Posts
Elizabeth Zelvin
Pace is one of those elements of a story that readers may not be aware of as part of the writer's craft, but which makes the difference between a story that drags and one that keeps readers turning the pages. I've been writing my whole life and editing the writing of others for what feels like almost that long. But it's only since my first novel was published that I have become fully aware of all the details that can make or break the pacing of my novel or story and how I can tighten a scene or a chapter in revision so that it sweeps the reader along.
Backstory is everything about the characters and setting except what happens during the period in which the story is taking place. In a mystery, it may include the protagonist's whole history, information his family, and the events that took place in earlier books in the series. In crime fiction, current opinion seems to be that the less backstory, the better. Some writing mavens even say that no backstory is the right amount. I wouldn't go that far, but I have learned how leaving it out can improve pace. In a literary novel, all those details that have nothing to do with the immediate scene form the texture of the narrative. In a mystery, they may slow it down.
Suppose my protagonist, Bruce, says: "Jimmy walked into the coffee shop ahead of me. Just inside the door, he stopped short." I might like to have him tell the reader a lot of digressive detail about Bruce and Jimmy's relationship to each other, how they feel about coffee, that the coffee shop used to be a neighborhood candy store when they were kids where it was a big treat to go in there with a dime or quarter to spend and the old man behind the counter would let them take as long as they wanted choosing the candy. This could be great stuff. But not now. We want to move the reader right on to what or who in that coffee shop takes Jimmy by surprise.
One bad habit I let myself make in a first draft but have learned to change in revision is starting a scene in the middle. Suppose Bruce says: "I was standing on the corner, waiting for Jimmy to bring the car around. He had promised me he'd drive me out to Brooklyn to the cemetery." That "had" is a clue that I need to revise. I can improve the pace by taking the events in sequence. "'I'll drive you to the cemetery,' Jimmy said. The next morning, we drove across the Brooklyn Bridge."
Another bad habit is starting a scene before the beginning. If the scene is about what happens in Brooklyn, why not start the scene in Brooklyn? When I’m writing the first draft, I have a tendency to rev myself up by starting a scene with the phone ringing. The first sentence of Death Will Help You Leave Him (out in October) is “I scootched into the back of Jimmy’s Toyota.” In the first draft, before Bruce got into the car, he answered the telephone, engaged in some banter with Jimmy and Barbara, and ran down the stairs from his walkup apartment into the rain before getting into the car. Luckily, I ran that chapter past a workshop group that included a very experienced short story writer. (Short story writers had better know about pace.) He looked at Page 1 over my shoulder, put his index finger on “I scootched,” and said, “The story starts here.”
Showing posts with label writer's craft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writer's craft. Show all posts
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Thursday, July 16, 2009
"The End" Is Just the Beginning, Part IV of Four: Two writers talk about editing, critique, and craft
Elizabeth Zelvin & Sharon Wildwind
What have you learned about writing since your first book was published?
Sharon: Old habits die hard.
The word “the” should not make up 33% of an entire chapter.
Remove every qualifier (just, almost, nearly, possibly, etc) as a matter of course. Occasionally, you may replace one, but only one, and that’s usually in dialog because it reflects how a character speaks.
There are words for which I lack a gene to spell correctly, ever, under any circumstances.
There’s not enough time or space in my life for people who are rude or stupid when they critique.
If more than one person says something is clunky or doesn’t read right, fix that part, no matter how much you adore it the way it is.
One of the great joys of writing it to pick up a terrific book, say to myself, “I’ve read this before,” but know that can’t be true because it’s just been published, and then realize that I read it in manuscript form. To know I was there at the beginning, before the story went public, is a gift.
Liz: With each book, I internalize more of what I’ve heard about writing fiction since I started talking with—and listening to—other mystery writers. The kind of editing I learned at my mother’s knee is essential to a clean manuscript that reads smoothly. But fiction writing—characterization, plotting, pace, “showing, not telling,” dialogue, backstory, point of view—is a whole different skill set. Crafting a mystery novel is different from crafting a short story. I hardly ever read short stories, and certainly never dreamed I’d write them, until a couple of years ago. It’s not a matter of deliberately following rules to construct these elements of the mystery. I think the information about what’s needed gets assimilated gradually and then bubbles up—either in a new intuitive ability, say, to stick to a point of view or pace an action scene—or in a new ability to see what’s wrong and fix it when you read it over.
What aspect of your craft as a writer are you most proud of?
