Margaret Duarte

Visionary Fiction

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Cart Before the Horse

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I don’t claim to be an expert on writing, so take my advice for what it is, an opinion, informed by ten years of practice, with many missteps and occasional victories along the way.

What I’ve discovered and want to pass on to you is that during all my years of studying the craft of fiction, I’ve been putting the cart before the horse.  In other words, I concentrated on mechanics rather than story.

A Publisher’s Weekly review I received on one of my unpublished novels did not refer to my voice or to my sentence structure or to my writing style.  What it did refer to, however, were issues of character development, resolution–and story.

A fellow writer once told me, “You’re a better writer than I am, but I’m a better story teller.”  Guess who’s published now?  While I fretted over writing the perfect sentence, she concentrated on story.

In Techniques of the Selling Writer, Dwight V. Swain says, “Your reader reads fiction because it creates a pleasurable state of tension in him, line by line and page by page.”  Then he adds, “Feeling is the place every story starts.”  Feeling!

During my creative writing courses at UC Davis Extension, my fellow students often commented on the quick writes I read aloud in class.  “Write like that in your novels and you’re set,” said one.  “Get those puppies published,” said another.  It took me a while to figure out what made my quick-writes so appealing.

The teacher would provide a prompt followed by fifteen minutes to respond, taking away the choice of subject and the luxury of time.  As a result, I wrote from the gut.  My passion soared, unshackled, and somehow I communicated this passion to my classmates.  I threw caution to the wind, dared to be wrong, and was rewarded for it.

So my advice to you?  Discover what arouses your passion, what brings you joy, what brings you to fury.  And then write about it.  Your readers will thank you for it.

Sure, you need to master the tools of writing, but not at the expense of story.  Story comes first.

So put the horse before the cart.

Not behind it.

As always, thanks for stopping by,

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About Margaret Duarte

Former middle school teacher, Margaret Duarte, lives on a California dairy farm with a herd of “happy cows,” a constant reminder that the greenest pastures lie closest to home. Margaret earned her creative writing certificate through UC Davis Extension and has since published four novels in her “Enter the Between” visionary fiction series: Between Will and Surrender, Between Darkness and Dawn, Between Yesterday and Tomorrow, and Between Now and Forever. Her poem and story credits include SPC Tule Review; The California Writers Club Literary Review; finalist in the 2017 SLO Nightwriters Golden Quill Writing Contest; First Place winner for fiction in 2016, Second Place winner for fiction in 2018, Honorable Mention for fiction in 2019, and Gold winner for fiction in 2020 NORTHERN CALIFORNIA PUBLISHERS AND AUTHORS Book Awards Competition; 2019 California Author Project winner for adult fiction.

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Comments

  4. Margaret Duarte says

    Thanks, Naomi. I used to dread the in-class exercises, but they ended up teaching me a lot, as did all of the fine teachers at UC Davis Extension. Godd luck with your new class!

  5. Theresa Adrian says

    Margaret I love your creative writing piece about the chair in my office. I have shared that story with so many people even the new Principal at the school where I work. Great job and I love reading everything you write!!!!

  6. Margaret Duarte says

    That piece about the chair in your office came to me during the night, and when I got up in the morning, I wrote it in one quick rush. That's when writing is often at its best, when you don't think too much, just write. It was a fun piece, with Oma's chair–and you–as inspiration.