In Reference to Murder

Tips and Tricks for Writers

Here's the latest roundup of posts about the craft and biz of writing going 'round the blogosphere:

ON WRITING

Veteran screenwriter Neil Landau, co-author of the book 101 Things I Learned in Film School, boiled down the three most essential things that go into crafting a successful screenplay.

Author Christie Craig offers up "Five Pieces of Well-Meaning Writing Advice That I’m Glad I Didn’t Take." The first one is probably the most controversial (depending upon whom you ask) namely "Ignore the trends and just write the book of your heart."

Book editor Alan Rinzler would slightly disagree with Craig's first statement above, stating that the #1 issue for writers today: Content is King.

If you think you're toiling away all day alone in your cave and no one can possibly understand what you're going through, check out the following Day in the Life of a Writer.


ON PUBLISHING

Agent Rachelle Gardner discusses the differing advice authors hear about signing with an agent, which boils down to the fact that some agents prefer to represent projects and others represent authors.

Lit agent Nathan Bransford answers the question, "I am just starting out and have never been published. What should I put in my bio?"


ON LEGALITIES

Should you copyright your title?  Publishing attorney Lloyd J. Jassin takes a look.

Agent Jane Dystel gives the reasons why it's so important to read your book contract, especially in this day and age of confusion over digital and e-book rights.


ON MARKETING

Publetariat offers up some ideas for creating printed marketing materials to promote your book. This is one time it's OK for even men to coordinate their look.

Are you a shy writer and terrified about marketing?  Elizabeth Craig has some book promotion tips for you.

(And if you have more ideas on that or any other of the above, feel free to share them in the comments below.)

Tips & Tricks for Writers

I like to collect interesting articles about writing that may be of interest to myself and others, so I'm passing along a few that caught my eye in the past week. Some may be relevant to you, others may not, but hopefully one or two will prove helpful.

ON WRITING

Rachel Aaron on the Magic District blog posted three scene hooks that will move your story forward.

Poet and writer Kimberly Davis discusses twist endings and why some work and others don't.

A literary agent (via Pub Rants) gives advice on how to tell if you're starting your novel in the wrong place.

One of the most important aspects of a good novel is building strong and interesting characters. Writer Miriam S. Forster has been posting a 6-part series of short takes on how to do just that.

Thriller writer Jamie Freveletti, who blogs for The Outfit, has suggestions for "how to" books for new writers. (If you have others, feel free to add them in the Comments here and/or there).

ON THE PUBLISHING BUSINESS

Literary agent Chip MacGregor answers the question "What's Reasonable in a Book Contract?"

Another agent, Jean V. Naggar, guest-blogged for GalleyCat about what she looks for in a potential author-client. ("Authors need to offer their best work, to be ready to revise, and to trust that they have put their work in good hands.)

It's inevitable that writers will make rookie mistakes. Agent Jenny Bent gives you a head start by listing eight of them to avoid.

ON PUBLICITY

Got your first book contract in hand and now wonder what to do with publicity? Dana Kaye offers up "Ten Things Authors Should NEVER Do to Promote their Book." (Not that any you would ever be guilty...)

Need other authors on what not to do? Editor Karen Syed provides excuses her authors have given her about why they aren't marketing their books.

Newbie writers often are totally unprepared for the overwhelming amount of promotion and marketing they're going to be expected to do for their own books. It can be so overwhelming, in fact, that you find you no longer have time for writing. Sharon Wildwind says, it's OK to "Lay Down Your Sword and Shield."

ON CONTESTS

If you have a manuscript in hand and want to give it a chance to test its wings and see if it will fly, try submitting it to a contest. It it happens to be set in the southwest U.S., then submit it to the 2010 Hillerman Mystery Writers Competition (but hurry, the deadline is June 1st). For any setting, any subgenre, the annual Minotaur Books/Mystery Writers of America contest has a deadline of November 30th.

