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This post, by Kristen Lamb, originally appeared on her blog on 6/24/11.

Today, we are going to talk a bit about failure. All writers who dare to dream seem to have this same fear–FAILURE. It can seem larger than life and everything fades away in the face of this looming beast. I want to let you in on a little secret. For many years I was the best, the Big Kahuna, the Big Gal on Campus. I was positively THE most successful person…at failing.

A little about me…

I was a high school drop out at the age of 15, then again at 16. I worked as a waitress, but was a really bad waitress. I lost my job and returned to school. I finally graduated high school at the age of 19. No one figured I would make much out of my life since it’s highly likely I graduated last in my class. I think by the time you get a GPA as low as mine was, they just start listing you alphabetically.

I came from a military family, so I decided to enlist in the Army…only I got sick in the middle of the physical and failed. Doc gave me a medical disqualification (DQ).

Great.

So, I dusted myself off and attended junior college. I figured I’d go to school and try the Navy. I come from a family of Squids, so that wasn’t so bad. I put in all my paperwork…then they found out about the Army. Sigh. Apparently a medical DQ lasted two years.

No Navy for me.

Back to the drawing board (school). I knew the medical DQ would run out, so I worked really hard and ended up winning a full military scholarship to become a doctor. I didn’t really want to become a doctor, but this was the best scholarship and I was broke ergo not picky. I transferred to T.C.U. and began pre-med. I swore in to the Air Force (yes, I made my rounds of all the branches) and pledged my life to serving my country as a future military doctor.

Two years in, I was a shining scholar with a 3.79 average. Then, in March of 1995, Fort Worth was hit with an ice storm and T.C.U. refused to cancel classes. On my way to class, I slipped and fell and hit my lower back on a concrete curb…and fractured it.

Bye, bye military. Bye-bye scholarship. Bye-bye medical school.

I returned to school a semester later. I had to use a cane for eight months as my back healed and there was no such thing as handicapped access to anything in those days. It seemed every class I had signed up for was on the third floor, too. But I did my best and took it one class at a time.

I didn’t want to be a doctor if the DoD wasn’t picking up the tab. Didn’t have the money. So I changed majors because I could no longer afford to be on a medical track. This was all well and good except that it set me back. Instead of being a junior, I was back to being a sophomore.

Felt a little like high school.

Read the rest of the post on Kristen Lamb‘s blog.

This post, by Roni Loren, originally appeared on her blog on 6/22/11.

A while back I talked about the TSTL character in a Lifetime movie I was watching.  Well, unfortunately (or fortunately–considering it provided fodder for two blog posts), the crappy plot devices did not end there.  The You’ve-Got-To-Be-Freaking-Kidding-Me moments continued.  But this time in the form of contrived coincidences.
 

Contrived Coincidence describes a highly improbable occurrence in a story which is required by the plot, but which has absolutely no outward justification

When we left our heroine in the previous post, she was under suspicion for murder.  So, she had decided the best course of action was to break in and search the crime scene (leaving DNA-laden hair and fingerprints in her wake no doubt).  Well, she doesn’t find much over there (although the killer does stop in the house briefly–at the exact time she’s there–she hides under the bed, seeing only his feet).  But, that my friends, is not even the silliest coincidence.

Our heroine goes on and continues her search for evidence in different places, but doesn’t turn up much.  However, she strikes up a friendship with the local coffee barista who tells her how every townie takes his or her coffee.  Well, fast forward, and Ms. Brilliant is being followed all around town by a mysterious black mustang (the car, not the horse, although that would have been better).  Because that’s what killers do, they show you their car and follow you in broad daylight.  But anyhoo, a few days later her own car is vandalized and she needs to go buy another vehicle.

Well, lo and behold, as she’s searching the used car lot, she happens upon what?  You got it.  The black mustang that’s been following her.  Oh, and what’s that you say Mr. Salesman?  The car was just dropped off yesterday and IT HASN’T BEEN CLEANED YET!  Well, hot damn!

So she buys the car and what is laying neatly in the floorboard of the car?  A receipt for coffee with the very order of one of the people the barista told her about.  Killer identified!

Seriously.  I’m. Not. Kidding.  That’s how they wrapped this thing up.

 

Read the rest of the post for some concrete tips on how to avoid contrivances and coincidences in your writing on Roni Loren‘s blog.

