These examples are taken from a blurb on the International Hockey Hall of Fame page for a replica of a square puck, used in a particular game. Here are the first two sentences:

Hockey’s most unique souvenir! A replica of the square puck used in the first organized hockey game played in Kingston, Ontario in 1886 between Queen’s University and Royal Military College of Canada.

First question: Is this blurb speaking of the “first organized hockey game” ever? Or just the first one played in Kingston, Ontario? You can’t tell, just from reading this blurb. BUT. Insert a comma after “game,” so you say, “used in the first organized hockey game, played in Kingston…,” and you’ve got the answer. It’s the first organized hockey game. Period. Without that comma, it’s the first ever in Kingston. Yet I have a feeling the IHHOF doesn’t mean that.

A bit large for the side of a puck. (Photo courtesy Flickr user Marcus Jeffrey)

Now look at the next sentence in the blurb:

This carefully crafted rubber square puck includes a scene from hockey’s first game played on the historic Kingston harbour that is carved directly into one side of the puck.

Oh dear. Kingston harbour is carved directly into this puck? How can even the smallest ships fit in there?

In fact, using the word “that,” the IHHOF is even more explicit. It’s not just any old Kingston harbour (is there one in Jamaica too? England?). It’s the “Kingston harbour that is carved directly…” It’s that one, not a different one.

So how should the two offending sentences be written, to be absolutely clear? Taking the IHHOF to mean that this was the first organized hockey game ever, you would write these sentences like this:

A replica of the square puck used in the first organized hockey game, [note the comma] played in Kingston, Ontario, in 1886, between Queen’s University and Royal Military College of Canada. This carefully crafted rubber square puck includes a scene, carved directly into one side of the puck, from hockey’s first game played on the historic Kingston harbour that is carved directly into one side of the puck.

Now it’s clear. Now we know. So yes — properly used commas help make our meaning clearer. And it really does matter how we organize the parts of our sentences. We may know what we mean (as the IHHOF writer did), but unless we make the sentence absolutely clear, our readers may not.

He Was Sad

Sadness can be described, not stated (Photo courtesy Flickr user wallygrom)

For example, if you’ve got a character who’s just received some bad news, you don’t generally write, “He was deeply saddened.” Rather, you write something like this:

He dropped the letter, unnoticed, and leaned heavily on his hands on the table. Closing his eyes, he bowed his head and swallowed a couple of times, hard, his throat working. When at last he raised moist eyes to his silent companion, he rasped, ‘She’s gone.’

Doing it this way, you help the reader see the entire scene and live through it with the character. This is a living, breathing man going through an experience right before your eyes. Saying merely, “He was deeply saddened” is more of a “documentary” way of doing things. You’re just reporting a fact, the same way you’d say, “Gravity exists.” But there’s no life to it — which is what you want when you write fiction rather than a documentary.

Conversational “Showing”

Naturally, in a novel or other story, you will also write narrative. And you do give factual information when you describe events as they occur. So it’s not all “showing,” since much of this narrative is inevitably “telling.” But even then, you can make many of these narrations more alive in various ways. For example, you could describe the scenery in the area surrounding your story location through the eyes of someone viewing it through a train window. All the while interspersing personal reactions to it, through conversation or through the character’s thoughts.

Describe scenery from a traveller's viewpoint (Photo courtesy Flickr user calculat0r)

Another way to keep from doing too much “telling” is to introduce needed information through conversations between characters. As they discuss what they should do next, or make introductions, etc., they can casually refer to information the reader needs to know. Either they supply all the information themselves, or they make a reference with some details, and then the narrator goes on to add more information.

“Tell Me Again Why…”

But the “conversational” tactic can be used ridiculously too. You need to keep in mind how people really talk, and whether they sound like a story narrator when they chat with friends. If characters don’t sound the way human beings would really talk in the situation they’re in, this injection of information sounds much worse than if the narrator just went ahead and described it. Here’s an example of what I mean:

“She wants this coffee house to be a premier attraction for tourists who visit this area,” Leah said.

