Pixar Challenge: Rule #6

Pixar’s Rule #6

What is your character good at, comfortable with? Throw the polar opposite at them. Challenge them. How do they deal?

The most beloved characters are not boring.  Conflict is how you sculpt and build personality.  It is the things that happen to us in life that make us into the adults we become.  If we go through life easy breezy, how fun is that?  You don’t grow.  You don’t learn.  You don’t stretch your mind you just remain one dimensional.  No fun. People tend to resent people who have life just a little too easy. The challenges thrown at people make them into who they are in the end of the story.  If they walk down a straight path and just wind up at the end, you are not allowed to watch as the character evolves. 

A protagonist has to make you want to cheer for them.  If they just waltz through life, everything is easy, and nothing learned they can’t become anything more.  The road traveled is too easy.  The path is too straight.  Remember this should be the person you want to be, you want to date, or you want to be their best friend.  Give us a reason to want these things.

An antagonist has to make you hate them, but you have to understand why they are part of the story.  They may have started out normal, enduring, lovely, but they switch and become something more, something different, and something evil.  You enjoy seeing them suffer for their crimes or even die.  Or they can start out extremely evil and through their struggle they learn a lesson.  They become someone better.  You actually hate to see them die or suffer.  You almost feel sorry for them.

Do your characters have depth?  Are they one dimensional?

Also, all of you should check out the posts from my blogging friends who are doing this challenge with me! The first posts go up today. Links to Kate Brauning, Talynn Lynn, Mary Pat, and Alex Yuschik’s blogs are located on the side bar. 

We’d love to see comments on our post and share anything you enjoy.  Thank you for reading!

Pixar Challenge: Rule #5

Pixar’s Rule #5

Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You’ll feel like you’re losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.

Simplify.

Twists and turns are fabulous.  The unexpected can be mind blowing.  But, if you have too much going on in your story the reader can’t follow it.  If they can’t follow it, they won’t continue reading, and they won’t recommend it to a friend.  Be true to your writing and to your plot, just cut away the excess fat, leaving the juicy meat.

Focus.

Keep a tight rein on where you are going and how you will end up.  You don’t want to jump around from action to action for the sake of action.  It has to mean something and take you somewhere specific.  If it doesn’t, cut it out—it isn’t needed.

Combine Characters.

This applies the same principle as simplify and focus.  Too many characters can confuse the reader.  You aren’t as invested in the characters if you spend all of your time trying to keep them straight.  If you have a few strong characters, the reader can come to love the character.  Instead of several shallow one dimensional characters combining characters can make one multi-dimensional character with more complex feelings and emotions that will draw the reader.  This makes for a memorable character you love, love, love.  And it is all about loving the characters.

Hop over detours.

To me if the detour isn’t taking you to your desired end point or molding your main character—simply get rid of it. 

You’ll feel like you’re losing valuable stuff but it sets you free.

Editing is the hardest part.  As a teacher, I have seen tears shed over editing a paper.  You have worked hard to come up with these words.  It is your work of art.  You don’t want to change it.  Sometimes, change is good and need.  In the end your work will be better.  It will be exactly what the story needs to be the very best story.

How do you feel about cutting chunks out of your work?  Is it painful or liberating?

Also, all of you should check out the posts from my blogging friends who are doing this challenge with me! The first posts go up today. Links to Kate Brauning, Talynn Lynn, Mary Pat, and Alex Yuschik’s blogs are located on the side bar. 

We’d love to see comments on our post and share anything you enjoy.  Thank you for reading!

Pixar Challenge: Rule #4

Pixar’s Rule #4

Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___.

As a teacher we preach not to formula write.  Don’t follow a pattern if you want catch the attention of raters or graders.  They don’t want to see the same thing over and over again.  It is boring and it will not set you apart from the stacks and stacks of writing.  But, what we mean by formula writing is four sentences, paragraph break, four-five sentences, paragraph break, and at least five paragraphs.  Where every student in your class has a nice neat paper and if you flipped through the stack, it would look as if someone photocopied the same story.  That is not what this rule means.

This is only a guide for getting your story started.  It will help you find direction. I feel this is a great place to start. One of the biggest struggles in writing is sitting down in front of a blank sheet of paper or a blank computer screen.  It is a scary place.  With something like this, you know where to start, where to go, and where you want to end up.  It is a compass giving you direction. The only thing left is set forth on your journey.  A journey you can take without hesitation, fear, or anxiety.  You know the major steps to be taken.  Just sit and write.

Do you think this would give you direction? Or do you think it is just another boring formula?

Also, all of you should check out the posts from my blogging friends who are doing this challenge with me! The first posts go up today. Links to Kate Brauning, Talynn Lynn, Mary Pat, and Alex Yuschik’s blogs are located on the side bar.  

We’d love to see comments on our post and share anything you enjoy.  Thank you for reading!

Pixar Challenge: Rule #3

Pixar’s Rule #3

Trying for theme is important, but you won’t see what the story is actually about until you’re at the end of it. Now rewrite.

Theme is important.  You always need something cohesive to pull all of the action together into a central theme.  Should you force a theme?  I think— no. 

In my opinion this rule is telling you to write with a central theme in mind.  Let the story take you on its journey through twists and turn.  Take this journey being ever cognizant of the thread that will tie these wonderful words up into a neat tight bow without unraveling the entire story. 

Look at fashion.  You go into a store or see a runway show and the theme an artist/designer has in mind with his/her pieces almost jumps out at you.  It is their art, their story told with fabric.  It is beautiful when it all moves from point to point seamlessly. 