Due to vacation scheduling, Publetariat will be on skeleton crew through the end of July. During this time it may take us a few days to process new member registrations, answer emails, and approve comments. Thanks for your patience, and happy summer to all!  (no need to click through, this is the end of the post)

An author who sold several bestsellers and millions of books once shared some insights into becoming a successful author. They indicated that the book has to be well written, professional looking, with a good product description, and for sale at the right price. With a bit of luck, these attributes can help make a book a commercial success.

What the author neglected to add was that successful writing starts with a good idea. Anyone can copy the latest literary trend, but a truly successful novel or story should be based on a compelling idea. The idea does not need to be original per se, but rather one that piques readers’ interest. It means moving beyond the latest paranormal vampire romance into unexplored territory. Can you guess what the next frontier in writing will be? If so, write about it before it becomes passé. A strong idea can be a good foundation for success.

This post, by Juliette Wade, originally appeared on her TalkToYoUniverse site on 6/21/11.

How can you get your reader to feel emotionally moved by your story?

Well, first off, you can’t just tell them, "you should be emotionally moved." This is obvious, I think. I had been thinking about the topic of emotional involvement and creating intensity at particular points of the story, and then I ran across this article by Lydia Sharp, where she gives the following quote from Donald Maass:

Lydia then asks:
"So what does this mean? For starters, it goes back to the age-old advice of "show, don’t tell." Where emotions are involved, it’s best not to simply outright tell your reader what the characters are feeling. Let the reader experience it.

"And how do you do that? By not being obvious."

All of this, I agree with. If I were to take the Donald Maass quote and give my own take on it, I would have to say that our impressions of the emotional experiences of characters grow more out of our own emotions in a particular part of the story than the other way around. In other words, it is our own emotional understanding of the story that deepens the character’s experience, rather than the character’s emotional state deepening our own.

In a way, this makes sense. Because the character inhabits the story, he/she is limited in his/her ability to grasp the entirety of the story. The reader usually does not have these same limitations. I’m going to come back to the idea of the entirety of the story in a moment, but first let me address Lydia’s advice.

Lydia suggests we should let the reader experience what the characters are feeling, rather than telling them, by not being obvious. An excellent point. There are a number of ways that emotional states can be shown. One way is to describe the internal physical sensations of a person – adrenaline surges, feeling hot or cold, and many different kinds of metaphorical descriptions of pain, fear, embarrassment, joy, etc. can be of use for internal points of view. Another way is to show the external behaviors of a person feeling an emotion. If the point of view is external, you can show facial expressions; this is awkward to do with internal points of view, but you can still show actions of rage (as one example) like throwing things across the room, or pacing, stomping, etc. Still another way is to have the emotional state of the character in a scene be reflected somehow in the way that person perceives things around him/her, by including a sense of rage or other emotion in the surrounding descriptions of setting, descriptions of the actions of others, etc. There is a descriptive passage in Snow Falling on Cedars where the destruction wreaked by a storm is treated in intensive detail…and that reflects the inner state of the protagonist, Ishmael.

 

Read the rest of the post, which includes numerous specific, before-and-after examples, as well as some concrete tips, on Juliette Wade‘s TalkToYoUniverse.

This post, by Peter Cox, originally appeared on his Redhammer blog on 6/8/11.

A major debate is going on in publishing circles at the moment, and you need to know about it.

Frequently, these things are a storm in a teacup.  What excites publishing folk often leaves the rest of the world… a bit limp.  “Inside Publishing” isn’t always as exciting as… watching leafcutter ants.

This time it’s different.

This issue is enormous.  Because it will affect every book deal, every publication contract, from now until the end of time.

It affects every author who has an agent, or who would ever like an agent.  It goes to the heart of what being an agent is all about.

In a nutshell, this is the question:

Should your agent also be your publisher?

In recent weeks, there have been a spate of agents who have cut deals on behalf of their clients with… themselves.  One such involved the agent to the estate of the late author Catherine Cookson.  According  to the Daily Mail, the literary agent didn’t even inform the author’s publishers, Transworld and Simon & Schuster, that she’d done a deal – with herself – to digitally publish 100 of the author’s titles.  “I haven’t told either firm about the deal”, she said, “and I am sure they are going to kick up a fuss about it”. [Click on image at right to read the full story]

Yes, I bet they will.

As should any author whose agent says to them – come on – let’s cut your print publisher out of the picture… give me those lovely digital publishing rights, and I’ll publish you myself!

No doubt many agents will jump on this particular bandwagon before it overturns.

It’s Not OK To be Your Client’s Publisher

Let me be absolutely candid with you.  Although various excuses have been put forward by agents for doing this – it’s mostly about lining their own pocket.

