Writing

How to Publish Your Audiobook for Less

April 28, 2022 By Sapphire Hodges 2 Comments

Julie MacNeil thought her work on her award-winning book The 50-Year Secret was done when she published it. Although she did successfully find readers, many of her friends told her, “I don’t read much, but let me know when it’s on Audible!”

In the ever-shifting world of publication, authors must keep up with current trends to get their work published, noticed, and to increase shelf life. One of the biggest recent developments is streaming audiobooks on platforms such as Audible.

Streaming on Audible comes with several advantages, as Julie discovered when she researched the platform. There are far fewer books on Audible as opposed to ebooks or in print, and its connection to Amazon is enormously powerful in finding new readers (and listeners!)

How to publish on Audible (the easy way)

According to Julie, the easiest and fastest way to publish on Audible is to hire a professional narrator using Audible’s “back office” site and service called ACX.

The first step is to apply and get accepted for publication with Audible. Next, create a client account on ACX. From there, you can browse the profiles of the people who narrate books. You can listen to voice samples, and even solicit auditions from prospective narrators.

Audible’s connection to Amazon is enormously powerful in finding new readers (and listeners!)

Once you find someone who’s a good match for your work, you and the narrator negotiate a price. Prices tend to be high — possibly thousands of dollars or even split royalties — because these narrators are professionals. While narrators work on recording, sections are sent to both the author and Audible for approval before being published as one whole book. When it’s done, your book will be available on Audible for purchase and streaming.

This is the most common way to publish on Audible. However, Julie decided to do something different.

The 50-Year Secret

For Julie, writing and publishing her book wasn’t about fame or money — it was about saving lives.

She had already lived through several difficult events in life, from bullying to abusive relationships, when she discovered through a chance DNA test that she had a rare liver disease called alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency.

The genetic disease is potentially fatal, but because it is a tricky disease that can often manifest as respiratory rather than liver problems, an estimated 90% of people who have it are undiagnosed. So, Julie was especially glad that she found out.

“I found it really empowering to learn about my disease,” Julie told me in a recent interview. “I wanted to encourage others to … be proactive about their health. Even if you find out you have it or some other disease — even if it means you might die young — I hope you’ll make the most of life.”

Because Julie was adopted, her doctor suggested she try to find her biological family so she could warn them about the disease and encourage them to get tested. Her book chronicles this journey of finding her biological family. Although her father had already passed away from alpha-1, the lives of other family members were saved because they were able to get treatment for the disease they might have died of but never known about.

Julie wrote her book largely because she wanted to help bring awareness to others about alpha-1 and encourage more people to get tested — and maybe save their lives too. Getting on Audible would amplify her message beyond Amazon.

How to publish on Audible (the cost-effective way)

Julie figured out she could still get her book on Audible — and save money — by doing more of the process on her own.

First, she bought a software program for recording and editing audio called Hindenburg. Julie heard about it at a writing conference where she was nominated for an award for her book and was impressed with some of its features. Besides important tools like filters for canceling background noise, she said, “Hindenburg has classes and deals and free trainings to help you learn how to use it.”

Armed with her own software, Julie didn’t need to choose a narrator on ACX. While some authors choose to narrate their own books, she enlisted the help of her friend, Christina Betz (aka Tina) to read for her. Tina set up her own account on ACX as a narrator so that Julie could select her, and then they negotiated their own deal. Tina had never done any professional narrating before, but she did have an advantage because her husband had a recording studio in their home for his own work.

The longest part of the publishing process was recording because there was a learning curve that Julie and Tina had to overcome. Tina would read a section and send it to Audible for approval, and Audible would reject it if it wasn’t perfect. In the beginning, recordings were often rejected, most often due to background noise. Tina had to make her recording studio more soundproof and get better microphones. Tina and Julie even had to change the lights because professional recording equipment can pick up many lights’ hum.

Writing and publishing her book wasn’t about fame or money — it was about saving lives.

After about six months of trial and error (and help from another friend who worked in audio and video marketing), they were finally able to produce quality recordings that lived up to Audible’s standards. After that, it only took Tina about a week to record the 6-hour audiobook. The book was submitted in pieces and finally published all together as an audiobook.

And now, Julie finds it’s easier to find listeners than readers.

If she had to do it again…

With the gift of hindsight, Julie told me she wouldn’t change anything. The hardest part, she said, wasn’t the long recording process. “It’s getting people to leave reviews!”

I asked her if it would be practical for other authors to do what she did to get on Audible. “It’s the cheapest way,” she said. “We could have hired someone else who had the recording equipment, but it might have cost thousands of dollars. It took a long time, but we learned a lot.”

With a little extra effort and research, authors who are accepted for publication on Audible can do a lot of the work themselves for less cost and learn something along the way. Tina enjoyed the process so much that she decided to keep her profile on ACX so that she could narrate again.

Readers who are curious about Julie’s disease — or who might be interested in her inspiring story of adoption and overcoming trials with a positive attitude — can visit her website The50YearSecret.com and check out her book on Amazon or Audible. The book will also be made into a movie.

Sapphire Hodges

Sapphire Hodges has taught anthropology and middle eastern dance at the University of Oklahoma and courses in English as a Second Language at Utah Valley University. Along with her studies in linguistics and anthropology, she has been a licensed massage therapist since 2009 and has taught a little massage. She likes to read, write, dance, and teach her blue heeler, Beowolf, new tricks.

The Power of Asking ‘Why?’: Improving the depth and credibility of your writing

March 24, 2022 By Howard Collett 7 Comments

When I emerged from the diminutive mosque in a remote African village, I had a burning question. It came to mind while sitting reverently during prayers which the Imam had graciously invited us to observe.

I was a writer and photographer in Sierra Leone with two senior missionaries and a two-person video crew for LDS Charities filming a documentary on clean water projects (see more).

The village was home to a thousand people: half Christian, half Muslim. After thanking the Imam for his invitation, I asked him, “How do you get along with the Christians?”

Asking the right questions

The puzzled look on his face mirrored his reply: “What do you mean?”

Stammering, I said, “Well, half of the village is Christian, the other half is Muslim. How do you get along?”

When he gave the same response again, I wondered how much English the Imam understood. Then I realized his point-of-view on world issues was vastly different than mine. The village had no electricity, no running water, no televisions, scant public transportation (unless you call the back of a motorbike or the top of a cargo truck public transportation), few cell phones, and no world news.

To provide perspective, I mentioned that throughout history Muslims and Christians had battled each other. Then I repeated my original question.

