I thought I'd share my process for any of you that are interested. (BUYER BEWARE: This story did NOT make the cut.)
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]]>Most of y’all know that I submit regularly to the “Postcards” series from Raconteur Press. For those aren’t aware, it’s an open submission call that happens from time to time whenever the gang go to a convention. They send an AI generated image to anybody who asks, and you must write a story of precisely 50 words, no more, no less, inspired by the image. You only have until the Monday after the con to submit the story, so there’s a time pressure added to the word count. It’s a fun challenge, and I’ve made the cut for two of the four volumes.
I thought I’d share my process for any of you that are interested. (BUYER BEWARE: This story did NOT make the cut.)
This is the image I received for the first postcards anthology.
My first step is to look at the picture and write down 10-20 words and phrases that quickly come to mind. I spend no more than a minute or two on this. For this image, I came up with:
- desolate
- wet pavement
- father and sons
- bleak
- walking away
- where’s Mom?
- cloudy gray sky
- jackets and parkas
- standing straight and shoulders back
- moving on
Next, I blow up the image, and look for fine details. Little things jump out and become hooks for the story, fleshing out the characters, or providing bits of the plot.
- The father is wearing a mask. There’s some kind of plague. Or the atmosphere is not healthy.
- Their posture is not slumped and defeated. They are walking away, but they are also walking forward. They’ve taken a hit, but they aren’t defeated.
- The older son is holding onto his father’s hand, looking for guidance.
- The younger son is less aware of what’s happened. He still believes that Daddy can fix anything and their current troubles will pass.
Then I sit down and write it out, ignoring word count. I tell the story conventionally capturing every nuance and detail.
Only then do I count the words. It isn’t pretty. In this case:
We leave the hospital, my boys and me. We’re all that’s left of our family.
We came to this damned place to build a new life, to escape the mess we’ve made of Earth, but that never works. We bring our problems with us.
Carol’s dead.
The Pain is what we call it. Neuropathic necrosis is what the docs call it. Untreatable. Incurable, and excruciating. It kills nearly everyone who contracts it, and that’s a blessing. The survivors don’t have much to look forward to.
Cathy’s suffering is over, but ours, well, it’s just beginning.
The evening rain is falling as programmed by the Colonial Terraforming Agency as the boys and I walk home.
Robert Jr puts his hand in mine while Billy skips along.
I’m gutted. No hope, no plan, no wife.
But I can’t let that show. God help me, but they need me and I have to be there for them.
“What do we do, Dad?” RJ asked quietly, holding in his tears for Billy’s sake.
“Just keep walking, son. That’s all we can do.”
Boys become men too soon in this world.
Next, I put it away for a while, at least an hour or so, maybe even overnight. When I pick it back up, I summarize the story. This let’s me isolate what the story is really about, which lets me condense it to the bare bones, eliminating extraneous bits and keeping only the most important parts, whether it is character beats or plot points or descriptions.
In this case:
A man walks home with his two sons after his wife dies of an illness. He knows that despite his own pain, he must be strong for his boys. He passes that lesson along to his oldest son. It’s too soon, but that’s life.
Right away, I see I can delete most of the stuff about the illness. And I don’t need the colonial setting anymore; the story can apply anytime, anywhere. The meat of the story is told in 44 words. But they aren’t the right words. The story is told, not shown. It’s time to go back to the first draft and edit.
My next draft looked like this:
We leave the hospital, my boys and me. We’re all that’s left of our family.
Carol’s dead.
The Pain is what we call it. Cathy’s suffering is over, but ours, well, it’s just beginning.
Robert Jr puts his hand in mine while Billy skips along.
I’m gutted. No hope, no plan, no wife.
God help me, but they need me and I have to be there for them.
“What do we do now, Dad?” RJ asked quietly, holding in his tears for Billy’s sake.
“Just keep walking, son. That’s all we can do.”
Boys become men too soon in this world.
I’m still way over the word count, but it’s manageable now.
I look back at the image, and see how much of the story is conveyed by the image. Maybe I don’t need to repeat what’s already there. Which sentences provoke an emotional response and which are just filler? Can I rewrite sentences to get rid of chronological cues and let the structure and order of the sentences convey sequence? Can I get rid of dialog tags, or if I hae to keep them, can I make them multitask, providing emotional content as well as narrative?
