March 28, 2019

The Most Basic of Basics

I don’t have a lot of time this week because tomorrow is the start of (cue cheering) WonderCon in Anaheim.  I’m going to be there hanging out for parts, signing some books, and Sunday I’ll be holding a two hour version of the Writer’s Coffeehouse.  Please feel free to stop by, say hi, and listen to me talk about this crazy business of writing stuff.

Speaking of which…

Keeping in mind our limited time, I wanted to take a quirk moment to chat with you about one of the most important thing to learn in storytelling.  This can easily be a make-or-break thing.  I’ve heard contest directors talk about it, agents talk about it, editors talk about it.  They all see it constantly and it makes all of them roll their eyes.

Spelling and vocabulary.

I’ve got to know how to spell if I want to make it as a writer.

Now I’m sure a couple folks have already rolled there own eyes and moved on to watching some cool YouTube videos.  I mean, I said this was going to be about basics, but nobody thought we’d go thisbasic, right?  We don’t need a grade school refresher.  Besides, its the 21st century.  People have spellcheckers on their phones!  Technology’s made knowing how to sell pointless.
Right?

Well…  As I’ve talked about once or thrice before, spellcheckers are pretty much idiots.  They can tell me if a word’s spelled right, but they can’t tell me if it’s the right word.  It’s the classic there, their, or they’re argument.

And that’s the vocabulary half of this.  Some of the greatest computers out there are pretty bad when it comes to understanding grammar, which means it’s doubtful they’re always going to know which word I’m trying to use.  Which means there’s a good chance it doesn’t’ actually know if this word is spelled right or not.  Did I want thereor their?  Only one of them’s correct, and if I don’t know which it’s supposed to be…

F’r example, check out this list.  I’ve done this sort of thing before.  These are all words people used in articles on fairly popular, journalistic websites (some news, some entertainment) pared up with the word they meant to use.  I’m willing to bet all those articles were spellchecked and given a good thumbs up from the computer, but the writer didn’t know the difference.  Or maybe their editor.  Or maybe both of them

lede and lead
poles and polls
borders and boarders
allude and elude
right and rite
peek and peak
serfs and surfs
reign
and rein

Yeah, a couple of those are laughable, I know, but I swear I didn’t make any of these up.  They meant to use X, but they printed Y. A couple of these I’ve seen multiple tines, even.
And I’m sure you know what they all mean, right?  You wouldn’t be laughing if you didn’t know bothof the words.  If I only know one of them, well… that’s not entirely helpful, is it?  Especially as a writer.  Words are supposed to be my thing, the raw material of my trade, but I don’t know what they mean?  Would you want surgery from a doctor who knew what some of your organs did?

Now, a common defense I see for this a lot is that I don’t need to know.  Spelling’s not that important, and it’s all just an arbitrary constrict, anyway.  Readers will get my meaning from context.  If I meant polls and I wrote poles, when it’s actually in a sentence people will still understand what I’m trying to say

Yeah.  Yeah, they will.  That’s why most readers and agents and editors will excuse a mistake or two.  We’re all human.  We make typos.  We get a little tired and bleary-eyed during that 2 am line edit the day before a book’s due (not that I’ve ever done that…).

But, y’see, Timmy, if I don’t know how to spell, if I don’t know my vocabulary, if I’m just depending on the computer too do it all for me… I’m going to make more of these mistakes.  More and more, the longer my manuscript is.  Dozens, maybe hundreds of them.

And, yeah, we’ll all gloss over one or two points where we just need to get it from context.  Maybe even three or four.  But there hits a point—and it really isn’t that high—where we start to wonder if this person really knows what they’re doing.  Again, how many times do you really want to here your doctor joke “Wow, what do you think thatdoes?”

Want proof?

