Weeding out Ideas by Christine Duncan

I was out in the garden earlier today, weeding out around the roses and planning all the writing stuff I was going to do in my head. I had ideas for my WIP, ideas to talk to my publisher about, stuff I wanted to tell you all about on this blog. Do you think I can remember a single one?
Now it’s hot in the garden right now, but I can’t blame this on heat stroke. I have done this before. Regular readers of this blog will remember me complaining that I will go running and plan a whole chapter in my head and come home to the computer and write…nothing. It’s gone.
I was more than slightly frustrated about this until I remembered a column that Lawrence Block wrote long ago in Writer’s Digest. He talked about ideas that pop up at you in the night (or on the run) and said that some won’t stay with you. That was all right, he claimed, since this is the brain’s way of getting rid of the clunkers. (Yeah, I kind of doubt that Block said clunkers too–but you get the idea. I am quoting this article YEARS after the guy wrote it.)
On thinking this over, I think he’s write, err, right. The thing is when I finally do get to the scenes I’ve mulled over like this, they tend to write themselves. Somewhere in the back of this thing I call a brain, some decisions have been made and the scene is usually a good one–even if I don’t really have a conscious memory of how I planned to write it.
Of course, you have to remember, I’m one of those people who can’t plot either. Maybe it’s just how my brain works. How about you?

Blurb

. The blurb, as I’m sure you know, is the paragraph or two written on the book jacket. It’s supposed to make you want to open that book, read on, and then buy it. Too often, I find, it does the opposite. And, as a writer, your blurb is one of your most important marketing tools, so it’s important to get it right.

Some blurbs – the most annoying kind – choose not to tell you anything about the book at all. (You often find this on non-genre novels aiming for prestigious literary prizes, as if having to actually advertise a book is beneath them). Instead, there is a long list of flattering quotes by the author’s friends. Personally, this puts me right off a book. I really don’t care if an author’s second best friend think he/she is the most important voice to come out of Glasgow this century – I just want to know what the book is about.

But then some blurbs do the almost opposite – and you often find this on crime/action novels. The blurb gives away almost the entire plot – including that at least one major plot twist. If you read the novel, most of the sense of mystery is gone – because you already read the revelation on the back of the book.

Or a blurb makes a novel sound completely different to what is actually is – overly highlighting the romance aspect of a crime novel, and making it sound like a romance for example (I’ve missed so many good books like this, until someone recommended them to me).

So what’s a good blurb? Well, my copy of Angels and Demons has a very good one.

1)It straight away mentions the two main locations – Cern Institute and the Vatican. These locations are a major selling point of the book, and two such diverse locations side by side in the same book sparks interest straight away. (It’s not the locations that’s important, it’s what they represent about the novel – a struggle between church and science)
2)It mentions symbols, Catholic Church and Illuminati. That hooks the conspiracy theorists and secret society buffs. Those, with the mention of the Cern Institute, hints that the reader is clever enough to know what these are – it’s a subtle compliment.
3)It mentions Robert Langdon – and now they’ve got the Da Vinci code fans (although this was written before the Da Vinci code, most Robert Langdon fans read that first, after the movie)
4)It calls the plot ‘a race against time’ – saying what kind of novel it is, without giving away too much of the plot.
5)It hints at plot twists and although it gives one away, it’s not a very important one, and it’s a fairly obvious one,and it hints at many many more to come.
6)It’s only got two reviews – one from a paper, and one from Amazon, which means it was probably written not by a professional reviewer but a normal reader.

So there you go – the perfect blurb. It hints and teases, it compliments the reader, it uses reviews by people unknown to the author, it uses certain key words to hook it’s perfect audience. (That last technique should be used carefully. Use the wrong key word and you can lose readers. Personally, the minute I read the words ‘heart-warming’ in a blurb, I put the book down and back away as far as I can). And it works. Despite heartily disliking all other Dan Brown books, that blurb caught me. (And it turns out, I liked this book).

So, I’d recommend getting a good blurb writer. Make sure they’ve actually read the book, so they know what they’re talking about, and test it before you let it go on the book – take it to friends and ask ‘What kind of book do you think this describes?’ Personally, I think it’s your most important selling tool. Advertise as much as you like – what gets a book bought is the blurb and the first page.

