As much as I wish to get back to relating the information from the JRWC sessions, a topic came up last night at Writers Wednesdays that I promised to mention: NaNoWriMo. It surprised me that some of the writers there hadn't heard of it, so I figured I should give it a shout.
NaNoWriMo, short for National Novel Writing Month, is a sensation that happens every November. The rules are simple: at 12:01 am on November 1, you must start with a blank page. At midnight on November 30, you need to submit a minimum of 50,000 human-generated (yeah, that means no using the "rand" generator in Word) and mostly different words, and you should have some idea that you're at the end of the story. If, in fact, there is a story--that's one of the optional parts. Doesn't have to have a plot, you see. Nor does it have to have gripping characters or sparkly dialogue (or is it the other way around?).
It certainly doesn't have to not suck.
Here's a snippet of what the official site (www.nanowrimo.org) says about it:
Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.
Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It’s all about quantity, not quality. This approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.
Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that’s a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.
Writing sucky crap is, in fact, kind of the whole point. It's a fairly well-accepted truthyism among those who have come before that nearly everybody's first novel is better suited for giving the gerbils something to pee on than to actually be read. There was a guest blog post on the subject this very morning, in fact, over in Rachelle Gardner's place: http://www.rachellegardner.com/2011/10/a-time-to-kill-your-novel/. According to Mr. Brotherton, "It’s fact: the death of your first few manuscripts is almost inevitable. Sure, exceptions exist. But there’s just too much to learn in this craft to be instantly brilliant."
So, if you're sitting there with Novel #1 still to come, why not make it happen in November? It's going to suck anyway, so why not have fun with it? And by fun, I mean actual fun, involving-other-people sort of fun. You know, that stuff that's significantly more fun than sitting at home in front of your keyboard telling yourself how much fun you're having.
When I did NaNo, it was up in Alaska at a time when there wasn't a whole lot of "real fun" to be had in that region. Now, though, were I doing it (and I would be, certainly, if I didn't have this nasty dissertation thing hanging over my head this year) I'd look up the Richmond group. Well, I would, except I already met the person in charge of the group. It was last night, in fact, and that meeting is what spawned this post. They're going to have several great get-togethers: writing parties and plot parties and party parties. Your area likely will do the same; go to the site and look up your region.
In the meantime, you've got a few weeks to read a couple of very important books on the subject. Chris Baty, NaNo's founder, wrote a book called No Plot? No Problem. It's short, yet it spins an interesting yarn about how they came up with this sort of silly notion. It also discusses how to go about writing 50,000 words in 30 days. At the other end of the spectrum, you should also read Stephen King's On Writing. That book is, by all accounts I've heard (and I've heard several), one of the seminal works on how to write well.
By reading both books, then, you're bookending yourself on both sides. One book tells the tale of how it's okay to suck, while the other tells how not to suck. Excellent works, both, and a great way to while away the rest of October whenever you're not doing your fingie exercises to prepare for a crushing 2K-words-per-day writing pace.
Only, 2K words per day isn't really crushing, is it? I did it for most of the spring and summer this year, and once you figure out where it should go in your schedule, it's really not that bad at all. Especially when those words don't have to be the right ones.
So go, doooo eeeeet. Two hundred thousand people did it last year. Thirty thousand novels were written as a result. According to the agents' blogs I've read, a gazillion horrible query letters were sent out in early December (don't do that, by the way). You'll be joining a great community.
You could, after all, be writing the next Water for Elephants, which was written as a NaNo project (and then, I'm sure, revised a LOT). Granted, you're probably not writing it, if statistics are to be believed. But what you are doing is limbering up the writing muscles, learning some great lessons in the process, getting that first throwaway out of the way, and setting yourself up for success later on.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
When will it be DONE?
I was preparing for another submission a few days ago, one in which I had to copy deeper into the novel than I had before to paste into the submission document, and I discovered even more suckage to unsuck. It's a little disheartening, really. I've spent a lot of time and energy, and I've abused the heck out of all those poor little computer bits, sending submissions/queries out over and over, saying it was ready.
I thought it was.
After six solid revision efforts and one professional editor's whacking away at it, it damn well should've been.
In a story that admittedly doesn't seem related at first, I had a very hard time on the key concept of shifting frames of reference in graduate quantum mechanics class. The professor explained the esoteric squigglery in the book by asking me to envision taking the room we were in, viewed from one corner, and lifting and rotating that room. Nope, didn't get it. So he tried again, and this time he used hand gestures also when he asked me to envision taking the room we were in, viewed from one corner, and lifting and rotating the room. Nope, still didn't get it. The third time he made his voice a little louder when he explained it yet again in precisely the same terms and gestures he'd used before. I left, frustration following me in a heavy, dark cloud back to the grad student cave where one of my peers explained it a different way and I got it in somewhere around thirty seconds.
I've had agent after agent tell me that my book, while interesting, didn't excite them, didn't make them love it. Unlike the professor in my quantum mechanics class, they had no way of knowing, and, really, no reason to care, that they were giving me the same information I hadn't understood the first time.
Two events that I "got" happened nearly simultaneously, though: I went to the James River Writers Conference and listened to others making the same mistakes I was; and I received a response from a small publisher to whom I'd submitted several weeks ago. Unlike the agents' flowery "nice, but don't love it" responses, her tune was different, as a washcloth is different from a hammer: "it's not ready." Damn. I'm honestly not certain I'd've believed her had it not come with the timing it did, and/or had she not taken the time to edit the Prologue to show me what she was talking about.
Okay, okay, I get it. Shifting frame of reference, I can now do. Gotcha. (reference back to the physics metaphor, in case I lost anybody)
To burden the field with yet another weak simile, writing is like sculpting. It's like it a lot, actually, but in this case I refer to the process of refinement. The first draft really just puts the shape into the piece, so you get, say, kind of an oval-ish chunk that is said to be the head. Maybe it even has eyes and a nose of sorts. Further refinement chips away, chips away, chips away. You bring in some of your most trusted buddies who look at it and point out everywhere it might be improved upon, except that one of them spends the evening talking about how it's too chilly in the room and another disappears frequently to visit the bar. Then you bring in a professional editor who looks at all your lines and balance and--well, whatever stuff is important to a sculptor--and advises you on further changes.
What they don't tell you in writing class, or at least I never heard it (and I didn't sleep all that many times in that class, if I recall correctly), is that after the professional editor sweeps through, you've still got some cleaning up to be done. After the edits have all been made, the changes invariably lay bare some spots that either were problems you didn't see before or weren't problems but are now.
For example, my editor told me to make the cataclysm bigger, since that, after all, is the title of my book (except that it's not, now, but the point still was valid). So I did, but I left somebody out of it: my main character. Oops. Every query letter I've sent out has begun with, in one form or another, "Crystal survives a cataclysm through the powers of her husband," which means she's kinda gotta be there. In fact, it's even better if the cataclysm is seen through her eyes, rather than the not-so-main character of Matt's boss.
Problem is, I read and read and read and read that after I beefed it up and never caught the omission. It wasn't until I was pasting it that the chip caught my eye. Oh, she's there, sort of, in much the same way some of my friends from Alaska are in the movie Big Miracle. You won't see them, though, as they'll be cloaked in the garment of "extra." Likewise, the scene mentions Crystal being there and even participating, but there are eight hundred people in the parking lot about to be swept away by a massive tidal wave. As written before, she was one of them. She needed to be more than that. She is, now, but only after yet another editing session.
At what point is the novel done, then? Some say never, I'm sure, but there's a certain point where you have to quit editing and send it out to the world. What say you?
Tomorrow I'll cover one of my favorite (and most-tweeted) sessions of the conference, One Novel's Journey, and the answer to the above question for the novel discussed may surprise you. Till then, then....
I thought it was.
After six solid revision efforts and one professional editor's whacking away at it, it damn well should've been.