We work in the fields side by side just to survive. What is there to fight about?

The Imam answered, “You don’t understand.” Then he gave me perspective. “The Christians helped us build our mosque. We helped them build their houses. We work in the fields side by side just to survive. What is there to fight about?”

Perhaps I should have first asked “why.”

Getting to the point

Not too long after my trip to Africa, I interviewed a science professor at BYU in Provo, Utah. He was renowned for his work in a particular field. I asked him why his work was so important. He answered with a barrage of scientific jargon, little of which I understood.

Unfortunately, I repeated the mistake I’d made with the Imam by asking the professor the same question again. His answer was mingled with words such as “leading research,” “peer-reviewed trials,” breakthrough technology,” etc.

Flustered, I blurted, “Why should I care?”

Startled, he looked at me thoughtfully, then answered, “It’s a possible cure for cancer.”

“Now I have a story,” I said. And a headline, I thought. People don’t care about a process until they can see the potential impact it can have on their lives.

For example, when Joseph Smith walked into the Sacred Grove that spring morning in 1820 to ask which church he should join, he had little knowledge about the nature of God. He received an answer to the “which” question but also learned why. God revealed the nature of Himself and His Son, knowing it is easier for us to pray to a God we can comprehend rather than a nebulous, unknown being. And that understanding would be essential for the revelations that followed in the years to come.

Who knows where “why” will lead

My final story comes from a sister missionary in Germany. My wife and I were senior missionaries and district leaders for an all-sister district. Wanting to know why they decided to serve missions, we asked questions. Our dialogue with this particular sister went something like this:

“What did you do before you started your mission?”

“I played soccer at a junior college.”

“How did you do?”

“I scored a lot of goals.”

When you think you have all the answers, ask one more question.

I could have ended there, but I’d learned when you think you have all the answers, ask one more question.

“Why?”

“I was the smallest player on the team,” she said, “so I knew I had to be faster, smarter, and more determined than anyone else.”

Now I had something to write about. I knew the why as well as the what and how. In fact, the physical characteristics and personality of the female protagonist in my novel are based on our missionary’s answer. You never know where asking why will lead you.

Asking questions leads to discovery

Asking questions while researching your book (or preparing for a presentation, podcast, interview, etc.) will add depth and understanding to your work. Ask questions of your characters to understand them better and make them more believable to your readers. We told our missionaries in Germany to ask questions before they started teaching. It not only endeared them to their friends, but their answers about their joys, concerns, successes, and failures often led to gospel discussions.

The concept of asking the right questions is not new, as Simon Sinek described in his acclaimed book, Start with Why. His Ted Talk on the topic has 56 million views. Simon says every inspired leader or innovator asks the question “What.” A smaller number ask “How,” and very few ask “Why.”

The essence of “why”

The plot in my upcoming novel, Erika’s War, is about uranium being smuggled from Germany to Russia. There, the Russians will generate vast amounts of electricity and sell it to the Germans at an extremely low price. The conspiracy will drive renewable power and other sources of electricity out of business, eventually giving the Russians economic control over Germany on a scale not seen since the Cold War.

Plausibility for my plot is strengthened when I discovered that growth of renewable sources of energy is already faltering in Europe. Asking the right questions gave me the why. For example, I discovered that villages in Germany are taxing wind farms for noise pollution and limiting encroachment to two kilometers. This raises the cost of land acquisition and wind farm operation, and increases the likelihood of acceptance of lower-priced energy from Russia.

“Why” has to do with purpose, cause, or belief, not results. It’s the reason Christians and Muslims get along in Sierra Leone. It’s the reason the science professor spends untold hours of research. It’s the reason my soccer player was so good. And it’s the reason the protagonist in your novel just might prevail.

Author Bio

Howard Collett has two novels in production, Erika’s War, a spy novel set in contemporary Berlin, and Lost in the Wilderness, the tale of a 10-year-old girl lost in Utah’s Uinta mountains. He has published 1,600 articles and 300 photos in aviation, medicine, software, and education in national and international magazines. His capstone achievement documented life-saving humanitarian aid on four continents. Visit www.howardcollett.net for more information.

Presenting Moral Themes for a Secular Audience

February 10, 2022 By Emma Heggem 2 Comments

By Emma Heggem

Most of us don’t work within an entirely Latter-day Saint community. Many of us work with audiences, co-creaters, gatekeepers, and financial backers who are not of our faith. Sometimes, in the secular publishing community, it feels like we have to pack our beliefs away during professional moments and save them for personal time. But that approach is never truly possible. Some of our beliefs may be easily removed from our creations, like letting characters drink coffee or swear. On the other hand, some of our beliefs are so deeply rooted that we don’t even realize they show up in our work. We may accidentally include topics such as what makes a good leader, whether people are primarily good, or if good is capable of overcoming evil. Sometimes these influences will be subtle and readers won’t consciously notice them. Other times, these beliefs become an active participant in the plot in the form of a theme.

When our beliefs become a theme in our fiction novels, we can still make books that can be published and appreciated by general readership. We just need to make sure we are making these ideas palatable for readers who are not of our faith by handling the theme with honesty and complexity.

Explore Your Theme

When tackling a belief that some of your readers may disagree with, you can’t present a singular and unequivocal answer. For example, in a book with a theme about lying, stating that lying is bad is not going to be convincing. An author can touch their readers much more deeply by exploring the pros and cons of lying. For readers who do not already agree that lying is bad, this exploration—as opposed to explanation—will allow them to inform their own decisions rather than feel as though they are being force-fed your answers.

Posing your theme as a question can help you make sure that you are exploring both sides of the issue in your book, though not all questions are going to lead to true exploration of a theme. For example, the question “Are serial killers bad?” is likely going to provide a single and fairly predictable answer. I think you’ll be hard pressed to find situations that do anything but show serial killers being bad and will have an even harder time convincing readers that there is any confusion over the answer.

A better theme might be “Are sociopaths destined to be evil?” as the book I am not a Serial Killer by Dan Wells asked. While related to the topic of serial killers, it is a question that readers had not previously considered, and the book’s main character was determined to prove that sociopaths didn’t have to be serial killers. People were interested in seeing if that answer could hold up.

Another option, if you don’t want to try to convince people of an unlikely (but possible) answer to an obvious question, is to present one answer out of many. This is the case for the question “Is lying always bad?” Many people will have different answers to that question, and your book can explore several of those answers and which might be right in various circumstances.

