I hope everyone enjoyed a good break at Christmas. I know I did, although with the holiday falling on a Wednesday I was mixed up a good deal of the time about what day of the week we were on. It seemed I had two or three Sundays in every seven day stretch.

I got my Christmas wish with a pile of books under the tree — mystery, romance, literary and non-fiction. Love all the choices. I’ve finished Louise Penny’s latest mystery and am now reading a literary novel set in Ireland.

I also found time to listen to a webinar by Alessandra Torre on goal-setting and read an eye-opening article by Donald Maass on Writer Unboxed about taking your moral inventory. Moral inventory? What’s that? And what does it have to do with being a writer? As it turns out, according to the post, quite a lot.

Maass holds that there are two types of story-telling, the mirror and the arrow. The mirror reflects the culture, the arrow points the way to something else (better.) He offers a little quiz to help readers determine which category they fall into by determining their moral inventory, i.e. does the writer believe fate (mirror) determines our path, or does she believe in destiny (self-determination.) Try the quiz for yourself. It’s in the link I posted above. 

When I answered the questions and scored myself, I came down almost in the middle 5/7. That’s my usual fate when faced with a self-knowledge quiz of any sort. Still, I found it useful to consider that I fell slightly more on the arrow side of the equation. At one time I was a teacher and I guess I never got over it. I do want to tell readers what to do. 🙂 

Apart from the total score, I found my answers to the questions enlightening.  I chose faith over reason. I saw each day as opportunity rather than peril. If those are my deeply held convictions, then, if I write characters with the same mind-set, they are more likely to resonate with readers since they are “true” to my beliefs.

Now, I’m not about to sit down and write a story based only on my answers to the quiz, but if I keep in mind that my moral inventory leans toward arrow, it will give me a new way to look at plot points that get tangled up or characters who won’t behave. Are those characters arrows or mirrors?

And, getting back to Alessandra Torre’s webinar, do my readers want to read stories of arrows or mirrors? Which do I want my “brand” to reflect? Torre’s notes were very focussed on marketing and finding an audience. Her own experience shows that readers like an author to “stay in her lane.” That is, they want to know, when they pick up an Alice Valdal novel that it will be like the last one and the next one. 

The Louise Penny novel I just finished is her 19th in the series and the characters and setting are familiar to me. I look forward to spending time with those people in those places. I would be disappointed if Armand Gamache suddenly became a hippie, or Ruth Zardo played nice. The books are not boring, the suspense goes right through to the last page, but they are on brand and I can shell out my dollars knowing I’ll be happy with the book.

I’ve given up on New Year’s resolutions, but I’m happy to have two new lessons to apply to my writing career.

What about you? Any resolutions? Changes? Goals? 

 

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