“Read what you like to write” by Sundari Venkatraman

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4. Read what you like to write

There’s story-telling verbally and there’s writing. Though both may appear to be the same, they are not completely synonymous. You can be an excellent story-teller when you listen to stories. This could be at your grandmother’s knee or even on YouTube nowadays. This could really open up your imagination and make a grand story-teller out of you. Story-telling is more focussed towards creating scenes while you talk.

But does that help you become a writer?

To an extent, yes! Since this can help open up your imagination. But to actually paint pictures in words on the pages of a book, you need to read. I know a few people who have planned their writing careers without reading a single book, or maybe after reading sporadically; a book or two in a year. 

Writing is a play of words. For this, you need to find out the many ways words can be played with. How better than to read? Read voraciously, ideally, anything that you can lay your hands on. There was a time when my sister and I used to fight over the piece of paper in which peanuts came wrapped in, to be the first one to read the print. If you don’t enjoy reading everything in front of you, at least read the books of some favourite authors. 

Okay, you need to read quite a bit to get a list of favourites in the first place. But I am sure you see what I mean. Reading helps to open up your minds, gets you more creative and hones your language. 

After reading a lot of books, you begin to understand which genre truly excites you. Then, you can turn your attention to reading that kind of books. This will go a long way in helping you decide how and what you want to write. 

I like romances. Not just romances, I love those that have “Happily Ever After” endings. Nowadays, I read those the most and I write HEA Romances. But well, I had to read (I still do actually) a lot of books from different genres before I realised what I wanted to do. 

Over and above all that, so much of reading has made my imagination abundant and helps me create my stories and characters. 

Sundari Venkatraman is an indie author of 15 titles—13 romance novels & two short story collections, all on Top 100 Bestsellers on Amazon. 

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Coming up next week: Write what you like to read >>

Sunanda Chatterjee, author of 'Shadowed Promise' speaks to Sanchita Sen

Author Sunanda Chatterjee

Here's an insightful author, whose story ideas are so realistic because she's inspired by real life characters. Read on to know her style:

The main character in Shadowed Promise is Moyna, whose background is partly based on the story of one of my acquaintances. After her sister died, my friend adopted her nephew on her mother’s request, while she was still single. She fell in love, got married and only when she had her own child did she tell her husband about the ‘adopted’ kid.

Sanchita: How did you happen to conceive the story? I ask this because I remember you reading about an article on child marriages and how that inspired you to write ‘Fighting for Tara’.

Sunanda: The main character in Shadowed Promise is Moyna, whose background is partly based on the story of one of my acquaintances. After her sister died, my friend adopted her nephew on her mother’s request, while she was still single. She fell in love, got married and only when she had her own child did she tell her husband about the ‘adopted’ kid. It nearly destroyed her marriage. I used that for Moyna and added the burden of being the unloved child. Tania was going to be the favorite child, the pretty sister, but my daughter didn’t like the idea of a mother loving one child more than the other. So Moyna became Tania’s cousin. Making her believe she was bad luck glued the story together.

Sanchita: Your characters often have a lot of conflict resolution to do which definitely adds layers to the story. As an author, how do you help your characters in resolving their conflicts?

Sunanda: The whole idea of interesting fiction is:

(1) for the main character to be likeable or relatable

(2) to have a believable objective (a desperate desire)

(3) to be deprived of that through obstacles

(4) to finally succeed

In most of my stories, the obstacles my main characters face are both mental and physical. Sometimes they are told by society they cannot achieve their objective, sometimes it is their own mind that prevents it. I make my characters jump through hoops to reach the heights they are capable of, but unaware of that capability. In my stories, unconditional love, forgiveness, and redemption play a big role. So my characters make mistakes and redeem themselves, they are flawed, but likable, they suffer, but survive in the end. They find strength from their loved ones, or have an epiphany that breaks their mind set, or get help from unexpected quarters. In 'Shadowed Promise', Moyna’s conflicts started in childhood, mainly due to her aunt. And even though Sameer telling her she is not bad luck puts a Band Aid, deep in her heart she still believes it. The resolution can only come from the source. So when at last her inner conflict is resolved, she is able to fix her outer conflicts.

Sanchita: How long did it take for you to complete ‘Shadowed Promise’ from conception till the end?

