{"id":882,"date":"2012-01-15T23:02:18","date_gmt":"2012-01-15T23:02:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/?p=882"},"modified":"2023-07-07T22:44:25","modified_gmt":"2023-07-08T02:44:25","slug":"everything-you-want-to-know-about-writing-and-then-some","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/2012\/01\/15\/everything-you-want-to-know-about-writing-and-then-some\/","title":{"rendered":"Everything you want to know about writing … and then some."},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0Any questions?<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Lots of presenters conclude with that phrase. I\u2019m different. I like to start with it.<\/p>\n

The strategy may not be as harebrained as it sounds. I\u2019ll explain.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>I\u2019ve just returned from my biannual residency in Writing Popular Fiction at Seton Hill University<\/a>, where I always open my presentations by passing out index cards and asking the\u00a0MFA candidates\u00a0to record questions that come to mind during the lecture. Naturally, they can raise their hands as we go, but the question cards ensure\u00a0that\u00a0important inquiries\u00a0don\u2019t get passed over in the race toward the bell.<\/p>\n

During the final hour of\u00a0each\u00a0three-hour presentation, I collect the cards, shuffle them, and spend fifteen minutes discussing them with the students. \u00a0It\u2019s a collaborative process. I don\u2019t profess to have all the answers.<\/p>\n

At last week\u2019s residency, my presentation on \u201cThe Art of Revision\u201d generated some terrific inquiries ranging from the nuts and bolts of manuscript style to deeply theoretical thoughts on the writing process. And as is always the case, a few questions were left unasked and unanswered.<\/p>\n

So what do you say we revisit those questions here? I\u2019ve got all the cards, reshuffled and face down. We\u2019ll try one card for starters, do a few more later in the week. Sound good?<\/p>\n

So here\u2019s the first one:<\/p>\n

\n

How do you show a scene break in your manuscript? Do you use an asterisk, hashtag, or simply a blank line?<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This one generated some good discussion, with some of the students preferring a set of asterisks\u00a0while others suggested that a single hashtag was best.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the SFWA <\/a>website still recommends the hashtag. Vonda N. McIntyre<\/a>\u2019s\u00a0wonderfully detailed document <\/a>on the subject is available there for free download<\/a>. Go check it out if you haven\u2019t seen it. It\u2019s been the genre standard for many years.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Personally, I prefer the hashtag, but I was intrigued to hear from Christopher Shearer<\/a> that at least one professional editor recommends avoiding them in favor of simply leaving the space blank.<\/p>\n

I recall an amusing story that Harlan Ellison <\/a>told about his manuscript for \u201cI Have No Mouth and I Must Scream<\/a>,\u201d about how he cut some graphics from a computer magazine and pasted them onto his manuscript to indicate line breaks.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I sometimes do stuff like that too: a serpentine line for my novel Vipers<\/em> <\/a>and a staring eye for my collection Visions<\/a><\/em>. My editor didn\u2019t complain, and the manuscripts were accepted. Nevertheless, if I were a young writer casting my first manuscripts to the wind, I\u2019d opt for the hashtag.<\/p>\n

What do you think? Please submit your questions, comments,\u00a0suggestions. As I\u2019ve said before, the best part of this blog is often in the talkback.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m out of space and out of time. We\u2019ll do more questions later. For now, I yield to the power of the hashtag.<\/p>\n

#<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0Any questions? Lots of presenters conclude with that phrase. I\u2019m different. I like to start with it. The strategy may not be as harebrained as it sounds. I\u2019ll explain. I\u2019ve just returned from my biannual residency in Writing Popular Fiction at Seton Hill University, where I always open my presentations by passing out index […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"single-cat-21st-centuryscop","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[176,28,6,177,8,179,119,51,7,175,59,174,130,145,173,178],"class_list":["post-882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-21st-centuryscop","tag-christopher-shearer","tag-fantasist-enterprises","tag-fantasy","tag-harlan-ellison","tag-horror","tag-i-have-no-mouth-and-i-must-scream","tag-lawrence-c-connolly","tag-literature","tag-science-fiction","tag-science-fiction-and-fantasy-writers-of-america","tag-seton-hill-university","tag-sfwa","tag-vipers","tag-visions-short-fantasy-sf","tag-vonda-n-mcintyre","tag-writing-popular-fiction"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=882"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23546,"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions\/23546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawrencecconnolly.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}