Sharing two great posts with you today. First, Staci Troilo’s final post in her Vonnegut’s Basic Plots series: Good News Bad News. This has been a super series, and you don’t want to miss this last segment!
Read Staci’s Post HERE
And the second post comes from John W. Howell, who is running a 3-day sale on his book, Eternal Road, the final stop. Great bargain for a great book. Head on over and check out this deal!
Read About John’s Sale HERE
I’m not, so like a lot of others, I have to fit my writing time around my full time business. And my business is VERY full time – I train and judge competition dressage horses at National and International level. It’s a fabulous job, but very time consuming, not to mention sometimes exhausting.
This is me in my day job
When people glibly tell me that there is always time to be found in the work day, I know they have NO idea what my life is like. I can often be on the road by 7am, and not home until 10pm, having been either driving or working the entire time. Please tell me where I am supposed to find time to write in that schedule?
I’m not complaining, no sir, I’m just making a point. Not everybody’s life lends itself to a regular writing routine. Mine certainly doesn’t.
So what is my point?
Well, I recently followed a short writing course, largely because it had a great module on plotting (guess who is trying to learn more about plotting vs pantsing?). But what it also had, was a section on time management.
My first thought was, ‘here we go again, I’ve heard it all before’.
But I hadn’t! This course introduced me to the POMODORO TECHNIQUE.
If you haven’t come across it yet, it is a time management approach developed in the late 1980s, and named after the Pomodoro kitchen timer.
The reason I found this so useful?
Because I have always felt that there was no point starting to write unless I had at least a clear hour available. Anything less than that seemed to me to be unproductive, and I hate to get started only to find I have to give up.
The nub of the Pomodoro technique, though, is that you work for exactly 25 minutes. Not more, and not less.
If you have that magic hour free, then you can fit two sessions in, with a small gap in the middle for coffee making or similar.
I guess, now I think about it, that this is at least partially based on the knowledge that we (humans) can only concentrate fully for 20 minutes at a time, so the 25 minutes stretches that just a touch, followed by the short break, and then back for another 20 (or 25) minutes work.
What it has meant for me, personally, is that my next book is coming along much quicker than previous ones, because I can often find 25 minutes spare, where I might have to wait days to find one of those precious hour gaps.
It has enabled me to give myself permission to write for just 25 minutes, and without guilt that I didn’t get that full hour of work in.
Crazy, huh? But it’s working for me.
I’ve finally realised that my one hour rule is yet another of those dreaded procrastinations we writers are often so prone to.
How about all of you, how do you manage your time?
Even if you are a full time writer, with all the guff that goes with it these days, how do you arrange your productive writing sessions?
Does anyone else have a favoured minimum writing time?
Mystery, magic and mayhem
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Taking Marica at her word. Here’s this week’s post at misterio press, which you all might find interesting.
12 Crime Lab Tidbits
by Vinnie Hansen
In March, I visited the Santa Clara Crime Lab because hey, that’s the kind of thing crime writers do on a lovely spring day.
My husband, Danny, went along. He enjoys police info, too. I guess you better if you’re married to a mystery author.
We were disappointed to learn that we would not be able to traipse about the lab. Even though the event was advertised as a “virtual” tour, when Danny and I visited the FBI Crime Lab in San Francisco, our guide led us right up to the line of weapons waiting for rifling tests.
Hope you feel better soon, Marcia!!!
by Kassandra Lamb
Hi all! Marcia and I thought you might find my guest post interesting. I’m over at Janice Hardy’s Fiction University today, talking about the pros and cons of writing short stories and novellas versus full-length novels.
Please check it out (and share if you are so inclined).
To Write or Not To Write Short?
Short stories, novellas, novels—what’s the best route to go as a fiction writer? Are there advantages to writing short?
This is a more complicated question than it may seem to be on the surface. There are several factors to consider:
● The definition of a short story vs. a novella
● The appeal of writing short for the author
● How readers feel about short stories and novellas vs. full-length novels
● The benefits of shorts for authors
● The bottom line: how much can you make off of shorts?
In order to give you more than just my take on writing short, I surveyed several authors from various genres. I’ve included their experiences along with my own, and in some cases, quoted them when they said it better than I could.
Definitions:
First let’s define our terms. A novel is considered to be full-length if it is at least 40,000 words. A novella is usually defined as 17,500 to 40,000 words. Technically, a short story is under 7,500 words.
There is this thing called a novelette that is 7,500 to 17,500 words, but the reality is that readers have rarely heard of this term. The 12K novelette I published several years ago is almost always referred to as a short story in reviews, and even my 25K novellas are sometimes viewed as short stories by readers.
So perhaps we should be defining short versus long differently. A “short” story, regardless of its length, is one with a simpler story arc, few if any subplots and simpler character arcs for its main character(s).
The Appeal of Writing Short:
To put it bluntly, it’s quick and easy… READ MORE
by Kassandra Lamb
While editing the book I’m releasing tomorrow, and especially while trying to pare down the scenes that beta readers and my editor said were dragging, I truly came to appreciate the importance of a finely honed description.
