Day 6, just one more day to go. Hang in there everyone!

Sudipta has written lots of fun picture books. Chicks Run Wild is a big favorite of ours, perhaps because of our own silly chickens. Take it away, Sudipta!

To Be? No! Not TO BE!

As writers, revision is a part of our lives. A totally unwanted yet unavoidable part of our lives. Like ear wax or belly button lint.

Or maybe…maybe ear wax and belly button lint aren’t like revision. Maybe…revision is more like the removal process of ear wax or belly button lint.

(At this point, someone should award me a trophy for the use the phrase “belly button lint” repeatedly in a writing-related blog post. Thank you. Thank you very much.)

Maybe it is the words that we need to trim off that are like ear wax or belly button lint, and revision just leaves our manuscripts cleaner, fresher, and more sparkly. And less waxy.

Maybe revision shouldn’t be so unwanted.

There are many ways to revise manuscripts to get them submission-ready. It would be impossible to point out all the strategies in a single blog post (in fact, I’ll be teaching a whole class on picture book revision this year at Kidlit Writing School! www.kidlitwritingschool.com). So, instead, I wanted to share one important, universal, deceptively simple yet incredibly powerful way to revise your work to make the writing stronger:

NO MORE TO BE 

No, that’s not some Yoda-speak wisdom that you need to mull and decipher. Very simply, I want you to go through your manuscript and try to remove every form of the verb “to be.” So that means go look for the following words:

be, am, are, is, was, were, been 

When you find these words, think of them as ear wax or belly button lint and get rid of them. Because almost every time you use one of these forms of “to be,” you are telling, not showing.

When you write, “She was mad,” you’ve told me what your character is feeling. When you revise it to, “Her jaw clenched and lasers practically shot out of her eyes,” you show me her feelings without having to tell me.

“We were terrified” is a tell. “We trembled like leaves” or “Our hearts pounded so loud it sounded like a bass line” is a show.

“She’s been sad all day” is a tell. “She cried until there were no tears left” is a show.

Obviously, you will never get rid of every instance of “to be” in a manuscript (just like you will never get rid of every last bit of ear wax or belly button lint!). There are many, many times when be, am, are, is, was, were, and been are essential. But as a place to start in the revision and tightening process, looking for “to be” can help you quickly identify parts of your manuscript that could use a second look and a bit of a makeover.

Show, don’t tell is the mantra of our industry. Even experienced writers have moments when they struggle with this (I know I still do on a daily basis). But I’ll bet you’ll be amazed at how this simple trick – getting rid of “to be” – will take your writing from telling to showing.

Happy Revising! 

Thank you Sudipta! One lucky reviser will win a critique from Sudipta! Watch for the Rafflecopters so you can to win on the 18th! 

 

Sudipta is an award-winning author of over 40 books and the co-founder of both Kidlit Writing School (www.kidlitwritingschool.com) and Kidlit Summer School (www.nerdychickswrite.com). Her books include DUCK DUCK MOOSE, TYRANNOSAURUS WRECKS, ORANGUTANGLED, and over thirty more titles that have been acclaimed by the Junior Library Guild, the California Reader’s Collection, the Bank Street Books Reading Committe, the Amelia Bloomer list, and many more. Find out more about her by visiting SUDIPTA.COM or her blogs NERDYCHICKSRULE.COM and NERDYCHICKSWRITE.COM. 

Starting on January 26, Sudipta is teaching a course on Character Building in Picture Books at Kidlit Writing School. For more information, visit this link: http://www.kidlitwritingschool.com/picture-book-a-to-zs-character-building.html

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SudiptaBardhanQuallen

Twitter: @SudiptaBQ

ReviMo Day 5 with H. Joseph Hopkins

We love Joe's book, The Tree Lady! AND Joe has LIVED on a houseboat. How cool would that be??!! :D  And now, here's Joe!

When I write I describe the pictures—images—in my head into my MacBook computer. I look for words that will provoke the reader to create similar pictures—images—in his/her head.

