All About the Writing

The Writer's Report Card

The end of the year is the perfect time to do a recap of how we've grown as a writer. 

Since we are always striving to upgrade our writing skills, we tend to obsess about concentrate on the "Needs Improvement" aspects. But sometimes it can feel like all there is is stuff to improve.

So let's take a day off from developing ourselves. It's time to acknowledge our dedication to the craft. And it's way past time for accolades, especially the ones we should be giving ourselves on a daily basis.

Let's do a Writer's Report Card--an assessment of what we're doing well.

I'd really like us to list three things, but I don't want anyone having heart palpitations, or breaking out in a sweat. I'm not the one you want to call during a medical emergency, and just the thought of mass amounts of perspiration dripping all over the place is making me lightheaded and woozy.

But back to our report card. . .

If we claim, "I'm good at such-and-such", we'll feel like we're being audacious or bodacious or braggarts. That's why I'm not going to suggest using letter grades, because we'll grade ourselves low--much lower than we deserve. We'd rather be thought incompetent than uppity.

Yet pass/fail doesn't give us enough credit for how far we've come. It allows those who party all semester long to end up in the same place as those who persevered through every assignment, including extra credit ones, instead of having a grand old time with the popular kids. 

So I'm letting you off the hook. All you need to do is come up with ONE thing you like about your writing. 

That's it. Just one.

It can be something you've always thought you do well, or it can be something you've learned recently. Maybe it's the way you worked out a tricky plot situation, or it's a snippet of dialogue, or that scene that makes you smile because your characters feel so deliciously real.

There's no grading on the curve here either. None of this, "I'm pretty good at dialogue but I suck at description." I know it's easier to qualify praise with a hearty dose of negativity. We do it all the time to keep our self-esteem from getting any big ideas. But try to resist the impulse just for today. If not, I'll give you an Incomplete on this assignment and you won't be able to graduate with the rest of the class.

When you're finished lauding yourself for your abilities, take a moment to think about all your writing accomplishments this past year. I'm sure there will be more than you realize, which is why it's good to reflect on them and pat yourself on the back for what you've done during the last twelve months.

After that is when it's time to make your goals and resolutions for the new year. It ensures your writing plans will be based on hopefulness and enthusiasm, not regrets or continued chastisement. It also strengthens your resolve, fortifying you for the writing days ahead.

Before you know it, it will be time to do next year's report card, and you'll have a hard time limiting yourself to just three good things about your writing.

Send Out a Search Party

I love looking at my blog stats, to see when people show up, and which pages they visit.

But even more fun is looking at the search terms they use to find my site. Here are a few of my favorites:

• An insect who knows how to wish upon a star – This tickles me, because it feels like it wasn't the first phrase that was used. Or maybe I'm projecting. There are times when you can type in the exact sequence of words to locate that one thing that eludes your brain cells--but not this time. And just so you don't have to look this up, they were searching for my beloved "Jiminy Cricket". Okay, I can't think of him singing that song or I'll get all misty-eyed again.
• Thigh high booted goddess of war – I'm wondering if this female marvel actually has a name or if the searcher was just hoping such a creature exists. Unfortunately now *I* want to know who she is, so I may have to go searching too. This landed on a post where I discussed boots, but I don't HAVE thigh high boots (yet), and I am pretty sure I'm not qualified to be a goddess of war (all in due time).
• Crickets in the bathtub – I happened to mention Jiminy in this post titled "Cricket in the Bathtub". I talked about how trying to get a cricket out of the bathtub was impossible--just like when you try to force a story to go the direction you preplanned for it when it is intent on going elsewhere. This is one of the most frequently searched terms in my stats, and I feel bad because I'm sure people are hoping for a solution with this issue, and instead I'm talking about wrestling a plot into submission.
• Character goals – This is the most popular search term. It makes me happy that one of my posts is actually being sought out by folks looking for writing advice. And if there's a different interpretation, I don't want to hear it. I like my rich fantasy life the way it is.
• I hate Jessica Fletcher – Who knew people would be hating on Jessica Fletcher? Unless. . .maybe it's a support group for all the criminals she busted with her clever ways and trusty typewriter. It's the only possible answer I can come up with. There are also a lot of people who get to my site because they want to know, "what is Jessica Fletcher typing on her typewriter?" Well, I think it's obvious she's writing a bestseller, right?
• Mad at my muse Endora – This baffled me because I hadn't really thought I was sharing Endora with anyone else. And then it hit me. All those times Endora disappeared in a puff of smoke. . . She was consorting with other writers! I'd believed we were writing exclusively. That witch.

