My Journey to a Book Contract - Part 6 Deep Point of View

by Elva Cobb Martin

Part 6 - Master Deep Point of View (DPOV)

I highly recommend you purchase a copy of Rivet Your Readers with Deep Point of View by Jill Elizabeth Nelson! It is a small book but a great help in mastering DPOV.

DPOV draws the reader into the arms and head of your character.

Mastering DPOV often eliminates most problems with show/don’t tell and italics.

Here are some quick pointers:

♦  Never say he/she thought, felt, knew, wondered, realized, decided. 

Simply write what it is.

    Wrong: He understood how much this would mean to her. He knew she’d be worried.

    Right: This would mean a  lot to her. She would be worried.

♦  Don’t name the emotion, describe it instead.

     

     Shallow: Jealousy flashed through me.

     Deep: Heat boiled my insides. If that wimp could win a trophy, where was mine?

♦  Describe physical effects on the body: 

         Anger: His hands formed into fists.

       Nervous: Sweat popped out on his palms. His throat closed.

♦  Ditch Prepositional telling phrases (of, with, in)

     

     Shallow: Desiree’s skin prickled with pleasant excitement.

      Deep: Shadows deepened. The place reeked of ancient secrets.   Desi's skin prickled.

♦  Don’t use he/she saw, tasted, smelled, heard. Simply state what he saw, tasted, smelled or heard.

     Shallow: He could see the tip of the dog’s nose peeking out of the                            closet.

     Deep: The tip of the dog’s nose peeked out of the closet.

     Shallow: He tasted bile. 

     Deep: Bile rose in his throat.

Do you have some tips to help master DPOV? Please leave a comment and share on your social media if this blog helped you.

Elva Cobb Martin

Before You Hit the Send Button to an Editor

by Elva Cobb Martin @elvacobbmartin 

At the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers' Conference in May I received a request for a full manuscript after pitching my inspirational historical romance, In a Pirate's Debt, to an editor.

I am so glad I had the forethought to tell her that I'd have it to her by June 5 instead of immediately. I wanted to troll back through it ONE more time. Actually, I've just gone through it two more times. I feel like I've backstroked across the Caribbean!

Here are some things I looked at carefully, besides misspelled words, grammar and punctuation:

1) The first and last pages - for hook and HEA ending with hint of Book 2

2) Deep POV: I didn't want to use she "heard, thought         wondered, felt" (Just  give the thing heard, thought, felt)
      Ex. She heard the boy call him Captain.
            The boy called him Captain.
      Ex. She wondered who he really was.
            Who was Captain Lucas Bloodstone Barrett?

3) Ellipses: space-dot-space-dot-space-dot-space (four spaces,         3 dots) And do not use many ellipses!
       "But . . . Arundel!"
       "Are you hurt? Did he . . .?" 

4) Keep all dialog, action, action beats, thoughts of each character in the same paragraph unless interrupted by other speaker.

5) Avoid ing verb forms and over use of prepositional phrases.
    Ex. He must pursue his goal of finding out about his mother.
     He must pursue his goal. He would find out what happened.

6) Use contractions in dialog and thoughts to make them flow.

7) Watch for POV slips.

8) Watch for telling!

9) NOTE: To use Find and Replace to change the spelling of a name throughout the ms, be sure to put a space before and after both words in the Find slot and the Replace slot. Otherwise, words with the same letters will be skewed up. Example: I had to change Captain Ned Lowe to "Low." I did not put the spaces in and all the words in my ms with "low" in them (slowed, followed) got messed up.Whew. ( :

10) Last, I did an msword spelling and grammar check and it caught some things I had missed in spite of everything. ( :

Finally, I hit the send button and knew how baby Moses' mother felt when she sent him off in that basket.

Do you have some other items you always check when editing your novel?  Please leave a comment.

Thanks for stopping by.

Elva Cobb Martin

Write Small - Five Ways to Make a Reader Care - Guest post

 Hope you enjoy this guest post by Mia Botha today! --Elva Cobb Martin

Guest Post by Mia Botha:

I have found my new all-time, favorite writing advice:

'The bigger the issue, the smaller you write. Remember that. You don't write about the horrors of war. No. You write about a kid's burnt socks lying on the road. You pick the smallest manageable part of the big thing, and you work off the resonance.' ~Richard Price

I love this quote. You may have come across it before, but I saw it on Pinterest last week and I have been staring at it since. Think of the best stories - you always remember the small details.

Often, when I teach, I listen to students talking of the great stories they want to write. They want to write about wars where hundreds of lives are lost, marriages that end in divorce, the loss of a child or a horrible parent. All big issues. All great topics.

But when do I, as the reader, start caring?

