Category Archives: Authors
Whither Goest Publishing?
There have been arguments all over the Web (and off it!) about the future of publishing. Some believe printed books are dead. Others think ebooks are a fad. (Yes, we actually heard someone say this.) It was inevitable that, as authors, we would get asked our opinions about this burning question. And our reply?
We don’t know.
That’s right, we have no idea what direction publishing is going to take. Are print books dead? We don’t think so. Are ebooks a fad? Nope. But do we have to choose one over the other? We aren’t so sure about that.
Let’s face it. Technology changes so quickly that discussing traditional formats vs. ebooks seems silly. Who knows what will be available ten years from now. And fifty years out is even more vague. We’ve read many of the predictions about publishing and are frankly amazed that so many seem so sure about something so nebulous.
Our first novel, Time’s Edge, is available in ebook and printed formats. Yes, the ebook is out-selling the paperback version, but we’re willing to bet price is the deciding factor. (The ebook is $3.99 and the paperback is $9.99.) Everyone loves a bargain.
We wish we could get into a space ship and time travel as the characters in our book do. However, we are stuck with today. And since that is all anyone has anyway, arguing about the direction the future is going to take seems unnecessary. If pressed on the subject, we’re willing to say that new ways of sharing information and emerging technologies are going to change the publishing field in ways no one is even considering.
It’s an interesting intellectual exercise. But that’s all it is. The important point is to stay current and to be open to new ideas and adaptable to new technologies. However, if any one does have a time-traveling space ship, let us know!
Never Moon an Editor
If you ever want a good laugh get a bunch of authors together to talk about rejection letters. Over the past few weeks we have encountered other authors at various functions and heard rejection stories so silly, we just have to share them.
One author related that an editor told her that the genre her book fell into was saturated. We giggled when we heard this. Did it mean the genre needed no more books? Was it simply too full? Did he honestly believe that no one anywhere, ever would buy another book in this genre? For that matter, we wondered just how full does a genre have to be before it is considered saturated? How many titles? And just who decides that a genre can hold no more?
And then there was the author who spoke on the phone to an editor who ripped the author’s book to pieces. It was too long, it was badly written, the plot was weak, it was simply the worst mystery story ever written. The author was puzzled. He had submitted a fantasy story.
Another author, who happened to be attending a book conference, was told during the course of the day by various editors that his book was too long, too short, too edgy, not edgy enough, too dark, too light, too slow, too fast-paced, not original enough, and (you guessed it), so different that it defied genres and would, in consequence, be too hard to sell. Apparently, that plain old genre known as “fiction” wasn’t good enough.
We, too, have had our share of silly rejections, but the best was the editor who read three pages of our book and encountered a description of a planet that had two moons. He immediately ceased reading and wrote us a letter stating that he NEVER published books with planets that had two moons. As soon as he saw the two moons, he knew he would dislike the rest of the story. To this day, we fondly relate this tale as the time an editor rejected us because we mooned him.
13 Pieces of Advice for Writers
A couple of blogs ago, we asked, “Why do writers write?”. During our search for the answer, we accumulated other bits of wisdom from authors past and present. Here’s a sampling of advice that falls under the “how-to-write” category.
1. There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein. ~Walter Wellesley “Red” Smith
2. I try to leave out the parts that people skip. ~Elmore Leonard
3. Substitute “damn” every time you’re inclined to write “very;” your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. ~Mark Twain
4. Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart. ~William Wordsworth
5. The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. ~Mark Twain
6. Be obscure clearly. ~E.B. White
7. …a writer is working when he’s staring out of the window. ~Burton Rascoe
8. The best time for planning a book is while you’re doing the dishes. ~Agatha Christie
9. Write your first draft with your heart. Re-write with your head. ~From the movie Finding Forrester
10. The best style is the style you don’t notice. ~Somerset Maugham
11. I’m not a very good writer, but I’m an excellent rewriter. ~James Michener
12. Don’t get it right, just get it written. ~James Thurber
13. There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are. ~W. Somerset Maugham
Why Do Writers Write? 16 Reasons.
We often get asked, “Why do you write?” The question seems simple but the answer isn’t. It made us curious about what other authors had to say on the subject.
