How are those writing resolutions holding up?

Do you make New Year’s resolutions? If so, did any of those resolutions include goals for your writing? Perhaps, like me, you already have particular projects in hand, and you have resolved to see them finished before the year is out. Or maybe you simply decided that this will be the year you finally get serious about writing. Either way, if you’re like me, you find that it’s already nearly the end of January and you have done little to follow through on your resolutions.

If that’s the case, don’t lose heart. The year is still young, and there's plenty of time to make some headway. If you need some encouragement – or accountability – try finding a writing partner or a stable writing group to help you maintain your resolve and make progress toward your writing goals. The Dallas/Fort Worth Catholic Writers Group is here to help you, offering camaraderie, encouragement, and charitable critique. Our next meeting is Tuesday, January 26, at 7:00 p.m., at the University of Dallas.  Join us, and get the help and encouragement you need to follow through on your writing resolutions. Find details of our meeting time and place here. I hope we see you there!

If you don’t live in the area but still need a little guidance or encouragement, check out some of our popular blog posts, in the sidebar to the left.

The secret to becoming a better writer

Do you want to be a writer, but hesitate? Do you think, “I have things to say, but I just can’t write well”? I've heard too many people say this, and I know that many times it simply is not true. I think what people mean when they say such things is simply that they don’t produce perfect first drafts. Guess what? No one does.

Being a good writer does not mean that beautiful, inspiring, grammatically perfect, fully formed sentences flow effortlessly from your fingertips whenever you sit down to write. Nor does it meant that you must endure excruciating writer's block first, but once that's out of the way  inspiration hits and those perfectly formed sentences will begin to flow.

Let me tell you a little secret, one that every successful writer knows, a secret that can make anyone a better writer. Are you ready for it? Here goes: real writing, good writing is rewriting.

Does that sound scary? Are you thinking “writing is hard enough, so re-writing will only be harder”? Then we won’t call it rewriting, we’ll call it revision. Re-vision: taking a fresh look at what you just wrote and discerning where the weaknesses are, then doing something to make those parts more effective.

The first draft is never the best draft -- in fact, very often, it may be downright lousy. (You should have seen the first few drafts of this article!) But if you take the time and effort to figure out what is making it lousy, you can make it better. Maybe it will take two, three, four, or eight drafts before you have really said what you want to say, in the way you want to say it, but when you’ve taken the time to get it right, you’ll have no regrets.  Check out the recommended reading at the end of this article for some great ideas on how to go about revising your writing.

Let’s face it, though –it’s hard to be objective about your own writing. You may have trouble seeing what’s working and what’s not, because, although you know what’s in your head, you may not realize when it doesn’t all make it onto the page. That’s when you might want a trusted friend or colleague to take a look at your draft and tell you what they find works or doesn’t, which part is boring or confusing and which part is sparkling with life and truth. Joining a writing group can help. Don’t know how to find a writing group? MeetUp is a great place to get started finding a group that meets in your area and shares your interests.

Every month the Dallas/Fort Worth Catholic Writers Group meets to give members a chance to get feedback on their writing, swap progress reports, and generally engage in mutual support and encouragement. Our next meeting will be Tuesday, August 12, at the usual time and place. Feel free to attend – we have no dues, no dress code, no secret handshake, no intimidation factor. We would love to see you there!

Want to know more about revising and rewriting? Try one of these helpful articles.

• True Writing is Rewriting, by Beth Shope. Three secrets to successful revision.

• 25 Things You Should Know About Revising And Rewriting, by novelist & screenwriter Chuck Wendig. His language gets a little “colorful” here and there, but his advice is spot-on, even if you're not a fiction writer.

• Revising & Rewriting, by Judy Reeves, “writer, teacher, and writing practice provocateur.” Solid advice on what to look for when revising.

• A Month of Revision, by Matt Salesses. Most of this is just for fiction writers, but there are some wonderful nuggets here for any writer in any genre.

Writing Tips for Non-Fiction Writers

There is a lot of great, free writing advice available on the Internet, but sometimes it may seem that it is all geared toward either fiction writers or copywriters -- what's a non-fiction writer to do?

Actually, once you get past genre-specific tips, these different kinds of writing all depend on the same principles: be clear, concise, and specific. Once you understand that, even non-fiction writers will find that they can glean a lot of good techniques from advice aimed at other kinds of writers.

Helen Aitken makes a similar point in
"Seven Writing Tips From a Nonfiction Author." Here are just a couple of the points she makes:

1. Writing nonfiction, creative nonfiction and humor require the same qualities as great fiction, it should be well written and flowing in a direction that takes the reader to a logical destination, without them knowing they’ve been highjacked.
2. Nonfiction doesn’t have to be boring, or in sequential order.  However, it requires a working knowledge of English, few passive verbs, pertinent facts, great quotes, and a lack of clichés, in a concise, coherent writing style, with lots of hot coffee.

Read the whole article on Where Writers Win, a website that is chockful of good advice on writing and book marketing.

P.S. Don't forget that tonight we're meeting at the University of Dallas at 7:00 p.m. Hope to see you there!