Sharon: That little click I get in my brain when I know that a heart-breaking scene is right. What makes it even sweeter is when someone later says, “I cried when I read that scene.”
Liz: In my mystery series, I’m very proud of my protagonist Bruce’s voice. I didn’t know if I could create a male character in the first person and make him real, smart, funny, and vulnerable—and nothing like me. To me, going beyond the autobiographical is the hallmark of professionalism in a fiction writer. I’m thrilled that reader feedback indicates I’ve pulled it off.
What’s the hardest part of writing for you?
Liz: The first draft of a novel is a nightmare. I’m telling myself the story, creating a world or community and characters to populate it, and I’m never sure I’ll make it through to the end until I’ve done it. And then I have dreadful doubts about whether I can do it again. It’s a little comforting that I’ve heard highly successful and prolific writers say the same is true for them. Revision is a breeze in comparison—and at that point, I have trusted critiquers to share the burden.
Sharon: It’s like this quote from the mystery writer, Claudia McCants: “What gets in my way when I'm writing? I think the question really is, What doesn't?” On any given day, anything, even things I’ve previously done easily, can be the worst chore in the world. Writing is a matter of keeping your courage up enough to write every day, even when you are convinced that you should have taken up any other occupation.
What have you learned about writing since your first book was published?
Sharon: Old habits die hard.
The word “the” should not make up 33% of an entire chapter.
Remove every qualifier (just, almost, nearly, possibly, etc) as a matter of course. Occasionally, you may replace one, but only one, and that’s usually in dialog because it reflects how a character speaks.
There are words for which I lack a gene to spell correctly, ever, under any circumstances.
There’s not enough time or space in my life for people who are rude or stupid when they critique.
If more than one person says something is clunky or doesn’t read right, fix that part, no matter how much you adore it the way it is.
One of the great joys of writing it to pick up a terrific book, say to myself, “I’ve read this before,” but know that can’t be true because it’s just been published, and then realize that I read it in manuscript form. To know I was there at the beginning, before the story went public, is a gift.
Liz: With each book, I internalize more of what I’ve heard about writing fiction since I started talking with—and listening to—other mystery writers. The kind of editing I learned at my mother’s knee is essential to a clean manuscript that reads smoothly. But fiction writing—characterization, plotting, pace, “showing, not telling,” dialogue, backstory, point of view—is a whole different skill set. Crafting a mystery novel is different from crafting a short story. I hardly ever read short stories, and certainly never dreamed I’d write them, until a couple of years ago. It’s not a matter of deliberately following rules to construct these elements of the mystery. I think the information about what’s needed gets assimilated gradually and then bubbles up—either in a new intuitive ability, say, to stick to a point of view or pace an action scene—or in a new ability to see what’s wrong and fix it when you read it over.
What aspect of your craft as a writer are you most proud of?
Sharon: That little click I get in my brain when I know that a heart-breaking scene is right. What makes it even sweeter is when someone later says, “I cried when I read that scene.”
Liz: In my mystery series, I’m very proud of my protagonist Bruce’s voice. I didn’t know if I could create a male character in the first person and make him real, smart, funny, and vulnerable—and nothing like me. To me, going beyond the autobiographical is the hallmark of professionalism in a fiction writer. I’m thrilled that reader feedback indicates I’ve pulled it off.
What’s the hardest part of writing for you?
Liz: The first draft of a novel is a nightmare. I’m telling myself the story, creating a world or community and characters to populate it, and I’m never sure I’ll make it through to the end until I’ve done it. And then I have dreadful doubts about whether I can do it again. It’s a little comforting that I’ve heard highly successful and prolific writers say the same is true for them. Revision is a breeze in comparison—and at that point, I have trusted critiquers to share the burden.
Sharon: It’s like this quote from the mystery writer, Claudia McCants: “What gets in my way when I'm writing? I think the question really is, What doesn't?” On any given day, anything, even things I’ve previously done easily, can be the worst chore in the world. Writing is a matter of keeping your courage up enough to write every day, even when you are convinced that you should have taken up any other occupation.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
“The End” Is Just the Beginning, Part II of Four: Two writers talk about editing, critique, and craft
Elizabeth Zelvin & Sharon Wildwind
How important are the mechanics of writing: spelling, grammar, syntax?
