Author: Elizabeth Spann Craig

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

One of the hardest things for me, starting out as a novelist, was internal dialogue.

Mysteries require the sleuth to mull things over. I really struggled over how to make these passages work. I tried putting thoughts in italics. I tried writing in first person. I tried showing thoughts through the character’s actions and dialogue with other characters.

I must have scrapped fifty or more pages of rotten internal dialogue. It all seemed like it would jerk a reader right out of the book.

I think this is one of those areas where the more we write, the more we get comfortable (and maybe different approaches work with different writers.) I thought I’d share what works for me now:

Deep POV: Deep point-of-view puts readers inside the character’s head for an intimate view of his world. While you’re in this character’s head, you can look at the world through his eyes (noting the kinds of things he would find striking or interesting or irritating or disconcerting and remark on them in that character’s voice and using his vocabulary.) In deep POV, you can also get rid of words like thought, wondered, and knew since the reader understands that they’re reading from that character’s perspective. The reader sees, hears, and notices only what that character would. It’s also a great way to show instead of tell (Her heart pounded instead of Judy was frightened, etc.)

I like fantasy writer Juliette Wade’s checklist for Deep POV. And writer Terry Odell has a quick trick for making sure you’re staying in deep POV:

To “test” yourself: Substitute “I” for “he” (or the character’s name) in a scene. Is there anyone else sneaking in there?

Sidekicks: Too much straight narrative usually makes me want to skim, so I try to interrupt it with dialogue when I’m writing. One way to know what a character is thinking is by having that character bounce ideas off of another character…a sidekick. In mysteries, this sidekick can be a Dr. Watson or a Captain Hastings type who actually helps with solving the case, but in your genre, this could be a best friend, spouse, parent, child—you get the idea.

How do you handle internal dialogue? Do you use much of it in your books?

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

Recently I was asked for tips on writing humor.  My books are billed as humorous cozies and the person emailing me asked if I could share some techniques.

I think that’s a tough subject to tackle, actually.  In person, I have a more dry sense of humor—I’m definitely not that much of a funny person unless I’m telling a story.  When I’m writing, I’m usually working with a particular type of humor…character based.  Let me use Saturday as an example (and we all have days like this.)

I’ve mentioned before that my ten year old daughter is absolutely obsessed with horses.  I don’t share the obsession, but I’m happy to facilitate her horse fixes (to a point!  My husband and I keep insisting we won’t become horse owners.)

She was set on going to the Carolina Cup steeplechase race on Saturday, so I bought a couple of tickets and packed a lunch and we were off.

I knew, though, that the entire situation was fraught with danger.  She was so determined to watch the horses.  This meant that the universe would conspire for her not to see the horses.

And, sure enough, problems arose right away.  The website directions from Charlotte to Camden, SC weren’t clear and took us off in the wrong direction.  I finally turned on my GPS and got us heading in the right direction.  And we ended up getting there fairly late and ended up having to park with the college kids who’d come with their kegs.

Because we’d parked so far away, it was about 3/4 of a mile to reach the main course.  We had to cross the infield and stamp through the tall grass.  As we got closer to the course, the spectators grew older and banquets were laid out with fine silver.  This was all ignored by my daughter, intent on the horses. 

We got as close as we possibly could.  I squinted at the grandstand and asked a staff member, “Can we sit there?  I see seats.  My daughter wants to see the horses.”

“If you have $650 a person.”

I decided we would just get as close as we could aside from being in the grandstand.

Of course, I’d forgotten to bring the folding chairs from the trunk.  I told her to stay put and not to talk to strangers and I trotted back the 3/4 mile to the car.  As I was returning, still running, with the chairs, they closed off the gates to the infield I needed to cross…because the horses were running through.  This, naturally, added another 20 minutes to my trip back…and when I returned she told me in exasperation that a crowd of people had come up to ask her if she’d “lost her mommy.”  They wouldn’t stop worrying over her and coddling her and she’d had a difficult time craning her head to see the course.

Between the bacchanalian shenanigans of the college students who occasionally staggered up to see the horses and blocked our view, friendly and well-meaning spectators who tried striking up conversation with my doll-like-diminutive and grimly focused daughter, I was hiding a smile most of the day.  If I’d been writing a book, these would have been the basic components for a humorous scene: the serious little girl, ferociously intent on the horses and the world working against her.

Character based humor is my favorite kind of humor.  It’s easy to write and doesn’t only create humor—it also makes for conflict (a gentler sort) and character development, too.

Even easier is a comic foil for the protagonist—someone who will put the character in these humorous situations on a regular basis: what we saw in The Odd Couple with Felix and Oscar.

What made Lucy and Ethel’s struggle in the candy factory so funny?  One reason was that they were so earnest about doing well but completely unsuited for the job they were facing. Because they were so serious about making a paycheck, the day’s unraveling and their horror at it, made the situation funnier and funnier.

This is as close as I can come to explaining my approach to humor, but I’m interested in hearing yours.  Do you write humorous scenes into your books?  Have any tips?

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

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First of all, I want to thank the folks at Writer’s Digest for putting this blog in their list of 101 Best Websites for Writers for 2012. It’s much appreciated.

Today I thought I’d kick around the topic of endings again…since they’re my nemesis and I’m dealing with them now. :) Beginnings are something that I have absolutely no problem with. I almost always open with dialogue that deals with a problem resulting from the mystery or the future victim.

But endings drive me a little crazy. I’m turning in a manuscript in May and I’m done with it so I thought I’d give it a couple of days to just marinate while I worked on my next project.

I decided I wasn’t crazy about my ending for the book. It ended on a bit of a down-note. I didn’t think that would be very popular with my readers since I always end on an up-note. I have, for the first time, put in a series subplot and it was the subplot that created this down ending.

I’ve got to be vague here since obviously this isn’t a book that’s even going to hit the shelves until spring 2013. Basically, I wanted to keep the ending for the subplot, but I wanted to extend the book’s ending so that there’s something positive happening at the end of the book (and so readers will want to read book three!)

What I did was to make some lists…my favorite way to work through plot problems or to generate plot ideas. To come up with an alternate/extended ending I:

Made a list of as many possible endings for the book that I could come up with. These ranged from the sublime to the completely ridiculous. The idea was just to come up with options and to get my creative juices going. No, aliens are not going to come down and take up the citizens of Dappled Hills in their spaceship. Brainstorm as many as you can, even if you get an idea that you like. Especially if you get an idea that you like, because you may find that you can come up with an even better one.

Took another look at various subplots in my story while brainstorming my list. One of my subplots involved membership for the protagonist’s quilting guild, for instance. Another involved a newcomer trying to fit in to the cliquey small town. I realized I could combine the two subplots to create an ending that would also lead into the next book in the series.

Brainstormed ways to connect to the theme of the book. I’ve got a couple of different themes running in the series—as basic as quilting and the fabric of friendship and as complex as adjusting to life changes and aging. It’s always a good idea to check back with your themes and look for tie-ins at the end.

Those are what works for me and for my genre. But for other books, I’ve seen writers plant doubt, hint at future conflict, and create a change through a secondary character and his interaction with the protagonist.

Do you have a tough time with endings? How do you create resolution at the end of your story?