Do You Commit These Deadly Sins of Self-Editing?

This was too good not to share -- and appropriately themed for Lent! Janice Gable Bashman & Kathryn Craft, on the Writers Digest web site, analyze the Seven Deadly Sins of Self-Editing, describing not only the "sin" but also prescribing the salutary "penance" to overcome it.

They seem to understand not only writers but human nature, saying:

We’re most likely to sin when we’re at our most vulnerable—and for creative writers, there may be no more vulnerable time than the delicate (and often excruciating) process of editing our own work. Sidestep these too-common traps, and keep your story’s soul pure.

What are  your besetting sins as you seek feedback and revise? Perhaps you tend toward sloth:

The lazy scribe is one who’s failed to develop and utilize all her natural talents. To draft a story—and then stop there—is to ignore the very nature of literature, which constructs meaning through the deft layering of craft elements. If you find yourself bucking that notion, you may be guilty of sloth.

If you hate having your work critiqued, you may fall into the sin of wrath:

The editing process can inspire uncontrolled feelings of rage in a writer. It’s difficult to discover or to hear from a trusted reader that you might not yet have fully developed your work—but it’s also an important step in growing your organic talent.

Read the article to learn what "penances" the authors prescribe for these and the other 7 deadly sins of self-editing.

Best Free Stuff for Writers

Since we started this new blog for our local Catholic Writers Group, I thought it would be a good place to post information that may be of use to group members, and others who may be trying to get started as writers. I don't know about you, but I love great free stuff (not the crummy free stuff that seems to proliferate on the internet). So I thought I would share with you, from time to time, some of the great free resources I've found that are particularly helpful or valuable to writers (I've actually used each of these). And I invite you to let me know if you can recommend others!

Writing productivity

• Scrivener (free 30-day demo, $40 to buy.) – Okay, only the demo is free, but it's great! Try it and you'll get hooked. Scrivener is a writing program that helps you organize your writing and keep track of your research. It has lots of useful features that make it super-useful for large, complex writing projects (I wish I'd had it when I was writing my dissertation!). Some features are: 

• cork board view (with virtual index cards) that makes it easy to reorganize sections of your document,

• outline mode allows you to plan before writing, or to get a sense of the structure of what you have already written; 

• an area to gather your research for easy access; and lots more!

The trial is good for 30 days of use, not 30 calendar days, which gives you plenty of time to get to know this program and fall in love with it. Available for PC or Mac.

• yWriter – This is completely free software for developing, writing, and keeping track of a novel, with lots of features to help the novelist keep track of chapters, scenes, characters, etc. yWriter is similar to Scrivener, but optimized specifically for fiction writers (although it would also work well for other kinds of writing project). It was developed by Simon Haynes, a computer programmer who is also a novelist, to help him with his own writing process. Completely free, and really helpful, yWriter is availabler in Windows version only (the author recommends Scrivener for Mac users).
• yEdit  – This is a simple text editor with countdown word counter. A distraction-free window in which to write. Set your word count goal per session, and yEdit keeps track of your progress toward your goal. yEdit is great helper for anyone who wants to establish a writing routine of writing X words per day/week/whatever.

Writing Advice

• Randy Ingerman’s Snowflake Method of developing a novel.  This is genius -- a brilliantly simple method of creating a well-developed novel from scratch. The method takes you from original concept, through outlining, character development, and writing, all the way to submission to a publisher.
• Free critique groups online (Critique.org). This web site offers great, fee-free online critique groups for all kinds of writing and other creative output. Workshops are available for a variety of fiction genres, as well as non-fiction. I haven't actually taken part in this one yet, but it looks like a great way to gain experience and get lots of intelligent reader feedback. The founder and moderator stresses, and enforces, civility and kindness in the way critiques are offered. Well-established, published writers are among the regular contributors. Here's what they say:

“Critique.org is for serious authors, artists, and creators in any field who wish to improve their craft — those who seek to gain professional stature within their field or increase it. Critique.org workshops focus on in-depth critiques of your works, a process which helps both the recipient and the reviewer to grow. In addition to depth of analysis, much of critique.org's secret is our emphasis on respectful and diplomatic critiques.”

Funding and Markets for Your Writing

• FundsforWriters website and free newsletter. Among other things, Funds for Writers lets you know about writing competitions with cash prizes, and occasionally lists grant opportunities for writers. I'll let the site founder describe this herself: 

"FundsforWriters is an online resource for writers. You can be a thirty-year veteran or a part-time wannabe, but here at FundsforWriters (FFW), we consider you a writer none-the-less. We emphasize finding money to make writing a realistic career. Of course, you’d write anyway. That’s the way of a writer.

"Other websites provide guidance on how to write, how to query, how to format manuscripts, and so on. We give you direction on the funding streams. We focus on markets, competitions, awards, grants, publishers, agents, and jobs for your writing abilities, with motivation chucked in."

I hope you find some of these helpful. Use the comment box to let us know if you've tried any of these, or can recommend other great free stuff for writers.