Question:
Why don't you blog every week like you promised?!
Answer:
I haven't been very active lately. It is true.
Life happened. I was getting THINGS done.
What kinds of things? I got a day job. I wrote a new short story of 5k words and am working on more.
So... why aren't you blogging as often as you said you would?
1. (and I think this is the most important) I don't like it. I've tried blogging and it simply didn't work for me. I'd rather say nothing than say a lot of bullcock or force myself to squeeze out some advice about craft that someone else could explain much better (someone who's written a craft book on it for example. I've read a lot of them and can recommend plenty. I feel there's enough material out there already and they've explained it much better than I have the patience for!) Plus... I don't want to bore anyone with stuff I don't really care to blog about. I will however blog when there's a topic I want to talk about and that I feel is important.
2. I'm busy
I'm writing new things all the time.
I don't get time to blog even if I wanted to. I've recently taken a day job and it's keeping me busy 9 hours of the day +1 for the commute. There's no time to blog if I'm also trying to write stories. And I have to set priorities.
I think these are the two most important points and while this post isn't really an apology (though it does suck I have so little time to talk to you guys!) it should explain what's been going on! I hope you're not too disappointed. And hey, here's a little something-bonus! I've read enough books on writing craft to be able to recommend some! So if you have any question, about my stories, craft, et al, or just want a recommendation on which book/craft book to read next, drop me a line, and I'll respond to your email within a few hours! (Days if I'm on holiday... but even then it should be quick.)
I hope you're having a good week... and if you haven't yet... check out the new, awesome cover of my short story "The Hungry Worlds"! You can find the story (plus cover) HERE! Oh and... as always, write a comment if you have something to say!
Monday, September 12, 2016
Sunday, September 11, 2016
Here's a great update!
Hi guys
I know it's been a while, and this post will be short. I'm just happy to tell you I've managed to get a cover for one short story (so far) and this is "The Hungry Worlds" one of my more popular ones. I hope you like the cover as much as I do! And the story of course! ;)
Here's the cover... and a link to the amazons! (It might still take a while until it's visible... check back every so often!)
You know what's also cool? There'll be two more short stories out shortly (Ho ho! The twistedness of this sentence) if I can drag myself away from playing The Witcher! More about those two shorts in a bit. :D
You haven't read "The Hungry Worlds" yet? You should. It's gotten the best feedback out of all my stories so far. (Plus, you can read it on KDP, which is also cool.)
I hope you're having a good week and such. I'm quite busy at the moment (two more short stories in the works...) but I'll be posting some more if there's time. Then again... writing stories has to be my priority over writing blog posts. :)
Cheers
I know it's been a while, and this post will be short. I'm just happy to tell you I've managed to get a cover for one short story (so far) and this is "The Hungry Worlds" one of my more popular ones. I hope you like the cover as much as I do! And the story of course! ;)
Here's the cover... and a link to the amazons! (It might still take a while until it's visible... check back every so often!)
You know what's also cool? There'll be two more short stories out shortly (Ho ho! The twistedness of this sentence) if I can drag myself away from playing The Witcher! More about those two shorts in a bit. :D
You haven't read "The Hungry Worlds" yet? You should. It's gotten the best feedback out of all my stories so far. (Plus, you can read it on KDP, which is also cool.)
I hope you're having a good week and such. I'm quite busy at the moment (two more short stories in the works...) but I'll be posting some more if there's time. Then again... writing stories has to be my priority over writing blog posts. :)
Cheers
Wednesday, August 17, 2016
(Bonus-ish post!) Novels VS Short Stories
Hello there!
This week's (second! Bonus-ish?) post will be about short stories and their advantage over novels/why they're good writing practice.
Here we go!
I recently planned an epic fantasy story/novel. It was good enough in the planning: cool characters, an intricate plot, a cool setting somewhere between fantasy and sci-fi... etc. But when it came to writing it I got to 40k words... and then realized it didn't work. 9/10 of the characters were zzzZzZz and the plot was tedious in itself. I deleted a lot of words (~34k)... and turned it into a short story instead. It works much better now though it still isn't done yet. The point is: the idea I was trying to convey didn't need three main characters and 5 supporting characters each. It didn't need three main plot threads (which were extremely annoying and tedious to come up with and way too intricate to ever make sense) and a million locations all over the map.
This leads me to my next point:
Do you know the main reason why short stories are so beautiful? (which is also why most people - especially authors - don't take them as seriously?)
* they're short.
This means you can focus on one (or max two) ideas to develop and you don't have to derp around endlessly trying to decide what the best scene for every of your plot thread (say: redemption or revenge or... any of these pesky 'themes' you hear so much about) would be. You can focus on one issue...
*and in many ways this is harder.
Writing good short stories is really hard. I'll give you my own as an example. I write about a short story a week... but not all of them are good and I don't have the patience to edit most of them. This means they're kind of... forgotten easily. The real good ones are usually shorts from one or other 'big project' I'm working on.
So why are short stories so hard?
a) they're short (yes. I've said this already. Let's go back to that first * for a bit.)
*You don't have as much space to develop an idea.
*You don't have any second chances to re-introduce characters and their motivations if they don't entirely work in the first scene scene. The introduction must be done neatly and can't contradict itself as much as a novel protagonist's personality and goals might.
*You have to be precise - very precise... and did I mention coherent? Everything you say and everything cool detail of worldbuilding or character-building or... otherwise needs to be relevant to the story.
b) they're not taken as seriously as longer works -such as novels (but this is only relevant if you care about making money/publishing them)
Why are they not taken as seriously as novels? I think - and this is purely my opinion without much research behind it - this is because they are HARD. They are hard to write and they're (often) difficult to understand (though if the author has ANY idea at all what they're doing they should be clearer than a novel.). They're hard to write because they're so condensed. There's no space to make a mistake as in a 90k novel. They're a lot like film scripts in that way.
Then why are short stories so great?
*they force you to focus
*they're great practice (whether it's about character development, setting, motivation, or goals in general). They're the singlemost great medium in which you can really learn how to write a great book and to make your writing excellent. They force you to sharpen your prose and your style and (most importantly) your thoughts. You can't waste a single word when you're writing a short story. And you'll learn what every scene's purpose is in detail.
*they're easy and quick to read whenever (whether you're traveling to work or getting bored of playing video games...)
*they contain a single important thought that can be absorbed in a very short time and (if the story is well-written) will subconsciously tell you something about humanity (pesky theme cropping up yet again!) or some other issue (also theme) that you didn't know before.
*they're perfect if you don't have a lot of time to read (which makes them highly accessible to many many people... if only they gave it a chance)
Does this make sense? I hope you know more about why short stories are so great now!
However... there is a caveat. I have to give you a little warning about short stories: while they're great to learn the craft (you can learn ANY aspect through writing short stories... except perhaps how to write long projects) they're not as desirable as novels. This has many reasons (which are listed on many other websites) and I'm not going to go into it. Bottom line? Novels are easier to sell than short stories if you're in it for the money/the publishability of your projects.
I hope this helped and you learned something from this post! Have a relaxing second half of the week!
J.M.
This week's (second! Bonus-ish?) post will be about short stories and their advantage over novels/why they're good writing practice.
Here we go!
I recently planned an epic fantasy story/novel. It was good enough in the planning: cool characters, an intricate plot, a cool setting somewhere between fantasy and sci-fi... etc. But when it came to writing it I got to 40k words... and then realized it didn't work. 9/10 of the characters were zzzZzZz and the plot was tedious in itself. I deleted a lot of words (~34k)... and turned it into a short story instead. It works much better now though it still isn't done yet. The point is: the idea I was trying to convey didn't need three main characters and 5 supporting characters each. It didn't need three main plot threads (which were extremely annoying and tedious to come up with and way too intricate to ever make sense) and a million locations all over the map.
This leads me to my next point:
Do you know the main reason why short stories are so beautiful? (which is also why most people - especially authors - don't take them as seriously?)
* they're short.
This means you can focus on one (or max two) ideas to develop and you don't have to derp around endlessly trying to decide what the best scene for every of your plot thread (say: redemption or revenge or... any of these pesky 'themes' you hear so much about) would be. You can focus on one issue...
*and in many ways this is harder.
Writing good short stories is really hard. I'll give you my own as an example. I write about a short story a week... but not all of them are good and I don't have the patience to edit most of them. This means they're kind of... forgotten easily. The real good ones are usually shorts from one or other 'big project' I'm working on.
So why are short stories so hard?
a) they're short (yes. I've said this already. Let's go back to that first * for a bit.)
*You don't have as much space to develop an idea.
*You don't have any second chances to re-introduce characters and their motivations if they don't entirely work in the first scene scene. The introduction must be done neatly and can't contradict itself as much as a novel protagonist's personality and goals might.
*You have to be precise - very precise... and did I mention coherent? Everything you say and everything cool detail of worldbuilding or character-building or... otherwise needs to be relevant to the story.
b) they're not taken as seriously as longer works -such as novels (but this is only relevant if you care about making money/publishing them)
Why are they not taken as seriously as novels? I think - and this is purely my opinion without much research behind it - this is because they are HARD. They are hard to write and they're (often) difficult to understand (though if the author has ANY idea at all what they're doing they should be clearer than a novel.). They're hard to write because they're so condensed. There's no space to make a mistake as in a 90k novel. They're a lot like film scripts in that way.
Then why are short stories so great?
*they force you to focus
*they're great practice (whether it's about character development, setting, motivation, or goals in general). They're the singlemost great medium in which you can really learn how to write a great book and to make your writing excellent. They force you to sharpen your prose and your style and (most importantly) your thoughts. You can't waste a single word when you're writing a short story. And you'll learn what every scene's purpose is in detail.
*they're easy and quick to read whenever (whether you're traveling to work or getting bored of playing video games...)
*they contain a single important thought that can be absorbed in a very short time and (if the story is well-written) will subconsciously tell you something about humanity (pesky theme cropping up yet again!) or some other issue (also theme) that you didn't know before.
*they're perfect if you don't have a lot of time to read (which makes them highly accessible to many many people... if only they gave it a chance)
Does this make sense? I hope you know more about why short stories are so great now!
However... there is a caveat. I have to give you a little warning about short stories: while they're great to learn the craft (you can learn ANY aspect through writing short stories... except perhaps how to write long projects) they're not as desirable as novels. This has many reasons (which are listed on many other websites) and I'm not going to go into it. Bottom line? Novels are easier to sell than short stories if you're in it for the money/the publishability of your projects.
I hope this helped and you learned something from this post! Have a relaxing second half of the week!
J.M.
Sunday, August 14, 2016
Milk it for all it's worth (or: The Folly of Sequels)
Ahoi
1st: I'll likely soon change blogging day to the weekend. There's been developments in my life that might make it difficult to post reliably every Wednesday.
To the post. It'll deal with the necessity and craft-problems of sequels... and also contain a lot of gushing about Stranger Things and Dragonflight (Pern 1 by Anne McCaffrey).
It'll contain major spoilers for:
Stranger Things
Dragonflight (Pern 1)
I've recently finished watching Stranger Things (I know, I know, I'm late to the party). I'm not sure if I want a sequel to it.
Why?
