technique
Gung-Ho About Grammar
If I’ve ever critiqued or beta-read for you, you probably noticed that I can get nit-picky with grammar when I want to. For me, it’s just part of my OCD, perfectionist nature. I see an error, and it’s like being jacked into an electric fence unless I do something to fix it.
Okay, maybe not that bad. But I used to be almost that bad. When we did diagramming sentences in ninth grade, I didn’t understand why so many of my classmates were complaining. For the most part, it was easy, I thought. What’s the big deal? My brain just seemed to be wired for it.
(Before anyone starts sending me hate-mail, realize that at the time I also thought creative writing was a kind of magic I would never possess. So, you know, some things balance out.)
When I started teaching deaf students, I really began to understand just how wacky English grammar is. No wonder even those of us who hear and speak the language every day screw it up! My students will master one rule only to discover there are twenty more exceptions they have to figure out.
Even with my super-grammar-skillz, there are a few things that still hang me up. I only just got a solid handle on the whole lay-vs-lie thing. (Related concepts, and the past tense of one is the present tense of the other? Whose idea was that?)
Further-vs-farther? I know the rule. Farther is for distance; further is for degree. But I swear I’ve come across a few places where I could argue it fits either condition. (And of course, I can’t come up with an example right now. If I ever do, I’ll throw it in an edit or the comments.)
“If it were” vs “If it was”? I remember being told if it actually happened that way it was one, but if the circumstance was never true, it’s the other … something like that. I have a really hard time wrapping my head around that one and all related forms, so if you have several super-clear illustrations to pass along, I’d be hugely grateful.
The nice thing is, grammar isn’t so hard to learn. (Particularly compared to some other aspects of writing. I can’t begin to tell you how to develop more voice in your manuscript, but I can help you understand the proper way to use semicolons.)
What about you? Any particular nuances of grammar that you just can’t nail? Any that you KNOW, but find you have to keep a close eye on yourself not to slip?
Speak up:
6 commentsDecisions, Decisions!
I’m starting a new novel, and I’m back at the old crossroads.
First or third person?
If first, present or past?
When I started Fingerprints, I actually wrote several pages in third person before it started screaming at me that it wasn’t working. Go back to the beginning, change it all to first person … ah, that’s better. It never occurred to me that present tense was an option. It was my first novel—what did I know?—and I’d hardly read any novels written in present tense up to that point.
Three manuscripts later, I began my Recently Finished New Novel. I’d learned a lot in-between, read a ton of current YA work, and felt like I almost had a coherent idea of what I was doing. The RFNN (uh-huh, that’s what I’m gonna refer to it as) is in third person. There was never any question about it, partly because I needed my MC to withhold quite a bit of information in the early parts of the story. I knew from first person, it would’ve been really obnoxious. Also, I briefly considered telling the story from several POVs, but never from my MC’s POV. I quickly decided I wasn’t that crazy brave, and I think it worked out pretty well. (We’ll see.)
Now, I’m about to embark on a Shiny New Novel (SNN … yeah). For the first time, I went through this active, conscious, stressful thought process. I could see pros and cons for doing it any of the three ways (third person, first past, or first present). For about ten minutes, it felt like choosing what college to go to: This decision will impact the rest of my life!
Well, okay, not quite. Making the “wrong” choice would just mean major rewriting once I decided it was, in fact, wrong. And depending on how long it took for me to make that decision, the rewriting could be a right pain.
Worse things have happened.
In this case, I started thinking about my MC. Her personality, what it would mean to be right up in her head, or have a little distance. Then I thought about the general plot as it’s formed so far (in my head)—what things might happen outside my MC’s presence, how to deliver those things if I’m in first person, etc. Settled on trying first person, then thought about whether the plot warrants the kind of immediacy I always associate with present tense. In combination with certain personality quirks of the MC, I think present might fit.
So my decision is to get in there and start drafting. If I get a page or a chapter (or five) in and realize it’s not flying … back to the drawing board.
That’s how we learn, right?
How do you guys make these types of decisions? How do you know whether the story will be best with one POV character, or two … or more? I’m still a newbie (in some ways), so I want all the learnin’ I can get.