Now I'm off to search for my fickle muse Endora. I doubt she's going to like how I phrase the search terms. . . 

The Release of Lord Midnight

It's been so much fun since I self-pubbed my novella, Summer Lovin', I decided I wanted to publish something full-length. So I just put one of my Regency historicals, Lord Midnight, on Smashwords, and it is now available on Amazon too.

This is a story that I've loved for a very long time. It was the first full-length Regency historical I wrote, after writing several shorter (70k) traditional Regency novels. It has won a couple of contests, and also come very close to being traditionally published.

Here's a short blurb about the story:

Lord Midnight, a dashing highwayman, lives for revenge against the uncle who stole his title and tried to kill him when he was a child. His plan for vengeance--seducing his uncle's bride-to-be--collides with his passion for this spirited young woman desperate to escape her wedding. Soon he must choose: the woman who stole his heart, or revenge against the man who stole his life.

The beautiful cover was done by Carrie Spencer of Cheeky Covers, and once again she's produced a cover that makes me just want to sit and stare at it all day! When she thought she was all done, I managed to come up with a last-minute idea to add the crescent moon, something that is important to the story. Carrie was gracious about adding it and then tweaking it when I said, "Can you make it face the other way?" and "It needs to be more crescent-y". She must have been thrilled when I finally squealed, "It's perfect!" (We'll have a chance to find out her exact thoughts since she agreed to let me interview her in the near future.)

So thanks for sharing in my excitement today. I hope you'll get a chance to fall in love with Gabriel and Marisa, just like I did while writing their story. Now I'm off to tend to another couple, Hugh and Felicia, who might be the next candidates for self-publication. . .

What A Blurb Needs

Did you know “blurb” is actually a made-up word? I’m such a word nerd, and I like to make up words, so this tidbit makes me happier than it probably should. Let me just give you a little history about the word “blurb”.

According to wordorigins.org, it was invented in 1907 by a humorist named Gelett Burgess. Apparently it was a tradition at the annual trade association dinner for the publisher to distribute copies of books with a special jacket extolling the book’s praises. Mr. Burgess created his own book jacket, which shows a woman, her hand cupped to her mouth as if she’s delivering an important message, with the caption, “Miss Belinda Blurb, In the Act of Blurbing”. It was all done tongue-in-cheek, to make fun of how books were described in such lofty language, as if no other reading material could hope to measure up to THIS particular book’s wonderfulness.

Nowadays a blurb’s purpose is to hook readers, using elements of the story and characters to make the book so irresistible, the reader rushes to click "buy now" without thinking twice. 

So how do we create a blurb? It’s easy. Just step over here to my patented Blurb-O-Matic, and throw in some story elements, a character or two, maybe a few unexpected twists, and–-yeah, that would be great to have on the kitchen counter, wouldn’t it? Maybe we’ll have to explore this in a different fashion.

Let’s start with a basic question in a story: What happens?

How about an earthquake. Or a kidnapping. Or somebody falling in love.

Okay, those are some good events, and maybe they actually get your story started. But—yawn—I don’t really care that much. At least, not until I know WHO it happens to. 

So we could have a scientist. Or a Highland bride. Or how about a man with a lot of ex-wives. 

Now I care a little bit more. Still, not as much as when I learn WHY these events and people are connected. 

Maybe a scientist miscalculates where the next earthquake will occur. 

