature, reviews children's books and writes stories and poems for children.

DIALOGUE
By Jo Hamlet

This month we are going to discuss how to write dialogue.

To have natural sounding dialogue you need to know your character extremely well. When you first start writing fiction, always use a character profile sheet. We covered this in the last newsletter. These sheets are also helpful when writing novels. It is so easy to forget a person's place of birth and possible dialect, or perhaps they have a nervous complaint and stutter, which disappears a few years down the track for no apparent reason. People from different age groups will speak differently. So before your character opens his mouth your reader should be quite happy and comfortable with the words your character uses. If a person speaks out of character then it must be intentional on your part and be part of the plot.

Good dialogue is crucial to your story. There is no room for polite chitchat, it must tell the reader something and it should do at least one of the following:

Convey character

It should tell you a lot about a person, age, upbringing, religious beliefs etc. Make sure you do it early in the piece. If you leave it too late the readers will already have formed their own image.

Help move the story along

Good dialogue will help readers understand what is happening. If a character is unhappy about something - he can say he is and why.

Dramatize an incident
 
If a character says how frightened he is, it adds more impact than the writer simply stating - he was frightened.

Entertain

As long as it natural and not stilted the dialogue should entertain.

Inspire

Hopefully your reader will be inspired by the right words at the right time. Instead of writing - she thought her mother was wonderful. "I love you Mum," she whispered. Would probably do a lot more for the reader.

There are two types of speech - indirect and direct. Direct speech is what your character actually says and needs to be set in quotation marks/inverted comma(s). With indirect speech you do not need quotation marks, as the actual words are not spoken.

Examples:

Direct speech
Jack asked, "Where is the party?"
Sean shook his head, "I'm not sure."

Indirect speech
Jack asked Sean if he knew where the party was.Sean shook his head and said he wasn't sure.

Never ever use quotation marks when a person is thinking. This is known as internal dialogue.

Quotation marks may be single or double, depending on a publisher's requirements. Whatever you do - make sure you are consistent. Don't forget to use a punctuation mark before you close your quotation marks. (See examples of direct speech above)

If a speaker's words run for more than one sentence, it is only necessary to put quotation marks at the beginning and end - not around each sentence. If a speaker's words run for more than one paragraph do not close the quotation marks at the end of the first paragraph. However, they must be open at the beginning of the next and subsequent paragraphs until the person has finished speaking and only then can the quotation marks be closed.

Don't forget that each new speaker requires a new paragraph.

Apostrophes can make dialogue sound more natural when they are used to show omission of letters in one or more words.

Example:

I would have written if I had known Jack was not going to write. I 'd have written if I'd known Jack wasn't going to write.

The first sentence sounds stilted and unnatural.

Realistic dialogue
To make sure your dialogue is realistic - read it aloud. Or better still, get someone else to read it to you.

Enjoy your writing.

Jo Hamlet's short stories and articles have appeared in newspapers, national/international/literary magazines, e-zines and have been broadcast on radio. She also contributes regularly to web sites and newsletters. She also runs creative writing workshops. Visit her web site for more information. http://members.iinet.net.au/~billyjo/ 

RAINY DAY HAIKU: An Exercise in Writing Poetry

As the vibrant greens of summer turn golden, red and brown, we capture the changing season in these simple images in our eyes. A poetry form that captures seasonal moments of time in words is the "Haiku."

Haiku originated in Japan. A common haiku is defined as “one breath” poem-three lines of 17 syllables, with Line One having five syllables, Line Two having seven syllables and Line Three having five syllables. Haiku can be viewed like a poetic scene or snapshot, meant to capture the happening of a moment in nature, like a bear coming out of hibernation in the spring, a frog sunning on a lily pad in summer, leaves changing to fall colors or birds flying south for the winter.

Writing haiku can prove a fun, but challenging task, like solving a puzzle or a word game. There is a method to writing haiku. You capture a brief scene, where you start with a "flash" (something catches your eye), then "recognition" (you see/focus on something), which leads you to have an "afterthought" (you think something about what you saw).

