I'm doing a "flying nun" trick today! Posting here AND at Writer Unboxed: "The Butcher, the Baker, the Candlestick Maker"
Which is, oddly, a great way to introduce this topic of being burned out and needing a break. On Monday I finished a short story I'd started earlier this month. I wrote the first half of it in about a week, then we went on vacation for a week, then I nibbled at it for another week and was honestly thinking I would NOT have it done in time for the Oct. 31st deadline... then this past Monday I wrote the entire second half of it in one day.
And that made me tired. It felt good to type END but...
The final parts of a story are often the most intense. Mental exhaustion leads to physical exhaustion. What have I written since finishing that story on Monday? Aside from a few edits (on that story) and my weekday blog posts... NOTHING.
That will change come next Monday, which also happens to be the first day of a new month. November! But, sorry to disappoint, I don't do NaNo. I will, however, be diving headfirst into finishing one of my novels that I'd started a few months ago.
The main reason I couldn't get anywhere on it before (although I didn't realize this until now) was that I knew I had a short story deadline coming up, and I hadn't even started the story yet. That was enough to niggle at my brain and TOTALLY MESSED UP MY MOJO. Now that I don't have to worry about it anymore, all the sudden my novel is clear in my head and ready to be written.
But I'm still allowing myself some much-needed "me time" for the rest of this month.
I'm reading (well, I always read, but now I'm reading simply for the joy it). I'm lazily flipping through fashion magazines, fantasizing about a time when I can actually afford new clothing. I'm cleaning my (very neglected) apartment. I'm doing stuff with my son that doesn't involve the television. I'm MOVING again. My poor legs forgot what it feels like to walk and run and skip and jump. I'm reminding my fingers that there is more to life than typing.
I actually styled my hair yesterday and put on make-up, and wore something other than a tee shirt and sweats.
So why not give yourself a break this weekend? I know many of you are gearing up for NaNo, which gives you even more reason to take it easy the next couple days before you're knee-deep in the craziness. See you all on the flip side!
Happy relaxing,
~Lydia
Friday, October 29, 2010
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Quotable Quotes
"Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius, and it's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring."
~Marilyn Monroe
"Do what you feel in your heart to be right -- for you'll be criticized anyway."
~Eleanor Roosevelt
"It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all - in which case, you fail by default."
~J.K. Rowling
"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away."
~Maya Angelou
"It is better to be hated for what you are than loved for what you are not."
~Andre Gide
"I have not failed; I've found 10,000 ways that don't work."
~Thomas Edison
"Every writer has an audience out there somewhere. They just have to find it."
~Lydia Sharp
Your turn! Please add your favorite quote (about writing or life in general) to the comments.
~Marilyn Monroe
"Do what you feel in your heart to be right -- for you'll be criticized anyway."
~Eleanor Roosevelt
"It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all - in which case, you fail by default."
~J.K. Rowling
"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away."
~Maya Angelou
"It is better to be hated for what you are than loved for what you are not."
~Andre Gide
"I have not failed; I've found 10,000 ways that don't work."
~Thomas Edison
"Every writer has an audience out there somewhere. They just have to find it."
~Lydia Sharp
Your turn! Please add your favorite quote (about writing or life in general) to the comments.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
What Exactly Is Women's Fiction?
Now that we've spent nearly an entire month discussing some specifics of the genre, I'd like to clarify what it is. I know, I'm all backwards like that. I should have made THIS the very first post, but whatever.
Pretty much anyone you address this question to, even longtime fans/readers of women's fic and authors of women's fic, will give you a different answer. So the following post is simply my personal rendition of the eighth wonder of the world.
What women's fic is and sort of isn't: fiction for women. I mean, yes, that is a true statement. Women ARE the target audience of women's fiction, but to me that's an insultingly generic definition. Women read TONS more fiction than what is officially termed women's fiction. We read science fiction. We read fantasy. We read mystery. We read horror. We even read YA. So, by that ridiculous definition above, ALL fiction is women's fiction, because women read ALL genres/types of fiction.
Get my point? So there has to be more to it than that. Fear not, my friends. There is.
When you see someone define women's fiction as "fiction for women", don't be afraid to call bullshit. In my experience, that statement is usually made by someone who doesn't specialize in women's fic, even if they are considered a pro in the publishing industry. They likely focus on a different genre or type, and therefore do not understand what women's fic actually encompasses. If you want to know what women's fic is, ask agents who rep it, ask editors who buy it, and ask authors who write it.
Hi. My name is Lydia, and I am an author of women's fiction. Here is my definition:
Women's fiction focuses on the female experience.
Since I also write YA, I'm going to use that to back up my definition.
Young adult fiction focuses on the teen experience. (Not young adult fiction is fiction for teens. Again, it is sort of a true statement, but SO NOT the same thing, especially since a good percentage of YA readers are not teenagers.)
Who's going to argue with that? Anyone? That is the accepted definition of a type that can sometimes be just as difficult to define as women's fiction. Why? Because there are so many avenues that it can take. We have YA fantasy, YA sci-fi, YA contemp, YA historical, YA romance, etc, etc, etc. So the definition of the common denominator has to be the answer to: What is the main theme? For YA, the answer is always focused on some aspect of the teen experience.
Isn't the same true of women's fic? Whether it be spec fic based, or historical fic based, or contemp fic based, the main theme always revolves around some aspect of the female experience.
For example, consider two of my fave women's fic authors. They both have novels labeled women's fiction that also include speculative fiction elements. THE LAST WILL OF MOIRA LEAHY by Therese Walsh, and TIME OF MY LIFE by Allison Winn Scotch. In LAST WILL, the main theme focuses on the relationship between two sisters. In TOML, the main theme focuses on marital relationships. This is what makes them women's fiction. Period. TIME OF MY LIFE is not Allison's only women's fic novel with spec fic elements (to date), and you will never see any of them filed under SF/F.
So where IS women's fic filed? Unfortunately, since the definition cannot be universally agreed upon, the bulk of women's fic (pretty much anything other than straight-up romance) is shelved under the generic "fiction" category, the place where we put things that we don't know how to label. Everything from Jodi Picoult to Stephen King to Jane Austen to Thomas Pynchon... on the same shelf? To me, that's sad. I think a lot of these stories are not seen by their target audience because they are not set apart the way they should be, and this adversely affects their sales potential.
But don't let this shy you away from pursuing a career as a women's fic author if that is what you so desire. Whatever you write, you must have a passion for it. And women's fiction, as a category, is still going strong.
So that's it, guys. This was my last official post on women's fiction for the month. If you would like to see another theme month of some sort in the future, let me know in the comments here. We can do SF/F, or YA, or short fiction, or... NaNo. Heh. I guess that would be next month, eh? Hmm... I might have a trick or two up my sleeve for November. We'll see.
In the meantime, happy writing (no matter what you call it).
~Lydia
Pretty much anyone you address this question to, even longtime fans/readers of women's fic and authors of women's fic, will give you a different answer. So the following post is simply my personal rendition of the eighth wonder of the world.
What women's fic is and sort of isn't: fiction for women. I mean, yes, that is a true statement. Women ARE the target audience of women's fiction, but to me that's an insultingly generic definition. Women read TONS more fiction than what is officially termed women's fiction. We read science fiction. We read fantasy. We read mystery. We read horror. We even read YA. So, by that ridiculous definition above, ALL fiction is women's fiction, because women read ALL genres/types of fiction.
Get my point? So there has to be more to it than that. Fear not, my friends. There is.
When you see someone define women's fiction as "fiction for women", don't be afraid to call bullshit. In my experience, that statement is usually made by someone who doesn't specialize in women's fic, even if they are considered a pro in the publishing industry. They likely focus on a different genre or type, and therefore do not understand what women's fic actually encompasses. If you want to know what women's fic is, ask agents who rep it, ask editors who buy it, and ask authors who write it.
Hi. My name is Lydia, and I am an author of women's fiction. Here is my definition:
Women's fiction focuses on the female experience.
Since I also write YA, I'm going to use that to back up my definition.
Young adult fiction focuses on the teen experience. (Not young adult fiction is fiction for teens. Again, it is sort of a true statement, but SO NOT the same thing, especially since a good percentage of YA readers are not teenagers.)
Who's going to argue with that? Anyone? That is the accepted definition of a type that can sometimes be just as difficult to define as women's fiction. Why? Because there are so many avenues that it can take. We have YA fantasy, YA sci-fi, YA contemp, YA historical, YA romance, etc, etc, etc. So the definition of the common denominator has to be the answer to: What is the main theme? For YA, the answer is always focused on some aspect of the teen experience.
Isn't the same true of women's fic? Whether it be spec fic based, or historical fic based, or contemp fic based, the main theme always revolves around some aspect of the female experience.
For example, consider two of my fave women's fic authors. They both have novels labeled women's fiction that also include speculative fiction elements. THE LAST WILL OF MOIRA LEAHY by Therese Walsh, and TIME OF MY LIFE by Allison Winn Scotch. In LAST WILL, the main theme focuses on the relationship between two sisters. In TOML, the main theme focuses on marital relationships. This is what makes them women's fiction. Period. TIME OF MY LIFE is not Allison's only women's fic novel with spec fic elements (to date), and you will never see any of them filed under SF/F.
So where IS women's fic filed? Unfortunately, since the definition cannot be universally agreed upon, the bulk of women's fic (pretty much anything other than straight-up romance) is shelved under the generic "fiction" category, the place where we put things that we don't know how to label. Everything from Jodi Picoult to Stephen King to Jane Austen to Thomas Pynchon... on the same shelf? To me, that's sad. I think a lot of these stories are not seen by their target audience because they are not set apart the way they should be, and this adversely affects their sales potential.
But don't let this shy you away from pursuing a career as a women's fic author if that is what you so desire. Whatever you write, you must have a passion for it. And women's fiction, as a category, is still going strong.
So that's it, guys. This was my last official post on women's fiction for the month. If you would like to see another theme month of some sort in the future, let me know in the comments here. We can do SF/F, or YA, or short fiction, or... NaNo. Heh. I guess that would be next month, eh? Hmm... I might have a trick or two up my sleeve for November. We'll see.
In the meantime, happy writing (no matter what you call it).
~Lydia
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Tuesday Tunes - In Memory of Those We've Lost
I'm not talking about the recent rash of teen suicides. Yet. That shall be addressed in a future post.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and while I've not lost anyone to breast cancer, specifically, I have lost a grandfather to lung cancer, a co-worker to lung cancer, and my only brother is currently undergoing chemotherapy to kill the cancer in his lymph system, even after having his entire thyroid gland removed. The first two were both elderly when they succumbed to this wretched illness. My brother was diagnosed earlier this year at age 36, and as far as I could tell beforehand, he'd been in generally good health.
I never got along with my brother very well, both as kids and as adults, but that doesn't mean I want him to die. No one deserves to get cancer. Not even your pet dog.
Cancer doesn't care who you are, what you are, where you are, or how old you are. It will eat you alive without bias. If caught early, your chances of survival greatly increase, but you still have to put up a damn hard fight.
I wasn't with my grandpa when he died, but I remember my uncle (one of his sons) who was with him, talking about that precise moment. He said his whole body relaxed, and the tension in his face just melted away. All the pain he'd been enduring for years vanished. In that way, it was a relief. But I'd still rather have had my grandpa at my wedding. He died exactly one month before.
To anyone who has battled with cancer, either in yourself or in someone close to you, my heart goes out to you. And to those who fought and lost, we remember you.
To my grandpa, I remember how hard you worked on your farm every day and how I never heard you complain about anything, even when things were at their worst. To Wanita, I remember the first day I worked with you and how much I screwed up, but you were so patient and kind, and you made a mean pasta salad on employee food days.
Even though we miss you dearly, we're glad you are no longer suffering. This song is for you.
And to my brother, I know we fought a lot, but I also remember when you stood up for me when I was 7 or 8, when a couple of older kids were trying to bully me at the local swimming pool. I remember your exact words, "What do you think you're doing to my sister? Back off." You're a good person inside, and I wish I'd shown that I felt that way more often.
Get better.
~Lydia
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and while I've not lost anyone to breast cancer, specifically, I have lost a grandfather to lung cancer, a co-worker to lung cancer, and my only brother is currently undergoing chemotherapy to kill the cancer in his lymph system, even after having his entire thyroid gland removed. The first two were both elderly when they succumbed to this wretched illness. My brother was diagnosed earlier this year at age 36, and as far as I could tell beforehand, he'd been in generally good health.
I never got along with my brother very well, both as kids and as adults, but that doesn't mean I want him to die. No one deserves to get cancer. Not even your pet dog.
Cancer doesn't care who you are, what you are, where you are, or how old you are. It will eat you alive without bias. If caught early, your chances of survival greatly increase, but you still have to put up a damn hard fight.
I wasn't with my grandpa when he died, but I remember my uncle (one of his sons) who was with him, talking about that precise moment. He said his whole body relaxed, and the tension in his face just melted away. All the pain he'd been enduring for years vanished. In that way, it was a relief. But I'd still rather have had my grandpa at my wedding. He died exactly one month before.
To anyone who has battled with cancer, either in yourself or in someone close to you, my heart goes out to you. And to those who fought and lost, we remember you.
To my grandpa, I remember how hard you worked on your farm every day and how I never heard you complain about anything, even when things were at their worst. To Wanita, I remember the first day I worked with you and how much I screwed up, but you were so patient and kind, and you made a mean pasta salad on employee food days.