1. Writing is a way of talking without being interrupted. ~Jules Renard
2. Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia. ~E.L. Doctorow
3. Writing became such a process of discovery that I couldn’t wait to get to work in the morning: I wanted to know what I was going to say. ~Sharon O’Brien
4. If I don’t write to empty my mind, I go mad. ~Lord Byron
5. The good writing of any age has always been the product of someone’s neurosis, and we’d have a mighty dull literature if all the writers that came along were a bunch of happy chuckleheads. ~William Styron
6. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand. ~George Orwell
7. Books want to be born: I never make them. They come to me and insist on being written, and on being such and such. ~Samuel Butler
8. I want to write books that unlock the traffic jam in everybody’s head. ~John Updike
9. I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear. ~Joan Didion
10. My stories run up and bite me on the leg-I respond by writing down everything that goes on during the bite. When I finish, the idea lets go and runs off. ~Ray Bradbury
11. Writing is one of the few professions in which you can psychoanalyse yourself, get rid of hostilities and frustrations in public, and get paid for it. ~Octavia Butler
12. Writing is the supreme solace. ~W. Somerset Maugham
13. Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation. ~Graham Greene
14. The easy answer is that writing novels is a lot more fun than practicing law. ~
Jeffery Deaver
15. The only reason for being a professional writer is that you can’t help it. ~Leo Rosten
16. Why do writers write? Because it isn’t there. ~Thomas Berger
If anyone knows the answer to this age old question, let us know.
The Seven Stages of Writing
1. Inspiration. You have a great idea for a book. You love it. You know everyone else will love it, too. You can’t wait to start writing. You begin to make notes. On your brown lunch bag. On napkins. On little sticky notes.
2. Frenzy. You start writing. Every spare moment, you’re at the computer. The words are flowing so freely, you can’t type fast enough. You write anywhere, any time you can. On your brown lunch bag. On napkins. On little sticky notes.
3. Doubt. The plot isn’t turning out exactly the way you thought it would. (Where is that sticky note with the great plot twist…?) The characters are, perhaps, not quite right. Maybe the pacing is too slow? Perhaps the ending is a bit predictable? Perhaps… maybe…
4. Anger. Oh, crap. This plot problem is insurmountable. You can’t figure out how to end the chapter you are working on. You’re over your word count. Your characters just aren’t behaving. Your sticky notes are wadded into a giant sticky note ball. Banging your head on the desk doesn’t help.
5. Exhaustion. You feel this damn book will never be finished. You type grimly with fingers made of lead. Each word is drawn slowly and painfully from your beleaguered brain. You know you will never have another creative idea as long as you live. The sticky note ball is in the trash.
6. Acceptance. It’s done. You sigh with the relief of a mother who has just given birth. You even retrieve the sticky note ball from the trash and untangle the pages. After all, you never know. You drift off peacefully to sleep. And dream…
7. Déjà vu. See stage one.
Writer’s Block
Okay. We’re sitting here staring at a blank page wondering how to write the next chapter in our book. The page is staring blankly back at us. Not a thing is coming to mind. (Or in our case, minds.) We look at each other, hoping for that most elusive of all writing tools. Inspiration.
What to do when inspiration packs its bags and heads for the door? This is the nemesis of every writer we have ever spoken to or read about. The dreaded brick wall that brings all writing to a halt and leaves even the most intrepid authors with the feeling they will never have another creative thought in this lifetime.
How can two writers fall victim to this malaise at the same time? Shouldn’t one of us be bursting with ideas even if the other is having, what is euphemistically termed, an off day? Here’s the awful truth: Writer’s block can be contagious.
Nothing is more discouraging than a writer with tons of ideas who runs smack up against a writer who is suffering from a full-blown case of writer’s block. Here’s an example.
ANNOYING WRITER: (Bouncing into the room.) All we all set write?
CRABBY WRITER: (Giving Annoying Writer a look that should have caused a quick retreat.) Sure.
ANNOYING WRITER: I can’t wait to begin. I’ve got this great idea for that scene we’ve been stuck on. I know just how to fix it! It’ll be great. You see the 7-foot tall monster is really not a monster at all but a nice guy who is just doing his job. What do you think?
CRABBY WRITER: (Closing eyes against the sight of so much enthusiasm.) Swell.
ANNOYING WRITER: Don’t you like it?
CRABBY WRITER: It won’t work.
ANNOYING WRITER: Why not? It’s perfect! You see, the monster looks scary but is really…
CRABBY WRITER: I know. But it won’t work.
ANNOYING WRITER: What’s wrong with it?
CRABBY WRITER: We need the monster to attack the hero. (Pointedly.) Remember?
ANNOYING WRITER: Oh. Um. Yeah. But…
CRABBY: WRITER: There’s supposed to be a battle. (Pointedly.) Remember?
ANNOYING WRITER: Oh. Um. Yeah. But…
CRABBY WRITER: It’s a key element of the plot. (Very pointedly.) REMEMBER?
