National Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month. A whole 30 days to celebrate poetry in all its forms.

You may not think of yourself as a poet, but chances are, reading and writing poetry can help you in all your other writing. It can help you learn about imagery and being concise among many other things.

If you want to challenge yourself this month, join those writers writing one poem every day throughout the month. Need a little help? Writer's Digest offers daily prompts to get you moving.

Challenge yourself to a little poetry this month and find out what words are hiding in you.

Celebrating writing that makes you blush

We live in a time when people are free to express themselves however they want.

This might not always be a good thing (scroll social media for some examples ;) ), but it does bring a freedom to your writing.

More specifically, it brings a freedom to how graphic you want your writing to be.

Sex scenes are no longer taboo in literature. While many people might not want to admit that they've read a book like Fifty Shades of Grey or won't be seen reading it on the bus on their way to work, that doesn't change the fact that such books exist and present no shame to the authors.

You can write whatever you are envisioning.

So go ahead, write scenes that make you blush. They can get printed. And, if book sales tell us anything, they will be read.

The Journey Home

There are many stories that use a journey home as a catalyst.

There's a wedding or funeral. Parents need help. Home is the only option after bankruptcy…

There are plenty of reasons to send your protagonist back home. And, if your character is finding themselves suddenly needing to confront a past they've been running away from, forcing them to return home is a great way to get that journey moving.

To shake things up, however, don't make your protagonist the one returning home.

Maybe it's a sibling coming home. Maybe it's a high school friend. Maybe it's an ex.

Returning home is the catalyst of many a movie and book. Don't think that the action has to be relegated to your protagonist, however.

Special is specific

You want your protagonist to stand out. You want them to stay in your readers' minds and have them coming back for more.

One simple way to do this is to give your protagonist some special, unique trait.

Maybe they walk on stilts in their spare time. Maybe they learned Mandarin because they thought it would one day be the universal language. Maybe they're ambidextrous and decide which hand they're going to write with based on the day of the week.

Little, human eccentricities make your characters real. Give your standout characters one or two to communicate their humanity to your readers.

Help the reader follow

There are many amazing techniques that you can implement in your writing to help move your story forward.

Tell the story from multiple points of view. Weave together more than one timeline. Tell your story backwards.

All the possibilities are open to you.

When using them, however, make sure that you take your reader along.

Add a heading with timelines if you are shifting through history. Make sure that your narrators' voices are distinct. Give a location tag to each of your chapters.

Feel free to use innovative techniques in your writing. Just make them clear so your reader can enjoy the ride along with you.

Take the pieces that work

A lot of fiction is retelling. Even Shakespeare was using stories that were known in his time to create his works of art.

Remember when you are using known tales to inspire your writing that your goal is to find inspiration. You don't have to look for a roadmap.

Find the parts of the story that work for you. Leave out the ones that don't.

Start at the part of the story that works best for you. Keep only the characters you have room for.

Find your inspiration where you will, but remember that it's inspiration. Do with it what you will after that.

Let your characters surprise you

Planning is great. Planning your story can help you write a cohesive and complete first draft that will require less editing in the end.

In all your planning, though, don't stop yourself from letting your characters surprise you.

Maybe one is kinder than you expected. One might have a skill that they were hiding from you. One might decide that they have more to give the plot and appear in more scenes than expected.

You can plan your story all you want, but if you want to keep your story fresh, let your characters surprise you and show you where they want to go.