Descriptions in fiction are needed to ground the reader in the setting and allow him/her to visualize characters. But they can also bog down the pace and bore the reader if they are too long, and they can be jarring if they’re in the wrong spot. Today I’d like to share some thoughts about how to make descriptions concise and effective.
1. Why descriptions are so important. People’s brains tend to show a preference for one sense over the others when processing information, and which sense is in the lead varies from person to person. Some people are primarily auditory (30% of U.S. population); they process words and sounds far easier than what they see or sense in other ways. Others are primarily kinesthetic, i.e., movement and touch-oriented (3%). A rare few are primarily smell and taste-oriented. Continue reading
I though I would share with you a review I did earlier today, and suggest that if you haven’t yet discovered Rayne Hall’s Writing Craft books, you might like to take a look.
This one is the newly published thirteenth volume, and other titles in the series include:
These books are not aimed at beginners, but at authors who want to improve their craft. They are succinct and brimming with knowledge from an author of more than 50 books.
I consider myself a fair writer, and I learn something from every one.
So without further ado, here is my review:
Writing Deep Point Of View: Professional Techniques for Fiction Authors by Rayne Hall
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is the thirteenth book in Rayne Hall’s Writer’s Craft Book Series, and like the others, it does what it says on the tin.
As an author, writing in deep point of view is a skill you will probably want to master, as it gives readers the most intense experience, allowing them not just to read about characters, but to inhabit their thoughts and emotions; to ‘become’ the character. This depth of identity with a fictional character is what makes the book live in a reader’s mind long after they’ve finished it, and drives them back for more as soon as they can get their hands on your next novel.
Using examples and exercises split into simple-to-follow categories, Hall makes the whole process simple to understand and execute. It isn’t a book for total beginners, rather for those ready to improve and expand their writing skills, so if that’s you, I’d advise you to grab a copy now.
On a personal level as a writer of fantasy novels, I found the chapters on character, sensory and gender filters (chapters 4 – 6) of particular interest, plus those on character thoughts and emotions (chapters 9 and 11), and I know I will be returning often to chapter 17, and its handy list of word choices.
When making commercials for the Super Bowl, you have less than 30 seconds to tell a story that needs to be compelling to millions. In my interview with director Kevin Willson I learn the challenges of crafting a 30 second story for the big game.
I posted this on my own blog a couple of days ago, and thought as it has relevance to indie authors, I would share it here as well.
Like so many, when ebooks first arrived on the scene I was a bit sniffy about them – “I like a real book,” I said.
I know quite a few who still haven’t succumbed to the electronic reader, though they are a dwindling group.
When I finally embraced the indie revolution and decided to self-publish, it went without saying that I purchased an ebook reader (Kindle Fire, in my case), and downloaded a kindle app to all my devices, so I could:
Next, becoming an indie author and maintaining a blog involved producing content, and after a bit of experimentation, I settled on a mix of news, reviews, articles on writing – and hosting other authors on blog tours.
As a result, I find myself signing up for a number of review tours, and reading books I didn’t originally go shopping for, but which sound interesting. And here is where I’ve noticed how far my reading habits have changed.
Sadly, I find I’m becoming less tolerant. Back in the day, when books cost £8 – £10 a copy, I would read from cover to cover whether I was enthralled or not. I’d paid for the book and damned if I wasn’t going to get my money’s worth!
Those books were, of course, traditionally published; but that doesn’t mean to say they were all good – I’ve read many a turkey and wondered how the hell it got published. But no matter how crappy it was, my habit was to always finish.
Nowadays? My habit has been well and truly broken.
My kindle is stuffed to bursting with far more books than I will ever read, and I add more daily. The majority are indie books, and many are very good.
Unfortunately, many are not.
I really hate adding to my DNF list, as I know intimately how much time has gone into writing each and every book; the passion, the agonising over whether it’s good enough, the money spent (patently not on all of them, but most). But with that plethora of reading material available, I just don’t have time to invest in a book I’m not enthralled by.
Hence the change in habit. I now give a book 2 chapters to win me over (provided I haven’t ditched it before that, due to formatting and writing errors, or construction and/or word choice I just can’t bear), and if I’m not thoroughly hooked by then, I stop and delete.
This post, like my earlier rant about cliff hanger endings here, has been prompted by a book I really wanted to like, but just couldn’t. I took it on as part of a review tour, and had to pull out (which I feel slightly guilty about), but the first chapter left me cold, and while the second was markedly better, I realised that it was the main character I did not care for, so not a good basis on which to continue.
The concept is terrific. I scanned the book to see where it was going, and the plot looks as good as it promised to be from the blurb. But that MC? I understand the issues with writing a somewhat unsympathetic character, and this was an exiled fae, with major issues in his life that led him to be rather cold and unpredictable emotionally and in his dealings with other people. I get that. But I couldn’t warm to him, so sadly that was that.