Proposing a Natural Theme

In order to explore a theme, you need to match it to the right story. The events of your story should naturally lend themselves towards questions and conflicts over the topic. A story about the morality of war will need a war. A story about honesty will need secrets and lies. A story about repentance will need a main character who has made a terrible mistake or who has suffered from someone else’s sins.

Themes should also match the story in tone. A kids’ book about unicorns would likely not be the right place for a plotline focused on the murky, gray areas of life. An adult novel about deadly political conspiracy would probably fail to carry a theme about the importance of friendship.

Sympathize with Multiple Sides

As your story develops and the theme becomes relevant to the plot events, your characters will begin to be affected. They may deal with the fallout of other people’s decisions, or they may make their own decisions and have to deal with the consequences. As this happens, the characters may begin to have opinions or even dialogue about the “answer” to the theme question.

No matter what you feel is the “correct answer”, your characters need to come to their own conclusions. A good example of this can be found at the end of the film Doctor Strange. (If you haven’t seen it, the climax is a fight with a demon who was summoned from a realm of destruction by magicians who want to use his powers for their own means. The hero, Doctor Strange, chooses to use forbidden magic of his own to fight the demon.) The overarching question in this movie is: “Can dangerous magic be used for good, or will it always cause destruction?” Doctor Strange and his friend both enter the climax to stop the demon, but they leave the fight with very different conclusions about the overarching question.

No matter what you feel is the ‘correct answer,’ your characters need to come to their own conclusions.

In the end, Doctor Strange believes that forbidden magic could be used for good because he has just saved the world with it. This ties in with his arrogance, which is an important personality trait for him throughout the story.

On the other hand, his friend leaves the movie with the opinion that using forbidden magic is what brought the demon to their world in the first place, so not using forbidden magic, or maybe even any magic at all, is the safest course of action. This lines up with his own established personality as a man who believes rigidly in rules. He also has recently learned that someone very important to him has been lying to him. This betrayal breaks his trust in people, and that carries over into his trust in Doctor Strange’s use of dangerous magic.

In your own stories, the line between characters who believe in the “correct answer” and the “wrong answer” should not one hundred percent follow the line of “good guys” and “bad guys.” Their backgrounds, personalities, and experiences may lead them to come to different conclusions from you and from each other. Always treat the differing opinions as valid and intelligent. If the only proponents of the “wrong answer” are misguided idiots or actual evil people, you will lose your readers and come across as preachy.

Proposing an Answer

When writing a story with a theme, you may frame your plotline around a specific answer, or you may keep it more open-ended and leave readers thoughtful about the topic. If you choose to provide a single answer at the end, you’ll have to be careful to do so gently and without invalidating the individual characters’ beliefs.

Have you ever watched one of those twenty-minute kids’ shows where, at the end of the episode, the main characters say, “And that’s why we always tell the truth,” and everyone nods sagely. Yeah, me too. And it wasn’t at all that convincing. Instead, it usually made me want to laugh. And possibly start lying ridiculously.

The reason this drove me nuts was because the idea is unbelievable. When was the last time that you got caught having lied to a friend, and they said, “Wow, now I see. I’m never going to lie again.” Never? Me neither.

In this example, the character who lied and the character who was lied to are going to have different experiences in the same scene. This may lead to different conclusions and reactions. The liar may feel as though the truth coming out was what got them in trouble, while the character who was lied to feels that the lie itself was the problem. Despite these differing beliefs, you can still have the plot demonstrate a clear answer. When the main character makes a correct decision, the plot should move forward. They should conquer an obstacle and make progress towards their final goal. Likewise, when the main character makes an incorrect decision, the plot should stall, their progress should fail, and negative consequences should occur. This pattern of being punished and rewarded by the plot will leave readers seeing how the “correct answer” is useful, and the “wrong answer” causes problems. Individual characters may believe or react differently, but the overall plot will still clearly send the message.

Using a Theme to Share our Faith

Writing is a deeply personal art form, but we don’t need to hide our religious beliefs to write books for nonmembers. Including complex and nuanced themes will leave room for our beliefs in our books while still creating a story that people from any background can enjoy.

Author Bio

Emma Heggem specializes in content editing sci-fi and fantasy novels. She has worked with authors from around the world to prepare their manuscripts for publication. When she’s not editing, she loves to attend writers conferences to give critiques and demystify the publishing industry. She also runs an editing advice blog (www.editsbyemma.com). Emma graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in English language and a minor in editing.

Why Fiction Is as Precious to God as Nonfiction

January 27, 2022 By Nicole Bay 3 Comments

By Nicole Bay

When I first began writing, I dabbled in YA fantasy, early readers, middle grade fiction, and picture books. I loved all these genres and the worlds I had created, but after a while, I started to wonder if I was spending my creative time wisely. I wondered if, rather than writing fantastical fiction, I ought to be researching and writing family history stories or writing nonfiction related to the gospel of Jesus Christ or the Restoration of the Church. I started questioning the value of what I was writing and the wisdom of taking time to write fiction that might be better spent using my talents to build the kingdom of God.

I thought about it, worried about it, and prayed about it. My prayers were answered in several ways over the course of a few years.

The Desire to Create Is God-Given

In the October 2008 General Conference, President Dieter F. Uchtdorf shared an important thing we can do to feel God’s happiness—we can create. “The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul,” he said. He emphasized that as children of a creator, we have a desire to be like Him, to create something that did not exist before. This is something I have felt. Ever since I was little, I have known there was an artist inside me. I took classes and participated in activities that allowed me to learn principles of drawing, writing, sewing, and acting, and I basked in the inner glow that creating provided me.

The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul.
Dieter F. Uchtdorf

President Uchtdorf continued, “Creation brings deep satisfaction and fulfillment.” Even when I struggle to get just one sentence on the page, I feel better for having taken time to work on my art. And nothing beats the floating-on-clouds feeling of being able to type the words “The End” when I finish a draft of a new story.

Taking time to be creative has more benefits than just feeling good. President Uchtdorf added, “We develop ourselves and others when we take unorganized matter into our hands and mold it into something of beauty.” Over time I have realized that development of self and others isn’t just referring to the development of talents. This development is all about the sometimes life-changing effects our work can have on us and those who experience our art. Both parties can learn. Both can grow spiritually, intellectually, emotionally, and socially. And both can discover truth through art.

“Out of the Best Books” Includes Fiction

The Lord commands us to seek words of wisdom out of the best books so we can teach each other and strengthen each other’s faith (DC 88:118). Of course, He is referring largely to the standard works and inspired writings of members of the Church. The truths found here are the most important truths to develop a testimony of.

