Posts Tagged ‘writer resource’
Wednesday, February 8th, 2012
Most every writer’s heard of scene and sequel. Jack Bickham’s Elements of Fiction Writing is some of the best instruction on novel structure out there. But he, and I today, aren’t merely talking about plot. The key is to apply structure principles to your characters every step of the way. Because, as Robert McKee tells us, plot IS character.
I’ve studied with both these masters. Bickham, in addition to devouring his books, I bought a workshop series from and wish I’d had the chance to hear him in person before his death. McKee, who isn’t dead but some who attended the three-day scriptwriting seminar attended most likely wished him so, was worth the money and travel expense ten times over, given what I walked away from his course better understanding about the real source of good writing.
It’s character.All the plot rules, setting rules, structure rules, symbol rules, and any other thing that someone’s tried to make you think is most important to story, is actually about CHARACTER. Because your story is about character. Each scene and its sequel, each element and act and conflict and motivation… It’s all about character.
Readers want the journey. (more…)
Tags: Anna DeStefano, brainstorming, character arc, creativity & inspiration, digital publishing, Elements of Fiction Writing, fantasy author, fiction, fiction writer, Jack Bickham, plotting, publishing, Robert McKee, scene and sequel, writer, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing craft, writing resources, writing workshops
Posted in How We Write | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, February 1st, 2012
If you want to write, write. If you want to publish, prepare to work your ass off getting very, very good at your writing. This business is all about soul. And I’m not just talking about your unique, creative voice–though that’s incredibly important, too. Today, I’m talking about grit. Stick it out, find your own way, stop waiting for everyone else to make this crazy business sensible and welcoming and easy, G-R-I-T.
I write my books; I edit for other authors. I’m close to offering my first two book contracts for Entangled Publishing. After publishing 16 novels of my own and reading countless propsals others have written over the years, all I know for sure is, this is all about soul.
- Have you been rejected (like me)? Figure out if you have what it takes to get up the next morning and start over from nothing–because every published author must do that each and every time they meet a deadline.
- Do you have a day job (like me)? Buckle down and accept that your personal life off the clock belongs first to the book you need to finish, not your hobbies and social (media) life–because the majority of published authors don’t make enough off their writing to support their families, so we’re all hoofing it to make ends meet while trying to stay creative in the dark hours of early morning.
- Do you have a busy family (like me)? Love them and care for them, the tell them your entire life doesn’t revolve around them and they’re going to have to take care of themselves the 1,2,3 hours a day that you devote to your writing. Otherwise, they’ll consume you (and maybe that’s what you want, if family is the excuse you’re making daily for not creating new words).
- Have you been dealing with an illness (like me)? Deal with it, by all means, your health is everything. But for Dog’s sake, knock off saying your illness is responsible for you not moving forward in your writing. I don’t mean to be insensitive or unkind, but whatever your condition is, I assure you I can find others who’ve managed to succeed battling far worse circumstances–because they refused to quit.
Soul is the thing that lives and breathes inside us, regardless of the piles of s**t raining down on our worst days. (more…)
Tags: Anna DeStefano, anna's world, creativity & inspiration, Entangled Publishing, fiction, indie publishing, novel, publishing, Soul, writer, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing craft, writing resources, writing workshops
Posted in Anna's "Soul of the Matter", How We Write | 5 Comments »
Thursday, January 26th, 2012
What challenges us emotionally in life, challenges our novel writing. What we’re best at in life, becomes what we look forward to most in our writing process. I teach this dynamic all the time–and I live it. If you’re a seat-of-the-pants writer, it wouldn’t be a coincidence if you’re not a list maker or a planner in the “real” world.” If you LOVE to revise (like me), it’s likely that analyzing things and breaking them into their orderly parts is you everyday zen (at least it’s something that doesnt’ drive you nuts the way it seems to for everybody else).
Flip that around. If the unknown scares you, and you tend to plan for likely outcomes before you embark on a journey, drafting a new novel won’t make you warm and fuzzy (I tend to call the feeling a blank Page 1 invokes in me abject terror, but that might be a bit extreme for the rest of you.)
