Writing Tips

WRITING TIPS

RESEARCHING FOR FICTION AND NONFICTION

by Patricia Hruby Powell

 

Whether we write fiction or nonfiction, we need to research. It’s a bit more challenging nowadays, with many of us sheltering at home, but it’s still completely doable.

What if there’s a scene in your story involving a goat? You don’t know any goats? Ask on Facebook who has goats. Visiting goats is an outdoor activity that you could do, whatever sheltering you’re practicing.

 

What if you’re writing about a boy who finds the entrance to the Amazon Rainforest in his attic? You must research the rainforest and its peoples and how to find nuts filled with nutritious squirming larvae. If that boy lives in New Bedford, Massachusetts, because your plot requires a place important to the historic whaling industry, look online for a New Bedford museum. Contact the museum. Speak to an expert. (More on experts to come).

If you can’t visit the Amazon, Google Earth the city of Manaus, Brazil, and work outward from there.

 

Those suggestions cover my unpublished novel—WAITING FOR RAIN. (I have two unpublished novels. But I didn’t give up. I kept writing and improving my skills until I found a niche in narrative nonfiction, and now I’m expanding upon that niche).

 

 

Books and Libraries

Begin your research on the internet. Print articles about your subject, including the bibliographies. Maybe a detail in an article will guide you to the slant you’ll want to take on a nonfiction project. Or you might realize the plot you’ll use for a novel, picture book, or graphic novel.

Using the listings in your bibliographies, search your local libraries via computer; also use keywords or subject headings. For me, “libraries” include not only the fabulous public library system in my town of Champaign but all other Illinois Libraries as well, which anyone can access at https://www.library.illinois.edu/search-tools/. Every Illinois citizen is entitled to a library card for checking books out from this extensive system. Alternatively, your public library can connect you to Worldshare: Libraries Worldwide for specific harder-to-obtain resources. Once you might have collected a mountain of books from your library yourself. Now you can request books and pick them up curbside or from a “hold shelf.”

 

Read those books. If you come across necessary, obscure, or fascinating facts and they’re marked by a superscripted number, refer to those numbers in the footnotes, “Notes,” or “Endnotes,” which will give a source. And if that fabulous fact was not marked by a superscripted number, fear not. You can do a little Sherlock Holmes work in the Notes section. Is there a quote in the text that’s abbreviated in the Notes and given a source? Work forward or back from that endnote and speculate on the source for your fabulous fact.

 

Notes at the back of the book are probably divided by chapter, which in turn will direct you to the source used by the author and found in the bibliography, if there is one. That source might well be a primary source. If the source is secondary, get whatever book or item that source may reference, and see if it holds a citation to the primary source. It’s good to use both primary and secondary sources.

 

 

Primary and Secondary Sources

Primary source – a document, first-hand account, or other source that constitutes direct evidence of an object of study.[i] “Direct” is the keyword here. This might be an “account” or quote or description by your subject; it might be a newspaper article or letter about your subject, contemporary to when it happened. Such sources are “first public accounts,” which also include autobiographies, diaries, interviews, oral histories, birth and death certificates, photos, and artifacts such as clothing or furniture, to name a few. These intellectual and emotional “properties” bring you close to your subject. Visiting Emily Dickinson’s home in Amherst, Massachusetts, I saw her white dress. What an emotional zinger! She wore it. I felt almost as if I were facing the reclusive poet herself.

 

Secondary sources – a book, article, or other source that provides information about an object of study but does not constitute direct, first-hand evidence.[ii] Authors of secondary sources have interpreted, discussed, or analyzed primary sources. Newspaper and magazine articles after the event, biographies, history books, and dictionaries are secondary sources. And they are valuable.

Both primary and secondary sources could be factual or not. So you must read a whole lot on your subject to be able to discern the “truth.”

 

 

Internet

Just as readers must evaluate books they must also evaluate internet sources. Here are a few dependable sites and internet “avenues.”

 

The Library of Congress owns “collections”—archival materials including photos, theater programs, letters, and much more. When researching Loving vs. Virginia I depended on this extensive site for finding photos to be published in that book. For my upcoming book about Martha Graham I used the Martha Graham collection for primary sources—in particular, concert program notes, which spoke of Martha’s performance intentions, costuming, and lighting as well as critical reviews contemporary to her performances.

 

The New York Public Library also has “collections.” The Martha Graham Dance Company has just given a load of its archival material to the NYPL, including Martha’s letters to composers, “outlines” of dances, old films of her early works, and much more. The bad news: It will take years for the library to digitize these materials, and traveling during the era of Covid-19 is problematic. The good news: Covid-19 has brought a million Zoom experiences, thus providing new paths to research.

 

Due to the pandemic, the Graham Company is Zooming premieres of Martha’s past dances, which are accompanied by live and recorded “chats.” I started asking small polite questions during those chats and increased my presence little by little. I’ve now contacted the present director of the Graham Company. We’ve scheduled an extensive conversation together. Like that director, other experts also chat and I’m developing relationships with them. I mention this here to say, follow leads. Use your imagination to get to leads. I fancy I’m a latter-day Sherlock Holmes. Research is fun.

 

University and museum archives, often available online, contain interviews with all kinds of people. Interviews with your subject are important primary sources. (How to conduct the personal interview requires its own article).

 

The online thesaurus is invaluable. Dig deeply—the words you choose must be carefully analyzed, considered. Also, by linking from one possible word to another (online) you might find a new way to describe what you were initially looking for. This is good.

 

Slang dictionaries are useful, particularly for historic fiction and nonfiction. Again, if you find a word once, keep looking. You want it to be authentic. Not everything you find is accurate. Use books written contemporary to the time and within the universe of your subject. While writing Struttin’ With Some Barbecue: Lil Hardin Armstrong Becomes the First Lady of Jazz (Charlesbridge 2018) I found the memoir Really the Blues (Random House 1946) by jazz player Mezz Mezzrow. Mezz and Lil were contemporaries, both working as jazz musicians. Mezz loved slang so much he included an outrageous glossary of slang in his book. And because I know jazz musicians, I know that they are big-time slang users. But you must be sure that any particular phrase was used during the era in which you’re writing.