I find that I’m also much quicker to dismiss a book on its blurb – if I’m not hooked in the first two sentences, I don’t look any further.
I find this change a bit sad, but I’m guessing there are many other readers out there becoming more discriminating too, and I take it as a wake up call – indies, polish that blurb until it can’t fail but grab the right reader (of course it must be tailored to the genre), and for goodness sake, start your book with a dynamite scene!
How long do you give a book before you put it aside? Or do you still doggedly finish everything you start?
If you’ve seen any of my blog posts, you may have noticed that I use hashtags in the titles.
You may be wondering why, as it doesn’t always look that attractive.
But wait! Not so long ago Marcia was exhorting us to ‘share, share, share’ – and rightly so.
Having those neat little share buttons at the end of the post makes it so simple – but how effective are your shares?
If you’re sharing to Facebook, then its likely to be to your closer group of friends; to Google, your like-minded associates.
But to Twitter?
Have you looked at the tweets generated by the share buttons, before you click on ‘tweet’?
They include the title of your piece – but unless the sharer takes the time to add hashtags, they go out with, often, a title that strangers might not find interesting.
If, on the other hand, you put appropriate hashtags into your title, hey presto! There they are in the ready generated tweet, so anybody looking at the hashtagged subjects you’ve chosen will see the tweet, and hopefully come to take a look at your blog post.
And that, dear friends, is why there are Twitter hashtags in my blog post titles.
And if you’re not sure what hashtag to use, here is a post with an exhaustive list of tags just for authors:
Questions anyone?
It began with my parents of course, who held hands as I explained that I had always felt “different,” and that I wanted to embrace who I was, without shame, hopefully with their acceptance and approval. They both exchanged glances, my mother squeezing my father’s hand and offering him a worried smile before turning back to me. She knew what was coming and slowly blinked, nodding her head ever so slightly, encouraging me.
I cleared my throat. Took a deep breath.
“Mom… Dad… I think I might be a writer.”
It’s been many years since I came out of the closet. Or, in my case, the laundry room, which is where I did most of my writing until becoming a columnist in 1998. But before that — before I actually started getting paid to write — that conversation replayed itself many times over the years with family, friends and co-workers, most of whom thought of my writing as something akin to collecting salt and pepper shakers; a “unique” hobby that I was asked not to talk about at parties.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but for people who don’t know you — it makes them uncomfortable when your eyes light up like that.”
The bottom line is that no one took my writing seriously (And, yes, I realize the irony of that statement considering I am a humor columnist, but still…). In retrospect, there were many reasons why my wanting to be a writer was perceived as a bucket list item instead of a legitimate rung on my life ladder — beginning with my own perception of “wanting to be” a writer. Because we’re conditioned from an early age to view money as a prime indicator of success and achievement, we naturally use that same measuring stick as validation when it comes to pursuits that don’t fall into traditional categories.
In short: If you aren’t getting paid for it, then you’re not legitimate.
That’s like saying you can’t include “skydiving instructor” among the achievements in your obituary just because your parachute didn’t open the last time you jumped. Even if you’ve landed flat on your face in terms of monetary or publishing success with your writing, it doesn’t mean you aren’t a writer.
It just means there’s a good possibility that every publisher you’ve submitted your work to was a skydiving instructor who died before they could read your masterpiece. I honestly can’t tell you how many publishers plunged to their death before I saw my first words in print.
Regardless, if you spend time formulating words for the sheer enjoyment while, at the same time, agonizing over those very same words, congratulations:
You are a writer.
How do I know this? Because no one who isn’t a writer would put themselves through this process. Ask the average person on the street to write five paragraphs about their favorite memory while holding them at gun point, and most will help you squeeze the trigger. The ones who don’t?
They’re the writers.
Or masochists. Which I realize is somewhat redundant.
My point is the only legitimacy you need as a writer comes from yourself — and it starts with believing what you do is important and has value that isn’t measured in dollars or even common sense in the eyes of others. Let’s face it, toiling alone over the choice and arrangement of words on a page doesn’t make much sense to anyone who isn’t a writer. They may nod their heads and smile when you try to explain it, but in their minds they’re wondering if buying a home so close to high-voltage power lines was a mistake. Again, the only thing that matters is giving yourself permission to take your writing seriously.
And by “serious,” I don’t just mean getting published or paid for the words you write. It simply means serious enough that you make time for it, in the same way you do other routines that are important to your daily life.
If you take your writing seriously, so will others.
And if they don’t? It doesn’t make you any less a writer. Published or unpublished, novelist or columnist, fiction or non-fiction, accept yourself for being a writer and always make time for putting those words down on paper. It is both a gift and a responsibility — and a pursuit that is uniquely your own to determine and discover. Make it part of your lifestyle and treasure those who embrace it with you.
As for everyone else?
I hear that skydiving makes a great holiday gift…
_______________________________________________________________
Ned Hickson is a syndicated columnist with News Media Corporation. His first book, Humor at the Speed of Life, is available from Port Hole Publications, Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble.
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