Finding Your Fiction: Concise Steps to Writing Successful Fiction

By Jeffrey Penn May

A condensed guide like this one works well for motivated writers who want to focus more on their own writing than reading about how to write. Avoids excessive examples and endless activities. Clear, concise, and direct. A poor person’s MFA.

Helps you avoid amateurish errors (professional errors are often hailed as “groundbreaking”). Gives you a strong foundation to build on and set you forth on a lifetime of exquisite misery -- for there is no misery as grand as the struggling artist, poet, writer. Mastering literary tricks and infusing passion into your work requires you to sell your soul to the devil and endure a lifetime of pain, which is of course hyperbole. (It does, however, require some initial talent and lots of hard work.)

There are no “rules.” However, you should learn the rules before you break them. You should master accepted “norms” before deviating from them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeffrey Penn May
• Release date: Apr 16, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458112637

Jeffrey Penn May

Jeffrey Penn May has won several short fiction awards. His story “The Wells Creek Route” received a Pushcart Prize nomination, and his novel Where the River Splits, an excellent review in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Merging his outdoor interests with his writing, Jeff has published mountain climbing articles, short stories and poems. He has also written education articles and technical writing guides. His work has appeared in the US, UK, and Canada. He wrote and performed a short story for Washington University Radio and was a consultant to a St. Louis theatre company.After earning his a B.A. in English and Psychology, a Masters in Secondary Education, and a Writer’s Certificate from the University of Missouri, Jeff worked as a waiter, hotel security officer, credit manager, deck hand, technical data engineer, creative writing instructor, and English teacher. He was the principal of a small alternative school where he organized a fund-raising, climbing expedition and appeared in television and radio spotlights.Born at Fort Ord near Monterey, California, and raised in St. Louis, Jeff comes from a family of all boys and has always been compelled to explore the outdoors, leading to many questionable “vacations.” His adventures include, but are not limited to the following: floated a home-built wood and barrel raft from St. Louis to Memphis, navigated a John boat to New Orleans, drove an old Volkswagen alone 8000 miles around the west, spent a month in a dirt floor shack in west-central Mexico digging for Pre-Colombian artifacts, climbed mountains from Alaska to South America, and spent several days in the Amazon jungle. Jeff teaches writing near St. Louis. Please visit www.askwritefish.com.

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Finding Your Fiction:

Concise Steps to Writing Successful Fiction

by Jeffrey Penn May

Finding Your Fiction: Concise Steps to Writing Successful Fiction

Copyright 2011 by Jeffrey Penn May

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the publisher of this book. However, the author encourages the free use of basic fiction writing concepts and the use of his phraseology with appropriate recognition, references, and links.

This is a work of nonfiction. Information in this guide comes directly from my writing and publishing experience, graduate classes and workshops, other guidebook sources, and primarily from my popular Finding Your Fiction workshop sponsored by the St. Louis Writers Workshop and St. Louis Writers Guild. The concepts within are basic writing concepts and common knowledge; however, citation and recognition is given when referencing other authors and guidebooks.

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Where the River Splits

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Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter One: Plot

Chapter Two: Character

Chapter Three: Point of View

Chapter Four: Dialogue

Chapter Five: Style

Chapter Six: Setting

Conclusion

Introduction

You are a writer. You have been writing most of your life, writing term papers, developing business proposals, composing letters, email, and social networking posts. But are you a writer with a capital W? Do you want to become a fiction writer?

Writing a step by step guide that will magically turn you into a successful fiction writer is of course impossible. But I can save you time. A condensed guide like this one works well for motivated writers who want to focus more on their own writing than on reading about how to write.

Rather than list endless numbers of activities, because I’m under the impression that nobody likes workbooks. Only those activities I have used successfully in conducting writing classes and seminars are listed. I try to keep it clear, concise, and direct.

But who the hell am I? Telling you how to write?

Among other things, I have won many short fiction awards, including one from Writer’s Digest, and my work was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. My novel, Where the River Splits received an excellent review in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. I wrote and performed a short story for Washington University Radio and was a consultant to a St. Louis theatre company. After earning a BA in English and Psychology, a Masters in Secondary English and writing from