Wishing You

2 Romance Anthos

Samhain Publishing has open calls for two anthologies, each with interesting themes: Superhero Romance and 2012 Summer Olympics.

Some details from the editor for the as-yet-untitled Superhero Romance Anthology:

"I’m open to M/F, M/M, F/F, or multiples thereof, any sexual heat level, and the romance must end happily ever after or happy for now. The novellas must range between 25,000 to 30,000 words in length, no more, no less—please note, only manuscripts that fall in this word count will be considered for this anthology—and will be released individually as ebooks in spring 2012 and in print approximately one year later."

Deadline for this one is September 1, 2011.

As for the Summer Olympics 2012 Romance Anthology, the editor notes:

"I’m looking for stories that revolve around events happening during the Summer Olympics, being held in London in 2012 from July 27 to August 12. Stories focusing on the 2012 Summer Olympics in London are preferred, though a great story is a great story no matter the year and location, so I will be willing to look at stories taking place at/during previous Summer Olympic years and cities. Also, please be aware that, as a primarily romance publisher, we require all stories for this anthology to fit into the romance genre, complete with “happy ever after” or “happy for now” ending. Any heat level is admissible, as well as m/f, m/m, f/f and any ménage combination."

Same length (25,000 to 30,000 words) for this one, and the deadline is also September 1, 2011.

For more info on these anthos, check out the guidelines as well as Samhain's submissions FAQs page.

Potter & More

I finally had a chance to look at J.K. Rowling's Pottermore, which has been sending shockwaves as well as lots of speculation through the industry since it materialized. Not much to see at this point, although the news folks claim that the author is cutting off publishers and booksellers from taking a slice of the profits while using it to release e-book versions of her phenomenal series and offer some sort of interactive experience for readers. However it turns out, I think it's an interesting experiment, potentially an enormous cash machine, and certainly a great way to hang onto the worldwide online readership and their love for all things Harry.

Amazon.com finally brings the questionable ethics of compensated blurbing out into the open by offering to authors promotion in exchange for cover quotes. It's basically the one hand washing the other approach; you review their book, and they'll promote yours. Which is no different than the reciprocal and buddy blurbing that has been going on behind the scenes in the industry practically forever; they're just being upfront about it.

The bootleggers are now making book videos in order to promote pirated copies via YouTube (and no, I'm not going to link to the jerk I found doing it.) An image of the cover art is shown along with a brief message about downloading the book for free and what kind of formats are offered, and the actual link to the bootleg is listed in the video description area. To find out if your copyright is being violated by one of these pinheads, do a You Tube search with your psuedonym and/or your book title.

WorldBuilding No-Nos

Ten Things I Hate about Your WorldBuilding

Beasts from your hell are always slimy, odorous, loud, over-size horrors with broken but razor-sharp teeth and bulging but blazing red eyes; they could easily be smelled if not instantly identified from two miles away. Yet somehow they still always get the jump on their victims.

Epidemics happen in your story only because some evil one cast a spell over a geographical region, and are never the natural byproduct of poor hygiene, crowded living conditions, contaminated water or food supplies, and/or lack of medical advancement.

Everyone in the village is an idiot. Everyone.

No one seems to be actively employed in the story. Farmers aren't planting crops, merchants aren't holding sales, and stable boys aren't shoveling manure, etc. Your courtesans, on the other hand, are always working triple shifts.

Queens and princesses are inevitably lovely, sylph-like creatures who radiate goodness and kindness, care deeply about their subjects, and are obsessed with feeding and caring for the poor; none display any of the typical physical or mental signs of being what they really are: the results of centuries of inbreeding.

The natural source of unparalleled magical power that has been sitting around in the open for millenia has never been discovered or exploited by native peoples, explorers, settlers, industrial developers, evil overlords or anyone except the hero, and then only when he is in desperate straits with nowhere else to turn.

While your world seems forever poised on the brink of destruction, an event that often can only be narrowly avoided by the hero and heroine having wild monkey sex, this doesn't seem to ever worry anyone else.

You give me in excruciating detail the pyramids, palaces and every other prominent place within a thirty-mile radius, but there are no bathrooms or toilets anywhere.

Your highly intelligent, extremely lethal mythical creatures, all of which are the size of a dump truck or larger, turn into quivering submissive bunny rabbits whenever a dinky human hero with a mission encounters them. P.S., even if they've been captured, beaten and starved by other humans for months, they never blame the hero or snap him up as a quick snack.