Freebies for Writers

There are many helpful (and free) tools for writers on the Web, although finding them can be a bit of a challenge at times. Here are a few that may help:

Writing and Reading Short Stories was a course taught at MIT in 2006. You can download lecture notes which take you through the elements of storytelling.

A Nine-Week Screenwriting Course is offered by screenwriter Steven Barnes, who has taught at UCLA and is offering his college course in an online workshop.

Plotting Mini-Course. Author Holly Lisle has prepared a seven-part course on plotting stories, which is sent via email, with tips and examples included in each lesson.

A Character Building Workshop was set up by the Writers' Village University which uses questionnaires to help you build your characters.

Start Writing Fiction is a 12-hour course from Open University with a section each on character, setting and genre.

FYI, these tips are courtesy of the newsletter from Writing World, which is another free resource with some helpful information and resources.

Oh That Word...

Transcend. As in "transcend the [crime fiction] genre." Discussion about genre vs. literary has been around a long time and generated recent commentary from Robert Crais, Michael Dirda, Oline Cogdill and Brian Lindemuth, among others. Here's a very brief pick of my favorite quotations from these sources on the subject:

Robert Crais:  "Well, there’s nothing new about the ghettoization of crime fiction or any of the genres. A long time ago, Gore Vidal wrote three mysteries under the name Edgar Box and supposedly just knocked them out. To me, though, it has more to do with marketing than anything else. I guess there is a literary establishment, a self-selected group of people who have risen to certain positions and, for whatever reason, command a pulpit...

I’ll bet you $10 right now that there are an awful lot of literary writers who started a long time ago and now they find themselves in this place where secretly they feel trapped. And you know what they really read for fun? They read crime fiction. And they start to think, God, wouldn’t it be fun—I mean maybe just fun—to write a big, blowout, kick-your-ass thriller?...

Think of the caveman and cavewoman sitting around thinking, Yesterday, I had a close call with the sabertooth. You don’t want to sit there in the dark night with crackling embers, fire dying, and think, Two o’clock on Wednesday—the tiger’s going to catch me and eat me...Whether you’re talking crime fiction, fantasy, romance, whatever, it’s about story."

Oline Cogdill:  "I think being a mystery writer is high praise in itself because it involves so many different aspect of writing. It takes much skill and intelligence to keep readers guessing for more than 300 pages not just about who did it but why it was done. When so called literary writers try to write mysteries, the result is, frankly, often less than desirable.

So elevate the genre, showcase the genre and let us see how rich and deep the genre is. Just don’t transcend it."

Michael Dirda:  "Good books, it has always struck me, can be found in every genre. That's the premise behind my most recent collection of essays, Classics for Pleasure. I write there about every sort of classic: Sappho's love poetry and M.R. James's ghost stories, John Webster's dramas and Georgette Heyer's regency romances. These are all works that, in some way, have shaped our imaginations. The overemphasis on genre boundaries really is shortsighted. But I do think things are breaking down now. About 30 years ago, I published a piece in The Nation called 'The Genre Ghetto', and there maintained that the divisions between branches of literature were often artificial and were usually just marketing tools. I sensed that in the coming generation, more and more serious writers would come out of fields like fantasy and crime fiction. These writers would adapt genre tropes and ideas and themes to a so-called mainstream literature."

Time Vampires

Galley Cat had an interesting post on "How to Turn off the Internet While Writing on Your Computer," which came after a week of visitor feedback debating the Internet's detrimental effects on a writer's ability to focus.

GC references an essay by Bradley Robb who compiled a list of programs that will reduce your computer basically to just a writing tool which minimizes the distractions afforded by web surfing. For those of us older than dirt, these programs actually harken back to the days of good ole DOS and Basic. Sarah Weinman also weighed in via the May issue of Poets and Writers with her essay titled "Are Authors Who Twitter any Fitter?" where she says, "As with any social network, it's easy to burn precious hours reading relatively useless information, and Twitter can prove distracting for writers struggling to finish their books."

