Happy St. Pattys!

Sorry, but there will be no post today. I am helping my friend out with the patty day bash hosted by his radio station. so excited. hope everyone else has a great night!

Common Sense Monday

I'm officially back to blogging as much as possible. The past month has been a tad sporadic and I plan to change that/develop an actual schedule.

*gasp*

From now on, I'll be writing common sense posts on Mondays. Think "Back to Basics" but ones that make you re-evaluate not re-learn. Does that make sense? Anyway, today's topic is to write for yourself. On some level everyone knows this, but sometimes it gets replaced with "you should write because you're good at it" or "you owe the world your story" or "you're wasting your talent if you don't do this." These are okay but if they're the main reason you're writing you should stop now.

I write for myself. How do I know this? Take, for example, my new WIP. I've gotten so wrapped up into the characters and action and twist that I stopped sending my prior novel out altogether. Two months ago I sent it to three agents, got two full requests, reject on one and still waiting on the other. Oh man, the waits are brutal, huh? Anyway, it doesn't bother me because I'm *gasps again* enjoying what I'm writing now so much that I don't need to "land an agent" at the moment.

(Though, I want to give a shout out to Elle from my crit group who landed an agent a lil while ago. Totally deserved. Her book Clockwise is going to be a bestseller when sold! )

Okay, back to the point. you do not EVER owe anyone your story. If you think that, someone needs to knock you into the pool with a big ol' noodle. (I'm excluding those of you who have signed contracts with publishers because, uh, why yes you DO owe THEM your story.) 

So back to the quoted reasons I listed in paragraph uno. Writing a book because you're good at it is one of the worst reasons in the world for doing it. Doubt me? Let me paint a picture for you...

You are the world's greatest garbage man. Total awesome at getting suckers barrels into the back of your 5mph-can't-let-anyone-past-you truck. But you hate it. Do you think that you should make it a lifelong career just because you do it well? Yes, if I made millions doing it, one of you thought just now. Whoever did, bad writer. Go find a new hobby.

Okay, last is the "you're wasting you talent by not writing" line.

I was good at martial arts growing up. Entered all the competitions and even one a few tournaments. My family said I should continue with it because I was just so darned good. Well, after a while I hated said "talent" and started doing kickboxing (which I'm still in love with). Just because you're good doesn't mean you need to do it.

You should be writing because you love to write, because sitting down and conjuring a story out of thin air makes you laugh, cry, cringe, and ultimately forget that you've got the oven on or your favorite t.v. show started twenty minutes ago. 

That's my first common sense post. As always, feel free to drop a few thoughts below.

What villain?

(Indiana Jones is not the hero or villain of this story. He's there for purely entertainment purposes only. )

So this broad-shoulder, gun totting man walks into a club. His black hat is pulled down low, and the duster he's wearing billows. OH, yeah. Scary dude. He's mean with more battle scars than the mafia guys on General Hospital. There's bourbon on his breath and death in his eyes.

The guy walks over to the hero and presses the gun against his temple. He laughs and says, "You're a dead man Mr. Walker."

Mr. Walker, our hero, puts down his old-fashioned and curls his fingers into a faux-gun, making the boom sound.

The villain falls over dead.

Okay, okay. This is an exaggerations--if not, you have some serious learning to do. But, variations of this lackluster showdown happens all the time. Writers love their MC and shy away from them having their asses kicked. When they make it to the final scene, most authors want to race right through the ending so everyone can bow down to the hero.

Er, no.

Or, even worse, you pull out some random kryptonite that had never been introduced in the story and defeat the villain with it. Ack.

When you write a story, you commit to hitting your hero where it hurts.  Your hero has to win only AFTER he gets the crap beat out of him (varies, depending on your genre) at least once. Maybe after Mrs. Walker dumps him for the villain or gets tossed into a garbage can and left for dead. Most people do this without truly understanding why their favorite characters needs a few beatings or a break-up. It's because, for winning to mean anything, your character has to earn it.

Short. Simple. Sweet.

In what ways have you proven your character earns the big win in the end? Did you find knocking the MC down first easy or difficult? Did you recently give your MC a mini-win in the first cpl of chapters without truly understanding why he/she deserved it?

Feel free to answer these questions or offer up your own thoughts in the comment section of this post.