“And tell me again why we got dragged into the project?” asked Ruth.

Leah glanced at her companion, a smile now dancing on her lovely, heart-shaped face that had been freshened very lightly by a dab of White Diamonds perfume. “Because her interior decorator walked out two weeks ago, and everyone else is booked solid till after the holidays.”

“You mean everyone with qualifications,” Ruth laughed. Her slender, well-manicured fingers shoved a lock of fine red hair behind one ear, before she straightened her form-fitting sweater.

“Now now,” Leah chided, “we both have plenty of experience. I own the local tea specialty shop, and you own a vintage china shop.”

This is similar to some dialogue that I recently read at the beginning of a novel. And even this small bit of writing is packed full of misuses of the “Show, don’t Tell” idea.

If you ever read a character saying, “Tell me again why…,” that’s probably your cue to run screaming from the room. This is frequently a bad writer’s way of injecting information that they don’t know how to include otherwise. This device usually involves one character telling another character something they both already know, but which they must rehearse again so the reader will know it too.

This could have been handled another way that would have been just as easy, and would have sounded much more natural:

“It’s too bad her interior decorator had to ditch the project,” Ruth grumbled.

“Well, it’s not like her mother broke her hip on purpose,” Leah reasoned. “It can take weeks to make arrangements for assisted living, so she didn’t really have a choice.”

That easily solves the problem of the writer trying to “show” the reader this information by having Leah tell Ruth what she already knew.

Tell Me What I Already Know, Part Two

But speaking of that, there’s an even more ridiculous example. Does Ruth really not know that Leah owns a tea shop and she herself owns a vintage china shop? Does she need reminding of these things, to justify why she and Leah are now helping with this project?

No. It’s the reader who doesn’t know. But there are so many other ways of letting the reader find out. Here’s just one of them:

“I really think I learned a lot,” Leah mused, “when I first opened my tea shop and had to decorate it.” She added, with a smile at her friend, “And everyone says it’s the way you create your displays in your china shop that makes them stop in and buy. So I think we’re more than qualified.”

Now Leah is not pseudo-informing Ruth who owns what, so the reader can “eavesdrop” on the information. Now she really is talking about their qualifications, and the mention of the ownership of their respective shops is more of an incidental illustration. The conversation flows much more humanly.

Piling on Descriptive Details

Save the perfume detail for later (Photo courtesy Flickr user Yortw)

There’s still an instance of “telling” rather than “showing” in the main example, above. Leah is described as having a “lovely, heart-shaped face that had been freshened very lightly by a dab of White Diamonds perfume.” First of all, since this is less than a page into the novel, the reader really doesn’t need to know what perfume Leah is wearing, or even that she’s wearing perfume at all. Save that for her lunch the next day, with her boyfriend. Perhaps after he kisses her hello, he can breathe deeply and say, “Chanel?” To which she replies, “White Diamonds. It’s my current favorite perfume.”

And the writer is telling the reader that Leah is “lovely.” Here’s where the reader should deduce that fact from how people around Leah respond to her. Again, this could have been saved for the boyfriend lunch. This is akin to the “He was saddened” documentary detail.

Other details in the example were fine, but perhaps crammed too thickly into a couple of paragraphs. The writer is obviously trying to establish, with some speed, who these characters are, what they look like, and what they own. But these details can be worked gradually into the conversation and the narrative. There’s really not that much rush.

The context is important too. These two women are about to witness a murder. The brand of perfume Leah is wearing is probably not an important detail to insert just here. And Ruth’s “fine red hair” could even be mentioned later, while the two are sitting on a nearby step as police and reporters are milling about the crime scene. Or if the red hair needs to be mentioned early, save the “form-fitting sweater” for the later scene when it’s getting cold outside and this is all Ruth is wearing.

Be Judicious, and Show. Don’t Tell.

It takes some practice to learn how to manipulate details and to know when you should insert them. But even more important than that is the imperative to show the reader what’s happening as much as possible, rather than tell him or her. When a character is reacting, show the reaction — don’t tell the reader what it was. When describing a character, yes, use adjectives and other descriptive terms — but don’t evaluate. (“Lovely” is the writer’s evaluative opinion about a character’s looks; “fine red hair” is descriptive.)

