Writing Resources 04 May 2013

Here you will find a selection of the best of the blogsphere from the past week. Grab your coffee, straighten the glasses or spritz those contacts and above all – enjoy.

Featured

Jami Gold

Why Is Storytelling Ability So Important?

Three Tips for Better Storytelling.

Excerpt: “What makes some poorly written books fall flat on their face while others succeed despite their flaws? One common answer is “storytelling ability.” But what is storytelling? The concept can seem vague and immeasurable—rather like “voice.” A recent experience with two poorly written books gave me insight into how a deeply flawed story can still hold our interest and be enjoyable.”

Inform & Inspire

Laura Drake: How to Step Outside Your Comfort Zone – Without Freaking Out. Excerpt: “Have you ever done that? Been cruising along in the comfort zone, and all of a sudden, you get beamed down an idea that’s so ‘out there’ you think the Universe sent it to the wrong mailbox? But still,  it intrigues me. Besides, the damned thing isn’t going back in the box, so I have to find a way to deal with it.”

Summer Anne Burton: 40 Inspiring Workspaces Of The Famously Creative. Excerpt: “From tiny writing desks to giant painting studios, the only thing all of these creative studios have in common is that they inspired their successful inhabitants to create greatness.”

Jeff Goins: How to Stop Getting Paralyzed and Start Making Better Decisions. Excerpt: “Thirty years from now, you will not remember what cereal you chose at the grocery store. You won’t recall whether you saw this movie or that one. What will matter is that you acted, that you made a contribution. That you decided to do something.”

Writing

Kristen Lamb

Ways to Create Multi-Dimensional Characters–Tip #1

Creating Multi-Dimensional Characters #2—Everybody Lies

Excerpt: “To give characters depth, we have to be people-watchers. Study people. Know thyself. I strongly recommend reading books on psychology as part of research. For instance, I read a lot of FBI books on profiling. As writers, characters need some amount of consistency without being predictable. If there is some deviation from the profile, there must be a good reason WHY, other than we need a character to act a certain way to move our story forward.”

Janice Hardy: Should You Maintain the Same POV Distance Throughout the Novel? Excerpt: “Is it acceptable for different characters through whom a story is told to have different degrees of closeness in their POV, according to their importance to the story? Yes, as long as you establish that fairly quickly and be consistent. For example, you might have one POV is first person and another in limited third (Skin Hunger does this), or mix first and omniscient third (the I.Q. series does this), or even change styles per book (The Old Man’s War series does this). However, be wary of what and how many you mix.”

Janice Hardy: Handling Scene Transitions With Multiple POVs. Excerpt: “Transitions can be tricky at the best of times, but this has to be one of the tougher ones to handle. With third person, simply switching POVs per scene can feel like a POV shift or head hopping if the characters are all in the same scene. Here are some guidelines: “

Roz Morris: Write great dialogue scenes in 7 steps. Excerpt: “Of all the scenes we write, dialogue is the most complex and rich. Most writers I know take several passes to get it right. On average, I find there are seven clear steps to nailing a dialogue scene.”

Marcy Kennedy: How to Format Internal Dialogue. Excerpt: “As you might have noticed from the comments last time, when it comes to internal dialogue, the most common question is “how do I format it?” It’s easier than you think. The answer depends on what point of view you’re writing in.“

K.M. Weiland: How to use Foreshadowing. Excerpt: “Foreshadowing is a necessary part of any well-executed story. And yet, despite all its prevalence and importance, it’s actually a concept that many authors have a hard time getting their minds around. If we sift foreshadowing down to its simplest form, we could say that it prepares readers for what will happen later in the story.”

Delilah S. Dawson: 10 Steps to Writing a Novella. Excerpt: “When I sold my first book to Pocket in 2011, it sold in a three-book series. Shortly after that, they requested three e-novellas. I’d never written a novella before, but I jumped at the chance. Here’s what I learned about telling an exciting story in 40,000 words or less.”

David Khara: Writing a Historical Thriller: A Journey. Excerpt: “Before starting my work on the Consortium Thriller series, I thought I had fairly good knowledge of World War II. I really did. It turned out I was wrong. Three books later, here are some key things I have learned about writing historical thrillers.”

Writer Support

Marcy Kennedy: The Secret Recipe for Writing a Perfect Pitch. Excerpt: “Writing a book is easy…at least when compared to what we need to do after we finish. We had 50,000 to 100,000 words to write our novel, and now we have to condense that down into a couple of paragraphs for an agent pitch, query letter, Amazon description, or back cover copy. It feels unfair. Mean really. After all, if we’d wanted to write something short, we would have written a short story. But it’s not as scary as you might think if you break it down into a formula.”

Marcie Flinchum Atkins: Time Management Tips for Every Writer. Excerpt: “Jugglers make juggling look effortless. They wow onlookers with their agility, showmanship, and daring. Time management is a lot like juggling, especially when you’re a writer! Every morning that I wake up before daylight to write, I wonder if I can keep all of the “balls” in the air. How many can I juggle before I drop everything?”

Susan Spann: Choosing the Right Literary Executor. Excerpt: “Although your general executor (or, in the case of a trust, trustee) can also handle intellectual property and copyrights as well as standard probate issues, many authors – especially those with significant numbers of works in print – may want to consider appointing literary executor to handle the intellectual property portion of the author’s estate.”

Industry Awareness

Victoria Strauss: Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against Author Solutions Inc.. Excerpt: “In March, I wrote about New York law firm Giskan Solotaroff Anderson & Stewart LLP, which had opened an investigation of Author Solutions Inc. (ASI). Well, now the other shoe has dropped. On April 26, Giskan Solotaroff filed a class action complaint on behalf of three plaintiffs against Author Solutions Inc. and Penguin Group USA “

Blogging

Joel Friedlander: Author Blogging 101: Introduction to SEO, Part 1. Excerpt: “A lot of the writing you’ll find online about optimization practices can be very confusing, so this article will focus on the basics in two parts. The first will describe what SEO means and why it’s so important; Part 2 will cover the tools you can use to improve your own sites’ optimization and some handy ways you can put these tools to use.”