 

Wikipedia, although useful, has its drawbacks, mainly having to do with “authority.” Anyone can write and/or edit a Wikipedia article. Still, I print those general articles (and file them under “Articles”) to refer to later. By the time I’m writing, because I’ve read so extensively, I’m pretty certain of overall facts about my subject. If there are discrepancies—and there always are—keep reading and try to ascertain what is accurate. Flag inaccuracies. The point being that it’s important to find several references for any fact you want to use.

 

Wikipedia might be the first article you read about a subject. You’ve printed it and highlighted potentially useful sources from its footnotes. Consider the Wikipedia article about Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who is one of nine “characters” in my (as yet unnamed) Women’s Suffrage Project. As I write about Stanton’s relationship with Susan B. Anthony through the years, I can check that Wikipedia article for the years of her children’s births, which are listed on the first page. I can show Susan B. Anthony visiting Elizabeth and caring for the “correct” baby. Which boys were outside playing?

 

Historic weather reports can offer pithy details. For Loving vs. Virginia, I looked up the Richmond County, Virginia, weather for July 10, 1958—where and when Richard and Mildred Loving, a white man and a black woman, were sleeping five weeks after they married. The hot humid night helped set the tension for the scene. The police, without knocking, entered their house and arrested them.

 

Google Earth, as I mentioned before, can help you visit a place. Look around. If your setting is historic you’ll have to depend on photos, newspapers, historic newsreels. Searching is not always easy, but if you take your time, it’s fun. Go from site to site. Who knows what pithy detail will arise?

 

 

Photos

You should take photos throughout the research process. I use my phone to snap bibliographies, documents, museum artifacts. Collect your photos in files on your computer. You’re never sure what you’ll need. If you’re writing an illustrated book, it could be helpful to pass these photos to your editor who can pass them to your illustrator. They’ll be grateful.

 

As with conducting interviews, how to properly collect photos for a book to be published requires an article of its own. But start with the Library of Congress database. You’ll need to find out if the photos you want to use are in the public domain. If not, who owns them? The creator? What will they charge you?

 

 

Experts

To find experts, start your search with the internet. Then follow where it leads you. Experts can be found at museums, historical societies, science institutions—all over the place. Use website “contact” links. Email or telephone your expert. While researching Loving vs. Virginia, I phoned the curator of the Tappahannock Historical Society, which was near my subjects’ home in Central Point, Virginia. I wanted details about the “whites only” section of the local movie theater in order to write a scene about Richard and Mildred on a date. The curator not only described the urine-smelling stairway to the black section, but why that was. It “made” my scene. He directed me to Cleopatra Coleman, an expert on the one-room schoolhouses of the day that were supported by the Virginia Baptist churches in the area where the Lovings lived. One expert leads you to the next. You get the idea.

 

Another way to find experts is to read acknowledgements in the back of books to see who is being thanked for what—experts supply an abundance of information and there’s an abundance of experts on limitless topics.

 

Which doesn’t mean that experts are always correct. My expert reader for Josephine informed my publisher that Josephine was born in East St. Louis, Illinois, rather than St. Louis, Missouri. I felt confident that she was born in St. Louis, so I endeavored to obtain Josephine’s birth certificate. I contacted the county courthouse in St. Louis, which can usually be done via email. I paid the required small fee. Well, darn, I received a letter saying that the records for those particular years of St. Louis births had all been destroyed in a fire. Sherlock Homes doesn’t give up. Josephine’s thirteenth “adopted” child and her one-time manager, wrote a biography of Josephine describing the hospital in which Josephine was born, the address she and her mother went home to, her grandmother’s address, her aunt’s address—all in St. Louis. That thirteenth child was a family member. I trusted him with this information.

 

Which reminds me to say, keep constant track of your references. I learned the hard way and had to re-re-research Josephine. Some people use Scrivener or Evernote to maintain their sources. Being an old-fashioned girl, I include mine in my manuscript Endnotes, a feature of Microsoft Word.

 

Finally, if you’re writing outside your culture, you’ll need to do more exhaustive research. You’ll need an expert reader at the least and, as the times change, you might need a collaborator.

 

 

End Benefits

I personally love research. I often start writing and continue to research as I realize I need more information. Or perhaps a new collection has just been released to the New York Public Library. You will find pithy details that will wake up and deepen your writing. Almost certainly, you’ll find your next subject.

 

Patricia Hruby Powell, who writes in Champaign, Illinois, is comforted by her husband and her Tree Walking Coonhound. And really she’s pretty happy, maybe in part because she feels she’s connecting young people to their emotional hearts and helping them build empathy. At least she’s trying to do that. You can reach Patricia at phpowell@talesforallages.com or at talesforallages.com

[i] https://tinyurl.com/y6vtrm2b

[ii] https://preview.tinyurl.com/y86hq3dn

 

Writer’s Tips

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

by Patricia Hruby Powell

 

CONJURING, CHOOSING, OR CHECKING YOUR CHARACTER

The underlying object of reading is to have an emotional experience. Generally, we want our readers to experience the emotions that our characters feel—to empathize with our characters. So we as writers must do the work of developing characters our readers can love, be inspired by, laugh and cry with—whether we’re writers of fiction or nonfiction; whether we write picture books, middle grade, or young adult books. How is this done?

 

If you’re just thinking up a character, maybe you want to start with an issue. A problem. An external problem or obstacle; and an internal goal. For instance, an external obstacle of racism and poverty and an internal goal of wanting to dance.

 

Or maybe you’re midway through your story and need to think more deeply about your character. You might write more intuitively than analytically, as I do, but it might help to scrutinize your character in order to deepen that character on the page. Or to help you write your next character.

 

In the course of teaching writing I’ve had to analyze how to develop characters. Along the way, I’ve devised a template, incorporating my discoveries with the teachings of workshop leaders, writers of how-to-write books, and input from my wise editor Melissa Manlove, who analyzed the character development of Josephine, my biography of Josephine Baker, in order to educate me. Let’s look at these ten elements of character development. And note that it’s not easy to extract character development from plot, nor to cleanly divide each of these ten from the others, but for the sake of simplicity, I’m going to try.

 

1. NAME & AGE

You might not name your character right away, or maybe you’ll rename them a dozen times during the process of writing your fiction. Or maybe you’re writing about a real person. I’m lousy with the hypothetical so in order to make this more concrete, please go along with me, as I use Josephine as a model.

Name:  Josephine Baker.

