Today over on Romance University, I answered a question about writing a scene in which the pov character overhears a phone call. Our own friend Murphy provided the question. Check it out!
Posting on this blog should pick up speed again over the next week or so. I've been in major triage on a project which should be wrapped by the end of today, and Alicia is on the road. Thanks for your patience.
Theresa
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Got Editing Questions?
If you have an editing question you'd like us to address, feel free to send it to rasley at gmail dot com. We like reader questions because they save us from having to think up post topics on our own. ;)
Readers' Choice for Top Ten Blog Posts
- 1. Top Ten Reasons the Editor Doesn't Love What Your Critique Group Loves
- 2. How to Put It Together Into One Neat Tweet
- 3. Marks of the Amateur - Starting a List
- 4. When Unnamed Characters Speak
- 5. Character-Driven/Plot-Driven
- 6. The Words Not Spoken, the Steps Not Taken
- 7. This Was in the Comments, But It's a Great Question, So Let's Discuss--
- 8. Dialogue Tags
- 9. Enjambment in Fiction
- 10. Thoughts on Pacing - Nothing Brilliant
Readers' Choice for Best Series by Alicia
Readers' Choice for Best Series by Theresa
Readers' Choice for Best Series by Both Editors
Theresa's Dubious Honor
Useful Sites for Writers
Blog Archive
When Theresa's not reading manuscripts, she's reading:
Labels
- action (26)
- active prose (12)
- acts (1)
- adjectives (10)
- advanced stuff (1)
- advanced training (1)
- adverbs (10)
- advice (2)
- agents (4)
- agreement (3)
- alliteration (1)
- American vs. British English (2)
- antagonist (3)
- antiheroes (12)
- art (1)
- audiobooks (1)
- author (2)
- author rights (1)
- authorial negation (3)
- authority (2)
- backstory (7)
- body parts (7)
- books (1)
- books we read (37)
- call to action (1)
- causation (4)
- chapters (2)
- character (81)
- characters (3)
- classes (2)
- classics (3)
- clauses (10)
- climax (2)
- coherence (1)
- coincidence (1)
- comedy (8)
- commas (10)
- concrete (1)
- conferences (20)
- conflict (18)
- conjunctions (5)
- contests (33)
- contracts (1)
- copy editing (9)
- Critique (1)
- Critique groups (7)
- danglers (7)
- deep pov (28)
- deep stuff (25)
- denouement (1)
- description (22)
- detail (4)
- details (1)
- deuteragonist (1)
- dialect (4)
- dialogue (38)
- dialogue beats (7)
- dialogue tags (6)
- direct publishing (9)
- double negatives (1)
- ebooks (3)
- editing (24)
- editors (24)
- electronic reading (1)
- ellipses (3)
- emotion (27)
- endings (15)
- epilogues (2)
- ETIQUETTE (1)
- examples (62)
- excerpts (1)
- exercises (23)
- exposition (13)
- eyes (2)
- fairy tale (1)
- feedback (1)
- film (13)
- first person pov (5)
- first sentence (1)
- flashback (4)
- foils (6)
- foreshadowing (1)
- formatting (1)
- frames (1)
- freewriting (2)
- fun stuff (5)
- future of story (2)
- genre (6)
- gerunds (1)
- goals (1)
- grammar (52)
- guest post (5)
- headhopping (2)
- hero (9)
- hooks (1)
- horror (1)
- horror books (1)
- hyphens (3)
- idea (1)
- inciting incident (1)
- innovation (2)
- interior monologue (9)
- internal conflict (1)
- irish (1)
- irony (3)
- journal (1)
- Kindle (4)
- life (3)
- line editing (63)
- links (36)
- lists (4)
- log lines (16)
- manuscript (1)
- mark of the amateur (11)
- melodrama (1)
- memoir (1)
- memory (1)
- metafiction (1)
- metaphor (4)
- middle (1)
- modals (1)
- modifiers (14)
- motif (9)
- motivation (7)
- multiple POV (4)
- mystery (4)
- names (4)
- nano (2)
- narration (1)
- narrative (8)
- narrative summary (6)
- new media (1)
- nouns (5)
- omniscient (2)
- openings (60)
- ordinary world (7)
- other (42)
- outline (2)
- pacing (12)
- paragraphs (37)
- participial phrases (23)
- participles (3)
- passive voice (9)
- past participles (3)
- Pen Olympics (18)
- pennames (1)
- perception (1)
- personal (7)
- phrases (1)
- pitching (28)
- plot (64)
- plotting (3)
- poetry (16)
- poetry plotting deep thoughts (1)
- polls (2)
- possessive (1)
- POV (51)
- POV contest (11)
- PR (14)
- predicates (5)
- prepositions (8)
- principles (1)
- productivity (14)
- progressive verbs (1)
- prologue (5)
- promotion (3)
- pronouns (11)
- proofreading (2)
- prose (5)
- protagonist (12)
- publishing (1)
- publishing industry (93)
- punchlines (1)
- punctuation (33)
- query letters (15)
- quotations (1)
- quotes from writers (1)
- read and revise like an editor (2)
- reader expectations (5)
- readers (2)
- redlines (12)
- reinventing (4)
- rejections (4)
- relative clauses (3)
- reversals (6)
- reviews (2)
- revising (8)
- revision (5)
- revision letters (8)
- romance (8)
- rule (1)
- rules (4)
- scene (3)
- scene charts (1)
- scenes (58)
- scenes pov setting emotion character (1)
- secondary characters (4)
- self-publishing (2)
- semicolons (2)
- sense of smell (4)
- sentence combining (5)
- sentence construction (2)
- sentence fragments (10)
- sentence structure (37)
- sentences (89)
- sequels (3)
- sequence (2)
- series - Alicia's sample line edits (45)
- series - Johnny and Drago (8)
- series- ongoing rants on PPPs (9)
- setting (31)
- settings (1)
- short stories (1)
- short stories Plot structure (1)
- show don't tell (5)
- simile (1)
- slang (1)
- smart stuff (2)
- sound (1)
- stephen king (1)
- story (7)
- stream of consciousness (2)
- structure (33)
- style (7)
- subject/verb agreement (2)
- submissions (57)
- subordinate clauses (4)
- subplots (3)
- subtext (10)
- symbolism (1)
- synopsis (11)
- syntax (2)
- teaching (1)
- tech (1)
- technique (1)
- tense (5)
- tension (3)
- terms (1)
- theme (24)
- thought (1)
- thought tags (1)
- three acts (1)
- tone (1)
- topic sentences (1)
- transitions (6)
- tritagonist (1)
- turning points (1)
- TV shows (23)
- typography (5)
- usage (10)
- verbs (27)
- villains (3)
- vocabulary (2)
- voice (50)
- word choice (1)
- words (41)
- workshop (5)
- worldview (2)
- writer control (1)
- writer's block (3)
- writers (3)
- writing advice (1)
- writing process (3)
Posts
3 comments:
Holy crap! :D I'm heading over. (hehehe)
Thanks T!
Wow, this is so enlightening! I liked Murphy's scene but then I read your comments and could see how it could be made much stronger. It was like suddenly being handed roadmap from good writing to awesome!
Dang, that Murphy is a dynamo! She'll make it. Soon we'll see her name in print.
Great tips, Theresa, on how to structure the scene.
That type of scene was used effectively in several Humphrey Bogart movies, particularly the Maltise Falcon as I recall. Garrison Keillor still uses it on Prairie Home Companion.
Wes
Post a Comment