Talk about the weather

Destiny Sets - read the first chapter free online

My mother always told me don’t talk about religion or politics. You’ll only get into arguments. So what about when you are writing? Should you mention them then?

I feel a hearty Yes coming on.

After all, you are not supposed to talk about those things because they lead to arguments. People feel strongly about them. If you leave them out of your books, you leave a big hole in your characters.

So where do you draw the line between well rounded character and someone that is just a vehicle for your own beliefs?

The question holds the answer. Is this really the character speaking? Is that a legitimate point of view for them to have, and would they really say that out loud?

One of my favourite authors is John Ringo. His characters are often quite pronounced in their beliefs. Occasionally he can stray into the realms of proselytising  but it’s rare. (Or maybe it’s only when I disagree with him that I notice it.) Most of the times, it rings very true for the character, even if they are complete blow hards. And the characters around them treat them accordingly.

That is the other litmus test for me. Do the people around the character react in a realistic way? When proofing, I often try to put the other character’s hat on and think about their reaction while this is happening. It can drive your editor mad when your point of view shifts mid stream and you didn’t notice, but it really does make for a more realistic flow to the action.

So what do you think? Should we talk politics or the weather?

What Keeps You Reading–Or Makes You Put a Book Down by Christine Duncan

Michelle’s post about reading the other week got me thinking. I tend to put books down for all sorts of reasons–sometimes there is nothing wrong with the darn thing at all–I’m just in the mood for something else.
Have you ever felt that way? This week with all of the news about the Iranian election and the test nukes from North Korea, I can’t read what I think of as simple or sweet books. There has to be a complexity of character or plot to capture me right now. Otherwise, I’m drifting into other thoughts.
But other times, when life is overwhelming, it is the simple, the sweet, and the cozy that draws me.
I guess even though I always say that I’ll read anything, I’m a picky reader.
As a rule, I don’t read hobby mysteries, even when I like the hobby. I don’t usually read horror because the images stay in my mind. I’m not the type to read bestsellers just because they’re bestsellers either–a book has to be about something I’m interested in. But I will sometimes read best sellers to see why others are enthralled. I tore apart a couple of Dan Brown’s books just to see what the deal was. I concluded that his style read so quickly because he tended to keep it short. Short chapters, short paragraphs. There was always something going on–always more excitement but it was terseness that kept the tension. Or so I decided.
Lately I’ve put books down for too much terseness. There seems to be a trend where authors skip on description so that I can’t really see what is going on. It made me drop one book. She described a car as a “big ass pimp mobile.” And I couldn’t see the darn car at all–thus making some of the action obscure.
Conversely, another author who went on and on about every leaf in a field (or so it seemed) lost my interest. There can be too much.
As a writer, though this might seem discouraging, I think the opposite is true. Someone not being interested in your book is not a personal rejection. It’s not really a rejection at all. Sometimes, we crave ice cream, sometimes we want roast beef. What do you think?