 

Age is particularly important when writing for children, because one or two or five years makes so much difference in the development of children, in what interests them, how they behave, and what they know about the world. Generally, your character should be the age of your reader or a bit older (kids read up) and your characters should have issues that concern your reader. The age of your main character should be delivered imaginatively (e.g., She showed them just how strong her eight-year-old muscles were. Or: He got his driver’s license the day after his birthday). A biography is different. For instance, Josephine goes from “cradle to grave.”

 

2. GOAL

You’ve heard it before: What does your character want? Sometimes the “goal” can be described as your character’s internal situation or want. Josephine wanted to dance. It was her internal desire. Along the way, maybe she wanted to become famous as well. The goal can change a bit during the course of your story.

 

3. OBSTACLE

Yep, we’ve all heard this: What stands in your character’s way? That obstacle has to be big enough that the reader cares. What would failure mean to your character? The bigger the consequences, the more tension you can create. It’s what keeps your reader turning pages. That usually means tension for our character. This can be described as the external situation. For Josephine, that primary obstacle was racism. And racism is a huge obstacle. No, she didn’t conquer her obstacle, but she worked her whole life to overcome that obstacle (by working for civil rights and by adopting twelve children of different races, ethnicities, and religions to prove they could be brought up together in harmony—to name a couple of Josephine’s struggles against racism).

 

4. CHANGE

Why and how does your character change? Your character changes according to what happens—that’s the action or plot of your story. Josephine wanted to dance, but repeatedly hit a wall of racism against black people in the U.S. Why does she change? She has to fight racism and poverty to achieve her goal—to dance. Here’s one of several threads. Josephine grows in self-assurance and gains strength as she risks her life spying for the French and the allies during WWI—all in order to help grant individuals’ freedom. How does she do it? With determination, relentless energy, and imagination—by writing her notes in invisible ink and hiding those notes in her underwear, believing that border patrol would not search a superstar like she was. (She was right).

 

5. CORE STRENGTH

In most stories your main character is your hero, so they must have heroic qualities. Deborah Halverson in her Writing Young Adult Fiction for Dummies (Wiley 2011) calls those qualities “core strength”—those traits that will allow your character to overcome their obstacles. I’d say Josephine’s core strength was her exuberant energy. You can see that overlaps with how she changes.

 

 

6. KEY FLAW

In her book Halverson also discusses the key flaw, or the trait that undermines your character and her core strength. This is essential for creating plot tension. No one is interested in a flawless character. That’s just not real. For Josephine I’d say her key flaw is impulsiveness. Usually the flaw is in opposition to the core strength. Exuberant energy—impulsive energy. Josephine made a lot of mistakes due to her impulsive nature—accompanied by her innocence.

 

7. 7. MOTIVATING BELIEF

Motivating belief is a term coined by the wonderful writer and workshop leader Kathi Appelt. What does your character believe about herself? Once you know this, it will pull your character along through every page of your journey. It directs every step your character takes. Josephine believed she could do anything she set out to do. She was fearless. And this is what makes her a great role model for young readers. We hope that readers will follow Josephine’s example and follow their own dreams—and believe in themselves.

 

8. VOICE

Cheryl Klein, in her book The Magic Words: Writing Great Books for Children and Young Adults (W.W. Norton 2016), defines voice by this equation:

Voice = Point of View (POV) + Tense + Personality

 

 

 

When writing a biography one generally writes in third person POV and past tense. But not always. In fiction, you have more choice. Often you have to experiment to see what combination of POV and tense works for your story. Telling your story in first person, using I and me, can help you get inside the skin of your character. As the writer, you must identify strongly with your character—understand how your character ticks—in order to have that character evoke emotions in your reader. You might want to rewrite a chapter in third person, using he, she, or they. You might even try you—or second person. For example, write to your character, like it’s a letter; or talk directly to your reader as Daniel Nayeri does in Everything Sad is Untrue (Levine Querido 2020). You might try writing your piece in present tense, then change the whole thing to past tense. Keep trying your options until you find the right combination of POV and tense for your particular story.

 

 

POOF! A funny face.

That used to be fear.

POOF! She’d mock a gesture.

That used to be anger.

Until finally there is a huge explosion of energy and she becomes a star. Josephine’s equation: Third person + past + exuberant, empathetic, compassionate, wild, razzmatazz.

(You can find more about the use of voice or metaphor by reading the former Writer’s Tips https://talesforallages.com/voice-and-first-lines-by-patricia-hruby-powell/

https://talesforallages.com/metaphors-and-similes/

 

9. HOW YOUR CHARACTER MOVES

Does your character take big strides? Or little mincing steps? Do they twitch? Are their heads held high? Are they slumped? By knowing how your character moves, you can employ those details to show them moving through their world. When Josephine dances the Charleston, her

knees squeeze, now fly

heels flap and chop

arms scissor and splay

eyes swivel and pop.

 

She makes faces. She used her tongue like a scarf. She “stumbled off-balance on elastic legs—on purpose.” She was a clown as well as sexy; she was sexy as well as boyish. She could move like the dickens. All these things make her likeable…which brings us to the final checkpoint.

 

 

10. EMPATHY (an umbrella category for all the others)

Your character must draw your reader in emotionally. This brings all of the points together. In addition, your character should have a balance of universal and unique traits.

 

Characters need universal traits so your reader identifies with them. Perhaps your character is fun or funny. Humor can go a long way in connecting character to reader. Perhaps your character is poor, an orphan, or a refugee. People generally sympathize with the underdog. Does your character become powerful? Or selfless? Can your reader identify with your character? That’s what you must ask.

 

Your character’s unique qualities make them stand out as one of a kind. Maybe they have a remarkable talent. Again, maybe they’re funny, or bold in a charming manner. Or humble. Perhaps your character is a social justice activist and your reader admires that. Many traits are universal, prompting your readers to empathize with your character and their plight, but it’s the details that bring your character into sharp focus. These details are the way you show each character trait in a unique manner.

 

HOW TO USE THIS INFORMATION

If you get stuck while writing, fill out this chart for main and/or secondary characters. It will give you something to do during those times you just can’t work on your manuscript itself. You will learn about your character and hopefully that will get you back to writing. If you’re a planner, make this chart before you begin to write. Make a quick chart right now of your main characters from a yet-to-be-published manuscript as well as your already published books. See what you discover.

 

Here are a few to consider. And maybe you see the checkpoints differently than I do. Let me know.