Stranger Things was technically (story-telling technically) brilliant - a self-contained story clearly and concisely written. There are no loose ends (except the slug at the end and where El went with the Demogorgon). Everything is explained. Nothing is wasted. How Will communicates via the lights... How the gate works and why it is there (this was a great moment! I was thinking it wouldn't be explained... and that it just popped up and El can interact with it because... plot!). Even the cliff Hopper warns his colleagues off in one of the first few episodes becomes relevant later on when Troy and whatshisname try to get Mike to jump off of it and El saves him. The radios the kids use, likewise, turns out to be IMPORTANT when Lucas needs to warn Mike et al that the Water and Light maintenance guys are actually bad. In this series, nothing is wasted. Truly, nothing.
It's so tight... so concise... it's brilliant. And that makes me wary of the sequel. How will they top such a great tight plot? What do they intend to do? Ok... there are some loose ends, such as, why the hell Nancy would celebrate Christmas with Steve?! Why did Hopper get into the CIA/FBI (whatever it is) car? What was it he actually promised White-haired-creeper dude whose name I don't remember (Papa)? And why the hell did the writers have to break Mike's heart? Oh and then the slug-thing Will spits out? I can live with all of these things unanswered (except perhaps the Mike-thing because it was gut-wrenching... closely followed by the Nancy-problem of Nancy's insanity! It would be easier to live with had she sworn off both boys and taken some time to develop herself... instead she goes right back to the dude the series's established she doesn't love? What?).
Then there's the fact that sequels rarely work. Take a look at (I don't even want to name it) the Cursed Child. I haven't seen it but I've read the wikipedia page... and it tells me: nor do I want to. In fact, it doesn't just tell me, it yells at me not to do this to myself. I've never read this much bull in my whole life. It doesn't even feel like a real part of the franchise... because come on, it breaks all the rules ever made in the books.
Take a look at the Pern series too. I loved the first book (Dragonflight). It was great. It was exactly how fantasy should be. There were two great main characters, there was a world-wide problem, there were people with their own interests in mind (the Lord Holders) who weren't 'the dark overlord'. The characters acted true to themselves all the time... and in the end audacity won against the terrible non-human threat (who also has a reason to exist, and that's survival, which is probably the most pressing issue to any non-sentient organism). This was brilliant! I loved it! I want to read it again and read it to everyone at home.
Then comes the 'sequel'. I'm ok. It's not terrible... but it doesn't quite hold my attention as much as Dragonflight. Do you know why? Dragonflight was entirely self-contained (as Stranger Things season one would be without the stupid slug Will spits out as a 'teaser'). It solved a world-wide problem with a great climax. Then suddenly... in the second book we're taken back to mundane concerns of the Lord Holders and some bla bla about Oldtimers not being happy and Benden Weyr being difficult and some girl I don't care about being all angsty about some guy I don't care about. There's no world-wide stakes and what little stakes there are should be easy for the main characters to deal with after what they've gone through in Dragonflight. Because come on, you can time travel 400 years into the past... but when there's trouble with Lords Holders (who have no pressure on you at all except your 'honor') they can't decide what to do? What? I then read Dragonsong and Dragonsinger... which were more enjoyable since new characters and it didn't pretend to be a part of the world-shattering 'main series' which goes from bad to worst in The White Dragon (which is a sulky teenage boy turning into a man, the classical coming of age story).
I'm equally as wary about what might happen to Stranger Things... although they have one advantage. They started with a 'minor problem' (Will's disappearance) and it was brilliant. They can build up on this (and I have more faith in the Duffer Brothers et al to manage it than most other writers/producers). They can make the problem more societal the next time (say the whole town of Hawkins is threatened to be sucked into the Upside Down... or the world will end if they can't close/stabilize the portal). This is something they can build up upon. Dragonflight was not. Too many other stories were not. You've already saved the world. What else could be pressing enough/difficult enough to justify the characters' incapability of handling it?
I can guess why there'd be a sequel. Stranger Things had about 8.6 million viewers in the first two weeks (translation: money! Money! Spend all your money!). They'd want to milk this - right? Just like every other writer (hello! I'm talking about most long-running series here) try to squeeze out every last drop of what used to be a perfectly fine one-series/one-movie plot... and in the end destroy it. I'm not saying I'm against the sequel/or against sequels in general (though once the main story is done it SHOULD end). I'm more saying: it's difficult to pull off. Very difficult.
What do you think? Are sequels necessary? Do you actually like them? Leave a comment!
J.M.
1st: I'll likely soon change blogging day to the weekend. There's been developments in my life that might make it difficult to post reliably every Wednesday.
To the post. It'll deal with the necessity and craft-problems of sequels... and also contain a lot of gushing about Stranger Things and Dragonflight (Pern 1 by Anne McCaffrey).
It'll contain major spoilers for:
Stranger Things
Dragonflight (Pern 1)
I've recently finished watching Stranger Things (I know, I know, I'm late to the party). I'm not sure if I want a sequel to it.
Why?
Stranger Things was technically (story-telling technically) brilliant - a self-contained story clearly and concisely written. There are no loose ends (except the slug at the end and where El went with the Demogorgon). Everything is explained. Nothing is wasted. How Will communicates via the lights... How the gate works and why it is there (this was a great moment! I was thinking it wouldn't be explained... and that it just popped up and El can interact with it because... plot!). Even the cliff Hopper warns his colleagues off in one of the first few episodes becomes relevant later on when Troy and whatshisname try to get Mike to jump off of it and El saves him. The radios the kids use, likewise, turns out to be IMPORTANT when Lucas needs to warn Mike et al that the Water and Light maintenance guys are actually bad. In this series, nothing is wasted. Truly, nothing.
It's so tight... so concise... it's brilliant. And that makes me wary of the sequel. How will they top such a great tight plot? What do they intend to do? Ok... there are some loose ends, such as, why the hell Nancy would celebrate Christmas with Steve?! Why did Hopper get into the CIA/FBI (whatever it is) car? What was it he actually promised White-haired-creeper dude whose name I don't remember (Papa)? And why the hell did the writers have to break Mike's heart? Oh and then the slug-thing Will spits out? I can live with all of these things unanswered (except perhaps the Mike-thing because it was gut-wrenching... closely followed by the Nancy-problem of Nancy's insanity! It would be easier to live with had she sworn off both boys and taken some time to develop herself... instead she goes right back to the dude the series's established she doesn't love? What?).
Then there's the fact that sequels rarely work. Take a look at (I don't even want to name it) the Cursed Child. I haven't seen it but I've read the wikipedia page... and it tells me: nor do I want to. In fact, it doesn't just tell me, it yells at me not to do this to myself. I've never read this much bull in my whole life. It doesn't even feel like a real part of the franchise... because come on, it breaks all the rules ever made in the books.
Take a look at the Pern series too. I loved the first book (Dragonflight). It was great. It was exactly how fantasy should be. There were two great main characters, there was a world-wide problem, there were people with their own interests in mind (the Lord Holders) who weren't 'the dark overlord'. The characters acted true to themselves all the time... and in the end audacity won against the terrible non-human threat (who also has a reason to exist, and that's survival, which is probably the most pressing issue to any non-sentient organism). This was brilliant! I loved it! I want to read it again and read it to everyone at home.
Then comes the 'sequel'. I'm ok. It's not terrible... but it doesn't quite hold my attention as much as Dragonflight. Do you know why? Dragonflight was entirely self-contained (as Stranger Things season one would be without the stupid slug Will spits out as a 'teaser'). It solved a world-wide problem with a great climax. Then suddenly... in the second book we're taken back to mundane concerns of the Lord Holders and some bla bla about Oldtimers not being happy and Benden Weyr being difficult and some girl I don't care about being all angsty about some guy I don't care about. There's no world-wide stakes and what little stakes there are should be easy for the main characters to deal with after what they've gone through in Dragonflight. Because come on, you can time travel 400 years into the past... but when there's trouble with Lords Holders (who have no pressure on you at all except your 'honor') they can't decide what to do? What? I then read Dragonsong and Dragonsinger... which were more enjoyable since new characters and it didn't pretend to be a part of the world-shattering 'main series' which goes from bad to worst in The White Dragon (which is a sulky teenage boy turning into a man, the classical coming of age story).
I'm equally as wary about what might happen to Stranger Things... although they have one advantage. They started with a 'minor problem' (Will's disappearance) and it was brilliant. They can build up on this (and I have more faith in the Duffer Brothers et al to manage it than most other writers/producers). They can make the problem more societal the next time (say the whole town of Hawkins is threatened to be sucked into the Upside Down... or the world will end if they can't close/stabilize the portal). This is something they can build up upon. Dragonflight was not. Too many other stories were not. You've already saved the world. What else could be pressing enough/difficult enough to justify the characters' incapability of handling it?
I can guess why there'd be a sequel. Stranger Things had about 8.6 million viewers in the first two weeks (translation: money! Money! Spend all your money!). They'd want to milk this - right? Just like every other writer (hello! I'm talking about most long-running series here) try to squeeze out every last drop of what used to be a perfectly fine one-series/one-movie plot... and in the end destroy it. I'm not saying I'm against the sequel/or against sequels in general (though once the main story is done it SHOULD end). I'm more saying: it's difficult to pull off. Very difficult.
What do you think? Are sequels necessary? Do you actually like them? Leave a comment!
J.M.
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Why editing is superior to writing (highly subjective of course)
Hi people (and otherwise!)
I want to explain why editing is so much better than writing itself. (Warning: this might not be as useful to plotters, but it certainly is to pantsers who don't have much patience to think every plot detail through.)
What????!?!?!!? will be the reaction of most of the people reading this. I don't blame you. But consider this:
1. you write... a first draft. It goes all right (at least if you're a pantser, you're normally not as concerned with what-on-earth is going on in your ms. At first.) You have a finished product, and if it's anything like mine, then it'll be the bare bones of the actual book. It'll be so minimalistic no one else would ever want to read it. The characters are great, they're actually life-like, and each has their own personality, but their emotions, and the reasons they do things (which they do!) might be lacking clarity. The plot, too, could be refined, just so on page one-hundred Max isn't a guy, when he was a girl before. (Unless that's the sort of story you're writing!)
Congratulations! You now have a skeleton (in your drawer!). It might have 60-100k words (or a looot more) and you can put it aside happily.
It's time to wait.
Wait...
Wait...
Ok. Let's pretend a month has passed. (A month is a good time to get over your initial furious writing draft and start to see things more objectively.)
This is when editing comes around.
What's next?
If you're at all sensitive to story structure/characters/plot you can now tell what the manuscript needs. I don't normally read through any of my drafts in detail. I just skim over them and usually edit as I go. This works for me. It might not work for you.
There might be a lot of things to do... such as:
reordering scenes
writing more scenes you forgot/didn't know at the time but which need to be in the manuscript
clarify text
tighten prose (or on the opposite side/the thing I have to do often: add meat to the bones)
strengthen your rambled adjectives into some more descriptive nouns
cut characters that serve no purpose
cut scenes that serve no purpose
cut mercilessly
add description of places/emotions (or perhaps cut them if they're too much or too fluffy!)
In short: you finally get to edit. You have the bones of a story you find brilliant, and now you have to flesh them out, so other people will be able to get a glimpse of the grand picture in your mind. This is FUN! I don't understand why people seem to hate it. It is the best thing of the whole writing process, when you finally have a framework, and can start doing what you set out to do in the first place.