But the point is valid: how do you find the time to write in a world of increasing electronic noise from news groups, news sites, blogs, Facebook, Goodreads, Library Thing, Crimespace, Twitter, Linked In, etc., etc., all demanding attention like a herd of hungry puppies? Should you go back to the old-fashioned typewriter? Invest in a word-processor-only device? Be like my hubster and offer to unplug the router for several hours? I'd love to hear anyone's suggestions on how to find more balance in your writerly life, i.e. how to stay connected without becoming a hermit.

The Theory of Query

Are you a writer struggling with that manuscript query you've been agonizing over trying to land an agent or book deal? Here are some thoughts from recent agent postings that may be helpful:

Michael Boureet of Dystel & Goderich warns authors not to obsess about the little details. He's more interested in a unique idea and good writing in your query and links to one he thinks was particularly effective, written by Lisa McMann for Wake.

Nathan Bransford says to be careful about comparing your book to others, especially bestsellers.

And Jessica Faust of the BookEnds agency has the most bleak, but realistic insight of all — even if your query is serious, well thought out and well-written, if the subject doesn't excite her or she feels like she's seen it a million times, your query is toast. If you need more ideas and examples of what agents like and hate, check out PubRants and Query Shark.

Top Ten Excuses for Not Writing

After seeing many blogs and articles about the various reasons writers can't seem to find their way to butt-in-chair mode and start a project (or even continue an existing one), I decided to compile a listing of what appear to be the Top Ten such excuses (with a teensie bit of personal experience mixed in for good measure):

1. I'm not talented enough. If you feel uncomfortable with your level of talent, take a writing class. Also, take comfort in the knowledge that every author starts by simply putting word #1 down onto paper. After all, you never know if you'll be good at something until you give it a go. 
2. When I sit down to write, nothing comes out. Try making an outline, even a small one. Come up with character names and engage them in imaginary conversations in your head. Keep a small notebook at hand at all times (or audio recorder) to take notes when ideas strike you while shopping, exercising, in the middle of the night, etc.  Don't get into perfection mode right away; writers' block can happen if you rewrite every sentence before moving on. As Michael Crichton said, "Books aren't written — they're rewritten. Including your own. It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn't quite done it."
3. My ideas seem terrific — until I try to write about them. See Michael Crichton above. That's what editing is all about. A perfect first draft is extremely rare (if not impossible).
4. Writing a book seems like an impossible dream. I'm too overwhelmed. One writer, Debra Koontz Traverso, compared writing to having a baby placed in your lap the moment you wanted one, for which you are totally unprepared. After all, conception is followed by nine months of growth, preparation and development, just as an author needs time to research, prepare and organize the many aspects of writing a book.
5. I'm too old to start. There’s no minimum or maximum age requirement. Authors like Harry Bernstein had their first book published at age 96. Although Alan Bradley had collaborated on a work of nonfiction, his first crime fiction novel, Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, was published when the author was 70.
6. There's too much competition. Audre Lorde said that there are no new ideas, only new ways of making them felt. Even with 275,000 new books published each year, you are a unique individual with a unique take on life. Work hard on developing your own style and your own voice.
7. I don't have enough money. All you need to start writing is a pencil, notebook and public library access. If you have your own computer, more's the better.
8. I don't know any literary agents. Very few debut authors do, at first. Check the acknowledgment sections in the fronts of books, go to conferences, check out agent blogs and search through other online resources like this listing of agent search sites.  After all, you probably didn't know a financial planner or plumber before you needed one. It takes research.
9. If the book doesn't sell, I'll have wasted all that time. Many authors don't sell their first book until after they've written book #2, 3, 4, or more. J.A. Konrath didn't sell his novel until he'd amassed more than 500 rejections searching for agents and publishers. Perseverance is the key. If that first book doesn't sell, consider it an exercise in learning to be a better writer. Write because you love it, because you're compelled, even obsessed to write.
10. I don't have enough time to write a book. Everyone has responsibilities and demands on their time. Many writers stay up late to write or get up at 4:00 am to catch a few hours. Some set goals of simply writing 500 words a day. If you truly want this, you’ll find the time and make it a priority. If you wait until you have a four-hour block each and every single day to pursue your writing career, it'll never happen.

