Freelance Writer and Social Worker

Fiction Writers - 10 Resources to Help You with Character Names

Naming your characters can be almost as hard as naming your kids--or so I've been told. I don't have kids. What I do have is experience gently rubbing my aching temples in the wee hours of the morning as I try to think of the perfect name for my villain or as I wonder half-hysterically if I can really tolerate writing 300 pages about a character named Priscilla Louisa.

At these moments, character naming resources come in very handy. The 10 I've listed are my personal favorites, but feel free to add yours in the comments section. I'm always happy for new ideas!

1. Baby Names for the New Century: A Comprehensive Multicultural Guide to Finding the Perfect Name for Your Baby, by Pamela Samuelson (HarperTorch, 1994). I was surprised to see that this book had a rather average ranking on Amazon, because I've been using it for years. It contains a ton of names along with their derivatives and origins. Unfortunately, it's getting a little dated now--it was, after all, published almost 20 years ago--but I still use it on a regular basis.

2. The Baby Name Wizard: A Magical Method for Finding the Perfect Name for Your Baby, by Laura Wattenberg (Three Rivers Press, 2005). There are many things I like about this book, including the graphs that show dips and rises in the name's popularity and the suggestions for sibling names that match the name being discussed.

3. Baby Names Made Easy: The Complete Reverse-Dictionary of Baby Names, by Amanda Elizabeth Barden (Touchstone, 2009). This very helpful book allows you to look up names by their meanings. If you enjoy using character names with a symbolic touch, this is an excellent resource for you.

4. A is for Atticus: Baby Names from Great Books, by Lorilee Craker (Center Street, 2008). Granted, this book isn't as comprehensive as some other books of baby/character names, but it does a great job of suggesting literary names from the obvious to the obscure. Especially helpful if you're trying to decide on a name for a teenage character whose parents are both English professors.

My Favorite Freelance Writing Posts

Isn't it a shame that when you write a blog some of your best posts slip away into obscurity. (Then, of course, there are the posts that truly should slip away into obscurity, but that's a different story.)

Anyway, this week I was feeling a little nostalgic, and maybe a little lazy as well, and decided to rerun some of my favorite posts from the last year or so. If you missed the originals, I hope you'll find something amusing or something informative in these selections.

1. 25 Strategies for Smashing Through Writer's Block. No, I'm not going to take the time to argue about whether there is any such thing as writer's block. Whatever we want to call it, most of us have had times when we're simply stuck, and these tips can help.

2. Freelance Writers: 7 Tips for Caring for Your Hands, Wrists, and Arms. We may not be professional athletes, but we still rely on our bodies to make a living. If you aren't already, start treating those hands with kid gloves.

3. Dear Debra - A Letter to My Sixteen Year Old Self. My personal favorite blog posts. I just wish someone really had been around when I was 16 to give me that advice!

5 Things Stephen King's "Misery" Taught Me about Writing

Stephen King's book On Writing has helped a generation of writers find ways to express their ideas. I loved it, and it's always one of the first books I recommend to newbies.

I have to confess, though, that I learned even more about writing from another book of King's. A novel. Misery.

For those unfamiliar with the plot, it's about a writer, Paul Sheldon, and his biggest fan. Paul's historical romance series about an empty-headed character named Misery has made him a fortune but shredded his self-respect.

Finally, in self-defense, Paul decides he must kill Misery. She will die in childbirth. Unfortunately for him, just as Paul's final Misery novel is released, Paul is involved in a horrible car accident in middle-of-nowhere Colorado.

Annie Wilkes, the nurse who saves his life and brings him to her home to heal just happens to be his number one fan who is so looking forward to reading the new Misery book. She just loves Misery.

And when she finds out that Paul has murdered her favorite character, her vengeance is swift and brutal. She buys an old, manual typewriter, slams the still-critically-injured Paul in front of it, and orders him to write Misery back to life.

Or else.

Here's what I learned from this nail-biter of a book.