I do however know why it might turn people off: because the first draft might not be good enough to love editing as much as you should. Do you ever run into problems such as 'the whole plot doesn't make any sense because it's based on something stupid?'. I'll give you an example: say you have an artefact which someone has and someone else needs. The two characters meet very early in the story... and the one in the position of 'more' power (who is also the one who needs the artefact) fails to realize it's next to her - and not because the other character is actively trying to hide it... but because... PLOT. The whole plot would have crumbled if she got the artefact when all intelligence implied she should have. (Yeah this was one of my early drafts.. actually my first finished book... and it was broken beyond repair. Don't worry. It's since been shelved.).
How can you love editing then, if your plot is not a plot, and if you're so close to the manuscript nothing ever works? I tell you what: Trust your instinct. Put the manuscript aside for at least a month, then look at it again. There will be things you hate/which don't feel right. You can cut them (though I do advise keeping them in a separate document in case you change your mind later - which I usually don't, but it doesn't hurt to have backup) immediately. There will be things you will want to expand. That's great. That's lovely. You'll know more now than you did when you first wrote it (unless you're an outliner, and I don't know how useful this essay will be to you!), and you can now put this all into motion.
Here's a quick tip: I don't normally use notes. I make a lot of notes in the month between first and second draft, but I rarely look at them while editing. The important details stick - as all good ideas do. The rest... can be dismissed if it wasn't important/exciting enough to remember in the first place. Plus: your notes might be conflicting (say one note says character A must do X to comply with the plot... but another say character A can't do X or the plot will break) ... and they'll just confuse you to no end.
This editing gives you so much freedom! You finally know what your story is about. You can finally put it the way you wanted it. And don't worry, if even after the edit the story still doesn't make sense. There's always the option to improve on the next draft. And you'll write other stories Your current manuscript is not the only thing you'll ever write! And the more you practise the better your next manuscript will be!
Does this help? I hope it does and I hope you'll have a great week! As usual I'd be excited to have some comments (or sales! Ahahah). Cheers!
J.M.
I want to explain why editing is so much better than writing itself. (Warning: this might not be as useful to plotters, but it certainly is to pantsers who don't have much patience to think every plot detail through.)
What????!?!?!!? will be the reaction of most of the people reading this. I don't blame you. But consider this:
1. you write... a first draft. It goes all right (at least if you're a pantser, you're normally not as concerned with what-on-earth is going on in your ms. At first.) You have a finished product, and if it's anything like mine, then it'll be the bare bones of the actual book. It'll be so minimalistic no one else would ever want to read it. The characters are great, they're actually life-like, and each has their own personality, but their emotions, and the reasons they do things (which they do!) might be lacking clarity. The plot, too, could be refined, just so on page one-hundred Max isn't a guy, when he was a girl before. (Unless that's the sort of story you're writing!)
Congratulations! You now have a skeleton (in your drawer!). It might have 60-100k words (or a looot more) and you can put it aside happily.
It's time to wait.
Wait...
Wait...
Ok. Let's pretend a month has passed. (A month is a good time to get over your initial furious writing draft and start to see things more objectively.)
This is when editing comes around.
What's next?
If you're at all sensitive to story structure/characters/plot you can now tell what the manuscript needs. I don't normally read through any of my drafts in detail. I just skim over them and usually edit as I go. This works for me. It might not work for you.
There might be a lot of things to do... such as:
reordering scenes
writing more scenes you forgot/didn't know at the time but which need to be in the manuscript
clarify text
tighten prose (or on the opposite side/the thing I have to do often: add meat to the bones)
strengthen your rambled adjectives into some more descriptive nouns
cut characters that serve no purpose
cut scenes that serve no purpose
cut mercilessly
add description of places/emotions (or perhaps cut them if they're too much or too fluffy!)
In short: you finally get to edit. You have the bones of a story you find brilliant, and now you have to flesh them out, so other people will be able to get a glimpse of the grand picture in your mind. This is FUN! I don't understand why people seem to hate it. It is the best thing of the whole writing process, when you finally have a framework, and can start doing what you set out to do in the first place.
I do however know why it might turn people off: because the first draft might not be good enough to love editing as much as you should. Do you ever run into problems such as 'the whole plot doesn't make any sense because it's based on something stupid?'. I'll give you an example: say you have an artefact which someone has and someone else needs. The two characters meet very early in the story... and the one in the position of 'more' power (who is also the one who needs the artefact) fails to realize it's next to her - and not because the other character is actively trying to hide it... but because... PLOT. The whole plot would have crumbled if she got the artefact when all intelligence implied she should have. (Yeah this was one of my early drafts.. actually my first finished book... and it was broken beyond repair. Don't worry. It's since been shelved.).
How can you love editing then, if your plot is not a plot, and if you're so close to the manuscript nothing ever works? I tell you what: Trust your instinct. Put the manuscript aside for at least a month, then look at it again. There will be things you hate/which don't feel right. You can cut them (though I do advise keeping them in a separate document in case you change your mind later - which I usually don't, but it doesn't hurt to have backup) immediately. There will be things you will want to expand. That's great. That's lovely. You'll know more now than you did when you first wrote it (unless you're an outliner, and I don't know how useful this essay will be to you!), and you can now put this all into motion.
Here's a quick tip: I don't normally use notes. I make a lot of notes in the month between first and second draft, but I rarely look at them while editing. The important details stick - as all good ideas do. The rest... can be dismissed if it wasn't important/exciting enough to remember in the first place. Plus: your notes might be conflicting (say one note says character A must do X to comply with the plot... but another say character A can't do X or the plot will break) ... and they'll just confuse you to no end.
This editing gives you so much freedom! You finally know what your story is about. You can finally put it the way you wanted it. And don't worry, if even after the edit the story still doesn't make sense. There's always the option to improve on the next draft. And you'll write other stories Your current manuscript is not the only thing you'll ever write! And the more you practise the better your next manuscript will be!
Does this help? I hope it does and I hope you'll have a great week! As usual I'd be excited to have some comments (or sales! Ahahah). Cheers!
J.M.
Wednesday, August 3, 2016
How About Cutting?
Hi people!
This will be a post about the craft - specifically about what I've learned in the years I've been writing and how to cut/how to know what to cut.
1.) The most important thing about writing is to cut. Less is more. Much more. You need to learn to weed out shiny-sparkly 'darlings' and cut your manuscript down to the roots. This doesn't mean to axe all the things you like about your work. It means to axe these shiny sparkly parts which have nothing to do with the story.
I know it's difficult. It's difficult to know what to cut. It's difficult to know precisely what you want to say. And I'll give you a fair warning before you read on: You'll need a lot of courage to cut. And you might need a lot of TIME too.
It's even more difficult to say exactly what you want in fewer words. But it's also much more effective and will make your manuscript much more powerful. (Note: this is why short stories are often more powerful than a full novel. They have one - at max two or three - condensed idea and the whole 5-10k deals with only this one concept. This gives the writer lots of space to deal with one or two issues they want to address.)
You set out to write a story about a young man who's trying to solve the disappearance of children in an advanced future... and you end up with an amnesiac constructed human trying to understand why he loves another person more than himself when - in his point of view - they've never met. And even then, after you're done with your first draft, it's still difficult. There's lots of words, sentences, annotations (yes, I annotate in the middle of the text!), that just don't... belong. But then you delete something... and suddenly you have no idea any more why it needed to disappear, why you wrote the story in the first place, and everything simply collapses.
But how? Where do you even start? How do you find the roots of the manuscript? What are the roots of a manuscript? I think of it this way. The roots are like an orchid. They're visible at the top of the soil... but not overly so. You see, there's this pesky thing called 'Theme' (I'll post about this too at some point). Theme is the 'message' of the story, which should be many things, excluding a sermon about what you believe is true/right in the world. Theme, to a good writer, an experienced person, comes naturally, and if it doesn't, there's plenty of pointers on what it is. (Note II: I plan to compile a 'Resources' post with links and book recommendations that helped me learn more about craft in the hopes you'll also find them useful.)
2.) Why do you even want to cut? Isn't your manuscript good as it is? Probably. But you want it to be shiny, right? You want it to sparkle.
a.) You want to be clear and concise.
This is important. You want to tell the story as you envisioned it - nothing more and nothing less. I've been thinking about this for a while now, and I've been playing around with format. The latest short story I finished is complete at ~17,000 words. Why? Because this is the story. I could fluff it up, sure, just add another subplot, or two, but really, these 17,000 words (knowing me, it'll be 20,000 by the end), are enough. They tell the story as it is supposed to be told. And remember: you can always flesh it out/add more detail afterward.
I know. There is a lot of things you want to say and you don't have to be as sparse as me of course. But too much clutter can lead to problems (of boredome of fatigue or just such confusion you don't even know any more what story you wanted to tell or where you wanted to begin it). This could be because:
b.) 1.) You're trying to put too much into the novel. I used to have a problem with this and I developed a question to ask myself after it happened: Is this your last novel? Will you never write anything again? Most of these things, these shiny scenes, these cool characters who have nothing to do with the plot/any of the plots, but you still want them there, are a 'darling', and the opposite of the 'root'.
b.) 2.) You have a great character you love and you want him in the story? Desperately? But somehow you can't squeeze him in there without seriously breaking some other part of the plot? Drop him like he's the sun! He's shiny. He's sparkly. He's brilliant? He also doesn't have anything to do with your story! - Let him go. He'll come back to you when the time is right. Perhaps in your next story?
I had to drop a few characters (including an antagonist) when re-writing The Descendant of Ra. It was just too much... and I couldn't even follow the story any more myself. But after cutting him... nothing really changed about the story, and it's actually better.
You have a cool scene/setting you absolutely must have? Yes. You must. But perhaps not in the story you're currently working on.
This also applies to plot twists, plot points, cool objects, mysterious symbols, et cetera.
Don't worry, though. It isn't as bad as it seems.
At some point, when you've done enough stories, and scenes, and characters, you'll get a feel for it. How many, do you say, are enough? Well, I've finished 7 books, plenty of short stories (a great medium to learn about clear/concise/coherent plots and enticing characters and also to polish your prose), and hundreds of scenes/scene starts, ends, middles, about too many characters to count.
I've discovered it's better to write too little (though perhaps there's also a limit to what is way too little) than too much. You can always add information later if it's necessary (if you're interested check my process on TDR). However, if you have a 190k behemoth of a manuscript, then it'll be very painful to cut.
I hope this helped! Next week's post will be about critique and why it's important! In the meantime... check out my short stories and see if they're overly populated. Is there too much fluff? Too little fluff (in the way that it starts to feel clinical)? Have a good week!
J.M.
This will be a post about the craft - specifically about what I've learned in the years I've been writing and how to cut/how to know what to cut.
1.) The most important thing about writing is to cut. Less is more. Much more. You need to learn to weed out shiny-sparkly 'darlings' and cut your manuscript down to the roots. This doesn't mean to axe all the things you like about your work. It means to axe these shiny sparkly parts which have nothing to do with the story.
I know it's difficult. It's difficult to know what to cut. It's difficult to know precisely what you want to say. And I'll give you a fair warning before you read on: You'll need a lot of courage to cut. And you might need a lot of TIME too.