And if you love your characters and want to write the best book possible, never, ever use the “Tell me again why…” device. It does damage to the integrity (and intelligence!) of your characters. And it may be insulting to the intelligence of your readers as well.

But if this is something you’re unsure of, I will tell you a secret now that will change your writing life forever: it is extremely easy to know which form to use. Believe me about that. It is easier than you have ever imagined.

Take this sentence:

“The snowball hit the car on it’s windshield.”

Now apply this simple, easy rule: If you can substitute “it is” (or “it has”) in place of “it’s,” then you can use the apostrophe.

That’s the only rule you ever need to know, to tell whether you should write “its” or “it’s.” So let’s apply it to our sentence:

“The snowball hit the car on it is/it has windshield.”

Um…no? That sounds awful, and is clearly incorrect. So you don’t need the apostrophe there. Use “its” instead of “it’s.”

And this sentence?

“Its a bright, sunny day.”

Applying our substitution rule:

“It is a bright, sunny day.”

And this means that yes, you do use the apostrophe. So be sure to stick it in.

Let’s repeat the rule: If you can substitute “it is” (or “it has”) in place of “it’s,” then you can use the apostrophe.

Isn’t that easy? That’s the only rule you will ever need to know, to decide whether to use “its” or “it’s.” Because the only time you ever use the apostrophe is when you really mean “it is.” Knowing that, you should never make an error with that word again. Simple!

(Thanks so much to Christopher for pointing out that you can use “it has” as well as “it is.” I’ve added that set of words into the rule too. Picture me slapping my forehead. )

(And by the way, if you’re vague about the apostrophe in general, and would like a little guide on how and when to use it, you can download my free PDF, That Darned Apostrophe! It covers contractions, possessives, and plurals as well as the its/it’s confusion.)

In "Helix" -- this is bad. To me personally -- it's good. There is a difference. Photo courtesy Flickr user Harshil.Shah

I recently put a novel up on the Smashwords publishing site, and it occurred to me this morning that there may be some confusion for the readers between me and what I write. There’s something that new and aspiring authors don’t always realize, and even some established authors might forget sometimes. That is that you, as an author, do not always hold the opinions that your narrator does.

Let me explain. In Helix, my novel, the whole world is governed by a United Nations government. And this government does some rather nasty things along the way, even though perhaps its original intentions were good. If a reader were to think that everything in that book reflects my own opinions, they’d think I really disapprove of the U.N., and believe the organization is bad.

In fact, the exact opposite is true. Even though some of the themes that run through the novel are things I worry about, the U.N. isn’t actually one of them. The only reason it’s the big bad guy in the story is that I needed an organization that was worldwide and had the infrastructure to take over quickly and coordinate things when most other governing systems in the world had collapsed. It just had the qualities I needed, to use it as a tool in the story.

Because that’s the whole point! This is what distinguishes a good writer from someone who just wants to recite their own beliefs at people, or reproduce themselves over and over. As an author, you take and use whatever tools you need to craft the work. Because it’s the story that’s important — not you.

Your writing should rarely revolve around ideas like, “I like this character too much to kill him off,” or “I’m going to write a sequel because I like these characters so much.” If killing off that character is important to pushing your plot forward — you kill him off. If the theme you wanted to express or the idea you wanted to explore is completed at the end of this novel — you don’t write a sequel and nullify your work.

The author is crafting a work of art with meaning to it, and always needs to remember that the work of art is paramount. We are not creating that work merely as a navel-gazing exercise. We sculpt and craft and smooth and shape, using every tool necessary to do so. And if we are really good authors — we ourselves do not get in our own way. We maintain a separate existence from our Narrator.

To that end, you might be interested in visiting the Write Spa website of Winslow Eliot. Every few days there is a post suggesting a visualization you can do, and a way you can write about it. For example, for June 5th, 2010, you imagine yourself on a lovely desert island, sending a concise message in a bottle each day. You need to decide how to narrow down what is most important to you on that day, and how you would explain it briefly to a stranger.

