Scookie Reviews

This is the last in the series, and is especially important for action writers or anyone writing a book that uses verbs... Adjectives may spice up the scene, but verbs are how readers live the story. If you’re not convinced, then please read on. Read Part 1: Time Cues Read Part 2: Space and Associations Actions You know how walking further takes longer? Ok, stupid question, but what’s interesting is picturing longer distances also takes more time . Similarly, if you ask someone to picture walking across the room, they will take longer if you ask them to also picturing carrying a heavy rucksack than an empty one. This is despite the fact that a person would compensate for the weight, and control conditions find participants to take the same amount of time. This may seem like obvious observations, but think about it a little longer. Our brains are amazing. Performing an action and watching an action being performed causes similar brain activation in the motor cortex ....

See what I did with the title? Passive is where the thing receiving an action is made the subject. They can always be rewritten as active sentences, where the subject is the thing that is acting. For example: The dog was bitten by the man. This is passive. Research has shown that many readers miss the intending meaning and instead think that the dog bit the man. However, for whatever reason the biting occurred (hunger or revenge come to mind), the dog was an innocent bystander in this particular sentence. Here’s the active version: The man bit the dog. Notice how it’s shorter, direct, and therefore more powerful. Such a small tweak can be very powerful, especially if it’s plagued your writing without you even knowing it. Key phrases such as ‘was being’ or ‘had’ are good indicators. Look for them in your writing and see if an active version can be used instead. You’ll most likely use passive by accident. It tends to creep into our everyday speech, and can make things...

I’ve never felt more adrenaline surging through me than when I checked my final exam results. After three years studying BSc Psychology at the University of Birmingham, I was tempted to leave it a few days before checking the verdict. I’m so glad I didn’t, because I manage to get exactly what I wanted. I achieved a first!! Yay! Now that the degree is out of the way, I have a bit of free time. I’ll spend some of it focusing on my clients whom I freelance edit for, some time will be spent chilling without feeling guilty, and the rest will be dedicated to this blog. So far, the response to these little articles has been very positive. Thank you to everyone who has posted or contacted me with advice or praise – just knowing someone out there is finding me helpful is very motivating. I hope to continue helping first time writers and learning more myself. Speaking of which, one aspiring author which I have been editing for is almost about the release their first novel. More ...

This is part 2/3 of how writers manipulate the mental representations which they create - essentially, the psychology of how the words you choose can impact the images readers create, because there's more to writing than just words on a page.  If you’re interested in subtle writing tricks and how the brain handles them, then keep reading (keep reading anyway – inspiration may happen). Click here to read how time cues can impact mental representations.  Descriptions of Space and Associations Your main girl/guy is more important than you think. Entities are faster to picture when they are spatially close to the protagonist in the story. For those quick paced scenes, you want stuff to go down right next to your main guy rather than across the room. It is also harder to picture the whole scene after the writer hones in on precise details on a smaller feature. Therefore it’s good to describe the whole place before settling in on your main targets. Honing in and ...

Language is changing. It's its thing. My favourite example is the word ‘tart’ which used to mean sweetheart... it doesn’t anymore in any shape or form, so don’t use it that way and think you’re being an endearing hipster! Another relatable example is the use of ‘queer’ in the first Harry Potter book – it’s not so politically correct now, although was perfectly acceptable when it was originally published in 1997. And lastly, it’s a good thing that Enid Blyton’s characters have been renamed. If you’ve read The Magic Faraway Tree series, which I fondly remember reading with my nan, you’ll know why. Kids with those names would get rather bullied in this day and age... We as writers may not like the changes, but sometimes it’s better to adapt and avoid premature aging of your novel. Here are some current words to keep in mind: Smelt, spilt, spelt – This issue cropped up in a manuscript I’m currently editing. The word in question was ‘smelt’ as the past tense of ‘to smell’. I a...

My eyes are tired from reading so many psychological articles, but every so often something crops up and inspires the writer in me. Several studies have recently got me thinking about how our words create mental representations in the readers. Writers are master manipulators of metal representations, writing words for readers to picture. Most of us will use subtle tricks without realising or understanding the why or how, and research has uncovered a lot about reading which will help you put your finder on it. I'm here to point them out and put you back in charge. Time How your story progresses forward in time can have subtle effects on the readers. Even walking through a door or saying 'an hour later' is enough to elicit extra processes in the reader's mind without them being none the wiser. In real life, we remember events in our lives in little episodes such as, “The time we were chased by geese,” which may or may not have happened to me... The point is...

I asked you guys if you had any writing quibbles and you answered with a thought provoking question. “What are your opinions on said versus other dialogue verbs? I've heard from a few places that said should be used in the majority, or even totally, because it's a word that becomes invisible to the reader. Is there any evidence on that?” Readers will always have different sensitivities to taglines, but you’ll annoy less people by using 'said' too often than going mental on the fancy alternative verbs. My thoughts are to use exciting synonyms of ‘said’ sparingly so that they have the most effect when you do, but there's no reasons to boycott all alternatives. In my mind, ‘said’ is a device rather than a word, and research supports this idea. We don’t look at every word when we read. Instead we make jumpy eye-movements called saccades which often leave out small words and those which are highly predictable (blue moon, apple pie). We still process those words, ...