Finally, I go through the words themselves and look for better, stronger word choices for each one. If I can find words with multiple layers, so much the better. I rely primarily on my own vocabulary, but I’ll crack open a thesaurus as needed to jump start my imagination if necessary. Strong verbs and descriptive nouns remove the need for adjectives or adverbs, and misusing (pardon, I mean creative use of) punctuation can also shave off a few words.
This is usually the longest part of the work, and the most fun for me. Trying out different words occassionally inspires me to rewrite an entire sentence or move it to another place in the story for better impact.
The last step is finalizing the title. I usually have a version of the title when I write the summary, but as I refine and move things around, different titles occur to me, but by this point, I want the title locked down. I’ll review the story and make sure that every word builds to the titles. It’s a way to cheat and get a few extra words into the story.
Here’s the final version:
Carry On
Carol’s dead.
It’s a blessing. She’s beyond the Pain now.
I’m gutted. No hope, no plan, no wife, and no mother for my boys.
I’m not enough, but I’m all they have.
“What do we do?” RJ asked.
Sometimes, a boy learns the truth too early.
“Just keep walking, son.”
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Happy New Year! I hope you had a great holiday season and are approaching this new year with energy, enthusiasm, and appreciation!
Now, to the update!
- Weight – I weighed in at 268 this week. I gained 3 pounds over the holidays. I didn’t want to gain anything, but three pounds isn’t the end of the world. I set a goal for this year to hit 215 by my birthday, June 14. That’s 43 pounds in 26 weeks, or just over 1.6 pounds per week. That’s a very realistic goal, particularly since I’m going to front load it with a short term goal of 15 lbs this month. We’re leaving for vacation Jan 28, and I want to look good for our destination!
- Non Fiction – I took some time off over the holidays, but now it’s back to work! Maintaining and growing social media, starting a newsletter and building a mailing list, and posting here regularly are all high priorities. I haven’t set any metrics yet for followers and such. Right now, I want to establish the routine, and build a reservoir of material for new readers to read through. Once I have a solid presence, then I’ll start working to build up!
- Fiction – Like I said, I took some time off for the holidays. I sat on the couch and watched TV with my wife, and then watched some football with the cats. I may have scared them a time or too, yelling at the screen. But now it’s time to get back into the harness and start putting words on paper. The weekly short story group started yesterday, and I plan on posting a story to the group every Friday, even while I’m on vacation. We’ll see how that goes! As for novel(s), it’s time to start working on those as well. The paranormal romance still sits at roughly 24k, and I want to have it completed by Jan 28. Then I’ll dive back into Calder Sharpe’s world and see what he’s been up to!
- Ukulele – One of my goals for the new year is to learn a new song each week and record at least one per month. This week, I’m concentrating on finishing “Hallelujah” and next week, The Rose (Bette Midler.) Other songs on my short list include “California Dreaming,” “All of Me,” “After the Goldrush,” “Over the Rainbow/Wonderful World,”and “Does your Chewing Gum Lose its Flavor (on the Bedpost Overnight?)” If there’s any song you think I should add to the list, let me know!
- What I’m Reading – Since I had time, I finished several books. First, “The Debare Snake Launcher” by Joelle Presby. This is her first solo novel and it is a good one even though it isn’t what I expected. I thought this would be more of a hard SF novel dealing with the construction of the first space elevator. Instead, it turned out to be more of a character study of the family given the contract to oversee construction of a support launcher to put supplies into orbit to build the elevator. We get to watch as the family fights deadlines, supply and construction issues, a volcano, and each other to complete construction of the launcher. Next up was Thief of Aether, by Bree Moore, book 2 of her “Shadowed Minds” series. Like the first book, this is another page turned as Lee is increasingly tangled in schemes and crossed loyalties as she tries desperately to find her way free of the magic that is killing her. Be warned, the book ends on a cliffhanger and we’ll all have to wait for book three to find out how it gets resolved. But it will be worth the wait! And right now, I’m reading Graphite and Turbulence, book two of Jami Fairleigh’s “Elemental Artist” series. It picks up immediatel after the conclusion of “Oil and Dust” as Matthew, a young Artist with the ability to alter things in the real world with his paintings continues his search to find his birth family.