Social Media

Martina Boone: Four Questions to Define Your Social Media Presence. Excerpt: “Not so long ago, agents and even some publishers insisted that authors (including aspiring authors) needed a social media presence. But that is slowly changing as it dawns on everyone in the publishing industry that an online presence is the means to an end rather than the end itself. Social networking comes down to GIVE: four simple questions you have to ask yourself.”

Joanna Penn: The Ultimate Guide To Goodreads For Authors. Excerpt: “If you want your books to be found, I think you need to make sure your books are on Goodreads and discoverable. After all, readers will add them for you if you don’t take control yourself. But there are also lots more opportunities on Goodreads and today, Mayor A. Lan, the Savvy Indie explains what else you can find on the site.”

Kristen Lamb: I LOST THREE Followers—Twitter & Tips to Keep from Going CRAZY. Excerpt: “Twitter is a highly effective social media tool for writers when used properly (which is code for DON’T SPAM US ABOUT YOUR BOOK). There seems to be a lot of concern about numbers of followers, but I want to give some advice: Ignore the Numbers. There is only one reason we need to care about Twitter numbers.”

Kendall Lynn: Using Pinterest for Pinspiration. Excerpt: “Pinterest is a way to organize all those beautiful pictures you see every day, from the delicious torte you’d love to make (but never will) to the beach you’d love to visit (and hopefully will). And for us creative types, it’s a visual playground of inspiration. In one weekend, I created boards for different aspects of my protagonist’s world.”

Marketing

Joe Turkot: Amazon KDP Select for eBook Promotion, Yea or Nay? Excerpt: “The main reason that all but one of my ebooks are in the KDP select program is the free book promotion tool. Sure, there are two other benefits to going exclusive with Amazon: %70 royalties in Brazil, Japan, and India (not important to me because I sell no books there), and entrance into the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library (KOLL), which helps authors find readers in the growing number of Amazon Prime members.”

Dan Blank:5 Reasons RELATIONSHIPS Are The Core of Your Author Platform. Excerpt: “The problem here is that these are THINGS; these are tactics. And while each may indeed be instruments to your success as a writer, they are not the point. The point is your writing, and how it connects with readers.”

Deborah Gafford: Author Newsletters: Everything You Need to Know and Then Some. Excerpt: “Fasten your seat belts. Come along with me as I head down the newsletter highway! To start, do a Google search for “newsletter hosts”. You’ll find a huge assortment of sites and apps for templates, writing, sending and hosting newsletters. Before you become overwhelmed, narrow down the choices by adding the word “free” to your search.”

Joanna Penn: Lessons Learned From Bestselling Indie Authors On Writing And Book Marketing. Excerpt: “There are a lot of ‘How To’ books out there on self-publishing and marketing but I liked this book as it is more of a companion book of interviews with some of the top selling indie authors on writing and marketing. Here are some quotes I found interesting and that resonated with me.”

Dana Lynn Smith: 8-Step Plan for Landing Book Promotion Endorsements. Excerpt: “Endorsements are recommendations from authors, experts or celebrities, in other words people whose opinion can influence sales of your book. These are the quotes you typically see printed on the covers and inside of books and they are sometimes referred to as “blurbs.” 

Technology

Amit Agarwal: An Impressive Web-based App for Photos Editing. Excerpt: “I chanced upon another interesting web-based image editor that’s fast, the UI is beautiful with several useful features. It’s called Picozu. While Picnik and PicMonkey are purely photo editing apps meaning you can use them to edit your existing images, Picozu lets you both edit and create new images from scratch. Picozu is written in pure HTML5 and CSS3 and requires no Flash or other plugins.”

Resource Heaven

K.M Weiland: 10 of My Favorite Writing-Craft Sites. Excerpt: “I’d like to share with you ten of the sites that inspire, educate, and help me refine my process—plus, they’re run by a bunch of super awesome folks!“

Jane Friedman: Best Business Advice for Writers: April 2013. Here is an incredible listing from Jane, always good for finding the absolute best advice out there.

Have a great day *smile*

Book Review: Hookers & Blowe

I recently had the pleasure of a fun read by Mhairi Simpson called, Hookers & Blowe.

When criminals start to drop dead without visible cause, most see it as a blessing sent from above. However, for Detective Robby Blowe, murder is murder, no matter the victims crimes. Blowe reminds me of the hard-boiled heart of gold detectives I read as a teen – a good man in a difficult world.

Blowe’s investigation leads him into a shadow world where supernatural beings live among and prey on humans with impunity. To complicate matters, those in the know fear that which stalks darkened souls and seem more than willing to sacrifice a few innocents to trim the vermin from the streets. Blowe finds himself alone and holding a hand full of jokers in a game where they aren’t wild. Who does one trust when all the information seems unbelievably insane? Well, a sexy life draining demoness, of course.

Hookers & Blowe is a fun read, full of twists, turns and gritty imagery. Mhairi’s style is crisp and clean. Hookers & Blowe is a lovely blend of detective story and paranormal thriller, with a dash of otherworldly romance on the side. I highly recommend this book for a light, exciting read.

Writing Resources 27 April 2013

Here you will find a selection of the best of the blogsphere from the past week. Grab your coffee, straighten the glasses or spritz those contacts and above all – enjoy.

Inform & Inspire

Kristen Lamb: The Myth About Introverts & Extroverts–Could You Be an Ambivert? Recommended Read! Excerpt: “As humans we tend to think in very black and white terms, but as writers and artists, we are wise to remember that people have many dimensions. What we see is not necessarily true, especially when it comes to labeling others as “introvert” or “extrovert.” What Does It REALLY Mean to Be an Extrovert or Introvert? Introversion and extroversion are commonly misunderstood. Just because someone is shy, doesn’t mean she’s an introvert. Someone who is bubbly, gregarious and the life of the party can, in reality, be an introvert.”

Chuck Wendig: The Admonition Of Ass-In-Chair, Or, “How Writing Is Actually Work”. Excerpt: “Writer and writing teacher J. Robert Lennon wrote a post recently, “The Ass-In-Chair Canard,” which takes aim at that oft-uttered snidbit of writing advice, a piece of advice seemingly universal across all those writers who dare to give advice on the subject of writing: Put your ass in the chair and write.”