Sunanda: It took me about eight months and three drafts. I changed the plot a lot, and added the secondary characters’ stories. In one initial outline, Moyna marries Aaron. When I decided to keep Sameer as the male lead, I made Lupe and Aaron a couple, who became great surrogates for Moyna. I had just finished the first draft of 'Fighting for Tara' when I started 'Shadowed Promise'. Then I got into Moyna’s head and was in so deep, that I had to finish it before getting back into Hansa’s head to polish the manuscript. It sounds silly, but there it is.

Sanchita: Which part of writing the story do you enjoy the most and why? Conceptualising, story boarding, concluding or reading the final draft?

Sunanda: Each part of novel writing has its own thrill. Personally, I enjoy outlining the most. Everything is fluid and flexible, words need not flow, prose need not be perfect, point of view decisions can come later. I’ll tell you an example. In my work in progress, I have a scene where the main character goes for a banquet in a wealthy person’s house and is ridiculed by the people there. I just write one line in the outline: “She gives keys to valet. Accepts champagne. Fancy food, fancy wine, fancy clothes, blah blah, bitchy snobs all around.” That sentence will become a full-fledged scene. It is very freeing, that initial phase. New characters are waiting to be born, new conflicts are itching to confront the MC.

The next part is also refreshing when I’ve decided whose point of view the scene will be from. I describe what she sees, smells, hears. That’s fun too, and sometimes I write a scene from two POVs and select the best one. The next draft will be when I’ve finalized the POV, and I get to describe what she feels and thinks. And the last one will be when I go ‘up the ladder of abstraction’ and describe what it all means in the big scheme of things.

Sanchita: Sneak peek into your next project.

Sunanda: I am working on a saga called Old Money. The main character is a Kashmiri pundit girl growing up in California. She falls in love with a handsome hunk whose family is filthy rich. His family ridicules her and wants him to marry another rich girl. Her own family, which is middle class, refuses to accept him because he turns out to be her cousin… Or is he?... If he isn’t her cousin, everything she believes about herself is a lie. As she goes on a journey to find her identity, dirty truths and secrets are revealed.

Rapid fire round (first thought that comes to mind on hearing these words)

a.      Emotional: mother’s love

b.      Promises: hard to keep

c.      Tragedy: strength

d.      Redemption: relief

e.      Author: Jhumpa Lahiri

Sunanda's book 'Shadowed Promise' is available at:

Amazon.com                    Amazon.in                    Amazon.co.uk

New Tour SignUp: Finding The Angel by Rubina Ramesh

'Editing Matters: Here's why you should never send your first draft to the publisher' by Sonia Rao

Editing matters! Let me tell you why.

Your NaNoWriMo Novel

Every year in November, millions of people all over the world participate in NaNoWriMo and write 50,000 words of a novel. Most of these Wrimos (writers who do NaNoWriMo) are first-time novelists and what is actually written in November is called the ‘first draft’. This piece of writing is expectedly full of verbose prose, meandering thoughts and incomplete or badly constructed sentences. And there is nothing wrong in that because this is expected in a swiftly written (a great method to get around the evil inner editor) novel.

But the very worst thing a Wrimo could do is send this novel, as it is, to a publisher.

In fact, it is believed that quite a few years ago, publishers dreaded 1st December because on this day they were inundated with ‘novels written in November’ which they just jettisoned into the slush pile (those were the days of physical submission of manuscripts). Writers who had edited and polished their book which they’d first written during NaNoWriMo were advised not to mention that fact as much as could be helped (though the situation is much different today).

Whether that anecdotal information is true or not, the fact remains that a novel is ready to be read by anyone other than the writer only after it has been edited, revised and re-written (as necessary).

Traditional Publishing has changed

In the days of yore, publishing houses had full-time editors who worked very closely with the author in making the novel a fine piece of work. So, a Publisher would take up a book with an appealing idea even if it was not well-executed, and the team of editors would do the needful.

Remember those well-written books by PG Wodehouse, Somerset Maugham, Enid Blyton, Agatha Christie and others? Did they ever have any typos or grammar glitches? I’m sure many of us are aggressively anti-bad- grammar because of all those books we read.

But what is the scenario today? Publishing companies are notoriously understaffed, and some of them are even limited to just one publisher and editor. In such a situation, do you think a badly edited book stands a chance of being taken up, however brilliant the idea?

You, the Writer, might then be tempted to turn up your nose at traditional publishing now that you have the self-publishing option available to you at your finger-tips.

