R. L. Stedman

Writer

Blog

3 Outstanding Ghost Stories to Encourage Kids to Read

By

Ghost Stories To Capture The Imagination.

Spooky stories are thrilling, scary, but always safe – because the child knows that if they put the book down, they can just walk away. Wish life was like that!

spooky stories
image source

Spooky stories are great at hooking kids into reading. Here are three books I recommend:

The Ghosts of Tarawera by Sue Copsey.

The Ghosts of Tarawera

Quick name drop: Sue was my editor for Prankster. Sue’s writing a three-part series of spooky tales (this is the second in the series) so if your class enjoys this book, then don’t worry, there’s more! The Ghosts of Tarawera is a Storylines Notable Book, and is available from bookstores or directly from Sue, at her website: Suecopsey.com  Sue also has a whole lot of spooky jokes on this website.

Under the Mountain by Maurice Gee

Under the Mountain

A well-known classic, Under the Mountain, is exciting to read aloud. There’s also a movie (which I didn’t like, but some people did), and Penguin have study notes available online here.

The House on the Hill by Kyle Mewburn, Illustrations by Sarah Davis

The House on the Hill by Kyle Mewburn

The House on the Hill is Kyle’s homage to Edgar Allen Poe and is written in rhyming stanzas, a little like The Raven. A natural performer, Kyle has a youtube channel which is great fun. Scholastic have produced some helpful teacher notes here.

Here’s a link to Kyle’s youtube Storytime Channel

Hope you enjoy.

3 Ghostly Facts Behind My Ghost Story

By

Do You Believe in Ghosts?

Spooky Image - From Deposit Photos
Image from Deposit Photos. Used under license.

My new book, The Prankster and The Ghost, is a fun-filled story about ghosts and practical jokes and friendship. While Prankster is totally made up, it does include some actual ghost stories…

Ghost Story One:

In Prankster, Jamie remembers seeing a strange lady in Edinburgh castle. This is based an actual encounter. My friend was on a tour through Edinburgh Castle and was creeped out by a strange lady in an old-fashioned dress. No one else could see this woman, but the tour guide was not surprised. ‘Oh yes,’ she said, ‘she’s often seen.’

Ghost Story Two:

I’ve worked in hospitals all my working life and thirty years ago there were still many Victorian buildings. There were plenty of tales of figures in white, or unexplained drafts, or a feeling of clutching hands. These old hospitals were the spookiest places; they had long echoing corridors and high dusty ceilings.  We didn’t like being called out at night in those wards! But even in modern facilities there are rooms with histories of unexplained figures being seen by patients, and there are still places where staff prefer not to go – especially at night, when the hospital is quiet. I’ve never heard a story of hospital ghosts being violent; it’s more like ghosts are part of the hospital, rather like the furniture.

Ghost Story Three:

In Prankster, Tayla floats out of his body. This is based on something a patient told me – when he’d had a heart attack; he’d floated free his body. He had returned when he was resuscitated. He said it was quite peaceful, and that he’d had no fear or pain (until returning to his body. He didn’t like the resuscitation so much!) I took this idea a little further in Prankster, though – I thought a kid might find floating around intensive care kind of boring. Surely, a floating, invisible boy would do exactly what Tayla did – go straight for the computers!

And now you’ve read this – do you believe in ghosts?

How to Fall in Love With Words

By

Falling in Love with Words —

Two nights ago I went to a workshop called ‘A Continued Sense of Wonder’.

Picture Book
Image Source

 

Hosted at the awesome Dunedin Public Library, the workshop was about children’s literature. It’s to be held quarterly, and is open to anyone with an interest in kids books. Best of all, it’s totally FREE!

What did I learn?

This group reminded me of how central a book can be in a child’s life.

We each brought a book that had resonated with us, either as a kid or as an adult. Books ranged from Tintin’s Explorers On the Moon to The Illuminae Files, and we each had an interesting story about why this particular book was, or had been, important to us.

(Rather cheekily, I brought along my own book, The Prankster and the Ghost, because to be honest, this is the kid’s book that has touched me the most. I learned an awful lot about myself while writing it, and I wanted to share a little of that experience.)

Why we like stories

We talked about how a favourite book provided a pathway into fantasy. ‘I used to imagine myself as Laura Ingalls Wilder, playing in the prairies.’

Books provided street cred: ‘I was the only girl in my class who had read a book eight times!’

Books created friendships: ‘I biked round to my friend’s house to read her books’.

