Sheryl McFarlane

2014 NIGHTLIGHT READING WRITERS CONTEST

Nightlight Reading is requesting submissions for their 2014 Nightlight Readings Short Story Writers Contest. It’s geared to at-risk boys in the 10-12 year age group who often stop reading for pleasure. Their goal is to fund and promote literature that appeals to boys and keeps them engaged and reading.

The 2014 CONTEST THEME is ADVENTURE.
MAXIMUM COUNT of 5,000 WORDS.

JUDGING
The 2014 contest entries will be pre-screened and read by a jury panel who may be scholars, librarians, teachers, and special guests who will decide on 10 semi-finalists. Then, a jury of young readers selected from our target readers will read all 10 entries and vote on the winners.

PRIZES

First Prize: $1,000 award plus certificate and publication of the story.
Second Prize: $500 award plus certificate and publication of the story.
Third Prize: $300 award plus certificate and publication of the story.
All award winners will be publicized nationally by Nightlight Reading.

RULES
Open to anyone who loves to write stories for boys, and may be a professional writer, student or budding writer.

Submissions must not have been previously published or won any other writing contest. Simultaneous submissions to other contests are acceptable.

DEADLINE
Deadline for submission for the 2014 contest is December 31, 2014 so get writing!

Enter: http://www.nightlightreading.org/contest-entry-form/

Good luck!

Hurray! My trip to the Northwest Territories is back on track. I’ll be heading out Feb. 8 and returning home Feb. 17. Yellowknife, Gameti, and Inuvik are the three communities on my itinerary. I’ve borrowed a warm coat and am ready to go!

The Governor Generals’ 2014 shortlist for Children’s Literature has been announced. Congratulations everyone. Find the full short list here.

Children text:

The Night Gardener by Jonathan Auxier (Puffin)
Jeremy Stone by Lesley Choyce (Red Deer Press)
Skraelings by Rachel and Sean Qitsualik-Tinsley (Inhabit Media Inc.)
When Everything Feels like the Movies by Raziel Reid (Arsenal Pulp Press)
This One Summer by Mariko Tamaki (Groundwood Books/House of Anansi Press)
Children illustrated:

Hana Hashimoto, Sixth Violin, illustrated by Qin Leng, text by Chieri Uegaki (Kids Can Press)
Once Upon a Memory, illustrated by Renata Liwska, text by Nina Laden (Little, Brown and Company)
Julia, Child, illustrated by Julie Morstad, text by Kyo Maclear (Tundra Books)
This One Summer, illustrated by Jillian Tamaki, text by Mariko Tamaki (Groundwood Books/House of Anansi Press)

Check out some of the fabulous books on these short lists. I wish they could all be winners. The pile of books by my bed is about to get higher!

A productive day…18 jars of 3 berry jam and 5 jars of raspberry jam.

Here’s a guest post by Nikolas Baron about characters that live.  For examples of books where the characters feel like real people, check out authors like, K L Going, Lisa Yee, Karen Rivers, and Sherman Alexie.

Creating Characters that Come to Life

The argument between writers who believe that plot is more important and those who favor characterization as the foundation of effective writing is long-running. Without an attention-grabbing plot, it’s difficult to keep the reader engaged, but without strong characters, the audience will quickly lose interest in even the most exciting action. Writing characters that draw the reader in is a matter of creating characters the reader cares about in the story. Even before a manuscript is run through a proofreading program, or the editing begins, it’s important to begin building characters that capture the reader’s attention and hold it through the story. Without a personal connection to the character, without a feeling of empathy, the reader will quickly lose interest and close the book or click away from the page.

Creating a connection with the reader requires an understanding of characterization. Characters come in several layers. The first layer character is flat, appearing only long enough to establish a scene or to set up the protagonist. The first layer character is the man or woman on the street, the child playing ball in front of the main character’s house as he stares out the window, contemplating his next move. They move the story forward, without becoming deeply involved. The first layer character is little more than a prop, a placeholder, which moves the story forward without becoming deeply involved. These characters are necessary to populate the stage and give background to the story, but they are little more than setting, used to establish a sense of place.

The second layer character is also known as the secondary character. This character may be a friend or family member of the main character. Their problems, fears, desires, or other conflicts exist only to move the main character forward. The secondary character may help move the main character forward, propelling him or her to action or motivating his or her development. The secondary character needs to be engaging to capture the reader’s interest, but should not hog the spotlight. The focus must remain in the main character in order for the story to keep moving forward. The secondary character serves as a foil, the Watson to Sherlock, the Robin to Batman, the Sam to Frodo. It’s hard to imagine one without the other, but while the story could be constructed without the secondary character, the protagonist, when it comes time to face the bitter climax, will go on alone, whether carrying the ring into Mordor, facing Moriarty, or bringing the villain to defeat.

The top-level (or main) character is the star of the show, the hero or heroine of the epic, and holds the focus from the beginning of the story to the end. This can be accomplished either by writing in first person, with the main character as the narrative voice of the story, or in third person by keeping the main character at the forefront of the action. Every plot point must focus on the main character’s story in some way. Even the conflict faced by the secondary characters must serve to move the main character forward in his or her journey.

Creating a relatable main character means paying attention to the details that make a character relatable. A secondary character must also have some of these virtues, but the main character should be a fully-developed creation, complete with hopes, dreams, goals, flaws, and mistakes. While a main character must have characteristics that make him or her likable and relatable, he or she should not be too perfect. Elsewise the author runs the risk of creating a character no one will like. Readers love a hero, but if the hero’s hair is never out of place, his teeth too white, her voice too sweet, or without a flaw to be seen, the reader will lose interest. While the action drives the plot, the change in the character himself or herself is the fuel that makes the engine run. A perfect character cannot change for the better, therefore there is nothing for the reader to advocate. A character must have flaws, not only to be believable, but also to be changeable for the better. Well rounded characters with problems, flaws, and depth are what make a story interesting to the reader.

by Nikolas Baron

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Bio:

Nikolas discovered his love for the written word in Elementary School, where he started spending his afternoons sprawled across the living room floor devouring one Marc Brown children’s novel after the other and writing short stories about daring pirate adventures. After acquiring some experience in various marketing, business development, and hiring roles at internet startups in a few different countries, he decided to re-unite his professional life with his childhood passions by joining Grammarly’s marketing team in San Francisco. He has the pleasure of being tasked with talking to writers, bloggers, teachers, and others about how they use Grammarly’s online proofreading application to improve their writing. His free time is spent biking, traveling, and reading.