K.M. Weiland: Be a Better Writer: Get Organized. Great tips for organizing everything from your desk to your browser and much more. Streamlining the tools we use frees more time to write and play.

Writing

Stacy Green: Writing Close Point of View. Excerpt: “Point of view is a tricky beast, especially if you are writing in third person and have multiple points of view. And one of the hardest things to pull off is close point of view–in other words, getting inside a character’s head. In order to make a reader empathize with a character and walk in that character’s shoes, you’ve got to get deep into their thoughts. “

Jami Gold: What Soap Operas Can Teach Us about Writing. Excerpt: “I don’t watch soap operas, but a bizarre conversation tangent triggered my thoughts comparing soap operas to novels. On the surface, they seem very similar. They both have characters, tension, and conflict. However, the more I thought about it, the more I saw differences. And those differences illustrated a problem many of us have with our stories.”

Janice Hardy: Are You Choosing the Best Words to Describe Your Setting?. Great tips and tricks for getting the most out of your setting descriptions.

Margie Lawson: Stellar Writing Sells! Excerpt: “When writing is bad, we may quit reading. When writing is good, we’ll probably keep reading.  When writing is stellar, we’re hooked. We read faster, don’t want to stop.  And when writing is better than stellar, when it’s psychologically empowered, we’re immersed in the story, and we tell friends they must read this should-be-made-into-a-movie book.”

Elizabeth S. Craig: Writers and Journals–and Online Journaling. Excerpt: “While reading blogs last month, I came across a post by Hannah Braime on the Lifehack site:  5 Killer Online Journaling Tools You Should Try Out.  One of the journaling programs they mentioned was the free site OhLife.  She hooked me when she used the word simple to describe it.  Who has time for complicated when you’re trying to establish a new habit?”

Writer Support

Chris White: How to submit for publication (or do it yourself, thanks very much). Excerpt:“How to submit for publication: it’s the question you probably wonder about when you turn out the lights and you’re trying to get to sleep. But it’s not one very many authors are asking out loud these days, and for good reason. It’s because of self-publishing. It’s because of technology. We might assume the world has changed for good. But publishers aren’t going anywhere. After all, Sony Music weathered the rise of Napster and iTunes; Harper Collins and Penguin aren’t just going to roll over and die. So then… you might want to know, after all, “How do I submit for publication?”

Gabriela Pereira: How Practicing My Pitch Helped Me Write a Better Book. Excerpt: “Being able to sum up a book in a sentence or two, under pressure and with focus, organization and intrigue is a skill that takes practice. Literary Agent Rachelle Gardner recommends you “give enough information—plot, character, setting, theme—to intrigue without giving away the entire story.”

Lindsay Buroker:Attorney Laura Kirwan on Contracts, Copyright, Foreign Rights, and Other Author Issues. Excerpt: “Of all the questions I get in regard to writing, marketing, and publishing, the ones on law and taxes are the ones I’m least likely to have a clue about. I still can’t help you with taxes, but I have someone here today to answer common questions on copyright, contracts, and other legal topics related to books and publishing. Attorney Laura Kirwan, who specializes in literary and publishing law, practices here in the Phoenix area and maintains a blog that should be helpful for authors all over the U.S.”

Indie / Self-Publishing

The Passive Guy: Self publishing suits commercially savvy, genre-defined authors brilliantly. Excerpt: “Long-time traditionally-published authors have been encouraged by publishers and agents not to be commercially savvy. Don’t worry about this contract stuff or how your book is promoted or money, just go back to your desk and write. Certainly, some authors, perhaps even most authors, have accepted this role. That was before there was an alternative.”

Barry Eisler via J.A. Konrath: Eisler on Digital Denial. Excerpt: “This past Saturday, I gave one of the keynotes at the 21st annual Pike’s Peak Writers Convention (great conference and I highly recommend it to other writers). During my talk, I shared some thoughts on the choices writers have today in publishing — thoughts which, judging from some of the Twitter comments I’ve seen, have caused a bit of upset here and there. Because I think it’s beneficial when ideas are pressure-checked by people with differing views, I welcome the discussion, and I hope we can continue it here.”

Kristine Kathryn Rusch: The Business Rusch: Experiments. Excerpt: “I’ve suffered the frustration of the unavailable book from both sides, as a writer and as a reader. As a reader, it’s rather nightmarish and stupid. You want to give someone your money for something you desperately want, and no one wants your cash. I’ve purchased pee-stained used copies of books and held them gingerly while trying to read them, just to find out what happens next in some series.”

Marketing

Tulolupe Popoola: Book Marketing: Creating Your Author Press Kit. Excerpt: “While doing research just before my novel was published, I came across the “press kit” and its usefulness when contacting people in the media for publicity. And since I started promoting the novel, it’s been a great tool, handy for sending out information quickly. It was also easy to give it to my publicist, so she could send it to her contacts as well. But it’s not just for media or journalists; your press kit can also be requested by retailers, book bloggers, event planners, editors; basically anyone who might take an interest in you as an author or in the topic of your book.”

Lindsay Buroker: How Do You Keep Your Book Sales Momentum Going Over the Months and Years?. Excerpt: “Inevitably, your time and enthusiasm for marketing wanes, or maybe you feel you’ve exhausted your options (as awesome as Bookbub is right now, they’re only going to promote the same book so many times). Other authors come along with fresh new releases and fresh enthusiasm for marketing. You scowl as your awesome book gradually drops in sales ranking, falling out of the Top 100 lists, and daily sales drop as well.”

Social Media

Lisa Hall-Wilson: Did Facebook Change Something? 5 Tips For Page Owners to ‘It’s All Good’. Recommended Read! Excerpt: “Connecting with people on Facebook doesn’t have to be hard, but it will take practice. You will have to experiment and some of those experiments will fail. Facebook is the slowest of all the online social media platforms to build a tribe or community on, so be patient.” Includes a bonus offer for Lisa’s upcoming class on Facebook – be sure to check it out!