That’s what I strive for:

Hence the saying,

That goes for all kinds of writing, essays, poems, shopping lists, and this post.

I came to writing for children late in life, after decades of writing professional reports and a bit of newspaper work. As a newbie I have only a few ideas to suggest.

For me writing is re-writing. Even shopping lists have crossed-out items.

SCENES:

Let scenes tell a story. I’m at my best when I describe a scene. In my head I often picture a cartoon, stick figure drawing, or diagram that illustrates what I want to write. All around my messy house you will find backs of envelopes and sticky notes with my little cartoons or diagrams.

After I have a picture on paper or in my head, I use words to describe that drawing or design.

While writing I repeatedly ask myself,
 

One big value of re-writing—or “revising”—is:  

 

 

Or, the scene in your head may change and you realize that what you really want to say is different than what you originally thought.

In this way you clarify your thoughts by writing. Some writers call this process, “Letting ideas percolate.”

Note: you may have to ask old uncle Jigs what “percolate” means. 

Or, others say,

 

I know of only one writer—

only one! —

who did not depend upon re-writing:

Robert Louis Stevenson

(1850-1894). Stevenson wrote

“Treasure Island,” 

“Kidnapped,”

“The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”

and other action packed adventure

fantasies. Stevenson’s books were

popular in his day

and remain so today.

 

I am told that Stevenson would sit or

pace for long silent periods, deep in

thought, and then proclaim with the

mighty voice 

of a Pentecostal preacher,

complete sentences of fully developed

descriptive prose. A secretary copied

Stevenson’s literary utterances, and thus 

his works were written.

 

Everybody else—including all the

geniuses—depend upon re-writing.

So, re-writing is not an admission of guilt or a badge of shame. Re-writing is a proclamation that you are doing the work of writing.

The fun of re-writing is discovering the exact words to express the precise idea that is in your head.

Discovering the precise word brings joy.


PUSHING WORDS AROUND:

Your computer lets you push words around on the page. So easy!

Two processes occur while you push words around on a computer screen:

• First, you glory in the freedom of being liberated from crossing out, writing in a crimped hand above a sentence, or squeezing notes in the margin. 

• Second, when I push words around on the screen I develop a deeper, richer understanding of my major ideas and the minor ones. So I get a deeper understanding of what I wanted to say.                                                               Then I keep pushing words around until I get the combination that satisfies me. 

Thus, by re-writing and revising I get to a place in which I understand my topic more deeply and clearly than ever before.

And note: I get to that place of understand by writing.

It’s true what they say:

Have fun!

Joe Hopkins

Thank you Joe!! I wish I were like Robert Louis Stevenson, but since I'm not... good thing I get lots of great revision advice from great peeps! :D 

 

 

H. Joseph "Joe" Hopkins lived for many years on a houseboat on the Columbia River in Portland OR. Joe came to writing through a series of happy accidents after retiring from life as a Speech-Language Pathologist (SLP). Joe's picture book, The Tree Lady, illustrated by Meg McElmurry, was published by Simon & Schuster in 2013 and has won numerous awards from librarians and groups interested in biography, sustainability, environmental science, and the lives of independent women. The Tree Lady is a picture book biography of Kate Sessions, an independently minded woman who spent her life bringing plant color to San Diego and Balboa Park in Southern California. Reactions by reviewers children and parents have been uniformly positive and passionate. Sales have been brisk and The Tree Lady has reprinted three times.  Contact Joe at Josephhopkins65@gmail.com

ReviMo Day 4 with Meg, the Megster, the Meganator...

Okay, today is going to be GRUELING. Get ready to WORK!

Just kidding! 

Today we are going to get in touch with our "broccoli" as Anne Lamott calls our intuition, that small voice inside you [Bird by Bird: Part Two: Broccoli]. "You need your broccoli in order to write well." You need your broccoli to KNOW what your character will do. Anne says we lose our intuition as kids. If not, I'd guess we lose it as adults, when we live by to-do list, with little time to daydream. 