But there are also many, many other works that can build our faith and lead people to be better for having read or experienced them. As an avid reader growing up, I was touched by fiction and nonfiction stories of heroism, triumphing over trials, clever thinking, kindness, and forgiveness. I will not soon forget the moving themes woven throughout my favorite books of sacrifice and redemption, good versus evil, the power of love, or the huge effect that one person choosing to stand up for what is right can have on the world. And if those stories can resonate so strongly with me, might I not also be able to tell a story that inspires someone else?

If fiction stories can resonate so strongly with me, might I not also be able to tell a story that inspires someone else?

I hope so. Because I believe that the best books can do just that.

God Cares about Your Creative Gifts

I’m grateful for a commandment to seek out the best gifts and to develop my talents (D&C 46:7–33). My desire to create is a way that I can enrich my own life and bless the lives of others.

And because this is a gift that is important to me, it’s important to the Lord as well. Amulek advised us, “Cry unto him over the crops of your fields, that ye may prosper in them. Cry over the flocks of your fields, that they may increase” (Alma 34:24–25). Whether creating art is my hobby or my living, the Lord wants to bless me in my efforts, so I can pray for that guidance, and my work will be better for it.

Any Genre Can Be a Conduit of Light

When Christ exhorted His listeners, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16), I believe He was talking about letting our testimonies shine through our actions and work. And that includes our creative work. My writing, whether nonfiction, fantasy, or humor, is a conduit for my testimony.

I’m thankful for the divine desire to create, for the understanding that all can learn from the best books, for the knowledge that God wants to support me in my work, and for the calling to share my light through my work.

Nicole Bay teaches linguistics and English language courses at BYU. She is also the Internships Coordinator for the Linguistics Department. She loves to write for children, especially when she can include fun facts about language and linguistics in the story. She spends her non-work time gaming with her family, reading, writing, doing New York Times crosswords, and volunteering for writing conferences. She currently serves as LDSPMA’s director of education.

The Lady and the Map of Sorrow: How Stories can Offer Direction in Dark Times

September 23, 2021 By Bridgette Tuckfield 5 Comments

By Bridgette Tuckfield

How Do You Know It Is Going to Be All Right?

There are a few neurological explanations for why time moves much slower when you’re younger, which I reflected on recently when showing the film Howl’s Moving Castle to my niece Sadie, who is four.

Sadie (aka the Lady) is a beautiful and sweet little girl with chubby cheeks, dimples, and the precise and uncanny ability to immediately and perfectly size up your insecurities and then unerringly cut you down to your core with a single sentence (a trait which I both marvel at and fear). She enjoys magic and peril and romance, and I thought Howl might appeal to her.

There is a scene near the beginning of the film when the wizard Howl saves the young protagonist Sophie from some soldiers in an alley. He walks her away, when they begin to be pursued by Howl’s enemies—amorphous undulating black humanoid blobs, sporting dapper hats.

It’s right before the first magical moment of the film—when Howl and Sophie take off flying, literally walking through the air to safety.

When this happened, Sadie crawled into the crevice of the couch, terrified. “FAST FORWARD,” she yelled, and I paused it.

“Sadie,” I said. “Don’t worry. It’s going to be fine. I promise Sophie is going to be fine. Just wait a minute.”

She was incredibly dubious. “How do you know?” she asked.

“I’ve seen the movie before,” I said, which left her unimpressed. I tried a few other tactics, to no avail: I promise you. I wouldn’t show you something terrible. I know it’s scary, but it’s only a few seconds, and then it will be magical (perhaps all the more so, given the peril). Actual time before the magic rescue? About fifteen seconds. I fast-forwarded it that time around; I’m not a monster. After we finished the film, it became Sadie’s favorite movie for a few months, which she could happily watch over and over with no fast-forwarding, but at the time, absolutely nothing worked to console her.

My mother always told Sadie and her sister something when they were afraid during a kid’s movie—something like, “Nothing bad ever happens in a kid’s movie.” Whatever it was, it always seemed to work.

Which was too bad, as I couldn’t ask her.

Mom had died a few months earlier, at age 55.

Grief: Both Universal and Isolating

Grief is, I believe, maybe mostly beyond words. As Daniel Handler put it in his children’s series: “If you have ever lost someone very important to you, then you already know how it feels; and if you haven’t, you cannot possibly imagine it.”

I will say that nowhere and with nothing else have I felt as keenly the conflation of time and space.

What grief can feel like, sometimes, is a wound that will not stop bleeding—and bleeding and bleeding. When you look back it seems you have left a blood trail back to the time and place you cannot get to—the last place in the past where your loved one once lived, and where it seems they still wait as you move further and further away in time, leaving them behind.

What it can do, sometimes, is shrink your entire world to only your loss and pain. Only your lack. With no hope of joy or meaning on the horizon—all that lies in the past, the only land you can never reach again.

It is then, of course, that you are most vulnerable to despair. And once despair sets in around you, it seems like you will never live anywhere else again.

I believe too that it can feel like this for everyone.

Our Sorrow Shall Be Turned Into Joy

Elder S. Mark Palmer addressed those feelings and fears for those of us mired in grief in his recent talk, “Our Sorrow Shall Be Turned Into Joy.” He centers his talk around what are the fundamental principles of our religion: that Jesus Christ died, was buried and rose again on the third day—that Jesus Christ lives and what that means for us:

We will live again after we die.
This is possible through Christ.
We will see our loved ones again.

As he puts it:

This knowledge [of Christ’s resurrection] gives meaning and purpose to our lives. If we go forward in faith, we will be forever changed, as were the Apostles of old. We, like them, will be able to endure any hardship with faith in Jesus Christ. This faith also gives us hope for a time when our “sorrow shall be turned into joy.”

Palmer also supports his message with the story of his parents, and how they navigated the loss of his sister Ann.

By illustrating and testifying of these gospel principles, Palmer does a few things:

He gives us an endpoint: the point at which our sorrow will be turned to joy.

He gives us a way to get there: having faith, and following Christ:

He gives us the truth. A way of understanding the world, as it is.

And, in this case, a way out of despair and grief and sorrow.

And what that truth is—what maybe all truths are—

Is a map.

A map to help us find the way through the dark.

Stories Are Maps

What I speak of here—the interrelatedness and importance of maps and narratives (and respectively, space and time)—is not a new concept.

“To ask for a map,” writer Peter Turchi says, “is to say: tell me a story.”