It's even more difficult to say exactly what you want in fewer words. But it's also much more effective and will make your manuscript much more powerful. (Note: this is why short stories are often more powerful than a full novel. They have one - at max two or three - condensed idea and the whole 5-10k deals with only this one concept. This gives the writer lots of space to deal with one or two issues they want to address.)
You set out to write a story about a young man who's trying to solve the disappearance of children in an advanced future... and you end up with an amnesiac constructed human trying to understand why he loves another person more than himself when - in his point of view - they've never met. And even then, after you're done with your first draft, it's still difficult. There's lots of words, sentences, annotations (yes, I annotate in the middle of the text!), that just don't... belong. But then you delete something... and suddenly you have no idea any more why it needed to disappear, why you wrote the story in the first place, and everything simply collapses.
But how? Where do you even start? How do you find the roots of the manuscript? What are the roots of a manuscript? I think of it this way. The roots are like an orchid. They're visible at the top of the soil... but not overly so. You see, there's this pesky thing called 'Theme' (I'll post about this too at some point). Theme is the 'message' of the story, which should be many things, excluding a sermon about what you believe is true/right in the world. Theme, to a good writer, an experienced person, comes naturally, and if it doesn't, there's plenty of pointers on what it is. (Note II: I plan to compile a 'Resources' post with links and book recommendations that helped me learn more about craft in the hopes you'll also find them useful.)
2.) Why do you even want to cut? Isn't your manuscript good as it is? Probably. But you want it to be shiny, right? You want it to sparkle.
a.) You want to be clear and concise.
This is important. You want to tell the story as you envisioned it - nothing more and nothing less. I've been thinking about this for a while now, and I've been playing around with format. The latest short story I finished is complete at ~17,000 words. Why? Because this is the story. I could fluff it up, sure, just add another subplot, or two, but really, these 17,000 words (knowing me, it'll be 20,000 by the end), are enough. They tell the story as it is supposed to be told. And remember: you can always flesh it out/add more detail afterward.
I know. There is a lot of things you want to say and you don't have to be as sparse as me of course. But too much clutter can lead to problems (of boredome of fatigue or just such confusion you don't even know any more what story you wanted to tell or where you wanted to begin it). This could be because:
b.) 1.) You're trying to put too much into the novel. I used to have a problem with this and I developed a question to ask myself after it happened: Is this your last novel? Will you never write anything again? Most of these things, these shiny scenes, these cool characters who have nothing to do with the plot/any of the plots, but you still want them there, are a 'darling', and the opposite of the 'root'.
b.) 2.) You have a great character you love and you want him in the story? Desperately? But somehow you can't squeeze him in there without seriously breaking some other part of the plot? Drop him like he's the sun! He's shiny. He's sparkly. He's brilliant? He also doesn't have anything to do with your story! - Let him go. He'll come back to you when the time is right. Perhaps in your next story?
I had to drop a few characters (including an antagonist) when re-writing The Descendant of Ra. It was just too much... and I couldn't even follow the story any more myself. But after cutting him... nothing really changed about the story, and it's actually better.
You have a cool scene/setting you absolutely must have? Yes. You must. But perhaps not in the story you're currently working on.
This also applies to plot twists, plot points, cool objects, mysterious symbols, et cetera.
Don't worry, though. It isn't as bad as it seems.
At some point, when you've done enough stories, and scenes, and characters, you'll get a feel for it. How many, do you say, are enough? Well, I've finished 7 books, plenty of short stories (a great medium to learn about clear/concise/coherent plots and enticing characters and also to polish your prose), and hundreds of scenes/scene starts, ends, middles, about too many characters to count.
I've discovered it's better to write too little (though perhaps there's also a limit to what is way too little) than too much. You can always add information later if it's necessary (if you're interested check my process on TDR). However, if you have a 190k behemoth of a manuscript, then it'll be very painful to cut.
I hope this helped! Next week's post will be about critique and why it's important! In the meantime... check out my short stories and see if they're overly populated. Is there too much fluff? Too little fluff (in the way that it starts to feel clinical)? Have a good week!
J.M.
Tuesday, August 2, 2016
Bonus Post! What is: The Descedant of Ra
Hi people!
This post will be a bit more about my process writing 'The Descendant of Ra' - and also its content.
Do you remember those 72k words I said I had between the third and fourth draft? Turns out the fourth draft, which is now done, has 27k words in total (Also turns out it took me three - or was it four? - years to muster the courage to ruthlessly cut.). The fifth draft, which I think will be the last draft before the final polish, will likely have around 50-60k words.
I'm extremely hyped about the project and I want to take this opportunity to tell you a bit more about The Descendant of Ra. I've done a bit of this on twitter (#TDR) already, but this will be a bit more plot-focused/detailed than the sporadic info you can pack into 140 characters.
In short: you (or your kids! Especially your kids!) will like this book if you/they like:
*ancient Egypt
*mystery
*adventure
*action
*magic
*and strong female as well as male characters
Here's the blurb as it stands (not the final version).
15-year old Zimon Walker is about to become the world's most celebrated archaeologist by discovering a secret ancient Egyptian tomb, but when he enters the tomb's heart, he finds himself in ancient Egypt instead. There, nothing is as it should be. The Pharaoh has been killed, and his sole heir, the princess Nefertari, struggles to survive against the pretender Zeti's magic. Her plan is to find the god Ra, the only one who can defeat Zeit, and Zimon can't go home unless the father of all gods is found. Zimon and his allies are forced to seek help, but not all who offer it are friendly, and the darkness is closing in on them.
I hope this gives a bit of an overview and you're as hyped as me about it! Please ask questions in the comments if you have any! :)
J.M.
This post will be a bit more about my process writing 'The Descendant of Ra' - and also its content.
Do you remember those 72k words I said I had between the third and fourth draft? Turns out the fourth draft, which is now done, has 27k words in total (Also turns out it took me three - or was it four? - years to muster the courage to ruthlessly cut.). The fifth draft, which I think will be the last draft before the final polish, will likely have around 50-60k words.
I'm extremely hyped about the project and I want to take this opportunity to tell you a bit more about The Descendant of Ra. I've done a bit of this on twitter (#TDR) already, but this will be a bit more plot-focused/detailed than the sporadic info you can pack into 140 characters.
In short: you (or your kids! Especially your kids!) will like this book if you/they like:
*ancient Egypt
*mystery
*adventure
*action
*magic
*and strong female as well as male characters
Here's the blurb as it stands (not the final version).
15-year old Zimon Walker is about to become the world's most celebrated archaeologist by discovering a secret ancient Egyptian tomb, but when he enters the tomb's heart, he finds himself in ancient Egypt instead. There, nothing is as it should be. The Pharaoh has been killed, and his sole heir, the princess Nefertari, struggles to survive against the pretender Zeti's magic. Her plan is to find the god Ra, the only one who can defeat Zeit, and Zimon can't go home unless the father of all gods is found. Zimon and his allies are forced to seek help, but not all who offer it are friendly, and the darkness is closing in on them.
I hope this gives a bit of an overview and you're as hyped as me about it! Please ask questions in the comments if you have any! :)
J.M.
Wednesday, July 27, 2016
What's wrong with my writing/my plot/my novel/my scene/my characters/me?
Hi!
Today's post will be about writing what suits you and what to do when writing (which you love and are sure you want to do for the rest of your life - otherwise you wouldn't bother reading this) feels like a drag? Warning: loooong.
Let's start with 1.
Unbusting the myth of 'just write'. There will be a point in your career when you feel sucked dry, worn out, and you'll want to quit writing, but some stubborn part of yourself refuses to quit. You try to write still, short stories, novels, you start a couple of them, or twenty, but they don't work out. You're frustrated, you cry, you might rant to your friends/family about it, but nothing works.
Why not?
a) You're not doing what you love.
Oh but hold up.
You're wrong! I love writing.
If you're reading this you probably do. You want a solution to the perceived writer's block.
I'm going to tell you a secret.
Writer's Block is real.
It happens when you're not doing what you love. It happens when you're trying to do something you're not THAT into... just because it sounds cool/you've heard it sells well/you're trying to make the coolest story possible.
b) I've recently discovered a simple truth: when you're working on something you love, there's no time to agonize or be afraid. The project simply takes over... and the moment you feel frustrated/angry with it (even after taking a two day/two week/two month/two year break) something about the material you're writing is wrong. And then you should take a break until the rest of the story comes to you without you even having to think about it. (I'm not sure intense thinking works in this case instead. It doesn't work for me. It mostly does the opposite by simply ruining the whole book. And then you have to go back to the first draft... after you've already done another three or four. :D Yey!)
Taking the above into account... what (else) could be wrong? The same thing that was wrong with the ten plus projects I wrote 30-50k words on and then quit.
1. you're not writing what you love any more
2. you're (pretentiously) trying to write something that sounds cool... but your heart doesn't beat for
3. you're bored of the project (because of 1. or 2.)
4. the idea only engaged you the first hour you had it... then you started finding faults... started trying to fix them... found it too hard/boring/whatever and gave up on it.
Does this sound like I'm advocating quitting? Well. I am. Here's a single rule you should always apply: if you're tired of a project (or worse, bored), and you really don't want to do it any more, quit. With a caveat: Don't quit immediately. Sometimes there's a gem somewhere in the mess you're getting allergic to. Sometimes your brain just needs to... develop before you can finish a certain story. You'll have to practice a lot to understand this.
I'll give you some examples. I have a novella at 36k... unfinished. It's not something I can ever finish, even though I know the outcome. I just can't do it. It's too depressing. The main character grabbed me and told me her story in three days but then she told me the ending and I said 'No. This is not the sort of thing I write or want to write.' It would break people's hearts and make them cry. It made me cry... and I didn't even know the ending at the time. I don't want to finish it. I don't want to be crushed by my stories any more than I want to crush my readers. There's too much depressing stuff out there already. I don't need to add to it. After all, I'm trying to make the world a better, happier place with my stories.
This is one instance in which you quit. I likely won't ever finish the story, though it'd take 5k words (an afternoon's worth of words) max to do it. Instead I decided to put it away.
Then there's the beginnings... lots of them. I must have about twenty to thirty started and not finished stories by now.
Why? I love ideas and I like writing beginnings a lot. But I have no patience to see something through when my heart isn't into it. I'll find out something about a character, the plot, the setting... and I just go 'nope' mode. For me to finish a book, it has to be something I really love, plot, setting, characters, et al. Otherwise it won't hold my attention... and how do I expect the reader's attention to be held if I'm so bored I can't even think about it without groaning (out loud. Trust me... I've gotten weird looks.)? I'm not too worried about these though. Remember what I said about practice? You have to do it a lot. 10k hours as the common conception goes. This is all practice (and hey, my beginnings are getting great! ...). 30k words are easily written and discarded. Some turn into short stories instead of novels, but the point is, you need to keep at it. I don't believe in outlining or plotting or whatever before you sit down to write. Because, especially as a panster, you simply cannot know whether a story is going to be a short story or a novel or a novella when you start to write. You can't even know the genre... or the word count (you sit down to write a novel... and suddenly it's over at 4k words. That's ok! You can sell it to magazines as a short story and keep all the other ideas you had for it for another novel/short story/novella!) Don't worry. A lot of this will be less hazy with experience... which you get through practice!
Ok. Practice Propaganda done. Let's get on with the post.
