It's Only a Sentence a Day . . . or Is It?

           Marian writing at all that is gold recently posted a tip for writers that they simply write a sentence in their stories every day. As I read through it, some thoughts came to mind on some simple ways to add variety to this writing commitment. Not that I'm suggesting anyone would become bored writing a sentence a day, but a little break from such a strenuous schedule can be fun, right?

Write Sentences Differently in Terms of Grammar

          In English, there are twelve different verb tenses you have available, which therefore leads to twelve different types of sentences (deep breath):

          Simple Present: I eat dinner at six o'clock precisely

          Simple Past: I ate dinner at six o'clock precisely

          Simple Future: I will eat dinner at six o'clock precisely

          Present Progressive: I am eating dinner at six o'clock precisely

          Past Progressive: I was eating dinner at six o'clock precisely

          Future Progressive: I will be eating dinner at six o'clock precisely

         Present Perfect: It is six o'clock precisely and I have eaten dinner

        Past Perfect: By six o'clock precisely, I had eaten dinner

        Future Perfect: By six o'clock precisely, I will have eaten dinner

        Present Perfect Progressive: It is six o'clock precisely and I have been eating dinner since five

         Past Perfect Progressive: It is six o'clock precisely and I had been eating dinner since five

        Future Perfect Progressive: I will have been eating dinner for an hour by six o'clock

         When experiencing writer's block (even when only writing a sentence), select a previously written sentence and rewrite it with a different tense. After eleven days of doing this, you will have probably thought up a different sentence to write.
         

Write Sentences with Different Narrators

           One of the first things novel writers have to decide about their story is what point of view (POV) they want to use. The most commonly used are:

          The first person: I ate dinner around six o'clock
          The third person: Johnny Tremain at dinner around six o'clock
          (There is a second person, but using it in a novel is awkward, distracting, and discouraged)

          Just because you wrote a sentence in the third person one day doesn't mean that it has to stay that way. Try switching the POV of your sentence. You may like it better than the original.

Write Sentences that Rhyme with Previous Sentences

          I ate dinner around six o'clock
         Then took a stroll around the block.
         They caught me and tied me to a chair,
         And I got a cramp while sitting there

        To me, it either sounds like the beginning of a story or third place in a fourth grade poetry competition. Either way, have fun with this one. Even if these sentences never make it into your final draft, you might enjoy the experience.

Write Differently Every Day

         Nothing beats a rut better than variety. While there's nothing wrong with trying these exercises all with the same sentence one day, consider making these into a schedule such as this one:

Monday: Write sentence
Tuesday: Alter the tense
Wednesday: Alter the POV
Thursday: Write a rhyming sentence
Friday: Write a new sentence
Saturday: Alter the tense
Sunday: Write a rhyming sentence

          Since altering the POV and altering the tense are relatively short activities compared to writing a rhyming sentence, consider writing the sentence in all the tenses when doing both.




         And that is how to add variety to your writing workout when writing a sentence gets boring. Or, I suppose, you could just write a different sentence from a different story . . . if you wanted to.

A Skylight on Mount Olympus

Hypaethral (also spelled Hypethral)

         According to Merriam-Webster Online, hypaethral is defined as a place with nothing prohibiting the sky from sight. It is an adjective, which means that it describes a noun.

         Examples:
    
         The sunlight broiled the baseball players in the hypaethral stadium.

         I had no cover from the rain because my greenhouse was hypaethral.

        Interestingly enough, when I learned this word, I noticed something.

        I wrote earlier that where you put a word in your prose was important to the sentence because of the way it sounds. Hypaethral is no different. You would probably not use it on Twitter, Facebook, or in a text message because it sounds like it should be in a college paper. In the case of hypaethral, it does something else as well.

        When I say or read the word hypaethral, I immediately think of it as a word that should be in classic Greek mythology. I probably think that because the word Hyperion sounds similar in the first syllable. Did you notice that both hyperion and hypaethral kind of look similar as well?

        Granted, one can quickly tell the difference between these two, but when words look similar in any way, they have the potential to connect to each other in the mind of the reader. This idea is what poets call eye rhyme, which is when two words look like they should rhyme, but they don't.