To reconnect with your intuition, "stop the chattering of the rational mind." Then give your intuition some room to breathe. If you give it some space it "wafts up from the soul", but crowd it and it "becomes a fitful little flame." Too much "manic attention" and it will be blown out.

image from http://www.explodingdog.com

"So try to calm down, get quiet, breathe and listen." "Stop trying to control your mind so much," let it wander and wonder a bit.

To this end, I'd like you to take paper and a writing utensil, find a cozy quiet spot and relax for a half hour or longer . . . And then write. 

Happy broccoli hunting! 

ReviMo Day 3 Interview with Rebecca Janni

My 5 year old daughter REALLY wants a horse, so we can relate to (and love) all the Nellie Sue books! Welcome Rebecca!

 

Can you give us a little background about yourself?

Revision landed me my first book contract.

I know, I know. Every author could say that, right? No editor pulls a rough draft out of the slush pile. (At least I hope not!)

I'm talking about revision mojo here. When I brought that early manuscript to an SCBWI conference, it had been revised several times already. But when Jane Yolen spoke about revision, about the benefits of seeing again, I knew there was more work to do. In a critique session, she encouraged me to keep revising and saw enough potential in the story to suggest a home for it.

I kept revising and submitted the story as she suggested. When a call came from Steve Meltzer at Dutton Children's Books, I almost fainted. (That wouldn't have turned out well, since I was potty training my toddler at the time.)

He called to say that Dutton's editorial team liked the story a lot, BUT . . . would I mind revising it once more for their consideration?

Of course, I said yes, and just like Nellie Sue, I kept getting back in the saddle, and that revision of my revision of my revision became my first book, Every Cowgirl Needs a Horse.

And there was much rejoicing!




How do you determine if a story idea is worth pursuing/revising?

For me the question is rarely whether an idea is worth pursuing or revising, but rather how to find the space and time to do it. With five incredible kids in the house (my four children, plus an exchange student from China), sometimes I just have to hide.

  

What is your revision process?

I make a book dummy. (Note that there is no comma after book in the preceding sentence. I'm not calling anyone a dummy!) But I do make a book dummy, which is to say I lay out my story page by page, even though I'm not an illustrator – especially because I'm not an illustrator. The editors never see this stage of my writing, but it helps me to work through pacing and plot and story arc. I use book dummies at every stage of the revision process.

To revise well, to really see a manuscript again, I also have to put it aside for awhile. That's one reason it helps me to have multiple projects going. When I've been working on the same project for a period of time, I become too close to it and can't see the cuts and changes that will make the story stronger. So I trade it for another. When I've walked away for a while – a week, a month, or more – time creates a healthy distance, and I can read my own work more objectively.

 

 

 

 

 

 

If that doesn't work, thank God for my Writers' Bloc – Sharelle Byars Moranville, Jan Blazanin, and Eileen Boggess – three talented writers who help keep me honest and mostly sane.

Sometimes when I'm revising, I look at past editorial letters to help take a story to the next level. Usually, those notes tell me to

add conflict,
add humor,
add character,
and cut words.

It may feel impossible to add, add, add at the same time as trimming words, but this is a great exercise to make sure

Every. Word. Matters.

Because every word really does matter. In stories, and in life. It could be my mantra.

Every word matters.

Every word I say to my children matters. Every word I say to my husband matters. Every word I say to my friends matters. Every word I say to myself matters. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Any other thoughts for fellow writers?

Sometimes, you just need to listen to the voices in your head. One morning, I was in revision muck. I knew my story needed revising, but I couldn't figure out how to make it better. I might have pitched a fit if a school visit hadn't come to my rescue. While presenting Every Cowgirl Goes to School to a smart and receptive group of second graders, I had an AHA moment. One of the students pointed out that Nellie Sue's day doesn't change at all, but that her attitude changes. I couldn't believe it. In a round about way, my fictional character was reminding me to have an attitude adjustment! And really, that was all I needed.