Book Design

Joel Friedlander: How Much Attention Should You Pay to Book Design? Excerpt: “I’m a firm believer in the power of design. I think it affects purchasing not just in obvious ways, but also on a subconscious level. So it often frustrates me when independent authors do their own design work to keep costs low. But I also understand the need to limit financial risk. Let’s say we have to make a compromise. What do you think an author might be able to accomplish reasonably well on her own (that has least potential to adversely affect sales), and what’s the No. 1 thing an author should hire a designer for (because of its potential to increase sales)?”

Blogging

Dan Blank: 2 Strategic and Compelling Reasons to Keep Blogging—Plus When to Kill a Blog. Excerpt: “While social media delivers a potentially more immediate reaction from others, I am still a big believer in blogging. There are many reasons for this, but let’s just focus on two specific reasons. Then we’ll discuss how to deal with blogging exhaustion—or when to kill a blog entirely.”

Talli Roland: Blog Tours: Waste of Time or Valuable Sales Tool? Excerpt: “One question that cropped up in the comments section was whether blog tours are still a valuable sales tool or if they’re a waste a time (I may have added that ‘waste of time’ bit for dramatic effect!).  Of course,  I’m exaggerating because tours may help raise awareness of your author brand, but do they actually help sell books?”

Technology

The Tweetdeck Team: Tweetdeck Apps will stop working May 7th. If you are a tweetdeck user, you’ll want to read this update from the company on the coming changes.

Dennis Abrams: Digital Public Library of America Launches with 2 Million Items. Excerpt: “The virtual doors to the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), the first public online-only library in the United States, have opened. And, according to author Doron Weber, it’s “as if the Ancient Library of Alexandria had met the Modern World Wide Web and digitalized America for the benefit of all.”

Jason Boog: Best Writing Apps for Android Tablets. Good overview of the top five Android writing apps. Most of these work on Android phones as well.

Nick Ruffilo: Tips for Technologists #17: CSS Tutorial Part 1. Excerpt: “CSS (Cascading Stylesheets) is the visual language to HTML’s data structures. CSS is very easy to learn because there are limited commands and the changes can be viewed immediately. However, it can be a very difficult concept to master as there is much more to it than meets the eye.”

Resource Heaven

Jane Friedman: How to Publish an E-Book: Resources for Authors. This post contains links to pretty much anything an indie or self-pubber will need. Bookmark Recommendation!

Opportunity Knocketh

Jason Boog: 30 Free Books by William Shakespeare. In celebration of William’s birthday, Project Gutenberg has assembled free copies of thirty of the bards best works.

Did Facebook Change Something? 5 Tips For Page Owners to ‘It’s All Good’

Facebook can feel overwhelming, especially when one is learning the ropes. Do I need a page or a profile? Or both? How do I get the most benefit from my time? Facebook is constantly making changes, can I trust the platform?

These are questions I found myself asking a couple months ago when taking the plunge back into Facebook. To answer them, I took a class by Lisa Hall-Wilson, and found out not just the answers, but a depth of information that has served me well.

This is why I’m excited Lisa accepted my invitation to come and share a bit of Facebook wisdom with all of you.

Take it away, Lisa.

Did Facebook Change Something? 5 Tips For Page Owners to ‘It’s All Good’

I hang out on Facebook a lot, and I hear the same things from my writer friends over and over. Do I need a page or can I use my profile? (I answered that here) 2) I don’t know what to post now that I have a page.

People like to point fingers at the Zuck. If Facebook would just stop changing things I could figure this out. Really? Facebook changing things isn’t the heart of the issue. Most of the changes are cosmetic and don’t alter the way people use Facebook, or why they hang out there. Most of the changes actually make a lot of sense in terms of preserving the user experience. (Don’t throw anything – I’m totally serious.) Some changes are clearly for monetary gain, but FB is free. You don’t have to advertise to be successful, and as long as that remains the case the rest is just the price of admission.

Writers – write.

So – do what you’re good at. Writers and authors make a living by conveying our thoughts and feelings (whether through non-fiction or fictional characters) to others and hopefully evoking an emotional response. Facebook is no different. And then it doesn’t matter what Facebook changes.

Connecting with people on Facebook doesn’t have to be hard, but it will take practice. You will have to experiment and some of those experiments will fail. Facebook is the slowest of all the online social media platforms to build a tribe or community on, so be patient.

Give yourself at least 8 months, a year is better, to build an audience on Facebook. Yes, it’s THAT slow. If you’re not consistent, if you post sporadically, if you annoy people, that timeline only grows longer.

I put most of my effort into building a tribe on my profile because I’m a journalist as well as a fiction author. I have a page, but I don’t spend a lot of time there. I also administrate the WANA Intl page. The photo below got a dozen likes on my page (less than 400 fans). The same photo on the WANA page got over 170 shares. Size matters, so don’t get too discouraged. Success is measured differently based on the size of your page.

Here are 5 content tips from my upcoming class Steering Through The Facebook Winds Of Change to help you plan for successful page administration. **Note: Many of these strategies will also work for those using a profile exclusively to build platform on Facebook.

1. Be aware of your writer/author brand. A like is considered an endorsement on Facebook, and people have lost their jobs over a simple like – so be very aware of what you’re liking and commenting on with your profile or your page. If you’re a children’s author, it might not be wise to like your favorite erotica author’s page. And this has nothing to do with how you spend your personal time or your likes and interests – you’re building an image. Make sure it’s the one you want to convey.
2. Think like OZ. Remember the great and powerful wizard of OZ behind his curtain with his big voice? I know – when Dorothy pulled back the curtain everyone was disappointed. But, pulling back the curtain is what fans are looking for from their favorite authors. They want a glimpse into the writer’s life. Where do you get your ideas? What does your office look like? What makes you laugh? What movie did you just watch – what did you think of it? If your readers pulled back the curtain what would you want to show them?
3. Give commentary. When you share a photo or a link, explain (very briefly) why you’re sharing it. Writers are thinkers. Share your personal insights even if they seem oddball. Journalists do this with news items – brainstorm how you can do this with your topic or genre. Let your voice shine through, and let fans see your humor, your passion, etc.
4. Use Facebook the WANA way. The WANA way is relationships first – before self-promotion, before selling anything. Always provide value. Always. Be helpful. Be open. Be charitable. Share links from other authors, even if they never share anything of yours. Show up and join the conversation. Be authentic. Don’t spam!
5. Use status updates to demonstrate you’re a good writer. Don’t waste your time blowing your own horn telling people how great a writer you are. That’s such a turn off. Crafting well-written, well-thought status updates will attract people to what you have to say, and to your blog – and maybe even your books, better than spamming the world with BUY MY BOOK!