[Flash] bees swarm everywhere-
[Recognition] buzzing, bustling in the breeze
[Afterthought] a spring symphony!

First, try writing a few haiku according to the flash/recognition/afterthought method. Have fun with this. When it's time to
revise, you can take your haiku one step further and make sure the poems follow common guidelines, like:

1. Use concrete images (things you can actually see, hear, feel, touch, taste);
2. Do not capitalize words
3. Avoid adjectives (words that describe nouns, or people, places and things)
4. Avoid adverbs (words that describe verbs, or actions)
5. Do not pass judgment on the moment (i.e., say that an object is pretty or ugly)
6. Limit use of pronouns (me, he, she, it, they, you all, etc.);
7. Uses a "kijo" or "season word" (a word gives a clue as to the time of year)
8. Do not use punctuation and
9. Do not title the poems.

[Flash] piglet takes a nap [no capitals/punctuation/adjectives/adverbs]
[Recognition] mud cooks beneath summer sun [necessary adjective/season word]
[Afterthought] pig in a blanket! [no capitals/punctuation/adjectives/adverbs]

Be aware that many variations of haiku exist. There is much dispute about which one is the "correct" form. You can start out with the above form. Once you learn to write haiku according to this method, you may wish to visit your local library or search on-line for an Internet tutorial for information on variations.

[Flash] thunder cracks and booms
[Recognition] lightning flashes from the ground
[afterthought] Mother Nature's mad


Writing haiku can be difficult and takes a lot of practice. Don't worry if it takes you a while to get it right. You don't have to show your experiments to anyone but yourself. You can learn something new and have fun learning, too!

 (c) 2002 Lynne Remick

Lynne Remick resides in New York with her beloved son Kevin, a darling Schipperke named Dante and Sahara-a feral cat, along with a spoiled Hedgehog named Willow and her three babies, Winken, Blinken and Nod. In the midst of this zoo, Lynne studies children's literature, reviews children's books and writes stories and poems for children.

RAINY DAY TWIST
An Exercise in Tongue Twisters
(c) 2002 Lynne Remick

Just because the holidays get hectic, doesn't mean there's no room for games. When a holiday dinner crams your family around the table and the turkey or ham's not done, try a tongue twister for some fast and easy fun!

You can create your own individual tongue twisters with your dinner guests, much like "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers" and "She sells seashells by the sea shore," by each using a pencil, a piece of paper, a dictionary (optional) and the following basic formula.

Each guest should number the lines of a lined sheet of paper from 1 to 6. He/she should put his/her own name on line one (Ex. LILY).

1. (Who?) A first name.

That person should then pass the page on to the person on his her right. That person should fill out the next number on the list, as follows:

2. (Who?)
A last name that begins with the same letter sound as name on Line 1.
(LERNER)

That person should then pass the page on to the person on his her right. That person should fill out the next number on the list, as follows:

3. (What?)
An action that begins with the same letter sound as name on Line 1. (LIKES)

That person should then pass the page on to the person on his her right. That person should fill out the next number on the list, as follows:

4. (Where?)
A place that begins with the same letter sound as name on Line 1. (LAS VEGAS)

That person should then pass the page on to the person on his her right. That person should fill out the next number on the list, as follows:

5. (When?)
A time period that begins with the same letter sound as name on Line 1. (IN LATE SPRING)

That person should then pass the page on to the person on his her right. That person should fill out the next number on the list, as follows:

6. (Why?)
A reason begins with the same letter sound as name on Line 1. (FOR LEARNING LIMERICKS).

The last person to fill out the blank should return the page to the person whose name is on top. That person should try saying it six times fast for lots of laughs.

Example Tongue Twister from above:

"Lily Lerner likes Las Vegas in late spring for learning limericks."

[Note: To allow the twister to make sense and portray a complete thought, you may add a few words (like "in," "spring" and "for," in the example above or "a" and "of" in the Peter Piper tongue twister].