He goes on to say about the similarity: “Maps themselves are stories. They’re simplifications, distillations, and interpretations of a hugely complex world. Maps provide meaning and context; they reveal patterns and relationships…sometimes maps can reveal hidden stories.”

If a lifetime is a space, then times of grief and loss are a wasteland.

This is perhaps why Elder Palmer ends his talk by stressing the steps you can take through sorrow (although perhaps never out of it), and the place you will find yourself if you do:

I invite all who feel sorrow, all who wrestle with doubt, all who wonder what happens after we die, to place your faith in Christ. I promise that if you desire to believe, then act in faith and follow the whisperings of the Spirit, you will find joy in this life and in the world to come.

As someone amid despair myself, this map spoke to my heart.

Wrestling With Despair as a Saint

All that said, it is not always easy to see the whole picture or the way forward.

Sometimes—perhaps most times—we can only take it on faith.

After all, some things can seem too good to be true, and thus to be regarded with suspicion.

Stories tell us all this, too (Sadie knows this, even at four years old).

Elder Palmer illustrates these difficulties with the story of the apostle Thomas. When Thomas is told of Christ’s resurrection, he doesn’t believe it:

Later Jesus admonished Thomas, “Be not faithless, but believing.” Then the Lord taught the vital role of faith: “Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”

I have always felt for Thomas—it’s very human, to not want to believe something so longed for. It’s also human, with our limited perspective, to fail to see the whole picture because we only perceive the bad.

Often in scripture, Christ encourages taking a broader perspective. Peter in particular seems to struggle with this (which I love him for).

In Matthew 16:21-25, Christ is walking with and teaching his disciples. He tells them he needs to go to Jerusalem and says he will suffer and die there, to rise again.

Peter objects; he says surely this doesn’t need to happen.

Christ admonishes him and says, functionally, you’re looking at this from a narrow framework.

You’re not looking at this from the view of God and seeing my true mission: the redemption of mankind, and that my death will not separate us for eternity but only for a brief moment. You’re looking at this from your limited mortal eyes, where my death would be just a catastrophe and separate us forever.

In short:

You lack perspective.

You are not seeing the end.

The whole picture.

Darkness Can Delineate Light

Elder Palmer also speaks of the wrenching ways this perspective can be gained and what else can come of it.

He tells the story of the tragic loss of his sister Ann when she was only a toddler, and how it affected his parents:

“Many years later Dad told me that if not for Ann’s tragic death, he would never have been humble enough to accept the restored gospel. Yet the Spirit of the Lord instilled hope that what the missionaries taught was true. My parents’ faith continued to grow until they each burned with the fire of testimony that quietly and humbly guided their every decision in life.”

This illustrates how important contrast can be: dark and light, sorrow and joy.

I know that I have fundamentally changed for the better as a person after the loss of my mother. My faith and connection to Heavenly Parents and Christ have improved.

This does not mean, I must stress, that a specific loss or pain is good or warranted or just or necessary, but rather that it can point us in the right direction.

It can make truths resonate with us more, just as the black ink of a map delineates meaning and space. Just as you can’t know light without dark.

Small Truths

Howl’s Moving Castle is not gospel, of course; it’s just a little gem of a film. And although I didn’t have my mother’s words or presence anymore in this time and place, I could at least comfort Sadie by sitting with her and promising her it would end well.

When it came to Howl at least, I had the whole picture. I knew what was going to happen, and how, and why.

Sadie had to find out for herself. She (like the protagonist Sophie) had to take the next steps, go through the (literally) fifteen seconds of dark (or in this case, again, very mild animated peril), to get to the magic part.

But in that moment, and in that film, are small truths. Facts that resonate, and that you can hold on to in times of fog and despair.

That you can never be certain of exactly how the end will look until you get there.

That you have reserves of strength and power and beings who care for you, that you aren’t even aware of right now.

And that ultimately, everything is going to be all right.

Maybe—almost certainly—it will be better than anything you can imagine right now.

Our Role: To Show a Way Through the Dark, as Best We Can, With the Truths We Know

Truths (and the stories they’re embedded in) can be maps through darkness and despair. This is the case whether they are an ultimate truth such as Elder Palmer spoke of, or a small one like in Howl’s Moving Castle.

I appreciate talks like Elder Palmer’s because his message was the promise of the purpose and the ending, given to us.

He gave us a map to follow. Like all narratives do.

For me, taking this message to heart meant flipping around the proverbial map of sorrow I was working with.

I was not moving away from my mother, as I once believed — I am moving towards her. The lines between myself and her in the time and space that separates us are not trails of blood and tears as they felt and sometimes still feel, but bonds.

The world around us is getting darker and brighter all the time.

And storytelling is—and has perhaps always been—a “deeply spiritual act,” as the poet Clarissa Pinkola Estés says.

It’s our job to add to the light.

I believe we do this not by shying away from the dark — by timidly skirting a way around it, as we seldom get to do in life.

I believe we do this by, instead, showing a way through it.

Bridgette Tuckfield is a writer and semiotician.

Cussing & Creating: 3 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t (& Should!) Use Profanities in Your Writing

June 30, 2021 By Lizzy Pingry 9 Comments

By Lizzy Pingry

During World War II, American soldier Audie Murphy earned a total of twenty-eight medals, including two from France and one from Belgium, making him the most decorated soldier in American history. His story was so extraordinary that in 1955, it was sensationalized in a film that Murphy himself starred in. To Hell and Back is his biography, and at one point, it shows the death of Murphy’s best friend, Lattie Tipton (named “Brandon” in the film). The scene was understandably difficult for Murphy, as Brandon is shot, looks at him from a distance, and falls down dead. However, this scene as depicted in the movie is not what really happened. Murphy stated, “When we shot the scene, we changed the part where Brandon died in my arms. That was the way it had really happened, but it looked too corny, they said. I guess it did.”

This highly decorated soldier had to relive one of his worst days, and a director or writer looked him in the eye and told him that the truth “looked too corny,” and the concept of that situation is just as shocking as the death itself. When writers censor or change the truth of a situation because it makes them uncomfortable or because it may be unpopular, they risk invalidating the truth, especially in nonfiction. Latter-day Saint authors have to grapple with the concept of censorship when trying to decide whether or not to use profanities in their writing.

