Monday, April 27, 2009

Favorite Book

Tess Hilmo had a contest on Friday about first favorite books. It made me pull out my favorite book as a child, A Chocolate Moose for Dinner by Fred Gwynne. I loved it because it had double meanings and I actually understood both.
As a writer, it reminds me that every sentence needs to be clear. Even if something seems crystal to you, it may be as opaque as my new black tights to someone else. So it's important to think of how someone who isn't intimately involved with your characters might read something. Otherwise, your characters could end up tackling a fish!

2 comments:

Tess said...

Thanks for the shout out and the thoughts. I've never read that book so will have to add it to my list

Unknown said...

I was also really excited about Tess' contest. It brought back some great memories and reminded me of one of the strongest powers of literature--namely, my father read to me out of an old "Uncle Wiggly" storybook, and I now read the same stories to my little daughter. Timeless ... and beautiful :)