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 |  This is a continuation of my blogging here at WdC |
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This will be a blog for my writing, maybe with (too much) personal thrown in. I am hoping it will be a little more interactive, with me answering questions, helping out and whatnot. If it falls this year (2024), then I may stop the whole blogging thing, but that's all a "wait and see" scenario. An index of topics can be found here: "Writing Blog No.2 Index"  Feel free to comment and interact. |
| Adaptations I wrote recently about Ghost Writing. Well, there is another form of writing that can be available to the willing writer: Adaptations. This is when you take another medium and turn it into the written one. Nearly every movie from the 1970s to the 1990s had a novelisation (if they weren't first based on a novel); if you liked fantasy or science fiction, Alan Dean Foster would be name from that era (and even to nowadays!) that comes to mind. His adaptations of films could be even better than the films themselves (cought*Alien Covenant*cough)! And now the Disney Company is screwing him over, but that's by the by. So... what? Well, if you can get an "in" to off-Broadway plays, student films, TV shows/ pilots, whatever, you can write an adaptation of it if given permission. So, two things first. One, you do need to know someone. Foster started as the Ghost Writer for the original novelisation of Star Wars (accredited to George Lucas) because he met Lucas through a mutual friend. Knowing the playwright or whatever is good. And two, you need a body of work first that they can look at to decide if you're a good fit. Again, Foster had some novels already published in the science fiction sphere. So, what do you do? First, you can take the original shooting script and adapt that (Donald F. Glut did that for The Empire Strikes Back). Second, you can watch the film (or whatever) and use the actual visuals to base your story on. (Or you can combine the two). Or third, you can work with the person whose idea it is and Ghost Write for them (as Foster did for Lucas) or use their original ideas (which became Foster's Star Wars book Splinter Of The Mind's Eye). Now, adapting movies (except student or indy or low-budget efforts) is not something easy to get into. And those student or indy or low-budget efforts are not likely to have much of an audience, but they could well be worth pursuing. Non-Hollywood films, however, are also worth chasing after if you have that "in", e.g., an English-language novelisation of a Bollywood movie? Adapting off-Broadway plays is well worth investigating, and is becoming more and more popular. Even musicals... you just don't add the songs to your work. Obviously. TV shows are going to be those made for local stations; the big ones are like Hollywood movies. Some visual artists have also employed writers to construct stories around the visual works. This happened in the late 19th century with the Heidelberg School of painters; some of the short stories are really good. And then there's the latest thing - songs. Not stories based on songs (which I write), but the stories of the songs. Think the film The Gambler based on Kenny Rogers' song of the same name. You cannot deviate from the song's story, but you can turn it into a story. I know this is happening as I submitted to a Taylor Swift-based anthology. So as something different, maybe try a written adaptation of a work from another medium? |
| Ghost Writing I have just completed a ghost-writing assignment, and on Monday start a new one. I try to limit myself to one at a time because (a) it takes up a lot of time, and (b) I really do not want to get two people’s individual stories mixed up! So, while I am in that mode, I thought I would give a brief over-view of Ghost Writing. What is Ghost Writing? Ghost Writing (or Ghost-Writing, or sometimes even Ghostwriting) is when a writer does the writing for someone else whose name will appear on the piece. Nearly every sports person’s and actor’s autobiography was Ghost Written by someone who knew how to write, or at least string two sentences together. I am a huge fan of professional wrestling, and yet I am not blind enough to deny that most autobiographies were ghost written. The only ones I am sure were written by the person in question were those written by Mick Foley, and that’s only because he showed everyone the hand-written first drafts! Ghost Writing is making someone else’s words make sense. It is a form of creative non-fictional journalism. It is not easy, but it can be fun and it can open up new worlds to the writer, including characters for later fiction pieces that can be based on these real people you have never met, and events from these incidents you never experienced. And, more than that, it can open whole new and different worlds to us that we have never experienced before. It is a way of learning about a part of the world that might have been hidden from us. How to Ghost Write? There are two ways I have seen. There might be more, but these two are the ones recommended by some of the author associations in Australia that actually admit that Ghost Writers exist (more on that later). First is the person gives you what they have written and you translate it into something that makes sense. This was the way I did my very first Ghost Writing