Then there's the actual finished projects and their edits. These are tricky. There will be parts that work and parts that don't. And sometimes you won't know what works and what doesn't. :D Oh joy! Unfortunately I can't tell you what works and what doesn't. Each book is too subjective to make a general rule about how you should edit. (Yes this is not what you wanted to hear. Oh well. It's the practice thing again... it'll become easier in time to tell what's wrong... and how to fix it! I'll talk more about this in another post.) I could give you advice... but I'd have to charge for consultation. But don't worry, once it's done, you can put it aside, for a year or two, and then you take them out again, and if you're still scared to ruthlessly cut, you need to put it aside again, and again, and again, until the solutions come to you like mosquitos during the night (in a swampy area... ok.)!
Did this help you decide whether you're a sloth or not doing what you should be? I hope it did and that you have a great week no matter the outcome.
Cheers
Today's post will be about writing what suits you and what to do when writing (which you love and are sure you want to do for the rest of your life - otherwise you wouldn't bother reading this) feels like a drag? Warning: loooong.
Let's start with 1.
Unbusting the myth of 'just write'. There will be a point in your career when you feel sucked dry, worn out, and you'll want to quit writing, but some stubborn part of yourself refuses to quit. You try to write still, short stories, novels, you start a couple of them, or twenty, but they don't work out. You're frustrated, you cry, you might rant to your friends/family about it, but nothing works.
Why not?
a) You're not doing what you love.
Oh but hold up.
You're wrong! I love writing.
If you're reading this you probably do. You want a solution to the perceived writer's block.
I'm going to tell you a secret.
Writer's Block is real.
It happens when you're not doing what you love. It happens when you're trying to do something you're not THAT into... just because it sounds cool/you've heard it sells well/you're trying to make the coolest story possible.
b) I've recently discovered a simple truth: when you're working on something you love, there's no time to agonize or be afraid. The project simply takes over... and the moment you feel frustrated/angry with it (even after taking a two day/two week/two month/two year break) something about the material you're writing is wrong. And then you should take a break until the rest of the story comes to you without you even having to think about it. (I'm not sure intense thinking works in this case instead. It doesn't work for me. It mostly does the opposite by simply ruining the whole book. And then you have to go back to the first draft... after you've already done another three or four. :D Yey!)
Taking the above into account... what (else) could be wrong? The same thing that was wrong with the ten plus projects I wrote 30-50k words on and then quit.
1. you're not writing what you love any more
2. you're (pretentiously) trying to write something that sounds cool... but your heart doesn't beat for
3. you're bored of the project (because of 1. or 2.)
4. the idea only engaged you the first hour you had it... then you started finding faults... started trying to fix them... found it too hard/boring/whatever and gave up on it.
Does this sound like I'm advocating quitting? Well. I am. Here's a single rule you should always apply: if you're tired of a project (or worse, bored), and you really don't want to do it any more, quit. With a caveat: Don't quit immediately. Sometimes there's a gem somewhere in the mess you're getting allergic to. Sometimes your brain just needs to... develop before you can finish a certain story. You'll have to practice a lot to understand this.
I'll give you some examples. I have a novella at 36k... unfinished. It's not something I can ever finish, even though I know the outcome. I just can't do it. It's too depressing. The main character grabbed me and told me her story in three days but then she told me the ending and I said 'No. This is not the sort of thing I write or want to write.' It would break people's hearts and make them cry. It made me cry... and I didn't even know the ending at the time. I don't want to finish it. I don't want to be crushed by my stories any more than I want to crush my readers. There's too much depressing stuff out there already. I don't need to add to it. After all, I'm trying to make the world a better, happier place with my stories.
This is one instance in which you quit. I likely won't ever finish the story, though it'd take 5k words (an afternoon's worth of words) max to do it. Instead I decided to put it away.
Then there's the beginnings... lots of them. I must have about twenty to thirty started and not finished stories by now.
Why? I love ideas and I like writing beginnings a lot. But I have no patience to see something through when my heart isn't into it. I'll find out something about a character, the plot, the setting... and I just go 'nope' mode. For me to finish a book, it has to be something I really love, plot, setting, characters, et al. Otherwise it won't hold my attention... and how do I expect the reader's attention to be held if I'm so bored I can't even think about it without groaning (out loud. Trust me... I've gotten weird looks.)? I'm not too worried about these though. Remember what I said about practice? You have to do it a lot. 10k hours as the common conception goes. This is all practice (and hey, my beginnings are getting great! ...). 30k words are easily written and discarded. Some turn into short stories instead of novels, but the point is, you need to keep at it. I don't believe in outlining or plotting or whatever before you sit down to write. Because, especially as a panster, you simply cannot know whether a story is going to be a short story or a novel or a novella when you start to write. You can't even know the genre... or the word count (you sit down to write a novel... and suddenly it's over at 4k words. That's ok! You can sell it to magazines as a short story and keep all the other ideas you had for it for another novel/short story/novella!) Don't worry. A lot of this will be less hazy with experience... which you get through practice!
Ok. Practice Propaganda done. Let's get on with the post.
Then there's the actual finished projects and their edits. These are tricky. There will be parts that work and parts that don't. And sometimes you won't know what works and what doesn't. :D Oh joy! Unfortunately I can't tell you what works and what doesn't. Each book is too subjective to make a general rule about how you should edit. (Yes this is not what you wanted to hear. Oh well. It's the practice thing again... it'll become easier in time to tell what's wrong... and how to fix it! I'll talk more about this in another post.) I could give you advice... but I'd have to charge for consultation. But don't worry, once it's done, you can put it aside, for a year or two, and then you take them out again, and if you're still scared to ruthlessly cut, you need to put it aside again, and again, and again, until the solutions come to you like mosquitos during the night (in a swampy area... ok.)!
Did this help you decide whether you're a sloth or not doing what you should be? I hope it did and that you have a great week no matter the outcome.
Cheers
Tuesday, July 26, 2016
Bonus Post! The Editing Process
Hi
This is a bonus post!
I've been keeping track of my wordcount and goals on twitter (@jimneyauthor) and I'd like to give an overview of what I'm doing at the moment. I have this project I've tentatively called 'The Descendant of Ra'. It's a MG (not YA as I long believed) about a junior archaeologist who gets transported back in time to ancient Egypt where he has to help a Pharaoh regain her throne. It involves magic and gods and all sorts of mystery (especially surrounding the MC).
Here's a quick overview of drafts:
The first draft was complete at 70k words. The second draft (adding some scenes, description, et cetera) at 117k. I spent the last week cutting it down and carving out the heart of the story. TDOR currently has 83k words (draft 3) and I'm editing it down to 75k at the moment. This entails cutting out superfluous words and scenes and characters (and fluffy gimmicks) and focusing on making the plot coherent. This is the most difficult part of the project. It is still not always clear what must stay and what must be cut. It still takes a loooot of getting-over-it (courage) to trust my instincts and take things out. But don't worry. It's also getting easier with every draft... :)
Update: I've actually done 75k (yesterday and today) and went beyond it. The current draft (draft 4) is as of today at 72k. No doubt there'll be things to add later as it looks a bit skeletal/basic now.
Here's a view of my editing: (errr... coming soon. Hint: lots of red)
My primary editing tools are a red pen (taking things out/changing things) and a yellow marker (important details that need to be kept/transfered to the new draft while the rest of the sentence/paragraph might be crossed out to be cut). The white parts (unmarked) are what I'll keep - at least until the next draft. I sometimes use a blue/black pen to make other notes... but mostly it's just red/yellow.
Like this? Follow me on twitter (@jimneyauthor) to get (sorta) live updates! And don't forget: tomorrow's Wednesday's regular post! Cheers
This is a bonus post!
I've been keeping track of my wordcount and goals on twitter (@jimneyauthor) and I'd like to give an overview of what I'm doing at the moment. I have this project I've tentatively called 'The Descendant of Ra'. It's a MG (not YA as I long believed) about a junior archaeologist who gets transported back in time to ancient Egypt where he has to help a Pharaoh regain her throne. It involves magic and gods and all sorts of mystery (especially surrounding the MC).
Here's a quick overview of drafts:
The first draft was complete at 70k words. The second draft (adding some scenes, description, et cetera) at 117k. I spent the last week cutting it down and carving out the heart of the story. TDOR currently has 83k words (draft 3) and I'm editing it down to 75k at the moment. This entails cutting out superfluous words and scenes and characters (and fluffy gimmicks) and focusing on making the plot coherent. This is the most difficult part of the project. It is still not always clear what must stay and what must be cut. It still takes a loooot of getting-over-it (courage) to trust my instincts and take things out. But don't worry. It's also getting easier with every draft... :)
Update: I've actually done 75k (yesterday and today) and went beyond it. The current draft (draft 4) is as of today at 72k. No doubt there'll be things to add later as it looks a bit skeletal/basic now.
Here's a view of my editing: (errr... coming soon. Hint: lots of red)
My primary editing tools are a red pen (taking things out/changing things) and a yellow marker (important details that need to be kept/transfered to the new draft while the rest of the sentence/paragraph might be crossed out to be cut). The white parts (unmarked) are what I'll keep - at least until the next draft. I sometimes use a blue/black pen to make other notes... but mostly it's just red/yellow.
Like this? Follow me on twitter (@jimneyauthor) to get (sorta) live updates! And don't forget: tomorrow's Wednesday's regular post! Cheers
Tuesday, July 19, 2016
Why do you write?
Hi!
This post will deal with 'why do you write?' and the 'writing mission statement'. Let's go!
Why do you write? What's your mission statement as a writer? You don't have one? Well... you should. It's important to know why you do what you do and what you want to achieve with it. It'll keep you on track if you don't know what to do next (such as if you have no more ideas or writer's block or any other excuse you can think of).
You can easily do this by completing this sentence:
When people are done with my book/story/film/etc I want them to...
What should they have learned? What should they feel? What do you hope you'll make them experience throughout your book and after they're done with it? I don't have any pretentious ambitions such as 'when people read this they will be kinder to their parents'... and it took me three years to be able to condense mine into a single sentence.
I want people to think.
It doesn't even matter too much about what (although I'll try to think of some good topics to start with in the coming weeks).
Let me explain.
Why think? What's so special about thinking? Everyone does it! But do they think deeply enough? Do they (to use a fancy word) contemplate? I suppose some of us do and some don't. Then why is this abstract concept of thinking important enough to me to make it my writing goal?
It's simple.
I enjoy helping people. I like making their lives better in any way I can (Life Pro Tip: often all it takes is a smile! I'm always happy if people smile at me on the train or the bus or... you know... randomly!).
My utopia is a world in which difference is understood and not fought or feared. Any kind of difference. Difference of opinion and emotion and skin colour and religion... et cetera. It doesn't matter whether there is difference or not. There always will be. No two people are alike, even if they're the same skin colour, or if they support the same presidential candidate, and in order for there to be peace, this has to be understood. I'm still trying to explain this concept clearly.
I do believe there's a simple formula for this.
Empathy.
Empathy is key. Empathy leads to understanding and understanding to change.
The only person who can change someone's life is that person herself. I want people to understand how all the world's differences don't really matter. At the core, people are the same, everywhere. We all want to be loved, we all want to be appreciated. We want to be cherished. And at the heart of it, all we want is to be happy, to be loved, to live a life in peace, without struggle.