In a story that admittedly doesn't seem related at first, I had a very hard time on the key concept of shifting frames of reference in graduate quantum mechanics class. The professor explained the esoteric squigglery in the book by asking me to envision taking the room we were in, viewed from one corner, and lifting and rotating that room. Nope, didn't get it. So he tried again, and this time he used hand gestures also when he asked me to envision taking the room we were in, viewed from one corner, and lifting and rotating the room. Nope, still didn't get it. The third time he made his voice a little louder when he explained it yet again in precisely the same terms and gestures he'd used before. I left, frustration following me in a heavy, dark cloud back to the grad student cave where one of my peers explained it a different way and I got it in somewhere around thirty seconds.
I've had agent after agent tell me that my book, while interesting, didn't excite them, didn't make them love it. Unlike the professor in my quantum mechanics class, they had no way of knowing, and, really, no reason to care, that they were giving me the same information I hadn't understood the first time.
Two events that I "got" happened nearly simultaneously, though: I went to the James River Writers Conference and listened to others making the same mistakes I was; and I received a response from a small publisher to whom I'd submitted several weeks ago. Unlike the agents' flowery "nice, but don't love it" responses, her tune was different, as a washcloth is different from a hammer: "it's not ready." Damn. I'm honestly not certain I'd've believed her had it not come with the timing it did, and/or had she not taken the time to edit the Prologue to show me what she was talking about.
Okay, okay, I get it. Shifting frame of reference, I can now do. Gotcha. (reference back to the physics metaphor, in case I lost anybody)
To burden the field with yet another weak simile, writing is like sculpting. It's like it a lot, actually, but in this case I refer to the process of refinement. The first draft really just puts the shape into the piece, so you get, say, kind of an oval-ish chunk that is said to be the head. Maybe it even has eyes and a nose of sorts. Further refinement chips away, chips away, chips away. You bring in some of your most trusted buddies who look at it and point out everywhere it might be improved upon, except that one of them spends the evening talking about how it's too chilly in the room and another disappears frequently to visit the bar. Then you bring in a professional editor who looks at all your lines and balance and--well, whatever stuff is important to a sculptor--and advises you on further changes.
What they don't tell you in writing class, or at least I never heard it (and I didn't sleep all that many times in that class, if I recall correctly), is that after the professional editor sweeps through, you've still got some cleaning up to be done. After the edits have all been made, the changes invariably lay bare some spots that either were problems you didn't see before or weren't problems but are now.
For example, my editor told me to make the cataclysm bigger, since that, after all, is the title of my book (except that it's not, now, but the point still was valid). So I did, but I left somebody out of it: my main character. Oops. Every query letter I've sent out has begun with, in one form or another, "Crystal survives a cataclysm through the powers of her husband," which means she's kinda gotta be there. In fact, it's even better if the cataclysm is seen through her eyes, rather than the not-so-main character of Matt's boss.
Problem is, I read and read and read and read that after I beefed it up and never caught the omission. It wasn't until I was pasting it that the chip caught my eye. Oh, she's there, sort of, in much the same way some of my friends from Alaska are in the movie Big Miracle. You won't see them, though, as they'll be cloaked in the garment of "extra." Likewise, the scene mentions Crystal being there and even participating, but there are eight hundred people in the parking lot about to be swept away by a massive tidal wave. As written before, she was one of them. She needed to be more than that. She is, now, but only after yet another editing session.
At what point is the novel done, then? Some say never, I'm sure, but there's a certain point where you have to quit editing and send it out to the world. What say you?
Tomorrow I'll cover one of my favorite (and most-tweeted) sessions of the conference, One Novel's Journey, and the answer to the above question for the novel discussed may surprise you. Till then, then....
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
The One Journey, Many Paths session
Having covered three of the overall sessions, I need to spend a bit of time discussing the concurrent ones. A conference planner just plain can't win with these. If you don't plan any concurrent sessions people are going to whine that all you had were the big-room events, some of which they didn't get much out of. If you plan many sessions of concurrent events, meanwhile, you'll get people who aren't interested in any of the four meetings in one slot, and those who are highly interested in more than one who haven't quite figured out how to be in two places at once.
I don't know whether Katharine Herndon, the planner for the JRWC this last time, experienced any of that, but I've seen it at prior events. I'll say that her design lent itself well to my needs; there was only one time block during which I desperately wanted to be in four places at once.
This was it.
There was a session called Flesh and Bones that taught character-building. It began as my first choice from the description, but it turned into my second choice when I saw that it was everybody else's first choice. The Good, the Bad, and the Sometimes-Ugly was a session on facing criticism over what you write, and it sounded like something that will be very appropriate for me once my book moves past the beta reader stage. Hopefully, then, they repeat it next year. Speaking of repeat: History Repeats Itself was on the topic of making historical dialog actually sound historical, a subject that interests me greatly from an academic standpoint but isn't all that crucial in my realm at the moment.
I walked into One Journey, Many Paths, a session on writing in multiple genres, media, and interests, looking forward to the discussion. The cast was certainly interesting, featuring Irene Ziegler, a novelist, actress, playwright, and excellent parallel parker, per her bio, and Michael Parker, a literary author who publishes in multiple places in both novel and short lengths and in both literary fic and non-fic genres. Rounding the trio out was David Henry Sterry, commercial author in more genres than I could keep up with.
First, let it be said that I didn't consider this topic up for debate until the conference. Not two weeks prior, I'd read a blog post by someone who's become a successful Indie who said not to do it. Her reasoning is that an author should always know his target market thoroughly, and you can't get that close to multiple target markets at once. Rachelle Gardner also tackled the topic in her blog, and her response to the self-posed question of "can I write books in multiple genres and still expect to build a successful publishing career" was a resounding "no," too. Her chief argument is one of focus. Both arguments have some traction with me, I admit. Then again, I have yet to publish one book, so it's a bit early for me to be picking sides.
A tip of the hat, if I may jump aside for a moment, to the phrase of the session: "viscerally hallucinogenic." Once again, I'm stuck looking at notes that copied the phrase but failed to attribute it, so all I can do is admire the term's beauty while wishing I knew who said it. If any of you happen to know, would you please leave it in the comment section?
Back to the session: it was interesting how the speakers diverged on the topic. It wasn't that they disagreed, but rather that they approached it from three opposite viewpoints. Ms. Ziegler told of the pleasure you can get from writing both screenplays and novels. A novel, she explained, is something you experience through your eyes and imagination, while a play is something you experience through its lyrical music. One's verbal, then, while the other is auditory. The writing of each contains very different challenges that she clearly loves.
Mr. Parker made some interesting observations on how the difference between writing fiction and non-fiction isn't as great as many believe. Specifically, he pointed out that a non-fiction writer has significantly more freedom than most people may think. He pointed to something he called a poetic truth; every retelling of a "true" situation carries a bit of the writer's perceptions and wishes with it, so there's really no such thing as entirely-non-fiction.
Mr. Sterry took the point about non-fiction to another level, having successfully published two memoirs himself. The memoir is normally considered non-fiction, but it's entirely composed of memories that may or may not have actually happened the way the author tells them. He explained that at one point he was advised, "just don't make stuff up." Thus, he continued, the plotting is different between a memoir and a novel, but the actual writing isn't. Both still have to carry a story in an entertaining way.
Having explained why one might get into writing in multiple genres, the panel--Mr. Sterry, specifically--took a crack at why we should do so: two different genres equals two different revenue streams. Two books out there is two books earning royalties, homogenre or not. Additionally, each category of genre carries with it other potential revenue streams; in the self-help category, for example, there are speaking engagements that may not be as prevalent for a novel writer. If you're in it to make money, it makes sense to leave yourself open to as many opportunities to make money as possible.
However--it's also, he acknowledged, a lot of work. He has five different agents, rather than the typical one, who don't return his calls. He described his efforts to keep his identities separate, which include (trying not to tell too much of his story here) having to be careful of the voice he uses for his various Twitter feeds.
Generally, the commentary in favor of writing in multiple genres was positive and plentiful, mostly related to the pleasure such writing brings to the writer but some related to making more money as a writer. Since the room held multiple novices, the panel provided some sage advice for beginners: Don't worry about "brand" as much as figuring out who you are. Write what you enjoy writing; go where your passion is. Most importantly, as Mr. Sterry said, "You have to have something to market in the first place. Lots of people have marketing structures built up around stuff where there's no 'there' there."
