Sunday, July 12, 2015

July Books Giveaways Plus Study in Plotting a Chapter Book

The winner of last month's Where Do You Get Your Ideas? by Fred White is Courtney Rene.
Please contact me to collect your prize.






For July we have All the Answers by Kate Messner AND




Planning Your Novel: Ideas and Structure by Janice Hardy.   


Janice will also be joining us Sunday July 26 for a guest blog.
Mark it on your calendar.
More about this next week. But be sure to leave a comment to be eligible to win.


Now on to my self study for plotting a chapter book.


I've been reading Barbara Seuling's book on How to Write a Children's Book and Get it Published.
In Chapter Ten- Writing Early Chapter Books  Ms Seuling suggests reading a chapter a book and then write a one sentence summary for each chapter. By doing this I discovered how a plot and subplot coincide.
Each chapter mentions both the plot and subplot even if it is only a sentence or short paragraph.
Since I'm interested in writing mysteries I chose Oh No, It's Robert by Barbara Seuling. In the first chapter, Robert wants something to go on his family's award shelf. We learn about how Robert is not good at anything.
In chapter three the mystery is revealed: Who's scribbling in the books.


This exercise showed me how to plant clues, red herrings and how many and tie it in with the main plot.
What are you working on?
What do you struggle with?


See you next week!
Sheila









9 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks for sponsoring this give-away! I enjoy visiting your site!

Linda Mitchell said...

Hooray! Love giveaways....I know lots of kids to give books to.

Catch My Words said...

These look like great books. Thanks for the contest.

Joanna said...

GREAT giveaways. Thanks for the opportunity to win!

Sean McLaughlin said...

Awesome of you to give these away! For a starving artist any help at all is always welcome. Thanks again!

C. R. Bailey said...

Oh, red herrings! I want to get straight to the point. Mysteries are so much fun to read--but constructing one is a big challenge. Thanks for the tips and the giveaways!

Sheila Renfro said...

Thank you all for the visits. I'm glad to pay it forward or rather to "prepay it forward".

Patricia J. Weaver said...

So is it too late to put your name in for this months books or rather July....

Sheila Renfro said...

There's always next months drawing!