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Lesson 1. Master Your Library
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Lesson 2. Sell Your Homework
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Phrase sentences
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The English language is so flexible that even sentences of one or two words can sell.
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Short sentences
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A string of short sentences can add excitement to a narrative and pennies to your pocket
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Puzzles
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Everybody loves them but they can be a bear to create
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Lesson 3. Simple Humor
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The A-B-C article
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It looks like something out of kiddy-lit, but it can serve an enterprising writer.
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Sheer Nonsense
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Sometimes writers pull off something foolish and totally madcap. And whaddya know. It sells!
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The Parody
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Everybody likes to poke fun. It's in our genes.
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Lesson 4. Novelties
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Question and answer
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All you do is write the question and let your subject answer it. Nothing to it. Oh?
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How To
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You know how? Tell us. Break it down. Oh, it's easy.
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Diary
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Recreate experience. That's the goal of all dramatic writing.
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Tales retold
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It's the Cinderella pattern--Rejection, Momentary Success, Despair, Happy Ever After
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Lesson 5. Conversational
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Conversation
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You've got to listen closely when you write in "people-talk."
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The chronological narrative
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We're with him when he rises, confronts, flees, escapes. Readers live it and they love it!
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The chronological reverse
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Games over! Who won? Tell us about it. Start with the final score.
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The slice of life
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It can be anything, do anything, say anything. It's the no-man's-land of feature writing
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Lesson 6. Sell Your Homework
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The frame and flashback
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Look at what you've done, Johnny! How did you ever get into this mess?
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Plant and pick up
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Plant the gun early. When you finally need it, it's there.
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Series
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Hail! Hail! The gang's all here. Tell us who's here and what each one looks like.
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Cycle
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Like baseball, everything starts and ends at home plate.
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Lesson 7. Sell Your Homework
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Cumulative
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It may be a gathering of the nuts or a run to the king. This one moves fast.
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Repetitive statement
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King David did it. Old-time minstrels did it. Singing cowboys did it. You score points when you do it, too.
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Catalog
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It reads like Sears Roebuck with a million things to tell. Catalog glues them together.
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Surprise ending
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You think all your marbles are under your cup. Somebody snatches the cup away. Surprise!
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Lesson 8. Sell Your Homework
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Alternating statement and quote
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Writing what pastors, politicians, professors say couldn't be easier.
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Alternating action and reflection
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Use this when a character ponders his problems while trying to solve them.
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Lesson 9. Sell Your Homework
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Double barrel
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You have two, three stories to tell in the same article?
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Triple barrel
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Mention all of them in your lead and discuss them one by one.
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Lesson 10. Sell Your Homework
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Inverted pyramid
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Make your paragraph's first sentence your punch line.
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Repeated pyramid
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Make your paragraph's last sentence your punch line.
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Lesson 11. Sell Your Homework
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Problem and solution
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The problem MUST be solved, but oh! how will we ever do it? Here's how.
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Sunk and saved
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We're dangling on the edge, calling feebly for help. Oh, for a strong hand to pull us to safety.
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Lesson 12. Sell Your Homework
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Biography
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The well-written bio is the reader's peep through the keyhole of life
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Autobiography
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You are the only person inside that shell of yours. Only you know what you are really like.
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