Well, I’ve littered half a dozen or so of these mistakes all through this little rant.  You probably noticed some and chuckled.  Hopefully all of them.  I’m tempted to say someone might even leap down halfway through reading this to comment on the irony of my post on spelling having such blatant spelling errors.  And they’d be kinda justified.  Here I am, trying to say I understand the craft, that my words are worth your time, worth reading, and yet…

I’m making a lot of really blatant, basic mistakes in just three or four pages. 

It’s understandable that they’d shake their head, scoff, and say “oh, no, good sir.  Not you.  Not today.”

To put it another way, we’d understand if I got rejected over that kind of thing.

And I don’t want to see anybody here rejected over that kind of thing.

This weekend—WonderCon!

Next time, I want to talk about what you can do.  Or, really, what your characters can do.

Until then, go write.

June 29, 2018 / 2 Comments

But If I Just Do This…

            A quick post this time.  As I mentioned last week, I’m kinda in a deadline crunch and… well, this time nobody stepped up to bail me out. Thanks again to Kristi Charish for helping out.  Screw you, every other writer friend I have.
            Naaaah, not really…
            Anyway, what I wanted to talk about this week is a bad decision I see every now and then. I saw it a lot when I used to read for screenplay contests. And I still hear mentions of it now and then.
            So… okay, look, we all love the idea of getting published, right?  Of getting some kind of recognition—maybe even some kind of payment—for what we do. I mean, it’s the big goal.  The brass carrot.  The… something. 
            I’ve already run out of humorous mixed metaphors.
            As I was saying, back when I was reading contest scripts for ramen money, one thing I’d see again and again was people who’d done a clumsy, half-assed pass on their screenplay in a feeble attempt to make it eligible for a contest.  A few cuts here. A find-and-replace there. Maybe adding in a random scene or two.  Believe me, it was very clear that’s what happened.
            Plus, talking with writers at many points in their careers, I sometimes hear ideas and plans. Cutting this novella down.  Bulking that short story up.  Maybe doing another quick draft and playing up Phoebe as a bisexual half-Asian for this one magazine. Especially if Phoebe isn’t either of those in the current draft.
            It’s really tempting.  I get it.  We all want to get published, win the prize, get the recognition.  And we’re willing to do what it takes to get there.
            But…
            I probably don’t want to make sweeping changes or cuts to my story just to fit a market or contest or trend. If a magazine doesn’t touch anything over 8000 words and my short story is 8108… okay, maybe I can snip a bit here or there. But if they don’t want anything over 5000, well… my story’s probably out.  That’s almost half of it gone.
            Likewise, cramming in a romance just so I can try to get into a Valentine’s Day anthology… that probably won’t work.  Or some hamfisted references to God and angels so I can win some of that sweet faith-based contest money.
            And I know you’re probably smiling right now, but keep this in mind…
            I’m not making up random examples.  People do stuff like this.  All the time.  I read scripts for a faith-based contestand—in the course of two years—read no less than five sex-romp comedies where characters would suddenly, for just one scene, look up to the sky and beg for God’s help.  And one of these was—dead serious–for help getting the hot female supporting character out of her clothes.
            Because that’s funny and sexy and religious.  See? Triple threat!  How can it lose?
            (it lost)
            I saw someone in an online writers group just push for “cutting your story down to meet their requirements.”  This was a discussion about an 11,000 word novella being trimmed to meet the needs of a 8,000 word market. And an amazing number of people chimed in to say “yeah, go for it.”
            Y’see, Timmy, once we’ve been doing this for any amount of time, we start to get a feel for ideas.  Some are great for flash fiction or short-short stories. Others are made to be novellas.  And some are just waiting to be fleshed out into books.
            And, yeah, some books are bigger than others.  The book I’m wrapping up is a solid 100,000 words, but I know Chuck Wendig recently finished a monster almost three times that size, and another friend who has one coming in at a nice tight 85,000.
            My point is, if I rewrote and edited and polished and my final story came in at 12,000 words… there’s a chance it’s a 12,000 word story.  And cutting 25% of it will make it… well 25% less than a good story.
            In my experience, most editors aren’t interested in 25% less than a good story.
            Likewise, if I can make major changes to a character and it has absolutely no repercussions anywhere in their story… maybe I don’t have a great character.  If making Phoebe bisexual instead of straight doesn’t change anything in my story, it’s doubtful this is the kind of story a niche market is looking for.
            As always, there’s no absolutes here.  Maybe I really can afford to lose three or four thousand words.  Perhaps my story does need a different viewpoint to excel.
            But…

