Hey all you writers out there...
Have you ever written TOO MUCH? So much, in fact that you know it is a big horrible load of nonsense that has gotten so out of hand, you can't stomach the thought of trying to sort through it to find that nugget of GREAT STORY you thought you were going to write?
I'm not talking fifty pages of going in the wrong direction with your story and then having to backtrack a bit. I'm talking NINE HUNDRED pages of WHAT IN THE HECK KIND OF WICKED DEMON WAS I POSSESSED BY when I typed all this meaningless crap?
Yeah, OK, I can see some of you out there nodding your heads. You know what I'm talking about.
Well, let me tell you what I did the last time I dug out that voluminous tome, that huge gorilla on my back weighing me down as a writer because it was the one thing I couldn't get a handle on.
I flipped through it. I read all the Post-it notes and margin scribbles I'd made, trying to shape that monstrosity into some semblance of a real, readable novel. I mean, I had printed out the whole thing and hole-punched it and put it in two huge piano-hinged D-ring binders. Do you know how much a 900-page manuscript actually weighs? It is a terrible burden on one's shoulders, on one's writing soul.
Finally I slammed the binder cover shut in disgust. Angry with myself because that THING had been hanging over me for ten years - TEN YEARS - I dragged it outside to the trash barrel and just dumped the whole thing inside. Then I went back in the house and got a box of matches. And I burned it.
It took three days of stirring and shuffling the mountain of paper and rekindling the fire to be certain it was all incinerated to an illegible crisp. Because I didn't want one single shred of it left to remind me of the horrendous failure I'd become. I felt awful and depressed the whole time I was doing this ritualistic cleansing.
And then an interesting thing happened.
I felt RELIEVED ... liberated ... because I didn't have to worry any more about that darn manuscript I couldn't fix. It had been one of my first stories that I labored over to make deep and complex with various subplots - to make it a worthy read. What I actually made was a worthy nightmare. To be sure, it was a learning exercise. In the process of building that monstrosity, I was learning how to write. But I hadn't learned well enough to rescue it from the depths of the flaming inferno to which I'd sentenced it.
Now, three years later, I still think about that story. I've even made a couple false starts, trying to rewrite it the way I felt it should have been written in the first place. But I haven't gotten past chapter two.
So maybe it was just one of those stories never meant to be written - at least not by me. I can always say that someday I'll go back to it when I get the time. But who's got the time? And anyway, whenever I think about it, I get an uncomfortably weighty twinge between my shoulders. And who needs that? I'll just leave it in reserve as one of those stories I can always revisit if I ever run out of writing ideas.
My advice to any of you out there facing a similar burden - burn your book and move on to a brighter, better story. You'll be a happier writer for doing it.
Dana Warryck
Crystal Clear: Storm Ryder
Lucifer's Last Lover
The Protectorate: Patriarch
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Let your story 'ferment' to help find the 'hook'
To me, coming up with a unique hook [catchy gist or draw of the story] is a lot like making wine.
With winemaking, it takes about three months from pressing the fruit to pouring a good glass of wine. First you have to assemble the basic ingredients: fruit, sugar, and yeast, and then let nature take its course.
In writing you have to assemble basic ingredients: the idea, the characters, and a twist, and let the story come alive.
I found that the style I use in writing is similar to the fermentation process. The idea has to bubble and ferment before I end up with something that is useable.
With my last book I had most of the story done before an interesting opening hook came to me. My point is, don't worry. Let the story ferment for awhile - you might surprise yourself.
C. Fern Cook
author of
Wild Evolution
With winemaking, it takes about three months from pressing the fruit to pouring a good glass of wine. First you have to assemble the basic ingredients: fruit, sugar, and yeast, and then let nature take its course.
In writing you have to assemble basic ingredients: the idea, the characters, and a twist, and let the story come alive.
I found that the style I use in writing is similar to the fermentation process. The idea has to bubble and ferment before I end up with something that is useable.
With my last book I had most of the story done before an interesting opening hook came to me. My point is, don't worry. Let the story ferment for awhile - you might surprise yourself.
C. Fern Cook
author of
Wild Evolution
What I saw in my experience as a cop
When I mention my law enforcement experience to fellow writers I hear comments like; 'I need to have a long talk with you sometime' or 'I have a lot of question I'd like to ask you'.