Sharon: Absolutely, one-hundred percent, ground-zero critical. Poor word-and-sentence-crafting skills are like saying that a concert musician can ignore finger exercises, or a painter doesn’t have to know the differences between acrylics and watercolors. Writers profit by losing the myth that an editor will fix all of that tawdry stuff once the publisher buys a manuscript.
Of the three, spelling without reference and without error is being replaced by an ability to use a spellchecker, but that’s like needing basic arithmetic skills to use a calculator. I may not remember that 6 x 7 = 42, but I need to know that the answer to 6 x 7 falls somewhere between 40 and 50, so that when my calculator misfires and tells me that the answer is 167, my brain goes, “Wait a minute.” It’s the same with spelling. If I have a choice between two closely-spelled words, I have to know which one to choose.
Unfortunately, there aren’t yet any grammar and syntax programs that can be as bang-on as spell checkers. With lots of writers, me included, the banging that goes on is me hitting my head in frustration when the computer, for the 137th time, corrects a grammar usage that I’ve intentionally chosen.
Liz: I was brought up to believe that correct spelling was not optional. I know today that spelling is not necessarily proof of intelligence—or vice versa—but I didn’t learn that from my family. We were all demon Scrabble players. I can still remember my feeling of triumph at the age of nine when I insisted—correctly—that “exhilarating” was spelled with an “a” in the middle, while my mother said it was an “i” and my father voted for “e.” To this day I don’t know if they were just giving me an easy win. My mother always said “It is I” and put “whom” in all the right places. I know where it should be, but I don’t do it in casual conversation. And I don’t mind ending a sentence with a preposition.
Do you have any particular bees in your bonnet about the use of language?
Liz: My pet peeve is the split infinitive. The Star Trek slogan—“to boldly go”—drives me nuts. So does “to better understand.” I don’t know why people think that it’s okay to split the infinitive when the word in the middle is “better.” You can write or speak a perfectly smooth sentence in which you say that you want “to understand [something] better.” Thinking “to better understand” is a better locution is like thinking it’s more aristocratic to stick out your pinky when you hold a teacup—something I’ve read enough Golden Age English novels to know no true aristocrat would do.
Sharon: Carelessness, such as split infinitives. Damn it, Jim, it’s either “to go boldly” or “boldly, to go.”
“Point in time.” The action has either reached a point (a place) or a time (a when), but not both at the same time.
Business jargon. “Uniquely recapitualize leveraged web-readiness vis-a-vis out-of-the-box information,” works fine in a Dilbert cartoon, but has no place in the real world. As an aside, if you run a Macintosh system that uses widgets, download Corporate Ipsum. You can have tons of fun with the business jargon it generates.
My biggest gripe is format.
There, I feel a lot better.
Coming on Tuesday July 14: Part III, on critique groups
How important are the mechanics of writing: spelling, grammar, syntax?
Sharon: Absolutely, one-hundred percent, ground-zero critical. Poor word-and-sentence-crafting skills are like saying that a concert musician can ignore finger exercises, or a painter doesn’t have to know the differences between acrylics and watercolors. Writers profit by losing the myth that an editor will fix all of that tawdry stuff once the publisher buys a manuscript.
Of the three, spelling without reference and without error is being replaced by an ability to use a spellchecker, but that’s like needing basic arithmetic skills to use a calculator. I may not remember that 6 x 7 = 42, but I need to know that the answer to 6 x 7 falls somewhere between 40 and 50, so that when my calculator misfires and tells me that the answer is 167, my brain goes, “Wait a minute.” It’s the same with spelling. If I have a choice between two closely-spelled words, I have to know which one to choose.
Unfortunately, there aren’t yet any grammar and syntax programs that can be as bang-on as spell checkers. With lots of writers, me included, the banging that goes on is me hitting my head in frustration when the computer, for the 137th time, corrects a grammar usage that I’ve intentionally chosen.
Liz: I was brought up to believe that correct spelling was not optional. I know today that spelling is not necessarily proof of intelligence—or vice versa—but I didn’t learn that from my family. We were all demon Scrabble players. I can still remember my feeling of triumph at the age of nine when I insisted—correctly—that “exhilarating” was spelled with an “a” in the middle, while my mother said it was an “i” and my father voted for “e.” To this day I don’t know if they were just giving me an easy win. My mother always said “It is I” and put “whom” in all the right places. I know where it should be, but I don’t do it in casual conversation. And I don’t mind ending a sentence with a preposition.
Do you have any particular bees in your bonnet about the use of language?