assignment. It can be hard to translate what is meant, but you have it in front of you. I made a lot of phone calls to make sure what I was doing was right and to clarify things, but, in general, it was me just writing based on their notes. It was more a re-writing job, really, and, truth be told, it was dull, but the book was exactly what the person wanted. Second is the way I prefer to do it – I interview the person. I like to record the interviews, but if you’re quick with a pen or know shorthand, then note-taking is also an option. I do take notes, especially with spelling of names, however. Then I go away and use the conversation to write a narrative. I will write it as a series of short stories, then, once everything is done, I tie them together and put them in chronological order. I will often do an hour of interview, then write, then later more interviews, and so on. It takes longer, but it is also easier to get more details. However, if you do not get on with your subject, this will fail. I guess there is a third option – combining the two. I haven’t done this, but it does make sense. After the book is completed, the subject MUST read it! They are not looking for line edits, but they need to make sure it makes sense and everything you’ve written is true according to their recollections. When I started, I sought advice from a man who does a lot of our local football players’ books, and he said sometimes their memories and the facts clash. He used to point out these inconsistencies, but some get quite angry at being questioned, and so he lets it slide; if he is mentioned as the “with” writer, he adds a disclaimer to the effect of memories being fallible; if he does not get that byline (and that costs a lot for the player!) then he lets it go. But, no matter what, he records all inconsistencies in case it comes to something legal. I follow his advice. Negatives of Ghost Writing There are a number of negatives with this form of work. 1) As I mentioned, if you and the subject clash, it can make a working partnership not viable. While it will be a loss of income, unless you can sort out any issues, then it might be in both your best interests to not continue with the working relationship. 2) You can end up making changes as they remember more things for a long time. The one I recently finished took me 2 months to write, then five months for changes to be constantly made. But, remember, they are the client, and if you charge by the hour (which I do) it will cost them. 3) If their truth and real truth clash, you need to go with the client. A great example would be the autobiographies of Hulk Hogan where he claimed, amongst so many other things, that he wrestled 400 days in one year because of time zones, that he was almost bassist for Metallica (very much denied by the band), that the George Foreman Grill was originally going to be named after him but he missed a phone call (denied by the manufacturer), he was going to star in Aronofsky's The Wrestler (was begged to star in it, but turned it down, in fact; denied by Aronofsky as Rourke was the only person he considered), that he fought for Pride Mixed Martial Arts (founded 1997) in the 1970s, that he got drunk with John Belushi after Wrestlemania 2 (in 1986... Belushi died in 1982)... so many lies he still insists are facts. Mark Dagostino, the ghost writer for them all, just pocketed the money and let Hogan become the biggest laughing stock in wrestling. 4) It can be very time-consuming.. Yes, all books are, but you need to organize with another person in this case, and that adds to it all. However, it is also wanted “yesterday” – time-consuming and demanded. 5) It is very difficult to add it to a writing CV, especially if they insist your name is not in the book. While this is less and less the case nowadays, some particularly egotistical subjects do still demand actual writer anonymity. 6)From earlier, there are many organisations and people in positions of power in the arts communities that do not consider it a real form of writing. To them, it is lower than journalism. At least, that is the attitude I have faced. 7) And, finally, you willingly give up ownership of your work. This should be spelt out in the contract you sign, but it is standard the subject gets the work. And it is something you just have to learn to live with. Conclusion And that is Ghost Writing. As you might have guessed, as someone trying to become a professional writer, I am all for it. Even if there is a lack of publicity for doing the work. I am not writing to become “Famous”; I am writing because it seems to be about the only thing I can do with any degree of success. As such, the anonymity of Ghost Writing is fine by me. And if you want to give it a go, I would recommend starting with someone you know well first. My first was my ex-wife’s grandmother. She self-published the book and ended up going into three publication runs, she sold so many. My second was a guy I was working with in adult numeracy class; he wanted it for his kids to show them what their dad had gone through. Then I did another guy who was a friend of his, for the same reasons. Then I had my first failure as we could not agree on how to write it (he wanted it to be a vindictive written assault on everyone he hated). The next one was fine, and that’s the one I just finished. Anyway, maybe it’s something worth considering? |
