Magic Carpet: Creating a Sense of Place in Fiction, with Mitali Perkins.
Members of Japan SCBWI had the opportunity to meet Mitali Perkins online in a wonderful event. She is the author of many great books. Her newest one is called Hope in the Valley and is already receiving many great reviews.
After introducing herself, Mitali told us about how she beats a writing slump by doing a ten minute “Writing Burst.” She explained that if we do something for ten minutes, our brains will break through the slump.
She asked us to think of three Ps in writing. We came up with place, plot and people. She said, “Yes, that’s right. As writers, we put people in a place, and move them forward (the plot).”
Next, Mitali compared the experiences of watching a movie and reading a book. When watching a movie, Mitali notes that a child’s imagination doesn’t work as hard. They take in sight and sound. But when reading a book, there is much more room for the child to imagine, there is sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch in a book.
To illustrate her point Mitali used samples of text from her books and encouraged us to use strong nouns and verbs in our own manuscripts. Be aware of weak description she warned. For example, beautiful shoes doesn’t tell us as much as combat boots. Think about the emotion of the scene.
And with that, we began the writing part of the workshop. We each chose a place, a person, and an emotion. The goal was to write about that person in that place, but without using the emotion word. She encouraged us to throw perfectionism away and simply write for ten minutes!
When we shared what we had written it was noticeable how we had taken her advice, using strong nouns and verbs, rather than weak description. All the passages were so great, especially considering that it was off the tops of our heads. I personally felt I had oomph in my step after the workshop, wanting to use her tips in my own work-in-progress.
Thank you, Mitali Perkins!
You can find out more about Mitali, her books and latest news on her website
Amy Lange Kawamura writes middle grade fiction and lives in Japan.