- Audio books – The reviews are in (all two of them) and, based on thier feedback, I will be releasing an audio version of “The Name of the Moon” on Amazon to go along with the story. I have a few edits left to make on the audio, then I have to figure out how to post an audio to Amazon, get everything set up, and then it goes live. My goal is for it to go live before we go on vacation, but we’ll see.
And that’s it for this update!
Have a great week!
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First of all, do you like the new digs? If you’re reading this via the link on Facebook, awesome! Welcome to my website. I plan on moving more and more of my posts over here. I’ll post links on Facebook back to here, but I prefer doing mjost of my longer posts fropm here.
There’s a couple of reasons for that. First, this is going to be my home on the web. Facebook is fine for short posts, sharing memes, and interacting with folks, but my posts tend to run longer than Facebook readers typically like. Most Facebookers are looking for 20-30 second interactions that they can like and then scroll along. When I write one of these updates, or post a review, I like to take a bit of time and space, and that simply works better here.
Second, I have a much greater degree f control over how my posts look. I can add inline images, host a video, link to a book or somebody else’s page, and all without worrying about Facebook throttling the post because I’ve triggered one of the algorythmically generated and unidentifiable landmines.
Which brings up the third reason, Facebook tends to be somewhat arbitrary in applying their standards and I’m putting too muich effort into these posts to allow them to just disappear becaue a bot doesn’t like a particular word choice I make.
Of course, as I post more here, I’ll be tweaking things to make them work better, and look better. I’ll be doing some other things, like building a mailing list, creating a newsletter, and stuff like that along the way, so keep your eyes opened!
Now, to the update!
- Weight – I weighed in at 265 this week for a loss of 3 more pounds. That’s a total of nine pounds lost. We leave for vacation in under 6 weeks and I’ve got a ways to go yet. Onward!
- Non Fiction – Everything is still on track. I’m hitting my goals and making my deadlines and interacting on social media. Growth is very slow, but it will come with time and persistance!
- Fiction – Horrible week. Truly horrible. And it’s all my fault, of course. I just had to write a post on maintaining a routine. Yep, things happened and my routine took a huge hit. Monday, I had family things to deal with, Tuesday and Thursday I lost to illness, Wednesday, I guess I’ll blame on illness as well. Friday, I got some writing done, but my word count really suffered for the week. But a once established, a routine has it’s own momentum and the only way to really lose that is to sit back and let it happen. So I wrote on the weekend and made up for some lost time, and I’ll be right back at it tonight at 9pm.
- Ukulele – I’m working on Hallelujah still. Such a powerful song about love and loss! I’m trying to meld a strumming pattern with fingerpicking, and singing at the same time. If I can nail this, it should be awesome!
- What I’m Reading – I finished Cedar Sanderson’s short story collection, “Crow Moon” this week and it is amazing! My full review will post tomorrow, and I’ve submitted an Amazon review as well. The short version is simple. Buy It! Each story is like an artist’s sketch; there’s enough detail to protray the story and to evoke an emotional response, but it invites you to supply details from your own imagination and emotions from your own experiences until it almost feels like you are collaborating with the writer in crafting the story. I’ve started “The Debare Snake Launcher” by Joelle Presby. Presby spins a tale of old and new cultures coming into conflict as the world’s first space elevator is being built in Africa.
- I mentioned before that I was working on an audio version of my short story. I finished the raw recording and did a basic edit last weekend and it has gone out to my alpha listeners. Based on their feedback, I will either continue to pursue recording my own stories, (and maybe do some recordings for other writers) or retire from voice work, never to be heard from again. (No pressure, alphas. Just my career. That’s all!)
And that’s it for this update! Remember, tomorrow is a full review of Crow Moon, then Wednesday will be my weekly craft post, then Friday, writer’s choice. WHo knows?
Have a great week!