On that note, it's time for me to go back to working on getting my 'there' there.
I don't know whether Katharine Herndon, the planner for the JRWC this last time, experienced any of that, but I've seen it at prior events. I'll say that her design lent itself well to my needs; there was only one time block during which I desperately wanted to be in four places at once.
This was it.
There was a session called Flesh and Bones that taught character-building. It began as my first choice from the description, but it turned into my second choice when I saw that it was everybody else's first choice. The Good, the Bad, and the Sometimes-Ugly was a session on facing criticism over what you write, and it sounded like something that will be very appropriate for me once my book moves past the beta reader stage. Hopefully, then, they repeat it next year. Speaking of repeat: History Repeats Itself was on the topic of making historical dialog actually sound historical, a subject that interests me greatly from an academic standpoint but isn't all that crucial in my realm at the moment.
I walked into One Journey, Many Paths, a session on writing in multiple genres, media, and interests, looking forward to the discussion. The cast was certainly interesting, featuring Irene Ziegler, a novelist, actress, playwright, and excellent parallel parker, per her bio, and Michael Parker, a literary author who publishes in multiple places in both novel and short lengths and in both literary fic and non-fic genres. Rounding the trio out was David Henry Sterry, commercial author in more genres than I could keep up with.
First, let it be said that I didn't consider this topic up for debate until the conference. Not two weeks prior, I'd read a blog post by someone who's become a successful Indie who said not to do it. Her reasoning is that an author should always know his target market thoroughly, and you can't get that close to multiple target markets at once. Rachelle Gardner also tackled the topic in her blog, and her response to the self-posed question of "can I write books in multiple genres and still expect to build a successful publishing career" was a resounding "no," too. Her chief argument is one of focus. Both arguments have some traction with me, I admit. Then again, I have yet to publish one book, so it's a bit early for me to be picking sides.
A tip of the hat, if I may jump aside for a moment, to the phrase of the session: "viscerally hallucinogenic." Once again, I'm stuck looking at notes that copied the phrase but failed to attribute it, so all I can do is admire the term's beauty while wishing I knew who said it. If any of you happen to know, would you please leave it in the comment section?
Back to the session: it was interesting how the speakers diverged on the topic. It wasn't that they disagreed, but rather that they approached it from three opposite viewpoints. Ms. Ziegler told of the pleasure you can get from writing both screenplays and novels. A novel, she explained, is something you experience through your eyes and imagination, while a play is something you experience through its lyrical music. One's verbal, then, while the other is auditory. The writing of each contains very different challenges that she clearly loves.
Mr. Parker made some interesting observations on how the difference between writing fiction and non-fiction isn't as great as many believe. Specifically, he pointed out that a non-fiction writer has significantly more freedom than most people may think. He pointed to something he called a poetic truth; every retelling of a "true" situation carries a bit of the writer's perceptions and wishes with it, so there's really no such thing as entirely-non-fiction.
Mr. Sterry took the point about non-fiction to another level, having successfully published two memoirs himself. The memoir is normally considered non-fiction, but it's entirely composed of memories that may or may not have actually happened the way the author tells them. He explained that at one point he was advised, "just don't make stuff up." Thus, he continued, the plotting is different between a memoir and a novel, but the actual writing isn't. Both still have to carry a story in an entertaining way.
Having explained why one might get into writing in multiple genres, the panel--Mr. Sterry, specifically--took a crack at why we should do so: two different genres equals two different revenue streams. Two books out there is two books earning royalties, homogenre or not. Additionally, each category of genre carries with it other potential revenue streams; in the self-help category, for example, there are speaking engagements that may not be as prevalent for a novel writer. If you're in it to make money, it makes sense to leave yourself open to as many opportunities to make money as possible.
However--it's also, he acknowledged, a lot of work. He has five different agents, rather than the typical one, who don't return his calls. He described his efforts to keep his identities separate, which include (trying not to tell too much of his story here) having to be careful of the voice he uses for his various Twitter feeds.
Generally, the commentary in favor of writing in multiple genres was positive and plentiful, mostly related to the pleasure such writing brings to the writer but some related to making more money as a writer. Since the room held multiple novices, the panel provided some sage advice for beginners: Don't worry about "brand" as much as figuring out who you are. Write what you enjoy writing; go where your passion is. Most importantly, as Mr. Sterry said, "You have to have something to market in the first place. Lots of people have marketing structures built up around stuff where there's no 'there' there."
On that note, it's time for me to go back to working on getting my 'there' there.
Monday, October 10, 2011
The New Era of Publishing
If I may channel for a moment my inner Army officer (since that's where I initially learned to communicate), I'll put the bottom line up front:
YOU MUST GO TO THE JAMES RIVER WRITERS CONFERENCE NEXT YEAR.
I'm serious. I've been to many conferences. This weekend's was the first one for writers I've attended, but my general experience from conferences in other disciplines is that you attend a bunch of sessions, and those that you expect to be great are usually pretty mediocre while those you expect to be mediocre are also often, well, mediocre. There are often, then, only a few good sessions that end up making the time and money you've invested worth it.
That's what I feared with the James River Writers Conference, and honestly, right now my time is extremely valuable. I'm still trying to write creatively while I buckle down this week to finish my dissertation, all the while continuing to love my day job. This conference required I use one day of my vacation and also give up a Saturday with the family--not a small sacrifice. It also cost $160 (since I registered early). That's pretty inexpensive as writers conferences go, actually, but it's also half of a car payment, or two nights out to dinner. All things are relative.
I went, though, and I'm extremely glad I did, if my last few posts haven't made the point strongly enough. Next year you really ought to go. I got something valuable out of every single session, which is a first for my conference attending experience. If you're in the Richmond area it's worth every penny, and if you're not odds are that the cost of airline and hotel and conference will still be less than or equal to the cost of similar conferences elsewhere. You must go.
So, all that done, let me flit back to my brief (ha!) on what I learned there. Today's post is going to be on the session that I, personally, found least valuable. I said least valuable, not that there was no value at all. It was still useful, and I could tell from the questions that a great many of my fellow attendees got quite a lot out of it. It's just that I've spent a long time lurking and listening in the Indie world, so many of the facts presented weren't new. But I'm choosing to cover this one third because despite my own lack of gain, it generated a bunch of buzz and thus needs to be discussed soon.
The session was called The New Era of Publishing, and it was run by April Eberhardt, an accomplished literary agent. Overall, it was a session largely filled with doom and gloom if you're an employee of the Big 6 (or a literary agent, though she didn't tie it back to that explicitly) but potentially containing a ray of hope if you're an author. I don't think Ms. Eberhardt's crystal ball shows the Big 6 going away as some Indies are suggesting, and frankly I agree with her. There will always be a place for the big publishers, though whether we end up with a Big 7 or a Big 5 or a Big 3 is up in the air (and largely disconnected from the discussion at hand).
The power is shifting rapidly from the publisher to the author, according to Ms. Eberhardt. I knew that, as does anyone who's got their ear to the ground around the Indie community, but it's still nice to hear an agent acknowledge it. According to her numbers, 80% of all books published were pubbed by the Big 6 just five years ago. Now, that number is down to 55% and shrinking. Since the number of books pubbed by the Big 6 probably hasn't changed a lot, that indicates the pie is growing rapidly through the addition of many more indie-pubbed books.
That's good news for Indies, right? Ms. Eberhardt didn't say, but I'm not sure it's good news. The potential to indie-pub has always been there, because nearly any printing press will happily take on a book printing for a fee. It's good news for readers, certainly, because we have many more choices out there. For authors, indie or traditional, though, now there are double (ish) the number of people to out-market if you want readers to actually find your book to purchase it. Discoverability is the key word for Indies, and your discoverability drops significantly the larger the field becomes.
She pointed out, interestingly, that Amazon is going into the publishing business through their acquisition of CreateSpace, setting up of a service, and acquisition of some of the senior editing talent from the Big 6 houses. Taken in light of their fairly recent and very public spat with MacMillan (one of the Big 6) over ebook pricing, it's even more interesting. As Ms. Eberhardt pointed out, they'll have lighter infrastructure than any of the Big 6, who are "like battleships on ice skates" (I love that quote from her). Amazon will be able to bring books to market much faster and much cheaper than their new competitors will.