1. You can write under any circumstances. Paul writes with two shattered legs and while he is under the addictive influence of pain killers. He writes when he's scared, thirsty, hungry, tired. He even writes after certain parts of his anatomy have been removed during Annie's rages. And I was complaining the other day about having to write with a migraine? Wow.

9 Pieces of Writing Advice I Wish I'd Never Heard

When you're considering a writing career, everyone wants to give you advice or tell you horror stories about the friend of a friend who tried to become a writer and ended up starving to death in her lonely apartment.

Aside from the scary stories (and I suspect they're told by the same people who like to regale first-time mums with tales of agonizing labor), I think most of what is said is well-intentioned. But is it accurate? Not always. There are a few pieces I wish I'd never heard. Here are some of my favorites.

1. Don't Quit Your Day Job

While it's true that you don't want to go rushing into the literary world without a plan, it's also true that if you want to live as a writer, you're going to have to make the plunge someday. Don't spend precious time waiting for the exact minute when all the stars are aligned and the wind is coming from the right direction. If you must follow some advice, why not make it the advice from the Broadway musical, Wicked? Just close your eyes...and leap!

2. Write What You Know

Do you know that Edgar Rice Burroughs, the creator of the Tarzan stories, never once set foot in Africa? For that matter, it's a pretty sure bet that he never went to Mars, either. And J.K. Rowling certainly didn't visit Hogwarts before her writing brought it into existence. Writing only what you know is dull. Write what you're passionate about and what you're eager to learn. Write the story you must tell. Everything else will work itself out.

3. Don't Tell Anyone About Your Project

It's true that some writers spend so much time telling others about their work that they never put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and create anything. But as long as you're writing, don't be shy about letting others know about your project. You never know when someone else may help you come up with the perfect plot twist or provide information on a subject you don't know much about.

Fiction Writing: Why Two Sets of Eyes Are Better Than One

After sending out a few manuscripts with embarrassing errors, I promised myself that I would never again hit the "send" key until at least one of my beta readers had looked at the manuscript and assured me the piece was good to go.

At first, I felt kind of silly about needing an editor--after all, I am an editor!

But after writing a manuscript, editing it, rewriting it, re-editing it, and so forth, it isn't long before all the words start to look like one big blur. They don't even resemble English anymore. That's when I pass the manuscript on to friends so that they can work their magic.

The errors they find are usually small and easily corrected--a typo here, a case of verb confusion there. But there have been instances when a beta reader has saved me some truly cringe-worthy moments. On reader--bless her!--caught the fact that one of my female characters had been pregnant for nearly two years straight. Another pointed out that my female protagonist "Kerry" became "Carrie" about two-thirds of the way through my story.

Finding a Beta Reader

It's great if you have a nearby friend who's willing to edit your work. If you can't locate anyone locally, perhaps you can find a writing group or a critique buddy online. If you strike out there, you may decide that hiring an experienced fiction editor is worth your money.

For instance, I work with writers who are just starting out as well as with those who have been in the business for years and just want a quick once-over before submitting their manuscripts.

To meet the needs of all my clients, I offer two levels of editing.

To Swear or Not to Swear?

Unfortunately, I happen to be very fluent in French, and not the kind that they speak in Paris. My French is more along the lines of  "[vile swear word]...oops, pardon my French."

This tendency has gotten me into some pretty embarrassing situations. When I was in my early 20s, for instance, I was driving one of my young nephews to the park when another driver cut me off so sharply that I had to slam on the brakes to avoid an accident. I won't tell you exactly what I said, but to this day, more than 20 years later, my nephew can still repeat every cringe-worthy word of it. Let's just say that I didn't win any Aunt of the Year awards for that one.

Strong language in my writing has occasionally become an issue as well. Obviously, there are some venues where it is verboten. Even I know better than to cuss like a sailor when I'm writing grants, white papers, academic pieces, and church newsletters.

But a few months ago, I was writing a case study and used the word "dammit" as part of a quotation. The editor asked me to please remove the profanity and, red faced, I did as she requested.