Once you get the hang of writing tongue twisters, you can organize and compete in a family challenge to write the fastest tongue twister about Tom Turkey or Kris Kringle. For example:

Kris Kringle carefully crunched on candy canes [anonymous].

Tom Turkey took a train to travel safely to Tibet [LMR].

If you become twisted with tongue twisters, you may want to try out other tried and true twisters:

Tongue Twister Database
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/8136/tonguetwisters.html 

Lynne Remick resides in New York with her beloved son Kevin, a darling Schipperke named Dante and Sahara-a feral cat, along with a spoiled Hedgehog named Willow and her three babies, Winken, Blinken and Nod. In the midst of this zoo, Lynne studies children's literature, reviews children's books and writes stories and poems for children.

SHOW DON’T TELL
By Jo Hamlet

How many times have you stopped reading a story or book because you lost interest? Was it because the descriptive paragraphs were long and boring? As a short story writer it is your job to make them short, sharp and sweet. However, you must use your words carefully, your descriptive passages should not read like the following:

He went for a long walk. Then he read an interesting book. And then he had a late dinner.
After dinner he went to the movies.

The reader probably wouldn't care less what he did next.

Aim to show the reader what is happening by suggestion and impression. Your characters’ actions will proclaim their behavior and you will not need to tell the reader. Telling slows the story; it becomes a dead weight.

So, how can you write a story without telling the reader what is happening?

You have to paint a picture with words and to do this you will need to use the five senses: touch, taste, sound, sight, and smell. Try and include as many of these senses in your story as possible. They will help your story come ‘alive’.

Most writers give visual details such as a colour, but does the subject smell, or make a noise? What does it feel like to touch and what about describing taste? Perhaps it's a flower you are writing about. Flowers usually have a fragrance but what sort of smell is it? Perhaps it's like a heavy perfume your mother wears or one that reminds you of a certain food. It could be an edible flower - does it taste sweet like honey or spicy like curry? Let the reader experience the smell and taste. What do the petals feel like? Soft like silk, or are they sticky like cobwebs?

Adjectives and Adverbs

Adjectives and adverbs are to be avoided if possible. They will tell rather than show.

If you've forgotten what an adjective is - it describes a noun.

Example: The dog was vicious. 'Vicious' describes the dog. There's nothing wrong with this sentence but it wouldn't particularly catch a reader's interest.

If the sentence read: A growl like a rattle came from the back of the dog’s throat and saliva dripped from its mouth. This would enable the reader to picture the dog and wonder what was coming next.

An adverb - describes a verb. It also describes adjectives and other adverbs. It often ends
in -ly.

Example: She screamed angrily. There is no picture here for the reader. YOU might be able to see the angry woman but the reader won’t be able to until you show him/her what the woman is doing. It would be better to write: She screamed, stamped her feet and tore at her hair.

Similes and Metaphors

Similes and metaphors have the power to make pictures for the reader. A simile is the comparison of two things using the words ‘like’ or ‘as’.

Example: He was as strong as Grandma's homemade wine.

A metaphor is another kind of comparison. It is a condensed simile as it omits the words ‘like’ and ‘as’. It states that something is the other.

Example: The man is an animal


Clichés

Clichés are dull and unoriginal. They are figures of speech that have been used for years and have now become boring. They may have had some meaning years ago but they no longer have the ability to conjure a picture in the mind of the reader.

Example: As clean as a whistle. It would have more meaning if you wrote:
As clean as an operating theatre

For a fun exercise make up your own original similes for these old clichés. Keep a copy and try and use some of them in your next story.

Plain as a pikestaff
Proud as a peacock
Straight as a die
Cold as charity
Flat as a pancake
Blind as a bat


© Jo Hamlet 2002

Jo Hamlet's short stories and articles have appeared in newspapers, national/international/literary magazines, e-zines and have been broadcast on radio. She also contributes regularly to web sites and newsletters. She also runs creative writing workshops. Visit her web site for more information. http://members.iinet.net.au/~billyjo/