In week #6 of Turning Tales, @efierro3172 took us back in time with a melancholy piece about wounds that don’t ever really heal. Growing up in a small town in California, she has always had a passion for writing even though there were few outlets for her creativity. She currently lives in Arizona with her husband and child. She is currently working on two different books. We asked her for writing advice.
And here’s her answer:
My advice is to just go for it. Even if you think that the idea in your head isn’t the greatest. Because you won’t know until you write it out.
I felt the hardest part of writing my piece was going to be the expression of emotions. It turned out it really was determining the time in which the story started to the point of where the character was now. I have never lost anyone I’m close to but I have had thoughts about how I will react when my parents pass. All of the emotion that went into my writing was all of those hypothetical emotions turned real for a character and relatable for those who have had this kind of thing happen to them in their lives.
Writing regularly helped me with coming back out of my shell. Originally, I had a really hard time pressing the enter button. For the first few weeks, I had talked myself out of participating in Turning Tales at all, but I was able to allow myself to push past the idea of someone not liking what I wrote, which helped me cope with the idea of rejection in general.
Everything is an experience, good or bad. The important thing is how you use that experience for yourself.
As authors, we often describe situations we never experienced and hopefully never will. How do you convey strong emotions in your writing?
This post is part of an ongoing series about our winning Turning Tales authors and the secrets to their writing. Previously, @TanyaDawson shared five ways to get more words on the page in 2023.