This is why there's been a change to my mission statement over these three years. It's become more detailed. I want to help people... and you know the why... so the question is: How? How do you achieve this? How do you make people think? What should you do? Well... Have you heard of preaching to the choir? This isn't my goal. It doesn't change anyone's point of view. It's been my experience people only really learn and remember - and really believe - through experience they make themselves.
It doesn't matter if I tell you the grass is green. You'll only believe me once you've seen it for yourself. Because then you'll know what the green-ness of grass is, how it looks like, how it smells, how it feels like under your fingertips, and you'll never forget.
This is why my mission is to make people think. It is all I want to have achieved when readers are done with my stories. They should think. They should think about what they've read, and if not consciously, then sub-consciously.
Here's a way to tell whether an author was working with a mission statement. Does the imagery come back to you after months? What does it make you feel/think? Do you still think about 'what happened next in a year'?
Want to know more? I'll recommend Catching Fireflies and Iana as a start. They're great stories to illustrate my mission statement. They're the core of it. They're the two stories about which readers most frequently ask me 'what happens after?'. Well... you tell me! You can read them for free on Kindle Unlimited.
I hope you're having a good week (it's so incredibly hot here!) and comments are appreciated! J.M.
This post will deal with 'why do you write?' and the 'writing mission statement'. Let's go!
Why do you write? What's your mission statement as a writer? You don't have one? Well... you should. It's important to know why you do what you do and what you want to achieve with it. It'll keep you on track if you don't know what to do next (such as if you have no more ideas or writer's block or any other excuse you can think of).
You can easily do this by completing this sentence:
When people are done with my book/story/film/etc I want them to...
What should they have learned? What should they feel? What do you hope you'll make them experience throughout your book and after they're done with it? I don't have any pretentious ambitions such as 'when people read this they will be kinder to their parents'... and it took me three years to be able to condense mine into a single sentence.
I want people to think.
It doesn't even matter too much about what (although I'll try to think of some good topics to start with in the coming weeks).
Let me explain.
Why think? What's so special about thinking? Everyone does it! But do they think deeply enough? Do they (to use a fancy word) contemplate? I suppose some of us do and some don't. Then why is this abstract concept of thinking important enough to me to make it my writing goal?
It's simple.
I enjoy helping people. I like making their lives better in any way I can (Life Pro Tip: often all it takes is a smile! I'm always happy if people smile at me on the train or the bus or... you know... randomly!).
My utopia is a world in which difference is understood and not fought or feared. Any kind of difference. Difference of opinion and emotion and skin colour and religion... et cetera. It doesn't matter whether there is difference or not. There always will be. No two people are alike, even if they're the same skin colour, or if they support the same presidential candidate, and in order for there to be peace, this has to be understood. I'm still trying to explain this concept clearly.
I do believe there's a simple formula for this.
Empathy.
Empathy is key. Empathy leads to understanding and understanding to change.
The only person who can change someone's life is that person herself. I want people to understand how all the world's differences don't really matter. At the core, people are the same, everywhere. We all want to be loved, we all want to be appreciated. We want to be cherished. And at the heart of it, all we want is to be happy, to be loved, to live a life in peace, without struggle.
This is why there's been a change to my mission statement over these three years. It's become more detailed. I want to help people... and you know the why... so the question is: How? How do you achieve this? How do you make people think? What should you do? Well... Have you heard of preaching to the choir? This isn't my goal. It doesn't change anyone's point of view. It's been my experience people only really learn and remember - and really believe - through experience they make themselves.
It doesn't matter if I tell you the grass is green. You'll only believe me once you've seen it for yourself. Because then you'll know what the green-ness of grass is, how it looks like, how it smells, how it feels like under your fingertips, and you'll never forget.
This is why my mission is to make people think. It is all I want to have achieved when readers are done with my stories. They should think. They should think about what they've read, and if not consciously, then sub-consciously.
Here's a way to tell whether an author was working with a mission statement. Does the imagery come back to you after months? What does it make you feel/think? Do you still think about 'what happened next in a year'?
Want to know more? I'll recommend Catching Fireflies and Iana as a start. They're great stories to illustrate my mission statement. They're the core of it. They're the two stories about which readers most frequently ask me 'what happens after?'. Well... you tell me! You can read them for free on Kindle Unlimited.
I hope you're having a good week (it's so incredibly hot here!) and comments are appreciated! J.M.
Thursday, July 14, 2016
Exposure. Experience. The Enemy.
Hi
I said this week I'm going to talk about how to write diversity/about diverse characters. So I am.
We've all heard there are too many straight/white/male protagonists in (especially) sci fi and fantasy. We've also been told this is because most authors are straight, white, and male, and most readers as well. This is a) not true and b) not the problem.
It doesn't matter whether the author is straight/white/male. The problem is that those s/w/m authors (mostly) can't slip into the shoes of characters who are not straight, white, and male.
Let's be realistic.
A lot of the people who write can afford it. They aren't about to lose the house and go completely broke if they spend hours on end at their desks and do nothing but dream on paper/the screen (with the exception of pre-success Steven King, perhaps). They aren't in danger of starving or drowning (in bills). They have a quite comfortable life as middle to upper class income citizens. They're normal. They're mediocre. They're (beyond the writing) normal people with normal friends and a normal daily routine/life. They have little hardship in their lives beyond what happens to everyone once in a while.
Their experience has (probably) not brought them very close to different kinds of people. They'll have a standard day-job (Accountant? Programmer? Teacher?), where they meet the same people every day, talk in the same fashion, and generally don't educate themselves on lives that are different. They go on holiday once a year (or twice if they're a bit better off) and have little contact with anyone but their family and the hotel consierge/campsite supervisor during those two weeks.
This doesn't nurture diversity. It advocates same-ness - of which a lot more can be found in books than characters. The plots tend to mold together after a while and the settings are dull. I find it difficult to discover books that don't work by some kind of standard formula.
Then what's needed? How do you actually diversify your writing? You need EXP. Experience with capital letters. You need to expose yourself to different cultures (even if you just listen to rap instead of metal one afternoon) and you need to talk to as many people as possible. It's impossible to write a diverse book without thinking diversely on auto-pilot. Diversity has to be ingrained in you so it'll come naturally. You hear about a 'man getting caught stealing book covers'? What race is he in your mind? Does it come with a negative connotation (such as 'oh those Mexicans')? This is the kind of automatically diverse thinking needed... except it shouldn't be as racist and should come automatically when you hear something positive as well. 'Woman saves kid from shark'. What colour is her skin? White? Why didn't your mind come up with another ethnicity instead? It's because you lack exposure and experience. You lack life.
I've said 'diverse characters come to me instead of me having to make them diverse'. I've said this despite being a prime example of straight and white. Do you know why? I spent most of my childhood and teenage years in a poor environment. I wasn't always able to afford the books and tools we needed at school. Holidays were once every three years tops - and then only half a week in a cheap room at most.
Does this make me different or special? Does it make me better? Does it make it easier to write diversely because of this?
I think it does ( - even if the margin likely isn't high). I spent a lot of time on the internet in those days... and especially in MMOS. I got to know lots of different people from all over the world. And I loved it. I knew people from Mexico to Canada to Australia to all over Europe and the Asian Islands. I learned chunks of different languages and dismantled many a person's mind about their beliefs and religions and sexuality. I got to know a gay high priest (I'll use MMO classes to obscure identity! Yey!) who'd be killed by his boyfriend's dad if anyone knew. I got to know a sweet muslim archer who put his life on the line to protect his younger siblings over the years. I met a rich mage buying an apartment block to rent out to become even richer.
You know what I've found? It is simple. People are all the same. It doesn't matter what colour they are or what God they pray to (if any). When it comes down to it they all yearn. They all hurt. They all love and hate. The worst have vulnerable sides (like the elementary school bully who cried when his parents didn't show up for a piece we'd prepared) and the sweetest of them have vengeful sides (like the protecting archer who cried when one of his tormentors died in an accident).
This rant concluded (I'm not sorry. Injustice just riles me... even if I believe it gives people an advantage in other areas of life!) I still have questions that need answers.
I wonder whether all the trouble of going through a non-privileged childhood/life is worth it. I wonder whether being in a minority makes it easier to write diversely. Do straight white women have an easier time writing diversely than straight white men? Do people of obscure religions/upbringings see the world differently and thus more diversely? Do ethnic people and LGBT people find it easier to write about diversity because they can relate?
And most important of all...
What do you think about this? It's a theory. Does it miss anything? Post a comment!
I hope this post made you think (thinking is really the core of what this blog is about) and you'll have a great week! J.M.
I said this week I'm going to talk about how to write diversity/about diverse characters. So I am.
We've all heard there are too many straight/white/male protagonists in (especially) sci fi and fantasy. We've also been told this is because most authors are straight, white, and male, and most readers as well. This is a) not true and b) not the problem.
It doesn't matter whether the author is straight/white/male. The problem is that those s/w/m authors (mostly) can't slip into the shoes of characters who are not straight, white, and male.
Let's be realistic.
A lot of the people who write can afford it. They aren't about to lose the house and go completely broke if they spend hours on end at their desks and do nothing but dream on paper/the screen (with the exception of pre-success Steven King, perhaps). They aren't in danger of starving or drowning (in bills). They have a quite comfortable life as middle to upper class income citizens. They're normal. They're mediocre. They're (beyond the writing) normal people with normal friends and a normal daily routine/life. They have little hardship in their lives beyond what happens to everyone once in a while.
Their experience has (probably) not brought them very close to different kinds of people. They'll have a standard day-job (Accountant? Programmer? Teacher?), where they meet the same people every day, talk in the same fashion, and generally don't educate themselves on lives that are different. They go on holiday once a year (or twice if they're a bit better off) and have little contact with anyone but their family and the hotel consierge/campsite supervisor during those two weeks.
This doesn't nurture diversity. It advocates same-ness - of which a lot more can be found in books than characters. The plots tend to mold together after a while and the settings are dull. I find it difficult to discover books that don't work by some kind of standard formula.
Then what's needed? How do you actually diversify your writing? You need EXP. Experience with capital letters. You need to expose yourself to different cultures (even if you just listen to rap instead of metal one afternoon) and you need to talk to as many people as possible. It's impossible to write a diverse book without thinking diversely on auto-pilot. Diversity has to be ingrained in you so it'll come naturally. You hear about a 'man getting caught stealing book covers'? What race is he in your mind? Does it come with a negative connotation (such as 'oh those Mexicans')? This is the kind of automatically diverse thinking needed... except it shouldn't be as racist and should come automatically when you hear something positive as well. 'Woman saves kid from shark'. What colour is her skin? White? Why didn't your mind come up with another ethnicity instead? It's because you lack exposure and experience. You lack life.
I've said 'diverse characters come to me instead of me having to make them diverse'. I've said this despite being a prime example of straight and white. Do you know why? I spent most of my childhood and teenage years in a poor environment. I wasn't always able to afford the books and tools we needed at school. Holidays were once every three years tops - and then only half a week in a cheap room at most.
Does this make me different or special? Does it make me better? Does it make it easier to write diversely because of this?