        Examples:

        rough doesn't sound like bough
        
        laughter has a different ring than slaughter

         In no way does ballet sound like mallet

        The advantage of using eye rhyme with your word usage is that if a word looks like it would relate to another, a writer will not sound unusual using it in such a context. For example, I mentioned above how one wouldn't use hypaethral in a Facebook post, but wouldn't it look natural in a short story about Apollo or Zeus? A reader might expect such a word, since it looks like it would fit in a such a story.

        So when deciding on a word, see if it sounds right in the sentence, but do not neglect to see if it looks right in the sentence.
       

       

The Abominable Conversation

       In the last post I did in relation to the Christian Bible text, I wrote about prayer (more accurately, I shared what others have written about prayer). I want to take the idea a step further with another favorite verse one would do well to remember.

 

The Text: Proverbs 28:9

He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, Even his prayer is an abomination. (American Standard Version)

If one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination. (English Standard Version)

Those who turn their ears from hearing Instruction— even their prayers will be detested. (Common English Bible)

 If you do not obey the law, God will find your prayers too hateful to hear. (Good News Translation)

The Reasoning:

           Note [. . .] It is by the word and prayer that our communion with God is kept up. God speaks to us by his law, and expects we should hear him and heed him; we speak to him by prayer, to which we wait for an answer of peace. How reverent and serious should we be, whenever we are hearing from and speaking to the Lord of glory! [Note also] If God’s word be not regarded by us, our prayers shall not only not be accepted of God, but they shall be an abomination to him, not only our sacrifices, which were ceremonial appointments, but even our prayers, which are moral duties, and which, when they are put up by the upright, are so much his delight. See Isa. 1:11, Isa. 1:15 . The sinner whose prayers God is thus angry at is one who wilfully and obstinately refuses to obey God’s commandments, who will not so much as give them the hearing, but causes his ear to decline the law, and refuses when God calls; God will therefore justly refuse him when he calls.  (Matthew Henry)

         "He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer [shall be] abomination."
Because it is not of faith which is grounded on Gods word or law which the wicked contemn. (Geneva Study Bible)

         "He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer [shall be] abomination." hearing--that is, obeying. God requires sincere worshippers ( Psalms 66:18 , John 4:24 ). (Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible).

After All, Where's Your Heart At?

You may not have a home like this, but think of your home as if it was

"Wherever you are you should always be contented, but especially at home, because there you must spend the most of your time." - Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

Of Pigs and the Power of Words

          In a previous post, I discussed the importance of choosing the perfect word over the almost perfect word.

           This video, in my opinion, brings life to that concept.

          The video description at youtube says that this is the three little pigs told with a "more classic, robust command of the English language," though apart from an alliteration or two (i.e. "The mighty maelstrom of the wolf's exhale splattered second swine's shack and shortened his sanctimonious scolding simultaneously), all the comedian did was use a varied vocabulary to retell a familiar tale.

         Is that not evidence of the power of a carefully chosen word?

His, Of Course

         I originally wrote that all posts under the label of Amateur Apologetics would be my thoughts on biblical matters. Before I begin, some clarification about the title is needed.

        I have never been to seminary, bible school, or any other place where I would have been taught how to apply logic and reasoning to defend the Christian faith. In that sense, I am indeed an amateur apologetist. However, I am using the word amateur in the title as it was used in the late nineteenth century, as someone who does something as a hobby rather than as a job. As with any hobby, one is a little shaky when they first start something and I expect that I'll make mistakes. But by God's grace I will get better as I learn more.

       That said, I saw something on the way to work that made me think.

        I work at my school library and to get there I have to walk by this church which I won't name for privacy reasons. By this church is a large billboard with changing slides indicating what services are offered--e.g. morning services, a nursery, who teaches what sermon, etc.--probably with the intent to give a taste of what prospective church-seekers will find there. Normally, while too technical for me, I wouldn't have a problem with this practice. What bothered me, however, was that one of their slides said something to the effect that this church was "praying that God would allow us our desires and satisfy all our plans."

       I disagree with this banner for a couple of reasons.

