I'm starting a new thing: a microburst every Tuesdays with stuff that's helped me as a writer.
Emotion. It's not humor or stuff that gets a reader laughing. It's the tug on the heart. In my Marrying Minda, it's little Neddie looking up at Minda with his blueberry eyes and asking the mail-order bride if she's his new mama.
In Little Women, my ultimate favorite, it's when Beth dies. Anybody who knows me knows that Louisa May Alcott does it all for me. This author has influenced me probably more than any other. The first time I read Little Women when I was eight years old, of course I cried when Beth died. But...I knew it was gonna happen. She was delicate and frail, tons of foreshadowing. It's in her book Jack and Jill, chapter 20, when the kids' pal Ed Devlin dies, that has the power to hitch my breath all these years later.
For an emotion fix, I'm reading the book again now. Got it free on the ipad. Last night I read Chapter 20 again and had to turn off the gizmo, let the emotions of grief, goodness, and peace simmer. These feelings hopefully will help me get my current deadline wip in shape.
2 comments:
Gosh, I haven't been here for ages! Had several past posts to catch up on! I love Little Women, and actually use it in my next release for HQN. The heroine encourages the hero's daughter to read it. Also, I loved your quiz post. :)
Cheers!
hi Lauri, I'm totally hopeless with blogging. So I tried to think of a couple of days to get myself here once or twice a week. Whew. Your comment meant the world!
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