I hope you found those tips helpful. Of course, there’s so much more to it. In my new class running May 4^th and 18^th, we’ll cover the 12 areas every page owner should focus on, best practices for driving traffic to your website and for better edge rank, and I’ll send you a list of resources to help you when you’re on your own. PLUS, 8 people will receive a live critique of their page with tips on how to improve. Learn more here. As a bonus for Gene Lempp readers, use the code Lisa20 to receive 20% off.

Lisa Hall-Wilson is an award-winning freelance writer for the faith-based market in Canada specializing in interviews, profiles, social justice initiatives, Facebook administration, press releases, print and web marketing copy. She writes dark fantasy novels, blogs Through The Fire, and is a social media instructor for WANA International. Find her at lisahallwilson.com or on Facebook at facebook.com/lisawilsonwriter

One Write Way: Plotting versus Pantsing

Wiki Commons CC

~We each must write according to our personal needs and compulsion~

Plot first? Find it as you go? Know the characters deepest inner everything? Just met over a drink? I’m sure you can see where I’m going with this. The only correct way to write, is your way.

There is no one guru out there bearing elixir panacea for all writing ails. The best anyone can tell you, is what works for them. And therein, I believe, lies the crux of the plotter versus pantser debate. Among others *smile*

My earliest memories are of playing with army men and Lincoln logs. Creating stories for the soldiers in my head. In fact, these are the only good memories of my childhood. Story is a bastion of life.

I wrote and “published” my first public piece in second-grade. It was a wonderfully-pantsed story with each page choosing a subject with a different letter of the alphabet. A to Z. Detailed in its hallowed pages, artwork included, was a war between two peoples of the sky. I even bound it with colored string. Gotta make it look sharp for the teacher, ya know.

She was not impressed. And so, at age seven, I knew how to write, publish and take a hard critic on the chin. And, on that day, my dream remained untarnished.

But then, we age, and life – happens. When I came back to writing I was in my early thirties. Life had taught me the hard lesson of clean process. The young pantser was a lost memory in the professional mind.

As I came back to writing, I rushed into a Writer’s Digest Short Story contest. Pretty sure the judges didn’t make it past the first paragraph. At least I hope they didn’t. This told me training was required. After all, that is the way professionals approach things.

Two hundred craft books later. I found myself sitting with 150k in prep materials for each of three different projects. Zero words of fiction written. My worlds were going to be spectacular in about a decade. Guaranteed.

Plot a story? Oh yeah, got that covered. Only thing is: Zero words of fiction written. I do find moderation comes, for some of us, by having first lived through extremes.

So, here is what I’ve learned.

We each must write according to our personal needs and compulsion.

Think of it as a sliding scale, where zero is 50% plotter and 50% pantser.

Knowing yourself is the key. What things are you always going back to work out? What things do you always prep, but rarely or never use? When it comes to writing, and life, what comes naturally to you: dialogue, action sequence, metaphor?

Wiki Commons CC

Think of prepared items as the structure of a playground. Without these items, there would be so swings to fly on. No merry-go-round to twirl the world palette into rainbow soup. No twisted slide to conquer from bottom to top.

If you’ve ever watched children play at a playground, you know they flit from one activity to the next. Often with a running interior and exterior dialogue of the adventure before them. Must pour sand from the plastic castle and then, rock the teeter bar. And there, friends, is the mixture of plotting and pansting.

If you pants-it, what things do you always have to go back and figure out after each draft in order to make the story work? Slide a little bit to the plot-side and give the pantser-side a better image of the playground. A better idea of the world calling them to come play. After all, it is hard to have an adventure in a void.

If you plot and pre-plan, what things do you find, in retrospect, to have been extraneous? or forgotten? Playground cluttered, over-designed? Slide a bit to the pantser-side and free yourself to explore the incredible world you designed. After all, we are the first explorers of our realms. Feel the awe.

To get the most out of our time, discovering where we lie on this scale, maximizes our efforts. Think of it like the firmness to softness number on a Sleep Number bed.

Yes, everyone has a right way. Just remember as you read others systems and advice; it is simply advice. Always do what works best for you. Know yourself and you’ll maximize your time and your effort.

Where do you fall on the plotter to pantser scale? Have you switched sides over time, or even by project? I’d love to chat with you.

Writing Resources 20 April 2013

Here you will find a selection of the best of the blogsphere from the past week. Grab your coffee, straighten the glasses or spritz those contacts and above all – enjoy.

Inform & Inspire

Ava Jae: 5 Truths I Wish I Knew When I Began Writing. Excerpt: “I sometimes think back to new writer me. The younger version of myself who began writing the first ever novel, fully expecting to get it published. The one with timed goals like get an agent this year or be published by age x.”

Writing

Jami Gold: How to Use Character Flaws to Develop a Plot. Excerpt: “Every personality trait is a continuum, with a good and healthy expression of the trait on one side and a bad and unhealthy expression on the other. Our characters (just like ourselves) might fall on different places along that line depending on the situation, who else is involved (does the other character push the main character’s buttons?), stress level, etc.”

Janice Hardy: How to Format Remembered Dialog. Excerpt: “How you format remembered dialog varies, same as internal dialog. A lot depends on how you’re using it, how much there is, and the style you prefer. You can also mix and match, using, say, introductory phrases and italics, or italics with the narrative.”