But if you’re the wanderer, dreaming of a backpacking trip through Europe where you merely have a start point and a destination and you’ll figure out pesky details like lodging and food and transpo along the way, well…you’re nuts! Eh-hem. What I meant to say is that I suspect writing blind into a new story is a mighty lovely place for you. Until you hit The End, and have to go back and break things down into their parts, rework your rough draft pieces into a better whole, then knit everything back together (which anal retentive, geeky analytical girls like me tend to think of as Nirvana ;o).
My point to my students is never that either one or the other of these approahces is bad, in either life or writing. But that it’s best to know your strengths and weaknesses and to play one up, while compensating for the other. If it takes you forever to write a draft (to the point that you revise and revise and revise your first 100 pages while never writing the rest of the novel), take a look at why. If you can’t “make” yourself go back and revise a first draft because all the fun’s gone out of the story for you now that you know how it ends, and the idea of working with it anymore makes you nauseous, take a look at why.
(more…)
Tags: Anna DeStefano, publishing, writer, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing craft, writing workshops
Posted in How We Write | 4 Comments »
Thursday, January 19th, 2012
“Being practical, yet innovative…” A friend and freelance client emailed that sentiment to me during an exchange about the beautiful novel I’m helping her take apart and revise. I’m pushing her to dig deep. She’s wanting to keep as much as possible of the beautiful inspiration that drove her to write in the first place. And she should–as long as the reader feels equally inspired to devour her beautiful words. Which is what revision is all about, and what makes it so hard and time consuming, and why the majority of those who attempt to publish never make it to a book contract–it’s VERY hard to craft a story that readers will love half as much as you did when you first envisioned it.
Let me repeat. Rewriting a manuscript until it’s reader-ready is hard. Brutal. Seldom pretty, at least at first. And it takes time.To analyze. Re-evaluate. Re-focus. And only then, to revise what you’ve already painstakingly completed. The process takes a creative artist out of her comfort zone and dumps her into the hell of picking apart word and character and theme and plot choices, drilling deeper until the true meaning and purpose of each piece is (effortlessly) crystal clear to a reader.
This isn’t a post on the method and technique of revision. I’ve done that already, so scroll back through How We Write, or attend one of the half-dozen workshops I’m already scheduled to give this year, the majority of which will include a discussion of rewriting. This is a blog about attitude. Fortitude. Determination to maintain your unique writer’s voice, while doing the writer’s day-to-day job of reaching others through story.
If you can’t commit to doing that, once it’s made very clear to you how hard and uncomfortable and unpleasant that part of your job can be, then that successfully published novel of your dreams won’t become a reality, no matter how wonderful your original idea might have been. I fact, it’s that very commitment to making your story everything it should be that protects that innovation bursting to live through your imagination.
By successful, I mean a story that reaches into readers hearts and souls and pulls out the best and worst of who they are, all while you’re transporting them to a fictional place that existed only in your mind before they began reading your words. (more…)
Tags: Anna DeStefano, critiquing, digital publishing, editing, fantasy, freelance editor, narrative structure, publishing, revision, writer, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing craft, writing resources
Posted in How We Write | 2 Comments »
Thursday, January 12th, 2012
Without conflict, your story has no forward momentum. Your characters have no motivation to act. There’s no goal they can’t achieve. So, in commercial fiction at least, there’s no reader engagement, no matter how well what you’ve written is, well, written. For lack of a better analogy, you need combustion that will lead the reader to expect some future explosion that’ll keep them on the hook through the rest of the wonderful things you plan to do.
And I’m not just talking about suspense plots.In addition to writing (and now editing) romantic suspense as well as crafting sci-fi/fantasies that are full-on thrillers, I also write home and family dramas (straight contemporary romance) where the same level of escalating conflict and tension must still exist, in order for the reader to care enough to turn the page.
Conflict is how readers identify with your characters. It’s how the story transports the reader through a purely fictional journey. How deeply do the dilemmas you put the protagonist through resonate? How carefully do you craft the internal motivation and goals and tension the character must resolve, and are there external factors (anchors and stumbling blocks) that drive that person to do and behave and learn and grow and fail and, ultimately, succeed?