As Annette Fix pointed out, here is only one viable reason for not pursuing your writing as a career:  someone is reading this blog post as a eulogy at your funeral right now. Don't let your life pass you by without pursuing your dream. Just do it.

 

What Makes a Good Mystery Writer?

That was the question asked by the Mysterious Matters agent after attending the recent Malice Domestic Conference and being asked—probably for the thousandth time—how to get published, deciding that a better question was how to improve your writing. Toward that end, seven tips were offered up, to wit:

1. A good mystery writer thinks first and foremost about the reader's experience.

2. A good mystery writer balances character and plot.

3. A good mystery writer thinks about the future.

4. A good mystery writer listens to and synthesizes the advice of agents, editors, and readers

5. A good mystery writer takes him/herself seriously, but not too seriously.

6. A good mystery writer pushes and challenges him/herself.

7. A good mystery writer understands the competitive landscape

The annotations provided on the blog flesh out the skeletal list with meaty tidbits which you can read more about here.

But if that advice isn't helpful enough, over at the Guide to Literary Agents Editors Blog there is a listing of the top 10 reasons agents stop reading a manuscript and/or throw it across the room (this time in reverse order):

10. Overdone description that doesn’t move the story forward

9. Spoon-feeding the reader what the character is thinking

8. Having the characters address each other repeatedly by name, as in, "John, let’s go!"

7. Introducing a character with first and last name, as in, “John Smith entered the room.”

6. Beginning a story with dialogue

5. Opening with a cliché

4. Yanking the reader out of the action with backstory

3. Not giving the reader a sense of place or where the story is going

2. Characters are MIA until bottom of the second page

1. Telling instead of showing

Wanna Be a Writer?

From time to time I like to collect tips and advice from around the blogosphere for writers about the writing process, as well as publishing and marketing. Here's the latest roundup:

ON WRITING

Best-selling novelist Tess Gerritsen says, "Won't take advice? Good luck," adding that although persistence is key, blind stubbornness can spell your doom.

Sharon Wildwind discussed "Epidemic Narrative": although it's about real-life narrative (the swine flu), it also applies to fiction writing, especially in "knowing the reliability of the narrator."

Brenda Novak posted ideas for "Getting Unstuck" and breaking writer's block. I think my favorite is #14.

John Gilstrap wrote about "Bringing Characters to Life."  One of his caveats: "Think less and imagine more."

Are you ready to be a best-selling author? Jane Friedman posted a snippet from an Alec Baldwin movie where he plays a salesman, drawing 7 parallels between his speech in the movie and authors.

Jesaka Long had a two-part essay here and here on "Discovering and Developing Your Voice."

ON PUBLISHING

Literary agent Rachelle Gardner answers the question "What to do now that you have an agent?"

Alison Janssen gave a breakdown of a typical Bleak House print run.

The Mysterious Matters anonymous agent told how he can tell the hallmarks of pretension in writing.

Reader Review has a very detailed (and for some, eye-opening) description of the cost of physically printing a book.

ON MARKETING

Beth Groundwater gives some tips on how to handle a book tour on the cheap.

When Do You Quit?

Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent is a model for perseverance. Toni McGee Causey over at the Murderati Blog takes it a step further and talks about writers working through rejection and how to know when to call it quits, basically concluding that "You quit when you have another dream that means more to you."

Author blogs like Murderati can be a wealth of inspiration and ideas. Another is Type M for Murder which has a new posting about writing secondary characters taken from Donald Maass' book The Fire in Fiction: Passion, Purpose and Techniques to Make Your Novel Great. One excerpt: "Supporting players in manuscripts are too often forgettable. They walk on, walk off, making no particular impression. What wasted opportunities, in my opinion, especially when you consider that secondary characters aren't born, they're built."

Take advantage of these free offerings from writers who have been there, done that, are still learning, and quite happy to pass along some tips gained from their experiences along the way.