           These aren’t the kind of alterations that get rushed out overnight.  They’ll have repercussions throughout the story. They’re require other changes.  And then more revisions to make sure those changes don’t cause changes.  A good story—even a short story—is a house of cards.  I can’t just pull one out and replace it and think nothing’s going to happen when I do.  Or take ten out altogether.

            I should think long and hard about forcing a story to meet a new set of requirements.  Length, style, content, whatever they may be.  When I’m done, it may not be what it was.
            Which would suck if it was good.
            And this has turned into a much longer rant than I planned.  Apologies.
            Next time… well, I just finished a draft.  Maybe I’ll talk a little bit about that whole process.
            Until then, go write.
            Hey, a quick bonus post or Writers Coffeehouse folks.  Or any of you who are interested in such things…
            One of our Coffeehouse topics this past weekend was querying agents, and I told the folks there about how I actually got attention from two fairly well-known, high profile agents because I had a good query letter and could talk like a professional in one-on-one meetings. And I thought it might be useful to some folks to have said letter as a rough template.
            Ironically, the book I was querying with was The Suffering Map, my early novel that I use so often here as an example of how not to do things.  Seriously, I use it so often there’s a tag for it.  A big one.  You could figure out a lot of the book  just by reading about all the elements I screwed up in it.
            Anyway…
————————
                                                                          May 15th, 2003
                                                                          My Old Address
                                                                          San Diego CA 92116
Name
Agency
Address
New York NY
Ms. ########,
            If you could travel in an instant to anywhere, or any-when, in the world, where would you go?  Now, what if there was a price?  What if each journey submitted you to a nightmare of pain and torture before you arrive, unharmed, without a mark on you, at your destination.  Getting there is not half the fun.  So why would Rob Fable do it a second time?  Or a third?  And what would happen if he got addicted to it?
My novel, THE SUFFERING MAP,  is a suspense/ horror novel that also involves a great deal of mythology, history, and a sprinkling of pop culture.  It’s set in my home city of San Diego, and the title refers to a mysterious device, found (well, stolen) by Rob, which allows him to travel while submitting him to the whims of a being called Bareback.  It also brings him into contact with Sondra, who develops an unusual bond with the Suffering Map, and Gulliver, who has his own plans for the mechanism….
        Rob comes to realize the financial potential of the device and travels with it more and more.  When he discovers some of the historical results of using the Suffering Map, though, he finds it isn’t that easy to stopusing it.  In the end, Rob must come to terms with his addiction to the ancient machine as his friends try to save him and themselves, for Bareback has his own plans, and the power of history is on his side.
            I would like to send you either the full manuscript of The Suffering Map (approximately 120,000 words), or some sample chapters and a synopsis, at your preference.  Please find a SASE enclosed for your convenience.
                                                                          Sincerely,
                                                                          Peter Clines
———————–
            So, look at what we’ve got here. First off, it’s short and simple–one page only.  I introduce the four major characters and explain the title.  Also notice that while pretty much the whole thing is talking about the story–this could almost be a back of the book/inside flap description,  I also slip in a bit of humor (okay, maybe he didn’t find the Suffering Map…) and some credentials (I’m not just writing about a city I’ve never been to or visited once).
            I wrap it up with a professional closing.  At the time this particular agent hadn’t set out firm guidelines past “query first,” so I suggested some options, each one showing that I have an understanding of the process.  By offering the full manuscript (with a word count) I’m confirming it’s done, and I have an idea how long such a book should be.  Offering a synopsis implies I either have one ready or know how to prepare one.  And all of that helps show that I’ve got an idea how to use words to convey ideas.  Y’know, like a writer…
            One more thing. The little device of asking questions—good, semi-rhetorical questions—encourages people to consider answers.  So even though I address these questions a bit later (to some degree), I’m still leaving room for the agent to wonder about what the answer is. The Suffering Map, as implied, has a mystery element to it, so questions worked well for me. YMMV.
            However… I hear that “asking rhetorical questions” has been getting used in queries a lot lately, and the device is bordering on gimmicky.  Most agents hate gimmicks, because even though it may be new and clever to me, odds are they’ve seen it a hundred times.  This week.  Some might just roll their eyes and keep reading, for others it may be a dealbreaker.  So be cautious with gimmicks.  Or something that may be bordering on gimmick-hood.
            And, again, please don’t forget—this is an example of what worked for me. Your individual query letter needs to reflect your book and your skills as a writer, so copying this and making minor tweaks won’t really help.  This is just a guide, so when you’re talking about your book you’ll have a sense of what to say.
            On our regularly-scheduled Thursday post, I wanted to talk about sucker punches.
            Until then, go write.
            And if you’re at that stage… query.
June 23, 2016 / 3 Comments