Even though we miss you dearly, we're glad you are no longer suffering. This song is for you.
And to my brother, I know we fought a lot, but I also remember when you stood up for me when I was 7 or 8, when a couple of older kids were trying to bully me at the local swimming pool. I remember your exact words, "What do you think you're doing to my sister? Back off." You're a good person inside, and I wish I'd shown that I felt that way more often.
Get better.
~Lydia
Monday, October 25, 2010
Special Guest Post: "Neglected Character Types In Women's Fiction" by Jessica Brooks
Please give a hearty welcome to women's fic and YA author, Jessica Brooks!
Jessica Brooks lives in sunny California with her husband, Lovemuffin, and their three daughters (plus three dogs, one snake, two fish, a cat, and a rabbit). She uses her love (aka addiction) of coffee to fuel her love (aka addiction) for all things writerly, and shares most of her addictive thoughts on her blog, My Thoughts Exactly. She is also on twitter and facebook.
-----
When Lydia asked if I'd like to guest post about a women's fiction topic, I was a bit wary at first. Sure I read women's fiction -- I even write it. But figuring out one specific thing to highlight? Ack! Luckily, one of my favorite things about women's fiction is the characters and their interaction with each other, so that's what I'm going to talk about today: Characters I'd like to see more of in women's fiction, and why.
1) An MC who knows how to say no.
Secondary character: "Could you do (insert whatever here) for me today?"
MC: "Yeah right. You're crazy in the head."
MCs don't have to be doormats. They can have conflict, decisions to make and internal issues that don't involve figuring out how to say no (or not being able to). What do you find more exiting, a character sitting around twiddling her thumbs about having to make yet another pie for the neighborhood picnic, or a character who just went off on her best friend for expecting her to pay for gas on a five minute trip? (Even better, make me think she's crazy-selfish, then fifty pages later, throw out some interesting reason as to why paying for gas was such a big deal.)
2) An MC who is on the heavy side, knows it, and works it to her full advantage.
Bigger women can have self-confidence too, ya know.
Say the MC is a little on the large side. Now say the reader finds this out in some simple, almost-easy-to-miss-if-they're-skimming-through-the-story, way. The reader now knows she isn't all skin and bones, so you can go straight to giving her a high dose of self-confidence. Show men dropping like flies as she passes by, jobs being thrown at her because she's good at what she does. Explain how she struts her stuff through a restaurant, knowing she's lookin' good. My point is, women and weight issues go hand in hand. That topic is old news. But a woman who's a little heavier, who enjoys eating her entire dinner while on a first date, who flaunts those bosoms because she can and knows what she wants and gets it -- that's the kind of character I want to learn more about.
3) MCs who are selfish. Who aren't very good at explaining how they feel. Who, by the end of the book, become caring, or good at something they were terrible at, in the end.
I loves me a transformation.
An MC doesn't have to be a flat-out jerk in the beginning of the book, or come across as someone who has their lips practically sewn shut and can't speak for themselves, to have a transformation. But why can't it be something a little like that, at least? A character who can't stand her father, for instance, and is overly hateful toward him -- but the further you read, the more you understand the reasons she acts that way. Then throw something out there, a situation that makes everything switch, a full three-sixty. Show me she's starting to care. It could be little hints at first, or a full-out personality switcheroo. Now when I close that book, I'm going to feel satisfied. I watched her grow. I went through the epiphany (whether it was hers, mine, or ours) with her. I'm proud of her growth. I call that a WIN.
4) Villains.
Villains are great. Give me mean, petty women, then show me how the MC kicks their butts. (This could be done literally, figuratively, or both.)
It's happened to all of us -- that one character who makes us cringe when they enter a scene. "Oh crud. What terrible thing is she/he going to say now?" or "Noooooo she's going to tell Billy's brother's ex-wife that Jennie is the one who hid the adoption papers! Run, Jennie! Run the other way!" Let's face it. All women have their witchy-side, but not all of them show it. Nothing makes me root for a character more than seeing them finally stand up for themselves and deal with that annoying villain (preferably totally and completely embarrassing said villain in the process).
And there you have it. Four character types I'd like to see more in women's fiction. What kind of characters would you like to see more?
-----
These are some really great insights, Jessica. Thanks so much for joining us today!
~Lydia
Jessica Brooks lives in sunny California with her husband, Lovemuffin, and their three daughters (plus three dogs, one snake, two fish, a cat, and a rabbit). She uses her love (aka addiction) of coffee to fuel her love (aka addiction) for all things writerly, and shares most of her addictive thoughts on her blog, My Thoughts Exactly. She is also on twitter and facebook.
-----
When Lydia asked if I'd like to guest post about a women's fiction topic, I was a bit wary at first. Sure I read women's fiction -- I even write it. But figuring out one specific thing to highlight? Ack! Luckily, one of my favorite things about women's fiction is the characters and their interaction with each other, so that's what I'm going to talk about today: Characters I'd like to see more of in women's fiction, and why.
1) An MC who knows how to say no.
Secondary character: "Could you do (insert whatever here) for me today?"
MC: "Yeah right. You're crazy in the head."
MCs don't have to be doormats. They can have conflict, decisions to make and internal issues that don't involve figuring out how to say no (or not being able to). What do you find more exiting, a character sitting around twiddling her thumbs about having to make yet another pie for the neighborhood picnic, or a character who just went off on her best friend for expecting her to pay for gas on a five minute trip? (Even better, make me think she's crazy-selfish, then fifty pages later, throw out some interesting reason as to why paying for gas was such a big deal.)
2) An MC who is on the heavy side, knows it, and works it to her full advantage.
Bigger women can have self-confidence too, ya know.
Say the MC is a little on the large side. Now say the reader finds this out in some simple, almost-easy-to-miss-if-they're-skimming-through-the-story, way. The reader now knows she isn't all skin and bones, so you can go straight to giving her a high dose of self-confidence. Show men dropping like flies as she passes by, jobs being thrown at her because she's good at what she does. Explain how she struts her stuff through a restaurant, knowing she's lookin' good. My point is, women and weight issues go hand in hand. That topic is old news. But a woman who's a little heavier, who enjoys eating her entire dinner while on a first date, who flaunts those bosoms because she can and knows what she wants and gets it -- that's the kind of character I want to learn more about.
3) MCs who are selfish. Who aren't very good at explaining how they feel. Who, by the end of the book, become caring, or good at something they were terrible at, in the end.
I loves me a transformation.
An MC doesn't have to be a flat-out jerk in the beginning of the book, or come across as someone who has their lips practically sewn shut and can't speak for themselves, to have a transformation. But why can't it be something a little like that, at least? A character who can't stand her father, for instance, and is overly hateful toward him -- but the further you read, the more you understand the reasons she acts that way. Then throw something out there, a situation that makes everything switch, a full three-sixty. Show me she's starting to care. It could be little hints at first, or a full-out personality switcheroo. Now when I close that book, I'm going to feel satisfied. I watched her grow. I went through the epiphany (whether it was hers, mine, or ours) with her. I'm proud of her growth. I call that a WIN.
4) Villains.
Villains are great. Give me mean, petty women, then show me how the MC kicks their butts. (This could be done literally, figuratively, or both.)
It's happened to all of us -- that one character who makes us cringe when they enter a scene. "Oh crud. What terrible thing is she/he going to say now?" or "Noooooo she's going to tell Billy's brother's ex-wife that Jennie is the one who hid the adoption papers! Run, Jennie! Run the other way!" Let's face it. All women have their witchy-side, but not all of them show it. Nothing makes me root for a character more than seeing them finally stand up for themselves and deal with that annoying villain (preferably totally and completely embarrassing said villain in the process).
And there you have it. Four character types I'd like to see more in women's fiction. What kind of characters would you like to see more?
-----
These are some really great insights, Jessica. Thanks so much for joining us today!
~Lydia
Saturday, October 23, 2010
A Review of Reviews
As I'd mentioned in a previous post, I've made it a goal to post reviews of every book I finish from now on. If you follow me on GoodReads (side note: I am now an official GoodReads Author!) and you see I'm "currently reading" something then it suddenly disappears, that means I put the book down and deleted it from my bookshelf. You can rightly assume I hated it. I don't finish books just to finish them, and I don't review books that I don't finish. Even in my bad reviews (which are rare), I will find something good to say about it, because if there was nothing good to say about it, I would not have kept reading.
Here are links to all the reviews I've written since reiterating that goal in September. Going forward, I will post a monthly recap of my reviews here on this blog.
Movie Reviews at The SF Scrivener:
JUMPER
SPLICE
REPO MEN
For all of my movie reviews, click here.
Book Reviews at The Book Book:
SIMPLY FROM SCRATCH, Alicia Bessette (contemp women's fiction)
GOOD GRIEF, Lolly Winston (contemp women's fiction)
A SEPARATE PEACE, John Knowles (young adult historical)
THE IRON KING, Julie Kagawa (young adult fantasy)
THE IRON DAUGHTER, Julie Kagawa (young adult fantasy)
THE SHIFTER, Janice Hardy (middle grade fantasy)
BLUE FIRE, Janice Hardy (middle grade fantasy)
For all of my book reviews, click here.
Happy reading,
~Lydia
Here are links to all the reviews I've written since reiterating that goal in September. Going forward, I will post a monthly recap of my reviews here on this blog.
Movie Reviews at The SF Scrivener:
JUMPER
SPLICE
REPO MEN
For all of my movie reviews, click here.
Book Reviews at The Book Book:
SIMPLY FROM SCRATCH, Alicia Bessette (contemp women's fiction)
GOOD GRIEF, Lolly Winston (contemp women's fiction)
A SEPARATE PEACE, John Knowles (young adult historical)
THE IRON KING, Julie Kagawa (young adult fantasy)
THE IRON DAUGHTER, Julie Kagawa (young adult fantasy)
THE SHIFTER, Janice Hardy (middle grade fantasy)
BLUE FIRE, Janice Hardy (middle grade fantasy)
For all of my book reviews, click here.
Happy reading,
~Lydia
Friday, October 22, 2010
When Every Word Is a Struggle (take 2)
(Thank you all for the feedback in yesterday's post! Keep it coming.)
Let's hope Blogger doesn't get hungry again this morning. Unfortunately, the post will be slightly different today than the one I lost yesterday. For the most part, I don't pre-schedule my posts. I honestly don't even have a plan of what I'm going to write from one day to the next. I get out of bed, make coffee, check my email, then get to blogging whatever I happen to be thinking of that day. Every so often, an idea will strike me in the afternoon or evening and I'll save it as a draft for a yet-to-be-determined date, usually when I'm doing a theme week or a theme month. But beyond that, no. I mostly write "on the fly."
Which is why comments from writers who are considering starting a blog, along the vein of "what do I blog about? I'll run out of things to say" make me suggest to them that they should try some other venue, like Twitter (only 140 characters allowed per tweet!). Blogging isn't for everyone, and there's no shame in that. Personally, I don't think I'll EVER run out of things to say. But that's just me.
And now to the task at hand...
If you're new to writing, you might think that the longer you do this, the easier it gets. Well, yes and no. In the beginning, I had no trouble getting the words out, but the words weren't all that great. I had grammar errors galore, and there was this thing called passive voice that had decided to take over everything. I knew how to end a chapter on a thruster, but had no idea how to edit for pacing. Etc, etc, etc.
You get the idea. Mainly, I had a good story to tell (I still think that first novel is one of my best stories, but not very well written). I just did not yet have the skills to tell it in the way it deserved.
After completing three novels (one of which is finally enticing enough to possibly sell) and several pieces of short fiction (two of which are published), and years of practice writing, editing, revising, and helping other people with their own work... you'd think I wouldn't encounter anything that could be called a "struggle."
Wrong. Writing is a creative process, and as is the case with anything creative, you always have the possibility of a major brain fart no matter how long you've been honing your craft.
I'm currently in one of those downs. But let me clarify: The problem is NOT writer's block. The problem isn't that I have a lack of ideas. The problem is that I'm having trouble getting those ideas onto the screen in a way that doesn't scream total suckage.
The problem is me. It's all in my head.
I also think the problem is that I'm tackling the daunting task of acquiring an agent at the same time as I'm trying to work on new projects. For those of you who have not yet experienced the query phase of being a novelist, let me just say this: getting an agent is worth it, but is definitely hard work. It's mentally exhausting. And that's not even factoring in the fortuity needed to keep going in the face of rejections.
Since I began my query quest, every word is a struggle. I've got two novels in progress that are getting nothing but a few scribbles here and there. Usually, a first draft will come to me fast and furious and then I'll spend a few months revising and editing. Now it's just... ugh. No other word for it. Just UGH.
I'm lucky if I get 500 words out in a day. I realize that a lot of writers have a daily goal of 500 words, and I'm in no way implying that this is not an accomplishment or that those who have that goal are somehow below standard. You're not. But for me, that is an extremely low output for a first draft.
And I can see that the stuff I'm writing now is worlds better than what I wrote even just a year ago, but still, it's a struggle. It's just not flowing how it should be. The scenes are stuck in my head, merely trickling out through my fingertips, and by the time they hit the screen they've lost their clarity. Characters are appearing flat. Settings are lacking detail. Dialogue is stilted, at best.
So what's a gal to do?