Your invented language bears a striking resemblance to Klingon as spoken by a stutterer.

Butterfly People

Another of my rewards for crossing the novel finish line was a nice big stack of art magazines (pretty much everything Somerset Studio publishes, plus a few on quilting and sewing.) I parked them on the porch table so I could get my fix whenever the dogs and I came out to hang with the birds.

I admit, I am kind of addicted to ArtMag world. It's an amazing, beautiful place. On this planet (populated entirely by the nicest women you'll never meet) everyone talks about the creative life as a journey of self-discovery. No one ever gets angry or annoyed or has a bad day. While they're effortlessly throwing together the most astonishing projects, they're also finding enlightenment or artistic validation or having some other kind of continuous spiritual orgasm.

In almost every issue there is someone who works exclusively in shades of white, or transforms plastic grocery bags into designer purses, or turns old watches into steampunk cuffs and pendants (which they claim they wear in public. I'm dying to see that.) Their friends are amazingly gifted artists who only want to inspire each other to greater creative heights. Their homes smell of cookies and lavender and baby powder. They have more Victorian art scattered around than Queen Victoria did. They listen to classical music 24/7. There don't seem to be any men in ArtMag World, but there's always a punched copper pie safe in the kitchen, a claw-footed tub in the bathroom, and somewhere near a window a mason jar tied with raffia and filled with sea glass and a single sunflower that never dies.

I want to go to this planet someday, and crash an ephemera exchange tea party so the hostess has to whip up in five seconds a place card for me out of old Valentines and Scrabble tiles. I want to gobble an entire cracked porcelain platter of those perfect chocolate raspberry scones dusted with powder sugar through a doily and sprinkled with edible flower petals. I want to tie bouquets of fresh violets gathered with vintage lace and old rhinestone brooches to the handles of coffee mugs and then watch people try to drink from them without putting out an eye. After we collage the contents of a hope chest into a 5 X 7 shadow box with the word DREAM stamped crookedly on a white-washed Barbie's head, I want to talk about the creative life in words that in our world are most often used to describe scented fabric softener, women's winged sanitary products, and extra-plush toilet paper.

Most of all I want to meet these women -- these fabulous, ethereal, gossamer creatures who evidently don't have jobs, spouses, weight problems, body odor, bills, etc. Apparently they never walk the floors at 3 a.m., sweaty and pissed off because they're having hot flashes or can't turn off their brains. Their lovely white cats sit in windowsills all day instead of hawking up hairballs and sharpening their claws on the furniture. I never see one of these artistic types perspiring as they plow through a six pound stack of their art while their peach tea goes cold and the ant bites on their right foot itch like the devil. They certainly don't seem to get hate-mail from disgruntled folks who decide they've forced their art on the world, and for whatever reason it offends justifies the audience bitch-slapping the artist with partially-starred expletives. No, I think they just shimmer all day as they flit around on translucent jewel-toned wings, like butterfly people.

Maybe this is why so many creative souls fear they're not legit; because they don't live on ArtMag world. They don't sprout wings the minute they rise from their not-so-snowy sheets. When they look at themselves in the mirror, they realize their T-shirt and shorts don't match, or their bra is giving them a uniboob, or they haven't shaved their legs in two months. They go out to drink the coffee they got on sale out of a chipped Garfield mug, and pet their scrawny tabby cat, which has shown its love by depositing an eviscerated lizard on the seat of the spouse's favorite armchair. The mail doesn't arrive in envelopes covered with calligraphy tied together with an ombre silk ribbon. Friends call only to bitch about their bad marriages or ask some insanely inconvenient favor. The tea parties in this world are run by the likes of Rush Limbaugh.

I know I'll never live in an ArtMag world. Writing is not especially pretty. Most of the time it's very hard, exhausting work that seems to take forever and can't be accomplished by gathering a list of supplies and following half a page of instructions. Our results are always and forever a stack of printed pages and that's it. You can dress that up with as many rhinestone brooches and dew-spangled violet bouquets as you want, but underneath all the ephemera you pile atop it the work remains work.

To be honest, I don't think ArtMag world exists. I think the all-white artist has a house that smells like chlorine and chalk, and the baker just burned her latest batch of scones because her mother called and distracted her, and the steampunk jewelry maker has to get a tetanus shot because she sliced her finger open while dissecting that rusty old watch. They live in the real world, just like the rest of us poor slobs, and while you'll never see the bleach bottles, burnt offerings or bloodstains in a magazine, they're still there, just beyond the butterfly wings.