A Highland bride kidnaps a handsome young man to take the place of her betrothed.

A man with a lot of ex-wives falls in love with his marriage-counselor neighbor.

Now we have a premise. It’s a starting point, and it contains certain presumptions, all of it leading to the most important question in a blurb: WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT?

With the scientist, obviously professional credibility is important, so a reader can guess at the calamity that might ensue by making a wrong prediction. But we don’t know if this is the scientist’s fourteenth mess up, or if the fault line is hiding underneath a nuclear reactor. If those hints are given, there is a sense of urgency to the story that increases the need to know what happens next.

The Highland bride? Well, we know she’s not interested in the man she’s meant to marry, if she’s kidnapping a different one. Maybe the young man ends up with amnesia from her inept kidnapping techniques. Or maybe HE has a betrothed who will be charging after them. All kinds of intriguing possibilities, even without knowing specifically WHY she wants/needs a new man.

And then there’s the man who can’t stay married who falls for someone counseling people just like him. A marriage counselor has seen and heard it all, so would she even consider a man who has that many notches on his marital belt? How about if he had been married to her best friend?

An important thing to remember about a blurb: it RAISES the question, but it does NOT answer it. Oh, no. This is a seduction, and you’re the temptress. Think in terms of come-hither language, and promises of wonderful things between the covers (of the book).

You want the reader to see your blurb and think, “OMG, I will lose my freakin’ mind if I don’t find out what’s going to happen next.” 

When your blurb does that, it doesn't need anything else.

The Perfect Home for our Stories

Recently, writer Sean Ferrell wrote a wonderful post titled "Pathetic email", where he gives encouragement to a writer friend of his about feeling "small", saying maybe it isn't such a bad thing. As he explains:

After completing a book you won't be the person you were before trying to write it, not if you've done it right. There's real fear in that, and we're all small before that task, to clear out enough of yourself so they [the characters] can move in, and to do it not with accolades or rewards but for the honest truth that it has to be done and who else will do it. You're supposed to be scared. The fact you are feeling small means you're in the right place: it means you care. If you didn't care it would have no power over you.

He mentions a Winnie the Pooh story I'd forgotten, where Owl loses his home in a storm, and Eeyore finds him the perfect new home. Unfortunately it's the one that already belongs to Piglet. Piglet graciously, and heroically, gives up his beloved home to Owl. Just reading about it made me ache for Piglet's sacrifice.

When we can feel a character's pain, our own heart opens up a bit more. We know what it costs him to give up something he cherishes, and we know how it's going to hurt when he does it. We might even think, "He couldn't possibly do that", since it means so much to him. We feel that pang in our own hearts, and wonder if we would be that compassionate or generous, hoping that we would be, and also hoping we'll never be put to the test.

Instead, we get to experience it vicariously, with a character that is faced with a terrible choice like that. It makes us feel a bit more heroic when we go through this situation with a character. We've somehow grown when they have. Maybe we're braver than we realized. Maybe we're not as small as we originally thought.

And maybe there's a lot more to this writing thing than we could have imagined when we sat down to put words on paper. No wonder it scares the heck out of us.

There doesn't have to be any specific meaning underlying a story of two people falling in love, or fighting off villains, or whatever your story may contain. But there's something to be said for giving a reader the opportunity to expand their worldview, or increase their emotional capacity, or experience something that would never come into their sphere if it weren't for the book you've written.

From the moment we write them down, our words are intended to find a new home: with readers who treasure the characters and story as much as we do. It doesn't matter that we felt small and inconsequential during the story's creation, or that we were consumed with doubts, and dread, and dire fear.

What really matters is that we found a heroic way to overcome all of those things, so our stories could end up where they were meant to be all along.

The Temptation of E-books

Santa recently paid me an early visit, gifting me with a Nook Simple Touch e-reader. I'm beginning to suspect he gave me this delightful present knowing full well it is the gateway to the real addiction: ebooks.