• I care when I meet the soldier, scared out of his wits, hiding in the trench, trying to light a soggy cigarette, wishing he could see his girlfriend just one more time. 
• I care when he throws away the cigarette and kisses her photo before climbing out of the trench to face the enemy.
• I care when I learn that the little girl who died liked drawing purple unicorns and that she drew a new one every day she spent in hospital. I cry when her mother takes them down. I cry because there are 42 pictures and I cry because there will never be 43.

How do I write small?

1.      Create a character: How do I get to the kid’s burnt socks? I create a mother or a soldier who walks down the road and comes across them. Think of Saving Private Ryan; Private Ryan was only one soldier, but because they singled him out, he made us aware that all soldiers have families, mothers, and fathers. They are not nameless, faceless, camo-wearing, gun toting soldiers anymore. They are all someone’s son.

2.      Give that character a concrete goal: If it is a war story, then yes, the character wants to survive. But try to give them a simpler goal in the midst of the survival. Maybe, to fulfil his mother’s dying wish or in the case of The Book Thief, all Liesel wanted was a book to read. Even though a war is raging, everyday life continues.   

3.      Write with the senses: Burnt socks? You can smell them right now, right? Gunshots? You can hear the bang, bang, bang. Purple unicorns? You can see them. You can see the round shapes left by the Prestik on the glass doors of the ICU as the mother pulls down her little girl’s pictures for the last time.

4.      Find your theme: War and Death of a loved one might be too generic. Consider them ideas and they are good places to start. Work hard to make your theme specific. The farther along you get in your story the more you will be able to identify the theme. This will help you pick out the details you want to highlight.

5.      Symbolism: Once you have made your way through a draft identify scenes where you can repeat symbols. Burnt socks? Maybe give me the moment when the little boy got them. They were blue and yellow and had Batman on them. Just like his big brothers.  

Write small about the big things. Make your reader care.

Happy writing.   

If you want to learn how to write a book send an email to  news@writerswrite.co.za for more information.

  by Mia Botha

Mia Botha facilitates for Writers Write. She is also a novelist, a ghost writer, and the winner of the Mills&Boon Voice of Africa Competition. When she isn’t writing, she is the mother of two children and the wife of a very lucky man. Follow Mia on Pinterest  and Facebook and  Tumblr  and  Twitter.

Writing Smarter and Sharper by Elva Cobb Martin

I have started back through my historical novel, In a Pirate's Debt with a critiquer's eye. I made a list of things I need to watch for, items my good critique partners might point out. These cover areas beyond the basics.

And, like all good things, they do take time so pull over out of the traffic of your to do list today with me and get your pencil sharpened.

1) Delete/change too often used ing verb forms (being, having, walking) and avoid overuse of prepositional phrases. :
  The duck is holding up traffic walking across the road.
vs. A mama duck and ten ducklings strutted across the stacked four lanes and no one blew a horn.    

Getting involved with Travay could pose a threat to his      (Captain Bloodstone's) goal of finding out what happened to his captured parents.
      vs: He did not have time to get involved with her. He must pursue his goal. He must find out what had happened to his parents.

2) In deep POV don't say the character "heard, thought, wondered" anything. Just give the actual fact.

  She heard the boy call the pirate Captain Bloodstone.
  vs. The boy called him Captain Bloodstone.
(Of course, if you're looking into the face of Gerard Butler as Atilla, you won't be able to hear anything but your heart pounding against your ribs).

3) Avoid naming emotions, show them.

     He made her feel safe.
vs: She expelled a huge breath, her eyes locked on the source of relief.
     She was grateful for the rescue.
vs: Her eyes softened and filled with an inner glow when she looked up at him.

4) Keep all dialog, action, and thoughts of each character in

the same paragraph unless interrupted by other speaker.
(Which can happen. Particularly if the other person is holding something behind their back.)

5) Use contractions in dialog.

6) Ellipses: space-dot-space-dot-space-dot-space
    "But . . . Arundel!"
    "Could it possibly be that . . . ?" (fourth dot or question mark is end of sentence)  

7) Can't use description tags like the below in current POV to comment on something said.
    Lucas looked out to sea as if to end the conversation. 
    vs. Lucas looked out to sea and Thorpe sauntered away.

8) I am told we no longer indent the first sentence of a new chapter or a POV change. Center the 3 *** for POV changes.
Use center button, not space bar. Then temporarily drag paragraph indent marker to left to finish centering.

Have you got all this, Elizabeth? 

Thanks for stopping by. Do you have a good tip to add to my list? I would love to hear from you.

Have a blessed Christmas and Wonderful New Year-- my prayer for you.

Elva Cobb Martin