Afterworks

Tonight I sifted through Julia Cameron's The Right to Write, another how-to skewed more toward adjusting one's writing philosophy than actual instruction (I think someone in the family passed this copy onto me.) While there were some autobiographical shock-geysers I had to dodge now and then, it wasn't uber neurotic. I actually thought it was interesting. A bit merciless at times, like a Storm Trooper's writing manual. That said, I suppose when you write for Hollywood you have to armor up daily. An excellent book for anyone who wants to write but feels "unworthy" of being a writer.

I just finished writing my fourth novel of the year, and I'm in need of something more restful and lyrical, so I'm retreating to Sage Cohen and her Writing the Life Poetic. I find I keep going back to this book as a little sanctuary where I can be one with the verse. I think poetry always has been my biggest creative retreat; the one place I can go where I don't have to be on display. I'd also like to work my way through the book again and this time do all the try this exercises.

I also have book #5 and #6 to get started, but I'm giving myself this week and the holiday weekend off to recharge and catch up on house work. I have a stack of fiction books to read, and when I get restless I have two rooms I'm reorganizing that I can work on. I don't usually take this much downtime between projects, but the last book was such an intense writing experience that I know I need a few more days to get it out of my head.

An ongoing part of the writing life is learning what works to reset/detox/restore yourself after you finish a story. I know cleaning the house sounds dull, but I like house work and the exercise helps me shake off the cobwebs. Reading fiction for pleasure helps back off the muse and the internal editor, plus it's a nice reward for crossing the novel finish line.

What do you do after the work is done and you're between stories? What do you find rejuvenates you most? Let us know in comments.

Got Doggelgänger?

Today I'm unplugging to finish up some work for my editor. So that your visit here was not entirely wasted, I thought I'd let you meet my canine twin. We met when Gerard over at the Presurfer tempted me to try out Doggelgänger, an online toy which matches human faces with their canine doubles.

Turns out I am a 56%* match for this lovely creature named Bailey:



Bailey is a Staffordshire Bull Terrier, and has the chocolate brown eyes I always wanted. Staffies are great dogs, too. If only I were this gorgeous!

The neat thing about this is that the pups used for matches to are all awaiting adoption (I'm guessing they're all in New Zealand, the site has an nz at the end of the URL, and my match is listed as being in Auckland.) Hopefully lots of our Kiwi friends try it out and find someone to bring home and love.

*We have the same white hair. I just have a lot more.

Sub Ops Ten

Ten Things About Submission Opportunities

A word of caution about three sub ops over at Ralan.com that threw up some red flags for me: Android2.com, ManStory2.com and Vampires2.com ezines all have open calls for short fiction submissions on the Pay Markets page, offering $25.00/per story payment. Sounded good, until I read the guidelines for each, which are almost identical, and the fact that they push site membership for submitters to get preferred publication consideration. Membership to these sites is purchased through an automatic billing service, so for example if you join Vampires2.com you'll be billed $5.00 per week. Since response time can be from one to three months, you could end up paying $20.00 - $45.00 for membership while you're waiting for a reply on your sub. Also, all three sites are going live in July. I'm not saying they aren't legitimate markets, but this all just seems a bit fishy to me. If you decide to sub to any of them, do be careful.

Science Fiction and Fantasy convention BayCon has a semi-open call for their convention program book, to include "works of science fiction or fantasy. We will consider slipstream if there is a clear speculative fiction element. BayCon is a family convention and the program book and progress report are read by people of all ages. Therefore, we are looking for works that are no more adult than PG-13 in content, meaning mild swearing (at most) and no explicit sex or violence. We welcome submissions from writers of every race, religion, nationality, gender, and sexual orientation, however, we are an English-language market only. While it is not required to use the convention's theme in submissions, it is encouraged. The theme for 2012 is: 30th Anniversary Pleasure Cruise." BayCon is not interested in subs from SFWA members, although the minimal qualifications for anyone to submit also rule out the as-yet-unpublished (the qualifications bit is a little weird. Go read it.) Length 1-4K, Payment: 5¢/word (min $50), no reprints, electronic submission via online form, see guidelines for more details. Reading period: July 15th - Sept 15th, 2011.