David Corbett: The Art of Character: The Five Cornerstones of Dramatic Characterization. Excerpt: “Creating believable and resonant characters is one of the great challenges of the fiction author. The concept of character has also become more important in narrative non-fiction and memoir, and even business books start with character stories to illustrate their points.“

Kristen Lamb: Great Fiction Goes for the GUTS. Excerpt: “I believe the hardest part of writing fiction is that, for most of us who aren’t crazy, conflict is something we avoid at all costs during our daily lives. In fiction? We must go for the guts. I’d like to offer you a simple way to make your stories and characters three-dimensional and grab hold of great fiction’s throbbing heart.”

Writer Support

Elizabeth S. Craig: Recording our Ideas. Excerpt: “Idea files are, in my way of thinking, completely necessary.  And not only for the work we’re currently writing, but whatever else we might be interested in writing down the road.“

Tiffany Reisz: From Brain to Bookshelf: An Author’s Timeline. Excerpt: “For those who aren’t published authors, the process of writing, editing, and publishing a book may seem like some kind of mystical voodoo. I know it did for me before my publishing career began. I thought I’d throw back the curtain and give the curious an insider look at the timeline and process of how a novel goes from brain to bookshelf. “

Susan Spann: Trusting … But Not in the Force (Author Trusts, Part 2). Excerpt: “Today we’ll take a look at how to divide your copyrights and other intellectual property within the trust itself. Dividing your copyrights among your heirs essentially boils down to two different – but equally important – questions.”

Indie / Self-Publishing

Dean Wesley Smith: Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing: Writing Fast. Excerpt: “Now this silly idea that the writing process has anything at all to do with quality of the work has been around in publishing for just over 100 years now, pushed mostly by the literature side and the college professors. It has no basis in any real fact when it comes to writers. None. If you don’t believe me, start researching how fast some of the classics of literature were written.”

Lindsay Buroker: How Leeland Artra Is Rocking the Amazon Sales Charts with His First Book. Excellent interview with Leeland about his methods and experiences. Insightful post. Highly Recommended Read for Indie’s.

Elizabeth S. Craig: Why Some Traditionally Published Writers Aren’t Self-Publishing. Excerpt: “Sometimes when I’m scanning my blog reader or reading through some of the messages from writer loops I’m on, I’m stunned by the lack of recognition or acknowledgment of the rapidly changing industry on traditionally published author blogs.  This applies to some agent blogs, too, although certainly not all of them“

Kristine Kathryn Rusch: The Business Rusch: Book As Event. Excerpt: “The most prolific traditionally published writers (back in the day) were in the romance genre, and most of them could manage about six new books per year. I know that some tie-in writers did more—Dean famously wrote five in one month, but he didn’t sleep and then he rested for the next two months. In the old, old days of publishing, a lot of pulp writers wrote two novels a month, but those books averaged about 40,000 words, less than half of what the average midlist novel is right now.”

Social Media

August McLaughlin: Reducing Social Media Stress. Excerpt: “As with most aspects of our careers, it’s important to utilize social media practices that work for us individually. I thought I’d share practices that seem to work well for me, and invite you all to chime in with your fabulous thoughts.”

Blogging

Jami Gold: WordPress Questions and Answers. Excerpt: “Today, I’m summarizing the questions and answers from the Facebook chat about WordPress I did last week with Lisa Hall-Wilson. Facebook makes looking through old posts a hassle, so I wanted to capture this information for others. If you’re thinking of implementing WordPress but you’re not sure when, you might want to check out my workshops anyway, as I’m not planning on offering them again this year. Everyone who signs up can play with a self-hosted WordPress.org site for one month—at no additional cost—thanks to my Tech Guy at my hosting company.”

Jane Friedman: 3 Ways to Improve Your Author Website Today. Excerpt: “To maximize the effectiveness of your author website, it’s necessary to study the data behind how people find your website, navigate it, and use it. This is typically done via Google Analytics, a free tool available to anyone with a Google account. On the day you install it, you’ll immediately start collecting data on your website traffic and visitors; while you won’t be able to see into the site’s past, you’ll start collecting and storing analytics data indefinitely.”

Industry Awareness

Roger Tagholm: At LBF, Authors Encouraged to Think Like Entrepreneurs. Excerpt: “If any talk emphasized just how much we are in a new world now, it was the Author as Entrepreneur session on the final day of the London Book Fair. Here, authors Orna Ross and Polly Courtney talked about why they decided to walk away from contracts with Penguin and HarperCollins and go down the self-publishing route — and each offered advice for those wishing to do the same.”

Mike Shatzkin: The three forces that are shaping 21st century book publishing: scale, verticalization, and atomization. Mike discusses: Scale, Verticalization and Atomization and how they impact the modern book publishing paradigm.

Technology

Amit Agarwal: How to Embed Just a Portion of a YouTube Video. Excerpt: “Do you want to embed the most interesting part of a YouTube video in your website and isolate the rest. Here are simple workarounds to help you embed portions of any Youtube video.”

Writing Resources 13 April 2013

Here you will find a selection of the best of the blogsphere from the past week. Grab your coffee, straighten the glasses or spritz those contacts and above all – enjoy.

Featured Special: Support our Troops with Books

This week I found a great poster from World War I artist C.B. Falls calling for book donations to be sent to troops. It made me consider how valuable a donation of books can be to a solider far from home and desperately in need of a few moments of relaxing escape. During the discussion that ensued, one of my friends, Jennifer Tanner, shared her knowledge of current projects working to get books into the hands of our brave men and women.

Jennifer’s Post: “booksforsoldiers.com and operationpaperback.com are two organizations I’ve heard about. You might want to check out anysoldier.com, too. I’ve been sending care packages (and lots of books/dvds) through this site for six years. Also, if you want to send new books, Amazon ships to APO/FPO addresses.”

I hope you all will consider sharing the gift of your own and others works with our soldiers. This is a great way for us to help bring a bit of peace to those who ensure our peace every day. Thanks!

Inform & Inspire

Les Edgerton: Fortune Favors the Prepared. Excerpt: “All of the points we’ve covered in this dialogue series are intended for one purpose only—to help writers avoid the red flags that improper dialogue can create for agents and editors… and readers. And that’s what they are—red flags. That doesn’t mean that breaking any of these “rules” or conventions will doom your mss from being taken, but it does mean the presence of them can cast a negative light on your work. And, I imagine we all want to avoid that!”