ANNOYING WRITER: Well, yeah, but I thought…
CRABBY WRITER: If we make the monster a nice guy, we’d have to rewrite the entire chapter. The monster would have to show up and then back off and the hero would be left wondering… Hmmm.
LESS ANNOYING WRITER: Yeah. I see your point.
LESS CRABBY WRITER: Actually, if the monster did that it would create a little mystery.
HARDLY ANNOYING ANYMORE WRITER: Maybe.
HARDLY CRABBY ANYMORE WRITER: We could leave it hanging and then have the monster unexpectedly show up in a later chapter and explain what happened.
BECOMING CRABBY WRITER: Explain what happened? Why should he do that?
BECOMING ANNOYING WRITER: Because it turns out he’s really a nice guy who’s just doing his job.
NEWLY CRABBY WRITER: I thought you said that wouldn’t work!
NEWLY ANNOYING WRITER: Why not? I think it’s a great idea!
And so round and round we go.
Is there a cure for writer’s block? Sure. There are any number of suggestions on the web and in books for breaking the block. Try a change of scenery. Switch to brainstorming. Take a walk. Learn to crochet. Any one of these ideas might work. Once, at least. However, the single best method that we’ve found for getting out of writer’s block is to write. Seriously. Write. Anything. Just start. Who cares if it’s bad? Who cares if it doesn’t make sense? Just spit it out. Force yourself. Yes, we can already hear the writing gurus screaming. But this works for us. We don’t necessarily keep what we write this way, but it gets us unstuck without fail. Once we get the bad stuff out of the way, the blockage loosens and the good stuff can come through.
So what happens when we both are just bursting with great ideas? Two annoying writers, of course. Our family members may avoid us, but we’re both as happy as we can be wallowing in over-enthusiasm and excitement and the thrill of creating.
Multitasking for Writers
We’re all so busy these days. Computers, cell phones, social networking and all the endless gadgets of “convenience” have contrived to make our lives busier than ever. So, how do two hard-working authors find the time to write? Multitasking, that wonderful, terrible word that popped into existence approximately when all the time-saving gadgets began to appear.
Can you remember an era when we all only did one task at a time before moving on to the next? No, we can’t either. In fact, the only time when we’re not multitasking is when we’re sleeping and even then, before we fall asleep, we lie in bed planning our next day, plotting a new chapter, squeezing every last ounce of productivity out of the day before we close our eyes.
How can we write while doing other things? Isn’t that sort of complicated? Difficult? Downright impossible? Well, it depends on what part of the writing process we happen to be engaged in. The actual sit-down-at-the-computer-and-type part requires total concentration. We simply can’t multitask while writing a new scene and if any authors can, we’d like to meet them and learn their secrets. In our house a sure way to endanger your life is to interrupt the person who is in the middle of writing a chapter.
However, there is more to writing than just writing. Plotting, character development, creating interesting new places and beings, and coming up with made-up words to describe things that don’t exist anywhere else but in our imaginations are some of things we group under the activity we call writing. And these things, thankfully, can be done while working on something else.
For instance, we recently painted our living room, which could have been a drag, but actually provided us with large chunks of time to work on the book and kept us from getting snippy about all the work we had to do. Brainstorming new plot ideas took the place of berating each other about how the room should have been repainted five years ago. Creating a few new characters distracted from the klutzy one who kept spilling the paint. Deciding when and how to reveal the secrets hinted at in Time’s Edge was a welcome change from the one who who kept whining about sore arms and hands. All in all, multitasking was a lifesaver.
And take this winter. We live in New England. The first snowstorm hit December 26th (see our blog How to Write a Book During a Blizzard) and it pretty much snowed every week for the rest of the season. This meant we spent any spare time we had shoveling snow into drifts that rapidly became taller than we were. Instead of allowing this to eat up our writing time, we multitasked and discussed the book while shoveling. We solved a lot of plot problems and built up our muscles at the same time. The only downside was the odd looks we got from the neighbors when they overheard us talking about what to call a six-legged, lizard-type creature that has long claws and venom in its fangs. They must think we have a new exotic pet because none of them have dropped by for a visit since.
Of course, we multitask out of necessity, not for a love of it. There are days when we yearn nostalgically for the slowness of times past. No cell phones, no Internet, not even an answering machine for the phone. Ah, to have peace and freedom from instant connections, statistics, and promotions. To be able to sit back and let the world go by and just write while the only multitasking to be done is to make the tea when the kettle whistles. Paradise.
Statistics, The Curse of Social Networking
Everywhere you go these days the unending varieties of social networking sites provide an equally unending stream of information. And the stats to go with them.