It's going to be fascinating to watch the world of publishing evolve in the near future.
Her big three things to take away from the talk were:
An author has three choices, then, as detailed by the speaker.
Traditional publishing has all the traditional advantages: the agent and publisher do much of the heavy lifting for us, and the author might receive an advance for the work (against which royalties are accumulated, by the way, so it's not like you get the advance and royalties, at least not at first). The negatives for this arena are that it's a very competitive space for new authors, advances are shrinking rapidly and are paid in more but smaller chunks, you still need to do promotion yourself, and no matter how good the reviews are, if your book doesn't earn to expectations, they may not take your next one.
A second option is running through small independent presses, typically on an un-agented basis. The publisher still does some of the heavy lifting, depending on the house (frequently in the form of editing and cover design), and may even do a better job than the Big 6 at it because they focus on significantly fewer book releases (that part surprised me, but it makes sense). The cons are that it's still lots of work, with fierce competition, it still takes two years to publication, the author still does much of the promotion, it still takes two years to publication, and the book still may or may not make a profit.
The third option is indie-pub. Hey, hey, you're in control, and you face no competition to get your book out there. Plus, there are many fewer people to share the money with when your book sells. If, I must add, your book sells. In indie-land, you have to do all the heavy lifting yourself, which is of course the general price of independence in the first place. It's a lot of work, and profits aren't guaranteed.
What Ms. Eberhardt didn't say, but I've picked up on loud and clear over in indie-land, is that the chief problem with self-pubbing is that the heavy lifting is in areas where authors very likely don't have interest, much less expertise. Expecting them to design a great cover themselves is a stretch, as is the suggestion that they spend a couple hundred to a couple thousand for a competent artist to design one for them. That's just a cover; very few writers have ever considered taking a business class or cracking open a marketing text to figure out how to go about making their work discoverable and something people want to purchase. Most people, in my experience, blissfully go at writing their next book without ever taking the time to figure out that "marketing" and "selling" aren't synonyms. I'm lucky. I bring an MBA to the table, but I frankly can't imagine how an Indie would survive long without that--or perhaps the same but more targeted information one receives from a writers conference (like the James River Writers Conference--hint, hint for now; I'll cover those sessions later).
Smashwords quotes that the overall average number of books sold per title is about 300, per Ms. Eberhardt. So let's say you get a buck from each one (which is tough to do if you price it at $.99 like most Indies, but just go with it for now), then that's almost enough to pay for two writers conferences. But you're in charge of pricing, remember? So let's say you raise the price enough to make five bucks from each one. If you still sell as many books, then that's enough to pay for a conference that's, like, out of town and stuff. The good news is that if you use the profits to pay for a conference, you might learn how to out-market the 300-copy-sellers.
All that said, Ms. Eberhardt also pointed out that indie-pubbed books are inexpensive to publish (though not free!), quick to get to the market, and they begin making money once the low costs are covered (if, she apparently didn't feel the need to point out, the costs ever get covered).
Whew. Long and dark session, indeed. But she did leave us with five steps for success, regardless of which of the three paths we take, and these five steps are worth every moment of doom and gloom:
She doled out a few other tidbits. For example, one path to success some are taking is self-pubbing till the Big 6 notice you. It typically takes a few thousand books sold to get to that point, Ms. Eberhardt said, but it's worked for several authors. Keep in mind, though, that we've already said the average author only sells 300 copies. To get from there to a few thousand requires something the average author doesn't have, and if you're at this point in the blog and don't know what that "something" might be, you should probably stick with sending queries.
Also, Smashwords has, on their site, a great wealth of information on self-pubbing. I agree; I've read most of it. They even have it all (or mostly) lumped into a single how-to manual with pictures. How's that for cool?
Finally, another thing I didn't know--the traditional publishers only have a 3-4 week attention span. If the initial print run is 10,000 books, and they don't sell in that time, it's not like they're shipped to you with a smiley face on the front of the box. Instead, the remaining copies of your wonderful work of literary genius are all--shredded.
And on that happy smiley note, time to get back to work for the day.
YOU MUST GO TO THE JAMES RIVER WRITERS CONFERENCE NEXT YEAR.
I'm serious. I've been to many conferences. This weekend's was the first one for writers I've attended, but my general experience from conferences in other disciplines is that you attend a bunch of sessions, and those that you expect to be great are usually pretty mediocre while those you expect to be mediocre are also often, well, mediocre. There are often, then, only a few good sessions that end up making the time and money you've invested worth it.
That's what I feared with the James River Writers Conference, and honestly, right now my time is extremely valuable. I'm still trying to write creatively while I buckle down this week to finish my dissertation, all the while continuing to love my day job. This conference required I use one day of my vacation and also give up a Saturday with the family--not a small sacrifice. It also cost $160 (since I registered early). That's pretty inexpensive as writers conferences go, actually, but it's also half of a car payment, or two nights out to dinner. All things are relative.
I went, though, and I'm extremely glad I did, if my last few posts haven't made the point strongly enough. Next year you really ought to go. I got something valuable out of every single session, which is a first for my conference attending experience. If you're in the Richmond area it's worth every penny, and if you're not odds are that the cost of airline and hotel and conference will still be less than or equal to the cost of similar conferences elsewhere. You must go.
So, all that done, let me flit back to my brief (ha!) on what I learned there. Today's post is going to be on the session that I, personally, found least valuable. I said least valuable, not that there was no value at all. It was still useful, and I could tell from the questions that a great many of my fellow attendees got quite a lot out of it. It's just that I've spent a long time lurking and listening in the Indie world, so many of the facts presented weren't new. But I'm choosing to cover this one third because despite my own lack of gain, it generated a bunch of buzz and thus needs to be discussed soon.
The session was called The New Era of Publishing, and it was run by April Eberhardt, an accomplished literary agent. Overall, it was a session largely filled with doom and gloom if you're an employee of the Big 6 (or a literary agent, though she didn't tie it back to that explicitly) but potentially containing a ray of hope if you're an author. I don't think Ms. Eberhardt's crystal ball shows the Big 6 going away as some Indies are suggesting, and frankly I agree with her. There will always be a place for the big publishers, though whether we end up with a Big 7 or a Big 5 or a Big 3 is up in the air (and largely disconnected from the discussion at hand).
The power is shifting rapidly from the publisher to the author, according to Ms. Eberhardt. I knew that, as does anyone who's got their ear to the ground around the Indie community, but it's still nice to hear an agent acknowledge it. According to her numbers, 80% of all books published were pubbed by the Big 6 just five years ago. Now, that number is down to 55% and shrinking. Since the number of books pubbed by the Big 6 probably hasn't changed a lot, that indicates the pie is growing rapidly through the addition of many more indie-pubbed books.
That's good news for Indies, right? Ms. Eberhardt didn't say, but I'm not sure it's good news. The potential to indie-pub has always been there, because nearly any printing press will happily take on a book printing for a fee. It's good news for readers, certainly, because we have many more choices out there. For authors, indie or traditional, though, now there are double (ish) the number of people to out-market if you want readers to actually find your book to purchase it. Discoverability is the key word for Indies, and your discoverability drops significantly the larger the field becomes.
She pointed out, interestingly, that Amazon is going into the publishing business through their acquisition of CreateSpace, setting up of a service, and acquisition of some of the senior editing talent from the Big 6 houses. Taken in light of their fairly recent and very public spat with MacMillan (one of the Big 6) over ebook pricing, it's even more interesting. As Ms. Eberhardt pointed out, they'll have lighter infrastructure than any of the Big 6, who are "like battleships on ice skates" (I love that quote from her). Amazon will be able to bring books to market much faster and much cheaper than their new competitors will.
It's going to be fascinating to watch the world of publishing evolve in the near future.
Her big three things to take away from the talk were:
- There's no one right way to publish.
- Authors and readers no longer need publishers to connect them.