Language: What Is It Good For? Absolutely Everything

The debate of appropriate use of language is an argument spanning centuries. It is one of the reasons the English language is so adaptable. Some words in English didn’t start as profanities but eventually evolved into something inappropriate for polite society. The Journal.ie’s article “The Historical Origins of 6 Swear Words We Use Every Day” explains that the Proto-Indo European’s base word skie, or the Old English scitte, started as a verb and noun (respectively) for “separating” or “purging” from the body. This base eventually evolved to suit the needs of the speakers until it stopped meaning “going to the bathroom” and started being a vulgarity for excrement. Meanwhile, some words started as vulgarities and eventually shifted into every-day terms. For example, a silly sounding word, zounds, is an archaic exclamation (popular in Baroness Orczy’s The Scarlet Pimpernel) meaning “God’s wounds,” and it was a terrible curse when it was first introduced.

Words are not capable of being bad by themselves. Even our synonyms for the phrase “swear words” supports that idea: vulgar means lacking in sophistication, and profane means disrespectful or irreverent. The word is only as powerful as our reaction to it as individuals and as a society. God’s name is a prayer—until it is used as an exclamation. The way we use the word defines its appropriateness, and we have to vet each term and syllable. Is it worse to say that it’s a “damn beautiful day” or to tell an overeager child to “please shut up”? Writers must evaluate the way they express themselves: how does our use of language and its profanities build or destroy our stories?

The word is only as powerful as our reaction to it.

Writers who are disinclined to use profane words in their writing might be familiar with a First Presidency message, in which Spencer W. Kimball addressed the world—specifically writers!—on profanities. He stated, “I lately picked up a book, widely circulated, highly recommended, a best-seller, and my blood ran cold at the profane and vulgar conversations therein, and I cringed as the characters used in an ugly way the sacred names of Deity. Why? Why do authors sell themselves so cheaply and desecrate their God-given talents? Why do they profane and curse?” Those who prefer to avoid using strong language in their writing may reflect on Book Cave’s article, “Profanity in Books: Show Don’t Tell Emotion,” which points out that “there are more effective ways to make the world ‘bloom’…the use of vulgarity quickly becomes a cheap, convenient device to give the impression that the book is up-to-date and realistic.” These individuals argue that profanity in any form is a sin and an example of weak writing styles; they believe that profanity is an excuse to express strong emotions without having to be vulnerable.

Meanwhile, we have stories about “the cursing apostle” J. Golden Kimball, who, when driving a stubborn stage of oxen, started cursing to get them moving. He remembered, saying: “Boy, how I did cuss! Did I wax eloquent! I’m afraid I did. But, did those oxen sit up and take notice? They sure did; every one of them got down to business. You see, they were Church oxen, and when you talked that language to them they understood it.” This humble and humorous story of working with Church oxen is a reminder that we are, none of us, perfect, and since that’s the case, we can’t expect the characters in our writing to be perfect either. The Writing Cooperative’s article “Should You Use Curse Words in Your Writing?” (heads up! This one uses strong curse words, so don’t read it if you want to avoid that kind of language) insists “swearing isn’t the only way to express emotion, but it is a tool in your arsenal.” Writers who use profanities in their work may relate to the article “Writing Dark Things as a Positive Person” by Zachariah Wahrer where he states, “If a story is all positive, it isn’t interesting. We have to have conflict, deception, destruction, lies, etc., to make it interesting, because that is how we experience everyday life (albeit usually on a smaller scale).” These individuals argue that strong language is representative of human nature and realism; they believe that profanity is an opportunity to represent a variety of character voices and experiences.

This argument is relevant to writers all over the world. Writers can join the discussion by educating themselves on the pros and cons of using profanities in our writing.

3 Reasons Why You Can Feel Justified Using Profanities in Your Writing

Lattie Tipton’s death was so traumatic that even nearly fifteen years later, Audie Murphy struggled to maintain composure while reenacting the scene. While the film’s representation of the scene is still potent, knowing the truth of the death is even more so. Failing to accurately represent the situation changed the meaning behind the scene, and one could argue that the same could apply to using profanities. For example, let’s take the phrase, coined initially by U.S. Naval officer David Glasgow Farragut: “Damn the torpedos! Full speed ahead!” This phrase is a popular colloquialism meaning to move forward despite the risks you may face.

If we were to take that phrase and change it to avoid the profanity, we lose the intention behind the phrase. Neither “Don’t worry about the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!” nor “Forget the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!” carries the same reckless abandon as the vulgarity; the original phrase stirs a level of shock and awe, and it is far more realistic to imagine a sailor cursing. The profanity is an exclamation we expect from such a character, and some authors (and readers) feel strong language is justified because it lends itself to realism.

Don’t worry about the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!

It could be argued that fictional characters cannot be directly quoted, so providing alternatives to profanities is not going to change the meaning. To expand on that counter-argument, let’s look at Tim O’Brien’s novel The Things We Carried, which is introduced as a nonfictional memoir of American soldiers in Vietnam. Strong language is used throughout the book; these were real men surviving war, and if changing an experience invalidates it, we should expect nonfiction writers to honor the language as much as they can. However, at the end of the novel, readers come to understand that it was never a memoir; none of the men were real, and it takes first-time readers by surprise because the details are so accurate, so realistic, that it’s more unbelievable to think these characters weren’t human. The language they use is shocking, but expected. If O’Brien created fake characters and let them swear like soldiers, was he being profane, or was he representing the soldiers who did exist, even namelessly? Writers argue that these vulgarities are tools for intentionality. We would not correct real human beings for their profane statements; why should writers have to tiptoe around fictional characters inspired by those same people?

Influential comedian Richard Pryor noted, “What I’m saying might be profane, but it’s also profound,” suggesting that strong language can convey powerful messages. What’s more is the fact that writers are crafting something; their decisions in their work are not always meant to represent their personal values. Conflict and antagonists must exist to create a story, and these conflicts can sometimes be gruesome, raw, and violent because the protagonist has to overcome these evils to develop. To this day, Cormac McCarthy’s The Road is impacting lives because of its haunting imagery. McCarthy wrote about characters that would kill their own children to survive; does that mean he agrees with the tactic and would implement it himself? No. The same could be said for writers who use profanity. These writers can uphold Oscar Wilde’s insight: “I didn’t say I liked it. I said it fascinated me. There is a great difference.”

3 Reasons Why You Should Feel Justified Not Using Profanities in Your Writing

On the other hand, writers are meant to develop the skills of producing powerful emotions without leaning on the reader’s shock. C.S. Lewis wrote to a young author about adjectives saying, “…instead of telling us a thing was ‘terrible,’ describe it so that we’ll be terrified. Don’t say it was ‘delightful’; make us say ‘Delightful!’ when we’ve read the description. You see, all those words…are only like saying to your readers ‘Please, will you do my job for me?’”