It’s all too easy to get obsessed by statistics. You start out with your very first page. The site very helpfully provides information about how your page is doing, how many people have visited, how many have left comments or liked your page. Instant feedback. How nice! And at first it’s fun. Look! We had ten visitors! Ten! Isn’t that amazing? Ten more people now know about us! (And then you learn that the ten were your parents, siblings and a cousin, the one you can’t stand.)
You then begin to worry. Why only ten? We have to do better. You scan other pages, looking at the hundreds and thousands of fans and comments they have. How in the world does L.L. Bean do it? What does Madonna have that we don’t? Gee, Stephen King only has to write the first few pages of a new novel and the world beats a path to his page. You read other blogs, trying to fathom the mysterious secret, the magic combination that sets them apart and earns them such avid readership.
Well, you decide, if they can do it so can we. You try to determine how to get the most hits. What brings people to your page? What gets the most likes and comments? You experiment, try new things and often end up scratching your head at what works and what doesn’t. (Like the time we simply could not think of anything to blog about so we quickly wrote a spoof of A Visit from St. Nicholas which we called Twas the Night We Were Blogging. It has been our most popular blog to date. Go figure!)
Soon you are checking your stats daily. Are they up? Hooray! Down? Oh, no! Unchanged? WHY? Is the darn site glitching again? You start questioning yourself. Wondering. Worrying. Trying to come up with something new, something entertaining, something… Well, if we knew what the magical something was, we’d do it! And you still keep anxiously watching those stats.
It is not long before you are sneaking peeks at your stats a few times a day. Just a quick look. Just want to see if we’re doing better/worse/the same than we were this morning/this afternoon/this evening/ten minutes ago. Any new fans on Facebook? 55? Yea! We got a new one. You dance an Irish jig around the office until your significant other comes in and says that you already had 55 fans. You insist it was only 54. And you spend the next half hour arguing over that one fan, who is probably your cousin, the one you dislike.
Book sales are the worse type of all the stats. The figures change hourly. You can be selling in the top 2% one hour and drop down to 10% in the next. It’s worse than watching the stock market and just as unpredictable. When your sales are soaring you wonder (amid the cheering and fist-pumping) just why the world has suddenly flocked to your book. Was it the blog? Did they see the trailer on youtube? Perhaps it was the promotion on Goodreads? Just what in the world did we do to make this happen and how can we keep doing it? Unfortunately, when sales are dropping, you wonder the same things, in reverse. Didn’t anyone read the bog? Can’t they find the trailer on youtube? Is the Goodreads promotion just not enough? What in the world did we do to make this happen and how can we stop doing it?
Statistics obsession eventually reaches a peak. After the roller coaster of ups and downs, you chill out, knowing that your rankings can and will change at the drop of a hat for reasons unknown. It could be the phase of the moon. Or the stars might not be in the right position. Or perhaps your cousin, the one you dislike, has a big mouth and a lot of friends, which, for once, has worked to your advantage. Or maybe, just maybe, it was that last blog/Facebook post/book trailer/promotion that did it this time. Hmm. Perhaps we should check those stats again and try to figure it out…
Please Folks, Don’t Try This at Home
Where do ideas come from? Mostly, they seem to appear out of thin air, but sometimes they can have far more real sources.
Picture this: A man and a woman are hiking in a park. The man suggests leaving the trail to climb up the side of a waterfall. The woman is dubious. The man assures her he has made the climb before and it is safe and easy. Against her better judgment, the woman agrees to give it a try. They begin to climb. Halfway up the steep, slippery, safe and easy side of the waterfall, the woman slips. She dangles from the rock above, the man gripping her hands. Below her are some very large, very pointy and very solid-looking boulders. She looks up into the man’s eyes. “I love you,” she says. “But if you drop me, I’m going to love you less.”
Yes, this really happened to us when we were dating. Years later, this event became the inspiration for a scene in Time’s Edge. The hero and heroine wind up dangling off a suspension bridge over a rocky gorge. Not an exact translation, but the spirit of the original adventure is there. And it wasn’t the only time a real-life situation inspired us.
On another pre-marriage outing, we decided to go to a local beach. The tide was out and we wandered far from shore collecting rocks and shells, blissfully unaware that the tide was not going out but coming in. By the time we did realize what was happening, there was a large channel of water between us and the shore. As the tide rolled in, we frantically hopped from one shrinking sandbar to the next before Joe finally pointed out it was time to sink or swim. We plunged into the icy waters (it was April on Long Island Sound, not a warm time of year for a dip) and made it to shore, soaked and freezing. As we stood on the shore waiting for feeling to return to our bodies, Joe said, “That would make a good scene in the book!” He nearly got tossed back into the water. However, years later, our icy swim has resurfaced as a scene in Time’s Illusion, the third book of our series.