Comets and Criminals ezine is looking for "fantastic stories of no more than 5,000 words in the Science Fiction, Adventure, Historical, and Western genres. We also accept Crime and Mystery fiction, with an upper word limit of 10,000 words. We want amazing poetry in these genres, too, though we’re willing to look at more mainstream poetry also." Length: Fiction - 1-5K, mystery/crime 1-10K, flash fiction 1K or less, Payment: 1¢/word for fiction, $10.00 for flash fic or poem, Reprints okay but pay is less, electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. First issue debuts January 2012.

Escape Collective Publishing has an open call for their escape-themed anthology" "For our first anthology, we are seeking short stories focusing on the theme of “Escape.” Escape from what, to where, why? That's up to you! But please notice that we ask for a “theme” of Escape, not specifically a “plot” based on escape; though we will read and accept stories centered around prison breaks, escapes from dying planets, and others, we wish to explore less obvious examples of escape or escapism as well. 'Fiction of the Fantastic' has often been called “mere escapism,” after all; we just want to do away with the derogatory “mere” and embrace the “escapism”: the wondrous, the sense of freedom, and more, that comes with literature that frees itself from the bounds of realism, and, in doing so, is able to look at 'reality' from a new perspective. So surprise us, entice us, move us, and free us with your stories. Stories accepted will be published in our Fall anthology." Length: up to 7.5K, Payment: "portion of the profit on the digital sale of the Anthology, on a per word royalty basis.", no reprints, electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: August 15th, 2011.

Rosetta Books' The Galaxy Project Contest is "both a celebration - through new editions in widely distributed electronic form - of the great 1950's Galaxy Magazine, edited by H. L. Gold and a means through these new electronic editions of classic longer works and through its new novella contest to carry forth that tradition in the new millennium. The contest to select one novella or novelette will be judged in the spirit of H. L. Gold and the great magazine of which he was founding editor. Galaxy was open to all potential contributors in the 1950's and 1960's. Only excellence mattered. The contest will be "open" and judged on the same standards. The winner will: Be published in e-book as part of The Galaxy Project collection. Receive an advance of $1,000 against royalties of 50% of net receipts to 2,500 copies and 60% of net receipts thereafter for world English digital rights. Retain the copyright and all rights other than the initial digital use (per Galaxy Magazine's policy.) See contest page for more details. Deadline: September 2, 2011.

Winner of the PBW Strangest Antho Title of All Time award, Generic Publishing has an open call for their King Paul Crushes Your Face and You like It anthology: "We here at Generic Publishing want you to dig deep and access you inner manly man, that beast within that screws, plunders and lays waste to all that approach it, to tell tales of the glory and awesome might that is King Paul, rife with sex, violence, debauchery, depravity and big heaping buckets of gore. Picture a Chuck Norris/Maddox/Tucker Max hybrid being punched in the face by Conan to a soundtrack of W.A.S.P., killwhitneydead and Manowar, then listen to the King Paul songs on Carinemily.com (all submissions MUST match the mythology of these songs to be considered). These stories should harken back to the style and ideals of Orature (traditional tales and history passed along orally) and should be either in Flash or Praise poetry form. Do keep in mind that, while the theme of masculinity taken to cartoonish extremes will likely be handled with tongue firmly in cheek, we expect it all to be played straight. My first image of the concept lends itself to sword and sandals fantasy, but don’t feel obliged to constrict yourself to that genre; we’d love to see a steampunk Paul mowing down werewolves on a pirate ship in space. This anthology is intended for adults, so feel free to be as raunchy and brutal as you desire (please), but don’t bother us with rape fantasies or kiddie porn. Even the King has his limits." Hokay. Length: < 2K (flash fiction) or 100 lines (poetry) max, Payment: Pay: .5 cents per word for flash fiction and $5 flat rate for poetry, no reprints, electronic submission only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: August 15th, 2011.

Author Michael A. Ventrella has an open call for his Tales of Fortannis anthology: "Tales of Fortannis is a new series of short stories set in the world of my novels. It's a high fantasy world with elves, dwarves, the mysterious biata, gryphons, goblins, and more." Length: < 10K, Payment: "small shared royalty", no reprints, electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: August 1st, 2011, or until filled.