| Organising Myself 2 So, I was asked about this after my last post, so let's go! I am slightly OCR, and so I make lots of lists of things. Lots of lists. Some great, some completely irrelevant. But one I would not survive without is my finished works spreadsheet. This is the spreadsheet where I place all my completed works. Once a work is finished and had its initial edit, I enter the details on my spreadsheet. Simple, really. So, here at the details:    ID: this is the ID number I give each item. It is unique and so can be the key when I transfer it to an Access database. The ID is the year followed by a 3-digit number of the order it was completed. If I ever write more than 999 things in a year, I am well up the creek. Title: the name of the piece. Yeah, it ain't rocket science. Style1: the sort of written work it is. Here's my list of ones I use: ? - indescribable article - odd piece that would most likely find a spot in a magazine like MAD or Reader's Digest book - normally non-fiction or a collection of similar things, a longer work with a slight connecting narrative cartoon - illustration designed to be funny and not realistic at all create-your-own... - like the old choose your own adventure books D&D - for use with Dungeons & Dragons game essay - looking at an aspect of the world, no story-based narrative flow, information-based, even if non-fiction or humourous game - a playable game graphic story - a story based around illustrations illustration - picture, often serious, sometimes done in an experimental style memoir - anecdote or story from my own life musical - song series that tells a definite story novel - work of 40,000+ words novella - work of 12,500 to 39,999 words play - work designed to be performed on stage poem - normally rhyming (though not always) emotional writing (includes parodies of famous poems) poster - cartoon with a sort of a saying attached recipe - normally a parody of an actual cooking recipe script - work designed to be performed on film (or radio) short story - narrative piece up to 12,499 words sketch - short performance piece, normally humourous (film, stage or radio) song - piece designed to be sung, some with music written song satire - comedy (a parody of a real song) Style2: deeper sub-styles of those in Style 1 dialogue - dialogue only narrative drabble - work of exactly 100 words (including title) [also drabble complex, 1000 words, 10 chapters of 100 words, and drabble trilogy, 3 independent drabbles forming one tale] epic poem - very long poem Every Song Tells A Story - narrative story based on a song's lyrics, but not the original meaning of the song Fur Animorum tale - story featuring the character Fur Animorum memoir - anecdote or story from my own life parody - using an existing poem and making fun of it, or using it to make fun of something else Secludos ethos - set in my fantasy world Tales Of The Squared Circle- set in the world of professional wrestling Uncle Joe's Tales - stories about Australia as if told by Uncle Joe Dates: Dates a story was written, beginning to end Notes: Any relevant notes, including if written for WdC or university Synopsis: 1-3 sentence summary of the story, including spoilers. Published: If published, and where Informal Pub.: Sort of published online or elsewhere without being official, or a cobbling together of online writings, and if read on the radio. Also, if I can't verify the publication (from early on in my writing life). These are not included in my publications list. Pending: Works that have been accepted but not yet published; SUB means submitted for publication, but no acceptance yet (keeps track of simultaneous submissions) Word Count: how many words in a piece (title included) Rating (/10): How I rate the pieces < 3.5 - virtually unreadable 3.5-4 - very bad 4-4.5- bad 5 - mediocre 5.5-6 - readable at best 6.5-7 - okay 7.5-8 - not too bad 8.5-9 - good 9.5+ - really good [Out of interest, here's the stats: Average rating: 5.21; Low rating: 2; High rating: 8.5; Median rating: 5; Rating mode: 5] Genre 1 & 2: The actual writing style of a piece children's - written for pre-teen audiences description - narratrive is more about describing than telling a story detective - standard crime piece erotica - sexual content fantasy - lots of elements of unreality, usually set in the Secludos ethos or our world twisted game - for use in a game of some sort horror - designed to set a fear emotion in the reader humour - designed to be intentionally funny mainstream - just a piece that is general, without a really specific genre non-fiction - true, or purporting to be true, but noit a memoir religious - with a distinct religious (usually Christian) bent, not always positive romance - where love is the over-arching theme science-fiction - where the future or present is set as technologically plausible sociological - looking at an aspect of society, seriously or humourously surrealist - where it might not make a whole lot of sense thriller - a narrative where there is action and designed to keep the reader enthralled western - set in the mythical American old west young adult - written for a teenaged to early twenties market (includes 'new adult') Link: The link to the actual piece on my computer hard drive. And there we are - how I organise my works! Oh, and at the moment, total works in the list: 2040. |