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]]>Tangled in Time: Non-Linear Storytelling
Why I Hate it and Why I’m Using it for This Short Story
First of all, let’s get this out of the way: I have no degrees in English, Creative Writing, or any credentials of any kind as far as Literature goes. What I do have is 5 decades as a consumer of fiction; written, spoken, visual, and other. I am a voracious reader, usually reading 3-4 books at a time, unless I’m reading nonfiction, in which case I tend to concentrate more and read slower.
So, having read thousands of books, and watched hundreds of TV show episodes, I’m very familiar with non-linear storytelling, it’s use, and too frequently, it’s abuse.
What is Non-Linear Storytelling?
Picture your favorite long running TV show. Inevitably, there’s an episode or two (or six or 12, depending on how lazy the writers are) where the show’s pre-credit stinger starts off with the protagonists in a very bad or unlikely situation. The scene unfolds to a point of high tension (Will these best friends actually shoot at each other?) before the Intro rolls and we go to commercial. After the commercial, we get a text crawl at the bottom of the screen saying “36 hours ago” or some such, indicating we’re going to step back in time and discover just how our heroes found themselves in such a precarious situation.
It’s a technique, a bit of artifice to try and build tension because the writers couldn’t do the work of maintaining your interest without some threat. To be fair to the TV folks, they have to write multiple scripts in a short period of time, so sometimes shortcuts are unavoidable. There are also times when nonlinear storytelling can be extremely effective in visual media.
Take the show Arrow for example. Most TV episodes have an A story and a B story; the A is the lead, and the B is a side story that often either plays into the A story or addresses the episode theme from another point of view. And sometimes the B story is there to keep the supporting cast happy. In Arrow, the B story was almost always a flashback, or in the latter seasons, a flash forward. It performed two functions. It filled in the five-year gap between Oliver Queen’s disappearance and reappearance, and it almost always provided motivation for his actions in the A story.
It added depth to the storyline without feeling like a gimmick to grab your attention.
What’s Wrong with It?
In my opinion, it’s usually a sign that the writer can’t build an effective opening scene, so they cheat by starting with the climax.
As writers, we’re told that we must hook our audience as quickly as possible or we’ll lose them forever, and that’s not wrong. I know one author who is kind enough to review stories for new writers, and his standard is they get three paragraphs for a short story, or three pages for a novel to capture his attention. If they can’t do it by then, he stops.
That’s pretty harsh, but I know another editor/publisher who lowers that to three sentences.
Yikes!
So there’s tremendous pressure on a writer, particularly a new one who is striving to build an audience, to hook the reader early. In most cases that I’ve read, the writer uses the climax as a hook, but then is back to square one, trying to maintain the reader’s interest as he slogs through the set up. It doesn’t eliminate the need for tight writing at the beginning of the story; it just postpones it. And worse, now, after teasing the reader, then forcing him to wade through the set up, you absolutely must nail the pay-off. Anticipation is a wonderful thing, unless you leave your reader hanging with a bail-out ending.
Then you may lose them forever.
So Why am I Using it?
Because I’m cursed. Inevitably, when I say I don’t like to do something, within moments, I’m being forced to do it.
My protagonist is a Paladin with PTSD. He faced a horrendous battle, and now has been retired from combat duties to act as an administrator and adjudicator. So of course, he’s thrown into conflict and combat.
I started writing the story linearly, with his arrival in the village and the low-level conflict he was sent to resolve. I wove the information about his PTSD and its causes into the story, then started the big fight. But as I wrote, something felt off to me. The first battle, the one in the past, was so horrific, and played such a huge role in his actions in the present, that I dint feel comfortable having it happen off screen. I rewrote it, fleshing out the battle as more or less a prol0gue to the main action, but it was too big; it dominated the first half of the story, making the resolution feel anticlimactic.
So I went non-linear. I started with the present day fight, segued to the past, then returned to the present battle. This minimized the initiating event of the story, his presence in the town to adjudicate some small matter, but that was okay. That part of the plot wasn’t critical. What was critical was his response to the earlier battle, and how it colors his response to the current one.
Shorter version: I’m using the technique because the story told me to.
