Ridding Your Work of Redundancy

Redundancy, usually flagged by an editor with the letter R, is the use of the same word or phrase over and over within a piece of writing.

This is a problem that can easily be fixed with a little creativity. Typically, in any good piece of writing, you really want to avoid using the same word or phrase, especially within the same paragraph. This is especially true when paragraphs are short - less than half a page long.  There should be little to no repetition of words, i.e. "cats" in the same paragraph.  This can be changed or avoided in one of two ways: by changing the redundant word to something with the same meaning, or by rewriting the sentence so it says the same thing, but in another way. I'll give you an example below; the first paragraph uses a redundant word that need editing, and the following two offer different ways of rewriting it to make it a stronger piece of work.

Cats are cute. My cat is very affectionate and has a typical cat name; Fluffy. Cats can climb trees, which is an important skill for a cat to have, especially when being chased by a dog.

Cats are cute. My feline is very affectionate and has a typical pet name; Fluffy. She can climb trees, which is an important skill for her to have, especially when being chased by a dog.

Cats are cute and can climb trees, which is an important skill for them to have, especially when being chased by a dog. My feline, Fluffy, has a typical name and is very affectionate.

So you see, in the first example, the word "cat" is very over-used.  It appears far too many times, and makes the writing seem elementary, or less sophisticated. In the second example, the paragraph remains the same, but with a little help from some useful synonyms, the writing sample becomes less tedious/boring for the reader.  A little bit of variation keeps them on their toes, and helps to prevent them from skimming.  The third variation completely changes the wording, but keeps the intent of the story intact.

POV or Point of View. How to Successfully Write from the POV of More than One Character.

  Books are generally written from the protagonist's point of view (or POV for short).  However, what if you want to switch partway through a book and show someone else's POV?

You can write a book correctly, from any number of points of view, but they have to be packaged neatly.  Each chapter or section of a chapter should be written from the same character's POV the whole way through that chapter or section.  So if you start writing a chapter from say, a girl named Stephanie's point of view, the whole chapter should only be from HER point of view - what she's feeling, sensing and seeing.  The next chapter can then be written from say...Peter's point of view, but then THAT whole chapter has to stay from Peter's point of view.  If you want to switch back to what Stephanie or another character is feeling or seeing or sensing, and you want to stay within the same chapter, you either have to cut the chapters in sections with * * * between the paragraphs to let the reader know there's a switch.  It's the way to give the reader the heads up that you're changing perspective, so they are expecting the switch, and don't get confused or suffer from what I think of as vertigo.  If you're going to do this though, do it consistently throughout the book. This should not be used once, and then not again. Whatever format you want to write in, be in all from one person's POV, from a protagonist and then antagonist, or from multiple characters, just be consistent with the changes and style of those changes throughout the book.

A common and effective way to switch POV in a book is to write complete chapters from different characters' points of view.  Robert Jordan does an amazing job of this in the Wheel of Time Series. Each chapter is headed by the name of the person he is writing from, so the reader automatically knows whose head space the story is happening in. Each chapter is told with a different feel, that is consistent with that character.  For example, all of the chapters written from Mat's point of view are done in a congenial manner, full of pranks and his perspective on women and gambling and the world in general.  Those written from Nynaeve's POV are all no-nonsense, and meshes perfectly with her personality. (If you haven't read his stuff, I would SERIOUSLY recommend it. It's 14 books of awesome, and they're fantasy, and LONG, but his cultures and characters and character lines are so complex (but easy to follow and remember), that his book series has actually been compared to War and Peace.  He even goes as far as to take the same readers for all fourteen of the audio books.  Michael Kramer reads all of the chapters told from the different male characters' points of view, and Kate Redding reads all of the female ones.  It would give you the perfect example of the correct way to write from multiple character's points of view.

The common error occurs when a writer switches in the middle of a paragraph or chapter, with no warning to the reader.  For example:


Chad walked down the street with his hands shoved way down in his pockets.  The melancholy he was dealing with had stolen his smile, and worry lines creased his forehead.  Charlene always walked this way, and he wondered if he would see her.  Part of him hoped that he would, just a glimpse of her smile made his heart beat quicker, but her stinging words often cut like a knife; she was not always a nice girl. It usually depended on who she was with.  His eyes stayed glued to the cement sidewalk blocks as they slowly moved under him.  His long blond bangs hung down, shielding his face from onlookers, and afforded him privacy, allowing him to think.  Then, her chiding voice filled the air.     