- New publishing models are cropping up every day. (agencies are even creating small pub houses)
An author has three choices, then, as detailed by the speaker.
Traditional publishing has all the traditional advantages: the agent and publisher do much of the heavy lifting for us, and the author might receive an advance for the work (against which royalties are accumulated, by the way, so it's not like you get the advance and royalties, at least not at first). The negatives for this arena are that it's a very competitive space for new authors, advances are shrinking rapidly and are paid in more but smaller chunks, you still need to do promotion yourself, and no matter how good the reviews are, if your book doesn't earn to expectations, they may not take your next one.
A second option is running through small independent presses, typically on an un-agented basis. The publisher still does some of the heavy lifting, depending on the house (frequently in the form of editing and cover design), and may even do a better job than the Big 6 at it because they focus on significantly fewer book releases (that part surprised me, but it makes sense). The cons are that it's still lots of work, with fierce competition, it still takes two years to publication, the author still does much of the promotion, it still takes two years to publication, and the book still may or may not make a profit.
The third option is indie-pub. Hey, hey, you're in control, and you face no competition to get your book out there. Plus, there are many fewer people to share the money with when your book sells. If, I must add, your book sells. In indie-land, you have to do all the heavy lifting yourself, which is of course the general price of independence in the first place. It's a lot of work, and profits aren't guaranteed.
What Ms. Eberhardt didn't say, but I've picked up on loud and clear over in indie-land, is that the chief problem with self-pubbing is that the heavy lifting is in areas where authors very likely don't have interest, much less expertise. Expecting them to design a great cover themselves is a stretch, as is the suggestion that they spend a couple hundred to a couple thousand for a competent artist to design one for them. That's just a cover; very few writers have ever considered taking a business class or cracking open a marketing text to figure out how to go about making their work discoverable and something people want to purchase. Most people, in my experience, blissfully go at writing their next book without ever taking the time to figure out that "marketing" and "selling" aren't synonyms. I'm lucky. I bring an MBA to the table, but I frankly can't imagine how an Indie would survive long without that--or perhaps the same but more targeted information one receives from a writers conference (like the James River Writers Conference--hint, hint for now; I'll cover those sessions later).
Smashwords quotes that the overall average number of books sold per title is about 300, per Ms. Eberhardt. So let's say you get a buck from each one (which is tough to do if you price it at $.99 like most Indies, but just go with it for now), then that's almost enough to pay for two writers conferences. But you're in charge of pricing, remember? So let's say you raise the price enough to make five bucks from each one. If you still sell as many books, then that's enough to pay for a conference that's, like, out of town and stuff. The good news is that if you use the profits to pay for a conference, you might learn how to out-market the 300-copy-sellers.
All that said, Ms. Eberhardt also pointed out that indie-pubbed books are inexpensive to publish (though not free!), quick to get to the market, and they begin making money once the low costs are covered (if, she apparently didn't feel the need to point out, the costs ever get covered).
Whew. Long and dark session, indeed. But she did leave us with five steps for success, regardless of which of the three paths we take, and these five steps are worth every moment of doom and gloom:
- Make sure your story is good.
- Edit, edit, and then edit again. Professional editing is full of win (my words on that last, not hers)
- Create an interesting cover - KEY. Say after me: you cannot sell more books than you have close (and non-poor) relatives without a catchy cover (my words on that last)
- Tune up your marketing skills. Or, in many cases, actually gain some (again, my words on that last)
- Let go of the belief that only traditionally-published books are "real" books.
She doled out a few other tidbits. For example, one path to success some are taking is self-pubbing till the Big 6 notice you. It typically takes a few thousand books sold to get to that point, Ms. Eberhardt said, but it's worked for several authors. Keep in mind, though, that we've already said the average author only sells 300 copies. To get from there to a few thousand requires something the average author doesn't have, and if you're at this point in the blog and don't know what that "something" might be, you should probably stick with sending queries.
Also, Smashwords has, on their site, a great wealth of information on self-pubbing. I agree; I've read most of it. They even have it all (or mostly) lumped into a single how-to manual with pictures. How's that for cool?
Finally, another thing I didn't know--the traditional publishers only have a 3-4 week attention span. If the initial print run is 10,000 books, and they don't sell in that time, it's not like they're shipped to you with a smiley face on the front of the box. Instead, the remaining copies of your wonderful work of literary genius are all--shredded.
And on that happy smiley note, time to get back to work for the day.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
First Pages critiques
It seems appropriate, after gushing over how useful the final event at the conference was, to spin around chronologically and gush over the first event. The chronology adds an irony to it, certainly, but the first event was quite similar to the last, and it had almost as profound an influence on my writing efforts going forward. I remember walking out of the beginning session, coffee-deprived (if you followed my Tweets, you know they banned food and drink as well as *gasp* coffee in the main lecture hall), thinking that I'd learned enough that if the entire rest of the conference taught me nothing, it was worth what I'd paid for it.
We launched the conference, after a brief but hysterically funny monologue by Mike Albo, with a session called, simply, First Pages. It was moderated by David Robbins, an accomplished author and playwright and professor as well as a leader within the writing group, and had as its panel of "judges" three agents: Michelle Brower, April Eberhardt, and Becca Stumpf. It progressed in a straightforward format; one of two prominent members of JRW read a submitted first page of an anonymous manuscript aloud, and then the judges and moderator critiqued it.
Had the panel been made up of readers or, say, English professors, it would've been valuable, but the choice of agents on the panel was brilliant. These are the folks who read tens of thousands of pitches and first pages each year searching for the diamond among the dust, and the audience was comprised of a couple hundred of us who'd submitted to people just like the judges hoping to be that diamond. You could feel the crowd hanging on every word. Well, nearly every word, anyway.
I'm not sure there's anything more entertainingly educational, or educationally entertaining, as seeing someone else's work torn apart (in a constructive and very non-mean manner, I should add). Yes, having my own work gutted at Pitchapalooza was more educational, but hardly as entertaining. To me, that is. I know others found it entertaining, but that falls under the first category, yes? In any event, this is the type of activity I would happily spend days observing, except that I'm not sure I'd learn much new after the first couple of hours.
Why do I predict a plateau in learning? Because of what I saw at the session. After a while, the agents began repeating themselves. There was always something new to praise, as well as something new to pummel, with each new work, but the core problems got repetitious after a while. Then again, I needed that, I think. Sometimes repetitive pummeling makes for the sharpest recall.
Speaking of lessons--on to the meat of the critiques.
There were several first-pages that received this comment. Is a novel just as beautiful a creation if the first page merely paints a scene using the perfect language? Probably. But it's not going to grab an agent's attention, and with the reading public's short attention spans, it's probably not going to get a lot of readership. Those are my thoughts, anyway. It's clear that the first assertion is correct, since this was something every agent objected to several times. Bottom line: in the very first page, in the very first scene, somebody has to have something at stake, and the reader has to be made to care about it.
Heard the former comment a bunch. Heard the latter once or twice, and decided to group them together since the latter is, to my mind, a subcategory of the former. One first page told of a recent college graduate sitting and waiting on an interview. The point of the one who made the comment there was that a recent college graduate thinks and acts a certain distinctive way, right? (if not, why do we care that he is one?) Telling us that he's a recent college graduate gathers far less emotional force than showing us that he is one through his nervousness, his somewhat awkward actions, etc.
Another example was in a scene set in a kitchen of a house overlooking a river. Most of the first page contained "stage directions"--the table was over there, the coffee pot was here, she walked around the table stage left to get to the.... You get the idea? Some of this is important for describing the scene, but too much takes away from the emotional investment the author is trying to force the reader to make. The only reason it would matter which side of the table she comes around is if one direction has a zombie in its path, and that didn't come out of the writing at all.
That's only directly applicable to one of the first pages, but it's my favorite quote of the day. The first line of the page had the character who owned the POV slug a nun, in those specific words, and then it drifted off into a discussion of--something. I don't remember what it said, though I'm pretty sure it mentioned "Catholic school" somewhere in it. I wasn't paying attention; I kept waiting to hear what happened after the fist made contact with the one in the habit.
