Knowing Your Process
Award-winning crime fiction writer Art Taylor talks about why this is important and the six-sentence story method.
Talking to Art Taylor on the Simply Write podcast last week was like sitting in the professor’s class. A masterclass in writing.
Taylor is a college professor. An award-winning novelist and an award-winning author of multiple short stories.
I didn’t know his work. Now I can’t shake it.
His newest collection, The Adventures of the Castle Thief and Other Expeditions and Indiscretions will be released Feb. 14. You won’t be able to get the stories out of your head either. The Premonition is still haunting me.
But so are his lessons on writing.
On process, Taylor says:
“There has to be an awareness of your working process. I think every writer has to understand how they work best.”
“Get something on the page and revise it later. Getting something down on the page gets the mind working.”
Even if Taylor doesn’t have a lot of time to work on a piece during the day, he does like to give a little attention to it. That makes it easier for him to keep it percolating, he says, in his mind, even when he’s not at the computer.
Finding a Way Into the Story
Taylor talks about his six-sentence story and the way he spoke about this totally changed how I’m thinking about a piece I’m working on.
The story was cumbersome and slow. I had gotten too far away from what I wanted to do and lost control over the basics.
I went back and thought about it the way Taylor described his six-sentence story method. Made sure I have all the elements and then rebuilt from there.
So. Much. Better.
Here’s Taylor’s Six-Sentence Story
1. One sentence about the character.
2. What does the character want?
What are they going to do about it?
What is the conflict they are facing?
Does it work? Does it not?
What is the ending or resolution?
If you want to hear Taylor talk about this and other techniques tune in. This part comes toward the end of the podcast.
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