I think it does ( - even if the margin likely isn't high). I spent a lot of time on the internet in those days... and especially in MMOS. I got to know lots of different people from all over the world. And I loved it. I knew people from Mexico to Canada to Australia to all over Europe and the Asian Islands. I learned chunks of different languages and dismantled many a person's mind about their beliefs and religions and sexuality. I got to know a gay high priest (I'll use MMO classes to obscure identity! Yey!) who'd be killed by his boyfriend's dad if anyone knew. I got to know a sweet muslim archer who put his life on the line to protect his younger siblings over the years. I met a rich mage buying an apartment block to rent out to become even richer.
You know what I've found? It is simple. People are all the same. It doesn't matter what colour they are or what God they pray to (if any). When it comes down to it they all yearn. They all hurt. They all love and hate. The worst have vulnerable sides (like the elementary school bully who cried when his parents didn't show up for a piece we'd prepared) and the sweetest of them have vengeful sides (like the protecting archer who cried when one of his tormentors died in an accident).
This rant concluded (I'm not sorry. Injustice just riles me... even if I believe it gives people an advantage in other areas of life!) I still have questions that need answers.
I wonder whether all the trouble of going through a non-privileged childhood/life is worth it. I wonder whether being in a minority makes it easier to write diversely. Do straight white women have an easier time writing diversely than straight white men? Do people of obscure religions/upbringings see the world differently and thus more diversely? Do ethnic people and LGBT people find it easier to write about diversity because they can relate?
And most important of all...
What do you think about this? It's a theory. Does it miss anything? Post a comment!
I hope this post made you think (thinking is really the core of what this blog is about) and you'll have a great week! J.M.
Monday, July 11, 2016
Noise about Diversity
Hi people!
I want to talk about "diverse" characters in fantasy and sci-fi and I'm not going to try not to step on anyone's toes.
You know what turns me off about a book with 'diverse' characters? Here's an example. Let's say this character's diversity is he's LGBT. He's gay like a peacock. That's cool. I like it (understatement!). However... if I read a blurb and it goes something like: 'gay high orc lord Waldwächter...' or 'twenty-six year old Alex Nano is gay. He's also the superstar of the galactic space emporium battle fleet'... I'm not going to pick up the book.
Look.
I don't care Alex Nano is gay and I don't want to be told this as if it/he's some kind of novelty. At least not in that fist-to-eye way. It's like a warning sign.
'WARNING: THIS BOOK CONTAINS GAY CHARACTERS. READ AT YOUR OWN PERIL.'
Understand: I don't buy books because the main character in your sci-fi epic is gay. I buy it because it's a sci-fi epic and because your character sounds cool and I can't think of anyone who reads a book simply because the main character is in some kind of minority (say he's religious as opposed to the many atheists out there or he's not white). Diversity is a requirement if you want to write a good story. The only occasion in which advertising diversity is acceptable is if a character's race/gender/sexuality/religion/etc is in itself a major plot point or ties into the main plot (like a romance sub-plot in which the subtext of Alex drooling over Richard tells me oh! This is something new. This sci-fi hero has a male love interest? I'm intrigued. I'll immediately buy it and read it in one sitting if the rest of the blurb sounds great too.)
On the other hand if you have to advertise it very bluntly (like a fist to my eye) as if Alex Nano's gayness is his only defining characteristic then I'll Alt+F4 the tab and never look at your book/work again.
I want to read a story about a cool character doing cool things and I don't expect a straight-white-male character when I pick up a book. I expect to be entertained. I expect to meet a great protagonist. It doesn't matter whether she is straight or gay or white or brown or, I don't know, violet. Tell me something different that makes her special. Why is it worth reading about this character? Diversity in itself doesn't mean your character will be interesting - never mind sympathetic - and it doesn't need to be advertised. It should be standard and though I might drool if there's a male same sex romance in it I want to meet all kinds of worthwhile characters of different sexes, sexualities, religions, races, et cetera.
Here's an opposite example: Richard K. Morgan's A Land Fit For Heroes. It's good. Two of the three main characters are LGBT (and one of them is a POC) and yet I *strongly disliked* one of them. Why? Not because the character is LGBT. That didn't matter. I *strongly disliked* this character because they were a god-damned bitch... and my favourite character wasn't the other gay character either.
You see what I'm getting at? There is no need to advertise diversity. There is only a need to include it. I want to meet all kinds of people and live as many lives as possible in one life.
I've one more thing to talk about in this post.
Despite being a straight white woman most of my protagonists are LGBT and POC and all other kinds of people.
Why?
In the same way I'm not interested in reading about the same straight/white/male character in every book and I don't want to write about the same straight/white/male character in every story. I want to create as many experiences as possible and live as many lives as is possible in one life.
But! Haven't I been advocating not to put emphasis on the other-ness of characters because it would defeat the point? Indeed! But writing is a lot like reading (if you're a pantser like me). The story tells itself in many ways. My characters aren't deliberately made dark-skinned or LGTB or even 'different' or 'diverse'. I'm not thinking 'why not make this character gay?' I'm thinking 'who does this character check out at the pool? Men or women? The girl his age or the guy who's two decades older than him? And most of the time I don't think at all. I just write and let the characters tell me who they are at their pace instead of forcing a persona and a plot onto them.
Think you should as well? Give it a try. It doesn't need to be a whole book or a whole story. Just lure in a character and ask them who they are. And then listen.
This is it for today's post. Liked it? Want to know more/see how I do it? Check out my short stories! You can read them all for free if you have a Kindle Unlimited subscription (which is useful)! :) Next (Wednesday's!) post will focus more on the writing part of diversity and why most protagonists in sci-fi and fantasy are straight/white/male.
Thank you for reading and I hope you have a great week!
J.M.
I want to talk about "diverse" characters in fantasy and sci-fi and I'm not going to try not to step on anyone's toes.
You know what turns me off about a book with 'diverse' characters? Here's an example. Let's say this character's diversity is he's LGBT. He's gay like a peacock. That's cool. I like it (understatement!). However... if I read a blurb and it goes something like: 'gay high orc lord Waldwächter...' or 'twenty-six year old Alex Nano is gay. He's also the superstar of the galactic space emporium battle fleet'... I'm not going to pick up the book.
Look.
I don't care Alex Nano is gay and I don't want to be told this as if it/he's some kind of novelty. At least not in that fist-to-eye way. It's like a warning sign.
'WARNING: THIS BOOK CONTAINS GAY CHARACTERS. READ AT YOUR OWN PERIL.'
Understand: I don't buy books because the main character in your sci-fi epic is gay. I buy it because it's a sci-fi epic and because your character sounds cool and I can't think of anyone who reads a book simply because the main character is in some kind of minority (say he's religious as opposed to the many atheists out there or he's not white). Diversity is a requirement if you want to write a good story. The only occasion in which advertising diversity is acceptable is if a character's race/gender/sexuality/religion/etc is in itself a major plot point or ties into the main plot (like a romance sub-plot in which the subtext of Alex drooling over Richard tells me oh! This is something new. This sci-fi hero has a male love interest? I'm intrigued. I'll immediately buy it and read it in one sitting if the rest of the blurb sounds great too.)
On the other hand if you have to advertise it very bluntly (like a fist to my eye) as if Alex Nano's gayness is his only defining characteristic then I'll Alt+F4 the tab and never look at your book/work again.
I want to read a story about a cool character doing cool things and I don't expect a straight-white-male character when I pick up a book. I expect to be entertained. I expect to meet a great protagonist. It doesn't matter whether she is straight or gay or white or brown or, I don't know, violet. Tell me something different that makes her special. Why is it worth reading about this character? Diversity in itself doesn't mean your character will be interesting - never mind sympathetic - and it doesn't need to be advertised. It should be standard and though I might drool if there's a male same sex romance in it I want to meet all kinds of worthwhile characters of different sexes, sexualities, religions, races, et cetera.
Here's an opposite example: Richard K. Morgan's A Land Fit For Heroes. It's good. Two of the three main characters are LGBT (and one of them is a POC) and yet I *strongly disliked* one of them. Why? Not because the character is LGBT. That didn't matter. I *strongly disliked* this character because they were a god-damned bitch... and my favourite character wasn't the other gay character either.
You see what I'm getting at? There is no need to advertise diversity. There is only a need to include it. I want to meet all kinds of people and live as many lives as possible in one life.
I've one more thing to talk about in this post.
Despite being a straight white woman most of my protagonists are LGBT and POC and all other kinds of people.
Why?
In the same way I'm not interested in reading about the same straight/white/male character in every book and I don't want to write about the same straight/white/male character in every story. I want to create as many experiences as possible and live as many lives as is possible in one life.
But! Haven't I been advocating not to put emphasis on the other-ness of characters because it would defeat the point? Indeed! But writing is a lot like reading (if you're a pantser like me). The story tells itself in many ways. My characters aren't deliberately made dark-skinned or LGTB or even 'different' or 'diverse'. I'm not thinking 'why not make this character gay?' I'm thinking 'who does this character check out at the pool? Men or women? The girl his age or the guy who's two decades older than him? And most of the time I don't think at all. I just write and let the characters tell me who they are at their pace instead of forcing a persona and a plot onto them.
Think you should as well? Give it a try. It doesn't need to be a whole book or a whole story. Just lure in a character and ask them who they are. And then listen.
This is it for today's post. Liked it? Want to know more/see how I do it? Check out my short stories! You can read them all for free if you have a Kindle Unlimited subscription (which is useful)! :) Next (Wednesday's!) post will focus more on the writing part of diversity and why most protagonists in sci-fi and fantasy are straight/white/male.
Thank you for reading and I hope you have a great week!
J.M.
Holiday and A Sale!
Hi guys and girls!
There's two things I'd like to talk about today.
1. I'm sorry about the lack of last week's post. I wasn't home (read: on a too-short holiday) and had no access to a computer. It is my aim to put up a post today... if the dust mites don't get me first... and there will of course be another on Wednesday.
2. Two things happened on KPD. 2115 was read on Kindle Unlimited (yey!) and I sold a copy of Catching Fireflies! This makes me incredibly happy and it made my day (twice!)! :D I hope there are more sales/reads ahead!
Thank you for reading and I'm again sorry the promised blog post wasn't there last week. It'll be up soon.
There's two things I'd like to talk about today.
1. I'm sorry about the lack of last week's post. I wasn't home (read: on a too-short holiday) and had no access to a computer. It is my aim to put up a post today... if the dust mites don't get me first... and there will of course be another on Wednesday.
2. Two things happened on KPD. 2115 was read on Kindle Unlimited (yey!) and I sold a copy of Catching Fireflies! This makes me incredibly happy and it made my day (twice!)! :D I hope there are more sales/reads ahead!
Thank you for reading and I'm again sorry the promised blog post wasn't there last week. It'll be up soon.
Wednesday, June 29, 2016
Covers, Titles, and Blurbs. How important are blurbs?
Hi.
It has been emphasised in almost every essay on marketing and publishing that the three most important things, the things readers notice and absorb first about your book, are 1. The Title, 2. The Cover, and 3. The Blurb.
This is only logical. Your eyes is first drawn to the visual aspect of something you want to purchase. Does the style of the cover appeal to you? Will it look nice on your bookshelves? Is it proper eye candy?
Then your consciousness starts up and your attention is drawn to the title. Does the book have a cool title (especially valid for fiction)? Is the title fitting? Will your visitors be impressed when they see it on your bookshelf?