Let the Story Tell Itself
That’s what I’m doing. I’m a pantser; it’s what I do anyway. I let the story tell itself. It goes much more smoothly that way. Is it the right thing in this case? I honestly won’t know until I finish the story and get it to a couple of beta readers. All I can say with assurance right now is the story is flowing much better than it was when I tried to do it with a linear narrative.
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Yeah, I know. It’s ambitious. Or insane. Take your pick. So let me tell you where this is coming from.
I Am the 95%
I just finished reading Titans Rising, as well as Have Keyboard, Will Type (both highly recommended by the way and TR is reviewed here.), and I joined the 20Booksto50k(r) Facebook group (Also highly recommended.) One piece of advice has been consistent in all three places: You have to finish your book before you can sell it.
It seems obvious, right? But it’s no less true for that. You must finish the book. And by finish, I mean get it out of your writer hands and into the reader’s hands, with everthing that goes along with that. Covers, formatting, book design, marketing and so on.
For me, I need a deadline in order to finish. A drop dead, no-shit, end of the world deadline. One of the things Bill Webb talks about in Have Keyboard is the army of people who “are going to write a novel” or “are writing a novel” that never quite manage to finish writing a novel. AS he says, 95% of the people who start to write a novel never finish. I think he’s optimistic in that assessment and I say that as somebody who fits that definition. I have two different novels “in progress” and a third percolating in my head. The first novel has roughly 25,000 words, the second about 12,000.
I’ve been working on them for years.
That’s bullshit. I’ve been playing with them for years. The LibertyCon Challenge is my way of escaping the 95% trap.
Leaving the 95%
When I was encouraged to submit a story for an anthology, there was a deadline, and that made it real. I worked on the story, wrote a couple of false starts, then found the voice and tore through the first draft in less than a week. I gave it to a couple of alpha readers who made some good suggestions. I revised accordingly, fixed typos, and submitted at the deadline.
It sold.
This did a couple of things for me. First, it made me squee out loud, scaring the cat. Second, it gave me a sense of affirmation. I can tell a good story. People will pay to read what I write. I CAN do this.
But I need a plan and a deadline.
Taking the Next Step
I have set a few goals.
- Submit a short story to the Baen Fantasy Contest
- Submit a short story to the New Mythology open call
- Submit a short story to Sanderley for the next Going Home anthology
- Have a novel published by CKP, either shared universe or stand alone. (Or both)
- Have a novel published by Baen.
You’ve probably noticed these are not monetary goals. These are what I’m going to call craft goals; they aren’t signs of a successful professional career because they don’t include the ultimate metric for professional success: money. But they are important to me nonetheless as measures of how well I am mastering the craft of writing. If editors and publishers I respect find my work worthy of taking on, that’s confirmation that I am continuing to learn and grow my ability as a writer and a storyteller. (Hmmm. The basis for another post. What’s the difference and why does it matter?)
Now, as important as that is, I also need to pay attention to the business side, and that means looking at revenue. Like I said at the beginning, a book is finished when it is getting into the hands of readers, and that leads to a different set of goals, the first of which is my LibertyCon challenge.
Minimally Viable Products
The mantra of 20Booksto50k(r) is write-publish, write-publish, lather, rinse, repeat. Quantity has a quality of its own. They refer to their books as ‘minimally viable products.” In short, a poorly edited book that’s on the market will sell more copies than a perfectly edited book that’s still in revision. I get what they are saying; a book can’t earn money until it’s published, and editing/revising takes a huge chunk of time, during which you aren’t making money. The model comes straight from Microsoft, which is famous for releases that are buggy as hell. Microsoft uses its customer base as beta testers, fixing bugs after deployment.
Everybody knows this; everybody gripes about how buggy Microsoft products are on launch. Yet everybody still uses them.
Of course, Microsoft has the advantage of operating in an area with a limited number of competitors; books aren’t like that. If I piss off a reader with a poorly formatted, poorly edited book, that reader has a million other options for their next book purchase.
I won’t put a book or story out that’s filled with typos, continuity errors, etc. On the other hand, they aren’t wrong. A tight deadline will force me to work fast and clean in order to have enough time to edit/revise the manuscript, find a good cover, write a blurb, design the book and so on.