1. Bang head on desk. After you get the ice pack and pop a few ibuprofen, go to step 2.
2. Phone a friend. Or, as it was in my case, IM a writer-friend online.
Every writer should have at least one writer-friend they know they can trust to be completely honest with them in any given situation. I'm lucky to have three such people in my life, but I only talked to one of them about this, earlier this week, when my frustration was at its peak.
I'm trying to get a short story done for an anthology that is due at the end of this month. Less than ten days left to finish it now, and the first draft is only about half done. I worked on it most of the day Monday, then got to a point where I seriously could not even get out one more sentence. My writer-friend just happened to catch me online checking my email after that, so we talked.
For about two hours. And most of it was me venting about how crappy my writing is lately.
Like I said before, this person has always been honest with me. If something I write is a heap of crap, she'll tell me. Conversely, if she thinks it's brilliant, she won't be quiet about that either.
She said: Lydia, you're burned out. You need to take it slow for a while.
I knew this. But sometimes it takes someone else telling you something you already know before you believe it enough to take action.
Notice she didn't tell me to stop completely. She knows me too well. I'm used to finishing projects quickly, so my main frustration was with myself, not my stories. I felt I should be producing more than I was, and that, in turn, made it even more difficult to get things done.
The solution? Chillax.
It's okay to have a lower output for a while, as long as you're still writing every day. It's okay to write a crappy first draft, as long as you fix it later. And I ultimately had to tell myself it's okay if I don't finish this story on time, as long as I finish it, period. There will be other anthologies that it might be a good fit for, and even if there aren't, there are plenty of other short fiction venues that I could submit to.
Then a funny thing happened on Tuesday. I wrote the next full scene in less than an hour.
Happy writing,
~Lydia
Let's hope Blogger doesn't get hungry again this morning. Unfortunately, the post will be slightly different today than the one I lost yesterday. For the most part, I don't pre-schedule my posts. I honestly don't even have a plan of what I'm going to write from one day to the next. I get out of bed, make coffee, check my email, then get to blogging whatever I happen to be thinking of that day. Every so often, an idea will strike me in the afternoon or evening and I'll save it as a draft for a yet-to-be-determined date, usually when I'm doing a theme week or a theme month. But beyond that, no. I mostly write "on the fly."
Which is why comments from writers who are considering starting a blog, along the vein of "what do I blog about? I'll run out of things to say" make me suggest to them that they should try some other venue, like Twitter (only 140 characters allowed per tweet!). Blogging isn't for everyone, and there's no shame in that. Personally, I don't think I'll EVER run out of things to say. But that's just me.
And now to the task at hand...
If you're new to writing, you might think that the longer you do this, the easier it gets. Well, yes and no. In the beginning, I had no trouble getting the words out, but the words weren't all that great. I had grammar errors galore, and there was this thing called passive voice that had decided to take over everything. I knew how to end a chapter on a thruster, but had no idea how to edit for pacing. Etc, etc, etc.
You get the idea. Mainly, I had a good story to tell (I still think that first novel is one of my best stories, but not very well written). I just did not yet have the skills to tell it in the way it deserved.
After completing three novels (one of which is finally enticing enough to possibly sell) and several pieces of short fiction (two of which are published), and years of practice writing, editing, revising, and helping other people with their own work... you'd think I wouldn't encounter anything that could be called a "struggle."
Wrong. Writing is a creative process, and as is the case with anything creative, you always have the possibility of a major brain fart no matter how long you've been honing your craft.
I'm currently in one of those downs. But let me clarify: The problem is NOT writer's block. The problem isn't that I have a lack of ideas. The problem is that I'm having trouble getting those ideas onto the screen in a way that doesn't scream total suckage.
The problem is me. It's all in my head.
I also think the problem is that I'm tackling the daunting task of acquiring an agent at the same time as I'm trying to work on new projects. For those of you who have not yet experienced the query phase of being a novelist, let me just say this: getting an agent is worth it, but is definitely hard work. It's mentally exhausting. And that's not even factoring in the fortuity needed to keep going in the face of rejections.
Since I began my query quest, every word is a struggle. I've got two novels in progress that are getting nothing but a few scribbles here and there. Usually, a first draft will come to me fast and furious and then I'll spend a few months revising and editing. Now it's just... ugh. No other word for it. Just UGH.
I'm lucky if I get 500 words out in a day. I realize that a lot of writers have a daily goal of 500 words, and I'm in no way implying that this is not an accomplishment or that those who have that goal are somehow below standard. You're not. But for me, that is an extremely low output for a first draft.
And I can see that the stuff I'm writing now is worlds better than what I wrote even just a year ago, but still, it's a struggle. It's just not flowing how it should be. The scenes are stuck in my head, merely trickling out through my fingertips, and by the time they hit the screen they've lost their clarity. Characters are appearing flat. Settings are lacking detail. Dialogue is stilted, at best.
So what's a gal to do?
1. Bang head on desk. After you get the ice pack and pop a few ibuprofen, go to step 2.
2. Phone a friend. Or, as it was in my case, IM a writer-friend online.
Every writer should have at least one writer-friend they know they can trust to be completely honest with them in any given situation. I'm lucky to have three such people in my life, but I only talked to one of them about this, earlier this week, when my frustration was at its peak.
I'm trying to get a short story done for an anthology that is due at the end of this month. Less than ten days left to finish it now, and the first draft is only about half done. I worked on it most of the day Monday, then got to a point where I seriously could not even get out one more sentence. My writer-friend just happened to catch me online checking my email after that, so we talked.
For about two hours. And most of it was me venting about how crappy my writing is lately.
Like I said before, this person has always been honest with me. If something I write is a heap of crap, she'll tell me. Conversely, if she thinks it's brilliant, she won't be quiet about that either.
She said: Lydia, you're burned out. You need to take it slow for a while.
I knew this. But sometimes it takes someone else telling you something you already know before you believe it enough to take action.
Notice she didn't tell me to stop completely. She knows me too well. I'm used to finishing projects quickly, so my main frustration was with myself, not my stories. I felt I should be producing more than I was, and that, in turn, made it even more difficult to get things done.
The solution? Chillax.
It's okay to have a lower output for a while, as long as you're still writing every day. It's okay to write a crappy first draft, as long as you fix it later. And I ultimately had to tell myself it's okay if I don't finish this story on time, as long as I finish it, period. There will be other anthologies that it might be a good fit for, and even if there aren't, there are plenty of other short fiction venues that I could submit to.
Then a funny thing happened on Tuesday. I wrote the next full scene in less than an hour.
Happy writing,
~Lydia
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Well That Just Totally Ruined My Day; aka, Looks Like a Good Excuse For a Poll
I just finished typing up a fabulous post for this morning, and Blogger decided to eat it. RAR! I don't have time to re-type the whole thing, and it probably wouldn't be as good anyway, since now I'm all irritated about losing the original.
Instead, I'm going to pose a question, or two, that I was actually saving for later this month, but I guess now is as good a time as any.
In the past few months we've gained a lot of new readers here, and I'd like to know a bit more about you all so I can cater the posts accordingly. Obviously, you must already like something you saw or you wouldn't be here, but just feed my curiosity for a moment. OB-KB?
Not putting up an actual poll with the nifty buttons and stats. Just looking for answers in the comments.
Answer as many or as few as you like. THANK YOU in advance. My main goal for this blog is to be helpful and sometimes fun. Any input from you, the readers, on how I can improve is greatly appreciated.
Happy writing!
Lydia
Instead, I'm going to pose a question, or two, that I was actually saving for later this month, but I guess now is as good a time as any.
In the past few months we've gained a lot of new readers here, and I'd like to know a bit more about you all so I can cater the posts accordingly. Obviously, you must already like something you saw or you wouldn't be here, but just feed my curiosity for a moment. OB-KB?
Not putting up an actual poll with the nifty buttons and stats. Just looking for answers in the comments.
- Where are you on your publishing path? (published? working toward first publication? published in nonfiction, but not yet in fiction? etc.)
- Do you write as a hobby or do you consider this a career (even if you write part time)?
- What is your main writing focus? (novels? short fiction? picture books? poetry? etc.)
- What genres do you write, if any?
- If you write novels, at what stage are you currently in? (first draft of very first novel, fourth novel but none published yet, querying, agented but not yet published, submitting to editors, awaiting release, etc.)
- If you write short fiction, at what stage are you currently in?
- What topics would you like to see discussed here that have not been covered and/or what topics would you like to revisit that you've found helpful in the past?
Answer as many or as few as you like. THANK YOU in advance. My main goal for this blog is to be helpful and sometimes fun. Any input from you, the readers, on how I can improve is greatly appreciated.
Happy writing!
Lydia
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Essentials In Women's Fiction - Men
That post title is so oxymoronic. But it's true. I honestly can't think of a single women's fic story that doesn't include either a male MC or a major-minor male character... someone who, if he were removed from the story, it would change the plot. He's that crucial.
Let's take Tom Hanks, for example. Off the top of my head, I can think of three movies he is in that are considered "chick flix": You've Got Mail, Sleepless In Seattle, and A League of Their Own.
In Sleepless In Seattle, Hanks' character, Sam Baldwin, is the main-main character. The story is more about Sam's struggles than Annie's. She is more of a supportive main character. Still crucial to the plot and she has her own character arc, but the story arc is not really about her.
In You've Got Mail, Hanks' character, Joe Fox, is an equal main character with Meg Ryan's character, Kathleen Kelly. The story is about both of their struggles, equally, and how they need each other to deal with their own issues.
In A League of Their Own, Hanks' character, Jimmy Dugan, is a main-minor character, or, a main supporting character. He cannot be removed, but the story is not about him at all. It's about the women in the league, specifically the two sisters, Dottie and Kit.
When the story is a classic romance between a man and a woman, the need for a male MC is pretty clear. But when the story is more about the female experience, with or without romance as a secondary element, it can sometimes be more difficult to see how important it is to have a male influence.
Whether we like it or not, as women, men have an effect on us. They play the adoring husband, the bad-for-me boyfriend, the best friend (with or without benefits), the deadbeat father, the mooching younger brother, the rich uncle, the annoying co-worker, the chauvinist boss, etc, etc. We cannot remove them completely, no matter how much we may want to at times. So as writers of women's fic, we should expend just as much effort on perfecting our male characters as we do the female characters, whether they be major or minor.
One of the things I raved about in my review of Therese Walsh's debut novel, The Last Will of Moira Leahy, was that all her characters were real. I fell in love with Noel the moment he stepped into the story, and he was very much a minor/supporting character. He was only hinted at in the first half of the book, then made an appearance for a few chapters, then disappeared again. But his presence was dramatic for both the MC and the reader.
And he has a British accent. Seriously... what's not to love? This particular snippet was not his first scene, but even still, within just a few lines we get a real sense of what type of person he is, and his effect on Maeve. Without him, the story would not have been as good, or have had the same outcome.
And that is why men are an essential to any story about women or for women. Who are your favorite male characters in women's fic or chick flix?
~Lydia
Let's take Tom Hanks, for example. Off the top of my head, I can think of three movies he is in that are considered "chick flix": You've Got Mail, Sleepless In Seattle, and A League of Their Own.
In Sleepless In Seattle, Hanks' character, Sam Baldwin, is the main-main character. The story is more about Sam's struggles than Annie's. She is more of a supportive main character. Still crucial to the plot and she has her own character arc, but the story arc is not really about her.
In You've Got Mail, Hanks' character, Joe Fox, is an equal main character with Meg Ryan's character, Kathleen Kelly. The story is about both of their struggles, equally, and how they need each other to deal with their own issues.
In A League of Their Own, Hanks' character, Jimmy Dugan, is a main-minor character, or, a main supporting character. He cannot be removed, but the story is not about him at all. It's about the women in the league, specifically the two sisters, Dottie and Kit.
When the story is a classic romance between a man and a woman, the need for a male MC is pretty clear. But when the story is more about the female experience, with or without romance as a secondary element, it can sometimes be more difficult to see how important it is to have a male influence.
Whether we like it or not, as women, men have an effect on us. They play the adoring husband, the bad-for-me boyfriend, the best friend (with or without benefits), the deadbeat father, the mooching younger brother, the rich uncle, the annoying co-worker, the chauvinist boss, etc, etc. We cannot remove them completely, no matter how much we may want to at times. So as writers of women's fic, we should expend just as much effort on perfecting our male characters as we do the female characters, whether they be major or minor.
One of the things I raved about in my review of Therese Walsh's debut novel, The Last Will of Moira Leahy, was that all her characters were real. I fell in love with Noel the moment he stepped into the story, and he was very much a minor/supporting character. He was only hinted at in the first half of the book, then made an appearance for a few chapters, then disappeared again. But his presence was dramatic for both the MC and the reader.
I turned to Noel, ready to let loose a comment about the likelihood of me going out to dance, but he stopped me.
"You look delicious," he said.
I shook my head. Delicious wasn't a label I could own.
"You make it hard sometimes, Maeve Leahy, to be a gentleman."
"But you are one."
"An effing inconvenient reputation," he said with a grimace. "But I know the rules. I'll be good."
And he has a British accent. Seriously... what's not to love? This particular snippet was not his first scene, but even still, within just a few lines we get a real sense of what type of person he is, and his effect on Maeve. Without him, the story would not have been as good, or have had the same outcome.
And that is why men are an essential to any story about women or for women. Who are your favorite male characters in women's fic or chick flix?