Books provided escape: ‘It was awfully soothing, just reading and listening to the waves.’

Books are important to us

We hold our favourite books gently. We smile as we talk about them and we turn the pages slowly, with reverence. If we’re talking to others about the book, we tip the book to share the pictures inside. Books carry more than a story; they carry memories; they remind us of a time we were happy.

Through stories, kids make sense of the world.

The evening reminded me again of just how much I had loved reading as a kid – oh, the memories! Mum coming home from the library with a bag full of books; picture books for the little kids, chapter books for us older ones. And the excitement of going to the library by myself, with my own library card. Reading by torchlight when I was supposed to be asleep; of the disappointment of watching Little House on the Prairie and realising it was nothing like the book.

How stories have changed, and how they’ve stayed the same.

I used to read books that had been translated. Heidi, Pippi Longstocking, Asterix. It’s much harder now to find translated works for kids (The Gecko Press is doing some great work in this space).

Thirty years ago, the plots of kids books had a slower pace, and frequently the words were more complex.

But many of the great novels are still as loved as they’ve always been. Astrid Lindgren’s Pippi Longstocking is as unorthodox and fun as ever – who wouldn’t love to have a horse on a verandah? Charlotte’s Web still makes kids cry. And children cheer when the Peach leaves with James inside.

Kids today are even luckier than we were because now they have Harry Potter!

fairytale book
Image source

Remembering the importance of books

Sadly, it’s all too easy to lose sight of the enjoyment your work provides others. Perhaps I need to remind the marketers of this when they talk about ‘what is the unique selling point of your book?’: It’s not about my book – it’s about all books. Writers are not in competition with each other.

Caught up in the drive to update the Facebook page, to increase the word count, to promote one’s work, sometimes its good to step back and remember: we write because we love it.

We write because, once upon a time, we fell in love with reading.

Finally…

What was your favourite book as a child? What’s the first book you remember reading? And now you’re an adult, what kids book do you love the most?

More information:

Dunedin Library’s A Sense of Wonder meets quarterly and is open to anyone who loves kids books (writers, readers, illustrators, librarians, parents, grandparents…). You can download the Fiction Highlights from the Children’s Collection here: Continued Sense of Wonder 1 Booklist

Just for fun, I’ve added links to the Amazon holdings of all the books mentioned in this post!

How To Tell When Your Manuscript’s Finished

By

When is Your Manuscript Finished?

It’s hard to know when you’ve finished a creative work.

How many times do you continue polishing, hoping to improve what went before? When do you ever finish?

 

writer's notebook

 

Wanna know the hard truth?

Your Manuscript Will Never Be ‘Finished’.

For me, I normally do about five ‘Final Drafts’. It’s crazy! Each time, I save the next draft as ‘Draft_FINAL’ and it never is. There’s Draft_FINAL One’; ‘Draft_FINAL Two’ and so on. My personal favourite? ‘Draft FINAL_FINAL’.

Each time I review a draft, I find more errors, or more room for improvement. Each re-draft takes less time than the one before, but each re-draft is harder, more freaky, because each time I re-read it I realist that there’s still so much wrong.

I suppose for me, a piece is finished is when I CANNOT bear to read it again. It’s when I think “If I work on this story anymore I will go insane.”

That’s the time to take a deep breath, package the finely crafted work up and sit it on it for four to six weeks. Then check it one more time – just in case!

I dread the next part, the sending it out into the wide wide world. Because as soon as that happens, I start getting rejections. Rejections are almost inevitable. And oh, how they hurt.

Perfection isn’t Possible.

 

Your work will never be perfect, but at some point you HAVE to step away. Because only then can you get ready for your BOOK LAUNCH!

9 Tips to Getting Published

By

How to Get Published

What most people actually mean by the question “How can I get a publishing deal?” is: “How can I see my work in print?”

 

writer's notebook

 

I totally get this. It is a buzz to see your book on sale at the bookstore (it’s a lot less of a buzz to see it in the sales bin!) My first novel was A Necklace of Souls and when it came out I spent a lot of time visiting bookstores and taking photos of it on the shelves!

Here’s a reprint of my article on Kura Carpenter’s blog last week. Thanks for the opportunity to share, Kura!

 

Inner Fire is at #5!!
Inner Fire is at #5!!