Don’t say it was ‘delightful’; make us say ‘Delightful!’ when we’ve read the description.
C.S. Lewis

The same reasoning can apply to using vulgarities. Writers claim that using profanity is a signal of lazy writing, and Mark Twain humorously suggested, “Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.”

Writers who won’t use profanities have to adapt their work around the void, and doing so can make it just as impactful, particularly since vulgarity for shock value is a detriment to the reader and potentially to the work, especially the more it is used. For example, when you hear about the 2013 film “The Wolf of Wall Street,” you may not think about the story of corrupt stockbrokers in America. Instead, you probably remember it as being the most expletive film in history. The consequence of “realistic” profanity? This film won’t be remembered for the characters or their development, nor the conflict or how it was or wasn’t overcome, but for its use of over 700 swear words. Realistically, this is profanity. Outside a Latter-day Saint community, people use strong language as frequently as any other part of speech. If writers want to claim profanity as realism, they may find their work being analyzed for reasons they didn’t intend.

Using profanities is not as tempting when you realize that there are ways to work around doing so. Great men and women throughout history have avoided using profanities, even when they could have been justified to do so. Teddy Roosevelt, America’s 26th president, didn’t swear.

Using profanities is not required to develop a unique character voice.

Instead, according to Mental Floss’s article “16 Savage Teddy Roosevelt Insults,” he employed colorful phrases to describe his frustrations. Rachel Hawkins’ young adult novel Rebel Belle produces a narrator who censors her friend’s strongest language throughout the story because “this is my story, so I’m cleaning it up a little.” Language contributes to realism, and using profanities is not required to develop a unique character voice.

Who is Right and What Really Matters

Both sides of the argument are so compelling and it makes the decision that much harder. We are advised to use “praiseworthy” language, but as artists, we aim to reveal the truth of our reality. Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved is one of the most influential stories of our time, and it uses explicit violence and language to tell the truth. Writers can’t be expected to use profanities to deliver that truth, but I would say they can’t be expected not to either. This debate is one for the ages.

In the end, I can only say to write what is true to you. Validation of your art is not necessary for it to exist; what you write will continue with or without others’ approval. Whatever language you decide to implement, I simply recommend that you do so deliberately and with the understanding that your words—profane or not—carry a meaning that will affect your readers. What you choose to put in or take out can change your story in big ways and little ways at the same time: To Hell and Back told the true story of a soldier who witnessed the death of his best friend, and whether Lattie Tipton died on a hillside or in Audie Murphy’s arms, he still died.

Lizzy Pingry is a full-time editor and enthusiastic writer. She graduated with a degree in English and emphasis in creative writing from BYU-Idaho and has worked as an editor on multiple projects since 2016. She lives in Idaho with her husband and their cat, Jack.

Questions Every Writer Should Ask Themselves

June 9, 2021 By Steve Dunn Hanson Leave a Comment

By Steve Dunn Hanson

In high school my most dreaded assignment was to write a composition. Give me a book, like Orwell’s 1984 back then, and you could just about say goodbye to me until I had finished it. But writing . . . ? Hand me a math problem or a science project or, preferably, a basketball or a MAD magazine. Just don’t ask me to write, or, even worse, give a talk.

Maybe my handwriting had something to do with this aversion. The lowest grade I ever received in school was in penmanship in the fourth grade. Mine was the poorest in the class. The teacher told us that she would give a book, The Magic Bus, to the student who improved the most in penmanship. It was no contest. I was so bad nobody could possibly improve as much as I could. I got the book, but bettering my handwriting never got close to the top of my I-want-to-do-this list again. Thank goodness for typewriters and computers!

So, when did my attitude about writing and speaking change, and why? Well, weird things sometimes happen when you grow up. For me, I began to discover that I had something meaningful to say. And if I was going to effectively share with others what I was observing and experiencing and thinking, I had to do something about my subpar communication skills.

I began to discover that I had something meaningful to say.

While each of us has our own unique path to where we are today in the use of our creative talents, all of us are faced with the same ongoing and defining question: Why am I doing this? Is it for money, or for recognition, or to be famous? Is it to make others happy, or to help others overcome challenges, or to share knowledge, or to provide entertainment? Will it give me an outlet for something in me that needs to get out, or fulfill my desire to achieve, or give me a satisfaction-high by watching something new and even beautiful flow from me? Or is it my duty to create?

Any or all the above might be our answer. But whatever our reasons for creating, we need to count on snags along the way. My foray into getting my first book published illustrates this rather dramatically. And, I might add, that this initial rollercoaster experience of mine has been replicated, in one form or another, a myriad of times throughout my creative journey. Here’s how it went.

Some 40 years ago I had two articles published in the Ensign magazine within a year or two of each other. That confidence builder got me thinking about writing a book. And I knew just the book I wanted to write. As a young man, I had an extraordinary Church mission to Australia. It had everything. Gobs of spiritual highlights. Dangers. Depressions. Really funny incidents. And even why-am-I-out-here gut-punchers. I could literally go 3,000 miles from one end of my mission to the other and be on islands or in the tropics or deserts or snowy mountains. I labored in small outback towns that were 100 years behind anything I had ever experienced as well as in a dazzling metropolis that boasted world-class beauty. All of this plus out-of-this-world fauna like kangaroos, emus, koalas, echidnas, and platypuses. I was in an exotic zoo with no cages.

In sum, my mission was an adventure I never dreamed possible, and I was certain the world would be waiting with bated breath to read about it! But after my initial enthusiasm, I was struck with a balloon-popping realization. Who would ever want to buy a book about the mission of a nobody like Steve Dunn Hanson? And with that came a critical question. “Why do I want to write this book? Really!”

Why do I want to write this book? Really!

Significant soul searching resulted and some course-guiding answers came. I decided my primary objective in writing was to help young missionaries find out who they were so their missions could be the life changing experience for them that mine was for me. Now all I had to do was write the book so it would appeal to a publisher and entice young men and women to read it. That shouldn’t be too hard. After all, the Ensign published two of my articles. Dream on!

I titled the book The Mission. It was a fictionalized account of some of my mission experiences with a focus on the changes taking place in the life of my protagonist, Elder Pete Hewitt. I wrote it as a series of letters that brought the reader into Pete’s mission and mind in a unique and intimate way. I submitted my manuscript to a major Latter-day Saint publisher and within two or three weeks I received a phone call from the managing editor saying they wanted to publish it. Well, I thought, what was so hard about this?

