THE ART OF SEDUCTION...

He grasped me firmly but gently, just above my elbow, and guided me into a room, his room. Then he quietly shut the door and we were alone.

Soundlessly, he approached from behind and spoke in a low, reassuring voice close to my ear.

“Just relax.”

Without warning, he reached down and I felt his strong, calloused hands start at my ankles, gently probing, and moving upward along my calves slowly but steadily. My breath caught in my throat. I knew I should be afraid, but somehow I didn’t care. His touch was so experienced, so sure.

When his hands moved up onto my thighs, I gave a slight shudder, and partly closed my eyes. My pulse was pounding. I felt his knowing fingers caress my abdomen, my ribcage. And then, as he cupped my firm, full breasts in his hands, I inhaled sharply. Probing, searching, knowing what he wanted, he brought his hands to my shoulders, slid them down my tingling spine to my panties.

Although I knew nothing about this man, I felt oddly trusting and expectant. This is a man, I thought. A man used to taking charge. A man not used to taking ‘no’ for an answer. A man who would tell me what he wanted. A man who would look into my soul and say …

“Okay, ma’am,” said a voice. “All done.”

My eyes snapped open and he was standing in front of me, smiling, holding out my purse. “You can board your flight now.”

Okay, you’ve probably all read that story before, and now you’re thinking it's a really weird thing for me to post and wondering what possessed me to do it. And... because you’ve read this far, I’m going to tell you.

You read this far because something in the title, or perhaps that first line...or even the photo...promised you something. You read even further because what you were reading was interesting in some way. Maybe it was titillating, or you thought it was funny…or maybe you know me and thought it was a bizarre thing for me to post. Or…maybe you really wanted to know what was going to happen next?

The excerpt is fiction…it’s a joke…a scene some think could be taken straight from a bad romance novel (or good depending on your point of view). But, for purposes of this blog, it’s an example of how to engage the reader and keep him reading. It's a very simple example in the art of verbal seduction.

The story started big and kept on going. You knew there was more to it, but you didn’t know what, so you kept reading. You kept reading because the beginning promised you something and you wanted to know if the story was going to fulfill its promise.

And it did with the punchline. But that’s not all…

You’re still reading because you know that story wasn’t all I was going to say. Why? Because with my blog title, I made a promise that I’m going to tell you something about the art of seduction. And…because this is a writer’s blog, I've made an unspoken promise to say something about writing.

So, I will.

Novelists must be experts in the art of seduction.

Whether you’re writing a romance novel or straight fiction, writers must persuade the reader to keep flipping pages. We do it by seducing him, trifling with his emotions. We toss out the emotional hook and draw him in. Whether we make the reader laugh, cry, or feel he needs to know more, we are engaging him emotionally.

Think about it. If we read something that makes us angry, or makes us rail at injustice, we are emotionally engaged. When we’re emotionally engaged, when we care about something…or the person we are reading about, we want to know what’s going to happen next and we keep reading.

We anticipate.

Anticipation causes tension and suspense. Tension and suspense, wondering what happens next is what compels us to keep flipping pages.

The relationship between your most wonderful character and the reader must be an emotional experience, one you tap into from page one. If we make a promise to the reader at the beginning of our story that something interesting is going to happen, he’ll keep reading.

Just like you did here.

Hey…if I got you to read this far, you know it works. Think about it. Why do you keep reading? What is it that pulls you into a story and keeps you reading?

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I'll be talking a lot more about this in my next online class “Infusing Your Story With Emotion” beginning May 27th. For more information about the class, go to http://www.bootcampfornovelists.com/ls-courses/l-course-5p-emotion.html

For more information about all classes, and about me, go to http://www.bootcampfornovelists.com/

LOVE SMART...

Find the One you Want--Fix the One You've Got.

No, I'm not going to tell you how to do that, but Dr. Phil will if you win the 6 CD audio book I'm giving away next Friday, March 4th, as part of our second anniversary celebration. Or, if you'd rather learn how to create a phenomenal family, Dr. Phil can tell you how to do that, too, in Family First--Your Step-by-Step Plan for Creating a Phenomenal Family. If you're the winner, you can choose which audio book you'd rather have.

