Know Your Audience by Christine Duncan

I was at the dentist the other day and I noticed that the magazines all seemed to be aimed at women of a certain age. There was More magazine, and AARP and one whose name I don’t remember but seemed to be about cheap places to retire. Now the dentist I was seeing was a young man so that seemed odd. Until I looked around the room, and realized uh, huh. The dentist was aiming his waiting room magazines toward the tastes of his patients.

Writers need to do that too. We should have in mind who our audience is and write to them. If you visualize your sister’s grunge rocker boyfriend as the type who will like the book you’re writing, everything from the language to the world view of the main character is totally different than if you think your audience is say, the investment banker who lives in the mansion at the center of town.

Let me give you an example. I was once in a critique group with a woman who was writing a mystery–a very good mystery. But she couldn’t decide on the sub genre. Some days she thought traditional, some days she thought maybe it was Noire. She just couldn’t decide.

But every time the group met she had more of the novel written. She made choices about the character’s sex life, the language she used and her general thoughts about the world. The character was a modern young women who thought the 3rd date meant sex and who didn’t think the F word was worthy of being called a bomb.

And then the author told the group she had decided that based on the fact that the heroine was an amateur sleuth in a small town, she believed her novel was a cozy. Since she was at least nine-tenths of the way through the first draft, we disabused her of that idea.

Cozy readers tend to be older and more conservative. They don’t want to read about someone’s sex life or sift their way through expletives.

Her reader mattered. Sure she could edit; it would just take some time. But it would also change the heroine–change the book.

I’ve come to believe that from the first word you put on paper, you should know who you are writing for. Who would read this book?
Because writing is a conversation with the reader.

Give a little, get some back

I’m so sorry this is late. My life is in upheaval at the moment (in a good way, mostly) and what with one thing and another, I completely forgot yesterday was Friday (I don’t know what day I thought it was, but by 5pm I’d completely zoned out and stopped relating to days and times anyway)

So…what I wanted to write about was how helping someone else with their writing can kickstart your own writing.

Someone this week gave me some writing and asked my opinion, and asked for any help I thought it needed. It didn’t really need anything, but we had a long discussion about themes and motives and foreshadowing and character development and other literary thing-um-jigs, which was all very interesting – and all totally unconnected with anything I was working on or thinking about.

Then, about ten minutes after that, an idea for a story popped into my head, then another and another. It seems helping someone else with their own work kickstarted my own imagination.

It’s like eating cake. It’s lovely, but then you finish the cake. Then you help someone else bake a cake, and you immediately want to eat more cake.

I’d always really avoided helping other people with their writing, because I thought it would influence mine. As it turns out, it doesn’t influence my writing at all, but it does stimulate it.

I guess that explains why so many writers teach writing classes.

Word for the Year???? by Christine Duncan

Okay, I admit it. I am stuck on this word for the year thing. Here I am a writer and words are suposed to be something I know something about and yet I can’t settle on one that will define how I will try to think about myself and what I am doing this year.

I want something like persevere…but I want it to sound happier. It should be something like “learning to dance in the rain,” but with less words. It should be…upbeat even when beat up.

I can’t figure it out.

But you see, I finally realized, I can’t control what will happen to me this year. I haven’t ever been able to do that which is really sad news to me since I like to be in control. But I want to …react better. Keep going even when it’s hard. Keep smiling even when …never mind you get the picture. Remember that even if I’m not in charge, Someone is, and He’s pretty good at it.

Anyone have any ideas?

Your Hero

. Heroes are difficult.

The problem with heroes (and I’m including female heroes in that) is that next to the mecurical, alchemical, charismatic villan of the piece, they often seem a little bland.

I’ve been reading Edwin Drood. Several men could be seen as the hero of the book, and they’re all very nice. But the character I want more of, the character I’m fascinated by is the villan, Jasper John.

Even Mr Rochester and Heathcliff only really work because, with their dark brooding looks, violent tempers and mysterious pasts, they are pretty much villans in disguise as heroes. (As is Sherlock Holmes, to a certain extent.)

So to make a hero interesting, perhaps he should lean towards the dark side. My favourite graphic novel hero is John Constantine, who maybe on the side of the angels, but only just, and who is so steeped in villany it’s hard to tell the difference between him and the bad guys.

Heroes should have flaws – usually a could-be-fatal flaw. Shakespeare’s best heroes do. Romeo’s overwhelming, blinding passion and hastiness, Hamlet’s prevariaction, Othello’s jealousy. A flaw that could drive them close to the edge, or even over it. A hero who is his own worst enemy is always good. (Although if I have to read about one more alcoholic detective, I may turn to actual crime myself).

And a weakness. Not necessarily a flaw, but a weakness. Poirot’s weakness for fine food, Miss Marple’s weakness for gossip. Not terribly heroic traits, but very human. Even a liking for fine antique furniture or cheap prints of Paris. Something that you or I could have a weakness for too.

And importantly, (I think) a hero should have a sense of humour. Not necessarily laugh-a-minute, roll round on the floor jokes, but humour. They understand a joke, or the ridiculousness of the situation they are in. They sometimes crack a joke themselves – it doesn’t have to be a good one. One of the most appealing things about Thursday Next is her ability to tease (especially people who call to the door claiming that Marlowe was Shakespeare) and generally, have fun.

And they should love. Even the most cold-hearted, cynical, closed-off hero should love with all their heart and soul, at least once. James Bond does it. George Smiley does it. Even Sherlock Holmes loves, in his own way (you just read The Three Garridebs). Love can be their weakness, their fatal flaw, or their salvation – but love like that (especially if it is unrequited, for a while at least) is what makes the reader’s heart beat faster, their breath catch, makes them want to read on just to see if they get the one they love.