| Organising Myself I spent yesterday putting my three - yes, three - submission management systems together. These are just the way I have been doing things since the divorce, and because of disorganisation on my part (and being homeless does not help), I had a Word document, a spreadsheet, and a hand-written thing. So, having spent the better part of 9 hours working on it, I have the following stats: Accepted without being published yet: 13 Published since June 2018: 91 Rejected in that time: 360 No Response: 47 Other results (withdrawn, defunct, etc.): 21 (this includes 2 that were accepted, then the company went belly-up) Currently waiting for a response: 22 (Why 2018? That's when the divorce was finalised and I got the computer I now use.) So, that is 554 submissions (273 individual pieces; the most one piece has been submitted is 16 times) since June 2018. I also discovered I submitted the same piece to the same company a year or two apart twice. (D'oh!) That means I have averaged 92 submissions each year, with 106 works accepted (even if not all will be published), for a 19% success rate. Not that great, to be honest. But it also means that, of my 143 published works, only 52 were published between 2000 (when I had my first verifiable publication) and 2018, so I have done better than I did back then. This does not count all the columns written for various websites (and which also pay), as I see that as my journalism and not my true creative work. I like to think I am getting better at this writing thing. Maybe one day I'll be a real writerer! |
| Real World Events In Fiction Before I start, this is the last topic I have on my list, apart from discussing self-publishing, which I am loathe to do here because on WdC it feels as though self-publishing is seen as the only way to publish. So, if there are any writing-related topics you would like me to write about, please, let me know! This is a topic I was asked about a few weeks ago now, and it has taken me this long to get answers. This is complicated. Okay, so you want to include real world events in your fiction story. Including them on the periphery is fine. It helps the setting, sets a definite time scale without you having to give a date. If you write a story where the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Moon Landing, or the September 11 attacks happen, then people understand the time the event is taking place. Public events are just that – public. They were reported across the world, and so if they don’t happen, then your story feels odd. It is when we get to centring a story around a real-life event that things get a little more complicated. Of course you can do it! You can even change the outcome and make an alternate history scenario – look at Inglourious Basterds (2009) or Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood (2019) for fine cinematic examples – and that, as a fiction writer, is your prerogative. Note – fiction writer. This does not look at non-fiction; that is something different and I do not understand the rules, laws and everything else involved in that. What this looks at is works of fiction. So, why is this complicated? First and foremost, it is the use of real people. I have covered this before – "20240526 Using Real People In Fiction" – and will not go over it again, except to say libel actions have been taken against fiction writers for their portrayal in works.The second thing to be aware of is, unless you are doing an alternate history story, getting facts wrong, no matter how minor, will see your work in this day and age of hyper-connectivity slammed and hammered. If a traditional publisher thinks the facts are wrong – rejection. If a self-published work is in this situation, the negativity could affect other works by the author. A writer from New York used the “government destroyed the towers” conspiracy theory (no, I don’t believe it; yes, I have seen the actual science and understand how two planes could bring towers down) to write a work of fiction, but details like the destruction of other buildings, first responders being portrayed as unwilling to get involved because of the government and things like that saw the book slammed so incredibly the author withdrew it. However, the stink remained, and he removed all his other books as well. Now, it was a work of fiction, and advertised as such, but those details that went against established facts were too much. How much differing is too much? The answer to this question seems to be how long ago it was, how important the event was, and if anyone is still alive who remembers it. That is a lot to consider. Third, the fact that there are conspiracy theories out there can cloud events. The new film Fly Me To The Moon takes the ‘Stanley Kubrick faked the moon landing’ nonsense and turns it into a film. Already, the film is being hammered online because, despite being portrayed as a comedy and a work of fiction, almost making fun of the theory (I am assuming based on interviews; the film is yet to be released here), it is giving air to something as patently wrong as this story. Finally, unless you are willing to sift through hours of news reports and miles of newspaper column inches, finding the facts of something without BS involved can be really difficult (for example, with the September 11 attacks, to be honest), and so having the reality of the situation can be awkward, and you can be letting yourself open to the issues mentioned above. Here's my entry on research - "20240712 Contemporary Research For Writers" .Now, many writers are going to say, “It’s fiction! What does it matter?” Only fifteen years ago, I would have agreed. But not now, with everyone looking for the smallest thing to be wrong, the smallest detail to harp on about, the negativity in the world. Even our fiction has to be accurate or correct. It’s the world we live in; something else technology has done to us creative, if you want to look at it that way. Anyway, that’s the way I see it. Feel free to disagree; I am but one person. |