Here’s what worked for me…

  1. A ton of hard work. I wrote on and off for about ten years before I got an acceptance. Over that time I wrote one novella, one novel, and many, many short stories.
  2. Write for free. I edited a professional magazine, which gave me experience in working with deadlines, keeping to word counts, formatting documents.
  3. Join a writer’s association. I joined the New Zealand Society of Authors. Associations like the NZSA often have mentoring programmes for new writers and access to grants and competitions.
  4. Formal training. I completed a Certificate in Creative Writing at a local polytechnic, but there are other opportunities both on-line and in person. Just do be aware of cost if you’re doing this, as paid tuition at a university is not cheap.
  5. Develop networks. This sounds cheesy, but often in life it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. (And be POLITE. Apart from the fact it’s the right thing to do, the writing world is a really, really small place!)
  6. Submit to e-zines and small journals. My first paid acceptance was an e-zine which paid TEN DOLLARS! So exciting!!
  7. Enter competitions. Comps can be expensive, so now I only enter those with that offer the opportunity to get my script read by a publisher, or that provide direct feedback on my script. The Romance Writers of America has some good ones, and my lucky break was with Storylines.
  8. Keep writing. Evaluate critically. Write some more. When you feel it’s good enough – and only then – begin submitting to agents or publishers.
  9. And finally, and this isn’t something you can ever predict, you need to get lucky. Why was A Necklace of Souls accepted, when another person’s might have been equally as good? I don’t know. Maybe the commissioning editor liked fantasy. Maybe they were looking for a novel with a strong female protagonist. Maybe the stars had aligned.

Reality checks:

Don’t expect overnight success. Actually, don’t expect to make a living wage from writing, period. Treat it like a passion and then anything’s a bonus.

Or, you could just be famous, notorious or both. Then landing a publishing deal is way, way easier.

Me with a much less famous author...
Me with a much less famous author…

Writing a Novel? How to Improve Your Third Draft.

By

A Great Third Draft

For me, the third draft is about copy-editing. Tightening the words, so everything is succinct. The third draft makes sure the right word is in the right place. I like doing my third draft. I work in hard copy, sliding a ruler under each line, and read line by line down the page, following the ruler. This stops me skimming, makes sure I consider each word carefully. I often do this in a cafe, just for a change of scene.

writer's notebook

I save my draft two file, make a new one, called ‘Draft Three’ – duh – and insert the hardcopy changes as track changes.  It’s time-consuming, of course, but it’s also fun, because it’s a chance to see if the premise and themes I dreamt of so long ago are coming together, that the story kind of hums along.

The big problem that I have is the continual second-guessing. Oh, but will this appeal to a reader? To an agent? To a publisher?

3 Tips to a Successful Third Draft

1-  Consider a Critique Partner (CP). 

A CP is someone who reviews and comments on your chapters. Preferably, someone who will be brutally honest, without fair of reprisals. Don’t use a family member, or a neighbour, or a friend. You need someone to tell you the parts that are boring, or which scenes don’t make sense.

Personally, I don’t find it too useful to have a CP until draft three, because up until this point, there’s so many changes. But after draft three, it’s invaluable. Especially for the all-important first three chapters.

Where Can I Find a CP?

  • If you’re doing a creative writing course, well then, it’s obvious. You’ll have more than enough eyes on your manuscript.
  • You can join a writing group.  Google writer’s groups + [the town you live in]. Or look up your local Writer’s Society. Here’s the link to the New Zealand Society of Authors
  • You can join a special interest group – such as a Romance Writers Association
  • Or – and here’s a special tip from me to you: join Ladies Who Critique . LWC is kind of like a speed dating service for writers, matching writers with critique partners. I’ve found it useful and its a good way to chat with other writers, all from different parts of the world, with varying experiences. Ignore the ‘ladies’ bit. They welcome men, too. 🙂
  • Focus on your first three chapters.

2-  Focus on your first three chapters and your ending.

Your first three chapters are the ones read by agents, editors and readers. Actually, the first three words, the first three paragraphs, the first three chapters. If you spend time polishing anything, polish these parts of your story. And don’t forget the ending. Endings are what we remember the most, and a great ending makes a reader keen to read another of your books.

3- Allow for length changes.

You may lose a lot of words in draft three. I usually lose about 10 – 20 percent. This means that if I’m aiming for a final word count of say 70,000 (average for a YA novel), I need to write about 100,000 to ensure I still have enough words for my manuscript. By contrast, some writers find they increase their word count. Whatever works for you, just be prepared for changes.

4 – And at the end of Draft Three – will my (good) novel finally be finished?

It’s up to you. If you are happy with it, then yes, perhaps. But for me – no. I will keep going on redrafting for quite a little longer.