 

 

Where the Wild things Are – Maurice Sendak (Harper Collins 1963)

1. name/age: Max, about 4
2. goal: to get what he wants
3. obstacle: parental rules
4. change: with imagination, takes a journey and comes back home wanting to be with his parents
5. core strength: confidence
6. key flaw: naughty
7. motivating belief: I am all-powerful.
8. voice: Third person + past + playful, wildly imaginative
9. move: able to swing in trees, agile
10. Empathy: Unique imagination

Universal  like every 4-year-old; naughty and loving (& confident)

 

 

Last Stop on Market Street by Matt De La Peña, illus. Christian Robinson (Putnam 2015)

1 name/age: CJ, about 4

2. goal: To get answers. (He asks why why why?)
3. obstacle: traveling through rainy, dirty, broken neighborhood by bus (life’s hardships)
4. change: with Nana’s guidance he sees beauty in everything, as she does
5. core strength: inquisitive; pretty respectful
6. key flaw: a teensy bit rude
7. motivating belief: I love my Nana.
8. voice: Third person + past + inquisitive, sweet
9. move: skips, agile as a child 😉
10. Empathy: Unique  sweetly inquisitive

Universal  sweet but cranky

 

 

Elizabeth Acevedo The Poet X  (HarperTeen 2018)

 

1. name/age: Xiomara or the Poet X, 15
2. goal: freedom; to move through the world unimpeded
3. obstacle: sexist misogynist society; her Catholic mami
4. change: self-actualizes due to writing and slamming poetry
5. strength: strength
6. flaw: anger
7. motivating belief: I’m not what I’m told I am.
8. voice: First person + present + sassy, strong, confident
9. move: sexy
10. empathy: Unique  cares for twin brother, talented poet

Universal  rebellious teen

 

What about your stories?

 

 

PATRICIA HRUBY POWELL, who writes in Champaign, Illinois, is comforted by her husband and her Tree Walking Coonhound. And really she’s pretty happy, maybe in part because she feels she’s connecting her adult students and young people to their emotional hearts and helping them build empathy. At least she’s trying to do that. You can reach Patricia at phpowell@talesforallages.com or at talesforallages.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Writing Tips

Writing to Evoke Emotion  

By Patricia Hruby Powell 

 

Readers read to have an experience—to go on a journey. Ideally, as writers, we take them out of their own lives and bring them into another. Most frequently, this is done when the reader engages so completely with the protagonist that the boundaries of the reader and the protagonist blur. Readers tend to feel what the protagonist feels and want what the protagonist wants. It works with some sympathetic secondary characters as well, but primarily it’s your main character the reader will identify with.

 

So, how do we emotionally get the reader into the world of our story? Showing rather than telling can be a great first step, because the reader can dive into the scene along with the protagonist and be there with them while the character is experiencing their own emotion. (See the Show-Don’t-Tell writing tip on my website).

We want to hook our readers—whether it’s our beta readers, agent, editor, or the general public. We must start at the onset and continue throughout the story. Here are some examples from books that do this job powerfully.

 

A Young Adult Example

In Laura Ruby’s young adult novel Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All (Balzer & Bray 2019), the thirteenth word on page one is “orphanage.”Most of us are wired to care about the underdog. Injustice disturbs us. In the face of injustice, we might feel hurt, anger, despair, empathy, or all of those emotions. We immediately care about the unjustly orphaned character, Frankie.

 

Not every story is about an orphan, of course, but with the examples I’ve provided here and below you might think about how your own stories might hook your readers emotionally.

 

Back to Frankie. Not only is she orphaned, she can’t talk. Why? What happened? I care. I’m curious. I desire to acquire information. That desire is an emotional connection to the story.

 

The story continues, “And then the shot from her parents’ bedroom—so sharp, so loud, so wrong.” Then screaming. I’m riveted now. An orphan who is unable to speak after she hears a shot in her parent’s bedroom? That means Frankie wasn’t always an orphan. Most all of us value our parents. That moment when one becomes orphaned? Despair. A nightmare. And the result is that our character becomes mute? I identify. I’m stricken. I’m with Frankie. I feel emotional attachment to her. But what happened? Again, curiosity—I desire to know.

 

All of these emotions, I bring to the reading of this book. Some I consider more universal than others. Desire to know, desire for justice, despair. Some are more personal.

 

I read the word “gaslit” early in Ruby’s book and think, ahh, this is historic. I love historical fiction. That’s a personal preference of mine. The author describes cribs like “gravestones” and that cements the tone. Injustice poured down on orphans. And the way the author uses words! “Crawling, hot tears on her face.” I admire great use of language and image. That’s another emotion: admiration. I have confidence in this writer. She knows what she’s doing and I’m going on a well-guided journey into another world—I’m connected by emotion.

 

Of course, some aspects—arguably all aspects—are subjective to some degree. The reader brings his or her own experience to the story they’re reading. I love history, great use of words, and feeling I’m in good hands. Maybe most of us do. But consider this. What if the editor reading this as an unpublished manuscript was brought up in an orphanage, or her sister was adopted from an orphanage? It brings that editor that much closer to the story. This helps explain why a manuscript may resonate with one (editor) and not with others—for instance, the twenty who have rejected your manuscript to date. The next editor might have been brought up as an orphan and be the one who connects emotionally to your story.

 

And yes, in Thirteen Doorways, Ruby does a lot of showing rather than telling. This is why the reader can be inside the action, the story, the world, right along with the characters.

 

A Picture Book Example

Consider Laurel Snyder’s picture book, Hungry Jim (Chronicle 2019). It begins:

“When Jim woke up on Tuesday,

his tail had fallen asleep.

This seemed odd.

Jim had never had a tail before.”

 

I’m laughing. “Jim had never had a tail before.” Chuck Groenink’s nostalgic illustrations show Jim as a lion in a child’s bed—the illustrations are a huge part of connecting book to reader. Picture books have the advantage of dual-showing—both illustration and text. The author is telling in the above passage. But as the story continues, she shows Jim’s activity.

Humor is a great emotional connector. And the humor here is sly. Jim feels “beastly” and he wants to eat everything—including his mother. He’s in a mood. And he just can’t control it, until he does. And yes, the book is an homage to the great Maurice Sendak and Where the Wild Things Are (Harper Collins 1991). Humor brings delight—a strong emotion.

