A
Step in the Write
Direction
September
7, 2015
Update:
Thank you so much for all your responses to my question on the blog—the length
and frequency. About 95% thought it was
okay as is and the others gave very good suggestions. I’ll incorporate a couple
of these next week. This has been a good week: a good church service yesterday,
enjoying the new flooring in our mobile home, and thankful for several
proofreading and editing jobs that have come in. It’s been six months today that
I joined the “living alone” category. Over the past few years I often wondered
what it would be like when my husband was gone (every illness I thought would be
his last). I knew it would be hard, but had no idea how hard. But I can say that
God has been with me every minute. As the Bible verse says, “As your day, so
shall your strength be.” If you have a prayer request you would like me to post
next week, send me an email and I’ll share it—unspoken, if you like. (Pray for
my 80-year-old brother who had a heart attack last week, had a stent put in,
went home, and then went back by ambulance yesterday with 3 blood clots in the
lung.)
Thought
for Today:
I used to think that God's gifts were on shelves one above the other and that
the taller we grew in Christian character, the more easily we should reach them.
I find now that God's gifts are on shelves one beneath the other and that is not
a question of growing taller, but of stooping lower and that we have to go down,
always down to get His best ones (F.B. Meyer).
Song
for Today:
Were
the whole realm of nature mine,
That
were a present far too small.
Love
so amazing, so divine,
Demands
my soul, my life, my all.
“When I Survey,” Isaac
Watts
Laugh
for Today:
·
Two
cannibals are eating a clown. One says to the other, “Does this taste funny to
you?”
·
An
invisible man marries an invisible woman. The kids were nothing to look at
either.
·
Mahatma
Gandhi walked barefoot most of the time which produced an impressive set of
calluses on his feet. He also ate very little, which made him rather frail and
with his odd diet, he suffered from bad breath. This made him…a super-calloused
fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.
Writers’ Tips:
Similarities
between the Short Story and the Novel[i]
1.
Both usually focus on at least one main character.
2.
Both generally rely heavily on characterization.
3.
Both require a plot evolving out of the needs and motivations of the main
character.
4.
Both require that the main character change in some way as a result of the plot
action.
5.
Both require clean, clear, crisp writing.
6.
Both require a central theme.
7.
Both require a particular point of view or slant.
8.
Both require a beginning, middle, and end.
9.
Both require competent use of the tools of fiction.
10.
Both require the writer to feel deeply about his characters and
subject.
Differences
between the Short Story and the Novel
In
the novel you can:
1.
Create more complex characters.
2.
Change points of view with each chapter.
3.
Utilize subplots.
4.
Cover more ground—in time, complications, characterization, and
theme.
5.
Give your main character a problem that cannot be easily solved and that is
worthy of
his wholehearted effort and
concentration.
Adapted from
Carole Gift Page, “Fiction Facts—Similarities and Differences: The Novel and the
Short Story,” The Christian Communicator,
April 1992, pp. 7-8.
Have a good week spreading
the
gospel
through the printed page.
Donna
Clark Goodrich
·
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·
A
Step in the Write Direction—the
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·
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·
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·
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The
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Grandmother,
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I am sorry your brother has to go through this. I have emailed you a special prayer request.
ReplyDeleteThank you. Will add your request to next week's blog. Am praying.
ReplyDelete