The LibertyCon Challenge
LibertyCon is just 9 weeks away. Many 20booksto50k writers generally aim to put out a novel every 5 weeks or so. That’s not a viable option for me right now; I have too many other projects (none of them sold, mind you, but one with a fast-approaching deadline) plus real-life commitments. But 5 weeks to write, then 4 weeks to revise, format twice(ebook/print). then do everything else to have physical copies available for sale at LibertyCon..
This is going to be interesting!
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]]>The Folks who gave so generously of their time and resources to contribute to Titans Rising aren’t stopping there. They’re happy to share what they’ve learned to new writers (like me) and listed resources and contact information in their respective chapters. As promised, here is a list of those resources. While this list is extremely helpful, without the context you get from the book, you’ll miss out on a lot of the value. In other words, don’t skip the book for the Cliff Notes.
Writer and Publisher Resources of the Titans
(*=multiple recommendations; items in italics are contact information)
- Chris Kennedy Publishing
- Stanford Publishing Course
- Publishers Weekly
- Wordfire.com
- Wordfirepress.com
- Superstars Writing Seminars*
- 20Booksto50K*
- 20booksto50kconference*
- www.mountaindalepress
- Facebook: The Devine Dungeon
- Amazon Dakota Krout
- Chicago Manual of Style, or any Style guide really.
- the sneakykittycritic.com
- the Keystroke Medium podcast
- Aethon Books
- Tim C Taylor
- Lydia Sherrer
- lydia@lydiasherrer.com
- badashpublishing
- Conundrum Publishing
- The Bestseller Code
- Front Line Publishing Inc
All of the resources above come from the stories told by the Titans of Titans Rising, or are ways to learn from the Titans themselves.
It’s certainly a great place to get started learning how to do what they have already done.
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]]>Last week I read the book Titans Rising which gives writers and small press publishers guidance on how to succeed in today’s rapidly changing publishing environment. The book is largely made up with successful publishers and writers answering a series of questions about themselves and their success. Besides providing an interesting cross section of experiences, it also provided a long list of resources for writers like me, who are just starting their journeys. After I finished it, I posted a review which you can read here. Since I plan on becoming a Titan, I decided to answer the same questions they did.
And here we are.
Biography
This should be good practice for the “About the Author” blurb.
I was introduced to science fiction at a young age, courtesy of the nun running the library where I attended Catholic grade school. The library had a complete selection of Heinlein juveniles, along with Clifford Simak, Arthur C Clarke, Isaac Asimov A.E. Van Vogt and many others. My guess is that this was one of the priest’s private collections that he donated since I don’t see a Catholic diocese buying science fiction in 1969. After devouring all the SF they had, multiple times, I branched out into other genres but SF and later fantasy remained my go-to reads.
I joined the Navy as a nuclear reactor operator after the University of Tennessee advised me to take a semester time off. I had developed the bad habit of attending class only on exam days. I passed the classes, but the teachers had a problem with my approach, and graded accordingly. I spent almost nine years in the Navy, acquiring a wife and 6 kids along the way. From there, I worked a variety of jobs until I got into developing and giving industrial training in 2004 or so, which turned into a technical writing gig, as well as some programming.
Along the way, I picked up a side gig as a sports stringer for the local paper on the strength of a blog I started in 2002. This was my first regularly paying gig as a writer and photographer, since I got paid a few extra bucks if I provided pictures. The money wasn’t much, but it paid for a nice camera, some lenses and a couple of laptops over the years. Each of these jobs involved writing to deadlines, communicating with multiple audience, and required both discipline and creativity. All of this will help as I work on becoming a Titan.
A divorce and new marriage upped the kid count to eight, and they have blessed me with 17 grandkids so far.
When I’m not writing, I enjoy gaming, hiking, swimming, reading, knitting, stargazing, woodworking and making awesome barbeque for my friends and family.
Education
I’m an autodidact polymath. I love learning new things, which is why I loved being a trainer. The military has a saying, that you never really know a subject until you try to teach it, and that is 100% true. I learn new things every time I teach a class, and that’s the way I like it. As for formal education, my semester break from UT has lasted almost 30 years now, but I still plan on finishing a degree.
Eventually.