My philosophy has always been, "If it's delayed, it's not gratification". The only delay with ebooks revolves around my paycheck, and the distressing fact it only appears every two weeks, whereas I can find a ton of new books every day.

And free samples!

Are there any sweeter words to a book addict than free samples? It is easy to get lost in a story, telling myself I'm merely testing out all the features on my new device. I won't need to read much, just a chapter--at the very most. The next thing I know the ereader balks, not giving me a single word more, even though I'm tapping the screen vigorously, positive my new Nook has broken down already.

If only it were broken. Instead, it devilishly displays two more words, but these are not nearly as sweet as "free samples".

Buy now.

It is nearly impossible to resist giving those words a little love tap. I need the rest of that book. So I do some quick math in my head, a little book budgeting exercise, to see if I can afford to indulge in this purchase. It requires me to mentally calculate how much gas I have in the car and how long I think I can go without refilling it. Is it one ebook's worth, or am I being too miserly? Do I even need a car anymore? After all, it's impossible to read and drive at the same time.

And since I'm a writer, reading is an absolute necessity, which means I have to have every book I've ever desired. If I cut back to two--no, make that 1.5 meals a day, I should have plenty of cash to "buy now". Of course, I may need to take some protein supplements to keep my strength up from all this constant tapping. But that would require cutting into my ebook budget, which already feels way too skimpy, even with all the cost-saving measures I've implemented.

So in order to finance my newest book addiction, I'll need to add a couple more words to my repertoire: Instant Millionaire.

I hope I can find an ebook that will show me how to do just that.

Loveswept Holiday Hop

Romance At Random is celebrating their Loveswept line with a random e-book giveaway to 25 winnners, plus an opportunity to win one Grand Prize from www.romanceatrandom.com. Enter here to be included in the FREE random e-book drawing (25 winners will pick up their FREE book from Net Galley) and then comment at www.romanceatrandom.com to enter the drawing to be the ''ONE” Grand Prize winner, to win a selection of great books.

INCREASE your chances to win by visiting all of the participating 'Loveswept - Holiday Hop' sites. Winners will be contacted after 1/10/12.

On the entry form, it will ask you which blog you entered from, so feel free to say you hopped over from this blog.

For those stopping by on their way through the blog hop, welcome! Take a look around, and hopefully you'll see something to bring you back for a future visit. Good luck to everyone who enters!

When a Reader Falls in Love

When we love a book, we want everyone else to love it too. It's a natural response, since it's fun to squee and carry on and gossip about the characters with someone else who fell in love too.

Unfortunately not everyone feels the same way about a book. Even people who like the SAME book may not like the same things in it that I do. Yet we feel the need to convert them, as if it is easier to create a new fan to join our club than to seek out others who already love the story with the same passion as we do.

"You're gonna LOVE this!", we say, even though there's no guarantee they will. But that's how intense our love for this story is. It convinces us we can make everyone else adore it like we do.

I have had to fight off folks who proselytize with the fervor of zombies desperate for a taste of brain cells. I'm glad they feel that way, because that means a book has captured their heart and soul, and I'm delighted for the author who has accomplished that feat. It makes me wonder how it was done, and how I can do the same with my stories.

My goal with the books I write is to make people happy, mostly for the few hours they spend reading the story. I like hearing that someone laughs and falls in love with my characters the way I do. I truly feel like I've accomplished something magical and wonderful.

I also hope to entice and seduce readers until they cannot think about anything but my story, impatient for the ones coming out next. It would be an utter delight if readers of my stories wanted to grab everyone they know and exclaim, "You have to read this!"

That is the ultimate in reader love.

How A Writer's Brain Works

I don't seek out story ideas, only because they always seem to find me.

I've tried to brainstorm and pre-plot and see if I can scare up a new idea. But it never quite works for me. It feels more like I'm waiting at the Story Idea Claim Area, trying to identify which plot thread belongs to me, so I can yank it off the carousel and take it home. It's tricky, though, since just like at the airport, a suitcase that seems like your very well-loved one ends up having someone else's name on it. Only you don't know it until you squeal with delight and then look at the tag.