       First, we must remember that Jesus taught us to pray that God's will be done on earth as it is in Heaven (Matthew 6:10), not our own. It must have been important for Jesus' disciples to realize  fulfilling God's desires comes before fulfilling our own, since it is listed before asking for preservation, forgiveness, and freedom from temptation in the Lord's prayer (Matthew 6: 9 - 15). Since Christians are called to prayer every day, and since we are instructed to pray in that way, we'd be reminded of the idea on a regular basis.

        It's worth noting that Jesus must have been serious about the distinction of whose will needs fulfilling, since he prayed that God's will be done, and not his own moments before he was betrayed and killed (Matthew 26:39). If the man who knew no sin prays that God's will be done and not his own, should we do less?

        I understand that this church does not imply that our needs and desires come before God's. Their intent is most likely to be encouraging and uplifting, which I have no issue with. My concern is when, in our encouragement, we use words that might mislead our brothers and sisters in their thinking. Therefore, my advice to this church would be to alter their slide just a bit. Why not have it read "May God use you in a way to glorify him and fulfill his will on earth as it is in Heaven"? After all, it should be our delight to do God's will (Psalm 40:8) and what could be more encouraging than the knowledge that someone is praying that for us?

       A closing thought: whose ends are you out to accomplish in your life? His, or yours?

Focus on Him, Not It

      Dr. MaryAnn Diorio at Christian Fiction Factor defined five points that are essential to writing fiction. As her first point, she writes:

Just as people still argue over the proverbial question, Which comes first, the chicken or the egg?, writers of fiction argue over what comes first, character or plot?

We Christians know that the chicken came first since God directly created the chicken. The egg, then, comes out of the chicken. The same is true in the best fiction--the kind of fiction that most impacts lives. The author creates the character, and the plot then comes out of the character. Think about the best stories you've read. What comes to mind first--a character or the plot? Most often, it is a character who remains branded in your memory, long after the plot is forgotten.

       For my first Craft Talk post, I’ll be looking at the first point in depth with five points of my own.

 A story environment, no matter how exciting, can be heightened with a developed character

      You are writing your story about someone doing something around someplace during sometime. Ideally, all of the above will be fleshed out, but the readers care about the someone. Having a hero cross through a dragon-infested valley is an exciting plot, but since we don't know much about the hero, the excitement is limited to the venomous lizards behind the rocks. However, what if the hero has had problems being brave for his whole life and yet feels the responsibility of his leading his middle school class influencing him to continue? Is he the kind of man who will leave the children to the horrors awaiting them, or will he fight his fears and lead his pupils to safety? Depending on what characteristics this teacher has, the reader will either want him to succeed, fail, be rewarded, be punished, be eaten, etc. Put a different way, the author can control how the readers feel, purely by who the writer chooses to put in the story. 

No matter how well-developed your character is, it is useless if he's invulnerable

         Imagine the story of the middle school teacher taking his students to safety. Wouldn't it be boring if all the dragons feared his superhuman ability to crush lizards within sixty feet? For today's audience, a story is all about the conflict involved. The less conflict, the more of a chance that the reader will lose interest. When was the last time you read a story where absolutely nothing bad could happen to the main character? Did you enjoy the read? Even Sherlock Holmes--with his powers of deduction and proficiency as a boxer--was challenged by criminals, investigation obstacles, and even by other investigators. The bottom line is that a reader will have a hard time being interested in a character that can't feel pain, fail, or even have fears.
If your character has a weakness, it must be believable, understandable, and conquerable

          Similar to the previous point, if your main character is a bundle of problems, vulnerability, and weakness, your reader will lose interest almost as quickly as if she was perfect. Imagine a story where the heroine is a poor, frail, easily frightened, unintelligent, clumsy, unfeeling person. In most cases, the reader will have a hard time finding reasons to continue reading. Nobody in the world is perfectly invulnerable, nor are they perfectly vulnerable. While I agree that writers should strive to create characters with weaknesses, those weaknesses should not be so large that they cannot be overcome by the hero in the end. For example, if we decided to make our middle school teacher into a walking pile of jelly, and he is still a coward at the end of the book, the reader will feel cheated. So while you should give your hero a weakness, make sure that it is not larger than life.