Pill Hill Press has an open call for their The Trigger Reflex ~ Legends of the Monster Hunter II: "The Monster Hunter is a breed apart, destined to a life filled with anguish, wild triumph, and blood. We want more of their very best stories. For inspiration, follow Van Helsing from Dracula, or Sylvester James from Autobiography of a Werewolf Hunter. Follow Quint from Jaws, Tangina Barrows from Poltergeist, or even Ripley from Alien. Set them after snow-beasts in the Himalayas, sea-monsters off of Komodo, or sandworms in Egypt. Give us legend, folklore, or beasts unknown that never leave the shadows. Tell the stories of those that hunt these monsters, stories filled with wild chases, hair-raising close calls, tragedy, regret and bloody victory. Make them gritty, give them punch, or make them subtle, creepy and suspenseful. You are welcome to dazzle, but bleak will be equally appreciated. Make the hunters heroes, or make them more evil than the creatures they hunt. Give them blind determination and a hell bent desire to win no matter what the cost, or let them face a moral uncertainty over whether or not they’re doing the right thing by killing…" (and there's a lot more, so read the guidelines carefully.) Length 2-7K, Payment: ¼¢/word, no reprints, electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: until filled.

The editor of the Trust & Treachery: Tales of Power, Intrigue and Violence anthology has an open call for submissions: "We are very open as to genre: Mystery, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Horror, etc. Please no romance, erotica (though relevant sexual content is fine), or YA." Length: 1-5K, Payment: $20.00, no reprints, electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: December 15th, 2011.

Sky Warrior Books has an open call for their Zombiefied – An Anthology of All Things Zombie anthology, for which they'd like to see "your best work on zombies, original or reprint (must have the rights), of stories 500 to 7000 words in length. Can be fiction, nonfiction, or poetry. Sure, we’ll take standard horror and dark fantasy, but you can be creative. Zombies in space, zombiefied critters, zombie love stories (uh, no erotica), fantasy zombies, steampunk zombies, zombie humor, zombies on toast…well, you get the idea." Payment: "author share divided equally among the authors. We pay quarterly", reprints okay, electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: August 15, 2011.

This and That

I went looking around for online events to link to for those who are wisely avoiding RWA National next week, but unfortunately I found zip except for Romance Divas, who appear to still be holding their annual Not Going to the Conference Conference; registration at their site required. If anyone knows of any free online events being held for those who aren't going, please list a link in comments and I'll add it to this post.

Added: Author Alison Kent is giving away writing books over at her blog here, hooray!

Several people have e-mailed to ask if I would start hosting my Left Behind & Loving It virtual conference again. My reasons for ending it back in 2009 remain the same.

Access Romance blog is closing its doors as of June 30, 2011. As a consolation offering it appears they're giving away boxes of books, so if you'd like a chance to win some, head over and leave a comment.

Finally, yes, I can confirm that the title for my first novel in the new Lords of the Darkyn trilogy is indeed Nightborn. I had planned to announce it here as soon as I had some cover art to show you, but the book got moved up on the release schedule, my publisher put it up for pre-order on Amazon.com and evidently someone out there in NetPubLand spilled the beans.

Sorry the newsy bits are mostly depressing. Does anyone have any happy news to share? Let us know in comments.

Full Spectrum Story

Whenever I'm away from home I carry my camera in my purse, just in case I see something I want to shoot (in the good way.) Experience has taught me that you never know when something interesting is going to cross your path.

This unretouched shot here is one I took while I was sitting in a diner have breakfast with my guy and our kid. I looked up at a shiny glass surface, but instead of seeing my own face I saw this. Now, while there are (cough) always rainbows in my heart, generally I don't see them in mirrored objects. I was seeing it because I was sitting in just the right place at precisely the correct moment; the sun and certain properties of light did the rest (and if you want to know what I was looking at, keep reading.)

The image made me think of writing, naturally, because of course everything is about writing. Story is like the reverse of refracting light, in that the creation of it begins with a wide spectrum of elements -- characters, plot, dialogue, action, setting, time period -- which through the prism of the writer's storytelling hopefully all blend back together into a single, dazzling read.

It would be nice to play God with a novel and only have to say "Let there be light," but as any writer will tell you there's a lot more work involved in it for us. I'd say the most difficult part of making this happen for the writer is being too close to see beyond the spectrum of elements. Occupational hazard, I think; we have to be so detail-oriented when we're working that we can be blinded by the dispersion. This juggling act we do often results in an uneven execution that affects the whole story.

Fortunately we have the editing phase, when hopefully we can back off enough to see all the elements, not just what we were so zeroed in on at the time of creation.