That, and a little chocolate. Always chocolate.

Thank you for your insight Rebecca! 

Rebecca Janni learned early on that biking was the best way to get around the neighborhood and reading was the best way to get around the world. Rebecca Janni is the author of Jammy Dance, and the Every Cowgirl series. She has an MAT in English and enjoys teaching composition and creative writing. Today, she divides her time between volunteering, adjunct teaching, and writing -- all of which take a back seat to motherhood! She lives in Iowa with her husband, four children, and a dog. She loves to read and bike with her family, but not at the same time. Visit her website at rebeccajanni.com

ReviMo Day 2 with Joe Berger

I adore Joe's art in the Hubble Bubble Series. The colors! Perfect for such a fun story. And his book My Special One and Only is near and dear to me. My daughter has a beanie pony that goes EVERYWHERE with us and has for years. Okay, enough gushing, take it away Joe!

My name is Joe Berger, and I’m a writer and illustrator of children’s picture books. For the last 12 years or so, I have also contributed a weekly single-panel cartoon to the Guardian newspaper, as one half of cartooning duo Berger & Wyse (Pascal Wyse and I co-write, I draw).

It might seem at first like these two strands of my work are only superficially related. But actually, the distillation and revision of an idea into a single drawing, perhaps with a few words, which creates a response in the viewer (hopefully a chuckle), is really a distillation of the art of picture book making. It’s a haiku-like form, perhaps, and one I find endlessly fascinating. And like all these creative endeavours, it’s a process of revision. Writing is re-writing. Even if the end point is pretty much back where you started.

And before I go any further, a caveat: there's nothing more insufferable than a comedian explaining why she/he is funny, and I'm afraid what follows may out of necessity veer into that territory. Console yourself that if our cartoons leave you cold you're probably smarter than us, maybe funnier too.

The background

For six years, beginning in 2001, Pascal Wyse and I produced a four-panel strip for the Film and Music pages of the Guardian, called the Pitchers, about a couple of hapless Hollywood screenwriters. Whilst we had no insider knowledge of tinseltown, the strip was really about the creative process, and the agony and ecstasy of working in a creative partnership.

Click images to enlarge                                                                                                       

In 2007, the Pitchers ended and we were commissioned to produce a single panel cartoon for the food pages of the Weekend magazine. The Pitchers comic strip was the first writing I had done, and it gave me the confidence to attempt my first children’s books. But after 330-odd strips, a single-panel cartoon made a refreshing change. Often with the strip we’d come up with a gag, and then have to write the three panels leading up to the gag, which sometimes felt labored. 

Our remit with the new single-panel was simply that it had to be food-related: anything from talking carrots to dinner-party mores; neurotic biscuits to psychotic chefs, gastronomic astronauts and beyond.

Seven years and another 334 cartoons later, we moved off the food pages and into a new slot where our single-panel cartoon could be about, well, anything.
This was at once a relief and a daunting challenge; without the subject-matter to confine us, we just had to be funny. Funnier than before, perhaps, because we no longer had the context of the food pages to make the joke ‘relevant’. Now the cartoon's only reason for being there at all was to raise a smile, so it had bloody well better do that.
 

 
The process

In the twelve or thirteen years we’ve been doing this, the process has remained largely the same. We meet or Skype for a few hours on a Monday morning, and hopefully settle on an idea. I then draw a pencil rough, and we consider if we’ve got all the elements right - the angle, the characters, the wording. I might do more roughs, or, if we’re happy, I’ll go to a final drawing (occasionally we abandon the idea altogether and go back to square one at this stage, but let’s not talk about that - it’s too painful).

The final, coloured drawing will then be considered, and maybe the words or a facial expression tweaked - once we’re both happy, I’ll file it before the end of the day.
Very occasionally we’ll hit a brick wall, and spend six hours or more coming up with nothing. This usually requires stepping away, making a call to the paper requesting an extension til tuesday, and having a fraught, sleepless night imagining that there are no new jokes left in the world, before starting the process afresh. This was easier in the Pitchers days, since our staple subject was Chet and Foley, our protagonists, being unable to come up with ideas. 

