Monthly Archives: July 2011
Please welcome Cindy Carroll ~ and Giveaway
I’m honored to have Cindy Carroll with us today. Author and teacher, she has an upcoming class on how screenwriting can help fiction writers. Check it out : ) http://www.writersonlineclasses.com/?page_id=592
Also, comment here to win a lecture packet from Cindy.
And, action!
First I want to say thank you to Amber for allowing me to guest blog here to kick off my blog tour! I love writing novels and scripts. And I love talking about how screenwriting techniques can improve your novel.
Action. There’s a reason it’s not lights, camera, passive. How boring would that be? Action is what movies and television are all about. They’re moving pictures, so they have to move. Of course there are two kinds of action. But I’m not talking action movies here with explosions, car chases, gun fights. Though I do love all that stuff. I’m talking active writing. Whether you write novels or scripts you have to keep the writing active. Avoid passive voice as much as possible.
In scripts those sections of description describing the action are actually labelled action in screenwriting softwares. Too much describing what’s going on slows the pace and lessens the white space. Scripts should have lots of white space. Script readers actually skip over large chunks of action. Novel readers would never do that would they? Uh, yes, they would.
Novels need white space too. Just because novels aren’t moving pictures doesn’t mean they can be passive. Lots of narrative in passive voice, not enough dialogue, too much introspection make for a slow paced book.
What can you learn from reading scripts and watching movies that can help your novels? Here’s an example of action that sets the scene from one of my favourite action movies – True Lies.
EXT. CHATEAU – NIGHT
The driveway and motorcourt are filled with cars. A formal dress party is in progress… a private reception for a middle-eastern dignitary. Tuxedoed men escort their diamond-encrusted ladies through the huge front doors, where they doff their overcoats and are politely scanned with hand-held metal detectors by white gloved security staffers.
The walled perimeter of the house runs along the lake, forming a kind of rampart. There is an opening, to a kind of waterway or canal, which connects to the private docks inside the grounds. There is a steel grating across the opening. The bars disappear down into the thin ice of early winter.
With the house visible BG, we CRANE DOWN below the parapet wall along which a guard is a white exposure-suit is walking… down along the dark wall to the grating… TILTING DOWN to see a glow pulsing under the ice.
Note how the action isn’t overdone. There isn’t a whole lot of description to set the scene but can you picture it? Can you picture the scene if you haven’t seen the movie? If you have seen the movie do you remember this scene? In screenwriting the writer puts in just enough detail to paint a picture but the rest of the details – the colour of the walls, what’s on the table in the character’s living room, what kind of TV they have – are decided on by other departments. Painting too detailed a picture may let the reader picture exactly what you, the writer, envisioned but it doesn’t let the reader use her imagination at all.
I talk about action and a whole lot more in my Is That Hollywood Calling? – How Thinking Like a Screenwriter Can Improve Your Novel. Comment here to be entered to win a lecture packet. If you don’t win, don’t worry! There’s still time to register for the class at: http://www.writersonlineclasses.com/?page_id=592
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Cindy
http://www.cindycarroll.com/blog
http://www.facebook.com/AuthorCindyCarroll
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Yummy Mondays ~ Ride em’ cowboy
In honor of the lovely mountaintop weekend I just spent writing, I’m in the mood for some cowboys.
Unfortunately, I didn’t see any at the cabin, but the cool weather and trees and horses I did see put me in a strange mood 🙂
And cause they’re so cute…
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Hottie Heroes and Empaths ~ Yum
A hottie hero and an empath. What’s better than that?
Bloodsworn II: Linked by Blood
by Kathy Lane
Release: TODAY!!!
Available at The Wild Rose Press
And at Amazon.com
Blurb:
The moment the lethal Blade, Bracca Cu-Laurian sees empath, Sheren Ni-Annun, he fights his desire for the young widowed mother. Not only is his life pledged to his Bloodsworn, but his past sins make him an unfit mate for any woman, let alone an empath. For him, the line between duty and desire will forever be one he can never cross. Sheren’s late husband taught her to resent a Blade’s duty, and she has since vowed to avoid those fierce warriors. Then Bracca awakens her empathic senses with a single touch, challenging both her vow and his resolve with the depth of their mutual desire. When her young son is linked to Bracca’s Bloodsworn, the dire consequences that threaten to destroy them and those they hold dear, may also be the very thing that brings them together.
Excerpt:
Breathing hard, Sheren ran through the exercise to put her normal shield back into place, concentrating on making it stronger, denser. It appeared to be working until she became distracted by a new emotion winding sinuously over and around the half-formed shield. Desire.
Potent, all consuming, and definitely not hers.
She snapped her eyes open and caught the longing in Bracca’s eyes an instant before he blinked it away.
“You want me,” she whispered, aware her voice trembled with wondrous discovery.
“Forgive me,” he said, averting his eyes and pulling away from her. Even without his touch his guilt assailed her, the emotion strong, but not enough to overpower that yearning desire.
“I never meant to frighten you. I only sought to keep you from injuring yourself. I’ll leave—”
She grabbed his retreating hand. Not even with Sayjan had she felt such breathtaking desire. Sayjan had loved her. But her senses had not blossomed under her late husband’s touch. Not like this. Compared to what she sensed now, she’d been blind before.
With her shield half up and only Bracca close enough to sense, she found the invading emotions easily bearable. More than bearable. Intoxicating.
“Bracca…” She reached up to touch his face. He stilled instantly. Pressing her hand firmly to his cheek, she said, “I feel you.”
He swallowed hard. “How can you even bear to touch me?”
She didn’t understand his question. Not bear to touch him because he was a Blade? Or because she’d swore never to get involved with a Blade again? How could he know? Not even Karess knew of her vow. At the moment, she had trouble even remembering why she’d made it.
Slowly he raised his hand and traced the edge of her face with calloused fingers. Wonder and longing swirled through the desire with a poignant sweetness that brought tears to her eyes.
“You are so beautiful,” he whispered. Head bending, he leaned closer.
Sheren knew she should stop him. Had to stop him. Yet the emotions pouring into her were like a heady draught of wine. She could no more stop drinking them in than she could stop breathing air. Merciful Luma, she wanted this.
The first touch of his lips went through her body like lightning. Her knees buckled. He caught her, one arm across her lower back, the other between her shoulders, his large hand cradling her head.
Sheren gazed up at him, clutching at his shoulders. Slowly, his gaze locked with hers, he lowered his head again, giving her every chance to turn away. She didn’t.
His lips were firm and warm. Insistent. His tongue stroked firmly against her closed mouth, demanding she let him in. She surrendered with a moan. He kissed like a warrior, invading, conquering. Sweet pleasure laced with the bitterness of desperation crashed over her. His? Hers? She could no longer separate her own emotions from those she felt coming from Bracca. Nothing in her life had ever prepared her for this…fusion.
Their bodies shifted closer. He deepened the kiss. Her hands slipped up his strong arms, fingers sliding beneath the edges of his sleeveless tunic. The hard muscles of his shoulders shifted and bunched beneath her touch. So strong, so hot…
Bloodsworn II: Linked by Blood
by Kathy Lane
Release: TODAY!!!
Available at The Wild Rose Press
And at Amazon.com
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Yummy Mondays ~ Timelessly Clooney
Another man in this short series of timeless and still handsome men.
He doesn’t need an introduction at all. Here’s George:
I saw this and had to share.
Titled: God’s gift to Women 🙂
Amber Kallyn 