Conflict IS NOT petty arguments and bickering between the leads. (more…)
Tags: Anna DeStefano, Bob Mayer, conflict lock, Dead Sexy Books, Entangled Publishing, publishing, story conflict, writer, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing challenge, writing coach, writing craft, writing resources
Posted in How We Write | 5 Comments »
Monday, January 9th, 2012
Yes, I have five different book proposals in the works (four of them with my agent or with publishers, waiting for acquisition, finger’s crossed), but I’m also stretching my more technical/editorial muscles in new, exciting directions–I’ve been hired as an Acquiring Editor for the NEW Dead Sexy romantic suspense line at Entangled Publishing.
Officially, the new imprint is:
Dead Sexy: The Nina Bruhns Collection.
And today’s the launch/announcement of our new baby!
If you know Nina, as I do, you’ll be as excited as I am by this announcement. She and I and our other newly hired editor Susan Meier are already working with authors and thrilling stories you’re going to love, come the May launch of Dead Sexy. What a great team, including our managing editor, Vicki Wilkerson!
The Dead Sexy editors were successful, award-winning, best selling authors first. All of us. Now we’re following our passion for teaching and nurturing and helping other writers fulfill their publishing dreams.
We at Dead Sexy strive to be the exciting home every successful romantic suspense author is dying to have. And Entangled is a digital-first publisher that puts authors first. An amazing partnership from the get-go!
Check back often in 2012 for weekly Publishing Isn’t for Sissies and How We Write posts that are taking on even greater meaning and purpose for me, as well as more updates from my popular Dream Theories and Psychic Realm and Soul of the Matter and Things my Teenager Says series.
Now that you know what’s kept me away from regular blog posts these last few months, let me say it’s great to be back. I couldn’t be happier about the horizon before me ;o)
Join me.
It’s going to be an exciting ride!
Tags: Anna DeStefano, anna's world, creativity & inspiration, Dead Sexy Books, digital publishing, Entangled Publishing, Nina Bruhns, publishing, Susan Meier, Vicki Wilkerson, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach
Posted in Publishing Isn't for Sissies | 7 Comments »
Thursday, January 5th, 2012
What new facet of the publishing business will you conquer this year? With all the changes rushing at us, what’s your greatest fear? How can you turn that perceived weakness into an asset? Small press or indie digital publishing has long been my wishy-washy place.
Yes, I can publishing solo, but do I want to? Yes, there are small indie digital presses out there, but do I trust their ever-evolving business models. In the end, I realized the real question was: Do I trust myself, without the umbrella of a large, established publisher propping up both me and my work?
I love my traditional publishers and hope to always have a home in print. I respect most of the inroads these huge corporations are making into digital media, too, though the changes they’re enacting have been slow to come and even slower to implement. Which has left a huge opportunity open for me to make a digital impact with my writing without them… But until lately I’ve been too hesitant to investigate those options on my own.
- Where will I be without a major press behind me?
- Will anyone notice if I go out on my own?
- Will my publisher/agent be less enthusiastic about my work, if I’m also self/indie publishing in the digital market?
- Will I be wasting a lot of time I should be spending writing, by taking on even more “other” business beyond the hours I need to focus each day on my creative pursuits?
Hard questions, all of them. And each question sprung from a core fear of the change happening all around me. Because the reality is, the playing field of publshing that I thought I’d conquered when I signed my first traditional book contract is gone. A new world with exciting new opportunities and scary pitfalls has arrived. I can’t fly beneath the radar and expect folks to find me, because I have THIS publisher or THAT one backing me.
In this publishing world, a writer is either a brand/entity unto herself, or she won’t be found, period.
- Traditional publishers expect us to do all the things we have to do to be successful as self/indie published authors.
- Branding is essential to a book’s success now, regardless of how it was published.
(more…)
Tags: Anna DeStefano, digital promotion, digital publishing, indie publishing, promotion, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing workshops
Posted in Publishing Isn't for Sissies | 4 Comments »
Wednesday, January 4th, 2012
Why do we work, love, write, care? Why don’t we enjoy who and what we are more this year, than ever before? Inspiration is the soul of the matter, as is running with that mission, that message, that kernal of us we protect too carefully and too seldom follow with abandon.