Revising the idea

Creating cartoons breaks down into two main areas: inspiration and execution - the idea and the drawing. And although these two parts are often inextricably interwoven, revision plays a key role in both of them.

The starting point for each cartoon is very often an idea I've jotted in a notebook - I keep one with me at all times. Whenever Pascal and I are stuck for inspiration, I can trawl through the stack of notebooks on my desk and inevitably find some forgotten shard of an idea that raises a smile. This is particularly valuable to the process, when you consider how cartoons are read.

A reader will leaf through the magazine, and perhaps this small colourful panel near the bottom of the page will catch their eye. They’ll glance at it, and if the speech bubble isn’t too long, they might give it a go. If it doesn’t make them laugh, or even make sense, within about 7 seconds, they’ll shrug and turn the page. Otherwise they’ll smile, maybe chuckle, and still turn the page.

So it’s really only when you’re looking through pages of old ideas that you experience them the way the reader will experience the finished thing, from a cold start.
It’s equally important to consider, when you’ve found an idea you like, how best to work it in to a finished cartoon. We both felt sure there was something in this notebook sketch, but the analogy of sharks to diners didn’t feel quite strong enough. And for me at least, the unpleasantness of the real-life situation made the joke feel slightly crass.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We abandoned the idea, but returned to it a few months later, and by turning it on its head we ended up with this.

 

 

 

 

 

Revising at the drawing stage

One of the key things to consider when it comes to finessing a cartoon, is how much ‘space’ you’ve created between the set-up and the joke. Cartoons are often most satisfying to read if, as the reader, you have to do a little decoding, join the dots. Here’s a few examples from our back catalogue:

On the other hand, if you leave too much space, the reader may give up altogether - here’s an example where we may have a left a little too much space . . . it may take you longer than 7 seconds to decode the joke, in which case you're probably going to feel you've worked too hard for the reward!
    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I could blather on for pages - talking about cartoons is almost as fun as drawing them - though I suspect, more so for me than the reader. So I'll end my guest spot here, with a final example of how revision can alter the original inspiration.

A few years ago, during our monday morning conference, Pascal mentioned an idea he’d had for a food cartoon about mice contemplating the moon. I quickly jotted down the following sketch in my notebook, as he described it.

We both liked the 'story', but didn't feel like there was quite enough of a joke there. Through a long, convoluted process of discussion (which I can’t now remember) we ended up filing the following cartoon.

I'm particularly fond of this example of the distance travelled between inspiration and execution, because although it took Pascal and me only a few hours to revise, the journey the mice take is rather longer. Having heard that the moon may be made of cheese, they have had to evolve to the point where they have (presumably) rid the earth of humans, taken over, invented space travel and sent a huge colony to their new utopia, only to be disappointed.

Happy revising - and a huge thank you to Meg for the invitation to talk about myself a little - something I’m disconcertingly happy to do. Please feel free to peruse the archive of Berger & Wyse cartoons at:

www.bergerandwyse.com

Our cartoons are also syndicated on GoComics:

www.gocomics.com/berger-and-wyse/

and my solo work can be found at:
www.joeberger.co.uk

Thank you Joe! Can't wait to see more of your books and comics!

Joe Berger is the author and illustrator of Bridget Fidget and Bridget Fidget and The Most Perfect Pet. He is the illustrator of many other books, including  the Hubble Bubble series of picture books and young readers by Tracey Corderoy, Princess in Training by Tammi Sauer, Hattie the Bad by Jane Devlin, Dot by Randi Zuckerberg, and three new Chitty Chitty Bang Bang stories by Frank Cottrell Boyce. Joe has just finished illustrating Girl & Gorilla, by Rick Walton, to be published in the US in 2016.