Meanwhile, if you do have a piece of fiction to submit, Duotrope’s Digest is a site for locating places where you can send it. The site lists more than 2900 fiction and poetry publications, and has a search form to help you narrow the list down to publishers in your own genre.

For more specific submissions, here are a couple of current examples:

• A Cup of Comfort is looking for true stories from the lives of Christian women
• New Love Stories Magazine is looking for Male/Female love stories with just enough sexual spice to liven things up but not wander into pornographic realms
• The Bark wants stories about humans’ relationships with dogs
• Not to leave out cat-lovers, Cat Fancy magazine is looking for similar pieces about cats

As always, you should read the submission guidelines for these websites and magazines, so you’ll send materials they are interested in, and in the right format. (Thanks very much to freelance writer Windy Lynn Harris for some of these suggestions.)

Happy writing, and good fortune in finding markets for your stories!

The way she describes these journals, these are sort of pre-writing writing. So this is where, as she says, you write about your writing. You set goals, you mull ideas over, put in tidbits of relevant research, try to work out plot points or other problems, and so on.

When I think of it, I’ve had my own versions of this sort of journal in the past. They just weren’t in journals. In fact, I look at the bookcase next to me, and it’s full of file folders where I keep all the random notes I’ve scribbled over the years, the ideas that did (or didn’t) make it into a story, charts of character relationships, and that sort of thing. Some of this stuff is written on the back of sheets from old phone message pads, on foolscap paper, on torn envelopes, and yes, once or twice, on the back of a napkin.

I have always called this mulling-over of things a matter of the “percolation” of ideas. Much of this percolation happens in your subconscious, so you can go to bed with a thorny problem in your head, and wake up with the solution just sitting there, all cooked. But the same sort of percolation can happen while you’re jotting down some quick notes: suddenly something is sitting on the page staring at you, waiting for you to notice it.

I like the idea of Process Journals. You can be spontaneous and get a lot of “percolation” done in there. But it’s all collected into one place, rather than on small pieces of paper that one good gust of wind could have a field day with.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

And that’s the reason we need an alphabet.

Imagine having to use such pictorial symbols to get a more complex idea across. It might work for a grocery list: there could be simple drawings for carrots, apples, or even dishwashing detergent. And many companies clearly believe that if you have to assemble a bookcase or a couch, pictorial instructions are all you need. Some people, on the other hand, might consider those bookcase instructions a good example of the limitations of this method of communication.

The earliest form of written or drawn communication was pictorial. But even if people drew or carved actual scenes, those pictures didn’t represent the actual words they used, so if they wanted to convey specific facts about the event, they were still out of luck. If they carved a battle scene and wanted to say something like, “We defeated these people, but they were rebels and their fellow citizens weren’t our targets,” that would have taken many more pictures to explain clearly.

So the emphasis eventually moved to smaller pictures in which one specific symbol represented a single idea. You can see this type of writing, called the “logogram,” in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics or, even today, in Chinese and Japanese scripts. With this type of writing, you could have one symbol for “rebel” and another for “citizen,” and you could begin to make a differentiation.

But with one logogram representing one idea, imagine trying to memorize all the symbols for all the ideas in English! Even if you combined some simpler ones to make a more complex idea, you’d still need to know many thousands of the basic symbols first. And the relationship of the symbols to the actual words spoken in the language would still not be entirely solid. For one thing, you’d have no way of knowing how the language is pronounced.

Historically, though, some of those logogram symbols gradually became associated with the sounds of the words they represented. So for example, if we had a symbol for “hand” in English, a hand symbol might come to stand for the “h” sound. A ball symbol might signify a “b” sound. And so on.

And that was the beginning of the revolution. Because even though you could combine idea-symbols to represent more complicated ideas, you were still not conveying the actual words. Furthermore, you needed to memorize thousands of those idea-symbols. But once you could represent the sounds in the language, you could combine those a lot more powerfully. And you wouldn’t need thousands of those – you probably wouldn’t even need as many as one hundred. But they could combine not just to form the exact words in the language, but they could even give a better clue about how the words were pronounced.