| Music And Writing There seems to be a lot of talk about music here on WdC. People posting clips, Jeff’s many and varied music-based activities (in fact, Jeff has made me forego my aversion to contests because his Musicology challenge is just way too tempting), people discussing music… it is there almost as much as writing. So, what is it about music that relates to writing? I am going to ignore the fact that song-writing is still a form of writing, and not an easy one (I have written a few, had one played on the radio, and I know how difficult it is to write lyrics and put tunes to them). This is how music and the writer interact. Disclaimer: I am not a psychologist, but this is one of the many topics I wrote about when I did my Bachelor of Arts in Creative Writing, so I have done the research. I will also say that I like most musical styles. Not a fan of what modern artists call r&b (not the r&b of my youth!), nor disco, nor hip-hop/rap, but even in those genres there could be individual songs I like (or even artists). I am also a sucker for lyrics; a lousy piece of music can be saved by great lyrics; a great piece of instrumentation can be ruined by inane lyrics. But that is me, and might be the writer in me. So, why do writers gravitate towards music? Some – and I am one of these – use music as a background while writing. The psychological reasoning behind this is some people while working at something that requires concentration find their minds wandering; background noise, especially something with a definite rhythm like music (or rain), keeps that part of the mind not focused on writing doing something else (no, the whole mind does not focus on any one task; it comes from when we were hunter-gatherers and had to be aware of the sabre-toothed cat wanting to hunt-gather us). It can, interestingly enough, keep focus. I also use music for this – as a tempo tool. A recent example – I had a Discord virtual write-in on Saturday night. I was clocking in at around 50wpm for the entire hour (5 x 10 min sprints). This is because I had Dragonforce playing and was typing along to the speed of the music. I was so caught up in the story – a new one I have started – that in one hour I typed over 2000 words. Then there are stories based on songs. I have had 4 published in anthologies (two of them were dedicated to all stories based on songs), and even did one for an activity here at WdC ("A Sky Full Of Stars" ), plus my Musicology entries. In all, I have written over 50 of them. Sometimes songs just tell me a story, a different one to the lyrics.Another reason for listening to music is that it can calm. The soothing ability of music can be enough to relax some writers into a mental state where any blockages in the creative process can be overcome. This relaxation can also open and free the mind, allowing it to be more susceptible to new ideas, letting story ideas form while the brain is in a state of partial shut-down. Music can also help set a mood. I do know one horror writer who listens to heavy metal while writing because of the atmosphere it creates in his study. An old friend who used to write children’s books used 1960s pop – especially anodyne pop music like 1910 Fruitgum Co, The Archies, et al. – as her atmosphere. And I have found that one of the Discord writers uses classical music when writing science fiction or fantasy, and no music at all when writing horror. It is an “each his own” scenario, but there is something to be said for that mood creation. Some artists in general (not just writers) find that having a secondary art to the one they are most involved with broadens the way they look at their own art. Many song-writers are readers and/or writers (Nick Cave springs to mind). Some musicians, like David Bowie and Bob Dylan, are painters. Stephen King played guitar in a band. Salvador Dali was a film-maker as well. What this does is give an extra outlet to their creativity. Sometimes their chosen art doesn’t allow the expression of an idea; a secondary one can help. (For the record, I am a very amateur artist and very bad musician, but do indulge in both.) This secondary art means that ideas don’t just rot in the brain and create stress; they are released into the wild. Finally, the use of music in the background can simply bring joy or happiness to the writer. A feeling of elation can make a story come alive in the writer’s head. Sounds simple, but that is sometimes all that matters. Now, it has to be noted that not every writer has this need for a musical addition. Quite a number of writers do not like any background noise. Then again, some like rain; some like whale song; some like the sound of a crackling fire. But for many, it seems, music is a big thing. And I am one of them.  |