Dr. Phil is an expert in human behavior and reading the back cover blurbs on the two CDs, I was reminded that we, as writers, have to be an expert in human behavior, too. In fact, I sometimes think Psychology 101 should be a prerequesite when learning the craft of writing. How can you write realistic characters if you know nothing about human behavior?

Like each of us, our characters' behavior is based on multiple factors stemming from genetics and life experience. No one is the same and two people striving for the same external goal will have different internal motivation that drives him toward it. Failure to delve deeply into a character's past is a common mistake new writers make. It's why characters seem wooden and sound alike. It's only when you dig deep enough to find your character's driving force that you can create characters with depth and breadth.

So, how do we do this, and how deep do we need to go? Some of us create charts or make long lists of traits--and we do need to do that--but charts alone will not get us where we need to be to make our characters come alive. We have to dig deeper and deeper, until we get down to the level of a character's values and beliefs about life...and, most importantly, about himself. When the reader understands a character's deep motivation, he can identify and will want to read more.

Do you go that far? Do you know what your character values the most? Do you know what your hero believes about himself? Do you know why he believes it? Do you know what happened in his childhood to cement this belief? Those are questions I have to ask if I want my characters to have deep internal motivation for whatever goal I give them. If you're not asking those kinds of questions, try it and see what happens.

If you'd like to be in the drawing to win one of the audio books by Dr. Phil, simply leave a comment and it's done.

And don't forget, there's still time to save on classes at Bootcamp for Novelists. The special discounted prices are good through 2/28 at midnight, but time is getting short. Check out our new Face-to-Face Clinic as well, at www.bootcampfornovelists.com.

Ciao for now,
Linda

Ann Voss Peterson on Pacing...

Guest blogging today is my good friend, award-winning author Ann Voss Peterson, who pens intense, emotional suspense and thrillers for Harlequin Intrigue. With her 23rd nail-biting Intrigue, A COP IN HER STOCKING, now on bookstore shelves, I think it’s safe to say Ann has mastered the art of suspense – and I’m delighted to have her here to chat about one of the most important writing techniques in a writer’s tool kit. Welcome Ann!

Thanks for inviting me, Linda!

Today I’m going to tackle a bit of a thorny topic but one that’s near and dear to my heart. Pacing. It’s one of the last things you master before you can write a book of publishable quality, and for good reason. Pacing can be tough. Is the story too slow? Too fast? What is just right?

There are a lot of articles out there featuring lists of tips and tricks for speeding up novel’s pace. If the story slows, kill someone. Add a ticking clock. Keep a secret. But I believe it’s more important to understand the WHY behind something than to just stick in a trick here and there. So in trying to understand pacing, I wanted to know why some prose feels fast and some feels slow. And this is what I came up with.

Pacing isn’t about speed.

That’s right. Pacing doesn’t have ANYTHING to do with how fast the action unfolds on the page. Think about it. We’ve all slogged through novels that felt either slow or sketchy and undeveloped. And it has little to do with genre. There are plenty of frantic thriller novels that feel as if they’re moving as fast as a glacier, just as there are literary novels or family dramas which don’t have a lot of exterior “stuff” happening, yet leave us breathless. So if a novel’s pace isn’t about speed, what IS it about?

The secret to pacing your novel is making the reader NEED to turn the page.

Well, I just happen to be a reader. I’ll bet you are, too. So in my quest to understand pacing, I asked myself what makes ME want to turn the page, and here are the four things I found.

1. Sequence: I turn the page to uncover what happens next. Stimulus and response.

2. Conflict: I turn the page to discover who wins.

3. Delayed Gratification: I turn the page to learn the answers to my questions.

4. Escalation: I turn the page to see how on earth the protagonist gets out of this mess!

That’s it. The secret to pacing. Those four concepts. Don’t believe it could be that simple? Think about the tips and tricks I mentioned above. If done right, killing someone is going to provide conflict. It’s also going to give those story stakes a boost (escalation). That’s why it can make a slow area feel faster paced. But it only works if the murder does those two things. If it doesn’t effect the stakes or if it doesn’t increase the conflict, it’s going to muddy your story instead of making the reader need to turn that page.

How about the other two tricks? The ticking clock is an example of escalation. The characters had to do something in your story (right?), and now they have to do it in a very short time span. Keeping a secret is an example of delayed gratification. The reader has to race through those pages to find out what the secret is or to see it revealed to another character. And of course, the character’s reaction to that secret is her response to a stimulus...sequence!