In short – heroes should be like us. Not perfect, not untouchable, but a mass of contradictions and doubts and passions and temptations and weaknesses and sudden, unexpected strengths.

Getting Started Again by Christine Duncan

So what do you do to get back to your writing? I’ve read of veteran authors who leave their works in progress at a good point, so they can just jump back in. One writer even recommended leaving it mid-sentence.

Apparently, I am not a good judge for good leaving points, because I have tried that and ended by cursing myself for the rest of the day for not finishing up the scene before because I have no idea what to write next.

I’ve also read the theory where you write for ten minutes (or whatever time you want) on anything. Write your diary, write that you can’t write, write your blog. Whatever–just write and then you will be able to whip out your current manuscript and get to work.

I’m sure it works for someone. Just not me.

What does work for me is tedious, time consuming and reliable as the sun rising and setting. I have to read what I wrote. Edit it. And generally get back into it. Then I can write new material to add to it.

If I just wrote yesterday, this can be a pretty quick process; I will just go back over the previous scene. If I took off a longer period of time (no, I never ever do that, of course not!) it can be a process that takes a couple of days.

I’m there right now, due to a nasty stomach bug last week, the holidays and oh yeah, the Broncos. But I’d love a shortcut if someone has one.

Why

. Why write?

It could be the money. It could be the prestige. It could be the praise that gives you the warm feeling from head to toe, and keeps your head high all day. It could be the intellectual desire to explore characters and situations. It could just be to relieve the boredom. Or you just read a bad book, and know you can do better.

But secretly, in our hearts, we know those all are all other reasons. The real reason is that feeling.

You write and slog and plough your way through a story – then you hit that moment, and suddenly it flows. You write faster, your heart beating, your breath catching in your throat. The story comes alive before your eyes, and you can hardly believe what you’re reading, that this is coming out of your mind, your pen. In that moment of utter perfection, you fly.

Praise is good. It warms you. But that feeling of creating something is different. It’s sharper, darker, deeper. It’s better than drugs, better then exercise, better than anything else. It’s addictive, and wonderful and invigorating and so rare – but it happens.

And that’s the reason why.

Authors, Why Write a Blog? by Christine Duncan

.I think the reason I hear most for writing a blog is about promotion–keeping your book out there somewhere. Whereever out there is. But I have to say that writing this blog for as long as we have now (is it going on 3 years or 4? Must look that up.) has taught me a thing or two that is useful.
For one thing, this blog has taught me a little (much needed) discipline. Inevitably it will be my turn to post again. And I won’t let my fellow bloggers down. This has been a good thing for my other writing too. Some how, this blog gets me jumpstarted enough to think about my novel each week. And then I write more.

This blog has also taught me the importance of titles. Over and over again, the same posts get hits. The search engines lead them here regularly. Are they the best posts on this blog? Eh. Maybe. But the titles are great. How to really really scare someone. Senior sleuths, what makes a really good bad guy.

People want to know and those titles lead them here.

This blog has also taught me just how small the net and the world really is. But that’s a whole ‘nother story.

Thinking of writing a blog? I say go for it. The rewards aren’t monetary but they are good

Explosion…

. So it’s New Year. You have your plan to write, and for once you are in the mood.

You settle down at the desk/table/favoured writing place. You then get up and spend ten minutes adjusting the chair and the cushions – why do people have to fiddle with things?

For some reason, your computer takes an inordinately long time to power up. And when it does, it decides to start in ‘safe mode’ and you have to restart. And then spend ten minutes creating the word processing document of your choice. You manage to get a good ten pages done…until your computer crashes, and wipes out everything, because you forgot to save. You did manage to print it out – but the ink ran out half way down page 3.

Or perhaps you prefer pen and paper. The first pen doesn’t work. The second pen does – for ten minutes. The third pen, despite being lurid green (it’s the only one you could find) works beautifully. Pity you run out of paper just in the middle of that great scene…

You may be prepared. You may have plenty of pen and paper and ink, or a template all ready and set up to go on computer (with auto save). You write merrily away – until the phone rings – over and over again. You can ignore the telemarketer, but what if it’s not? (Note -it always is).

You can probably ignore the neighbour knocking at your front door for a quick coffee. But can you ignore your partner leaning over your shoulder every five minutes and offering ‘helpful’ advice? Or the children who seem to be murdering each other on the stairs?

Ok, you could be prepared. You could have sent the family away, switched off the doorbell, taken the phone off the hook. You’re ready to go. Nothing can stop you. Your writing flows across the page, the ideas sparkle in your mind, the plot unveils invitingly in front of you, your characters come to fascinating, thrilling life…

That is when your boiler explodes. And that actually happened to me.

Word for the Year by Christine Duncan

Like Michelle, I’m giving up on doing any resolutions. Goals yes, one of my goals is to get a new job this year. It’s not a resolution because the job I have is about to end–the construction company I’m working for has almost completed the project and there will be no more job soon. So it is a goal to find something new.
So no resolutions. But I do believe in new beginnings. I believe in goals. I believe in having a touchstone to reach for.
What I am trying to do is find a word for the year. I have been doing this for the past couple of years and found it oddly comforting in times of stressed. For instance, the word for one of the previous years was placed. I knew I was where I was supposed to be. And that was comforting to remember in a way I can’t explain when times got hard.
This year I’m still searching for a word. Endure? Sounds arduous and not what I’d like to year to be. Resolute? Hmm, too much discipline. But what I’m trying to say is that I’m hanging in there. I can do this. And that is too many words.
Anyway, I’m working on it. How about you? What is your word for this year?