Then... supposedly... the blurb is next. But I want to ask you a question.
Do you actually read blurbs? (I mean 'read' in a wider sense than word-for-word. In this case skimming counts as reading.)
For most people, the answer will likely be yes. Most people read blurbs. Did you nod when you read the question? Did you say to yourself 'yes'? Well, that's creepy.
Errm...
Why would you not read a blurb? How then would you know whether the story is something you'd like? How else can you tell the book is something you want to read?
I have a confession to make.
I don't. I don't read blurbs because I read like I write. I don't want to know what the book is about before I start it. I don't want to be primed in any way. I want to come into the book like I don't know what's going on, and I want to find out what's going on while I read it. The cover and title are normally enough... and if they aren't, I drop the book. Life's too busy, and there's way too many great book out there to spend time on something you don't enjoy 100%.
A blurb can prime you. You'll expect the book to be a certain thing... and then you might be disappointed if you don't get it, even if the story was brilliant, and the blurb wrong for it, or just tailored to another version of it, a version that wasn't written, and that you won't find in the book. I'd rather be surprised, go on a journey. This way, I don't get impatient with the book, because I don't know what I'm waiting for, what still has to happen for the blurb to make sense/fulfill its potential.
I'd much rather have a cover that hints at mystery.
Why is the man with the staff facing off against some kind of water-demon? What's the with the girl in a man's knight's armour? Why are there four children stranded in a secluded valley? This, and the title, are the things that draw me in to such an extent that I forego the Blurb completely. They are much more effective on their own than if a Blurb is included.
In the same way I prefer books that don't explain their magic system, I'd rather find out about the magic of a book without being told what it is about.
What do you think? Does this seem like something you could agree with... or am I the only one who thinks this way?
I hope you're having a great week and your writing is going well! :)
Cheers!
Like this post? Like my short stories too! Like the insightful rantiness of this post? Become a stalker! Follow me on twitter @jimneyauthor. :D
It has been emphasised in almost every essay on marketing and publishing that the three most important things, the things readers notice and absorb first about your book, are 1. The Title, 2. The Cover, and 3. The Blurb.
This is only logical. Your eyes is first drawn to the visual aspect of something you want to purchase. Does the style of the cover appeal to you? Will it look nice on your bookshelves? Is it proper eye candy?
Then your consciousness starts up and your attention is drawn to the title. Does the book have a cool title (especially valid for fiction)? Is the title fitting? Will your visitors be impressed when they see it on your bookshelf?
Then... supposedly... the blurb is next. But I want to ask you a question.
Do you actually read blurbs? (I mean 'read' in a wider sense than word-for-word. In this case skimming counts as reading.)
For most people, the answer will likely be yes. Most people read blurbs. Did you nod when you read the question? Did you say to yourself 'yes'? Well, that's creepy.
Errm...
Why would you not read a blurb? How then would you know whether the story is something you'd like? How else can you tell the book is something you want to read?
I have a confession to make.
I don't. I don't read blurbs because I read like I write. I don't want to know what the book is about before I start it. I don't want to be primed in any way. I want to come into the book like I don't know what's going on, and I want to find out what's going on while I read it. The cover and title are normally enough... and if they aren't, I drop the book. Life's too busy, and there's way too many great book out there to spend time on something you don't enjoy 100%.
A blurb can prime you. You'll expect the book to be a certain thing... and then you might be disappointed if you don't get it, even if the story was brilliant, and the blurb wrong for it, or just tailored to another version of it, a version that wasn't written, and that you won't find in the book. I'd rather be surprised, go on a journey. This way, I don't get impatient with the book, because I don't know what I'm waiting for, what still has to happen for the blurb to make sense/fulfill its potential.
I'd much rather have a cover that hints at mystery.
Why is the man with the staff facing off against some kind of water-demon? What's the with the girl in a man's knight's armour? Why are there four children stranded in a secluded valley? This, and the title, are the things that draw me in to such an extent that I forego the Blurb completely. They are much more effective on their own than if a Blurb is included.
In the same way I prefer books that don't explain their magic system, I'd rather find out about the magic of a book without being told what it is about.
What do you think? Does this seem like something you could agree with... or am I the only one who thinks this way?
I hope you're having a great week and your writing is going well! :)
Cheers!
Like this post? Like my short stories too! Like the insightful rantiness of this post? Become a stalker! Follow me on twitter @jimneyauthor. :D
Wednesday, June 22, 2016
The Meaning of Success
Hi there again!
This post will start with a little bit about myself and my stories (especially my stories) to illustrate some important points. It's also the first of a series of What I've Learned posts.
I started to (write seriously) in 2012. I was 21. To date I've written 7 books. I don't know whether any of them will ever see the light of day as a professionally published title. Two of those seven novels I sent out to about ten (yes, in total) publishers and/or agents. I got one request for a full and then a swift rejection. Then more rejections.
I often wonder whether these novels-which-didn't-quite-work-out are successes - or not. I think they are. They weren't that great in many aspects. The prose was wonky and often an exercise in 'how many metaphors can I take from books I've read'. The plot didn't come together nicely - and sometimes not at all. They weren't picked up by publishers or agents. But the worst way they fall short is because they weren't read. They didn't bring in any money. BUT. They're successes in many ways.
They brought me joy to write and I still like to think about them once in a while (and who knows? Perhaps at some point I'll pick them up again and make them shiny!). They taught me more about the craft than any craft book, craft blog post, or craft panel I've attended. (And those have been plenty!) I have learned what NOT to do if I want a publishable book and what I could use instead. I have grown as a writer and as an author and also as a person.
At the time it was right.
I had to experiment. I even published one of the novels (the first) on KDP. I sold about six copies before deciding to end the experiment. It wasn't worth it commercially.
Personally? There were a lot of angry rants (mostly to my mom) and tears. But I'm happy I did it. I know what to look for now that I've published something else. This first book will never be available again (at least not in the form it was, which was admittedly atrocious) but I'm ready to give publishing another try. That's why there's six (6!) shiny new short stories on amazon.
Why? I want people to read my work. I want to see if I've gotten better - good enough to be read. I want to know whether someone else is interested in the things (variety) I care about.
Why? If these stories have any value then it's because they are real. They are real in the sense that I've told nothing but the truth. Everything else (remember those 7 discarded novels? Those tens of short stories?) isn't worth talking about. This is why this isn't a craft post. It's a truth post. Like my stories it's as real as I can make it.
And I would call this, at least, a success.
This post will start with a little bit about myself and my stories (especially my stories) to illustrate some important points. It's also the first of a series of What I've Learned posts.
I started to (write seriously) in 2012. I was 21. To date I've written 7 books. I don't know whether any of them will ever see the light of day as a professionally published title. Two of those seven novels I sent out to about ten (yes, in total) publishers and/or agents. I got one request for a full and then a swift rejection. Then more rejections.
I often wonder whether these novels-which-didn't-quite-work-out are successes - or not. I think they are. They weren't that great in many aspects. The prose was wonky and often an exercise in 'how many metaphors can I take from books I've read'. The plot didn't come together nicely - and sometimes not at all. They weren't picked up by publishers or agents. But the worst way they fall short is because they weren't read. They didn't bring in any money. BUT. They're successes in many ways.
They brought me joy to write and I still like to think about them once in a while (and who knows? Perhaps at some point I'll pick them up again and make them shiny!). They taught me more about the craft than any craft book, craft blog post, or craft panel I've attended. (And those have been plenty!) I have learned what NOT to do if I want a publishable book and what I could use instead. I have grown as a writer and as an author and also as a person.
At the time it was right.
I had to experiment. I even published one of the novels (the first) on KDP. I sold about six copies before deciding to end the experiment. It wasn't worth it commercially.
Personally? There were a lot of angry rants (mostly to my mom) and tears. But I'm happy I did it. I know what to look for now that I've published something else. This first book will never be available again (at least not in the form it was, which was admittedly atrocious) but I'm ready to give publishing another try. That's why there's six (6!) shiny new short stories on amazon.
Why? I want people to read my work. I want to see if I've gotten better - good enough to be read. I want to know whether someone else is interested in the things (variety) I care about.
Why? If these stories have any value then it's because they are real. They are real in the sense that I've told nothing but the truth. Everything else (remember those 7 discarded novels? Those tens of short stories?) isn't worth talking about. This is why this isn't a craft post. It's a truth post. Like my stories it's as real as I can make it.
And I would call this, at least, a success.
Friday, June 17, 2016
About Content
Hi there once again!
After getting the introduction out of the way, I want to share with you what I intend to do on this blog (in the near future and beyond).
1.) writing craft posts
There will be at least one post per week about the craft of writing or something related. I have put the release schedule on every Wednesday of the week - subject to change to another day if Wednesday doesn't work out.
Ah. I can hear you shouting already.
Who are you to give craft advice? I'll get to that in a bit (precisely? In the first craft post).
2.) news updates
This is mostly to update you on my work.
3.) There are several other options of what could be done on this blog in the future. I'll update this post when they're ready.
Thank you for reading and I hope you're having a great week!
J.M. Trent
PS: If you haven't yet, check out my Amazon Author Page Here! Happy reading, and as always, consider leaving a review! Reviews go a long way to help us authors out!
After getting the introduction out of the way, I want to share with you what I intend to do on this blog (in the near future and beyond).
1.) writing craft posts
There will be at least one post per week about the craft of writing or something related. I have put the release schedule on every Wednesday of the week - subject to change to another day if Wednesday doesn't work out.
Ah. I can hear you shouting already.
Who are you to give craft advice? I'll get to that in a bit (precisely? In the first craft post).
2.) news updates
This is mostly to update you on my work.
3.) There are several other options of what could be done on this blog in the future. I'll update this post when they're ready.
Thank you for reading and I hope you're having a great week!
J.M. Trent
PS: If you haven't yet, check out my Amazon Author Page Here! Happy reading, and as always, consider leaving a review! Reviews go a long way to help us authors out!
About the Blog (and its Author!)
Hi there!
I'm J.M. Trent. I'm a writer and reader of mostly fantasy, some science fiction, and some action/adventure, mystery, magical, et cetera fiction. I like games (RPGs, MMOs, FPS, you name it!) and movies almost as much. Oddly enough (do you believe it?) I also like The Outdoors.
As the first blog post, this should be shiny. I'll see what I can do.
1.) I am a writer from Austria. I write exclusively in English.
I've been writing fantasy and science fiction stories ever since high school (instead of doing homework/paying attention in class) - with a lot of doodling of characters in between of course - and after spending the last three years exclusively on the writing craft I hope to level up to the 10,000 required mastery points soon!
I've written a couple of stories by now: 7 books - at least. More about that later.
2.) In addition to my stories (always more stories!) I'm also working on this blog and a website.
I'll update this part of the post once the website is out.
3.) In the meantime there's six (six!) short stories out on amazon you might like to try.
I'd be more than happy if you do! You can borrow them for free if you have a Kindle Unlimited membership (which you should! It's inexpensive and it gives you access to thousands of books, essays, and short stories.)
J.M. Trent's Amazon Author Page
Please consider leaving a review. Authors live for reviews!
Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy my work. Please contact me at jmtrentauthor@gmail.com if you have any questions/requests/comments! I look forward to hearing from you.
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