Emotional investment gets people to read the book. Frustrated, half-ass emotional investment makes me throw the book across the room. Hey, the author gets a royalty either way, but only one of them gets the author a royalty on Book 2.
I saw several of these, and this was a comment that prompted me to rewrite my own first paragraph as soon as I got home. It's a subtle point, but introducing a character by first and last name is an example of what not to do. My own work's first line, "Crystal Vincent bustled about getting breakfast and lunches ready for the day," is now, "Crystal bustled about getting breakfast and lunches ready for the day," and the paragraph that contained it is now two lines, down from five. There was stuff in there that, frankly, the reader didn't need to know, and anything on the first page that the reader doesn't need to know needs to be shucked. Speaking of that:
We've all written beautiful sections of prose that either didn't work in a scene or weren't needed in the scene. I've got some of those I've already ripped out of my heart along with the book, but it's a requirement of writing. If telling a story were merely a matter of delivering beautiful prose, it would be much easier.
Incidentally, I have two words written and highlighted with my funky circled asterisks under that line: "shrink prologue." I loved my prologue, I really did. I still love it, a page and a half shorter though it may be. And, thanks to another comment, it's now no longer titled "Prologue" but rather "Chapter 1."
That comment was interesting, especially since person and tense are two things I've studied at some length. I'd never really thought of using third person present ("Michael is a boy. He goes to school and learns to read.") versus third person past ("Michael was at school learning to read when the building was attacked by zombies."). The guy who made the comment, David Robbins, taught me something. It's not applicable to what I'm doing, but it was still very interesting since I'd never thought of it that way. Third person present tense is what we expect in screenplay voice, and since stage directions aren't what the reader wants out of a novel, it's probably not a good choice there.
Readers sometimes pick up on cliches, I guess, but it makes sense that agents reading tens of thousands of pitches would, and given their vocation, I can see where it would annoy them. In a later session we heard the truism that a writer is really writing for an audience of one, and in this case, that one is the agent. Avoid, then, the easy way out, and find a less often used method for showing the reader that your character is frightened.
God, I wish I could recall which panel member uttered this little gem. It's a brilliant way of explaining the importance of POV. In my own earlier writings, I had the same troubles as the person whose first page had just been read, in which the POV, or character/narrator whose eyes are absorbing the tale that is being spun, flits around through the scene like a butterfly of bad similes. *ahem* I've said before that switching up POV is required sometimes, but too much of it confuses the reader. The reader is confused because we don't know whom to settle in on, who's going to tell us the story, who's going to, as the panel member eloquently described, represent us.
This bit was counter-intuitive at first, but the speaker is correct. We see awakenings and door openings all the time. Big friggin' deal. The big deal is that there's zombies already in the house, so start there and, if you must, tell of the door opening later. Start with what will grab the reader's attention. Start with the big deal.
Above were some other comments I felt worth writing down. All good advice, but nothing new to me. Even the Prologue one wasn't new; I just decided I'd heard it enough to finally believe it. Hell, it doesn't matter to me whether the first few pages of my book are named Prologue or Chapter 1, or even Bob, as long as you read them.
Hope you learned a bit from this too. Come back next blog post for more!
We launched the conference, after a brief but hysterically funny monologue by Mike Albo, with a session called, simply, First Pages. It was moderated by David Robbins, an accomplished author and playwright and professor as well as a leader within the writing group, and had as its panel of "judges" three agents: Michelle Brower, April Eberhardt, and Becca Stumpf. It progressed in a straightforward format; one of two prominent members of JRW read a submitted first page of an anonymous manuscript aloud, and then the judges and moderator critiqued it.
Had the panel been made up of readers or, say, English professors, it would've been valuable, but the choice of agents on the panel was brilliant. These are the folks who read tens of thousands of pitches and first pages each year searching for the diamond among the dust, and the audience was comprised of a couple hundred of us who'd submitted to people just like the judges hoping to be that diamond. You could feel the crowd hanging on every word. Well, nearly every word, anyway.
I'm not sure there's anything more entertainingly educational, or educationally entertaining, as seeing someone else's work torn apart (in a constructive and very non-mean manner, I should add). Yes, having my own work gutted at Pitchapalooza was more educational, but hardly as entertaining. To me, that is. I know others found it entertaining, but that falls under the first category, yes? In any event, this is the type of activity I would happily spend days observing, except that I'm not sure I'd learn much new after the first couple of hours.
Why do I predict a plateau in learning? Because of what I saw at the session. After a while, the agents began repeating themselves. There was always something new to praise, as well as something new to pummel, with each new work, but the core problems got repetitious after a while. Then again, I needed that, I think. Sometimes repetitive pummeling makes for the sharpest recall.
Speaking of lessons--on to the meat of the critiques.
- "No stakes at first."
There were several first-pages that received this comment. Is a novel just as beautiful a creation if the first page merely paints a scene using the perfect language? Probably. But it's not going to grab an agent's attention, and with the reading public's short attention spans, it's probably not going to get a lot of readership. Those are my thoughts, anyway. It's clear that the first assertion is correct, since this was something every agent objected to several times. Bottom line: in the very first page, in the very first scene, somebody has to have something at stake, and the reader has to be made to care about it.
- "Too much telling, not enough showing / Too many stage directions."
Heard the former comment a bunch. Heard the latter once or twice, and decided to group them together since the latter is, to my mind, a subcategory of the former. One first page told of a recent college graduate sitting and waiting on an interview. The point of the one who made the comment there was that a recent college graduate thinks and acts a certain distinctive way, right? (if not, why do we care that he is one?) Telling us that he's a recent college graduate gathers far less emotional force than showing us that he is one through his nervousness, his somewhat awkward actions, etc.
Another example was in a scene set in a kitchen of a house overlooking a river. Most of the first page contained "stage directions"--the table was over there, the coffee pot was here, she walked around the table stage left to get to the.... You get the idea? Some of this is important for describing the scene, but too much takes away from the emotional investment the author is trying to force the reader to make. The only reason it would matter which side of the table she comes around is if one direction has a zombie in its path, and that didn't come out of the writing at all.
- "Don't slug a nun and then say 'be right back.'"
That's only directly applicable to one of the first pages, but it's my favorite quote of the day. The first line of the page had the character who owned the POV slug a nun, in those specific words, and then it drifted off into a discussion of--something. I don't remember what it said, though I'm pretty sure it mentioned "Catholic school" somewhere in it. I wasn't paying attention; I kept waiting to hear what happened after the fist made contact with the one in the habit.
Emotional investment gets people to read the book. Frustrated, half-ass emotional investment makes me throw the book across the room. Hey, the author gets a royalty either way, but only one of them gets the author a royalty on Book 2.
- "Let readers meet your characters like we meet each other. We don't hand out brochures that give our full names, our waist sizes, etc."
I saw several of these, and this was a comment that prompted me to rewrite my own first paragraph as soon as I got home. It's a subtle point, but introducing a character by first and last name is an example of what not to do. My own work's first line, "Crystal Vincent bustled about getting breakfast and lunches ready for the day," is now, "Crystal bustled about getting breakfast and lunches ready for the day," and the paragraph that contained it is now two lines, down from five. There was stuff in there that, frankly, the reader didn't need to know, and anything on the first page that the reader doesn't need to know needs to be shucked. Speaking of that:
- "Kill your darling."
We've all written beautiful sections of prose that either didn't work in a scene or weren't needed in the scene. I've got some of those I've already ripped out of my heart along with the book, but it's a requirement of writing. If telling a story were merely a matter of delivering beautiful prose, it would be much easier.
Incidentally, I have two words written and highlighted with my funky circled asterisks under that line: "shrink prologue." I loved my prologue, I really did. I still love it, a page and a half shorter though it may be. And, thanks to another comment, it's now no longer titled "Prologue" but rather "Chapter 1."
- "Third person present tense is tough. It's stage direction voice."