On the other hand, if I want to learn something, I just fire up the computer and dig in. Did you know that MIT has a large portion of its curriculum available online for free? Lectures, notes, assignments, everything but the textbooks. I’m working through calculus right now so I can dive into physics for real. I have a hard spot with the whole concept of dark matter. It’s too much like a fudge factor for me, but until I have the math to understand the theory, I can’t prove my suspicions.
Being self-taught is excellent preparation for becoming a Titan. It’s not always about what you know; it’s about what you can learn. I’ve learned how to learn.
Influences
Instead of talking about who has influenced me as a writer (early Stephen King, Robert Heinlein, Ray Bradbury, Robert Jordan, Harlan Ellison, the list goes on) I’m going to talk about the guy who motivate me by showing that I can tell a story that people like.
High school freshman English, we were all assigned to write a tall tale. I wrote about an Irishman who fell into a bottomless hole and wound up on the other side of the earth. Once the assignments were turned in, the teacher read them for the class, keeping the author’s names secret. As each story was read, the class reacted. One guy, Alex, became the ultimate arbiter of each story. If the story failed, in a laconic voice, he would say, “I’m still thirsty.”
When my story came up, I tried to keep a poker face, waiting for Alex’s remarks. “My thirst,” he said, “is quenched.”
That was the point that I knew I could tell a story that people would respond to. And that formed my primary goal. When I finish a story, I want to hear Alex’s voice saying “My thirst is quenched.”
Path to Publication
I have one story out, but “a journey of a thousand miles” and all that. My first step was sitting down and talking with Rob Howell, who publishes the New Mythology line of books for Chris Kennedy Publishing. I’d met Rob before at LibertyCon, a literary SFF con in Tennessee, and we’d enjoyed talking about his books and stories. Rob is a big-hearted guy who is all about helping new writers get their start, so when I saw him in 2021 at another con, I decided to ask his advice on getting a book published.
He said four things.
- Start with short stories in anthologies. You can write them faster, you get the advantage of being in a book with established authors, and you show you can write to a deadline and be professional.
- Develop relationships with publishers in your field. This doesn’t mean shmooze them. It means learning what they want to publish, what they are looking for, and demonstrating that you can deliver it. Of course, a little shmoozing doesn’t hurt.
- Develop a social media presence. Even before you have fans, give them a way to find and follow you. Publishers are looking to leverage any marketing edge they can. If you’ve already built the platform, you’re ahead of the game. At the same time, you have to work the platform. In Titans Rising, there’s a story of a publisher rejecting a book, not because it was bad, but because the author didn’t show that he was willing to do the hard work of marketing the book. Small press publishers have limited resources. Don’t make them work harder than you do in promoting your work.
- Once you’ve demonstrated to the publisher that people will pay money for your work, and you’ve developed a decent sized and active fan base, then put the effort into writing longer works.
Then he told me he had an open call for submissions. I read the details, read a few books that he had published, then wrote and submitted my first story ever.
It became my first sale and my first step towards becoming a Titan
The Hard Lessons I’ve Learned
I suck at running a business. I’ve proven that to myself by failing, and I hate failing. I have no interest in running a business. Accounting, invoicing, taxes, etc, they all bore me to tears. Unfortunately, in the world of independent and small press publishing, a writer who doesn’t practice sound business management will quickly fail no matter how good their story is.
So how am I solving this?
I have friends and family members who love the business side of things and I’m enlisting them to shore up my weak areas. I can’t totally divorce myself from the business side of the house, but I can reach out and get help from people who are better at it than I am.
Come to think of it, that advice applies more generally as well. If you find a weak spot, shore it up yourself as best as possible, and get help from people who are better than you.
Where am I Now?
I’m at the very beginning. I have one sale, and I’ve got requests for more stories from a couple of publishers, and I’m constantly looking for more open calls for submissions. I’m still working on a couple of novels, but they are on the back burner while I get stories out in circulation. I have a fast-approaching deadline for the Baen Fantasy contest and I need to finish and edit a story for that. I’m building my marketing platform (Hello marketing platform!) and planning con travel, not just for fun but to continue networking with Titans and other up and coming writers/publishers.
Where do I See Things Going?
This question has two answers.