Self-publishing gives you no free pass

Self-publishing your novel does not mean that you can get away with not editing your story. In fact, the entire burden of ensuring that the text is of high quality now falls upon the writer. A reader who picks up your book expects to find quality writing that is entertaining too. In case your book fails to provide that experience, rest assured that the reader is going to waste no time in delegating you to their “never-ever- want-to- read-this- author” pile forever.

C’mon! Didn’t your parents and your teachers always advice you to “revise” what you have written before submitting your exam answer sheets to the invigilator? Editing matters, see.

In fact, to make sure Wrimos realise editing is an important next step after the writing, NaNoWriMo has designated January and February as the “Now What?” months.

So, let’s ask ourselves the question “Now What?” as we get set to edit the first draft of our very first novel.

Here are 5 steps that can be taken to make the editing process easier (haha, I’m kidding. Editing is not really an easy task, but these pointers can give you a direction to begin with):

1) Distance: Keep away the first draft and only take it out to edit once you are sure you do not remember what you’ve written. This time duration could range from a month to many years.

2) Printout: Take a printout of your novel and get it bound in the form of a book (spiral binding will work well, thank you and no, I am not talking about the hard cover binding with ornate embossing. Keep it practical, folks).

3) Relax and Read: Choose a day when you have enough time to read your book cover to cover. On that day, carry the book to your favourite reading spot with your favourite beverage and a pen (red, if you will) and settle down to read it. Remain relaxed and read it as you would a favourite novel. Use the pen only if you must. Use it at those places where your reaction is WTF!!! Or WOW!!! Did I actually write that? Yes, both reactions will erupt while you are reading and if a thought, idea, impression about the novel arises in your mind at that time, make a note of it in the margin.

4) DONT’s: DO NOT CORRECT THE TYPOS AND THE GRAMMAR AT THIS

STAGE. DO NOT DELETE ANYTHING.

5) Write: Once you’ve finished reading, write a review of the book you have just read. Be as cruel and frank as you can be.

Once this is done, detailed editing can begin.

About the Author

Sonia Rao

Sonia Rao is the editor of Mumbai Mom (mumbaimom.com). She is also a fiction writer and editor, and an award-winning blogger (https://soniaraowrites.wordpress.com/). Her fiction has appeared and is forthcoming in many prestigious anthologies.

As NaNoWriMo’s Municipal Liaison for all-India and founder of the Wrimo India group, Sonia has motivated thousands of people in India to write a novel every November since 2011. She also expedited and edited the first Wrimo India Anthology, Vengeance – A Sting In Every Tale.

Next post- Editing Matters: What kind of editing does your book need?

The Times Lit Fest covered by Janaki Nagaraj

The Times Lit Fest was organized between December 2nd and 4th in the Mehboob Studios which has become synonymous with this festival. The theme of this was - THAT MAN WOMAN THING. The theme explores the relationships, or lack of it, across time,  place, space, profession, family and literature.

I had the opportunity of attending a talk on 'Devis and Demons' by Mythologist Devdutt Pattanaik, Ramayana scholar Arshia Sattar and graphic novelist Amruta Patil recreating an epic  gender battle.
This was mainly about the role of women in mythology- drawing parallels between the two epics or rather similarities. The word Devi reminds us of women and a certain vulnerability attached to them. But both Ramayana and Mahabharata are about women who were strong and also driven by ambition. Kaikeyi was driven by the ambition to see her son as the King of Ayodhya and in Mahabharata we see Satyavati with similar ambition. It is this ambition, which sets the stage for the bigger events to happen.

Noted author Devdutt Pattanaik in action

The men in turn were weak in comparison...they were bound by their word/promise given to their women which caused much heartbreak. And more often we come across Kings who were impotent in both these epics. Both the epics in fact mirror each other in many ways. Mahabharata was a more gory one, where as Ramayana was refined to a certain extent.

Draupadi's vastra haran was done in front of a packed court in front of all the elders of the clan.  And when Rama meets Sita after killing Ravana - he tells her that he cannot accept her as he is bound by the rules. She is free to go with anyone she wants be it Lakshmana, Bharata, Nakul , Sahadev or even Vibhishana.....This is a subtle form of disrobing Sita...disrobing of her dignity and all the chastity she stood for.