| Types Of Fiction Writer I have been going through a lot of discussions on Discord with various writers about what they want out of writing. One server I am a member of is filled with those who purely want to be published; another has a mix of those who do and do not want to be published; another has people who want very specific things; and two others have even further types. So, reading through these, plus my experiences on Twitter (years ago; I am no longer on that accursed hell-hole) and even reading discussions and posts here on WdC, I think I have come up with the following types of fiction writer in the world. And by fiction, I mean prose – short stories through to novel series. As such, this does not include poets, screenwriters, playwrights, journalists, columnists, biographers (including autobiographers and memoirists) etc. Just those who write prose fiction. Hobbyists I think these are by far the most common writers. They just write for the fun of it. Not all want to improve, they just want to write. They might not show anyone what they write, or maybe only a few select friends, maybe even post the odd jotting or two in a public space, but they just do it really for themselves. Traditionalists This is me. These are writers who want to write and be published, but do it the old-fashioned way. They submit to magazines and publishers and agents, and are always writing, trying to hone their craft, using books and people and reviewers and beta readers. Always selling and pushing. Open Writers These are people who feel they want their writing in the world, no matter what. They write and are serious about their writing, but they just the world to see it. They post wherever they can, sell to wherever, do the self-publishing thing, even post work on social media. These are writers who want to be read, no matter what. Fan Fictionists These are writers who write only in the fan fiction genre. I won’t say anything about it beyond that it does feel like an obsessive writing. Especially when fan-fiction devolves into erotica and pr0n. Idols These are the people who probably hate the idea, and is something I do harp on about. These are those who, like the “performers” in the first few weeks of Pop Idol, American idol and their ilk, when they are told their work is no good, reckon because their mum or [insert relative/ friend here] likes their writing, they already the best ever. They take no criticism, refuse to be corrected and hate on everyone who dares think their work is not a potential NYTimes best-seller. So, there we are. A bit of fun, I guess. I’ve put forth where I reckon I stand. Where do you think you are? Are there any other general writer types I might have missed? Let’s start some sort of a dialogue. Writer types, combinations, things like that. Or not. I am not your father. |
| Selling Short Stories Thought I’d just share how I write and sell a short story, what works for me, and what is proving successful. For the record, this is coming from a question I was asked at another site. See, this past week I signed two more contracts to appear in anthologies (one is a one-off payment, the other is a royalty share payment), and with these two, plus a book due out in August, I will have 94 short stories traditionally published (in 96 anthologies; 2 stories made “best of the year” anthologies as well). Should crack 100 in the next few years. This does mean that my short stories seem to hit the mark with editors and publishers. So, what do I do that seems to appeal to small to mid-sized publishers? This is an interesting question and I was thinking about it all night. Now, first and foremost, it is not because I am some amazing writer. I am not the next coming of Stephen King or anything like that. I write what I write and that is that. So, it has nothing to do with my alleged writing “talent”. Also, I am Australian, which means it is harder for me to break into a market, so it is also not because I am in the right place at the right time. Luck could well have something to do with it, and I freely admit that, but I am going to ignore that aspect. So, first is I think writing to a genre’s dictates has helped. There are tropes and stereotypes, and I use them. Sometimes I twist them, sometimes I play them straight, but I use the genre tropes. While most of my published work is horror and supernatural, I have also had science fiction, Western, fantasy, romance and comedy short stories published. It might be great to play with genre dictates, but readers know what they want, and my stories follow the familiar story beats and so give them exactly what they want. Second is I write a classic short story. One PoV – be that first or 3rd limited – character only. One conflict only. Minimal characters (except I have been known to break this). Start in media res nearly all the time. Minimal world-building. Build to a climax with one, maybe two, complications on the way. Don’t draw out the finish. Standard “Story Writing 101” really. I don’t mess with the formula. Be experimental if you wish; it probably will be a hard sell. Third, and I know this because an editor I worked with in the 2010s told me, is that my copy is really clean. The grammar and punctuation is spot-on; I know and utilize all the rules of grammar correctly. There might be a couple of typos. Sure I use Australian/British English, but more and more US publishers let that slide. Occasionally I might