Most people would be surprised or even shocked if they new what kind of people carry a gun and a badge. Many times the type of people who are attracted to law enforcement are just one step away from the kind of people they haul off to jail. Even when I was in the academy we were told that cops and criminals are a lot alike.
My experience covers 2 states and 4 law enforcement agencies and with all of them I encountered the same type of personalities. Law enforcement agencies attract a special kind of people; that is a two edge sword.
In my experience the people I knew who became police officers would fit into four basic categories, they were:
The lazy man, a cop's job is considered a lazy man's job;
Prestige, wanting other people to look up to them or the perceived power they hold over others;
The thriller seeker, 99 percent boredom and 1 percent pure adrenalin, they often push the envelop to feed their need;
And the one who wants to make a difference. The one who wants to help either quits or becomes jaded. I quit.
Yeah, I'm sure most people would be surprised at the kind of antics that go on behind the scenes at their local police department. The image your local police department puts on for the public is not what really happens when they think no one is looking.
Most law enforcement officers develop an 'us against them' mentality.
In their training they are taught 'command presence', but in personal matters that type of behavior often leads to divorce. After awhile they end up associating only with other law enforcement people. That is the worst thing that can happen because they lose their perspective and it further feeds the 'us against them' mentality.
Crime scene processing will change as technology advances, but when you deal with people's ego, that pretty much stays the same. No matter how much we advance technically, our egos get in the way and we act like a jackass.
C. Fern Cook
author of
Wild Evolution
Most people would be surprised or even shocked if they new what kind of people carry a gun and a badge. Many times the type of people who are attracted to law enforcement are just one step away from the kind of people they haul off to jail. Even when I was in the academy we were told that cops and criminals are a lot alike.
My experience covers 2 states and 4 law enforcement agencies and with all of them I encountered the same type of personalities. Law enforcement agencies attract a special kind of people; that is a two edge sword.
In my experience the people I knew who became police officers would fit into four basic categories, they were:
The lazy man, a cop's job is considered a lazy man's job;
Prestige, wanting other people to look up to them or the perceived power they hold over others;
The thriller seeker, 99 percent boredom and 1 percent pure adrenalin, they often push the envelop to feed their need;
And the one who wants to make a difference. The one who wants to help either quits or becomes jaded. I quit.
Yeah, I'm sure most people would be surprised at the kind of antics that go on behind the scenes at their local police department. The image your local police department puts on for the public is not what really happens when they think no one is looking.
Most law enforcement officers develop an 'us against them' mentality.
In their training they are taught 'command presence', but in personal matters that type of behavior often leads to divorce. After awhile they end up associating only with other law enforcement people. That is the worst thing that can happen because they lose their perspective and it further feeds the 'us against them' mentality.
Crime scene processing will change as technology advances, but when you deal with people's ego, that pretty much stays the same. No matter how much we advance technically, our egos get in the way and we act like a jackass.
C. Fern Cook
author of
Wild Evolution
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Criticism is Good
When I was first testing the waters for writing, I couldn't even watch someone read my writing. If they made a grimace, it sent shivers through my spine. It could have been a burp working its way up their throat; it didn't matter to me. I needed a smiling face when someone read my heart and soul put down on paper. At that time in my development as a writer, I couldn't take the pressure; I needed approval for my writing.
Years later, I have learned to cherish other people's opinion. I want them to be honest. I need to know where my weaknesses are. I need to know how they see the story to be a better writer.
Of course, there are the people who will not give you an honest assessment or can only tell you what they hate about it. These are not the people who help you grow as a writer.
When you find one or two friends who are willing take the time to read and give you honest assessments about your story, they are worth their weight in gold. Hang on to these true friends.
C. Fern Cook
author of
Wild Evolution
Years later, I have learned to cherish other people's opinion. I want them to be honest. I need to know where my weaknesses are. I need to know how they see the story to be a better writer.
Of course, there are the people who will not give you an honest assessment or can only tell you what they hate about it. These are not the people who help you grow as a writer.
When you find one or two friends who are willing take the time to read and give you honest assessments about your story, they are worth their weight in gold. Hang on to these true friends.