 

A Middle Grade Example

A Wolf Called Wander (Greenwillow 2019) by Rosanne Parry is a middle grade novel. I’m a sucker for well-done animal stories—especially wild animals. These were my favorite stories when I was young. Endangered wolves are the underdog. I’m there. I identify with wolves. This novel is told in first person by a young wolf, so yeah, I guess it’s anthropomorphized, but so gently. Our wolf shows his world from his experience.

 

The author has her wolf character use verbs that a wolf might understand by hyphenating English language verbs—because English can’t cover the wolf culture. You’ve heard that in the Inuit language there are two hundred different words for snow. Most English speakers don’t need two hundred words for snow because, thank heavens, we don’t have a regular experience with so many types of snow—they’re not part of our culture. Language reflects culture. Maybe we should consider Parry’s book a translation from wolf.

 

Our wolf says, “I crouch-growl-sniff” when he encounters an unknown scent. When he smells a human, he “crouch-freezes.”  When he encounters a female wolf, his excitement causes him to “yip-spin like a pup.” Our young wolf, who will eventually identify himself as “Wander,” encounters an “almost-wolf” with “a deep voice . . . strange to my ear. Oof, oof.” We the reader know that the creature is a dog because Parry translates from wolf so adeptly. But Wander knows the creature only through his wolf experience: as “almost-wolf,” a meek creature who stays with his human rather than run wild with Wander.

 

So, part of the reader’s emotional connection is the joy of understanding another species as depicted by the writer. Again, as a writer, I admire the writing. And we need to read as writers. We need to learn from what we read—whether consciously or unconsciously. Which means reading a lot!

 

And Wander is so lonely. He longs for his long-gone pack. Surely loneliness is a universal condition. We connect emotionally to the lonely wolf.

 

On top of the emotional draw that comes from “becoming” a wolf—the reader/writer admiring the writing, the feelings of loneliness and vulnerability—there’s the huge emotional connection brought on by the life-or-death circumstances. Wander’s very existence makes him vulnerable to starving or being shot and killed. We care so deeply for him. He must find food and hunt, or he will starve. Humans are his worst enemy. His mother told him early on that humans “can kill with a look and a loud noise.” They carry black sticks that throw lightning. “A flash of fire, a clap of thunder, and the wolves go down.” There is so much loss in his young life, you root for him with everything you’ve got. And again, you feel the injustice he faces—hurt, anger, despair, empathy.

 

A Nonfiction Example

Nonfiction writers must also create this same kind of hook. Consider 2019 National Book Award winner for young people’s literature, 1919: The Year That Changed America (Bloomsbury 2019) by Martin W. Sandler. We do not identify with one protagonist—as we might in a biography. Instead, we’re fascinated by stories that surround the facts. A desire to know and to discover the interconnectivity of historic events.

 

Sandler’s opening chapter would be humorous if it weren’t so horrific. A huge vat of molasses—2.3 million gallons—explodes in Boston’s crowded North End in mid-January 1919, burying people and horses alive or blowing them clear into the bay. If the reader is anything like me, they’re riveted.

 

But molasses? Yes, as Sandler shows, molasses connects us directly to many other issues of 1919—the year that changed America. Molasses had everything to do with the slave trade. Sugar cane was grown and processed into molasses by enslaved people from the 1600s through the 1800s, which led to the racial unrest and riots that would break out across the country in 1919. Explosives were made by mixing molasses and ammonium nitrate during World War I, which had ended a few months earlier, in November 1918. Soldiers were still arriving home from that war.  The Prohibition Act had just been passed by Congress so manufacturers were frantically making rum (from molasses) before the law would be ratified and the nation would cease to drink (legally).

 

Women were largely behind the prohibition of drinking, in order to protect their families from drunken husbands. And they worked diligently for women’s suffrage, which would become the 19^th Amendment, passed in June 1919. Are you hooked? Are you curious? I hope so. There’s so much information to attain in such a riveting emotional ride—racial injustice, gender injustice, immigrant injustice, worker injustice, and information about our history.

 

In reading this book we marvel at the fact that molasses can connect so many issues. I’m thinking of the awe or surprise emoji. Awe is a good emotional connector.

 

Finding Your Emotional Center

 

Look at your own manuscripts or books. Do they have the emotional hooks you need to pull your readers into the story?  In my picture book Josephine (Chronicle 2014) I aimed to lure readers with Josephine Baker’s exuberance and her response to racial injustice. We can all be inspired by her living her dream. The book is a dance and, as I have written, “Dancing makes you happy when nothing else will.”

 

Loving vs. Virginia (Chronicle 2017) shows two people in love who can’t be married and live where they want to live. Both romance and love are great emotional connectors, as is injustice.

 

Struttin’ With Some Barbecue: Lil Hardin Armstrong Becomes the First Lady of Jazz (Charlesbridge 2018) shows a feisty piano-playing girl with an overbearing mother, who falls in love with the great jazz trumpet player Louis Armstrong. Injustice and love. It reads (or is meant to) like an early jazz tune. Music might be the ultimate emotional connector.

 

My upcoming Lift As You Climb: The Story of Ella Baker (McElderry/Simon & Schuster 2020) is about the African American woman who worked her entire life for African Americans’ right to vote. Again, injustice. Next comes my book about women’s suffrage (Chronicle). Unbelievable that only 100 years ago women couldn’t vote! Injustice. Look at your work and learn what hooks you emotionally. I seem to be injured by injustice. I want justice!

 

But maybe I’m moving on now. The life of dancer Martha Graham was about finding and presenting truth over beauty. Even though I’m a Graham-trained dancer, did I know that before I began writing about her? Not really.

So, check out your work. Where is your emotional heart? If you don’t see it in your writing, is it blocked in some way? Are you afraid to reveal it? I often think that I write to discover what I know. Or to discover what I don’t yet know. If your work is not evoking emotion in others, maybe you need to journal to figure out why.

 

I’d love to know where your emotional heart lies.

 

Patricia Hruby Powell, who writes in Champaign, Illinois, is comforted by her husband and her Tree Walking Coonhound. And really she’s pretty happy, maybe in part because she feels she’s connecting young people to their emotional hearts and helping them build empathy. At least she’s trying to do that. You can reach Patricia at phpowell@talesforallages.com or at talesforallages.com

 

 

To Comply or Not to Comply: A Few Stories

 

Critique Groups

We write by ourselves—pouring our hearts and ideas out onto the page. Then we bring those heart-filled pages to our writing group. Hopefully they support us and want the best for us. But the whole point is to improve our writing, so the members critique— after all it is a critique group. They question us. What is your main purpose? Someone asks, Is this phrase really what you want to say? Or, This structure confuses me. Or, perhaps the worst, This is fatally flawed.