Then reality hit.

Someone on the publisher’s board of directors didn’t like the book—too realistic they said. Remember this was over 30 years ago, and Latter-day Saint fiction tended to be more vanilla then. I soon received a “with regrets” letter from the managing editor. They would not be publishing it. I picked myself up off the floor (I stayed there for quite a while!) and submitted my work to other Latter-day Saint publishers. My rejection letters piled up until I received an acceptance from a very small publisher. That was an almost euphoric experience, but I was learning to restrain my hope. A publishing date was set, and then . . . reality hit. Again.

The company didn’t have the funds to publish it for a while, they said apologetically. I could wait for when they did (no date was given), or, if I wanted to do this now, they would help me self-publish it and would distribute it for me at a special price. I would, of course, foot the bill. I had run out of options, and since I had the funds, that’s what I did.

Amazon didn’t exist back then, and there wasn’t a plethora of publishing, marketing, editing, formatting, or distributing services to get a self-published book up and going. My would-be publisher, however, was good to their word and successfully guided me through the process. A learning experience, and an expensive one. I printed 7,000 hardback copies, and Deseret Book and other Latter-day Saint bookstores carried them. It was all working. At one point, Deseret Book even told me The Mission was their top-selling book for the week.

And then . . . (Stop me if you’ve heard this before).

While all copies of my book were ultimately sold, my publisher/distributor declared bankruptcy somewhere along the way, and I was sans thousands of dollars in royalty compensation. But fortunately, that was not the end of the story.

Over the years, I have had countless people tell me how that book changed their mission. Changed their lives. And even today, decades later, I have had grandfathers approach me to tell me how my book affected them deeply when they were struggling with their missions. And I’ve thought, it didn’t just affect these now-grandfathers, but through them their children and grandchildren as well. My book was a success in the most meaningful way it could be. It accomplished what I wrote it to do.

My answer to the “Why” question back then was the right answer and put me on a convoluted but exceptionally rewarding path. The ride was amazing . . . especially looking back. But, then again, maybe I have just described life.

How we respond to the “Why” question, of course, is affected by how we answer another question: Where does my talent come from? Am I the source of my creative genius and solely responsible for how successfully it is manifested and received? Or is my talent a gift from God that He has given me stewardship over, and my magnifying it requires an abundance of His grace?

How we respond to the “Why” question is affected by how we answer another question: Where does my talent come from?

While I, for one, find it disturbingly easy to drink in accolades and internalize praise, that is literally a dead-end street. I wrote a little poem about that.

When I think
that it is me,
I find my glint
is hard to see.

As I lose myself in Him,
His Beam bursts forth
where e’er I Am.

When we perceive that we are the sole or primary source of our talents, we will likely focus on ourselves. A dim light indeed. If we recognize the gift-nature of our abilities, we will strive to know what the Lord wants us to do with the talents He has given us. On an admittedly bumpy and inconsistent road, we will also grow and learn to become an extension of Jesus Christ; an instrument in bringing about His purposes. We are then entitled to have the Spirit work through us, and what proceeds can be far beyond what we are innately capable of producing.

How we answer the “Why” and “Where” questions will affect the content, quality, and impact of our creativity. But those responses beg another question that is even more important. Are they congruous with who we really want to be eternally? If not, perhaps we should consider reprioritizing some of our objectives.

Steve Dunn Hanson has a BS in economics and an MA in political behavior. He has served in many community and Church capacities, including as a jail chaplain, stake president, and member of a temple presidency. He lives with Joyce, his wife of 57 years, in northeast Washington and is the author of several books, including The Course of Fate, a fiction trilogy currently available on Amazon.

Showing Versus Telling to Write Compelling Dialogue

June 2, 2021 By Emma Heggem Leave a Comment

By Emma Heggem

To write a good conversation, you first need to be picky about what conversations make it into your book. A conversation that doesn’t affect the story, no matter how dynamic, realistic, and well-written, will feel like an unnecessary aside. Dialogue takes up a lot more space than narrating a conversation would. It needs to earn that space by showing readers something important. Characters need to learn valuable information through the conversation, whether that’s the password to their bank account or the state of another human being’s emotions. The things that are talked about must change the story or the character by being known.

There are some things that come across particularly well by being shown to readers in a conversation. One example is relationships. Readers don’t like to be told about a relationship between two characters. They want to feel the connection for themselves, which means that it is very important to show relationships and show them changing over the course of the book. Downtime or relationship-changing moments for characters, including dialogue, can help readers feel the bond between the characters and be invested in the relationship. This is true whether the relationship is improving or declining. Inter-character conflict is just as important to show as characters falling in love.

Decisions can also work well as dialogue conversations. Inner monologues can get tiring to read and can drift into angst or get repetitive. Real people mull over the same thing again and again when making a decision, but characters need to avoid boring their readers. One way to show them pondering a decision without sitting inside their head and going in circles is to have them talk their decision through with another person. This pushes them forward and forces them to move through each part of the decision and then move on. When the character weighing the decision gets bogged down, their friends or listeners can express the same frustration the readers will be feeling and cut them off.

Another excellent use of dialogue is to provide the reader with an active and dynamic account of events that your point-of-view character wasn’t present for. This can help tone down unnecessary telling in your novel. The characters who were present can retell the story, be asked questions, and even be unreliable when it suits your needs. That’s much more interesting than a factual summary of important events.

Speaking of things your point-of-view character doesn’t know, dialogue is a great way to show readers the emotional state of your other characters without necessarily cluing your POV character in. Is one of your characters keeping a huge secret? Is a side character madly in love with your oblivious main character? By showing the conversations directly to the reader, you allow the reader to pick up on things that the point-of-view character doesn’t notice. This can help fill in the blanks and explain complex side-character motivations without having to switch POV.

As with most forms of showing, dialogue takes up more time and space than narration does. Choosing which conversations to show your readers is a very important step towards making sure that the conversation will be compelling. Don’t waste time with dialogue that isn’t going to strengthen your story. Focus on the moments that readers truly need to hear (read) about and you will end up having a much easier time keeping them interested and invested.

Happy writing!

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Emma Heggem is the managing editor with Future House Publishing. She specializes in content editing sci-fi and fantasy novels. She has worked with authors from around the world to prepare their manuscripts for publication. When she’s not editing, she attends writers conferences to take pitches, give critiques, and talk to aspiring writers about the mysterious world of publishing. Emma graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in English language and a minor in editing.