~Lydia
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Tuesday Tunes - Common Themes In Women's Fiction: Oops, My Bad
Women's fiction month continues with one of my favorite things about character-focused stories -- the moment a character realizes they really really really screwed up.
And it's not just men. Women can be just as idiotic, at times. My husband and I know this fact all too well. The phrase "I'm sorry" is practically a daily occurrence in our house. Almost as much as "I love you." (cue the awwww)
The following is one of our favorite songs by one of our most favorite bands, and it is entirely appropriate this month because of its relation to women's fiction and because the title is "October." I couldn't NOT use it.
For the version with lyrics, click here.
As a bonus, here is one of my favorite "I'm so effing sorry" moments from my very first women's fic novel, Sunset Rose, which I wrote a year ago this month.
Can "oops, my bad" really be a theme? Yes, actually, it can. This novel, although I'm not ever going to get it published, is one big string of "crap I really screwed up and need to fix it" moments. The above song by Evanescence could honestly be the theme song for it. Can you think of any stories that would fall into this category?
~Lydia
And it's not just men. Women can be just as idiotic, at times. My husband and I know this fact all too well. The phrase "I'm sorry" is practically a daily occurrence in our house. Almost as much as "I love you." (cue the awwww)
The following is one of our favorite songs by one of our most favorite bands, and it is entirely appropriate this month because of its relation to women's fiction and because the title is "October." I couldn't NOT use it.
For the version with lyrics, click here.
As a bonus, here is one of my favorite "I'm so effing sorry" moments from my very first women's fic novel, Sunset Rose, which I wrote a year ago this month.
Candles were definitely in order tonight. Emma Lynn struck a new match for each one and turned out the lights. Slipped into the soothing bubbles. Cried her f***ing eyes out. Jacob had been the best thing that ever happened to her. He took care of her in every way she needed. She needed him. He'd even made a psych visit fun. She'd never find anyone like that again--patient and understanding, and still made her tummy flutter whenever she saw him--and she'd never have the daughter she'd always wanted with a man who would treat their child like a loving father should.
It was all her fault; she'd ruined everything. Things were going too well, she reasoned, it was bound to happen. But that didn't mean she had to be okay with it. She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. Maybe if she fell asleep she'd accidentally drown and she wouldn't have to hurt anymore. Ever.
She forced herself to relax, allowed her body to slide lower and lower. Hot water touched her chin and she kept going. Nose. Ears. Eyes. That burned a little. She wondered what she would look like dead, how Jacob would find her all bloated and purple. Would he cry?
"Emma Lynn?"
And now she was hearing things. The pressure in her chest increased, begging for precious air. She heard a thud. Saw an angel. It pulled her toward heaven. She gasped and shuddered.
The angel held her shoulders and placed a hand behind her head. "Emma Lynn, look at me."
"Jacob?" She wiped her eyes and he came into focus. "Are you really . . . here?" Pain in her chest again. She couldn't breathe.
"I'm here." He pulled her against his cold leather jacket and goosebumps prickled every part of her that wasn't under water. "I'm sorry I left you. I'm so sorry. Are you okay?"
"No, I-- " Gasp. Heave. Breathe! I should have told you sooner. The words wouldn't come out. I shouldn't have let him kiss me. I shouldn't have hidden it from you. I've never loved anyone before and . . .
"I love you," she whispered.
"I love you, too, and I shouldn't have left." He took off his jacket. Warm underneath. Her goosebumps receded and tears reappeared.
"Don't ever do that again," she said.
"I won't. I promise I won't." His eyes were red like he'd been crying, too.
"You always tell me we have to talk things out. You walked away, Jacob."
"I know. I'm sorry." He took her hands, all wet and bubbly and fingers pruned up, and kissed them. Rubbed them against his cheeks. So this was what making up was really about. Apologizing and showing that you meant it. Acting like not making up would be worse than dying. Believing that nothing else in the world mattered except being together again, forgetting the bad, and moving toward the good.
Jacob couldn't even look her in the eye now, he was so distraught over leaving her. And she had been the one who messed everything up, not him.
She nudged his chin up with the crook of her finger, and locked onto his hazel gaze. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
He sighed, but the tension in his face remained. "Can you answer something for me?"
"Yes." Anything. Front row seat to the Emma Lynn tell-all.
"When did it happen?"
"Halloween."
He nodded and turned his head away. Now she wanted to die for real this time. Her slutty ghost would haunt him every Halloween night from this moment on.
"And you promise you didn't have sex?" he said.
"We didn't, I swear." She crossed her heart for emphasis.
"Just one more question. Then that's it."
"Then we forget about it?"
He shifted to look at her again. "Depends on the answer."
She rubbed under her nose and sniffled, prepared herself for the possibility of being without him. Someone else would find her body because he'd never come back.
"Okay, go ahead," she said.
"Be honest."
"I will."
He glanced at the floor, then up again. "Is he a better kisser than me?"
She smiled.
"Is that a yes?" he said.
"No."
"Then why are you smiling?"
"Because thinking of your kisses has that effect on me." She straightened and reached for him. "Get in here with me."
Jacob laughed and finally looked normal again. "I'd love to, but we can't."
"No, I don't mean that. I just want to be close to you, you're too far away. And I'm not ready to get out yet. It's comfy in here."
She watched him undress. That was all hers. So what if he didn't have washboard abs, he took care of her the way a man was supposed to.
Can "oops, my bad" really be a theme? Yes, actually, it can. This novel, although I'm not ever going to get it published, is one big string of "crap I really screwed up and need to fix it" moments. The above song by Evanescence could honestly be the theme song for it. Can you think of any stories that would fall into this category?
~Lydia
Monday, October 18, 2010
Special Guest Post - "Debut Series Writing" by Janice Hardy
WE'RE BACK! *waves*
Lydia here. Today we have a very special treat! Janice Hardy, fellow blogger and author of The Healing Wars trilogy, is here to discuss her experience with writing a sf/f series. As spec fic writers, having your own series is a common goal, but as yet-to-be-published novelists we often read comments in writerly circles that we should refer to our "book one" as "a stand alone with series potential" and then hope someone out there will grant us the powers to expand the story.
Book One: The Shifter (click here for my review) was Janice Hardy's debut novel and the start of a trilogy. So how exactly did she manage that?
-----
Welcome, Janice! I know a lot of sf/f writers (including myself) would like to know about the process of writing a good trilogy/series. What’s yours?
THE SHIFTER was written just like any other book I’d write. I had an idea, developed my world and the inherent conflicts surrounding that idea, and put a character into it whose life I could make miserable for 60K words. I outlined, wrote, revised, edited--all pretty standard. When I saw places the story could go (once I realized I could turn this into a trilogy) I took notes in a separate file.
When BLUE FIRE came along, I wasn’t sure where to go. I knew where the story went, but not the plot. I knew Nya’s (my protag) worldview had to change. I knew she needed to be on the run after what she did in book one. I knew she needed to be drawn deeper into the problems and gain more notice from the Duke (the bad guy). I had to explore her past more, flesh out the secondary characters more. The problems I left dangling (and there weren’t many, more like hints of problems) had to be addressed. And it all had to lead up to the final war I wanted for book three.
The first draft was a disaster. It wasn’t its own story, it had way too much backstory and rehashing of THE SHIFTER. It set up book three but didn’t resolve anything in book two. It was one big, soggy middle from start to finish. Even worse, the stakes from page one were the same as the climax. Nothing ever escalated. I rewrote it five times before I felt it was good enough to send to my editor, and even then it wasn’t good by any means. We did three more major passes with it, and by then it was finally coming together. I lost perspective on it, because to me, all I saw was that horrible draft I struggled with. Even though folks were telling me they liked it better than the first, I didn’t believe them, convinced they were just being nice. Eventually the reviews started coming in, and reviewers known for being hard on everything praised it, so I finally relaxed. All that work paid off in the end.
Then came book three. I spent more time plotting before I started, learning from my mistake with BLUE FIRE. It went together a lot easier, but by the end of the first draft it felt more like I had a wrap up to the series, not a personal story about Nya and how she ended this long journey. It was “a” story, not “Nya’s” story if that makes sense. My crit groups confirmed this and offered lots of good advice on how to fix it. I rewrote it, but I used the same basic plot, just from a different perspective.
What I realized, is that I had written the background for the war. I figured out who all the players were, how the city had become divided, who controlled what, who was on what side, how folks felt about the situation, etc. The stuff I needed to figure out before I could see how Nya fit into it all. Once I made that mental shift, it was a pretty easy rewrite. I just looked at it all through Nya’s eyes and made her role and participation in those same events matter to her on a personal level. I kept asking, “How can this situation affect her personally?” I also looked at my theme and the ongoing internal struggle Nya’s had the whole series about her abilities, and how I could connect all that into events as well.
One of the more challenging things was tying up all the loose ends. With three books and all those characters, everyone had their own little tale to tell. Finding the balance between wrapping up a small, but well-liked character, and still staying on target with Nya’s story, was tough at times. I’ll be working on more of that I’m sure as soon as my revision letter from my editor comes back (anytime now, eek!).
I’d do it differently next time. For one, I’d spend more time planning the full series arc so I had a solid conflict in each book. I’d use the stepping stone technique more – where the first book causes the next problem, the second book fixes that but causes the next, etc. Pieces that are all part of the big problem, but can be solved independently. That way I’d get a better idea of how all the pieces fit together so I wouldn’t be thinking of something for book three that would have been awesome if only I could go back and edit book one. I’d also limit the number of characters, especially if I planned to have those characters come back. Book three got a little unwieldy at times trying to juggle them all. I’d also love to write first drafts of all three before I submitted the first, but that might be unrealistic. Would be nice to get all the brainstorming out and the basic story down first though.
How much (if at all) did THE SHIFTER change after getting the book deal?
THE SHIFTER changed very little after it was sold. It was tightened up in the slower spots, clarified in the more vague areas, but overall it was pretty much the same book I submitted. However, I did go through some edits with my agent. She liked the book, but felt the ending needed some work. My stakes flattened out in the third act, and really didn’t escalate for the climax. I needed to make it more personal for Nya, and give her a really good reason for going back into trouble. I did two rewrites (I didn’t really get what my agent had said the first time around) and came up with something I’m really thrilled with, that I wouldn’t have done had my agent not pushed me.
The ending has a clear lead-in to book two. Did you have to change the original ending, knowing you'd be putting out a sequel?
It wrapped up the story in the original, because I had no idea if anyone would want that book let alone two more. After my editor bought it, we adjusted the ending so it didn’t wrap things up quite so nicely. I like series where they give you a little hint at what the next book is going to be, so I added the lead-in. I’ve actually had reviewers ding me on that, so not everyone feels the same way. If you want to provide a lead in, go for it, but don’t feel you have to. Lots of books don’t. And I’ve discovered not everyone likes that. (grin)
Did you originally write it as a stand alone with series potential?
Total stand alone. This is the first series I’d ever tried actually, and I’ve learned a ton from doing it. My ideas had always been one book stories before, but halfway through THE SHIFTER I saw a bigger picture and more problems that Nya could be part of. She was connected to the overall conflict of the region in ways she didn’t even know, and as she discovered them – and the bad guys discovered her – she could be pulled right into the middle of it all.
That’s what I think made the real difference. The story was something that had layers, and as each layer was revealed, it provided just as many questions as answers. It wasn’t about taking one story and stretching it over three books. I could have tried to make the whole trilogy about saving Tali from the problem in book one, but I think it would have failed miserably. There just wasn’t enough conflict or stakes to keep it going. Too many scenes would have been the same obstacle with new details (like getting info, escaping, getting into someplace). But each problem in each book created the next problem, and everything grew. The stakes went up (larger repercussions to more people on a grander scale) but at the same time they also went in (became deeply personal to Nya and what she was struggling with internally). Keeping it Nya’s story made all the difference. It wasn’t just a premise.
Had you already started BLUE FIRE when THE SHIFTER sold?
Nope. I was actually 60% of the way through the first draft of a YA supernatural thriller. I set that aside and dived into BLUE FIRE. All I’d done at that point was write a one-page synopsis for BLUE FIRE, and a half page synopsis for book three. Just enough to let editors see where I was going with the series.
Writing one book and writing three really took slightly different skill sets. I found that surprising, because I always figured a trilogy was just a bigger “book” in parts, but I found that wasn’t the case. Every time I thought about it in that way, I got into trouble. As long as I focused on each book being its own story and plot, the writing flowed much easier. Part of me wants to never do another series, but then another part thinks now that I know how, I can do so much more with the story than I could with a single book. Dig deeper, span wider. I have a few stand alone stories I really want to write, and I plan to do some of those, but there’s another series brewing as well. I don’t think it’ll be long before I dive into that one.
Thanks so much for sharing your journey with us today, Janice!
~Lydia
-----
Book Two of The Healing Wars, Blue Fire, is available now!
Part fugitive, part hero, fifteen-year-old Nya is barely staying ahead of the Duke of Baseer’s trackers. Wanted for a crime she didn’t mean to commit, she risks capture to protect every Taker she can find, determined to prevent the Duke from using them in his fiendish experiments. But resolve isn’t enough to protect any of them, and Nya soon realizes that the only way to keep them all out of the Duke’s clutches is to flee Geveg. Unfortunately, the Duke’s best tracker has other ideas.
Nya finds herself trapped in the last place she ever wanted to be, forced to trust the last people she ever thought she could. More is at stake than just the people of Geveg, and the closer she gets to uncovering the Duke’s plan, the more she discovers how critical she is to his victory. To save Geveg, she just might have to save Baseer—if she doesn’t destroy it first.