Liz: My pet peeve is the split infinitive. The Star Trek slogan—“to boldly go”—drives me nuts. So does “to better understand.” I don’t know why people think that it’s okay to split the infinitive when the word in the middle is “better.” You can write or speak a perfectly smooth sentence in which you say that you want “to understand [something] better.” Thinking “to better understand” is a better locution is like thinking it’s more aristocratic to stick out your pinky when you hold a teacup—something I’ve read enough Golden Age English novels to know no true aristocrat would do.
Sharon: Carelessness, such as split infinitives. Damn it, Jim, it’s either “to go boldly” or “boldly, to go.”
“Point in time.” The action has either reached a point (a place) or a time (a when), but not both at the same time.
Business jargon. “Uniquely recapitualize leveraged web-readiness vis-a-vis out-of-the-box information,” works fine in a Dilbert cartoon, but has no place in the real world. As an aside, if you run a Macintosh system that uses widgets, download Corporate Ipsum. You can have tons of fun with the business jargon it generates.
My biggest gripe is format.
There, I feel a lot better.
Coming on Tuesday July 14: Part III, on critique groups
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
"The End" Is Just the Beginning, Part I of Four: Two writers talk about editing, critique, and craft
Sharon Wildwind & Elizabeth Zelvin
Where, when, and how did you first learn about editing?
Liz: I literally learned to edit at my mother’s knee. She graduated from law school in 1924, when it was hard for women lawyers to get a job, and eventually made a niche for herself as a legal writer and editor at a major publisher. She left to raise a family, but went back to work as a home-based freelancer when I was 10. In those days, the publisher would pay extra for the author to create her own index. She would type each index item on, yep, an index card, a white 3x5, and I would alphabetize them for her, laying them out on the dining room table like a deck of cards for solitaire. My mother did a contributed book, an encyclopedia of real estate appraisal (a topic on which she knew nothing when she started), that became a long-term bestseller, paying royalties for decades. She left nothing to chance with the real estate experts who were her contributing authors. She sent each of them a well-planned outline, hounded them to stick to it and turn in their manuscripts on time, and in many cases then rewrote each chapter from scratch.
Sharon: I had one technical writing course back in dim mists of university, and I did business writing for a number of years. That gave me a good grounding in the nuts and bolts. My fiction editing was strictly on-the-job training, exchanging on-line critiques with a number of people. Of course, I have the requisite Strunk and White on my reference shelf, along with both of Karen Elizabeth Gordon’s books—The Well-Tempered Sentence: A Punctuation Handbook for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed and The Transitive Vampire: A Handbook of Grammar for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed—and most recently a second-hand copy of Eats Shoots and Leaves.
At what point do you invite critique on a manuscript?
Sharon: As soon as I get the itch to share. I send out my first chapter, to a select group, as soon as possible. My accompanying questions are “Did the story grab you? If so, on what page? Why or why not? Where do you hope the story is heading?
My husband reads every word of every draft as soon as it comes out of the printer. We’ve agreed that he’ll make general comments, like “This is a funny chapter,” or “There’s not a lot of tension here. You might want to rethink it,” unless I ask him specific questions. Poor man, by the end of the book he can’t remember what’s been included and what dropped, which I suppose is a good thing, because when the advanced reading copy arrives, he’s as surprised as anyone.
I also ask for critique when I’m about a third of the way through the first draft; when I’ve included technical information in an area outside of my personal experience; or when I’m stuck and the plot seems dead. Finally, I have a small group of dear friends and gentle people from whom I pick one to read the entire next-to-final draft before I do the final tidying.
Liz: I don’t show anybody the first draft. I don’t outline, so I’m telling myself the story, creating plot and characters as I go, and I can’t afford to feel inhibited or self-conscious. When I have the whole novel on the computer, I print it out and read it through with pen in hand. I put the first set of revisions on the computer, print it out again, and then either make more revisions or ask a trusted critique partner to take a look.
The only time I broke the full-first-draft rule was recently, when I sent Sharon (my gold standard for critique!) 60 pages of a manuscript I didn’t think was working. She didn’t think it was necessarily hopeless, and she had some excellent suggestions. But she asked a great question: “If your publisher went bankrupt tomorrow, would you still want to write this story?” The answer was “No,” so I put it aside and started a different story.
On Thursday July 9: Part II, on spelling, grammar, and the use of language
Where, when, and how did you first learn about editing?