C. Fern Cook
author of
Wild Evolution
ON WRITING: Slinging Slang and Jumbling Jargon - the Idiocy of Idioms
Idiom is defined as “a speech form or an expression of a given language that is peculiar to itself grammatically or cannot be understood from the individual meanings of its elements, as in keep tabs on.” Other terms for idiom, depending on the application, are jargon or colloquial expression or slang.
The writer’s primary objective is to communicate to the reader. Writers often like to ‘spice up’ a passage by inserting some slang expressions or industry-specific jargon, or colloquial expressions to make their writing more entertaining and lively. One disadvantage in doing this is the 'spiced up' expressions might not be understood by a variety of readers, or might undesirably date the writer and make the writing untrustworthy to a part of the reading audience.
The most important thing a writer can do is anticipate the general reading audience of the piece and conduct careful research to determine what idioms are familiar to the audience the writing targets. Younger people especially may be offended by inadequate attempts by older writers to mimic their slang. And remember: A little goes a long way. Don’t over-spice your writing with too much colloquial expression or lingo, or it will become unreadable. Also a choice phrase can quickly become overused and will stand out as a tired cliché in your writing. (See the last line of the last paragraph below for a shining example.)
Some common older idioms like “get your goat,” “beat around the bush,” “burn the midnight oil,” “chow down,” “it’s a cinch,” “elbow grease,” “count your chickens before they hatch,” “green” or “wet behind the ears,” “down pat,” “nose to the grindstone,” “pay the piper,” “fair to midland,” and “with bells on,” may have lost their relevance. Some slang idioms like “tubular,” and “sock it to me” that were popular in the past have lost their zest or meaning. Also simple words or phrases like “fat,” “cool,” and “hot” as slang may actually mean something new the writer is not aware of. Keeping abreast of current lingo and taking special care in researching can help relieve the idiocy of idioms and make your writing sing like a bird.
Gwynn E. Ambrose
The Cat’s Fancy
The writer’s primary objective is to communicate to the reader. Writers often like to ‘spice up’ a passage by inserting some slang expressions or industry-specific jargon, or colloquial expressions to make their writing more entertaining and lively. One disadvantage in doing this is the 'spiced up' expressions might not be understood by a variety of readers, or might undesirably date the writer and make the writing untrustworthy to a part of the reading audience.
The most important thing a writer can do is anticipate the general reading audience of the piece and conduct careful research to determine what idioms are familiar to the audience the writing targets. Younger people especially may be offended by inadequate attempts by older writers to mimic their slang. And remember: A little goes a long way. Don’t over-spice your writing with too much colloquial expression or lingo, or it will become unreadable. Also a choice phrase can quickly become overused and will stand out as a tired cliché in your writing. (See the last line of the last paragraph below for a shining example.)
Some common older idioms like “get your goat,” “beat around the bush,” “burn the midnight oil,” “chow down,” “it’s a cinch,” “elbow grease,” “count your chickens before they hatch,” “green” or “wet behind the ears,” “down pat,” “nose to the grindstone,” “pay the piper,” “fair to midland,” and “with bells on,” may have lost their relevance. Some slang idioms like “tubular,” and “sock it to me” that were popular in the past have lost their zest or meaning. Also simple words or phrases like “fat,” “cool,” and “hot” as slang may actually mean something new the writer is not aware of. Keeping abreast of current lingo and taking special care in researching can help relieve the idiocy of idioms and make your writing sing like a bird.
Gwynn E. Ambrose
The Cat’s Fancy
New and Recent Releases - Everything's ON SALE
Hello readers...
We've got several new releases out, soon to be available in ebook as well. They can be purchased from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other popular book retailers, as well as our web site and direct from the author!
Right now on our web site you can get $2.00 off any print title we sell direct, and get free economy shipping too! Visit http://www.penumbrapublishing.com/ to find out more...
NEW RELEASES...
Crystal Clear: Storm Ryder
by Dana Warryck
First in the new sci-fi-romance series
A widow and her young son are caught in the middle of a tug-of-war over top-secret alien biotechnology missing from the military. Meanwhile, the original owners want it back, and have sent someone to retrieve it!
The Protectorate: Patriarch
by Dana Warryck
First in the vampire erotic romance series (reissued in print)
A vampire sworn to protect the secret existence of his people risks everything to save a human child - and love a mortal woman.