Click here to order.
-----
A long-time fantasy reader, Janice Hardy always wondered about the darker side of healing. For her fantasy trilogy THE HEALING WARS, she tapped into her own dark side to create a world where healing was dangerous, and those with the best intentions often made the worst choices. Her books include THE SHIFTER, and BLUE FIRE from Balzer+Bray/Harper Collins. She lives in Georgia with her husband, three cats and one very nervous freshwater eel.
For more about Janice Hardy and The Healing Wars, check out her website:
www.janicehardy.com
And her blog, The Other Side of the Story:
www.storyflip.blogspot.com
Lydia here. Today we have a very special treat! Janice Hardy, fellow blogger and author of The Healing Wars trilogy, is here to discuss her experience with writing a sf/f series. As spec fic writers, having your own series is a common goal, but as yet-to-be-published novelists we often read comments in writerly circles that we should refer to our "book one" as "a stand alone with series potential" and then hope someone out there will grant us the powers to expand the story.
Book One: The Shifter (click here for my review) was Janice Hardy's debut novel and the start of a trilogy. So how exactly did she manage that?
-----
Welcome, Janice! I know a lot of sf/f writers (including myself) would like to know about the process of writing a good trilogy/series. What’s yours?
When BLUE FIRE came along, I wasn’t sure where to go. I knew where the story went, but not the plot. I knew Nya’s (my protag) worldview had to change. I knew she needed to be on the run after what she did in book one. I knew she needed to be drawn deeper into the problems and gain more notice from the Duke (the bad guy). I had to explore her past more, flesh out the secondary characters more. The problems I left dangling (and there weren’t many, more like hints of problems) had to be addressed. And it all had to lead up to the final war I wanted for book three.
The first draft was a disaster. It wasn’t its own story, it had way too much backstory and rehashing of THE SHIFTER. It set up book three but didn’t resolve anything in book two. It was one big, soggy middle from start to finish. Even worse, the stakes from page one were the same as the climax. Nothing ever escalated. I rewrote it five times before I felt it was good enough to send to my editor, and even then it wasn’t good by any means. We did three more major passes with it, and by then it was finally coming together. I lost perspective on it, because to me, all I saw was that horrible draft I struggled with. Even though folks were telling me they liked it better than the first, I didn’t believe them, convinced they were just being nice. Eventually the reviews started coming in, and reviewers known for being hard on everything praised it, so I finally relaxed. All that work paid off in the end.
It wasn’t about taking one story and stretching it over three books.
Then came book three. I spent more time plotting before I started, learning from my mistake with BLUE FIRE. It went together a lot easier, but by the end of the first draft it felt more like I had a wrap up to the series, not a personal story about Nya and how she ended this long journey. It was “a” story, not “Nya’s” story if that makes sense. My crit groups confirmed this and offered lots of good advice on how to fix it. I rewrote it, but I used the same basic plot, just from a different perspective.
What I realized, is that I had written the background for the war. I figured out who all the players were, how the city had become divided, who controlled what, who was on what side, how folks felt about the situation, etc. The stuff I needed to figure out before I could see how Nya fit into it all. Once I made that mental shift, it was a pretty easy rewrite. I just looked at it all through Nya’s eyes and made her role and participation in those same events matter to her on a personal level. I kept asking, “How can this situation affect her personally?” I also looked at my theme and the ongoing internal struggle Nya’s had the whole series about her abilities, and how I could connect all that into events as well.
One of the more challenging things was tying up all the loose ends. With three books and all those characters, everyone had their own little tale to tell. Finding the balance between wrapping up a small, but well-liked character, and still staying on target with Nya’s story, was tough at times. I’ll be working on more of that I’m sure as soon as my revision letter from my editor comes back (anytime now, eek!). I’d do it differently next time. For one, I’d spend more time planning the full series arc so I had a solid conflict in each book. I’d use the stepping stone technique more – where the first book causes the next problem, the second book fixes that but causes the next, etc. Pieces that are all part of the big problem, but can be solved independently. That way I’d get a better idea of how all the pieces fit together so I wouldn’t be thinking of something for book three that would have been awesome if only I could go back and edit book one. I’d also limit the number of characters, especially if I planned to have those characters come back. Book three got a little unwieldy at times trying to juggle them all. I’d also love to write first drafts of all three before I submitted the first, but that might be unrealistic. Would be nice to get all the brainstorming out and the basic story down first though.
How much (if at all) did THE SHIFTER change after getting the book deal?
THE SHIFTER changed very little after it was sold. It was tightened up in the slower spots, clarified in the more vague areas, but overall it was pretty much the same book I submitted. However, I did go through some edits with my agent. She liked the book, but felt the ending needed some work. My stakes flattened out in the third act, and really didn’t escalate for the climax. I needed to make it more personal for Nya, and give her a really good reason for going back into trouble. I did two rewrites (I didn’t really get what my agent had said the first time around) and came up with something I’m really thrilled with, that I wouldn’t have done had my agent not pushed me.
The ending has a clear lead-in to book two. Did you have to change the original ending, knowing you'd be putting out a sequel?
It wrapped up the story in the original, because I had no idea if anyone would want that book let alone two more. After my editor bought it, we adjusted the ending so it didn’t wrap things up quite so nicely. I like series where they give you a little hint at what the next book is going to be, so I added the lead-in. I’ve actually had reviewers ding me on that, so not everyone feels the same way. If you want to provide a lead in, go for it, but don’t feel you have to. Lots of books don’t. And I’ve discovered not everyone likes that. (grin)
Did you originally write it as a stand alone with series potential?
Total stand alone. This is the first series I’d ever tried actually, and I’ve learned a ton from doing it. My ideas had always been one book stories before, but halfway through THE SHIFTER I saw a bigger picture and more problems that Nya could be part of. She was connected to the overall conflict of the region in ways she didn’t even know, and as she discovered them – and the bad guys discovered her – she could be pulled right into the middle of it all. That’s what I think made the real difference. The story was something that had layers, and as each layer was revealed, it provided just as many questions as answers. It wasn’t about taking one story and stretching it over three books. I could have tried to make the whole trilogy about saving Tali from the problem in book one, but I think it would have failed miserably. There just wasn’t enough conflict or stakes to keep it going. Too many scenes would have been the same obstacle with new details (like getting info, escaping, getting into someplace). But each problem in each book created the next problem, and everything grew. The stakes went up (larger repercussions to more people on a grander scale) but at the same time they also went in (became deeply personal to Nya and what she was struggling with internally). Keeping it Nya’s story made all the difference. It wasn’t just a premise.
Had you already started BLUE FIRE when THE SHIFTER sold?
Nope. I was actually 60% of the way through the first draft of a YA supernatural thriller. I set that aside and dived into BLUE FIRE. All I’d done at that point was write a one-page synopsis for BLUE FIRE, and a half page synopsis for book three. Just enough to let editors see where I was going with the series.
Writing one book and writing three really took slightly different skill sets. I found that surprising, because I always figured a trilogy was just a bigger “book” in parts, but I found that wasn’t the case. Every time I thought about it in that way, I got into trouble. As long as I focused on each book being its own story and plot, the writing flowed much easier. Part of me wants to never do another series, but then another part thinks now that I know how, I can do so much more with the story than I could with a single book. Dig deeper, span wider. I have a few stand alone stories I really want to write, and I plan to do some of those, but there’s another series brewing as well. I don’t think it’ll be long before I dive into that one.
Thanks so much for sharing your journey with us today, Janice!
~Lydia
-----
Book Two of The Healing Wars, Blue Fire, is available now!
Part fugitive, part hero, fifteen-year-old Nya is barely staying ahead of the Duke of Baseer’s trackers. Wanted for a crime she didn’t mean to commit, she risks capture to protect every Taker she can find, determined to prevent the Duke from using them in his fiendish experiments. But resolve isn’t enough to protect any of them, and Nya soon realizes that the only way to keep them all out of the Duke’s clutches is to flee Geveg. Unfortunately, the Duke’s best tracker has other ideas.
Nya finds herself trapped in the last place she ever wanted to be, forced to trust the last people she ever thought she could. More is at stake than just the people of Geveg, and the closer she gets to uncovering the Duke’s plan, the more she discovers how critical she is to his victory. To save Geveg, she just might have to save Baseer—if she doesn’t destroy it first.
Click here to order.
-----
For more about Janice Hardy and The Healing Wars, check out her website:
www.janicehardy.com
And her blog, The Other Side of the Story:
www.storyflip.blogspot.com
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Essentials In Women's Fiction - Relationship Woes
The main thing that separates women's fiction from either romance or "general" fiction, is that it focuses on relationships. Now, obviously, this will include romance, but the relationship in question does not always have to be romantically inclined.
Familial relationships:
Spouse or significant other
Mother/daughter or Father/daughter
Brother/sister or Sister/sister, including twins and half-siblings
Grandparents, or other extended family, or step-family
Career relationships:
Co-workers
Employer/employee
Friendships:
Friends (obviously) of any gender or age
Familial relationships are by far the most common, because 1) there are many different options to choose from and/or mix and match, and 2) pretty much anyone can relate to family issues (even people who have no family, because that, in itself, is a family issue). Anything with universal appeal is going to do well.
This is where you have your "divorce/ affair/ widow" stories. And your baby clause stories (or anything regarding parenting). And your "I can never forgive my mother/ sister/ whoever because they [fill in the blank]" stories. And pretty much anything else you can think of that would affect the MC and a member of his/her family as the main plot. Sibling stories can be somewhat compared to friendship stories, but there is more depth to it than that.
These stories offer the most variety in type. There is no "typical plot", really, but many of them trend toward drama with a bit of occasional comedic relief. "Parenting" and "significant other" stories have the most opportunity to actually be sub-categorized as comedy.
A few examples:
What's Eating Gilbert Grape?
Little Women
Sins of the Mother
Cheaper by the Dozen
The Break-Up
Mr. and Mrs. Smith (really? yes, really. sub-category action/suspense, but it's a relationship story at heart. see what I mean about variety with this type?)
Workplace stories in women's fiction often fall under the sub-genre of humor/comedy, and this is also where a lot of chick lit is found (because younger women are supposedly more career-focused rather than family-focused). There is sometimes romance involved, but not necessarily anything regarding family members. And many times these become friendship stories as well because the co-workers have to find a way to work together toward a common goal.
Examples:
The Devil Wears Prada
Nine to Five
Friendship stories are often intertwined with family stories and, sometimes, romance. But the focus of the plot is always the relationship between friends. It is thrown into the proverbial fire, and the climax is the point when the MC decides to either 1) ditch the bad friend(s) and move on, or 2) embrace them despite the flaws they can't seem to fix. It is usually the latter, but not always.
The best friendship stories are a good balance between drama and comedy. Here are just two examples:
Steel Magnolias
Now and Then
What are some of your favorite relationship stories?
~Lydia
Familial relationships:
Spouse or significant other
Mother/daughter or Father/daughter
Brother/sister or Sister/sister, including twins and half-siblings
Grandparents, or other extended family, or step-family
Career relationships:
Co-workers
Employer/employee
Friendships:
Friends (obviously) of any gender or age
Familial relationships are by far the most common, because 1) there are many different options to choose from and/or mix and match, and 2) pretty much anyone can relate to family issues (even people who have no family, because that, in itself, is a family issue). Anything with universal appeal is going to do well.
This is where you have your "divorce/ affair/ widow" stories. And your baby clause stories (or anything regarding parenting). And your "I can never forgive my mother/ sister/ whoever because they [fill in the blank]" stories. And pretty much anything else you can think of that would affect the MC and a member of his/her family as the main plot. Sibling stories can be somewhat compared to friendship stories, but there is more depth to it than that.
These stories offer the most variety in type. There is no "typical plot", really, but many of them trend toward drama with a bit of occasional comedic relief. "Parenting" and "significant other" stories have the most opportunity to actually be sub-categorized as comedy.
A few examples:
What's Eating Gilbert Grape?
Little Women
Sins of the Mother
Cheaper by the Dozen
The Break-Up
Mr. and Mrs. Smith (really? yes, really. sub-category action/suspense, but it's a relationship story at heart. see what I mean about variety with this type?)
Workplace stories in women's fiction often fall under the sub-genre of humor/comedy, and this is also where a lot of chick lit is found (because younger women are supposedly more career-focused rather than family-focused). There is sometimes romance involved, but not necessarily anything regarding family members. And many times these become friendship stories as well because the co-workers have to find a way to work together toward a common goal.
Examples:
The Devil Wears Prada
Nine to Five
Friendship stories are often intertwined with family stories and, sometimes, romance. But the focus of the plot is always the relationship between friends. It is thrown into the proverbial fire, and the climax is the point when the MC decides to either 1) ditch the bad friend(s) and move on, or 2) embrace them despite the flaws they can't seem to fix. It is usually the latter, but not always.
The best friendship stories are a good balance between drama and comedy. Here are just two examples:
Steel Magnolias
Now and Then
What are some of your favorite relationship stories?
~Lydia
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Tuesday Tunes - Common Themes In Women's Fiction: When Life Throws You Lemons...
...you either throw them back or make lemonade. Or do nothing and get a good clunk in the head.