Liz: I literally learned to edit at my mother’s knee. She graduated from law school in 1924, when it was hard for women lawyers to get a job, and eventually made a niche for herself as a legal writer and editor at a major publisher. She left to raise a family, but went back to work as a home-based freelancer when I was 10. In those days, the publisher would pay extra for the author to create her own index. She would type each index item on, yep, an index card, a white 3x5, and I would alphabetize them for her, laying them out on the dining room table like a deck of cards for solitaire. My mother did a contributed book, an encyclopedia of real estate appraisal (a topic on which she knew nothing when she started), that became a long-term bestseller, paying royalties for decades. She left nothing to chance with the real estate experts who were her contributing authors. She sent each of them a well-planned outline, hounded them to stick to it and turn in their manuscripts on time, and in many cases then rewrote each chapter from scratch.
Sharon: I had one technical writing course back in dim mists of university, and I did business writing for a number of years. That gave me a good grounding in the nuts and bolts. My fiction editing was strictly on-the-job training, exchanging on-line critiques with a number of people. Of course, I have the requisite Strunk and White on my reference shelf, along with both of Karen Elizabeth Gordon’s books—The Well-Tempered Sentence: A Punctuation Handbook for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed and The Transitive Vampire: A Handbook of Grammar for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed—and most recently a second-hand copy of Eats Shoots and Leaves.
At what point do you invite critique on a manuscript?
Sharon: As soon as I get the itch to share. I send out my first chapter, to a select group, as soon as possible. My accompanying questions are “Did the story grab you? If so, on what page? Why or why not? Where do you hope the story is heading?
My husband reads every word of every draft as soon as it comes out of the printer. We’ve agreed that he’ll make general comments, like “This is a funny chapter,” or “There’s not a lot of tension here. You might want to rethink it,” unless I ask him specific questions. Poor man, by the end of the book he can’t remember what’s been included and what dropped, which I suppose is a good thing, because when the advanced reading copy arrives, he’s as surprised as anyone.
I also ask for critique when I’m about a third of the way through the first draft; when I’ve included technical information in an area outside of my personal experience; or when I’m stuck and the plot seems dead. Finally, I have a small group of dear friends and gentle people from whom I pick one to read the entire next-to-final draft before I do the final tidying.
Liz: I don’t show anybody the first draft. I don’t outline, so I’m telling myself the story, creating plot and characters as I go, and I can’t afford to feel inhibited or self-conscious. When I have the whole novel on the computer, I print it out and read it through with pen in hand. I put the first set of revisions on the computer, print it out again, and then either make more revisions or ask a trusted critique partner to take a look.
The only time I broke the full-first-draft rule was recently, when I sent Sharon (my gold standard for critique!) 60 pages of a manuscript I didn’t think was working. She didn’t think it was necessarily hopeless, and she had some excellent suggestions. But she asked a great question: “If your publisher went bankrupt tomorrow, would you still want to write this story?” The answer was “No,” so I put it aside and started a different story.
On Thursday July 9: Part II, on spelling, grammar, and the use of language
Thursday, May 21, 2009
What Writers Need to Keep Going
Elizabeth Zelvin
Most professional writers agree that to get the first book published and and then keep a writing career in play, you need the hide of a rhinoceros. For years, I kept on my bulletin board an old Peanuts cartoon in which Snoopy is lying on top of his doghouse reading a letter: “Dear Author, This is the worst novel I have ever read. Your writing stinks.” In the last frame, Snoopy consoles himself by thinking, “It must be a form rejection letter.”
If you go to conferences and read interviews with writers, you know that very few got either their agent or their publisher on the first try. I’ve heard it said more than once that on the average, it takes eight to ten years to get the first novel published. Along with the form rejections and the occasional agent or editor who hates one’s book are the heartbreaking rave rejections: “I loved it—but not quite enough.” “You’ve got it all—fine writing, characters, plot, suspense; I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting it published elsewhere.”
Once that first book comes out, the pressure to produce at least a book a year is tremendous, especially in the mystery world, where series are the norm. And now beleaguered authors not only have to write the next book and promote the first, but also deal with bad reviews, readers who didn’t like their work, emails from experts (genuine and self appointed) saying they got the details wrong, and their own self doubt. I have heard a number of successful authors admit that the fear that this time they’ll fail to come up with a publishable story doesn’t go away, even after the seventeenth book in a series or the third major award.
