There are lots of ways to write. One is to blog, or create a book, journalism, essays, poems, literature, and much more. Writing is a way of expressing yourself and coming up with a story that is of your own imagination. It can be made up or real. That is when fiction and non fiction come into context. And when it comes to coming up with the story, you need to come up with the characters, setting, plot, climax, theme and much more. It takes a lot to write a story and to get the true feeling of it. Sometimes it comes naturally, and then sometimes it leaves you stuck. Writer's block will do that to you.
In Chapter 3, Murray is talking about the elements of "surprise" and how to report it. I've read in Murray's chapter that when it comes to "reporting to surprise", the author needs to use ten senses. They are sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch, self, change, effect, conflict, and context. The sight sense is all about seeing what the writer can visualize. Hearing is all about listening and expecting what to hear. Tasting the sense of writing would help make the story come to life if you can crave it. Touching is getting a feel of what you're writing about. Knowing what you are writing about and who for. Smelling in what is being described as a detail in a story. You can almost sense a patch of brownies coming out of the oven and smelling fresh. Changing is all about being aware and the writer will make many of those. Effect can have a big impact, especially on journalists in which they do not always possess the quality of a persistent feeling of how the news will affect his/her audiences. Conflicts come and go and they occur a lot in the media. And finally, context is another mishap of journalism. They need to talk about the importance of the context more often.
Murray applies these techniques to help the writer become a person full of “surprises” and to have the qualities. You want to wow your audience, maybe throw them off guard a little bit. And to come up with these qualities, you need to see the obvious. These facts include inventory the obvious, brainstorm, and mapping, change your point of view, and much more. Inventory the obvious means to list the things that occurring around you, like emotions you are feeling such as worries, satisfactions, wants, and exedra. You need to look for other topics for your story and explore beyond them. Brainstorming has to with what comes to your mind, like ideas for a story or topic you want to write about. Write down these ideas and apply them to your topic or story. It’s a great way of helping the author to remember what is being stocked in his or her mind. Mapping is all about exploring a topic or story and much more effectively than the original customs. Brainstorming and outlining can help, but so can mapping. Basically you are trying to find new way of approaching your topic and you extend your knowledge. And finally, changing your point of view is all about changing your mind about how you want to write your story. Many writers go through this. I know I am definitely one of them! Whenever I come up with a topic or write a story, I tend to change the plot or theme or characters along the way. Changing an idea can help the writer while writing the story. It can be frustrating at times because you feel like you’re never going to finish it or ever get the right idea. But once you get the feeling of it, it’ll work out in the end.
Murray also explains later on in the chapter to think like an editor. Be very different from what you were going through and try something new. Go beyond anything you’ve ever written and see how far it will lead you. I have done that a little bit in my writing. I wanted to write a ghost story about a haunted high school. And when I started to write about it, the ideas just flowed into my mind and it came out naturally. It felt amazing! The characters came to life and so did the setting.
Free writing is also another good way of getting thing down. Whether it’s on paper or in a Microsoft Word document, it’s good to get ideas out and whatever is on your mind. It’s also a good way of relieving stress. The writer can benefit a lot from writing down his or her ideas for a story or topic that he or she has in mind. It can make a huge difference when you write it down because it’ll help you remember what you were aiming for.