Rejected by Inspector #12

            If I can shamelessly namedrop a bit,  I heard a great Richard Matheson quote from Jonathan Maberry a while back, which I will now paraphrase as such.
            Writingis the art of telling stories.  Publishingis the business of selling as many copies of that art as possible.
            If you break it down, this collection of rants is probably 98% about writing, maybe 2% about publishing.  This week, if I may, I’d like to step away from the straight writing stuff that I normally do and touch on an issue more on the publishing side of things.
            Nobody here likes getting rejected. Not for an apartment, not for a job, not for a date. Definitely not for our writing.  But that’s life. Rejection happens all the time, even to the folks who get considered professionals.  I had a short story rejected from an anthology last year.  I’ve been trying to pitch a book trilogy to my editor for two years now, and he’s just not interested. Heck, my agent’s not even that interested in it.  These things happen.
            I bring this up because there’s a meme, or sometimes an article, that floats around a lot, presenting a bunch of facts that go something like this… 
            “Famous writer X showed their manuscript Y to twenty-three editors before someone bought it.  Not only that, bestselling novel Y2 by famous writer X2 was rejected by forty-two editors. Can you imagine that? Forty-two people passed on Y2?  Ha ha ha, how many of them are kicking themselves now?”
            This list can be ten or fifteen authors/books long, and I see it get used a lot to show how A) I shouldn’t give up hope just because of all my rejections, B) editors don’t know anything, C) the publishing industry is a dinosaur that’s going to die out any day now, just wait and see, or D) all of the above.
            So, at first glance, this list can seem like a really awesome thing. It makes me feel more positive about rejection.  It makes me feel more positive about that stupid editor’s decision.  It validates my feelings about big publishing and their ongoing habit of ignoring my letters.  And this is good, right?
            Thing is, there’s three problems here.  And I think they cause more issues than all this positive affirmation solves.  Y’see, Timmy, this list isn’t as clear-cut as it seems…
            First problem is the false parallel that often gets drawn because of this list.  Carrie was rejected many times and my early book– The Suffering Map –was rejected many times.  Therefore, logically, my book must be just as good (and just as worthy of being published) as Stephen King’s breakout hit.
            We can all see the flaw there, right?  Just because an editor rejected a good book doesn’t mean all the books they reject are good. Some of them—let’s be honest—some of them are not good.  Some of them are bad.  We can all probably name one or two folks who aren’t as good at writing as they think they are.  And they can probably name two or three folks, too.
            I can freely admit, I’ve had books rejected by agents.  And they deserved to be rejected.  They were awful.  Honestly, in retrospect, I’m kind of ashamed I submitted one of them. 
            The next problem, to be blunt, is that writers don’t always send stories where they’re supposed to go.  Sometimes we get overeager or don’t do all the research we should.  If I’d sent Ex-Heroes to Harlequin, of course they would’ve rejected it. So would the Black Library (a very specific niche press), Razorbill (a young adult press), or Lonely Planet (a travel book publisher).  Getting rejected from these places would be completely understandable, but would it really say anything about the quality of my writing?  Or that editor’s ability to recognize good writing?
            So should I consider those when I say that my book’s been rejected half a dozen times?
            Heck, a while back I spoke with a woman online as she lamented that her story had been rejected four times.  Ignoring the fact that four times is nothing, it turned out she’d submitted to four radically different markets.  She’d tried marketing it as young adult, sci-fi, fantasy, and as a horror novel.  Which really meant she’d been rejected once.  Once as a young adult story, once as a sci-fi story, and so on.
            Is that worth calling it quits over?
            Also, there are some writers out there who… well, who can’t take a hint.  They’re the literary equivalent of the guy who thinks if he keeps asking Phoebe out every Friday night, eventually she’ll break down and say yes. When an editor rejects a manuscript… that’s it.  Unless they specifically ask to see it again, I shouldn’t try to sneak it back in their pile six months later. No, not even if I explain that I tweaked three of the chapters. My goal is to convince them I’m a professional, and that’s not how professionals work.  But some people do it anyway, often the folks who tend to do “carpet bomb” submissions of twenty or thirty editors at a time.
            If Phoebe rejects my advances twenty times, is that twenty rejections?  Or is it just one (and I’m really bad at taking a hint)?
            So rejection numbers don’t necessarily tell a complete story.
            Finally, this list implies a really big misconception, something a lot of beginners (or willfully uninformed folks) don’t get.  When they hear that bestselling author Wakko Warner was rejected thirty times, they make the assumption that Wakko sent out the exact same book with the exact same query letter thirty times.  Thirty editors all saw the same book that got published, letter for letter, and every one of them passed on it.
            As someone who’s made those rounds, I’d be willing to bet some serious cash that’s not true.
            After a given number of rejections, a good writer’s going to take note that something isn’t working.  It might be a low number, just two or three.  It might be as high as a dozen.  But only a really deluded person is going to keep doing the exact same thing again and again and expect the results are going to radically change.