One mark of the professional writer is openness to critique. It’s hard to write in isolation—and nowadays, essential for aspiring writers to connect not only with “critters” but with those who can teach professional submission behavior and open doors to the newly published. Once upon a time, Thomas Wolfe brought a messy several-hundred-page pile of manuscript to legendary editor Maxwell Perkins, who shaped it into a bestselling novel. This happened in 1929, and people are still talking about it. That’s because it doesn’t happen any more. It doesn’t take much toughness to pour it all out and count on someone else to fix it. Today’s writers have to self critique rigorously as well as being prepared to take in feedback from their critique groups and partners, assess it, and make decisions about which suggestions to accept and use. Then they have to listen to the comments of agents, editors, and copy editors before publication and the whole world once the book appears.
So writers have got to be tough. Yet they must also be sensitive, or how would they empathize with their characters? How do they strike a balance? For me, the key elements I’ve identified so far are self-awareness, detachment, and time. I need to know my craft and love at least some of what I write. Yet I need to know the weaknesses in my writing. I need to identify aspects of craft I have not yet mastered and how to go about improving. I need to remain teachable in both a practical and a spiritual sense. I need to discern the difference between critique and personal attack—most writers encounter both in the course of a career. In my particular case, I need to know that “I can’t” is part of my process—a transient fear, akin to stagefright, that crops up at the beginning of every new project, sometimes every day of writing—and push through it time after time. And I need to know that becoming a better writer is a journey, not a destination that I can reach instantaneously if the perfect agent or the long-sought first contract or even the lucky break will only beam me up.
The cover of Death Will Get You Sober, designed by David Rotstein, has been nominated for an Anthony award for best cover art. Voting will take place at Bouchercon in Indianapolis in October.
Most professional writers agree that to get the first book published and and then keep a writing career in play, you need the hide of a rhinoceros. For years, I kept on my bulletin board an old Peanuts cartoon in which Snoopy is lying on top of his doghouse reading a letter: “Dear Author, This is the worst novel I have ever read. Your writing stinks.” In the last frame, Snoopy consoles himself by thinking, “It must be a form rejection letter.”
If you go to conferences and read interviews with writers, you know that very few got either their agent or their publisher on the first try. I’ve heard it said more than once that on the average, it takes eight to ten years to get the first novel published. Along with the form rejections and the occasional agent or editor who hates one’s book are the heartbreaking rave rejections: “I loved it—but not quite enough.” “You’ve got it all—fine writing, characters, plot, suspense; I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting it published elsewhere.”
Once that first book comes out, the pressure to produce at least a book a year is tremendous, especially in the mystery world, where series are the norm. And now beleaguered authors not only have to write the next book and promote the first, but also deal with bad reviews, readers who didn’t like their work, emails from experts (genuine and self appointed) saying they got the details wrong, and their own self doubt. I have heard a number of successful authors admit that the fear that this time they’ll fail to come up with a publishable story doesn’t go away, even after the seventeenth book in a series or the third major award.
One mark of the professional writer is openness to critique. It’s hard to write in isolation—and nowadays, essential for aspiring writers to connect not only with “critters” but with those who can teach professional submission behavior and open doors to the newly published. Once upon a time, Thomas Wolfe brought a messy several-hundred-page pile of manuscript to legendary editor Maxwell Perkins, who shaped it into a bestselling novel. This happened in 1929, and people are still talking about it. That’s because it doesn’t happen any more. It doesn’t take much toughness to pour it all out and count on someone else to fix it. Today’s writers have to self critique rigorously as well as being prepared to take in feedback from their critique groups and partners, assess it, and make decisions about which suggestions to accept and use. Then they have to listen to the comments of agents, editors, and copy editors before publication and the whole world once the book appears.
So writers have got to be tough. Yet they must also be sensitive, or how would they empathize with their characters? How do they strike a balance? For me, the key elements I’ve identified so far are self-awareness, detachment, and time. I need to know my craft and love at least some of what I write. Yet I need to know the weaknesses in my writing. I need to identify aspects of craft I have not yet mastered and how to go about improving. I need to remain teachable in both a practical and a spiritual sense. I need to discern the difference between critique and personal attack—most writers encounter both in the course of a career. In my particular case, I need to know that “I can’t” is part of my process—a transient fear, akin to stagefright, that crops up at the beginning of every new project, sometimes every day of writing—and push through it time after time. And I need to know that becoming a better writer is a journey, not a destination that I can reach instantaneously if the perfect agent or the long-sought first contract or even the lucky break will only beam me up.