"Anthony, give it back!" she flirted with another boy from their history class.  He was holding her book in the air just out of reach, and she was stretching up to take it. She knew full well that she wasn't tall enough to compete with his gorgeous six-foot-two physique, but she didn't care in the least.  That wasn't the point anyway, she didn't care about the book, but reaching up like that made her shirt lift, just a little.  She saw his eyes flick down to her exposed skin, and caught him smile.  She blushed, and took a small step toward him.

"You heard the lady, give it back," another voice ordered from down the block.  Ick, it's that annoying creep from history, she thought, perturbed that her fun was to be interrupted...

So you see, I started out from Chad's point of view, and then jumped into Charlene's.  For this type of writing to be correct, I should have stayed with Chad's POV and finished the scene.  Then I could break it up with * * * or a new chapter and tell a different part of the story from her point of view.(Stephanie Meyers even went so far as to make a start of rewriting the entire Twighlight book but this time from Edward's point of view.  I forget what it was called, but it was neat to see the same story from a male perspective).

If you want to see another quick example of how to make the switch in mid-chapter properly, check out the first book in my medieval fantasy series, Knight's Surrender.  You can find it in hard copy at Amazon.com (search Knight's Surrender, Heather Reilly), or on ebook at  Smashwords.com (Search Knight's Surrender).

Chapters 17, 18, and 19 will give you a great snapshot of how the switching technique is used. Chapter 17 is from the main character's point of view, then chapter 18 switches to the villain's POV. Chapter 19 has the POV switching back and forth, but with those *** breaks I was talking about so the reader sees it coming.  I hope you read and enjoy!

No matter whose POV you are writing from, just remember to make sure the whole chapter or scene is complete before you switch. Also, consistency will help the reader know what to expect.  When a reader becomes confused when reading, it breaks their suspension of disbelief, and pulls them out of your world and back into the real one.  As long as you stick to a pattern, and are consistent with the ways you switch, and whose point of view you are switching to, they will have no problems following your story, and can remain happily submersed in the world you've created.

How to add or fix page numbers and title/author headers in your book

Feb 13, 2015

This is one of those things that you have to do every time you write a book, but because you don't do it that often, perhaps it's something that you keep forgetting (as I sometimes do when I'm not repeating an action), or maybe the program just won't do what you think it should be doing.  This can get very frustrating, so I thought I'd give you some instructions or tips to help you do this for yourself. This would probably be a good time to plug my services quickly, so here goes.  I offer complete formatting services for ebook or printed book (both are very different), for an affordable price.  For more information, check out my website: reillybooks.weebly.com.

These instructions work when using word - I've never typed a doc on a Mac, so I'm sorry, I can't be of much help there, but perhaps this can point you in the right direction.

When I write or edit in a Createspace template, I scale down the size of the document (in the bottom right corner opposite page and word count,) to 90%. This lets me see two pages at a time. It is worth noting that the pages are opposite to how they will appear in the book: the page you see on the left on your computer screen will be the page on the right in the actual printed book.  Therefore, I have left some reminders below to make sure things will print properly.

Once you have all of your introductory stuff added (title page, copyright page, dedication, acknowledgements, map or graphic, table of contents etc), and have started your actual story, this is a good time to enter the formatting.  I usually wait until all the "front matter" is done, so I don't have to add in pages or move things around later.

Formatting – set up your document

·         Back up the “Chapter 1” onto the previous page

·         Go to Page Layouts

·         Breaks

·         Section Breaks (this will drop "Chapter 1: back down to a new fresh page, which should be on the left screen page). The section break you have just created means that you won't have the author/title, or page numbers appearing on your front matter, they will begin when your story does.

Page numbers:

·         Go to footer

·         under the HEADER AND FOOTER design tab:

·         unclick the “link to previous” (make sure different odd/even pages, & show text doc are all checked)

·         Go to page number

·         Format page number: start on 1

·         Alignment for page numbers: left screen page - number to right (and vice versa) this puts the numbers at the outside edge of the actual book

Title/Name:

·         Go to header

·         unclick the link to previous

·         name goes on the top of the right screen page

·         Book title (italics) goes on the left screen page.

Note: for both page numbers in footer and author’s name/title in header, if they don’t appear to be continuing, or if a page number 3 is missing etc, double check that on that page in the footer or header, that you don’t have to unclick the “link to previous” again.  In my word document, I have had to do that a second time on that one page, for both the new numbers and the header.

Hope this helps, happy writing!