A Scary Task

“Chelle, could not put it down. Final Sin! Your mind scares me a bit.” A friend recently sent me these comments after reading my suspense thriller novel Final Sin. “I really loved it. Fast, easy reading, page turner, passionate, scary and a bit creepy.”
So how did this romantic suspense author whose earlier books dwell on passion make this crossing to a dark, scary and creepy side? Yes, there is a love story in Final Sin but it is a mere subplot to the story and designed to add tension. There’s some humor and some drama. There are real life situations as fellow paramedics Julie and Matt work to save lives. There’s frustration as Jake must temper his law enforcement prowess with old fashioned and self serving politics.
Then there is the psychotic serial killer whose rationale is anything but rational and whose methods are brutal, sadistic and terrifying. It’s not really the stuff I think about all day long. Honest. So how did my mind get so scary? To be truthful, it scares even me.
I came up with a story about two public servants who meet in an unlikely place, get attracted to each other and then get torn apart when the seamier side of life lands right on them. I created my characters and just like I always do, I built histories for each – I put an embittered divorced man into a job which he eats, sleeps and breathes as a deputy sheriff – I created a young woman whose idealism made her want to help everyone and whose rebelliousness made her free spirited and a little too trusting.
Other characters were added like Matt, Julie’s paramedic partner who doesn’t hide his dislike of Jake, Gregg, Jake’s colleague and one-time brother-in-law, and Brian, Jake’s troubled teen-age son who is angry at his father for abandoning him.
Then I did research – oh that research! As a real life NYS EMT, I admit I already had some knowledge of emergency medical response although I questioned others more experienced than me for finer details. I watched videotaped autopsies and learned about crime scene investigations. And I read about serial killers and common traits.
Lastly I researched history and learned about barbaric punishments and tortures from both the Crusades and early Victorian times. It scared me – there were nights I couldn’t go to sleep because of the inhumane and horrifying things I learned and the realization that humans did these things to other humans. Then I wrote these scary things into the book. I wanted my words to be as real as possible.
And I am proud to know that I was able to convey so much horror while I kept my readers turning pages. I wrote a story that, unlike the requisite happy-ever-after of the romance genre wasn’t necessarily going to have a happy ending. I wanted to make people shudder and look over their shoulders, but it was scary even to me. One of the things I did learn was that I would not want to be surrounded endlessly with the knowledge of the research I did.
It was very scary.
~~~~~~~~
Chelle Cordero is the author of romantic suspense novels Bartlett’s Rule, Forgotten, Within the Law and Courage of the Heart as well as the thriller Final Sin. You can learn more about Ms. Cordero at http://chellecordero.com.

Escape

. I’ve had an awful week. Okay, compared to some it was a breeze, but to me, it was terrible. And my reaction was, as usual, just to disappear into a world inside my head whenever I had a spare moment.

But this time it wasn’t someone else’s world. This time, I chose the worlds I’ve created.

First I tried my ghost stories. But they’re short stories, so I came back much too soon. I tried the world of my Victorian detective – but that’s still being created. So I disappeared into the first world I ever made out of my own head – a fantasy land. A world of dark and light, and dragons and goblins, and heroes and heroines and villains.

I’ve been writing these stories, on and off, for over ten years now, so in my head, the world is pretty much fully created. I close my eyes, and I can see the hills beyond the plains, the great rift, the dark and lonely woods. And I can be whoever I want to be – the daring and doomed hero, the lost yet strong heroine, the other reluctant, dark hero, even the insane villain. I dived into my world, and had adventures.

It sounds insane, I know to disappear into my head this way. But be honest, isn’t this what every writer does? How could we write truthfully if we haven’t lived what we write, even if it is only as a daydream?

I came out of it with a few new stories, a few new insights, a few new neat turn of phrases. But what’s really important is that I went in tired and distressed and lonely, and came out stronger and happier.

And that’s what’s really necessary to me as a writer. Getting published, getting paid, good reviews – they are important. But what’s necessary is the world I create in my head, with my words.

The millionth word

Well, according to the Global Language Monitor , English now has over a million words. Others are saying that it is more, some less, but one thing we all have to admit, the English language is a living, breathing thing. Like most living things, it is changing every day. Ever since the Bard started coining new words to meet the requirements of his plays, writers have been adding new words into their books.

More power to them. As a Sci fi writer, I made up some words to show my characters were from a different place. I even did up a glossary in my fact file so I wouldn’t forget how I spelled them last time. Even in main stream writing though, new words are born every day. Take the term metrosexual - Mark Simpson created it when writing an article. He needed a quick way to describe a straight guy that dresses like a gay. You have to admit, it sounds a lot better and it invokes a great image. And that is the point. Language is there to help us convey our thoughts to someone else. So long as it is doing that, I feel it is valid. New words like this even have a name neologisms ( that was my new word for the day).