How to Handle a Bad Review

If you write for any length of time and if you allow others to see your work, it will happen--you'll get a bad review. I've had editing and coaching clients call me practically hysterical because their books got a one-star rating on Amazon. I've also felt the pain of poor ratings and criticisms that seem unfairly harsh.

My knee-jerk response is to quote one of my favorite Clint Eastwood lines, "Opinions are like a**holes. Everybody has one."

But bad reviews can cut deep, and it's a good idea to develop a strategy for handling them with grace. The following ideas have worked for me.

1. Acknowledge your feelings. Share your pain, anger, and disappointment with someone you trust, or pour your feelings out to your pet or your journal. Some people find that physical activity like taking a brisk walk or rearranging the living room furniture can help to discharge painful feelings.

2. Don't retaliate. One of the worst things you can do is flame the reviewer or leave an angry or defensive message on the reviewer's blog explaining why the review was unfair. You won't change the reviewer's opinion of your book, and you'll make yourself appear childish and insecure in the eyes of others.

New Year's Plans

I made my last New Year's Resolution about ten years ago. It was a resolution to stop making New Year's Resolutions, and it was the only one I ever kept.

Now I prefer to say that I make New Year's plans, which means I sit down and think about what I want to bring into my life--and sometimes expel from my life--during the coming year. This year, I have ten New Year's plans, and since many of them involve my writing career, I thought it would be appropriate to share them on this blog.

1. Trust My Instincts

Every time I've run into a problem in my personal life or my work life, it's been because I ignored my gut instincts and went with "logic" instead. Years ago, one of my psychology professors gave his class this bit of advice: Statistically, women answer more questions correctly on an exam if they stick with the first answer that pops into their minds. Men, on the other hand, do better if they go back and change answers when they have second thoughts. My goal this year is to trust my hunches more than my self doubts.

2. Believe in My Ability to Achieve

Zig Ziglar once said, "If you aim at nothing, you're sure to hit it every time." This year, I plan to set goals that challenge me to step outside my comfort zone and shoot for the stars.

3. Laugh More

It's easy to take life far too seriously for one's own good. This year I plan to find something that makes me laugh every day.

7 Things I Learned from Winning NaNoWriMo

November might mean Thanksgiving and black Friday to the uninitiated, but writers know it is National Novel Writing Month. Between 12:01 AM on November 1 and 11:59 PM on November 30, thousands of authors all over the world commit themselves to writing a 50,000 word novel.

2011 marked my first year as a NaNoWriMo participant. At 9:00 AM on November 30, I confirmed my word count at 50,200. I won!

So, what did I learn from my successful participation in NaNoWriMo? Actually, quite a lot.

1. Free-writing is fun.

In order to pound out 50,000 words in a single month, you have to put a choke collar on your inner editor and just allow the words to flow however they like. The results might cause your high school English teacher to faint in horror, but I guarantee you will have more fun--and more ideas for your fiction--than you've had in ages.

2. Procrastination = Pain

You can complete a 50,000-word novel at the relatively sedate pace of 1667 words per day. Or, you can do what I did, blow off a bunch of days, and then spend the day before zero hour writing 9000 words in an effort to catch up. Ow.

Three Outrageous Ideas to Jump-Start Stalled Fiction

As most of you know, I've been participating in the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) this November. Even though I started out from what I thought was a comprehensive outline, my characters soon took on a life of their own and simply refused to do what I wanted them to.

I began writing myself into corners and getting stuck on major plot points. Luckily, one of the first rules of NaNo is that the inner editor goes into a kennel for a month. That means you're free to change-up main characters, switch from first-person to third-person narration, or even skip a scene that isn't working and move on to something else.

It also means that you can let your imagination roam free as it tries to find ways to get your plot going again. If you're novel is way off course, and the strong characters who talked you into abandoning your outline in the first place have fallen stubbornly silent, it's time to take drastic action. The suggestions below probably won't make it into your final draft, but they will get your creative juices flowing again and force docile characters to do something besides sit and ruminate.