Lucifer's Last Lover
by Dana Warryck
First in the supernatural romance series, Good and Evil (reissued in print and retitled)
Satan faces his ultimate downfall in the arms of a beautiful corporate PR expert.
Learning to Love on Indian Time
by C. Fern Cook
Inspirational/sweet romance (reissued in print and retitled)
A woman newly ordained as a minister goes out west to begin a new job with a small parish and learns that, like everything else in the small town, love runs on 'Indian Time.'
AVAILABLE NOW...
Wild Evolution
by C. Fern Cook
Horror/suspense/paranormal
A Colorado rancher evolves into someone - something - different after he becomes a werewolf by contamination and his former best friend, a local deputy, tries to pin him with murder.
Talk of the Town
by Lucille Naroian
Category romance
A mystery writer butts heads with a caustic talk-show host on live TV, and their antics become ... the talk of the town!
Dominatrix-Online.com
Mistress Blackheart: Policeman's Prerogative
by Dallas White
First in the Dominatrix series
An internet dominatrix tangles with the police officer who booked her for arrest - add a pair of handcuffs, and no telling who will end up on top!
Pixie
by Willa Kaye Danes
Magical romance
To save her clan from extinction, a three-inch-tall fairy must find and return with a half-pixie, half-human childhood playmate who's now a man all grown up. If he comes back with her to Fairyland, will he stay as her mate?
Happy reading - check back soon for more new and exciting additions to our catalog of available books from great authors!
http://www.penumbrapublishing.com/
We've got several new releases out, soon to be available in ebook as well. They can be purchased from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other popular book retailers, as well as our web site and direct from the author!
Right now on our web site you can get $2.00 off any print title we sell direct, and get free economy shipping too! Visit http://www.penumbrapublishing.com/ to find out more...
NEW RELEASES...
Crystal Clear: Storm Ryder
by Dana Warryck
First in the new sci-fi-romance series
A widow and her young son are caught in the middle of a tug-of-war over top-secret alien biotechnology missing from the military. Meanwhile, the original owners want it back, and have sent someone to retrieve it!
The Protectorate: Patriarch
by Dana Warryck
First in the vampire erotic romance series (reissued in print)
A vampire sworn to protect the secret existence of his people risks everything to save a human child - and love a mortal woman.
Lucifer's Last Lover
by Dana Warryck
First in the supernatural romance series, Good and Evil (reissued in print and retitled)
Satan faces his ultimate downfall in the arms of a beautiful corporate PR expert.
Learning to Love on Indian Time
by C. Fern Cook
Inspirational/sweet romance (reissued in print and retitled)
A woman newly ordained as a minister goes out west to begin a new job with a small parish and learns that, like everything else in the small town, love runs on 'Indian Time.'
AVAILABLE NOW...
Wild Evolution
by C. Fern Cook
Horror/suspense/paranormal
A Colorado rancher evolves into someone - something - different after he becomes a werewolf by contamination and his former best friend, a local deputy, tries to pin him with murder.
Talk of the Town
by Lucille Naroian
Category romance
A mystery writer butts heads with a caustic talk-show host on live TV, and their antics become ... the talk of the town!
Dominatrix-Online.com
Mistress Blackheart: Policeman's Prerogative
by Dallas White
First in the Dominatrix series
An internet dominatrix tangles with the police officer who booked her for arrest - add a pair of handcuffs, and no telling who will end up on top!
Pixie
by Willa Kaye Danes
Magical romance
To save her clan from extinction, a three-inch-tall fairy must find and return with a half-pixie, half-human childhood playmate who's now a man all grown up. If he comes back with her to Fairyland, will he stay as her mate?
Happy reading - check back soon for more new and exciting additions to our catalog of available books from great authors!
http://www.penumbrapublishing.com/
Monday, October 19, 2009
A note for all the authors trying to get published
Hello fellow authors...
If you thought finishing your first novel was the hardest thing you would ever do, think again. If you thought editing your finished novel to make it publish-ready was the hardest thing you'd ever do, think again. If you thought getting your publish-ready novel accepted by a big agent or publisher was the hardest thing you'd ever do ... maybe you're right.