Go to an art gallery.  When you walk from piece to piece the story is beautifully told with the stroke of a brush or the shape of a sculpture.  If the artist needs to go back and add something to a sculpture or color to a painting, the artist may be able to tie the art together. But, would the individual piece lose some of its beauty?  It could make everything perfect or it could ruin the entire design. 

This is where the rewrite is important.  The writer/artist must step back and see gaps or flaws.  The little thing that doesn’t move the story in the direction it was intended. That little thing that seems like your telling the reader what to think or feel, it could turn the reader off.  And you have to be careful to take delicate stokes.  Don’t go in with an axe.  Let things move naturally. Be mindful and true to the theme. 

With plots and subplots they all need to work together in a theme.  You develop the story with an intentional direction, but you have to be careful not to force things.  The words should glide across the page moving the reader physically and emotionally along with the main character. 

How do you choose a theme in your writing?  Or do you write and watch as a theme forms?  How do you keep the theme without forcing it?

Also, all of you should check out the posts from my blogging friends who are doing this challenge with me! The first posts go up today. Links to Kate Brauning, Talynn Lynn, Mary Pat, and Alex Yuschik’s blogs are located on the side bar. 

We’d love to see comments on our post and share anything you enjoy.  Thank you for reading!

Pixar Challenge: Rule #2

Pixar ChallengeRule #2
You gotta keep in my mind what's interesting to you as an audience, not what's fun to do as a writer. They can be v. different.

Hmmmm!  This is one isn’t quite as easy as Rule #1.  I think the important thing is the ‘can’ in sentence two.  They ‘can’ be very different.  Hopefully they are the same thing, but that would make writing super easy. 

The important thing is to know your audience.  If you are writing MG it’s probably a good idea to spend a little time with some kiddo’s in that age range, same goes for YA, NA, or adult.  Each age group comes with its own set of wants, needs, and even language. 

Yeah, I was a teenage—a couple of years back.  The thing is times change.  New problems emerge.  And the technology.  Just the other day my oldest son was watching Rock of Ages with me and my husband and said, “What kind of cell phone is that?”  I told him, “That was the original cell phone.”  He thought it was hilarious.

And you have to know the language is different by the day.  These kids come up with new ‘language’ to keep us parents and adults on the outs.  Like when I was in teenager they wrote that ‘valley girl’ dictionary. (Wait!  Did I just give away my age?)  The dictionary would be a mile high at this point.  So, it’s our job to figure it out, if you want to be a successful author.  That is the ‘thing’ really—what do you want?

It is important for a writer to know the ins and outs. So, you have to spend time with your audience.  Read books and magazines geared toward your preferred age group, and listen to their music.  If you surround yourself with things teen, young adult, or adult it will make what’s fun as a writer, fun for them to read. If you don’t love the things geared toward that age group maybe you’re not writing to the right age group, maybe you would have more fun writing to a different audience.  It is about loving your craft after all.

Only you can decide what is best for you and your goal.  If you want people to love your words know your audience.  Be flexible.  Take your audience where they want to go, just use your one and only special voice to get them to that end point.  In the end you will have a book you are proud to write and to share.

Also, please check out the posts from my blogging friends who are doing this challenge with me! The first posts go up today. Links to Kate Brauning, Talynn Lynn, Mary Pat, and Alex Yuschik’s blogs are located on the side bar. 

We’d love to see comments on our post and share anything you enjoy.  Thank you for reading!

Pixar Challenge: Rule #1

Pixar’s Rule #1: Character Struggle

#1: You admire a character for trying more than for their successes.

As an avid reader, I feel the key to any good story is love for the characters, feeling their struggle and wish for their success.  You want to be them, date them, or be their best friend.  It keeps you engaged.

Most of my favorite books have protagonist that are strong women with the courage to push through the struggles of life.  Those struggles shape the character into someone you can love.  Beatrice ‘Tris’ Prior of the Divergent series by Veronica Roth is appealing because of the strength she doesn’t even realize she possesses.  She knows before her test that she is different and that she struggles with her ways of her faction.  The thought of leaving her family causes her distress, but the thought of not being who she is meant to be can’t be denied.  She has to follow her true self.  She is small and has to work harder than the others in her new.  Every obstacle thrown her way is overcome making someone you respect. 

Really, it is the basics for any story.  Something has to happen to keep us interested.  You add in a little bit of a personal connection to a character and the makings of a beautiful story emerge. 

Be it a struggle you are horrified about like the killing of children for sport in The Hunger Games or life as a slightly odd kid from Diary of a Wimpy Kid.  Life no matter how ‘normal’ or how extreme has a set of it’s on struggles, it’s how the character deals with the struggle and come through on the other side that makes the story worth reading—again and again.

So, I agree that you need to admire the characters and their struggle.  Characters are how I personally become invested in a novel or series.  I love to see where they start and were they end up. It’s all about taking that ride and making us want to be in the passenger seat.

Also, all of you should check out the posts from my blogging friends who are doing this challenge with me! The first posts go up today. Links to Kate Brauning, Talynn Lynn, Mary Pat, and Alex Yuschik’s blogs are located on the side bar. 

We’d love to see comments on our post and share anything you enjoy.  Thank you for reading!

Check Out this YA Cover reveal

Cover Reveal and Giveaway: ALIENATED by Melissa Landers

Check it out.  It's a beautiful cover.  

http://www.yahighway.com/2013/03/cover-reveal-and-giveaway-alienated-by.html

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Use numbers instead of names...
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