Nine times out of ten, your reader will feel cheated if your story isn't a conflict centered around your main character

       Apart from "why am I reading this story?" authors should keep reader from asking, "why is this character even here?" In the excitement of creating characters that we care about, one can easily forget that--as Dr. Diorio put it--plot comes from the character. If the main character is not involved with the conflict, they become extraneous. If you've chosen this character to be the hero of your story, make sure the story is focused on him. This does not mean, however, that you should only tell the story from the main character's point of view (point of view will be discussed later). I simply mean that the story should be the main hero's problem / battle, and the author will do well to keep the author fully engaged in it.
Although your hero doesn't have to bring around the resolution, he or she must be involved in it in some way 

         The fairy godmother might have provided the glass slippers, but it was Cinderella whose feet fit them in the end. In the end, as I mentioned above, it is the hero's battle, and the resolution (or conclusion of the action) must either bring it about, or be involved. One of my favorite books, The Bedouin's Gazelle, disappointingly ends when the reportedly evil sheik simply decides to let the girl out of his clutches. The author's excellent main characters had nothing to do with the decision and only breathed a sigh of relief when it turned out well. The reader has faithfully kept to this character because they like them and want to see them overcome the obstacle. Don't cheat the audience with outside help. It is the heroine's battle, and should therefore be her strength that overcomes the opponent.

An Eternal Conversation

I'd like to open the first Bible Readings and Reasoning post with a question that Christians might argue about.

How do we pray?

The Text: Matthew 6: 7 - 13

7 And in praying use not vain repetitions, as the Gentiles do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. 8 Be not therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him. 9 After this manner therefore pray ye. Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. 10 Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth. 11 Give us this day our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil [one.] (American Standard Version)

7 And when you are praying, speak not much, as the heathens. For they think that in their much speaking they may be heard. 8 Be not you therefore like to them for your Father knoweth what is needful for you, before you ask him. 9 Thus therefore shall you pray: Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. 10 Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us this day our supersubstantial bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation. But deliver us from evil. Amen. (Douay-Rheims)

7 But when ye pray , use not vain repetitions , as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. 8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him. 9 After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. 10 Thy kingdom come . Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. 11 Give us this day our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen. (King James Version)

Reasoning on the text:

He [Jesus] rebukes two revolting faults in prayer, ambition, and vain babbling. Long prayers are not condemned, but vain, needless, and superstitious ones.[These verses are a] true sum and form of all christian prayers. Give us this day our daily bread. That which is suitable for our nature for our daily food, or such as may suffice our nature and complexion. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. From the devil, or from all adversity. (Geneva Study Bible)

Christ saw it needful to show his disciples what must commonly be the matter and method of their prayer. Not that we are tied up to the use of this only, or of this always; yet, without doubt, it is very good to use it. It has much in a little; and it is used acceptably no further than it is used with understanding, and without being needlessly repeated. The petitions are six; the first three relate more expressly to God and his honour, the last three to our own concerns, both temporal and spiritual. This prayer teaches us to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and that all other things shall be added. After the things of God's glory, kingdom, and will, we pray for the needful supports and comforts of this present life. Every word here has a lesson in it. We ask for bread; that teaches us sobriety and temperance: and we ask only for bread; not for what we do not need. We ask for our bread; that teaches us honesty and industry: we do not ask for the bread of others, nor the bread of deceit, ( Proverbs 20:17 ) ; nor the bread of idleness, ( Proverbs 31:27 ) , but the bread honestly gotten. We ask for our daily bread; which teaches us constantly to depend upon Divine Providence. We beg of God to give it us; not sell it us, nor lend it us, but give it. The greatest of men must be beholden to the mercy of God for their daily bread. We pray, Give it to us. This teaches us a compassion for the poor. Also that we ought to pray with our families. We pray that God would give it us this day; which teaches us to renew the desires of our souls toward God, as the wants of our bodies are renewed. As the day comes we must pray to our heavenly Father, and reckon we could as well go a day without food, as without prayer. We are taught to hate and dread sin while we hope for mercy, to distrust ourselves, to rely on the providence and grace of God to keep us from it, to be prepared to resist the tempter, and not to become tempters of others. Here is a promise, If you forgive, your heavenly Father will also forgive. We must forgive, as we hope to be forgiven. Those who desire to find mercy with God, must show mercy to their brethren. Christ came into the world as the great Peace-maker, not only to reconcile us to God, but one to another.  (Matthew Henry)