Does this mean we have fallen through mysterious dark doorways into other times or that we’ve been accosted by a seven-foot tall monster? Nope. Our imaginations work just as well as any other writers. However, real-life events do have a way of working themselves into our tales, albeit in a roundabout way. We’ve been lost in the woods, trapped in an elevator, stuck on a cliff ledge and stranded on a roller coaster. (We hope our mothers aren’t reading this.) And do these things happen to our characters? Not exactly. What we tend to do is latch onto the feeling of the event, the emotion and adrenalin and underlying humor that always seems to infuse the mishaps of our lives.
Of course it’s not just outdoor adventures that inspire us. Mary’s close encounter with an MRI is a good example. There she was lying on the board that slides into the closed tube (no open MRIs in those days!). She had been injected with a strange substance by the evil attendant who then ran away to his safe, radiation-free booth. His voice crackled over the microphone that he used to communicate with his victim…um, patient. He cheerfully told her that if she began to feel uncomfortable she could just squeeze the blue ball that was attached to a wire. This would let him know there was a problem. She had the ball in her hand and lifted it to make sure it was connected. It wasn’t. As she realized she had no way to communicate with the owner of the voice, she looked up to see a yellow smile face sticker grinning down at her from the top of the tube, which seemed at the moment to be a fine sadistic touch. She stoically endured the session and emerged from the tube with red, blotchy skin because she was having a reaction to the injection. The attendant came out from his room with a big smile and proclaimed, “That went well! By the way, you seem to have a sinus infection.” She prudently left before she gave in to her desire to punch him in the nose.
This experience became a scary scene in Time’s Secret. The MRI became a torture device in a place called the Inquisitor’s Chamber, and the attendant became a villain who is eager to demonstrate how the machine works. (For those who are wondering, the smile face sticker didn’t make it into the scene.) All the emotions of the actual event are there and the resolution… Well, the book isn’t published yet, and we don’t like spoilers, but we will say that getting even with evil MRI attendants can be fun.
Twas the Night We Were Blogging
‘Twas the night we were blogging, when all through the house
Not an idea was stirring that would inspire a mouse;
Our manuscripts were flung by the chimney without care,
In hopes that inspiration soon would be there;
We wished we were nestled all snug in our beds,
While visions of blog stats danced in our heads;
And my wife in frustration and I in despair,
Were beginning to think we had nothing to share.
When out of the blue I got a great notion,
I sprang from my chair in a whirl of commotion.
Away to the computer I flew like a flash,
And opened the program but the thing promptly crashed.
I pounded the keyboard, right-clicked the mouse
Then uttered a yell that was heard through the house.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a Microsoft message that wasn’t too clear.
It’s an outdated driver, so slow and so sick,
I knew in a moment this wouldn’t be quick.
More rapid than eagles our curses they came,
We stamped, and we shouted, and called it some names;
“Now, Damn it! now, Darn it! now, How do we fix this!
Oh, Blast it! How stupid! oh, How do we nix this?
This is taking too long! We’re climbing the wall!
Just go away! go away! go away all!”
As frustration did grow and our tempers did fly,
We met with the obstacle, and said “Do or die!”
So back to the keyboard my fingers they flew,
With determination, and disk repair, too.
And then, in a twinkling, I saw on the screen
Another message from the hateful machine.
As I threw up my hands and was starting to frown
Error messages appeared with a bound.
They made no sense to me and no sense to my wife,
And had but one purpose; to cause us much strife;
A bundle of codes, which took us aback,
And made us believe we were on the wrong track.
Our eyes — how they twitched! our faces weren’t merry!
Our cheeks were like roses, our noses like cherries!
My wife’s little mouth was drawn tight as a bow,
And the look on her face as cold as the snow;
I turned to the screen and gritted my teeth,
The steam from my ears circled my head like a wreath;
I felt a sharp pain deep in my belly,
And was beginning to shake like a bowl full of jelly.
I grabbed a manual from off of the shelf,
And mumbled and murmured and read to myself;
My wife caught my eye and then shook her head,
Which let me know I had plenty to dread;
I spoke not a word, but went straight to my work,
And fixed all the problems; then turned with a jerk,
And giving the finger to the stupid machine,
I started it up and it worked like a dream!
My wife sprang to the keyboard and began typing away,
Creating a blog to post the next day.
But I heard her exclaim, as we finished that night,
“Blogging can be quite fun, but sometimes it bites.”
(With apologies to Clement Clarke Moore)
J.M. Dattilo 