So will we ever see a novel written in SMS speak? y not, info is convyed u get point & it shld b OK. In fact it was a consistent rumour that even if you rerragne ltters but the frist letetr and the lsat are in the rihgt sopt, you can stlil raed it.  Now I think that is going a little far, but the idea that we should let the words flow, feel free to create and transform language and concentrate on painting the scenes we are portraying as fully as possible.

http://the-writing-bug.blogspot.com/2009/04/know-rulesthen-know-when-to-break-them.html seems to say it all for me. Especially as she says it is OK to write vampire stories. Whew, that’s OK then, I don’t have to take my series off the shelves.

Why I return to a blog

I already blogged this week on the other blog I’m on about why I go back to certain blogs over and over again. But you know, our discussion here about the difference between amateurs and professional writers got me going again. I’ve spent a lot of time on other people’s blogs this past couple of months as part of this blog tour and I’ve had a heck of a lot of time to figure out why I would return to one or the other. I’m going to write a post here pretty soon about the blogs I love because there are a bunch of them.
But it is the sense of community that comes from the back and forth discussion like the one we had this week that is the real reason I return to blogs. Whether it’s a discussion on sex scenes and whether we do them or not or just what it is that sets apart the real writer from the ones who aren’t, I learn from all of you. I like you guys. I like “talking” to you. And it’s fun to agree to disagree sometimes. Just thought I’d tell you that.

Why it’s ok to e-publish by Yvonne Eve Walus

http://yewalus.kiwiwebhost.net.nz/

 100 years ago, hardback was all the rage and paperbacks did not command respect. The first reputable publisher to produce paperbacks was Penguin (1935). One of its titles included “The Mysterious Affair at Styles” by Agatha Christie.

            In a neat parallel, Stephen King wrote a book exclusively for Kindle earlier this year.

            When e-books first appeared, many were of a lesser quality than paper books, sometimes having gone into the marketplace with only the most cursory of edits, if that. For some reason, “cheap and easy” meant “inferior” back then.

            All that has changed. At Red Rose Publishing (an e-publisher with some books POD), for example, the process is highly professional, with copy editing as well as line editing.

Several recent paper bestsellers could have done with that. Mary Higgins Clark’s books, for example, are full of unintended echo-words and fact repetitions, and I’ve caught at least two dangling participles, not to mention long passages of “walking the dog”.

What determines the quality nowadays, is not the medium (e or paper). It’s the publisher’s track record.

 Obvious Benefits for E-book Writers

• There is a demand for e-books.
• Many publishers will accept shorter works of fiction, like 10,000 words or even 2,000 words.
• Response time is on average 3 months from submission to contract, and another 6 to release.
• Edits happen online.
• Although there is often no advance, the royalties are in the order of 50%.
• No messy bookstore return policies. Once an e-book is sold, it’s sold.
• No pulping, “out of print” or “out of stock” problems.
• And – best of all for those of us who still need to touch our books – many e-publishers release their bestselling e-books in print.

 

Yvonne Eve Walus writes bestselling romances as Eve Summers for Red Rose Publishing. She also writes paper books. Please visit her on http://yewalus.kiwiwebhost.net.nz/.

Back to Basics

. Last weekend I went to the Dickens festival in Rochester, Kent. Dickens lived there for a while, and drew a lot of inspiration from the place – Resurrection House is Satis House, and a lot of Great Expectations is set there. Being a Dickens fanatic (as you may have guessed), I had to go.

It was brilliant. Fantastic to see a whole weekend devoted to honouring a writer. There was a fair, people dressed up in Dickensian costume, events, the lot. And there was a parade – and what was surprising about that is how many of Dickens characters, despite being described only in words, are instantly recognisable. Sikes, Quilp, Fagin, Mr Pickwick – all straight off the page, and the best iss Havisham I’ve seen since Martita Hunt (she played Miss Havisham in David Lean’s brilliant adaptation of Great Expectations). It’s good to know that long, long after a writer is gone, his (or hers – over here in England we worship Austen and the Brontes and Agatha Christie as much as Dickens, Hardy and Shakespeare) words and ideas live on, and are celebrated and read as much as the day they were written.

Anyway, at the festival was a Tudor area (I’m not sure why….) with a knight, and a cook, and a musician (maybe it was a Chaucer thing…) and an itinerant storyteller. These blokes would wander the country, telling stories in pubs and greens and halls, in return for his bread and board. They bought the stories directly to the masses. This storyteller told the kids a story of how the rabbit got his short tail, and long ears, with no special effects, or breaks every five minutes, and yet the kids were spellbound.

Over the past couple of centuries, that direct connection between storytellers and story listener has sort of drifted away. A whole host of editors and publishers and publicists and critics – all usually demanding changes – have come between the first words in a writers head and the person they are telling the story to.

But the internet has brought that back to us. No longer do we have to have our work filtered through other people. We don’t even have to have it beta read if we don’t want to. We think our stories, write them down, and in seconds, the very words we thought are being read. We’ve gone back to telling stories directly to the masses. Back to the story in your head, the words in your voice, and their mind. Back to basics.

Of course, it’s unpaid. But if you’ve ever enjoyed one of my stories, and we happen to meet at a Stargate con, or at a bar, or just in a street, I’d be happy to share a drink with you. Mine’s a rum and coke.