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It’s a rough world out there right now, job-wise.

It’s even rough for characters in manuscripts. I’ve found that if one of my characters isn’t doing their job in telling the story, then it’s time for them to get canned.

After all, we don’t have all the time in the world to just let a story meander around. If I’ve written a character in, they need to perform. Some of them need to create conflict for my protagonist (like the interfering son who won’t let my sleuth do her investigating.) Some of them need to provide clues or red herrings for my detective. Some need to be killed, some need to be murderers, and some of them need to be bystanders….but even the bystanders have a job to do. They should be entertaining or colorful in some way.

I need quieter characters, too—like Ratty and Mole in The Wind in the Willows. They were gentle, quiet creatures—and great foils for Toad. Some of my characters are straight-men for my funny protagonist. Some of them are sounding boards so my sleuth isn’t having long conversations with herself, wondering who the killer is.

But if I have a character that isn’t really doing anything, or if they’re just kind of hanging out in my manuscript without a purpose, it’s time for them to get their pink slips. Let them mess up someone else’s manuscript.

Do not put statements in the negative form. And don’t start sentences with a conjunction. If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do. Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all. De-accession euphemisms. If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is. Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky. Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague. ~William Safire, “Great Rules of Writing”

Sorry for the long quotation, but I just love that bit by Safire. Right now I’ve got three totally different things going on (hope this won’t be news to either of my publishers). I’m editing a completed manuscript, writing a first draft for a different series, and gearing up to promote an August release.

I thought I’d surely say that the promotional stuff is the worst out of the three, but I think the editing/revision has won out.

Actually, I frequently break many of Safire’s rules. I guess my style of writing is colloquial….or chatty. It’s conversational, at any rate. I frequently have fragments in dialogue or in narrative, I’ll start with conjunctions, and end with linking verbs. I was an English major and know these things are real boo-boos, but no one has stopped me yet. I mean, editors have really revised my writing, but not the stuff I thought they might go after.

This makes me wonder….are the rules changing? Are we relaxing some of our grammatical and style standards? And why aren’t I feeling horrified if that’s true? I’m definitely a word nerd and I keep thinking I should shape up, but when I follow the rules (particularly in dialogue), my text sounds really stiff.

Here are some fun sites for all the other word nerds out there:

On Twitter: GrammarCops

Blogs: Grammar Cops (Blog) , Apostrophe Abuse, Wordsplosion, The Cliche Slayer, Gr8Grammar

Lately I’ve really paid attention when I’ve had an “aha!” moment when talking to people. You know the kind of moment: one minute you’re having a boring conversation with a mom about the snack schedule for soccer practice—and then you happen to notice she has a Grateful Dead tattoo.

Maybe there is something about an acquaintance that really gets under your skin. They’re chronically late, but always blame it on a litany of unlikely occurrences. Or your friend frequently gets annoying songs stuck in his head and keeps singing the tunes so they’re now stuck in your head. Or your plumber has an odd take on news events that’s very different from everyone else: “Well, the reason General Motors is in so much trouble is because our military is spread all over the world trying to fix other people’s problems.” Uh…right.

How about the people who have a completely different side of them? The “Clark Kent” syndrome. One minute she’s a mild-mannered banker, then she gets off work and joins her friends to see Rocky Horror Picture Show for the 4,000th time.

When I’m with someone and they’re either really fascinating me by throwing me a complete curveball (I didn’t know they lived at a commune before they became church-going choir members!) or they’re doing something I find really annoying (you’re chewing gum? At a funeral? And blowing bubbles?) I pay attention. I write it down. Maybe I can use it to flesh out a character. Maybe I can use it to create a bit character. But these types of encounters really spotlight how different we all are from each other…and that’s worth writing about.

I’m definitely a morning person. I get up at 5:00 each morning, if not before. Actually, I’m up most of the night, but that’s the insomnia thing.

Because of this schedule, I find I’m most productive first thing in the morning. That’s when my writing flows fastest and when I’m more creative.

In afternoon, I’ve already switched to mindless housework (laundry, straightening up, wiping down counters and bathrooms).

By evening, I’m pretty much done. I watch the news, read a book, shoot emails, and go to bed (I get my best sleep before 1:00 A.M., then the insomnia kicks in.)

Today, I’m going to try to switch this completely around.

Can it be done? I have no idea. But my daughter is having a sleep-over here tonight, and the girls will be up really late. I need to be up late too, and I thought I may as well get some good writing time in while the girls were occupied with movies, nail painting, and Barbies.

This means, though, that I will be writing at night. And I’m not a night writer.

I’m curious to see how this experiment goes. Are there many night writers out there? Do you write in both morning and evening?

The Devil in Manuscript: Nathaniel Hawthorne

“I do believe,” said he, soberly, “or, at least, I could believe, if I chose, that there is a devil in this pile of blotted papers.”

I was having a conversation with my online author friend Galen Kindley, and the topic of abandoned manuscripts came up.

Does everyone have a book graveyard at their house? Either a manuscript that they gave up on (or got disgusted with) or a novel they bought and intended to read until it started dragging in the early chapters?

Even Samuel Clemens had an abandoned work-in-progress: a nonfiction book on England that he was trying to write at the same time as Tom Sawyer. Can you imagine? Writing Tom Sawyer would be draining enough.

Sometimes I’ll wonder if I’ll ever go back to these rusty old projects of mine. I’m thinking no. Maybe the original idea was a good one—I know it must have been one that I was originally excited about, or I wouldn’t have started writing. But at some point I realized it stunk. I hate to put it so bluntly, but there it is.

What made Samuel Clemens give up? Did he read another author’s fabulous account of England and realize his came up lacking in comparison? Did he just take on too much at one time? Was he more excited about his Tom Sawyer WIP (who wouldn’t have been?)

Here’s what made me give up on the projects in my graveyard:

My protagonists didn’t have “it.” They simply weren’t interesting enough to carry a story.

The plot didn’t have a hook. It was too derivative of similar books in that genre.

I’d written myself into a huge hole. I do this with other books, but can always write my way out of them. But with these books, I was so disgusted with the WIP by that point that I let my protagonist live eternally in my plot hole.

Do you have a manuscript graveyard?