When yours is the work being critiqued, you listen carefully. If you have an ongoing group you learn each member’s strengths in critiquing as time goes on. This one is good with rhythm and sound. This one is a librarian and knows the literature. This one is the grammarian. But this other one knows the main character’s voice doesn’t need to be grammatical. You don’t disregard anyone’s feedback—whether they’re published or not. Sometimes the least experienced person in your group has a clarity that turns out to be the most helpful of all.

You take notes during the meeting. You go home and pore over the written comments, whether on paper or in e-documents. I take the one paper version that speaks to me most clearly (or is the cleanest, or attracts me for some reason) and then I assign a color for each critiquer and add their notes to the document. If two or more people have the same comment, I take that comment especially seriously. I return to my color key to remind myself who else made similar comments. I know my critiquers. I respect my critiquers. We’ve grown up together as writers and have gotten published over time. Some are pre-published. Yes, some people move away, but we usually remain friends. New people occasionally join. We help each other.

It’s understood that as a critiquer you’re expressing opinions. So much is simply subjective. One suggestion or marked problem might contradict another critiquer’s suggestion. You know that the one being critiqued won’t do everything you suggest. It’s their piece, guided by their vision. So the buck stops at the writer. It’s up to you—the writer—to figure out the right path.

 

Submissions to Agents or Editors

When you or your group think it’s time to send your work to an editor or an agent, you ready yourself to receive further suggestions or advice, from the editing professionals. If the editor or agent likes your work enough to ask you to revise, that’s great. They’re interested. Hoorah! You’re making progress. But what if the advice makes no sense to you, or you’re opposed to the changes?

Now let’s get personal. Here are some stories, starting with my own.

My background is that of a dancer/ choreographer who was the chief cook and bottle washer for my dance company, One Plus One. Well, actually I was dancer, choreographer, booking agent (sometimes), and oftentimes costume designer, lighting designer, travel guide, grant writer, and who knows what else! I was NOT accustomed to others telling me how something should be done. Walter Lorraine at Houghton Mifflin said he might buy my picture book titled Frog Plus Frog if I made a story out of it. Hmmm…It felt like a story to me. It was the story of my internationally touring dance company, told in “Frog” and illustrated by me. I revised, trying to make it more of a “story.” Perhaps I still didn’t understand what Mr. Lorraine meant by “story.” Anyway, I didn’t change it to his satisfaction. He told me I was stubborn. True. But I’d tried. It was never published.

I wrote an autobiographical novel of my eleven-year-old self, titled Maddy (get it, Patty/Maddy?). Editor Wendy Lamb, then, an editor at Penguin, said, Do this and this and this and I’ll look at it again. I tried half-heartedly, but I didn’t really want to do this and this and this. I liked my book the way it was. Virginia Buckley of Clarion and Robbie Mayes of FSG each asked me to make revisions I didn’t want to do or didn’t understand. I sort of tried. They both declared it publishable—but not by them. It was never published. Who knew it would be so difficult to get published?

I submitted a collection of retold flower folktales, Bloom Tales, to Charlesbridge. An editor there told me that if I chose Writing Tips To Comply or Not to Comply: A Few Stories 14 other simple folktales and retold them briefly such that each could be an illustrated double-page spread, she’d love to look at that. But that wasn’t what I wanted to do. Who knew it was this difficult to get published?

So a few years later I tried what that editor had suggested and sent it to her, but by then she’d left the house. And no one else at Charlesbridge wanted it. Publishing is a subjective matter too— and therefore placing a manuscript is partly luck.

Eventually that manuscript of brief folktales became my first book, Blossom Tales: Flower Stories from Around the World (Moon Mountain 2002), beautifully illustrated by Sarah Dillon. Sadly, Moon Mountain is now defunct. But the lesson is: Those editors are smart. They know what they’re talking about. Today, most manuscripts have to go through agents to get to editors, but those agents know their stuff too, and might also suggest revisions.

So if you want to get published, I’d suggest you do what those smart and knowledgeable editors and agents suggest. But how can you do that if your heart isn’t in it? Next question: Am I sorry I didn’t comply? I was disappointed to not get those early manuscripts published, but I kept working, persevering, improving my work. As with any art, by practicing diligently you improve your skills. After Blossom Tales I published two retold Navajo folktales with Salina Bookshelf, wonderfully illustrated by the Navajo artist Kendrick Benally.

 

Let’s look at some other authors’ stories—members of SCBWI-Illinois who complied and got published. They’re not necessarily compliant but they did end up complying. And so became published authors—probably sooner in their careers than I, a noncomplier, did.

Sallie Wolf had a manuscript critiqued at a local conference. The editor liked her writing but didn’t want the piece Sallie had submitted. The editor wanted a truck piece. Sallie set to writing it on her ‘L’ trip home—a different truck for each day of the week. The editor said, “Wrong age group, trucks are for toddlers, focus on your audience”. Sallie complied, rewrote, sent it in. After nine months she called the editor. The editor asked her to rewrite it in rhymed couplets and gave her a first couplet as a model. OK, said Sallie.

Four years after that ‘L’ ride Peter’s Trucks was published (Albert Whitman 1992). Sallie then wrote Truck Stuck, which Whitman rejected, and twelve short years later 😉 it came out with Charlesbridge (2008). (Sallie did not give up). Sallie complied. She believed some smart editors and improved her stories as she worked with them.

There are lots of similar stories. Frequently an editor will ask for a revision, the author will comply, and yet no contract is offered. Most authors feel they vastly improve their manuscripts by working with an editor who cares. So what if, after all that work, no contract is offered? Oftentimes it will sell to another publisher. That’s what happened with my Lift As You Climb: The Story of Ella Baker (McElderry—Simon & Schuster 2020). I worked with an editor from one house. We radically improved my manuscript. We worked great together. But she couldn’t get it through acquisitions— you know, that’s when the editor brings the work to the editorial, marketing, and maybe art staff meeting—where they decide on whether to offer a contract. Shortly after, my agent sold this manuscript to Simon & Schuster and there was practically no editing to be done (I’d already done it).

Sara Shacter spent a year revising her novel for an agent. Though the agent ultimately passed, the manuscript had improved immensely and Sara snagged another agent.

