Dialogue ~ To say or Not to say

Numbers 16:31 And it came to pass, as he had made an end of speaking all these words, that the ground clave asunder that was under them:

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“Excuse me, can you help me?”

No! I’m busy.

“But I need your help in understanding something.”

Okay, but make it quick, I have a lot of work to do here.

“What is dialog? And why can’t I use tags?”

Well, missy, you need to listen up. Dialog is a conversation between two people in a story. Like what we’re doing?

“Are we in a story?”

No, but your on my blog and I’m talking to you!

“Oh.”

Did you see that play on words up there? This weeks lesson at f2k is dialog. The word dialog can be spelled with the UE or without, just for those of you grammar checkers out there. I’ve looked  up the word and either spelling is acceptable.

Anyway, our lesson is for dialog with no tags. Tags are the cozy words at the end of who is speaking.

“Excuse me, can you help me?” she says in a timid way.

“No! I’m busy.” The lady behind the counter grumbles.

Practicing not using tags, really helps you see into the window of the characters. We have no backdrop, no setting up of the scene, we have words. Words that need to be read by the reader, and they need to follow who is speaking. If you can’t do a 500 word piece of dialog with no tags, then you need to strengthen the personality of your characters.

Something always stands out with your character, whether it is a strong accent, a southern belle type character, a farmer Bob type guy. In practicing no tags, we’re fleshing out our character and giving them personality and making them come alive.

Yes, in books we use tags. Novels are written with the dialog using tags, but take a look at those novels, any one of them. The dialog does not have a tag EVERY SINGLE sentence of a conversation. It doesn’t because once you’ve established who is speaking, you can really carry a conversation along a few pages with a tag here and there.

This is a tough lesson also. I never said that F2k was this easy, fly by night course on easy writing. No, it teaches important skills that are going to carry you through your writing and hopefully have you writing better with just one course. Maybe through all my blog posts on the matter of the free course, you can tell if it is something that you’d like to try when we offer it again in April.

Even if your not a writer, maybe this course will give you something to try for. Believe me, it will help when you’re jotting down a blog too. You’ll soon see that this course will have you using these skills without you realizing that you’ve drank from the knowledge pool and are now serving it to others.

F2K ~ FREE Writing Course

New and Improved F2K!

The art of writing is not a skill you just stumble upon. It takes awhile to master all the things that go into writing and sometimes we need a course to help move us into the next level of our journey.

Writer’s Village University offers a seven week FREE Writing Course, to refresh your muse, if you’re already a writer, or to dapple in the craft if you think it might be something you’re interested in; either way it is FREE and you have nothing to lose.

This session was the most exciting in all of my years mentoring. We have 8 classrooms, 8 volunteer mentors, and over 200 hundred students divided into those rooms. Now that may sound like a lot of people and a little intimidating, but believe me, after the first week, the students have either lost interest, life intervened, or find that this is just not for them. But this session, it was as if all the students stayed around to finish the course.

Our first week, the Master Administrator, Bob Hembree, switched the format of the board on us. The mentors were learning the boards as well as the students, but we adapt quickly. Why the switch? The old format was dated and Bob wanted to move us into the 21st century. Apparently these things take time to build and it wasn’t ready until we had all started in f2k. It went smoothly, like butter on bread.

New doorways were opened; we had a Social Scene, in a facebook like setting, where students came and introduced themselves, made friends, and uploaded avatars. Groups were formed, discussions were broached, music and photos were shared and we rode into the sunset of newness with a finesse that rattled the world of writing. The classrooms remain private and professional!

A bonus this session was that of a certificate of completion! If you posted your six lessons, gave ample feedback in these seven weeks, then you were rewarded with a Certificate of Completion. You could not just post the lessons and get a certificate. We are a peer to peer feedback course and if you don’t participate in giving feedback then you have not completed the requirements of the course.

We also produce people seeking publication and one woman had her lesson six accepted by an online magazine. Although we require your lesson six to be something NEW that you write FOR THIS COURSE, she had obviously written and submitted the story weeks prior to this course. Everyone was like, “I helped critique that!” But lo and behold, it had already been in the hands of the publisher before your crit.

That’s okay. We take pride in seeing one of our own publish ANY work! :) Congrats Kriti Bajaj on her work The Dream Catcher!  
 

We will have new doors opening again this session come October 6th. Possible publication in our new f2kzine? Bait bait bait... lol I don’t need to bait anyone, this course stands alone on its strength in producing writer’s. It sure doesn’t need me bragging about the course. 

Hope to see you then!

Important: Lessons and Classrooms will not be visible until course start date.

A New Day

Deut. 26: 16 This day the LORD thy God hath commanded thee to do these statutes and judgments: thou shalt therefore keep and do them with all thine heart, and with all thy soul.

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I’d like to thank all my friends and followers for putting up with me last week. Many may have stayed away because Joni went off topic, but it is okay. I only get like that about twice a year, Easter and Christmas, so you’re safe to come back and read about writing now. :)

Now if I have a major upheaval in my life, for certain I will blog about it because writing is my life, whether I, or anyone else for that matter, likes it or not. You’re definitely stuck with me and my ramblings. ha ha

Today I’m going to tell you about WVU, and in my terms, that’s Writers Village University, not West Virginia University. With all this talk about basketball I’ll be glad when football begins. Until then, I’m writing!

WVU is the best place on the net for writing courses. Bob Hembree has come up with some really tough courses that you pay for individually but WVU in and of itself offers over 200 courses for a one year membership fee. I think $99 for a life altering experience is well worth its weight in gold. The site won’t let you down.

Then we have F2K, the 7 week FREE writing course, that begins on April seventh. Oh dear, that's this Wednesday! We’ve had registration for a month now, and maybe it’s not too late for you to sign up. But please note, that when you do, you can not enter until the seventh. I don’t know why people have been trying to get in there for well over a month, they think the sign up, they get access to WVU, which they don’t.

F2K is a FREE course, WVU is a paid for site. Maybe Bob needs to change some of the offerings to show that more clearly in the sign up because people are complaining like there is no tomorrow! They want access to WVU now!

Hold on people! F2k is FREE, WVU is not. Bob and his assistants handle the demanding folks in an extremely cordial manner when they say, “You gain access on the 7th”, but these people are ruthless in their pursuit of writing.

“You said free! Why is it asking me to pay?”

Because clearly WVU is a paid for site, F2K is the FREE writing course offered. I see many come in from different countries, so maybe there is a language barrier somewhere, but even the English speaking folks, want in now. Patience my precious, patience.

We’ll begin with a week long orientation to get you familiar with the site, but will these people have the patience and perseverance to stay for seven weeks? We’ll see. It is always a fun experience. A learning experience for me and for them, the wannabe writers, or  the ones getting a refresher in the craft. 

Enjoy F2K for all it is worth. You’ll walk away a changed person, in your writing and in life for the new friends that enter your life.