have to change Australian slang. But this is good. There have been times when my not quite as good work has been accepted over possibly better stories because there are less edits for the editor to wade through and argue with a writer about. Yes, this is me big-noting myself a little, but when my lesser work is accepted because it does not need a lot of editing, then I think I am doing something right. Fourth, I write a story. If I have a message to push, it is subtle and in the background. It is not spelt out and it is not front and centre. I write to entertain, not to push a barrow. The story, the main thing I produce, is what I focus on. And I do not focus on theme, either. All those fancy things creative writing courses tell you to do, they don’t work with publishers. Yes, some markets want them, but readers, those general members of the populace who just want to read a story (and not writers who read; they tend to be different), clearly do not want them, either. Finally, and this is something I know not a lot do, I have a lot of stories in my finished pile. I have over 700 unsold short stories between 300 and 12500 words completed (over 1000 including drabbles and other flash fictions). Most horror open calls I can find something I have already written that fits the unifying concept of the anthology. The two stories I recently had accepted were about a cryptid and time travel. I had a few to pick from. And if I don’t have a story but I like the anthology concept, I will use it as a prompt and write a quick-fire 3k words in a day or so. I am a very fast writer (last year in NaNoWriMo I churned out over 154k words in 30 days), so if I get an idea, I can pants my way through it. Quick edit, put it aside, another read, give it to a beta reader, edit, submit. Might be rushed, but it’s how I have to do it sometimes if there’s a close submission date. So, that is what works for me. It has not made me a fortune, but it has meant I think I am a real writer, maybe even an author. And this might not work for you; sorry. But it is how selling works for me. And if you want to see what I have had published so far in what we shall laughingly call my “career” (remembering it is all trad publishing; I don’t do self-publishing), head on over to: "20240114 The Boring List Post" |
| Contemporary Research For Writers I have brought this up in passing before, but read an interesting discussion on it on Discord, which I had to throw my 2 cents’ worth into, and that inspired this blog post. So, this will cover three things – why research, where to research and how to research. Why Research? In the old days, writers would make up all manner of things about other places because everything not European or North American was seen as exotic and strange and no-one went there. So you just make things up about “Deep Africa”, “the jungles of South America”, “the exotic East”, “Outback Australia”, whatever. Nowadays, people travel. People go everywhere. And if they don’t, the Internet is there. A story that has a contemporary edge, is set in our world in this day and age, needs to avoid the tropes and stereotypes of setting, of people, of culture, of anything else that was in a lot of fiction prior to the 1970s. Books are sold all over the world and people have travelled all over the world. If you make stuff up, a number of your audience is going to know. This is going to do 3 things: 1) make it look like you don’t care about accuracy; 2) make you appear like a lazy writer; &/or 3) make people not take what you write seriously. None of these are good outcomes for you. Then there are assumptions created by pop culture or general “knowledge”. I’ve used this example before, but because Australia looks small on maps and is so far away and has a population of only 30 million, it must be small. Australia is as large as the contiguous 48 US states. An author I read had a horse ride from Melbourne to Adelaide take a night. By car, on sealed roads, it’s 450 miles (725 km), and takes 8 hours. Never assume. Research. Take your writing seriously. Where To Research? Okay, five years ago I would have said Google, Bing, those search engines. But in the past 18 months the AI component that has infiltrated all search engines, and the fact they are scraping Reddit predominantly for knowledge, means I would suggest do not trust them for accurate answers. Opinions are put forth as facts and get higher SEO status than reality. Having said that, Google Maps is a wonderful resource. You need to go to actual websites that you know and trust. Wikipedia is curated by “regular” people, and so the information there is also dodgy, but the footnotes could be a good place to start. Anyway, where do we go? Websites marked “.gov” or “.edu” are a good place to start. While there may be political agendas all over them, the information, by legislation in most countries (Australia and the UK I know for sure; I am guessing the USA as some places have had their “.edu” removed) has to be formally accurate. Great for historical information and current geography. If science, journals are important, but, well… it is way too long to include here. Fortunately, here is an explanation of deciding if science is real that I prepared earlier:
But, tl;dr is – be skeptical. Media can be okay, but you need to find trustworthy. In Australia, if the media prints a falsehood, they can be fined. Broadcast media is a little looser, because of the fact some news comes from overseas. The government is currently looking at regulating information on social media as well, but I would not trust any socials as far as I could spit them. In the USA, there is no such regulation; media can print lies and it’s called “freedom.” Here’s a fun fact: In the USA The National Enquirer is considered a news magazine; in Australia it is classified a fictional publication. The UK has poor print media regulation, but stricter broadcast media. In media, I only trust the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation as sources. So, where do I go to research? Get ready for this. Maybe you’ve heard of them: books! Okay, slightly simplistic. I look for books printed before 2010 when the Internet became a dominant research tool. Some, you need to be later, but for general research, older books work for me. Next, is people. I wrote a story set in the UK, so a series of emails went back and forth between me and a fellow writer I’d “met” online who lives in Leeds, and she was fantastic. I have helped people with facts about Australia (and was used by a publisher in the 2010s as a fact-checker on this large country). Finally, is going there yourself. Yes, this can be expensive, but if you are writing about your own area, don’t trust your memory, go for a visit. I spent two days staying at a small local town that a recent novel was set within to remind myself of where everything was. And always remember: opinions are not facts! So, choose your research facilities wisely. How To Research? This is covered in the previous section as well, but in addition, I will add one more thing: Take notes! Write it down; do not rely on memory. I am a pantser, and yet for my current WiP novel, I have three pages of hand-written notes about the Mediterranean and travel around it in the 1920s. Keep referring to the notes. Keep adding to them as you find/need more information. You never know what you are going to need. I would also suggest for some things that might be controversial, get two sources. Make sure they don’t do circular referencing – boy! has that become more common recently! – and just confirm things by one another. Conspiracy theorists tend to lie about certain aspects or to cherry-pick their information, and they have infiltrated mainstream media because the Internet is just the worst place ever. So, if researching something to find the truth of a claim, you will need to look further afield. And that is my opinion about research in this day and age of too much misinformation. I fully expect people here to reject what I have written because it goes against current prevailing attitudes, but that is their right. Good luck! |
| Comparison Economy A question many publishers and agents are asking of potential authors more and more is one I have always struggled with: What other books is your book like? They need this information for a number of reasons: 1) so they know which slush reader to send your manuscript to; 2) to get an idea of the sort of books you read, so the sort of authors you read, and so the sort of work you might subconsciously emulate; 3) if they might not even bother reading your book; 4) for future potential marketing; 5) to see if it's true or not, so you didn't just search Goodreads for a title that might look the same; 6) to see if you are merely chasing trends; &/or 7) to see how current your work might be. Yes, some of them are contradictory. The reason I find it so difficult is that I try to write a story I want to read that I cannot find anywhere else. Also, I tend to read older books a lot of the time, so my reading is rarely current (except for the bad book club). This can be an issue. So, what can you do if you find this question difficult to answer? Here's what I have done: A) asked my beta readers. So for the book my daughter recently finished beta reading, she told me two works it might be like. Patch of Green I used older books (Day of the Triffids, specifically); B) asked one of the librarians I have come to know. Better than Goodreads because they are actual people; & C) I have even done the Goodreads method, but I have then found the book at the library and done a quick read. I don't trust the reviewers or blurbs. This is a relatively recent thing. When i started submitting seriously at the start of the 2000s, we were never asked this; since about 2010, it has become more and more frequently seen. In my last university degree, one of the lecturers put it like this: "Publishers don't care what your book is like at the moment. they care what book your book is like. Or, more often, what film is your book like." Note that, and I have seen it once this year. The question was: What book or film is your book like? This is because more and more - and this was the case in the 1990s as well, I will hasten to add; it is not new - agents and publishers have one eye to a movie/TV show based on what they publish/ represent. In the 1999s it was because the cost of making films dropped with the cheapening of technology. Now it's because there is an absolute glut of studios and streaming services that need to fill their quotas. What does this mean for those looking to be traditionally published? That you need to keep an eye on the market. Just something else to add a complication. |
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