Carol Grannick made six huge revisions to her novel for one agent, who finally felt she’d nailed it, but the agent failed to sell the book. They parted 15 ways. So Carol returned to her original concept, made improvements to the story, and sold it. Ta da! Sometimes what an editor or agent wants isn’t what the book you’re writing necessarily needs to find its home. Carol’s vision held strong. Look for Reeni’s Turn (Regal House/Fitzroy Books, 2020). Yeah, Carol!

I do love working with an editor whose ideas make sense to me. But I’m still stubborn. My agent has been placing my work for ten years now. We do well together. But recently, she was confused by the structure of a manuscript I submitted to her. She asked me to do something that baffled me. Each day I’d look at her preferred structure and each day I’d close my computer and go off to clean my deck, organize my office. Or play Wordscapes on my phone. After a week or so, I asked my (editing) agent to submit the piece as I’d organized it, to the four editors who have bought recent works of mine. I wondered if she’d drop me, but I couldn’t do what she’d asked. After a few days of silence, she agreed. If it turns out all four of those editors are perplexed by my work, I’ll go back to the drawing board. It was risky. But I simply couldn’t do what my agent wanted—it was no longer my piece with my ideas if I restructured it.

 

Post Contract

Even after you have a contract (Yay! Congratulations! Fireworks! Cocktails!) editors inevitably ask you for revisions. Sometimes you fully comply and sometimes you don’t. They expect this. Editors respect their writers.

In Alice McGinty’s first trade book, Ten Little Lambs (Dial 2002), there was the mention of underwear. The editor did not like the underwear. Alice said something to the effect of, “Please, I want the underwear. Kids love underwear.” But it was a first book and as Alice says, “You pick your battles.” That underwear became pajamas.

In another of Alice’s books, the marketing department created a title that simply didn’t work for Alice. Every day she’d suggest an alternate title. Finally they agreed on the title Eliza’s Kindergarten Surprise (Marshall Cavendish 2007). You pick your battles.

My editor wanted a metaphor of fabric to run through Loving vs. Virginia (Chronicle 2017) in the same way I’d used a volcano metaphor in Josephine (Chronicle 2014). I couldn’t make it work. But I kept a few references to home-spun cloth and fabric, which deepened the tactile sense in the story. Sometimes (or maybe always) an editor requests changes because she thinks something is missing from the work— but there are various ways to address what might be missing. What they want is for your book to work in the best way possible.

 

To Comply or Not

If you’re not yet published, is it because you’re still developing your style, your work? The stories above are just a few sample situations. Walter Lorraine was correct. I’m stubborn—not just due to my experience as chief cook and bottle washer, but stubbornness is a deeply hewn character trait of mine. I like to think of it as being strong-willed 😉

We make decisions about our work at every turn. And when we let others into the mix—critique group members, agents, editors, our readers—we open ourselves up to even more decisions that must be made. No one can tell you with certainty when to comply and when not to, but maybe these stories can help guide you when you face your own struggles with editorial demands. To comply or not to comply, that is often the question.

 

Please share your inspiring (or not-inspiring) stories or ask questions or advice from this knowledgeable group of Illinois SCBWI members.

 

Patricia Hruby Powell teaches continuing education writing classes at Parkland College in Champaign. She tends to feel a strong ownership of her writing, but loves to work with editors whom she admires and respects and who can guide her in improving her books, which currently include Struttin’ With Some Barbecue; Loving vs. Virginia; and Josephine: The Dazzling Life of Josephine Baker.

 

 

Literary voice can refer to an author’s complete body of work—their quality, style, and character of writing. We might be able to identify the voices of Charles Dickens, Stephen King or Shel Silverstein by their unique syntax, attitude, style—without seeing a credit line. And then there’s the voice of an individual work by a specific author. In her book The Magic Words, Cheryl Klein defines voice by the equation: Voice = Person (POV) + Tense + Personality.

These two definitions of voice overlap. I want to concentrate on the individual work—to help us all read analytically and to develop our own voices.

When you read a book you should always analyze the point of view. Is it told in the first person? The unusual but doable second person? Or third person? And is that third person limited to one character or is it omniscient—a God-like narrator who can see what each character is seeing and feeling? Omniscient viewpoint is rarely used in children’s literature, but any rule can be broken.

The first line (or lines) of any book should introduce the entire work. In that first line, we’ll identify the point of view of the character, the tense used, a sample of the narrator’s vocabulary, grammar, tone, (which is part of the “personality” of the above equation) and maybe other elements such as the setting or the topic. That first line introduces the voice. And it’s the seed from which the entire book will grow.

First Person

Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation (Pantheon 2018) adapted by Ari Folman, is, by definition, told in the first person. It’s a diary. (The original is The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank). The opening line of the adaptation is:

No one would believe me, but at the age of 13, I feel totally alone in this world.

“I” indicates 1^st person and is the young Jewish girl, Anne Frank, who survives for two years by hiding from the Nazi regime, in the attic of a warehouse in the Netherlands, 1942-1944. Anne speaks in the present tense unless she’s describing a story from the past.

The first line is a powerful seed. The central character is 13 years old, lonely, and “no one would believe” this because—as we’ll eventually find out as we read—she puts up such a cheerful and feisty front.

Just to throw a wrench in the works, because this is a graphic novel adaptation we also see Anne in the remarkable illustrations of David Polonsky. So in a way, we get two points of view, Anne’s 1^st person text, and then a 3^rd person limited view in the artwork. Someone might argue that it’s an omniscient 3^rd person point of view. It could be either. The illustrator is looking in on the Frank and van Daan families and Mr. Dussel in the Secret Annex, plus Miep and other helpers on the “outside,” as well as SS Officers. But we’re still seeing all these characters driven by Anne’s 1^st person narrative, and oftentimes through her visual fantasies.

Third Person Limited

Fox the Tiger (Balzer & Bray 2018) by Corey R. Tabor, an award winning first reader, begins:

“I wish I were a tiger,” says Fox.

The words “…says Fox” shows that this is present tense, 3^rd person limited from Fox’s viewpoint. This is Fox’s story. The dialog is in first person, as is natural, but the book is in 3^rd. The author uses the subjunctive, “I wish I were.” The grammar is impeccable, which seems right for a first reader. Overall, an author establishing voice doesn’t have to use correct grammar if her voice character wouldn’t. But this is an erudite fox. Incidentally, the satisfying ending is: Fox is glad to be a fox.