Life is a constant learning experience, which gives us as women's fiction authors plenty of ammo to use for a rite of passage story. This theme encompasses many different avenues of emotional pain and torment. In its most basic form, rite of passage is about a specific life transition and how the main character handles the dramatic change.
Often times, when we reach some kind of pinnacle revelation about life during adulthood, it has a way of relating back to some misunderstanding of life during our youth. To emphasize with just one example of this theme, here is one of my all-time favorite songs by Reba McEntire -- the story of Fancy Rae Baker.
Enjoy.
~Lydia
Life is a constant learning experience, which gives us as women's fiction authors plenty of ammo to use for a rite of passage story. This theme encompasses many different avenues of emotional pain and torment. In its most basic form, rite of passage is about a specific life transition and how the main character handles the dramatic change.
Often times, when we reach some kind of pinnacle revelation about life during adulthood, it has a way of relating back to some misunderstanding of life during our youth. To emphasize with just one example of this theme, here is one of my all-time favorite songs by Reba McEntire -- the story of Fancy Rae Baker.
Enjoy.
~Lydia
Monday, October 11, 2010
For the Love of First Person Present Tense
Few things discussed in writerly circles garner more hostility than first person present tense. I will admit, I used to be one of the haters. I used to think it was awkward. I used to think it was rare in published fiction, only attempted and mastered by a select few.
All I had to do was read a bit more women's fiction to not only be proven wrong, but to see it's really not so bad after all.
The use of first person, whether in past or present tense, is one of the best ways to put a reader in the character's shoes. Even if you don't feel like you are the character, you feel an extremely close connection to him/her because it is as if they right there with you, sharing their story.
Changing the tense from past to present is one of the best ways to give a sense of immediacy to your story, and this is why it works well for some types (such as contemporary women's fiction) and not so great for others (such as military sf). And that isn't a feeling that can really be explained; whether in reading or writing, you just know.
If you find yourself a bit unsure as to what tense you should use, as a default, use the one you're most comfortable with. If something about that doesn't feel quite right, then write a "test scene" in a different tense. This also works well when you're unsure of the viewpoint (first or third).
Forsome most writers, past tense feels more natural when writing. I am one of those people. But I recently discovered that my women's fiction WIP, One-Way Ticket to Nowhere, which I'd already shifted from third person to first a few months ago, was still missing that special something in the style.
So I tried it in present tense, and zap! the spark was there. This is the first novel-length piece I've attempted in first person present tense, and so far, I'm loving it.
This shouldn't surprise me, though, since many of my fave novels, in both women's fiction and YA, are written in first person present tense.
Time of My Life by Allison Winn Scotch
Good Grief by Lolly Winston
Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver
Simply From Scratch by Alicia Bessette
Break by Hannah Moskowitz
...to name just a few. Two of those listed above are bestsellers, and two are 2010 debuts, proving that there is definitely a market for first person present tense.
If done well.
Hehe. There's the clincher. It can be written horribly awkward, at best, if you don't know your craft well enough at the time you attempt it. My author-friend and critique partner, Liz Penn, actually writes her present tense stories in past tense first, then goes back and shifts the tense. It works for her. I don't do that, but I do find myself accidentally slipping in a past tense verb from time to time.
The biggest awkwardness that arises, in my opinion, when using present tense is with dialogue tags -- the words "say" and "says."
This cannot be avoided completely, but it does give you, as the writer, a good opportunity to get creative in finding ways to NOT use a dialogue tag. And this is something that will improve your writing overall, no matter what viewpoint or tense you use in the future.
And, as with "said" in the past tense, it sort of becomes invisible after a while if the writing that surrounds it is riveting enough to distract.
The number one reason I enjoy first person present tense is because it has a way of making the writing more fluid, less choppy. This is not to say that you can't use short sentences, or even fragments. You can. But there is just something about the immediacy of it that pulls you gently along, like a leaf floating down a river.
Probably one of the reasons for this is that present tense eliminates the need of words like "had" when speaking of something that happened in the past for the character. You simply relay the past event in past tense.
Here is an example from my women's fic WIP named above. Notice how present tense is used for what is happening now, and past tense is used for what happened the night before. I'll make it even easier for you and highlight the present tense verbs in blue and the past tense verbs in red.
Easy peezy lemony squeezy, right? Actually, no. When switching to past tense when I first wrote this, I slipped into "past tense mode" and added the word "had" where it wasn't necessary. But once you get into a groove, present tense writing really isn't that difficult. As along as you keep in mind everything else you know about writing, you'll do just fine.
That doesn't mean you have to write present tense, though, or even read it, if you don't want to. We all have our preferences. The only thing I ask is that if you find yourself in a heated debate over the use of first person, present tense, or both, please remember that it is NOT the devil. It's not even rare. In fact, for some authors, it's the only thing they use and they are doing quite well in their careers.
Example: Allison Winn Scotch's The Time of My Life was not only a bestseller but it's also been optioned for a film. And she recently got a six-figure advance for her fourth book, The Memory of Us. How many of us can say that?
So what's your take on first person present tense? Love it? Hate it? Somewhere in between?
Happy writing,
~Lydia
ADDENDUM: As of tomorrow we will not be able to check on the blog for about a week. I have a few posts scheduled to go up over the next few days, but I apologize in advance for not being able to respond to comments after today. Please know, however, that I will read through all of them once we return.
All I had to do was read a bit more women's fiction to not only be proven wrong, but to see it's really not so bad after all.
The use of first person, whether in past or present tense, is one of the best ways to put a reader in the character's shoes. Even if you don't feel like you are the character, you feel an extremely close connection to him/her because it is as if they right there with you, sharing their story.
Changing the tense from past to present is one of the best ways to give a sense of immediacy to your story, and this is why it works well for some types (such as contemporary women's fiction) and not so great for others (such as military sf). And that isn't a feeling that can really be explained; whether in reading or writing, you just know.
If you find yourself a bit unsure as to what tense you should use, as a default, use the one you're most comfortable with. If something about that doesn't feel quite right, then write a "test scene" in a different tense. This also works well when you're unsure of the viewpoint (first or third).
For
So I tried it in present tense, and zap! the spark was there. This is the first novel-length piece I've attempted in first person present tense, and so far, I'm loving it.
This shouldn't surprise me, though, since many of my fave novels, in both women's fiction and YA, are written in first person present tense.
Time of My Life by Allison Winn Scotch
Good Grief by Lolly Winston
Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver
Simply From Scratch by Alicia Bessette
Break by Hannah Moskowitz
...to name just a few. Two of those listed above are bestsellers, and two are 2010 debuts, proving that there is definitely a market for first person present tense.
If done well.
Hehe. There's the clincher. It can be written horribly awkward, at best, if you don't know your craft well enough at the time you attempt it. My author-friend and critique partner, Liz Penn, actually writes her present tense stories in past tense first, then goes back and shifts the tense. It works for her. I don't do that, but I do find myself accidentally slipping in a past tense verb from time to time.
The biggest awkwardness that arises, in my opinion, when using present tense is with dialogue tags -- the words "say" and "says."
This cannot be avoided completely, but it does give you, as the writer, a good opportunity to get creative in finding ways to NOT use a dialogue tag. And this is something that will improve your writing overall, no matter what viewpoint or tense you use in the future.
And, as with "said" in the past tense, it sort of becomes invisible after a while if the writing that surrounds it is riveting enough to distract.
The number one reason I enjoy first person present tense is because it has a way of making the writing more fluid, less choppy. This is not to say that you can't use short sentences, or even fragments. You can. But there is just something about the immediacy of it that pulls you gently along, like a leaf floating down a river.
Probably one of the reasons for this is that present tense eliminates the need of words like "had" when speaking of something that happened in the past for the character. You simply relay the past event in past tense.
Here is an example from my women's fic WIP named above. Notice how present tense is used for what is happening now, and past tense is used for what happened the night before. I'll make it even easier for you and highlight the present tense verbs in blue and the past tense verbs in red.
It's already quarter past nine by the time I lug myself downstairs. I didn't plan on spending the night, but after the cake incident I needed a good shower and then made the mistake of lying down "for a minute to rest my eyes", and the next thing I knew it was eight a.m., just before Jason came in. Now I'm wearing another borrowed set of Trevor's loungewear, and my hair is too soft and fluffy and sticking up with random slept-in cowlicks.
Long hair doesn't do this, I remember, and vow to grow my hair out again this year. Or maybe I'll weave in some extensions. Why wait? If the weather can be summer-like one day and frigid the next, then I can have a blonde bob today and dark sultry locks tomorrow. This is me, using my schizophrenic climate zone as an excuse to do something fashionably stupid (for a white girl).
Easy peezy lemony squeezy, right? Actually, no. When switching to past tense when I first wrote this, I slipped into "past tense mode" and added the word "had" where it wasn't necessary. But once you get into a groove, present tense writing really isn't that difficult. As along as you keep in mind everything else you know about writing, you'll do just fine.
That doesn't mean you have to write present tense, though, or even read it, if you don't want to. We all have our preferences. The only thing I ask is that if you find yourself in a heated debate over the use of first person, present tense, or both, please remember that it is NOT the devil. It's not even rare. In fact, for some authors, it's the only thing they use and they are doing quite well in their careers.
Example: Allison Winn Scotch's The Time of My Life was not only a bestseller but it's also been optioned for a film. And she recently got a six-figure advance for her fourth book, The Memory of Us. How many of us can say that?
So what's your take on first person present tense? Love it? Hate it? Somewhere in between?
Happy writing,
~Lydia
ADDENDUM: As of tomorrow we will not be able to check on the blog for about a week. I have a few posts scheduled to go up over the next few days, but I apologize in advance for not being able to respond to comments after today. Please know, however, that I will read through all of them once we return.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Snagged by the Cover
Book covers have an important role in selling a story to its audience. When browsing shelves, I am first drawn to a book because of the cover, then the title, then, if the blurb intrigues me, I'll read the book.
I have a "to read" pile that grows (literally) by the day because of finding books on other blogs I follow and websites I happen to browse. If you are friends with me on GoodReads, you know exactly what I'm talking about. The updates are endless. And some of those additions to my reading pile have come from seeing friends' updates on the books they're reading or going to read.
This is marketing through word of mouth at its best. So I thought I'd show you some of the book covers that recently got my attention and ended up in my reading pile. For fun, and to share the love. Maybe you'll be reading one of these soon because you saw it here.
I have a "to read" pile that grows (literally) by the day because of finding books on other blogs I follow and websites I happen to browse. If you are friends with me on GoodReads, you know exactly what I'm talking about. The updates are endless. And some of those additions to my reading pile have come from seeing friends' updates on the books they're reading or going to read.
This is marketing through word of mouth at its best. So I thought I'd show you some of the book covers that recently got my attention and ended up in my reading pile. For fun, and to share the love. Maybe you'll be reading one of these soon because you saw it here.
I just added that last one today. Something about the snow... eerie.
Have you been snagged by a book cover lately?
~Lydia
Friday, October 8, 2010
What's Your Favorite Catch Phrase?
Giving one of your characters a catch phrase is an effective way to emphasize a distinct personality trait and make that person memorable. Here is just one example:
What would Miranda Priestly be without her "that's all"? It's the cherry that tops her sundae of bitchiness.
What's your favorite catch phrase, either in real life, fiction, or film?
~Lydia
What would Miranda Priestly be without her "that's all"? It's the cherry that tops her sundae of bitchiness.
What's your favorite catch phrase, either in real life, fiction, or film?
~Lydia
Thursday, October 7, 2010
This Is How I Plot
In writerly circles outside this blog, I've talked about how my personal writing process is somewhere between a plotter and a pantser. I do some pre-plotting, but it's very basic. Here is what I have for my current work in progress, a contemp YA/ light sci-fi, FINDING ME.
(For an actual snippet of this novel, click here. It's the second one.) Don't worry about trying to read the chicken scratch. Even if you could, it still wouldn't make sense to anyone but me. It's a lot of scribbling and fragmented sentences and arrows pointing to where something truly belongs because I ran out of writing space. Here's what to focus on:
1. It's handwritten. I can't plot and/or brainstorm on the computer. Neither can Joe, which is why we stock up on spiral notebooks during "back to school" sales at Walmart. They're like, 15 cents a piece! Pens are cheap, too. I don't like pencils because then I'd tear up the paper with all my erasing. I actually prefer to scribble stuff out. But that's just me.
2. It is only ONE page. That's the whole novel, right there on one side of one page. Well, okay, it's not the whole novel, but it's all the major points from beginning to end. And it's all I need to go forward; it's the basic foundation on which I build.
But that doesn't mean it won't change. In fact, I was talking to one of my critique partners just last night, and in part of our conversation, I said, "In every novel that I've completed, I've had a basic idea of my ending, and by the time I got to that point in the writing, the ending had changed dramatically." Laying out your idea in such a basic format allows for the needed flexibility in your storytelling.
Also, just because I do a little pre-plotting doesn't mean I have to know everything before I can start writing. Look a bit closer at the top of the page. (If this is still too small for your eyes, clicking on the image will enlarge it.)
See where it says Theme -- (not sure yet)? Heh. Yeah.
Theme is one of those things that is revealed over the course of writing the first draft, and then brought to light and emphasized in the second and subsequent drafts. Also, my opening is still very weak at this point. Do I care? No. The ways in which to make it stronger will be more clear once the first draft is complete. What you can see in that second image is the first half of the novel, which in this case will be about 35 - 40K. That's a heck of a lot of storytelling -- majorly condensed.