Dang. How could you have thought this lame idea would work for your story?

But then the idea that DOES belong to me shows up. It doesn't arrive with fanfare, nor is it ever accompanied by a superhero theme song. It generally sidles up to me while I'm doing something else -- maybe even writing another story -- and then it kinda thwacks me in the head. Sometimes it's more subtle than that, more like a seductive whisper in my brain.

"What if such-and-such happened?"

And then that idea has my complete attention, just as it intended.

For example, I recently got to meet up with some agency-mates, and my agent, at a local writers' conference. I was thrilled at the opportunity to enjoy some writerly conversation, and commiseration, with people I usually only chat with via Twitter or email. One of them couldn't attend the banquet he'd already paid for, so he gave me his ticket to use. I had to wear the identification badge thingie to the dinner, and nobody seemed to notice I was a female with a male name, which I found amusing.

Later, as I took the badge off, it just kind of hit me: what if somebody had to prove their innocence after they'd deliberately misidentified themselves?

This is how a writer's brain works. I was minding my own business when my brain took an innocuous action and turned it into an intriguing story possibility.

It happens all the time. It's why I am constantly storing things away in the file cabinet of my mind. It's already filled to overflowing with "What If" bits and pieces, as well as random odd facts and research trivia. Hopefully it will strike my muse's fancy one day when she's poking through the overstuffed file drawers. Or maybe some spring cleaning will put two crazy ideas into the same mental file folder, things that never would have been combined otherwise, but are obviously so perfect together.

There will always be more stories than I can write. I know that. Still, it doesn't stop me from keeping my eyes open, and experiencing everything I can while hoarding bits of information that probably seem nonsensical to non-writers.

A writer's brain is always working. Because that's how a writer works.

Following The Story

The other day I opened the shower curtain, so I could preheat the water before I took my shower.

There was a cricket in there. 

Now everyone who knows me knows I'm not a big fan of nature. I'm glad it exists. I just don't want to commune with it, especially INSIDE my abode.

However, it doesn't seem right that an insect should get a death sentence, followed by an immediate execution, just because it happened to stumble upon my domain. 

Also, I am happy to confess I have an utter weakness for Jiminy Cricket. I get teary-eyed every time he sings When You Wish Upon A Star. (Hang on a minute. I need a tissue, just from THINKING about him singing that song.) Anyway, my Jiminy fangirl-ness kept me from squooshing this cricket, because, you never know, you know?

So I did my humanitarian best to get JC out of my bathtub, so I could use the tub for its intended purpose: my shower. I don't think he really got that this was not a time-share arrangement. Or maybe he thought I was indeed going to squoosh him. Every time I tried to help him out, he did what crickets always do – hop in a completely unexpected direction. So I adjusted, trying to anticipate where he might jump next. I guessed wrong.  I'm not even sure HE knew where he was going to go. But he still hopped. And I continued to be surprised where he landed.

After about forty-eleven attempts, something finally worked, and he ended up OUT of the tub. I didn't follow him, because I wasn't in the mood by then to extend our relationship any further. Especially since I was this damn close to revoking my "no squooshing crickets" rule, even if it turned out he was my beloved Jiminy.

It did make me think about how our characters, and even our stories, are like this cricket. We're trying to make them go one way, and they steadfastly head a different direction. So we "adjust", and try to scoop them into going where we think they should go. Surprise! They head off down another path. 

But maybe that's the way it should go, only we don't know it yet. And we persist in trying to make things work the way we want it to, getting more and more frustrated the harder we try.

So maybe we should just let our stories head the direction they want to go, by Jiminy. It's not like the path is permanently etched in granite, so maybe a little meandering and hopping to the side and taking a detour is a good thing. It can help explore the characters a little more, which is always fascinating. It could open up new plotting vistas.

Even better, it might just be where we were supposed to go, even though we didn't realize it.