Getting only rejections? News flash - All the rejections you've been getting may be due NOT to the fact that your book sucks, but due to some small nuances of marketing you may not even be aware of. Here are some tips from the BEEN THERE, DONE THAT file.
1. You have to present yourself as a professional. Keep your query letter short and sweet and to the point. Add a lot of humor if your book style warrants it. Be a real person but don't be real annoying. Don't send candy, don't write your letter on scented or colored stationery. Keep it clean and professional, and for heaven's sake, spellcheck and grammar-check and address it to the right person whose name you have spelled correctly. Believe it or not, if you don't do the necessary legwork to find out who to write your query letter to, it will be thrown into the slush pile, perhaps never to be heard from again.
2. Follow all the little niggling details of submission set forth by your target recipients, no matter how senseless they may seem. Don't give your recipients any excuse to deep-six your query submission. Don't skimp on this.
3. Don't mail-merge your letters and send out a bunch of shotgun queries that all sound alike, because chances are you will send the letter addressed to one place to the wrong place, or you might send the same letter to two divisions of the same publishing company and actually get your two letters compared side-by-side (with a snicker added for insult) - assuming of course anyone actually reads it. If rumor is to be believed, all queries are logged, so that a record is kept for future reference.
4. Personalize your letters and put your heart and soul into them. And make sure your sample chapters and synopsis are as error free and engaging as possible. Engaging as in INTERESTING. If the opening line of your first chapter does not GRAB the person reading it, your query packet will be deep-sixed. Why? Because, as harsh as it sounds, if your very first sentence doesn't grab the agent or editor or assistant or first reader (whoever), then that person will assume that the real readers out there in Consumerland won't be HOOKED by your story either. One actual real-live reader who buys and reads lots and lots of books in different genres admitted that if the first sentence doesn't grab him, he puts the book back on the shelf. So by golly, make your book INTERESTING enough that the reader doesn't feel like setting it aside and moving on. (And of course, it naturally follows that the second sentence, and the third, and so on, will be just as engaging to keep the reader reading. In short, your book has to be interesting to your target audience.)
5. TARGET AUDIENCE???? What, pray tell, is that? Oh, here is where we must repeat aloud that dreaded M-word ... MARKETING. Yes, you MUST know who would want to buy and read your book. It is YOUR job, as the author, to tell the prospective publisher or agent where your book fits in the greater scheme of all things literary. If you do not have a handle on this, if you do not know a book like yours that is already popular, (but of course yours has a completely different twist that will make it unique!!!), then how can you possibly convince the reader of your query letter that you have indeed done your research to make sure there is an existing market for your book. Without an existing market, you have to demonstrate that one does exist but has not been tapped yet. Think how many thousands of FICTION books are published each year (the number is staggering) and you get some ghost of an idea how dang difficult it is to market a book and reach your target readership.
6. Which brings me to the final point of this long drawn out message... It doesn't matter whether you can write well. All that matters is whether you can sell well. That, my author friends, is called THE BOTTOM LINE, something every one of us is terribly guilty of ignoring. Agents are in business to sell books to publishers so they can earn a commission off those sales. That is their primary, perhaps only purpose for existing. Publishers are in business to sell books and turn a profit from those sales. That is the ONLY reason they are in business. If they do not make money, they do not stay in business.
So THAT is what really matters. Whether your book is great and all your friends love it means absolutley nothing. If your query letter doesn't convince the business entity you are trying to get to publish your book, then you won't get published. Writing is the easy part. Selling yourself as a marketable commodity - and yes, YOU are the commodity, not just your book - should be your one goal in life if you want to be published. Your book is just window dressing. YOU are the investment that will produce the writing that sells, and then go on to produce more writing that sells more books.
Put your business hat on, and rewrite your query letter with that in mind. Oh, and don't forget to make your writing interesting and error free and a joy to read. Because that's what readers want - assuming they ever get to the point to be able to look over your book with a buying eye. They don't give a flip about the business of writing, because that's your job. And the job rarely if ever pays well. Sometimes it doesn't pay at all.
Now, why was it again that you thought you wanted to be an author????
:-)
-Penumbra Publishing
If you thought finishing your first novel was the hardest thing you would ever do, think again. If you thought editing your finished novel to make it publish-ready was the hardest thing you'd ever do, think again. If you thought getting your publish-ready novel accepted by a big agent or publisher was the hardest thing you'd ever do ... maybe you're right.