Not that I’m against agents making money – how could I be?

But this isn’t just about making money. It comes perilously close to what is termed in law “self-dealing“, and it is both ethically wrong and legally very dangerous. In taking this fateful step, those agents who choose to do this are in danger of crossing a line that is legally and ethically of immense significance.

Read the rest of the post on Redhammer.

This post, by Marc Johnson, originally appeared on Longshot Publishing on 6/16/11.

Going indie has some drawbacks. One of those drawbacks is staying on top of the news. While I did that anyway especially in the Fantasy genre, with today’s publishing climate, I’ve had to do it a lot more. I’ve had to not only keep track of my preferred genre, but publishing as a whole. There are many good blogs and news sources out there, but how was I to keep track of them?

The last year and a half, I learned something about a little thing called RSS. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. While I don’t understand the technical aspects, RSS really is simple.

Instead of constantly visiting and bookmarking all the websites I go to or leaving dozens of tabs open, I just use RSS. In most websites these days, they’ll be either a button that says subscribe like what I have in the upper right corner or they’ll be this picture. By clicking on this button, you’ll be able to get the feeds from a whole bunch of websites. You will never need to go to the website ever again.

What RSS does is pull the news from the site. You’ll get their updated news feed whenever they update and you’ll see whatever images they post. In the case of some sites, you’ll no longer need to play the guessing game of when they update their site. It’s also helpful for podcasts and webcomics.

 

Read the rest of the post on Longshot Publishing.

This post, by Jody Hedlund, originally appeared on her blog on 6/6/11.

In the writing community, most of us want to support each other. One way to generously show support is to buy each other’s books. We can’t discount fellow writers as a segment of our readership. (See this post: The New Growing Segment of the Reading Population: Writers)

But in buying and reading each other’s books, we’ll inevitably come across books we don’t like. That’s just a fact of life. We won’t like all books all the time.

We might not like the subject, the writing style, the plot, the development of the story, the typos, the characters. There could be a hundred and one reasons why we don’t like a book. And that’s okay.

But what should we do about the negative reaction we have to a book? Particularly when the book was written by an author who happens to be an acquaintance or friend? What should we do when that particular author knows we read his or her book (and is perhaps waiting for word on how we liked it)?

Let’s face it, as more of us publish our books (either traditionally or self-pub), we’ll continually have more writer friends’ books to read. How are we going to handle the books that don’t resonate for one reason or another? How can we offer our support to our fellow writers when we don’t like the book? How do we tell them our true feelings without hurting their feelings and/or our relationship?

When we read a book we don’t like, here are several possible scenarios:

• We lie totally and completely. We tell our friend we liked her book and think she’s a good writer, when in reality we couldn’t finish the book.
   
• We tell a half-lie (if that’s possible!) We fudge just slightly. We think of the positive aspects we liked about the story and tell the author those things (like how well they used commas), but refrain from telling her how much we disliked the rest.
   
• We’re politely honest. We give truthful but tactful feedback. We figure from one writer to another, our friend will want to know her weaknesses so she can improve. However, we make sure to point out the positives too.
   

Read the rest of the post on Jody Hedlund‘s blog.

This post, by Anne R. Allen, originally appeared on her blog on 9/19/10.

The wonderful Sierra Godfrey mentioned this post in her round up of round-ups last week as one of her favorite posts ever, so I figured it would be a good one to post again.

One note of caution: these are rules for the final draft. When you’re first diving into a novel, you’re not introducing your characters to a reader; you’re introducing them to yourself. All kinds of information about your MC will come up, like she eats cold pizza for breakfast, grew up next to an adult book store, and feels a deep hatred for Smurfs. This stuff will spill out in your first chapters. Let it. That’s the fun part. But be aware you’ll want to cut most of the information or move it to another part of the book when you edit.

When you’re doing that editing, here are some dos and don’ts:

DON’T start with a Robinson Crusoe opening. That’s when your character is alone and musing. Robinson Crusoe is boring until Friday shows up. So don’t snoozify the reader with a character driving alone in the car, sitting on an airplane, waking up and going to work, or looking in the mirror.

DO open with the protagonist in a scene with other characters—showing how he interacts with the world. Two or three is ideal: not too many or the reader will be overwhelmed.

DON’T give a lot of physical description, especially of the "police report" variety. All we know about Elizabeth Bennett in Pride and Prejudice is that she has “fine eyes.” We don’t have to be told the color of Sam Spade’s hair, or Inspector Morse’s weight. The reader’s imagination fills in the blanks.