That comment was interesting, especially since person and tense are two things I've studied at some length. I'd never really thought of using third person present ("Michael is a boy. He goes to school and learns to read.") versus third person past ("Michael was at school learning to read when the building was attacked by zombies."). The guy who made the comment, David Robbins, taught me something. It's not applicable to what I'm doing, but it was still very interesting since I'd never thought of it that way. Third person present tense is what we expect in screenplay voice, and since stage directions aren't what the reader wants out of a novel, it's probably not a good choice there.
- "Avoid cliches, like 'his hands and knees trembled.'"
Readers sometimes pick up on cliches, I guess, but it makes sense that agents reading tens of thousands of pitches would, and given their vocation, I can see where it would annoy them. In a later session we heard the truism that a writer is really writing for an audience of one, and in this case, that one is the agent. Avoid, then, the easy way out, and find a less often used method for showing the reader that your character is frightened.
- "Somebody's gotta represent the reader on the page."
God, I wish I could recall which panel member uttered this little gem. It's a brilliant way of explaining the importance of POV. In my own earlier writings, I had the same troubles as the person whose first page had just been read, in which the POV, or character/narrator whose eyes are absorbing the tale that is being spun, flits around through the scene like a butterfly of bad similes. *ahem* I've said before that switching up POV is required sometimes, but too much of it confuses the reader. The reader is confused because we don't know whom to settle in on, who's going to tell us the story, who's going to, as the panel member eloquently described, represent us.
- "Start near an ending. Never start with an awakening or a door opening."
This bit was counter-intuitive at first, but the speaker is correct. We see awakenings and door openings all the time. Big friggin' deal. The big deal is that there's zombies already in the house, so start there and, if you must, tell of the door opening later. Start with what will grab the reader's attention. Start with the big deal.
- "Asides confuse things - avoid them on your first page."
- "Resolution is your enemy. Tension is your friend."
- "Mood-setting must be organic, not forced."
- "Move the best line to the front."
- "I don't like Prologues."
Above were some other comments I felt worth writing down. All good advice, but nothing new to me. Even the Prologue one wasn't new; I just decided I'd heard it enough to finally believe it. Hell, it doesn't matter to me whether the first few pages of my book are named Prologue or Chapter 1, or even Bob, as long as you read them.
Hope you learned a bit from this too. Come back next blog post for more!
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Pitchapalooza!
Closing out a great conference was an event called Pitchapalooza. Now, I'd learned quite a lot yesterday, and I learned quite a bit before 3:15 today, also, but what I received from Pitchapalooza dwarfed it all.
I learned why I've been getting so many no's.
At least, I think so. I'll explain, but first, a little more about the event. Pitchapalooza is the brilliant creation of The Book Doctors (www.TheBookDoctors.com), the company formed by agent Arielle Eckstut and author David Henry Sterry for the purpose of helping aspiring authors get published. I heard each of them present, and will sometime later tell of the sessions they led, but for now I'll just say they both seem like extremely smart people, so much so that I ordered a copy of their book. I'm looking forward to receiving and reading it.
Meanwhile, the event in question is described on their web site: http://www.thebookdoctors.com/workshops
Five years ago, we created an event that has drawn thousands of people into bookstores, writing conferences and book festivals all over the country. It’s called Pitchapalooza, the American Idol for books (only without Simon) and it works like this: Anyone with an idea for a book has the chance to pitch it to a panel of judges. But they get only one minute. Eckstut and Sterry team up with two guest industry insiders to form the judging panel. The Judges critique everything from idea to style to potential in the marketplace and much, much more. Whether potential authors pitch themselves, or simply listen to trained professionals critique each presentation, Pitchapaloozas are educational and entertaining for one and all. All attendees come away with concrete advice on how to improve their pitch as well as a greater understanding of the ins and outs of the publishing industry. At the end of each Pitchapalooza, the judges come together to pick a winner.
Certainly, it's not the event for anyone nervous about public speaking. I'm not, after fifteen years of having my nerves beaten out of me in adult education, so I signed up as soon as I could. I don't know what the odds were of being called up, but I was one of the lucky ones who got to present.
I'd prepared fairly extensively. My one-on-one with an agent was also today (and it went particularly well; the agent I'd picked was very engaging and "got" my story) so I'd written both a long-form pitch to go within 7 minutes for the one-on-one and a short-form Pitchapalooza version. I finally printed out version three of the long-form pitch, which used as its core my query letter verbiage, this morning as I prepared to walk out the door. By lunch, though, I'd already rewritten it long-hand on the back. Later, I was glad I did, as that pitch went extraordinarily well. The other one?
Here's (more or less) what I spoke into the microphone at Pitchapalooza:
Return of the Gods: Cataclysm is the story of Crystal, a suburban housewife who survives a destructive cataclysm through the powers of her husband, who she learns in the process is actually Mars, the God of War. (pause for laughter) She's conflicted, as most of us would be; who is her husband, really? Who are her twin daughters? Who is she, and how does she fit into the relationship with an immortal? Meanwhile, her husband's servant, a shape-shifting dragon who spends most of her time in stunningly beautiful human form, provides Crystal with several jealous moments. (another pause for laughter) Crystal soon learns, however, that her true enemy is Aphrodite, the Goddess of Love, who is her husband's ex-wife and has now set her mind to rekindling the flame with the God of War. (another pause for laughter) The story blends the classic mythologies in a manner designed to make sense of the western world’s history of deities and their pantheons in a realistic setting. In doing so, it transports the reader to the dive bar of the gods known as Olympus, as well as the ancient kingdom of Atlantis, before ending in a tumultuous battle between the God of War and the Goddess of Love. I think that Cataclysm will appeal to the many lovers of dragons and their lore*TIME* damn.
I had one sentence to finish, so the pauses proved to be my undoing. To be fair, though, my not finishing probably wasn't the main reason I didn't win. First of all, the guy who won did a perfect job, finishing an engaging pitch right at the sixty second mark. Second, the comments the panel gave me on my pitch weren't entirely wonderful. They were pretty good, actually--the judges said they want to read my book, as did several audience members as I sat back down. But there were some "room to grow" comments that, in a few seconds, made it clear why I haven't been having much success so far.
First, the title isn't gripping. I'd known that, but I didn't have many better ideas. Mr. Sterry did, and I'm now renaming the book and acknowledging his help on the ack page once I get it published.
The second problem is more subtle, yet more fundamental at the same time. I'm so so so so glad they put their finger on it, though, because it's something this newbie writer had already felt but may not have ever seen.
The pitch loses Crystal. It introduces her, certainly, and even engages the reader in her emotionally to a certain degree at the beginning. But then it heads off into action-land, telling all about what happens in the book. In doing so, any emotional connection the reader had with Crystal (my main character, remember!) is lost, set adrift in a sea of "then they went" and "there was a great battle" and other activity-related prose.
No wonder I've gotten a dozen (ish) query replies complaining about not loving it. There's nothing to love about a story where they go here, and then they go there, and then, like, this other thing happens. People love characters, not events. I've worked on this in the novel itself, raising the tension by showing the emotional impact upon Crystal that the events are having. Sadly, I then got caught up in the structural requirements of the query letter and neglected to do the same thing there.
As I said, it's subtle, but it's fundamental. The agent who's trying to fall in love with my (short) description of the story wants to know that Crystal is angry and frustrated over the attacks by Mars's ex-wife, and that she's involved on several levels in the final battle, and that she is caught up in and amused by the trip to the gods' dive bar.
Ah, well--that's what Sundays are for, yes? Query letter rewrite, coming up once again.
I learned why I've been getting so many no's.
At least, I think so. I'll explain, but first, a little more about the event. Pitchapalooza is the brilliant creation of The Book Doctors (www.TheBookDoctors.com), the company formed by agent Arielle Eckstut and author David Henry Sterry for the purpose of helping aspiring authors get published. I heard each of them present, and will sometime later tell of the sessions they led, but for now I'll just say they both seem like extremely smart people, so much so that I ordered a copy of their book. I'm looking forward to receiving and reading it.