Getting only rejections? News flash - All the rejections you've been getting may be due NOT to the fact that your book sucks, but due to some small nuances of marketing you may not even be aware of. Here are some tips from the BEEN THERE, DONE THAT file.
1. You have to present yourself as a professional. Keep your query letter short and sweet and to the point. Add a lot of humor if your book style warrants it. Be a real person but don't be real annoying. Don't send candy, don't write your letter on scented or colored stationery. Keep it clean and professional, and for heaven's sake, spellcheck and grammar-check and address it to the right person whose name you have spelled correctly. Believe it or not, if you don't do the necessary legwork to find out who to write your query letter to, it will be thrown into the slush pile, perhaps never to be heard from again.
2. Follow all the little niggling details of submission set forth by your target recipients, no matter how senseless they may seem. Don't give your recipients any excuse to deep-six your query submission. Don't skimp on this.
3. Don't mail-merge your letters and send out a bunch of shotgun queries that all sound alike, because chances are you will send the letter addressed to one place to the wrong place, or you might send the same letter to two divisions of the same publishing company and actually get your two letters compared side-by-side (with a snicker added for insult) - assuming of course anyone actually reads it. If rumor is to be believed, all queries are logged, so that a record is kept for future reference.
4. Personalize your letters and put your heart and soul into them. And make sure your sample chapters and synopsis are as error free and engaging as possible. Engaging as in INTERESTING. If the opening line of your first chapter does not GRAB the person reading it, your query packet will be deep-sixed. Why? Because, as harsh as it sounds, if your very first sentence doesn't grab the agent or editor or assistant or first reader (whoever), then that person will assume that the real readers out there in Consumerland won't be HOOKED by your story either. One actual real-live reader who buys and reads lots and lots of books in different genres admitted that if the first sentence doesn't grab him, he puts the book back on the shelf. So by golly, make your book INTERESTING enough that the reader doesn't feel like setting it aside and moving on. (And of course, it naturally follows that the second sentence, and the third, and so on, will be just as engaging to keep the reader reading. In short, your book has to be interesting to your target audience.)
5. TARGET AUDIENCE???? What, pray tell, is that? Oh, here is where we must repeat aloud that dreaded M-word ... MARKETING. Yes, you MUST know who would want to buy and read your book. It is YOUR job, as the author, to tell the prospective publisher or agent where your book fits in the greater scheme of all things literary. If you do not have a handle on this, if you do not know a book like yours that is already popular, (but of course yours has a completely different twist that will make it unique!!!), then how can you possibly convince the reader of your query letter that you have indeed done your research to make sure there is an existing market for your book. Without an existing market, you have to demonstrate that one does exist but has not been tapped yet. Think how many thousands of FICTION books are published each year (the number is staggering) and you get some ghost of an idea how dang difficult it is to market a book and reach your target readership.
6. Which brings me to the final point of this long drawn out message... It doesn't matter whether you can write well. All that matters is whether you can sell well. That, my author friends, is called THE BOTTOM LINE, something every one of us is terribly guilty of ignoring. Agents are in business to sell books to publishers so they can earn a commission off those sales. That is their primary, perhaps only purpose for existing. Publishers are in business to sell books and turn a profit from those sales. That is the ONLY reason they are in business. If they do not make money, they do not stay in business.
So THAT is what really matters. Whether your book is great and all your friends love it means absolutley nothing. If your query letter doesn't convince the business entity you are trying to get to publish your book, then you won't get published. Writing is the easy part. Selling yourself as a marketable commodity - and yes, YOU are the commodity, not just your book - should be your one goal in life if you want to be published. Your book is just window dressing. YOU are the investment that will produce the writing that sells, and then go on to produce more writing that sells more books.
Put your business hat on, and rewrite your query letter with that in mind. Oh, and don't forget to make your writing interesting and error free and a joy to read. Because that's what readers want - assuming they ever get to the point to be able to look over your book with a buying eye. They don't give a flip about the business of writing, because that's your job. And the job rarely if ever pays well. Sometimes it doesn't pay at all.
Now, why was it again that you thought you wanted to be an author????
:-)
-Penumbra Publishing
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