Each "beat" is limited to a sentence or two, and that's how it all fits on one page, and that's how you keep yourself from over-plotting and not getting any real writing done.
What's a "beat"? Read Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder. Yes, it's a screenwriting book. Don't let that scare you or turn you off. The "beat sheet" I use for pre-plotting is on page 70, and it's the best thing I've found for structuring my novels (it can be used for any genre or story length -- I even use it for my short fiction), but it won't make a lick of sense unless you read the book.
It works for me. Maybe it'll work for you, too.
Happy plotting,
~Lydia
(For an actual snippet of this novel, click here. It's the second one.) Don't worry about trying to read the chicken scratch. Even if you could, it still wouldn't make sense to anyone but me. It's a lot of scribbling and fragmented sentences and arrows pointing to where something truly belongs because I ran out of writing space. Here's what to focus on:
1. It's handwritten. I can't plot and/or brainstorm on the computer. Neither can Joe, which is why we stock up on spiral notebooks during "back to school" sales at Walmart. They're like, 15 cents a piece! Pens are cheap, too. I don't like pencils because then I'd tear up the paper with all my erasing. I actually prefer to scribble stuff out. But that's just me.
2. It is only ONE page. That's the whole novel, right there on one side of one page. Well, okay, it's not the whole novel, but it's all the major points from beginning to end. And it's all I need to go forward; it's the basic foundation on which I build.
But that doesn't mean it won't change. In fact, I was talking to one of my critique partners just last night, and in part of our conversation, I said, "In every novel that I've completed, I've had a basic idea of my ending, and by the time I got to that point in the writing, the ending had changed dramatically." Laying out your idea in such a basic format allows for the needed flexibility in your storytelling.
Also, just because I do a little pre-plotting doesn't mean I have to know everything before I can start writing. Look a bit closer at the top of the page. (If this is still too small for your eyes, clicking on the image will enlarge it.)
See where it says Theme -- (not sure yet)? Heh. Yeah.
Theme is one of those things that is revealed over the course of writing the first draft, and then brought to light and emphasized in the second and subsequent drafts. Also, my opening is still very weak at this point. Do I care? No. The ways in which to make it stronger will be more clear once the first draft is complete. What you can see in that second image is the first half of the novel, which in this case will be about 35 - 40K. That's a heck of a lot of storytelling -- majorly condensed.
Each "beat" is limited to a sentence or two, and that's how it all fits on one page, and that's how you keep yourself from over-plotting and not getting any real writing done.
What's a "beat"? Read Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder. Yes, it's a screenwriting book. Don't let that scare you or turn you off. The "beat sheet" I use for pre-plotting is on page 70, and it's the best thing I've found for structuring my novels (it can be used for any genre or story length -- I even use it for my short fiction), but it won't make a lick of sense unless you read the book.
It works for me. Maybe it'll work for you, too.
Happy plotting,
~Lydia
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Essentials In Women's Fiction - Let's Have a Baby! Or Not
Each Wednesday this month I'm going to discuss an essential I've noticed in my women's fic reading. No, not every women's fic novel includes each of these, but if a novel focuses on one of these essentials, there is no doubt in my mind that it is women's fiction. Make sense?
Good. Let's get started.
Babies are a quintessentially female topic. Why? Because men cannot get pregnant, give birth, or breastfeed. At least right now they can't... unless you're Arnold Schwarzenegger; that man can do anything. I heard or read an article somewhere (I know, I shouldn't be saying something unless I can direct-quote it, but I am) that the uterus is one of the few organs that has yet to be duplicated in modern medicine. You can get yourself a brand new heart if you need it--seriously?--but if your uterus is damaged or not functioning properly, you're SOL.
And because of this organ and all the wonderful female hormones that keep it maintained, women have a natural desire to bear children. But sometimes it's not always the best time. So in women's fiction I've noticed there are three basic routes the story centers around if babies are the main focus of the viewpoint characters:
1. Woman who wants a baby more than anything in the world cannot have a baby, for whatever reason.
2. Woman who doesn't want a baby at this point in her life, for whatever reason, gets pregnant by accident.
3. Woman is forced into the role of mother for someone else's baby and this creates havoc, for whatever reason.
I call this the baby clause. As far as having a baby is concerned, those are really the only three basic situations. Does that mean if your story centers around baby-making, pregnancy, birth, baby care, etc. that your story is old hat? Not necessarily. There are SO MANY different side roads you can take off these three main highways, and each of them will be uniquely YOU once you write the story.
(Quick aside: If you write female-focused YA, throwing in a baby clause will push it into adult fiction, in my opinion. That is not to say that you cannot have pregnancies in YA--far from it in today's world--but the baby clause is an adult focus, an adult decision. The "woman who doesn't want a baby at this point in her life" usually has made this decision in favor of furthering her career, or caring for an aging parent, or something else "adult." Few teen girls actually want to get pregnant (yes, I know there are exceptions), so in general, teens will fall under number two above, but not by any real choice. It's an age default, in my opinion. A teen girl who gets pregnant by accident will always have someone in her life, if not multiple people, saying "you're so young, you've ruined your life!" as part of the conflict, so to me, it doesn't count. A 25 or 35 year-old adult who simply wasn't mentally or financially ready for children yet? Not so much, because it's a choice they made in which age, in general, isn't as much a factor as their current situation in life.)
For baby clause number one, the female MC is usually nearing middle age. She thought she did things in the right order--went to college, established her career, got married, got a house, etc--and now that it's time for that next step--the baby!--her body wants nothing to do with it. You've worked hard all your life, it tells her. This is your time to relax. Why add more stress?
So what does she do? The desire to have a baby is strong, even for men, but especially for women. Once that seed is planted in a woman's brain, it is extremely difficult--if not impossible--to uproot.
Regarding age, thirty-five is actually the new thirty. If you hit age 35 and you still haven't had kids, you'd better put a rush on it. (That's medically-speaking, by the way. Social expectations are a whole other ball game.) Any woman over age 35 is automatically considered a higher risk for problematic pregnancy and/or birth. Plus, you're nearing menopause when your hormones really take you for a ride.
In this type of story, the possibilities are endless. The woman may be single and want a baby. How will she go about that? In addition to the physical, there are also ethical dilemmas involved in that choice. More conflict = good. Or, the woman may be infertile. I can't even list how many different reasons there are for infertility. In fact, it may end up being the man's issue, not the woman's. Again, more conflict = good.
For baby clause number two, the female MC is generally younger. Still an adult, but maybe in her twenties or early thirties. She is in the active planning stage of life, not the settling down stage. This doesn't mean she's celibate, though, and WHAM! suddenly she's skipped a period and excusing herself from a board meeting to go puke in the nearest trash can.
This type of storyline is a little more predictable, but still full of enough choices that it can be fresh. After the realization of her pregnancy, there are buckets-full of questions to face. How did this happen, I'm on birth control? And/or, who is the father? Will he step up to his role? And/or, should I even keep the baby? (that doesn't always mean abortion; some women carry and birth the baby and then allow it to be adopted) And/or, how do I tell my mother?! Etc, etc, etc.
Seriously. Moms are scary, even when we're adults. That's not just a teen fear.
You can always change up this type of story by having an unexpected "change of life" baby, but remember there has to be more to it than "OMG I THOUGHT IT WAS JUST MENOPAUSE" for readers to even pick it up.
In baby clause number three, a variety of fun things can happen. The baby is forced on the MC, so she can be in just about any life situation when this monkey wrench is thrown at her. She can already have kids of her own. Maybe they are young children, maybe they're nearing adulthood. She can be single. Divorced. Widowed. Married but childless. On the brink of a new career. Contemplating retirement. Live in a studio apartment. About to move across the country. She could even be in a foreign country doing who-knows-what when she gets the news.
Basically anything. Even the circumstances that bring the baby to her care in the first place are innumerable. Death of the parents, abandonment, illness, imprisonment, "I just need you to watch my kid for a month while I...", etc.
You can even have a male MC in this one and it will still be considered women's fic (more specifics on "men in women's fiction" will be discussed in a future post) because anything that focuses on a baby will be of interest to women. You need look no further than Three Men and a Baby for proof of this. It was a hit for both the male and female audience.
In all of these scenarios, you have the opportunity for either comedy, drama, or (preferably) both.
On my to-read list is a 2010 debut novel, The Atlas of Love by Laurie Frankel. Very obviously a baby-focused story, just by looking at the cover. Based on the blurb, which baby clause do you think it falls under?
It's easy to pinpoint now, isn't it? (number two!) I doubt you'll look at baby stories the same way ever again. Can you think of some classic examples for the baby clause?
~Lydia
Good. Let's get started.
Babies are a quintessentially female topic. Why? Because men cannot get pregnant, give birth, or breastfeed. At least right now they can't... unless you're Arnold Schwarzenegger; that man can do anything. I heard or read an article somewhere (I know, I shouldn't be saying something unless I can direct-quote it, but I am) that the uterus is one of the few organs that has yet to be duplicated in modern medicine. You can get yourself a brand new heart if you need it--seriously?--but if your uterus is damaged or not functioning properly, you're SOL.
And because of this organ and all the wonderful female hormones that keep it maintained, women have a natural desire to bear children. But sometimes it's not always the best time. So in women's fiction I've noticed there are three basic routes the story centers around if babies are the main focus of the viewpoint characters:
1. Woman who wants a baby more than anything in the world cannot have a baby, for whatever reason.
2. Woman who doesn't want a baby at this point in her life, for whatever reason, gets pregnant by accident.
3. Woman is forced into the role of mother for someone else's baby and this creates havoc, for whatever reason.
I call this the baby clause. As far as having a baby is concerned, those are really the only three basic situations. Does that mean if your story centers around baby-making, pregnancy, birth, baby care, etc. that your story is old hat? Not necessarily. There are SO MANY different side roads you can take off these three main highways, and each of them will be uniquely YOU once you write the story.
(Quick aside: If you write female-focused YA, throwing in a baby clause will push it into adult fiction, in my opinion. That is not to say that you cannot have pregnancies in YA--far from it in today's world--but the baby clause is an adult focus, an adult decision. The "woman who doesn't want a baby at this point in her life" usually has made this decision in favor of furthering her career, or caring for an aging parent, or something else "adult." Few teen girls actually want to get pregnant (yes, I know there are exceptions), so in general, teens will fall under number two above, but not by any real choice. It's an age default, in my opinion. A teen girl who gets pregnant by accident will always have someone in her life, if not multiple people, saying "you're so young, you've ruined your life!" as part of the conflict, so to me, it doesn't count. A 25 or 35 year-old adult who simply wasn't mentally or financially ready for children yet? Not so much, because it's a choice they made in which age, in general, isn't as much a factor as their current situation in life.)
For baby clause number one, the female MC is usually nearing middle age. She thought she did things in the right order--went to college, established her career, got married, got a house, etc--and now that it's time for that next step--the baby!--her body wants nothing to do with it. You've worked hard all your life, it tells her. This is your time to relax. Why add more stress?
So what does she do? The desire to have a baby is strong, even for men, but especially for women. Once that seed is planted in a woman's brain, it is extremely difficult--if not impossible--to uproot.
Regarding age, thirty-five is actually the new thirty. If you hit age 35 and you still haven't had kids, you'd better put a rush on it. (That's medically-speaking, by the way. Social expectations are a whole other ball game.) Any woman over age 35 is automatically considered a higher risk for problematic pregnancy and/or birth. Plus, you're nearing menopause when your hormones really take you for a ride.
In this type of story, the possibilities are endless. The woman may be single and want a baby. How will she go about that? In addition to the physical, there are also ethical dilemmas involved in that choice. More conflict = good. Or, the woman may be infertile. I can't even list how many different reasons there are for infertility. In fact, it may end up being the man's issue, not the woman's. Again, more conflict = good.
For baby clause number two, the female MC is generally younger. Still an adult, but maybe in her twenties or early thirties. She is in the active planning stage of life, not the settling down stage. This doesn't mean she's celibate, though, and WHAM! suddenly she's skipped a period and excusing herself from a board meeting to go puke in the nearest trash can.
This type of storyline is a little more predictable, but still full of enough choices that it can be fresh. After the realization of her pregnancy, there are buckets-full of questions to face. How did this happen, I'm on birth control? And/or, who is the father? Will he step up to his role? And/or, should I even keep the baby? (that doesn't always mean abortion; some women carry and birth the baby and then allow it to be adopted) And/or, how do I tell my mother?! Etc, etc, etc.
Seriously. Moms are scary, even when we're adults. That's not just a teen fear.
You can always change up this type of story by having an unexpected "change of life" baby, but remember there has to be more to it than "OMG I THOUGHT IT WAS JUST MENOPAUSE" for readers to even pick it up.
In baby clause number three, a variety of fun things can happen. The baby is forced on the MC, so she can be in just about any life situation when this monkey wrench is thrown at her. She can already have kids of her own. Maybe they are young children, maybe they're nearing adulthood. She can be single. Divorced. Widowed. Married but childless. On the brink of a new career. Contemplating retirement. Live in a studio apartment. About to move across the country. She could even be in a foreign country doing who-knows-what when she gets the news.
Basically anything. Even the circumstances that bring the baby to her care in the first place are innumerable. Death of the parents, abandonment, illness, imprisonment, "I just need you to watch my kid for a month while I...", etc.