August McLaughlin: Living Well to Write Well When Feeling @%$#-y. Great tips for keeping your mind and body in prime writing shape.

Julie Glover: Changing Horses, Or Goals, Midstream. Great advice on knowing when it’s time to reassess goals and find a faster “horse.” Great Post!

Writing

Janice Hardy: How to Set Tone and Mood in Your Scenes. Excerpt: “Setting the right tone can go a long way to drawing readers into your story and keeping their attention. Think of it like the scary music in horror movies. With the sound on, the scene makes you nervous, you jump when things happen, and it adds to the overall mood. Turn the sound off and the scene isn’t scary anymore. It’s just things happening in front of you.”

Roz Morris: Create your characters from different moulds. Excerpt: “I’m somewhat preoccupied with characters as I’m finishing NYN 2: Bring Characters To Life. I’ve recently read two novels with several main characters – one that made them real and the other that didn’t. I thought it would be interesting to compare the key differences.”

Jami Gold: The Thin Line between Character Strengths and Flaws. Excerpt: “Strengths and flaws are often two sides of the same coin. Interference is often the “bad” side of helpfulness, control can be the bad side of protectiveness, obsession can result from love, etc. The intentions and motivations for both sides can be identical. This fact gives us another method for developing our characters.”

Ava Jae: How to Write Multiple POV’s. Solid advice for ensuring that multiple POV’s retain their uniqueness from each other for a more powerful story.

Orly Konig-Lopez: Playing Dr. Frankenstein – 5 Questions To Ask Your Characters Before You Begin. Great tips for a safe and happy first visit with a new character.

Janice Hardy: Do We Expect Too Much Realism in Our Stories? Is fiction required to be “exactly” like real life? Great post and comments thread – Recommended Read for fiction writers!

Martha Alderson: Thematic Significance of Stories. A great look at theme and how to draw it out from your drafts.

Les Edgerton: Two Tips to Take Your Dialogue to a WHOLE New Level. Excerpt: “Here are the couple of things I neglected to cover in the first two posts. Format with Tags. One is the format of dialogue with tags. I suspect that this one will draw as many responses from folks who don’t buy it as there were who resisted using “said” as dialogue tag verbs. It’s your choice—I’m just relaying the mindset of many editors.”

Editing

Fae Rowen: A Museum Visit–and Four Editing Lessons. Excerpt: “As writers, we can use our lives to fuel our stories in many ways–from plots, to characters, to emotional journeys. This means that our daily lives become a field of rich experience to mine for writing gold. Let me share an excursion that resulted in unexpected treasure for my WIP.”

Writer Support

Suzannah Windsor Freeman: The Biggest Problem with Writing Advice. Excerpt: “Writing advice requires use of common sense in its application. Those who have been writing for many years have probably already learned this lesson, but newer writers often jump on advice like following all ‘the rules’ will get them to the top. All advice, in every realm of life, requires careful decision-making based on a variety of factors.”

Lindsay Buroker: How Do You Find Beta Readers? Some good ideas from Lindsay on how to find those second sets of eyes we all need.

Devon Flaherty: 11 Ways Stay-at-Home Moms (and Other Busy Folks) Can Find Time to Write. Great tips for staying productive in the midst of life’s chaotic swirl.

Kristen Lamb: Authors of the Digital Age–What It Takes to Be a Real Author CEO. Excerpt: “I do a lot of reading of other blogs, particularly blogs that aren’t about writing. I think this keeps my information fresh. As many of you might know, financial blogger Steve Tobak is one of my favorites, and he regularly inspires my writing. This past week he had a neat post What It Takes to Be a Real CEO, and there were so many of the principles that applied to being a Digital Age Author. We are now Author CEOs, no matter what path we take. So what does it take to be a REAL Author CEO?”

Susan Spann: Who Can an Author Trust? (Trusts in Author Estate Planning, Part 1). Excerpt: “Today we continue the ongoing series on author estate planning with a look at how to pass copyrights by means of a trust. The language we look at here applies only to revocable trusts, meaning trusts established by a living person or persons (the “settlor” – in our case, an author and/or the author and his or her spouse) which can be canceled or modified during the settlor’s lifetime.”

Indie / Self-Publishing

Chuck Wendig: “Indie First?” What Is Best In Publishing?. Excerpt: “What I want to do is to talk a little more about this “indie first” path — the path that Howey and others feel is the best way forward for new authors. This was also echoed a number of times at the Writer’s Digest East Conference, where I spoke this past weekend. Lots of folks were suddenly presenting self-publishing less as a standalone option and more as the new gate (kept or unkept) leading to traditional publishing. Self-publish first, they say, and get attention and audience. You can even query the published story while it sells on the digital marketplace. It’s an interesting shift. And not wrong or impossible. But, is it “the best?”

David Gaughran: Self-Publishing Grabs Huge Market Share From Traditional Publishers. David takes a look at Nook, Kindle and the breakdown of the “official numbers” for the first part of 2013. Excellent Post!

Elizabeth S. Craig: Make Your Content Work Harder for You. Excerpt: “Recently readers started really…well, I’d like to say encouraging me since badgering me sounds rude, to explore other formats for my work.  I’d received random and scattered emails since the ebooks released, asking about print versions.  I’d always been able to gently respond that I’d get around to print at some undetermined future date. Then I received a particularly direct email…”

Hannah Shepphard: 5 Tips for Self-published Authors to Maximize Rights and Licensing Deals. Excerpt: “The discussion of the pros (and cons) of self-publishing (or indie publishing, if you prefer) rages across a wide gamut of publishing media every day. But the debates all focus on the idea of getting a book published in one market — what few fail to address is how self-published authors can maximise the full potential of their creative work in terms of rights licensing deals.”

What is Dying Now?

This little segment is all about Scott Turow, “head” of the Author’s Guild. While I’d love to insert my own thought here, I’ll abstain. Decide on your own, if you choose to explore.

