Kate's Top Writing Tips For a story to really work you need to have all three of these things: A main character A plot A setting

The Main Character

Your main character needs to have a strong voice and something to say. 

I find my characters by putting some music on, sitting back and closing my eyes. The music draws me out of my mind and wakes up my senses and creativity. It can sometimes help to use my other senses too. If I open a jar or a bottle and take a sniff at something, or breathe in fresh cut grass or a stormy wind, or fresh washing or dirty washing I wake another part of me up. Like the music, the smells can get my imagination flowing. I don’t search for a character but wait to see who floats into my imagination. When they’ve appeared I look at them in my minds eye and get interested in their hair colour, height etc, in what they look like, what kind of expression they have on their face, what kind of clothes they’re wearing, what their voice is like and what their name is. I absorb all these details through my senses and then I ask this question:

What do you want or what don’t you want?

And then I wait for them to tell me.

In my book Shine, Tiffany wants a normal Mum who she can trust. In Glitter, Liberty wants her dad’s praise and love.

Characters have to have a goal. They either want something or they want to get away from something and then the entire story needs to be built around this need. I find it helpful to imagine my character holding onto a golden rope that threads through every word, keeping them on track of this goal. This way I find I don’t stray from the point and get lost in unnecessary happenings.

Then I ask my character a few random questions like:

• What do you eat for breakfast?
• What do you love to do on a Sunday evening?
• What secrets do you have?

This is really helpful because when I’m busy with my story and something happens I know exactly how my character will react. I’ll know things like, if someone shouts at them whether they’ll laugh or cry or runaway and hide.

The more I know my main character the more believable she’ll be.

The Plot

The Plot is all the things that happen in the story, the things that travel along the golden rope. For a story to be really interesting and keep the reader reading you need to:

First, give the reader a little taste of the character’s normal life

In Shine, I spent a bit of time describing Tiff’s chaotic life with her mum. In Glitter I described how much Liberty loved her school and how afraid she was of her dad.

Then something needs to happen

 Something that tips the characters normal life off balance. In Shine, Tiff’s mum goes to prison. In Glitter, Liberty gets pulled out of her school.

Then things need to start happening that get in the way of the character achieving their goal

If the character gets what she or he wants straight away then the story will be pretty boring. Readers want tension and surprise. In Shine, Tiff’s mum doesn’t understand that she’s done anything wrong and with her mum in prison it seems impossible to work out their relationship. In Glitter, Liberty’s dad refuses to let her play the violin and she knows if only he would let her, then he could be proud. This is where your smaller characters come in. These are the people who either get in the way of the character achieving their goal or encourage them to keep on trying.

After several attempts at getting what the character wants make her feel like everything is lost, like she’s never going to achieve her goal

This place is often called, The Dark Night Of The Soul.  This is the place where the character feels she might as well give up. She may feel sad, frustrated, angry, alone, lost and hopeless.

Then let her get what she wants or not get it

After The Dark Night Of The Soul something needs to happen to let her get what she wants or not get what she wants. This usually comes from having learned some kind of a lesson from her struggle.

In Shine, Tiff struggles to trust her mum, but once her mum has confessed all the bad things she’s done, apologised to all the people she’s hurt and promised Tiff that things will change, Tiff makes a decision to trust her again.

In Glitter, Liberty uncovers the truth about why her dad seems to hate her and why she’s not allowed to play the violin. Once this is uncovered she starts to see the truth, which is he’s loved her all along but hasn’t been able to show it.

Show a little bit of the new life

To give the reader a satisfying experience they’ll want to read just a little bit about life after the struggles, about how the character feels about the new world she’s living in.

The setting

You don’t need to go into huge detail about where your story is set but it helps the readers imagination if they have some idea (especially if it’s a fantasy story)

Throughout the story a really good thing to remember is: Show not tell

‘She felt very scared because she could hear someone following her’

isn’t so satisfying for a reader as

‘Fear raced through her body. Her heart was pounding like a bird in her chest, her hands were trembling; the footsteps were coming closer, slapping the pavement with intent.’

I find it useful to keep a little notebook with me all the time so I can scribble down ideas as they pop into my head. Or sometimes I’ll record my ideas on my phone.

The most important thing when you’re writing is to remember to have fun, because that’s what it’s all about!

Happy Writing,

Love Kate xxxx