Why don’t we follow our inspiration more?
- Are we afraid of all that we want? Nothing should be that simple.
- Are we too tired to take our heart’s desires into our own hands and fight for that promise? That’s more likely.
- Are we programmed to only see the work, never the gain? Why, I think we’ve arrived.
We are that quiet place inside that speaks when the rest falls away.
We are our dreams, and those inspirations are the hope that carries us through so much.This is the symbolism, the recurring metaphor that speaks to my work and my life. I think it speaks to all of us.
Whether you see yourself as creative or not, there’s a voice inside you (your soul, if you will), promising that you’re more than the sum of your parts.
This year, listen to that voice and celebrate the “why” of all that you are:
- Each day, make a note in your journal, naming the part of you singing loudest that morning.
- Jot down the tune that yearns to fill your day with magic.
- Circle back before bed, and see what your voice has shown you, now that the rest is sleeping.
Be inspired in your writing and your family and your work and your dreams. That’s my 2012 wish for you!
Tags: Anna DeStefano, anna's world, creativity & inspiration, writer, writer resource, writing articles, writing coach, writing resources
Posted in Anna's "Soul of the Matter" | No Comments »
Friday, December 2nd, 2011
Platform. Everyone says you MUST have one in social media. Platform is your brand. It tells folks what you’re about. “The Soul of the Matter,” is what I’ve come up with for my particular bent on the world, after reviewing back blog and Facebook and Twitter streams.
It’s a focus I chose organically about two years ago,when my world view was skewed by surgery and scary medical predictions and a chaotic publishing environment that’s become even more crazy since. If I was going to write, blog and participate in social media, it had to go deeper. I wanted to be saying something meaningful about how I see my world, every time I put my thoughts onto paper or typed them into the computer.
I’m in the entertainment business, and that’ll never change as long as I publish in commercial fiction. But I wanted to feel even closer than before to what I’m writing. And I wanted that to spill over into my weekly blogging and the things and people I focus on in social media. I want it to be about heart and soul, above all else.
For two years I’ve posted into my “Revising a Year” blog series. It’s morphing now into “Anna’s Soul of the Matter.” You’ll see it at the top of the category list to the right. And in each blog post I write forward.
Whether I’m writing women’s fiction or romance or suspense or psychic fantasy/sci-fi, or chatting about dreams or my teenager or wacky current events and happenings or psychic stuff or the nuts and bolts of writing, I’m pouring my heart into the words. That’s my daily goal. That’s what keeps me coming back, keeps my writing, no matter the stumbling blocks.
That’s the kind of community I’d like all this content and sharing and re-tweeting to build. Folks looking deeper and wanting more and loving the insight as much as the chatty, easy-to-read posts and pics and one-liners.
Let’s share the soul of all that matters to us. If that’s your cup of tea, you’ve stumbled across the right place. Welcome!
Tags: Anna DeStefano, anna's world, brainstorming, creativity & inspiration, writer resource, writing, writing coach, writing resources
Posted in Anna's "Soul of the Matter" | No Comments »
Wednesday, November 30th, 2011
I received editorial revisions the other day. I’m a multi-published author. So, no big deal, right? WRONG. Revisions are hard. They’re built that way. If they were easy, everyone would be published traditionally and selling millions. And any working writer that tells you differently is just plain fibbing.This post is for everyone who wants to see their words in print, the published and the unpublished and the newly “WINNING” nanowrimo masses and those who think it’s always easier in someone else’s writing reality.
The reality is, the better you revise, the better your book will typically read for your reader. The more push it will have from your imprint. The more established you will find yourself within the very small world of publishing. Those who’re self-publishing without the benefit of a third-party editor, you’re in the same boat, except that you have to see the holes in your story that are more and more difficult to see the deeper you get into creating it. So we all schedule and accept it into our process the way you do everything else right?
Yeah. No.
Why is it so hard?
Two reasons, one that veers toward mechanics and one that takes a head trip inward to the heart of all that we do for our creative dreams. (more…)
Tags: editorial revision, revision, writer, writer resource, writing, writing articles, writing coach, writing craft, writing resources, writing workshops
Posted in How We Write | No Comments »