Every book you write has its own set of challenges. With the one I just finished I was fully immersed in four of the characters: my two protagonists and two central secondary characters. This quartet had strong, distinct personalities, and the story issues they had to deal with were so interwoven even one misstep could have turned into a big ball of tangled plot yarn. An added problem was with one who decided to give me nothing but grief whenever she was on the page; at one point I was so frustrated I actually killed her to shut her up. Which of course I went back and rewrote as soon as I cooled off enough to do the daily edit.

My daily edits are what really prevented the book from being all character and no story, and also saved me from having to do a massive rewrite or a total manuscript toss-out. I knew I was focusing too much on the characters, so at the end of each day I made myself stop obsessing about them and take a hard look at the other elements in the scene. In the beginning of the book I saw that I was rushing through or skipping things that needed to be there so I could get the characters on the page and transcribe all this great dialogue in my head. By the middle of the book, I was remembering this while I was writing new material, and correcting myself in the process of getting the story down. The last half of the book went much smoother, and what I produced was much more balanced and needed far fewer rewrites.

Every writer has their own set of strengths and weaknesses, and unless you're a cookie cutter writer every story will bring these together in different ways. Your challenge is to find the correct combination of elements and focus that produces that single dazzling result.

I found this wallpaper while I was hunting for spectrum images, and I think I'm going to put it into my desktop background file for when I start my next novel. Seeing this every morning will be an excellent reminder to mind the details, but also keep my eye on the full spectrum of the story.



Spectrum Colors image via 3D Wallpapers

Winner

I appreciate all the great comments for the One Book giveaway. What you wrote about what your one book means to you, the impact it's had on your life, and what it might do for others was great, and some of the titles were quite unexpected. But then, you guys are never really predictable, are you?

We revved up the magic hat, and the winner of the is:

Vorpaks, who chose Cinderella Complex.

Vorpaks, when you have a chance please send your full name, ship-to address and the title you'd like granted for your BookWish to LynnViehl@aol.com so I can get your package on the way. My thanks to everyone for joining in.

Place Name Gen Ten

Ten Things to Help Name Your Fictional Location

Chaotic Shiny's Place Name Generator -- this unusual place namer gives you random names based on geographic features. Excellent if you need a particular landmark name.

Namesmade.com's Fantasy Place Name Generator -- gives you up to 100 place names, including dark and weird ones. Best for fantasy stories.

PicaStudio.com's Random Place Name Generator -- has a nice option that allows you to tick whichever names you like to keep on the page before you generate a new list. Good for fantasy stories.

Pseudo-Elizabethan Place Name Generator -- generates batches of 100 names with a distinct Dickensonian/UK-flavor. Probably best for historic or fantasy stories.

The Random Town Name Generator -- scroll down past the explanation of how it works to generate a "unique, scientifically-derided, custom-made name for the country, kingdom, area, town, city, village or place you are trying to name."

The Regency Place Name Generator -- this generator produces quality place names geared for Regency-era stories, but could work in other time periods as well.

Samuel Stoddard's Fantasy Name Generator -- the place name generator with the most customizing options; allows you to generate a wide selection of serious, fun or specialized names.

Serendipity's Place Name Generator -- Manon says this one is good for cities, countries, continents or other large areas, and I agree. Reality-based, so check your results as it may generate the name of an actual location.

Seventh Sanctum's Realm Name Generator -- this place name generator allows you to customize by size of area being named. Good for fantasy stories.

Squid.org's Random Name Generator -- has a long list of customizing options you can sort through to see which suits your story.

Elsewhere

Today I'm being questioned over at author Shiloh Walker's weblog, where among other things I confess the title of the one book I think everyone should read.

One Book

Author Shiloh Walker asked me some interesting questions the other day (and my answers will be appearing on her blog tomorrow.) Among them was one I didn't want to answer because I thought it couldn't be answered: What's the one book you think everybody, writer or not, should read?

Like saying you want world peace at a beauty pageant, the Holy Bible seems to be the default answer. But the Bible and I have our issues, and I feel it's simply not appropriate for everyone. So back to the drawing board. Shakespeare was next on my list, but he wrote plays, not books, and he can be difficult to understand. I came close to saying Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer because I do think that illustrates the human character from soup to nuts, plus it's funny -- but also, not an easy read.