I give a workshop on how to use each of these things to improve the pace of your story in everything from the construction of sentences to the structure of the entire novel. Obviously that would make for an overly long blog post. :) So instead of me telling you ways to use these concepts to make your prose and your story FEEL fast, you tell me.

What makes you NEED to turn the page in books you read? Are any of these tips and tricks examples of sequence, conflict, delayed gratification or escalation?

To catch an example of the way Ann paces her novels, pick up her 23rd published novel, A COP IN HER STOCKING, a Harlequin Intrigue in stores this October. Also check out Ann's website at www.annvosspeterson.com

In the Zone...

Wow, it's hard to believe this is my first blog. And to make it even more wow, it’s my first Bootcamp blog, which gives it a specialness all of its own. In fact, I kinda, sorta feel obligated to write something pithy and incredibly astounding...but since I’m writing this after midnight, the pithy neurons in my brain cells have ceased to fire. Part of that problem has to do with the fact that I’ve been writing a pivotal scene in a new story and I can’t get the plot developments out of my head. So, pithy Bootcamp stuff is definitely at risk.

Actually, I’d still be writing on my story if I didn’t have to sleep. It was amazing...the words just kept coming and coming. How good they are is another story, but tonight, they’re the best words I’ve ever written. I’m sure of it!

I’m always amazed at how that writer’s passion in me can still exist after years and years of writing. When I’m in the zone, nothing else exists. If you’re a writer, you know what I mean.

That passion, that fire in the belly, is at the very heart of what we do. It’s what made me get up at 4 a.m. to write just a few paragraphs before work when I was desperate to finish a book and send it out to an editor, who would, of course, snap it up and make me the next Nora. That passion is what had me hurridly stuffing hard copy of my manuscript into my briefcase so I could edit even a few lines on my lunch hour at work. It’s what gave me the perseverence to write five books over five years in the few spare minutes I had while raising four sons...and it gave me the cojones to spit in the face of rejection upon rejection. Passion is not only an essential part of a successful author’s makeup, it’s a necessary ingredient. It's part of who we are.
http://bootcampfornovelists.com
As writers, our passion has few boundaries. We’re passionate about the process of writing. Some of us love some parts more than others, but we looove the act of writing...the sitting at the computer and keeping our butts in the chair. It doesn’t matter if we get rejections, we still write. We have to write. We can’t quit. We write...even if what we write sucks pond water. (okay, that’s cliché, but it’s now 1 am.) We write even when it feels like drawing blood from a stone. We write because we can't not write!

As writers, we love the art of putting together scintilating words and colorful phrases to create a story that is not only structurally and grammatically correct, but one that is also evocative. Some writers literally feel the words as they flow perfectly from their brain through their fingers and leak onto the page. (lucky them.) Others (most of us) struggle mightily with the execution, but in the end, we looove how our words come together.

And lastly, but not leastly, we looove the story we’re writing. And that passion for your story is by far the most important writing passion you can own. When you’re passionate about your story, you bring your emotions to the page. When you write about something that touches and excites you, it's going to excite someone else. When you write stories that are emotionally significant for you, you’re writing from your heart and your voice rings true. Writing from a place of passion allows your voice and style to shine. It gives your voice and story authenticity. When you write authentically, your emotions are conveyed to the reader and your story will feel deep and personal. When that happens, the reader is compelled to read on.

Infusing a story with emotion isn’t just about how your characters think and feel, it’s also about what you, the author, think and feel. Passion for your story means owning it…giving it your all, no holds barred. Release your passion when you write and it will reverberate in the conviction in your voice...and, as we all know, in commercial fiction, voice is king. To use another cliched phrase, "No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader."

And that’s an awful lot of words for someone who started out with nothing to say. But, hey, it's my blog...and I looove writing!

Ciao for now,
Linda

PS - Check out my blog on Tuesdays, and on Thursdays, Connie, my partner in crime, will be blogging in her corner. That does not mean we won't be blogging otherwise, but for sure, we will on those two days.

And do let me know your thoughts on writing with passion...or passionate writing...or anything else, because I know you looove to write, too.