Past and Past Perfect Tenses

January 28, 2015

A new year, and more notes! I had a very good conversation with one of the authors I edit for, so I thought I'd talk about it here.  A lot of authors have questions about the correct time to use tenses in writing as a general rule.  I was lucky growing up.  I had a grandmother who was chief of the grammar police, so things like tenses and correct word choice were ingrained into me at a young age. It now comes naturally to me for the most part, but for a lot of people, it doesn't.  There are a lot of great web sites out there that can help you as an author, but when doing research or when trying to learn, keep in mind that all websites are like television; you can't always believe what you see.  Remember that all websites are written by people like you or I, and every article is written with some bias.  Some of us are specialized in our areas (I have an honors English degree, and I've been an editor for over two decades,) but these things we write are still our take on things.  Having said that, I hope that some of what I talk about can guide you and shed some light on things that might be to date, as clear as mud.

So take a journey with me through the wonderful world of tenses. If you are writing from the first person's POV (point of view), then you will likely be writing predominantly in the present tense, with a possible smattering of past and past perfect. If you are writing from the third person's or narrator's POV, you'll be writing in a mixture of past and past perfect.

Present: walk, run, fumble, explode, sympathize.
Past: walked, ran, fumbled, exploded, sympathized.
Past Perfect: had walked, had run, had fumbled, had exploded, had sympathized.

The easiest way to explain it is if you're writing in the third person, or narrator's voice, using the past tense denotes what is happening as you read the book. Past Perfect is used to tell a story within the story, or to tell about something that happened before the "present" in the book.  I'm not talking about present as in using present tense verbs, but rather, what is happening as you read. Past can describe something habitual or repeated, whereas past perfect can also describe an action that has ended and will not likely be repeated.

 "Listened" is in the past, but when writing in third person, that talks about what the person is doing in the story as you are reading it. "She listened at the door, and the sound came again."  When you read this, you understand that it's happening.  The sound could come again as you are watching the scene unfold.  Her listening didn't end.

However, if it was something that happened in the current story's past (like at breakfast earlier in the morning), or only happened once, and then stopped happening, the perfect is used.  "She had placed the coat in the closet and had forgotten about it."  She did this a long time ago, and it was done with.  The action was not going to repeat itself, it was complete.

Part of it is using context of the rest of the paragraph or chapter to explain which to use.  If a chapter mentions something about time context, like Sabrina was washing dishes after supper, (and then she has a flashback or the story talks about what she did earlier that day),  the washing dishes part (the story's current present as it is happening now), would be washed, but the verbs in the flashback or description of earlier would be perfect: she had made breakfast for everyone that morning.

In any histories of your characters, it should all be past perfect.  had been, had lived, had moved, etc.  It was long ago in the past, and it's no longer happening, nor is it likely to repeat itself, it's complete.

All of the present things happening currently in the book should be washed, slept, changed etc. because that is still happening as the story is unfolding.

I find the best way to really explain what might be confusing concepts, is through examples.  It's easier to understand something if we can experience it and see it working. I was doing some editing of my own work, and I came across a passage that I thought might explain better the past and past perfect.

Master Zalice held in his hands a little wooden box with decorated metal bands across the top.  It was the same box he had procured from Cal’s trunk just after the boy had left.  He hadn’t stolen it, well not exactly.  It happened to have been his box in the first place.  He had just retrieved it from Cal’s room when the boy had gone. Thankfully, he had interrupted the child before he had had a chance to examine the contents that lay within.

As you can see, the first line is what is happening in the book's present tense, it's what's happening in the story now.  (it's written as past tense held, because it is written in the third person.  But as you read it, you know that this part of the story is unfolding as you are reading it.)  Then, the tense changes to past perfect, had procured, had left, hadn't, have been, had retrieved, had interrupted, had had... because the story tells about something that happened prior to this "present" time in the story. (It happened a day or two earlier).

So to sum up, if your book is written in third person, the tense to use when describing what is happening as you read, or of what is going on is past tense:

Sabrina walked to the table and sat down.

When you are telling about something that had already happened before the "right now" of your storytelling, i.e. about a character's past, or about something that had happened earlier in the day or earlier in the week, that is when had and had been are used:

She had been a wreck that morning, with great knots in her hair and mascara trails that had run down her face.  She had brushed her hair for almost an hour, and had scrubbed her face with a warm wash cloth. That had felt good, but it was only with a force of will that she had been able to make herself presentable before breakfast.