          Personally, I’d rewrite my cover letter after every fourth or fifth rejection.  Sometimes it would be to update it with a new sale or credit.  Other times I’d come up with a cleaner, slicker way to get a point across.  All too often, it was to fix the typo that had slipped past three revisions and didn’t get noticed until after I sent things out.   Whatever made me do it, it was rare for more than a handful of editors to get the exact same letter from me.  And  different people interpret those letters different ways

            Not only that, if I was lucky enough to get any sort of feedback… I listened to it.  I didn’t always follow it word for word, but if the people who were in the position to buy my stories offered suggestions, I considered them.  The Suffering Mapwent through a pretty decent revision halfway through my submissions, and then another one right after I attended the SDSU Writers’ Conference. 
            Out of its dozen or so submissions, I’d guess at least three different versions of it went out under three or four different cover letters.
            So, with all of this in mind…  is it that amazing a particular book was rejected forty-two times? 
            It seems kind of, well, normal, doesn’t it?
            It’s always fantastic to look back at the people who inspired us and how they got their start.  If I want to walk that same path, though, I need to look at that start without any blinders or preconceptions. Which is going to make the path look a lot tougher.
            But it’ll also make it easier to follow.
            Next time…
            I don’t know. Between the ranty blog and the Writers Coffeehouse, it feels like I’ve been going on and on about so many things, it all feels a bit repetitive to me.  Is there an appropriate writing topic anybody’d like to hear me babble on about?
            If not… I’ll put something together…
            Until then, go write.

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