For me, I expect to place a few more short stories in open call submissions. The next step will be when I’m asked to contribute directly, rather than through an open call. The next step is to finish and submit a novel and get it accepted. Whether it’s a traditional publisher or a small/Indy press depends on what is happening by then. As an alternate, if I can’t get any traction, but I still think the novel is good, I’ll self-publish. With the help of some good friends of course. As a look at the logo for this site shows, my graphic design skills are somewhat lacking.
And then, it’s off to the races. If I do it right, and that means writing, publishing, and marketing, then I’ll make enough money to do it all over again. And again. And again.
If I don’t do it right? Figure out what I did wrong and try again. And again. And again.
Persistence is the key.
Contact Info
rich@richhailey.com
www.richhailey.com
Facewbook and other social media to come.
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The post Titans Rising: Publishing in the 21st Century appeared first on Rich Hailey Writer.
]]>Edited by William Allen Webb and Chris Kennedy, Titans Rising is a manifesto combined with a how-to book on writing and publishing. I am not exaggerating when I say it may be the most important book on how to succeed in today’s everchanging climate. Independent presses are springing up everywhere. Amazon has crashed the gates of traditional publishing and the few major houses left standing are reeling, trying desperately to hold onto control of the market. And failing. It’s a real-life Game of Thrones and the Big 4 are playing the role of Ned Stark, clinging to the past even as their heads are on the chopping block. Want a different analogy? Okay. The Big 4 are the dinosaurs; Amazon is the comet that wipes them out, and the Independent Presses are the small squeaky mammals who improvise, adapt, and take over the world. (Hmmm. Small Squeaky Mammals. Could be the name of a publishing company. Or a bad punk band.) However you want to look at it, publishing is changing and the pace of the change is accelerating. Just last month, Brandon Sanderson turned the publishing world on its head when he announced a Kickstarter to publish the four novels he wrote during the travel restricted period of the shut downs. Titans Rising shows you what you need to do to build your audience in the most credible way possible: 19 highly successful writers and publishers, from small press, indy and traditional, share their stories on how they achieved success. Not only that, but they share the mistakes they made along the way, and the resources they found that helped them get passed those mistakes It is said that a mart man learns from his mistake. Well, I think a smarter man learns from somebody else’s mistakes, and the generosity of the Titans in this book makes it possible to do just that. In fact, the resources listed alone are worth the price of the book. There are a lot of scams out there; the Titans are helping new writers and publishers to avoid some of them. One of the things I plan on doing on my second read through is to compile a list of those resources. I’ll post that list here once I do. The book is a fast read, but one I’ll come back to time and again because there’s so much good information, and just as importantly, encouragement. The Titans talk about the hard parts as well as the good parts. Seeing your stories told and being shared is awesome, but the process to get to that point is hard work and plenty of it. There will be setbacks; there will be failure and rejection. But they’ve been there, and weathered it, showing you that you can as well. Like I said at the top, I just finished the book, and it got me so fired up that even though this site is nowhere near finished, I had to write this first post, just to get the ball rolling. The closing of the book takes the advice from the Titans and turns them into Action Steps. I’m taking action. One of the points of emphasis is the absolute importance of building a marketing network, including social media, blogs, writer groups, and so on. This site you are on right now is my start at doing just that. I’ll be adding a Facebook author page, developing my Amazon page, setting up a Twitter feed, and all the other parts that go along with it. If you’re reading this close to its publish date, then congratulations; you’re here from the beginning. Welcome aboard, and I hope you enjoy the trip. I plan on being a Titan. Notice I didn’t say I want to be a Titan. Wanting, aspiring, hoping, these are all passive expressions. There’s no action implied. I’m planning and executing the plan. That’s the first step.Not only is the paint not dry on this site, I haven’t even finished building the foundations and I’m already writing a review! That’s how important Titans Rising is.Brandon Sanderson’s Kickstarter
He raised $42 million dollars in a month. As is pointed out in Titans Rising, that’s 10x more than one of the biggest SF publishers brings in over an entire year. Sanderson has paid attention to the market, and has learned the lessons provided in Titans Rising. Build and audience, and they will support you.How to Succeed in Publishing
Moving Forward
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