And the precision in what you could say was magnified many thousands of times. For example, with logograms you’d pretty much be stuck expressing something like, “Army – south – defeated – rebels – surprise – morning.” To say anything more elaborate would take a great many more pictures and a lot of space. But with an alphabet forming actual words, you could say explicitly, “The army coming from the south soundly defeated the rebels who had not been expecting an attack so early in the morning.”

Alphabets work phonetically, representing sounds rather than separate ideas. In English we have twenty-six sound symbols, and they combine to express both the meaning and pronunciation of about a million words. Symbols in or other languages can easily express hundreds of thousands of words. Can you imagine how many separate pictorial symbols it would take to represent those words, if there was no alphabet?

Sometimes, even now, logograms work better than an alphabetical system. Just think of those universal symbols that let people know where the bathroom is, no matter what part of the world they’re in. But for expressing complex linguistic ideas, with economy of space and a precision of detail, the alphabet was pretty much the best invention ever.

The guest poster, Jim Adam, makes the point that while adverbs sometimes do get overused, occasionally they are necessary too. This is something I have been arguing with people about for quite a while now. The current rage is to strip all adverbs out of everything, searching instead for “strong verbs” that can stand alone and carry all the narrational weight on their own.

In my own writing, I’ve recognized that adverbs can indeed serve to shore up verbs that are too weak for the function they’re supposed to fulfill. I’ve enjoyed correcting this problem when I find it, looking for those stronger verbs, and I think my writing has improved as a result.

Yet I think the idea that all adverbs must be obliterated is not only an unbalanced view, as Adam says, but it’s inaccurate too. The darn things came into existence for a reason, as modifiers, and sometimes you simply can’t do without them. Sometimes the gymnastics you have to go through to say the same thing without using an adverb get ridiculous. Adam gave an example, contrasting “with a reluctant grin” and “grinning reluctantly.” When you find yourself multiplying words just to skirt a single word that would have said it all, maybe the darned adverb is the right word.

I’m grateful for Mr. Adam’s post. I don’t feel quite so much the solitary voice crying out in the desert any more.

“Get me a publishing deal for four books a year. Get me a movie deal. Get me foreign publication.” And so on, and so on, and so on.

I was astonished that there are as-yet-unpublished writers who actually think that a) they can express those desires and the whole publishing world will just fall obediently in line to accommodate them, and b) they can order an agent around like that and actually expect that agent to take them on.

Rather than being thankful that the agent is interested in helping them further their career, and being eager to learn from the agent’s experience and get some advice on helpful ways to proceed, these writers apparently just waltz in and assume that whatever decrees they lay down, the agents should just fall all over themselves to try to fulfill. Even if the demands would hurt the author’s own career, if only they knew what the agent knows.

I’m surprised that writers are so naive as to assume they can plan out the course of the career like that. It seems to me they’ve fallen prey to too many business marketers who promise that they can climb the ladder of success by being “proactive” and having a business plan. This doesn’t even work that well in the straight-on business world. (Just have a chat with the hordes of people who’ve been “downsized” unexpectedly in the past year or so.)

I’m also surprised – though I suspect I shouldn’t be – that these writers are simply that incredibly selfish. That’s not entirely their fault, because another facet of today’s business and consumer climate is to teach people (incessantly) that they are the center of the universe. The fact that they’ve come to believe it shouldn’t surprise anyone.

But one assumes that they’re capable of thinking, if they’re really writers. And they should be capable of discovering the utter fallacy of that “center of the universe” thinking. They need to recognize that the universe is going to do what it’s going to do, whatever this writer’s own stipulations, and in a clash of wills like that, the universe always wins. Add the publishing market in there, not to mention the human wills and decisions of the agent, other members of his or her agency, and all the people working at all the publishers…

Well. You get the picture. No intelligent writer will walk around with the attitude of “the world revolves around my business plan.”