I finally turned around the question and thought what is it that I wish everyone would get from reading one book? And then I knew.

I read this book when I was quite young, probably too young to be exposed to the content, which is brutal. It's not a pleasant read, especially for writers. Even after you learn that the author actually lived it, you don't want to believe it. Thinking about it afterward made me cry a couple times and I even had some nightmares about it.

So why would I want everyone to read a horrible book like that? Honestly, it made me grateful. Grateful for everything I had: the tiny room I shared with two sisters, the squashed peanut butter and jelly sandwich in my lunchbag, the hand-me-down clothes that were too big or too small, the cheap shoes that pinched my toes, even the dismal prospects waiting in my future. I didn't believe that I had anything of value in my life until I read this book, and then for the first time clearly saw and understood exactly how fortunate I was. That the few things I had, the things that had never before been good enough, were blessings that could so easily be taken away from me, along with my family, my home, and even my future.

In answering Shiloh's question I also realized I've never given anyone a copy of this book, which I intend to remedy right now. In comments to this post, name a book that changed how you think about yourself or anything (or if you've not yet read that one book, just toss your name in the hat) by midnight EST on Thursday, June 23, 2011. I will draw one name at random from everyone who participates and send the winner a copy of the book that I think everyone should read, and I will also grant the winner a BookWish*. This giveaway is open to everyone on the planet, even if you've won something at PBW in the past.

*A BookWish is any book of your choice available to order from an online bookseller, up to a maximum cost of $30.00 U.S. (I'll throw in whatever shipping is involved.)

Graphic credit: © Yellowj | Dreamstime.com

Search Terms Ten

I've never checked what search terms new visitors use that lead them to here because I don't know how to do that spy stuff. Turns out Blogger does, though, via their Stats section, and they also list the terms at the very bottom of the Traffic Sources page.

The good thing is that it's anonymous; they list only the total number of visitors who used the search terms to get here. I guess you could use it to judge if your content is appropriate to your audience. With that in mind, here are:

Ten Things People Look for at PBW

Face Generator (130): Probably the best face generator I've found is the Morphases Editor.

Paperback Writer Blog (156): There are a couple of other blogs that use the same name, but I'm probably the best-known in the Publishing Industry and (far as I know) the original.

Plotting a Novel (488): Here are all the plotting posts I've tagged from most recent to the earliest.

Lynn Viehl Website (501): I don't have a formal website, sorry, but all the pertinent info about my books can be found via the sidebar links.

Place Name Generator (674): My old post about place name generators is here, although most of the generators I listed back in 2006 have since winked out of existence. The links that are still functional are Serendipity's two place name generators as well as the Planet, Realm and Tavern name generators over at Seventh Sanctum. Also, I've made a note to myself to start hunting new place name generator links, and I'll put together an new/updated post as soon as I compile them.

Novel Outline (770): Here are all of the posts about outlining that I've tagged, from latest to earliest.

Outlining a Novel (880): See Novel Outline.

How to Outline a Novel (1,658) Now I understand why the most popular writing post of all time on PBW is Novel Outlining 101.

Paperback Writer (3,370): Just in case anyone came here to listen to The Beatles' song, after which this blog is named, here's a video of them performing it:



Lynn Viehl (6,132): Yep, you found me. Welcome. My bibliography is here, the most important info about me and the blog can be read here. Links to all of my free novels, novellas, stories and other stuff can be found here.

Those of you who have Blogger as your host, do you use these search term lists for anything useful? Let us know in comments.

Wishing You

Seeing the Light

You know you're a series writer when you never want your stories to end. I happen to be that kind of storyteller. I'm also allergic to happily ever after, don't like saying good-bye, and refuse to believe in Armageddon.

Then there is the frustrating mystery of the appropriate time to stop replying to e-mail replies, which I have never been able to solve. Do I stop replying too soon? Do I drag it out longer than I should? I'd put -30- at the end of mine, but not everyone would get it. And there's no graceful to say "Do you still want to reply, and then should I reply, or is it okay if I stop after you send the next one?"

Hey, I'm a writer. I worry about this stuff.

I also hate ending books, which is why I often rush through writing my last chapter. It's like taking cough medicine; sipping it slowly is simply not possible. For a while it was becoming a real problem for me; during the full manuscript editing phase I almost always threw out the last chapter because it sucked and rewrote it from scratch. Then someone mentioned online that they wrote their final chapter way before they got to it so they could work toward an ending versus screeching to a halt and wrapping it all up (and I'm sorry, but I don't recall who said that or I'd give them credit.)