The experts talked about symbolism too. They also said that acceptance of queers or third gender was natural and common, and so was the sexual act. More often we see that women were impregnated either by Rishis or Devas.  It was a common and acceptable practice, so was polygamy and polyandry.

They also cautioned public in general about how these days people tend to pick out a couplet or a shloka from these epics and make it controversial and out of context. They said that to understand anything in these epics, we have to read the book because everything is interconnected and there are stories within stories.

By the end of the session, we felt enlightened and were thirsty for more, as they made is so simple for us to grasp.

Summerita Rhayne, author of 'His Christmas Delight' speaks to Sanchita Sen

Author Summerita Rhayne

From an anthology, book to series, characters find places in formats they are meant to be. Summerita discusses about her latest series. Read on to know more:

Writing a series is both a joy and a pain. You get to spend more time with the characters and visit them again in subsequent books, but timelines need to be worked around. A multiple cast adds color and ambience to the story.

Sanchita: How did you ideate upon the ‘Christmas Romance’ series?

Summerita: I was invited to take part in a Christmas romance anthology. The story was supposed to be 6k words long. I started writing and became immersed in the characters. Meanwhile, for some reasons, the anthology couldn't materialise. I wasn't sorry because I knew 6k wasn't enough to hold the whole story of my characters. Myra, lively and supportive, who's gone through the turmoil of losing her young husband after a short marriage. Jay, who witnessed the accident, which took away his life and himself suffers from the after effects. Then the ties, which they have, because of being in the same neighborhood...all of it demanded to be explored and came together in a novella. Then the older brother developed into a character, who couldn't be ignored. The background of the brothers also had issues that needed to be solved, so I had to given in and chart out a series. 'His Christmas Delight' is already released. 'His Christmas Surprise' will be out very soon. 'His Christmas Miracle' will follow, and the fourth is yet to have a title.

Sanchita: When writing a series, what are the advantages and disadvantages that you face as an author?

Summerita: Writing a series is both a joy and a pain. You get to spend more time with the characters and visit them again in subsequent books, but timelines need to be worked around. A multiple cast adds color and ambience to the story. You have to do minimal research as far as setting is concerned...in case of Christmas romance series, most are set in Goa. The background story is also provided readymade. For example, I knew what issues Dan would face in 'His Christmas Surprise' because I'd already touched on their father absconding in their childhood in Jay's story.

The difficulties are that you have to outline accordingly. Jay and Myra come in the second book too. So what's happening in their life. Christmas happens in all the books, so I'll have to be careful what is happening around Christmas 2017 in one book, doesn't happen during Christmas 2016 in another! Also, now this may sound contradictory, but your setting becomes same-ish and that can be too uniform for all the books. Maybe I'll introduce other locations in subsequent books.

Sanchita: Would you ever want your stories to be played out on the silver screen? Yes or no and why?

Summerita: It's every writer's dream to see their characters brought to life. So no reason I shouldn't want it. But the story shouldn't be tampered with.

Sanchita: Who is your favourite author and why?

Summerita: I love to read historical romance and whodunnits, interspersed with thrillers and classics. The author I don't tire of reading is Georgette Heyer. Her research is detailed and her characters are unique, not to mention her entertaining style of writing.

Sanchita: Sneak peek into your next project.

Summerita: After the Christmas romance series, I would like to concentrate on finishing the historical romance series, Indian Princesses Saga. The next two books will be about royal sisters, Liya and Kambodini respectively. Liya is a warrior princess. Kambodini is studious, but mischievous. I'm still to work on the stories in detail.

Rapid Fire round (First thought that comes to mind on hearing these words)

a. Jingle: It makes me think of my old school rhyme. It was sung along the tune of 'Jingle Bells' and it went like, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells...oh what fun it is to have our school birthday today! Hey!

b. Red: Well, red is undoubtedly the color romance. Roses, hearts and in India, the bridal color...so definitely the romantic color.
c. Spark: Hmm... I might use that as a character name sometime.
d. Holiday: Most summers of heading out to hill stations, makes me think of wooded green slopes, horse riding and paragliding.
e. Friends: Nowadays I'm watching How I Met Your Mother but time was when I hardly missed an episode :) Seriously though, they have been invaluable in their support. Not naming them. You know who you are!

Summerita's book 'His Christmas Delight is available at:

Aamazon.com                            Amazon.in                    Amazon.co.uk