You can even have a male MC in this one and it will still be considered women's fic (more specifics on "men in women's fiction" will be discussed in a future post) because anything that focuses on a baby will be of interest to women. You need look no further than Three Men and a Baby for proof of this. It was a hit for both the male and female audience.
In all of these scenarios, you have the opportunity for either comedy, drama, or (preferably) both.
On my to-read list is a 2010 debut novel, The Atlas of Love by Laurie Frankel. Very obviously a baby-focused story, just by looking at the cover. Based on the blurb, which baby clause do you think it falls under?
When Jill becomes both pregnant and single at the end of one spring semester, she and her two closest friends plunge into an experiment in tri-parenting, tri-schooling, and trihabitating as grad students in Seattle. Naturally, everything goes wrong, but in ways no one sees coming. Janey Duncan narrates the adventure of this modern family with hilarity and wisdom and shows how three lives are forever changed by (un)cooperative parenting, literature, and a tiny baby named Atlas who upends and uplifts their entire world.
It's easy to pinpoint now, isn't it? (number two!) I doubt you'll look at baby stories the same way ever again. Can you think of some classic examples for the baby clause?
~Lydia
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Happy Release Day, BLUE FIRE!
Briefly interrupting women's fic month to announce the release of Blue Fire by Janice Hardy. YAY! This book was easy to find on the shelf, even though it was near the bottom at my local store, because the rich orange-red cover is so vibrant. The book covers in this series are really a step above, in my opinion.
If you're not familiar with Janice's Healing Wars series, click HERE for my review of book one, The Shifter.
Yes, that is my actual personal copy (just purchased today!) next to my actual favorite glass mug full of hot chocolate that I just made, sitting on my actual kitchen table. It's cold and rainy today in my part of the world. A steamy drink and BLUE FIRE are just what I need.
Happy reading!
~Lydia
If you're not familiar with Janice's Healing Wars series, click HERE for my review of book one, The Shifter.
Yes, that is my actual personal copy (just purchased today!) next to my actual favorite glass mug full of hot chocolate that I just made, sitting on my actual kitchen table. It's cold and rainy today in my part of the world. A steamy drink and BLUE FIRE are just what I need.
Happy reading!
~Lydia
Tuesday Tunes - Common Themes In Women's Fiction: Life Goes On
Raise your hand if you're old enough to remember this show and/or had a serious "I want to be Kellie Martin" or "I wish Kellie Martin was my girlfriend" type thing going on.
*crickets chirping*
Okay, never mind.
Life Goes On was a huge hit when I was younger. Kids liked it. Teens liked it. Adults liked it. Which is why it had such a great run. And the thing I really loved about it was that the writers never strayed from the theme "life goes on." The story always remained centered around an average family facing day-to-day issues that any one of us could possibly have ourselves, despite differences in family type, location, age, etc. The theme is universal.
This is one of the main reasons contemporary women's fiction is so popular. The reader is able to sense, from beginning to end, "this could be me." And that's the best connection you could ask for as an author.
The television series Life Goes On also had a very clever way of opening each new episode. It was always the same, yet always different (kind of the like The Simpsons "couch" openings). And that really is a great trick. You give your audience the cozy familiarity while keeping things fresh.
The first video clip is from one of the first season episodes (it might even be the pilot but I'm not entirely sure), and the second clip is the opening of the finale. While they kept these openings familiar and fresh throughout the entire four-year run of the series, seeing these two together emphasizes the circularity of the theme.
Enjoy.
~Lydia
*crickets chirping*
Okay, never mind.
Life Goes On was a huge hit when I was younger. Kids liked it. Teens liked it. Adults liked it. Which is why it had such a great run. And the thing I really loved about it was that the writers never strayed from the theme "life goes on." The story always remained centered around an average family facing day-to-day issues that any one of us could possibly have ourselves, despite differences in family type, location, age, etc. The theme is universal.
This is one of the main reasons contemporary women's fiction is so popular. The reader is able to sense, from beginning to end, "this could be me." And that's the best connection you could ask for as an author.
The television series Life Goes On also had a very clever way of opening each new episode. It was always the same, yet always different (kind of the like The Simpsons "couch" openings). And that really is a great trick. You give your audience the cozy familiarity while keeping things fresh.
The first video clip is from one of the first season episodes (it might even be the pilot but I'm not entirely sure), and the second clip is the opening of the finale. While they kept these openings familiar and fresh throughout the entire four-year run of the series, seeing these two together emphasizes the circularity of the theme.
Enjoy.
~Lydia
Monday, October 4, 2010
Learning From Hollywood - High Concept In Women's Fiction
YAY, IT'S OCTOBER!
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and since that is mainly a women's issue (not saying guys aren't affected by it, because they SO are) I'll be focusing mainly on women's fiction topics.
Women's fiction is an umbrella term, in my opinion, under which resides genres like romance and chick lit (or whatever they're calling it now). In film, these stories are often called "chick flicks." As with any other type of movie, chick flicks can be dull and/or annoying if they lack a high concept.
Why do I keep talking about high concept? Because without it, your story dies before it's even born. And (something else I keep repeating ad nauseam) the best way to determine if your story is high concept is by giving it the one-liner test.
Did you all just groan? Stop it and just trust me. This stuff works.
Example time! First up, a couple movies starring Diane Keaton, which, in novel form, are considered women's fiction. Both of these movies focus on three female main characters who are connected in some way. Even if you did not see either of these films, you should be able to gauge their marketability simply from the logline. Here they are:
The First Wives' Club -- Reunited by the death of a college friend, three divorced women seek revenge on the husbands who left them for younger women.
Hanging Up -- A trio of sisters bond over their ambivalence toward the approaching death of their curmudgeonly father, to whom none of them was particularly close.
The first movie was a hit and the second one totally flopped. Why? Well, take a closer look at those loglines and tell me which one you're able to imagine an entire story from? The first one, obviously. I read that second logline and I'm like... okay, so what? Where's the story? You've told me nothing! The first one has a clear conflict -- revenge on the exes. The second... I don't see a conflict. Do you?
Even after watching the trailer, which is the movie world's equivalent of a jacket blurb, I still don't know what the story is about.
And (saving the best for last) I see absolutely NO RELEVANCE between the title of the second film and its logline. Maybe if I got philosophical and vague I could relate the "hanging up" to "leaving the past behind", "what's done is done", "bury the hatchet", etc. But it's not really clear. Look at the first one again. The relevance of the title is not only ABUNDANTLY CLEAR but it also makes us want to see how the story plays out.
Hanging Up was dead on its feet. Did any of you even see that movie? I did. And it sucked. If only I'd known about loglines and pitches ten years ago, I could've saved myself the torture.
High concept does not only apply to tales of the strange, like Inception, and I believe every story worth selling to your readers MUST be high concept, no matter what the genre. Whenever I'm struggling to describe my story within a brief sentence -- not a paragraph that is technically a sentence because of clever punctuation -- I know it is lacking that special ingredient that makes you go, "Aha! Now that's a story!"
Yes, you got me; I struggle with it, too. My novels with high concept are (no surprise!) the ones that I'm able to focus on enough to finish relatively quickly because the all-encompassing idea of it never falters. My novels that hit the fifty or one-hundred page mark and then get set aside (not forgotten, though) in favor of something else... looking back on it, I didn't have a clear concept to work around. I try to write that one-liner and it gets longer, and longer, and longer... until I realize I need to revamp it all because my thoughts aren't cohesive in the slightest. They're all over the place.
This seems to be especially difficult in women's fiction, especially contemporary women's fiction, stories about the every day realities of a woman's life in the modern world, whether she be 20, 30, 40, etc. You can put all the quirky voice into your MC that you can muster, but if there is no high concept to the story itself, you're sunk. You've got an excellent character with a story too boring to care about.
Let's take a look at a couple more film examples:
Romy and Michele's High School Reunion -- Two women get into a lot of trouble when they go to their high school reunion and lie about their lives after twelfth grade.
*yawn* Relevant title, but it doesn't really snap. What exactly is "a lot of trouble"? And doesn't everyone lie at their high school reunion? SO not interested.
Life As We Know It -- Two single adults become caregivers to an orphaned girl when their mutual best friends die in an accident.
Yes! I can see all the possibilities in that single sentence. Two people who probably have no clue how to care for a child (baby mayhem! always a winner), emotional trauma over losing friends, even a budding friendship and/or romance is imagined between the two. A shared experience like that will likely draw them together even if they don't really like each other, but how? I want to watch the movie to find out. And again, the title clearly fits. I'm sure "life as they know it" will be changed forever.
So if your women's fic novel seems to be lacking that blockbuster element -- maybe your critique partners are in love with your MC but can't quite put their finger on why they're not raving over the story, or your query letter lacks a natural flow but you're not sure how to fix it and not a single agent requested anything -- then take a lesson from Hollywood. Strip it all down to one line and see what you've got. Can you envision an entire story, complete with a clear conflict, just by reading that single sentence? If not, it's time to rethink your concept.
All it takes is one special ingredient to give the whole story a new flavor.
Happy writing,
~Lydia
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and since that is mainly a women's issue (not saying guys aren't affected by it, because they SO are) I'll be focusing mainly on women's fiction topics.
Women's fiction is an umbrella term, in my opinion, under which resides genres like romance and chick lit (or whatever they're calling it now). In film, these stories are often called "chick flicks." As with any other type of movie, chick flicks can be dull and/or annoying if they lack a high concept.
Why do I keep talking about high concept? Because without it, your story dies before it's even born. And (something else I keep repeating ad nauseam) the best way to determine if your story is high concept is by giving it the one-liner test.
Did you all just groan? Stop it and just trust me. This stuff works.
Example time! First up, a couple movies starring Diane Keaton, which, in novel form, are considered women's fiction. Both of these movies focus on three female main characters who are connected in some way. Even if you did not see either of these films, you should be able to gauge their marketability simply from the logline. Here they are:
The First Wives' Club -- Reunited by the death of a college friend, three divorced women seek revenge on the husbands who left them for younger women.
Hanging Up -- A trio of sisters bond over their ambivalence toward the approaching death of their curmudgeonly father, to whom none of them was particularly close.
The first movie was a hit and the second one totally flopped. Why? Well, take a closer look at those loglines and tell me which one you're able to imagine an entire story from? The first one, obviously. I read that second logline and I'm like... okay, so what? Where's the story? You've told me nothing! The first one has a clear conflict -- revenge on the exes. The second... I don't see a conflict. Do you?
Even after watching the trailer, which is the movie world's equivalent of a jacket blurb, I still don't know what the story is about.
And (saving the best for last) I see absolutely NO RELEVANCE between the title of the second film and its logline. Maybe if I got philosophical and vague I could relate the "hanging up" to "leaving the past behind", "what's done is done", "bury the hatchet", etc. But it's not really clear. Look at the first one again. The relevance of the title is not only ABUNDANTLY CLEAR but it also makes us want to see how the story plays out.
Hanging Up was dead on its feet. Did any of you even see that movie? I did. And it sucked. If only I'd known about loglines and pitches ten years ago, I could've saved myself the torture.
High concept does not only apply to tales of the strange, like Inception, and I believe every story worth selling to your readers MUST be high concept, no matter what the genre. Whenever I'm struggling to describe my story within a brief sentence -- not a paragraph that is technically a sentence because of clever punctuation -- I know it is lacking that special ingredient that makes you go, "Aha! Now that's a story!"
Yes, you got me; I struggle with it, too. My novels with high concept are (no surprise!) the ones that I'm able to focus on enough to finish relatively quickly because the all-encompassing idea of it never falters. My novels that hit the fifty or one-hundred page mark and then get set aside (not forgotten, though) in favor of something else... looking back on it, I didn't have a clear concept to work around. I try to write that one-liner and it gets longer, and longer, and longer... until I realize I need to revamp it all because my thoughts aren't cohesive in the slightest. They're all over the place.
This seems to be especially difficult in women's fiction, especially contemporary women's fiction, stories about the every day realities of a woman's life in the modern world, whether she be 20, 30, 40, etc. You can put all the quirky voice into your MC that you can muster, but if there is no high concept to the story itself, you're sunk. You've got an excellent character with a story too boring to care about.
Let's take a look at a couple more film examples:
Romy and Michele's High School Reunion -- Two women get into a lot of trouble when they go to their high school reunion and lie about their lives after twelfth grade.
*yawn* Relevant title, but it doesn't really snap. What exactly is "a lot of trouble"? And doesn't everyone lie at their high school reunion? SO not interested.
Life As We Know It -- Two single adults become caregivers to an orphaned girl when their mutual best friends die in an accident.
Yes! I can see all the possibilities in that single sentence. Two people who probably have no clue how to care for a child (baby mayhem! always a winner), emotional trauma over losing friends, even a budding friendship and/or romance is imagined between the two. A shared experience like that will likely draw them together even if they don't really like each other, but how? I want to watch the movie to find out. And again, the title clearly fits. I'm sure "life as they know it" will be changed forever.
So if your women's fic novel seems to be lacking that blockbuster element -- maybe your critique partners are in love with your MC but can't quite put their finger on why they're not raving over the story, or your query letter lacks a natural flow but you're not sure how to fix it and not a single agent requested anything -- then take a lesson from Hollywood. Strip it all down to one line and see what you've got. Can you envision an entire story, complete with a clear conflict, just by reading that single sentence? If not, it's time to rethink your concept.
All it takes is one special ingredient to give the whole story a new flavor.
Happy writing,
~Lydia
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