I'm also a linear writer, in that I write from beginning to end without stopping, so I knew from the start that this was not going to be easy for me. Still, I wanted to see if it worked, so I tried it. I stopped when I was writing in first third of the book, and put together a draft of the last chapter. Once I finished it, I parked it at the end of the manuscript anyway and went back to pick up where I left off.

I don't think about what I've already written while I'm writing, so I forgot about it. And sure enough, when I got to the end of the book and started getting the usual, "Oh, God, I have finish it" heebie-jeebies, the ending was already there, like a nice little light at the end of the bridge.

Now granted, that last chapter draft was pretty rough, and needed plenty of revision because certain things had changed during the process of the novel. But I am much less stressed when I edit, especially when I have a completed manuscript to work on. I also didn't take as much time off between the writing and the full manuscript edit because I wasn't annoyed with myself or how I'd written the ending. Having it waiting for me was actually energizing.

If you wrestle with your endings and want to try this method, I have a few suggestions:

Know how you want your book to end (obviously writing ahead isn't going to work for organic writers) and briefly outline the chapter before you write it.

Write light. This is a draft, not a finalized chapter, so keep it simple and nail the most important details.

Characters, dialogue and action make a great framework for a draft chapter. Avoid things that bog down the writing, i.e. tons of description, endless setting, weather reports, travelogues, etc.

Don't tell yourself it's set in stone, because it's not. If it sucks you can always toss it and rewrite a new version from scratch.

Writing the last chapter while you're still working on the front of the book also has one final benefit: once you have it written, the book is technically finished. Then all you have to do is write toward that light at the end of the story bridge.

Image credit: © Karin Jehle | Dreamstime.com

True or Fake?

I am bailing on you guys today to take care of some new contract negotiations. So your trip here was not entirely wasted, you might visit Mikhail Simkin's True Art, or a Fake?*, a quiz to test your knowledge of authentic abstract art.

I scored 92%, but then I'm a student as well as a fan of abstract art, and recognized all but one of the real artworks. Just the Klee threw me for a loop.

*Link swiped from Gerard over at The Presurfer.

Props

In Naming the World, a how-to with a collection of essays and exercises from writers/editors/teachers, author Nick Arvin wrote a piece about revision, specifically about how to revise physical objects in the story -- what he refers to as props -- to make them more effective as a story element. He mentions Chekhov's Gun, one of those literary theories they beat into our heads in high school.

According to Chekhov, no object in the story should be there without a reason:

"If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it's not going to be fired, it shouldn't be hanging there." —Anton Chekhov (From S. Shchukin, Memoirs. 1911.)

I agree with Chekhov, sort of. I think of props as active and benign; the active ones are there for a reason, the benign there for the setting. Active props are probably the least-used story element in genre writing, and it's a shame, too, because when employed with some imagination they can be pretty effective. Not only as elements to provide some foreshadowing for the reader, but as inspiration for dialogue, focal points in an otherwise ho-hum scene, etc.

My new Darkyn trilogy is unusually object-driven. When plotting I always like to use unusual active props, so it's probably no surprise that I employed Mickey Mouse ears to inspire and put a fresh spin on what would have otherwise been a pretty standard confrontation scene (and if you want to see how I did it, head over to the stories blog and read the partial scene here.)

Most of the time I see great stuff in other writers' stories that is only described, and this kills me, because when I come across that mysterious urn of ashes or portrait of a one-legged man I start telling myself stories about them while I'm reading. Then I get to the end of the story and those great props are still sitting there, unused and covered with dust, like story clutter.

That said, not every prop in a story has to have a reason for being there. Some props are active and others aren't. Not all rifles go off; sometimes they really do just hang on the wall as part of the setting description. If we didn't have at least some benign props, every story would be written in a series of empty rooms, vacant lots and flowerless meadows.

What's your favorite type of active prop in a story? Do you think the rifle hanging on the wall always has to go off? Let us know in comments.

The House That Frank Built

While hunting for some architectural info, I discovered Cristóbal Vila's short CG movie showcasing Falling Water, the magnificent home Frank Lloyd Wright designed, which was built over a waterfall back in 1936.

For those of you at work there is background music to this one, which is definitely worth viewing full-screen.

Fallingwater from Cristóbal Vila on Vimeo.