Second Person

Second person is most likely to be used in a self-help book, where an author is directly addressing you. In literary work, second person might be used for brief moments when the author breaks from the story to address her reader.

In Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster (Amulet 2018) by Jonathan Auxier, see how the author speaks to the reader in the Prologue.

…if you are very, very lucky, you might even catch a glimpse of the girl and her Sweep.

Look! Here they are now, approaching through the early fog: a thin man with a long broom over one shoulder, the end bobbing up and down with every step. And trailing behind him, pail in hand, a little girl, who loves that man more than anything in the world.

The author “breaks the 4^th wall” (to use a theater phrase) and addresses the reader: “if you are very lucky . . . Look!” He introduces his characters to you the reader, personally—2^nd person point of view. The rest of the book will become, 3^rd person limited from Nan’s point of view:

It was dark in the coal bin, but Nan could tell it was Newt who was asking. Newt was the newest to Crudd’s crew.

And what else do these early lines show us? “Fog,” “long broom,” “pail,” “coal bin,” “crew.” They’re a team of child chimney sweeps in London. The characters’ names (Newt, Crudd, Nan) are Charles Dickens-like, as is the setting, as is the theme—impoverished laboring nineteenth century children.

When Angels Sing: The Story of Rock Legend Carlos Santana (Atheneum 2018) is told very effectively in second person by author Michael Mahin.

When you were born, your tia abuela called you el cristalino, the crystal one. She thought the light of angels shined through you.

Your father wanted to name you Geronimo, after the brave Apache freedom fighter. He was proud of his mestizo blood. 

At first, the intimate stories sound like a mother’s lullaby—but a little later the author mentions “your mother.” The reader realizes that the voice is an omniscient God-like voice giving an overview of Carlos’s life. So instead of speaking to “you” the reader, the author is speaking to his subject, Carlos Santana.

Which Should You Use?

So how do you choose to use 1^st, 3^rd, or even 2^nd person point of view? You should probably experiment with some scenes from your manuscript(s).

First person allows us, as writers, to get inside the brain and eyes of our main character. But more importantly it allows us to feel what our character is feeling and convey these emotions to the reader. This can certainly be done in the third person, but sometimes doing the exercise of revising your third person work into first person can be a great exercise for getting closer—so close you’re inside—your character. It’s much more than doing a universal change of “she” to “I” and adjusting the grammar. You have to do the work of becoming another person. Acting can help. Become your character—each of your characters—get inside their skin, walk like they do, greet people as that character might greet people. Go through the day, or the hour, being this character. Once you’ve changed a passage or chapter or entire novel to first person, then you might want to return it to third person, with the added insights and closeness which you developed while it was in first person. Or maybe you want to keep it in first person.

The author has certain advantages, using 3^rd person point of view. The author may use somewhat more advanced (and therefore specific) vocabulary or even use ideas that your young and/or naïve character might not be able to use authentically.

Consider syntax, grammar, tone, and dialogue. Look at more examples.

What about this first line and the few lines that follow?

I don’t mean to be dramatic, but God save me from Morgan picking our set list. That girl is a suburban dad’s midlife crisis in a high school senior’s body.

Case in point: she’s kneeling on the floor using the keyboard stool as a desk, and every title on her list is a mediocre classic rock song.

1^st person, present tense. If you don’t pick up “set list” in the first line, you’ll catch “keyboard” and “rock song” in the next paragraph. Our character is a musician. Our point-of-view character is more sophisticated than Morgan, or thinks she is. Superior? Dramatic? Oh yeah. Profane throughout. Hip, contemporary, sarcastic and distinctive. This is the young adult book, Leah on the Offbeat (HarperCollins 2018) by Becky Albertalli, which delivers voice in spades.

Try these lines.

I’d seent plenty of animals by the time I was old ’nough to start talking, but only one kind worked me up so much that it pult the first real word I said out my mouth.

1^st person, past tense. Using dialect can be tricky. I admit that at first I was annoyed because it slowed my reading considerably. But, one, I got used to it; two, the author lets up somewhat once he’s established his voice; and three, it’s done by master multiple Newbery winner, Christopher Paul Curtis. This is the middle grade The Journey of Little Charlie (Scholastic 2018).

What does the author’s unique vocabulary and syntax suggest to you about who the speaker might be? About his level of education? About his imagination? Do you wonder about his race? Curtis never tells us the answers to these questions, but shows us by many small actions who Little Charlie is. Read the book and see if you think Curtis is playing with our preconceptions of dialect.

Analyze everything you read. That is, read like a writer. Here are a couple to analyze:

Josephine

            danced a sizzling flapper dance—

the Charleston.

Does it suggest attitude, setting, theme? This is the middle grade picture book, Josephine: The Dazzling Life of Josephine Baker (Chronicle 2014).

How about:

Yessir, Lillian Hardin

was proud to be who she was.

Do you detect attitude? Theme? Could this be the woman who had enough ambition for both herself and Louis Armstrong? This is the middle grade Struttin’ With Some Barbecue: Lil Hardin Armstrong Becomes the First Lady of Jazz (Charlesbridge 2018). What point of view and tense are the last two?

How about:

Garnet and I walk in the grass

alongside the road

to keep our shoes clean,

but Lewis doesn’t care.

What person? 1^st, 2^nd, or 3^rd? What tense? What does it suggest about who she is? This is Mildred’s opening in the young adult Loving vs. Virginia: A Documentary Novel of the Landmark Civil Rights Case,which begins with civil rights photos and documents. Mildred’s chapters alternate with Richard’s.

So look at the first line of whatever you’re working on now. Is it a seed from which your entire story can grow? Is the voice powerfully indicative of your narrating character? Does the first line offer a hint of the setting or the theme or the plot?

Do you take exception to any of the samples I’ve offered? Disagree? Have questions that will take the discussion deeper? Have examples of your own? We’d all love to hear from you. Try #writersvoice

First published in The Prairie Wind, the newsletter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, Illinois. https://illinois.scbwi.org/prairie-wind-2/current-issue-of-prairie-wind/writing-tips/

Bio:

Patricia Hruby Powell writes in Champaign, IL, mostly about remarkable women who threaten to be lost to history: Josephine Baker, Lil Hardin Armstrong, Mildred Loving; upcoming are Ella Baker, Alice Paul, Lucy Burns and others.