Meanwhile, the event in question is described on their web site: http://www.thebookdoctors.com/workshops
Five years ago, we created an event that has drawn thousands of people into bookstores, writing conferences and book festivals all over the country. It’s called Pitchapalooza, the American Idol for books (only without Simon) and it works like this: Anyone with an idea for a book has the chance to pitch it to a panel of judges. But they get only one minute. Eckstut and Sterry team up with two guest industry insiders to form the judging panel. The Judges critique everything from idea to style to potential in the marketplace and much, much more. Whether potential authors pitch themselves, or simply listen to trained professionals critique each presentation, Pitchapaloozas are educational and entertaining for one and all. All attendees come away with concrete advice on how to improve their pitch as well as a greater understanding of the ins and outs of the publishing industry. At the end of each Pitchapalooza, the judges come together to pick a winner.
Certainly, it's not the event for anyone nervous about public speaking. I'm not, after fifteen years of having my nerves beaten out of me in adult education, so I signed up as soon as I could. I don't know what the odds were of being called up, but I was one of the lucky ones who got to present.
I'd prepared fairly extensively. My one-on-one with an agent was also today (and it went particularly well; the agent I'd picked was very engaging and "got" my story) so I'd written both a long-form pitch to go within 7 minutes for the one-on-one and a short-form Pitchapalooza version. I finally printed out version three of the long-form pitch, which used as its core my query letter verbiage, this morning as I prepared to walk out the door. By lunch, though, I'd already rewritten it long-hand on the back. Later, I was glad I did, as that pitch went extraordinarily well. The other one?
Here's (more or less) what I spoke into the microphone at Pitchapalooza:
Return of the Gods: Cataclysm is the story of Crystal, a suburban housewife who survives a destructive cataclysm through the powers of her husband, who she learns in the process is actually Mars, the God of War. (pause for laughter) She's conflicted, as most of us would be; who is her husband, really? Who are her twin daughters? Who is she, and how does she fit into the relationship with an immortal? Meanwhile, her husband's servant, a shape-shifting dragon who spends most of her time in stunningly beautiful human form, provides Crystal with several jealous moments. (another pause for laughter) Crystal soon learns, however, that her true enemy is Aphrodite, the Goddess of Love, who is her husband's ex-wife and has now set her mind to rekindling the flame with the God of War. (another pause for laughter) The story blends the classic mythologies in a manner designed to make sense of the western world’s history of deities and their pantheons in a realistic setting. In doing so, it transports the reader to the dive bar of the gods known as Olympus, as well as the ancient kingdom of Atlantis, before ending in a tumultuous battle between the God of War and the Goddess of Love. I think that Cataclysm will appeal to the many lovers of dragons and their lore*TIME* damn.
I had one sentence to finish, so the pauses proved to be my undoing. To be fair, though, my not finishing probably wasn't the main reason I didn't win. First of all, the guy who won did a perfect job, finishing an engaging pitch right at the sixty second mark. Second, the comments the panel gave me on my pitch weren't entirely wonderful. They were pretty good, actually--the judges said they want to read my book, as did several audience members as I sat back down. But there were some "room to grow" comments that, in a few seconds, made it clear why I haven't been having much success so far.
First, the title isn't gripping. I'd known that, but I didn't have many better ideas. Mr. Sterry did, and I'm now renaming the book and acknowledging his help on the ack page once I get it published.
The second problem is more subtle, yet more fundamental at the same time. I'm so so so so glad they put their finger on it, though, because it's something this newbie writer had already felt but may not have ever seen.
The pitch loses Crystal. It introduces her, certainly, and even engages the reader in her emotionally to a certain degree at the beginning. But then it heads off into action-land, telling all about what happens in the book. In doing so, any emotional connection the reader had with Crystal (my main character, remember!) is lost, set adrift in a sea of "then they went" and "there was a great battle" and other activity-related prose.
No wonder I've gotten a dozen (ish) query replies complaining about not loving it. There's nothing to love about a story where they go here, and then they go there, and then, like, this other thing happens. People love characters, not events. I've worked on this in the novel itself, raising the tension by showing the emotional impact upon Crystal that the events are having. Sadly, I then got caught up in the structural requirements of the query letter and neglected to do the same thing there.
As I said, it's subtle, but it's fundamental. The agent who's trying to fall in love with my (short) description of the story wants to know that Crystal is angry and frustrated over the attacks by Mars's ex-wife, and that she's involved on several levels in the final battle, and that she is caught up in and amused by the trip to the gods' dive bar.
Ah, well--that's what Sundays are for, yes? Query letter rewrite, coming up once again.
Friday, October 7, 2011
Requiem for a pseudonym
Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine
There's more to a requiem mass, I suppose, but Evan Koenig hardly existed substantially enough to be worthy of more than a line. Besides, he's not totally dead. I'm keeping the domain name. In fact, that's my main domain for the administration login to my web host. I probably can ditch it, but it takes more effort than it's worth.
That said, I'm going to re-vamp my web page soon (it takes 24 hours for the change to be effective with the web hosting, so no point doing much before that). Every reference on the page is going to be to Stephen H. King, and the domain is TheOtherStephenKing.com/net/org. Then, when I roll my debut book out (after making another couple of changes, to be discussed more in a future blog post), it'll have Stephen H. King, my name and that of my father, on the front cover.
Why the reversal? I had an inspiration today, in the form of two sessions at the James River Writers Conference. Which, by the way, was excellent, thank you for asking. I do plan on blogging the enormous amount of information I brought home today (and will likely bring home tomorrow as well) but I'd rather handle it a topic at a time than slammed entirely into one long blog post.
First topic, tomorrow, then.
For today: bye bye Evan. Today I attended a session on why you should write in multiple genres, and I'm looking forward to sharing that with you. The member of the panel who has five presences, though, provided the caveat that it's a lot of work to maintain multiple identities. At the next session, then, the wife of the guy who has five presences, a woman who serves as a literary agent, was on the panel discussing platform. I went to her immediately after and asked her opinion on my specific issue, having a presence named The Other Stephen King and one named Evan Koenig. I've built a modest following under TOSK. I've built none under Evan Koenig, which is the name under which I'd intended to publish my main work.
She didn't even blink before she told me to ditch EK, which is, incidentally, the same suggestion several others have given me. It's not like her opinion is the only one that matters, certainly; it's more like hers was the last straw to be nailed into EK's coffin, to bungle a metaphor badly on purpose.
So, all that said, please join me in bidding Evan Koenig a fond adieu. TOSK is now the author.
There's more to a requiem mass, I suppose, but Evan Koenig hardly existed substantially enough to be worthy of more than a line. Besides, he's not totally dead. I'm keeping the domain name. In fact, that's my main domain for the administration login to my web host. I probably can ditch it, but it takes more effort than it's worth.
That said, I'm going to re-vamp my web page soon (it takes 24 hours for the change to be effective with the web hosting, so no point doing much before that). Every reference on the page is going to be to Stephen H. King, and the domain is TheOtherStephenKing.com/net/org. Then, when I roll my debut book out (after making another couple of changes, to be discussed more in a future blog post), it'll have Stephen H. King, my name and that of my father, on the front cover.
Why the reversal? I had an inspiration today, in the form of two sessions at the James River Writers Conference. Which, by the way, was excellent, thank you for asking. I do plan on blogging the enormous amount of information I brought home today (and will likely bring home tomorrow as well) but I'd rather handle it a topic at a time than slammed entirely into one long blog post.
First topic, tomorrow, then.
For today: bye bye Evan. Today I attended a session on why you should write in multiple genres, and I'm looking forward to sharing that with you. The member of the panel who has five presences, though, provided the caveat that it's a lot of work to maintain multiple identities. At the next session, then, the wife of the guy who has five presences, a woman who serves as a literary agent, was on the panel discussing platform. I went to her immediately after and asked her opinion on my specific issue, having a presence named The Other Stephen King and one named Evan Koenig. I've built a modest following under TOSK. I've built none under Evan Koenig, which is the name under which I'd intended to publish my main work.
She didn't even blink before she told me to ditch EK, which is, incidentally, the same suggestion several others have given me. It's not like her opinion is the only one that matters, certainly; it's more like hers was the last straw to be nailed into EK's coffin, to bungle a metaphor badly on purpose.
So, all that said, please join me in bidding Evan Koenig a fond adieu. TOSK is now the author.
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