Barry Eisler: Scott Turow And The Politics of Cowardice. Excerpt: “There are a lot of substantively interesting aspects of “Authors Guild” president Scott Turow’s April 7 New York Times op-ed, “The Slow Death of the American Author.” Indeed, you could write a long article debunking all the factual mistakes, legal errors, misleading claims, and failures of logic that comprise Turow’s screed. Happily, Mike Masnick of TechDirt has done so, in a devastatingly well-argued and empirically based piece called “Authors Guild’s Scott Turow: The Supreme Court, Google, Ebooks, Libraries and Amazon Are All Destroying Authors.” I won’t repeat what Masnick has already so ably pointed out, and will instead add just a few observations of my own.”

David Gaughran: A List of Things Scott Turow Doesn’t Care About. Excerpt: “Scott Turow woke up from his slumber recently to bark nonsense about Amazon’s acquisition of Goodreads on the Authors Guild blog, before being thoroughly eviscerated in the comments. Undeterred, Turow sought out the considerably larger platform of the New York Times’ Op-Ed pages on Monday to decry The Slow Death of the American Writer.”

Kristine Kathryn Rusch: The Business Rusch: Anti-Published. Excerpt: “What you need to know is this: Our ignorant friend Mr. Turow believes that the American Author is under siege, that we’re losing ground, and that the Great American novel will disappear. He published that ridiculousness three days ago. Let me show you the life of a so-called besieged American author. My life. In the past three days, I have…”

Book Formatting

Joel Friedlander: eBook Formatting Tips for Print Book Authors. Excerpt: “As soon as you introduce the types of formats found in many kinds of nonfiction—like subheads, bulleted and numbered lists, extracts, quotes, tables, charts, graphics, figures, captions, and so on—your book will get increasingly difficult to convert successfully to eBook formats. So how can you organize your book while you’re preparing your print edition so it moves smoothly to an eBook when it comes time to convert it?”

Elizabeth S. Craig: Audio Books for Self-Published Authors–ACX. Here is a complete overview and tips on using ACX to broaden the reach of your writing, audio-style.

Social Media

Marcy Kennedy: 4 Ways Google+ Communities Help Authors Build Their Platforms. Excerpt: “Did you know that Google+ has the second most active user base of all social media sites? Yet one of the biggest complaints I hear about Google+ from authors is that they struggle to meet potential future readers and to get others to engage with what they’re posting. The solution to both problems is Google+ communities.”

Melissa Donovan: Pinterest: A Visual Marketing Tool for Writers and Bloggers. Excerpt: “My blog is about writing, which isn’t exactly a visual topic. I didn’t see how I could use Pinterest as a marketing tool and the last thing I needed was another online distraction. It didn’t seem like a place where writers would hang out, so I decided not to sign up. Imagine my surprise a few months later when I discovered Pinterest was sending a significant amount of traffic to my site.”

Amanda Luedeke: 5 Ideas for Using Pinterest as an Author. Five excellent quick tips for using Pinterest to both aid your writing and market your work/brand.

Blogging

Talli Roland: O Blogger, Wherefore Art Thou? Excerpt: “Four years ago, I was like most other writers: feverishly blogging every day to try to build up my platform. Back in 2009, blogs were hot, and everyone and their dog (sometimes literally!) had one. Fast forward four years, and blogs aren’t what they used to be.”

Dan Blank: 4 Ways Blogging Will Make You a Better Writer. Excerpt: “Recently, social media seems to have stolen the spotlight from blogging. And while I am a huge advocate for writers engaging in social media, today I want to explore the value of blogging to help you improve your craft of writing and grow your audience.”

Dianna Dilworth: Turn Your WordPress Blog into an App in Minutes with UppSite. Interesting new tool for bloggers worth checking out.

Marketing

Jessica Bennett: The Discoverability Challenge: With More Authors Self-Publishing Each Year, How Will Your Book Get Noticed? Excerpt: “When I first decided that I wanted to be a writer, I assumed in perfect naivety that the hardest part of the process would be writing the book. Now that I had a book, I thought the rest would be easy, or at least less hard. How wondrously wrong I was.”

Dana Lynn Smith: Use Relationship Marketing to Sell Books. Five smart common sense principles to keep in mind when marketing your work, and yourself.

Industry Awareness

Rachel Aydt: Smashwords Prioritizes International Self-Publishing Markets. Excerpt: “Mark Coker, founder of Smashwords, is moving his company — already heralded as the largest, global, indie, self-publishing digital outlet — to an even more global playing field. As international as the distributor/publisher is, all instructions on the Smashwords site remains in English (including a very lengthy and comprehensive self-publishing guide written by Coker). That is about to change…”

Porter Anderson: Ether for Authors: Who Is Pitching Whom?. Insights from the Writer’s Digest Conference, hybrid author initiatives, the danger of predictions in a fast-changing industry and much more.

Dennis Abrams: Barnes and Noble Rebrands Self-publishing Platform Pubit as NOOK Press. Because, when something is working correctly, it should be changed…

D.D. Scott: Self-Published Authors: Have You Switched from Nook Pubit to Nook Press? D.D. breaks down some of the important aspects of B&N’s transition. Worth the read if you are a PubIt! user.

Technology

Jason Boog: How To Self-Publish with Amazon: Video Tutorial. AND How To Self-Publish with Kobo: Video Tutorial. AND Self-Publishing with Smashwords: Video Tutorial. Jason put up one for Nook as well, but they made him take it down for privacy reasons (?) – have to love counter-intuitive marketing *smile*

Amit Agarwal: A Podcast Directory Integrated with Dropbox and Google Drive. Excerpt: “With Podcast Gallery, you can watch or listen to your favorite podcasts online in the browser itself. You can also send podcast episodes to your Dropbox or Google Drive accounts via the cloud itself.”

Dianna Dilworth: Turn Your Old iPhone Into a Security Camera. Excerpt: “If you’ve got an old iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch laying around, you can use Presence by Power People to turn it into a surveillance camera. Maybe you want to watch your pet while you are away at work, or you want to make sure that the new nanny you hired is doing a good job watching your child.“

Be sure to connect with me on Twitter and Facebook for more great posts and fun!

Have an excellent day *smile*