DO give us some physical markers that indicate personality. Unusual characteristics like Nero Wolfe’s size, Hercule Poirot’s mustache, and Miss Marple’s age show who these characters are and make them memorable.

Read the rest of the post on Anne R. Allen‘s blog.

This post originally appeared on the Writers Anonymous blog.

As writers, we all struggle with editing our own work. We know what we intended to say, so often our eyes see our intentions in place of what is actually there.

Is all lost? Are we completely unable to edit our own work? Are we forever reliant on the assistance of others?

At some point, we are reliant on others to edit our work. Besides reading our work with fresh eyes, others also bring a world of experience that is different than ours. Others also read our work with (perhaps) different goals in mind–for example, perhaps I intend a piece to be entertaining, and a reader believes the same piece (at least at first) to be educational.  These different perspectives change how our work is interpreted, so we may not get our intended message to the reader.

However, there are several techniques we can use to look at our own writing through fresh eyes.  I have used each of these techniques with varying degrees of success, and have found them to be successful at finding different types of errors.

1. Change your work’s appearance

By changing the size, color, or font of your work, you force yourself out of the familiar feel of your favorite font.  Suddenly, words that fit poorly with the flow of the rest of your article, story, or other work pop out due to the changed appearance.  The best font to use is one that changes which words are on the edge of a page–so, as an example, you might use a fixed-width font like Courier instead of your typical variable-width font like Times New Roman.

This method is best used for looking at the general flow of your article and making sure that it makes sense.  You may also find that this method helps find double word errors, such as “the the” or “of of”.

2. Give yourself some time

The worst time to edit is immediately after you’ve finished writing a piece.  At this point, everything is still clear in your mind, so you’re more likely to fill in holes with what you intended to say.

Instead, go out for a walk, a cup of coffee, read a book, or just about anything to get your mind off what you just wrote.  For best results, you should stay away from what you wrote for at least an hour, and preferably as long as a day.

Once you get back, use this in combination with one of the other strategies to make sure that you are looking at your work in a different mindset than when you wrote it.
 

Read the rest of the post on the Writers Anonymous blog.

This post, by Bill Walker, originally appeared on his blog on 1/4/11.

Many aspiring novelists, begin the writing process without really thinking about what his/her publishing objectives are. They don’t think about questions such as: Why do I want to write a book in the first place? How will this book be published? For whom am I writing this book? Who is my target market? Do I want to make money from the sales of this book? How am I going to market my book?

These are questions that should be answered prior to writing your book. Here are a few things to consider:

What are your goals and objectives?

• Why do you want to publish a book? (What is your Big “Why”?)
   
• Is this a hobby or do you want to earn a living as a writer?
   
• Are you going to print just a few copies for friends and family or do you want worldwide distribution?
   
• Do you want to become a household name?
   
• Who is your target market?
   
• Are you passionate about your writing?

How do you envision your writing career?

• Hobby – A favorite leisure time activity or occupation.
   
• Job – A paid or unpaid position of employment.
   
• Career – A life’s work or journey.

 

Read the rest of the post on Bill Walker‘s site.

This post, from Blue Horizon Communications, originally appeared on that site on 12/8/10.

Brands are those vague but persuasive associations we conjure up whenever we think of any well-known product. Mac computers. TIDE laundry detergent. Nike running shoes. 

Brands are also the far more complex associations that come to mind whenever we think of well-known authors. Often, they’re a flash of images mixed with a dominant feeling, or a scene from a particular book montaged with memory fragments.

Here’s a small demonstration:  Does the name Stephen King conjure something different for you than the name J.K. Rowling?  What about Dan Brown, Elizabeth Gilbert, Jodi Picoult? Or Malcolm Gladwell, Joan Didion, Seth Godin?  What association appears for a second or so when you first see each name? 

People Brands Aren’t Product Brands

Whatever that instant of recognition is composed of, it’s there because that author’s brand put it there. Each association is complex and meaningful —  unlike the association you’d experience for a brand of laundry detergent.

In fact, it’s that much-ado-about-nothingness which characterizes many product brands that makes it easy to imagine authors rejecting the B word as too schlocky, too commercial, too huckster-esque. So let’s substitute the word “story” instead – the “author-identifier” story, if you will.

Brand:  Author-Identifier Story

The author-identifier story (aka brand) refers to the complex messages authors put out into the world about themselves and their books — which we then absorb and retain in a highly individual way.

 

Read the rest of the post on Blue Horizon Communcations.