The cover of Death Will Get You Sober, designed by David Rotstein, has been nominated for an Anthony award for best cover art. Voting will take place at Bouchercon in Indianapolis in October.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
The Writer’s Craft and the Learning Curve
Elizabeth Zelvin
I’ve been writing my whole life, having first declared I “wanted to be a writer” at the age of seven and sticking to it through many years of rejections (eight or nine book length manuscripts in the drawer), false starts (like majoring in English and working as a textbook editor), and distractions (like selling life insurance—disastrous—and being a therapist—reasonably successful). As a shrink, I know that if we’re wise, we never stop learning. But having done as all top writers and writing teachers advise—read read read, write write write—for so many decades, I thought the learning curve would flatten out once my “mature” mystery manuscript, Death Will Get You Sober, had actually been accepted and published. Not so.
That first book has been out for a year. The second, Death Will Help You Leave Him, has been through the hands of an editor and copy editor, back to me, and off to production to become the “uncorrected proofs” that my publisher will send as advance review copies to the powerful “big four” of pre-publication reviewers. The third, after many revisions and three sets of comments by carefully selected critique partners, is in my agent’s hands, to be submitted to my editor. And as I struggle to choose between the two stories that might come next in the series and start to turn them into first-draft reality, I am bowled over by how the challenges keep coming, by the amount of craft it takes to turn out the third and fourth and fifth mystery in a series, and by how much more I have to learn.
Much of my learning has taken place the hard way, over time and by living with my mistakes. I’m not complaining about this. I’m a social worker by training, and a beloved boss of mine (a psychologist himself) once said that the only two words social workers ever say are “appropriate” and “process.” In retrospect, I can see that nothing is wasted.
And that knowledge helps me keep going through the next round of rejections, false starts, distractions, and mistakes.
Here’s what I’ve learned so far:
Death Will Get You Sober. First draft completed 2002, accepted for publication 2006, published 2008
1. Don’t submit your first draft to agents—I was given this advice in 2002 but it took several years to sink in.
2. Kill your darlings—same as above.
3. Don’t quit five minutes before the miracle—after 125 agent queries and 35 publisher submissions with and without agents, I got a contract with St. Martin’s, where the manuscript had sat on an editor’s desk for 2 ½ years.
4. Rewrite the whole thing if you have to, if that’s the price of getting published—that’s how my recovering alcoholic Bruce got to be sole protagonist and my world-class codependent Barbara got demoted from co-protagonist to sidekick. In spite of a little feminist embarrassment, I’m so glad I agreed to do it. The result was a much better book.
Intended second manuscript in the series, title withheld. Revised several times. My agent loved it, my editor didn’t. It took me till 2009 to acquire enough craft to see what was wrong with it.
Death Will Help You Leave Him. Submitted March 2008, accepted November 2008, to be published October 2009. Having workshopped the first few chapters in 2006, I revised the first draft lightly. My editor liked it and made hardly any changes.
Next manuscript in the series, ready for submission. Writing the first draft was sheer torture, and I hated the result. For the first time, I couldn’t get away with no research. I had to talk to the police, pick strawberries, and go fishing, all lots more fun than I expected. Three hand picked critique partners helped me turn it into a manuscript I love.
Two candidates for follow-up to the last manuscript. I wrote 60 pages of Manuscript A and decided it wasn’t working. Not enough conflict, too large a pool of suspects. For the first time, I submitted an incomplete first draft to a critique partner. Her comments will help me write this book eventually if I decide to do it. But her key question was, “Is this a book you feel you have to write—if your publisher went bankrupt tomorrow, would you write it anyway?” I couldn’t say yes. But the next day, my thoughts about Manuscript B began to come together in my head. I could even see how much better it would be for the character and series arcs to make B the next one and A the one after that. I’m a little scared about my ability to write B—the stakes get so much higher once you’ve got a series going, especially in a bad economy—and I may have to try outlining for the first time. If so, it’ll be another vertical stretch in the learning curve. I’ll simply have to dig in my pitons and keep going.
I’ve been writing my whole life, having first declared I “wanted to be a writer” at the age of seven and sticking to it through many years of rejections (eight or nine book length manuscripts in the drawer), false starts (like majoring in English and working as a textbook editor), and distractions (like selling life insurance—disastrous—and being a therapist—reasonably successful). As a shrink, I know that if we’re wise, we never stop learning. But having done as all top writers and writing teachers advise—read read read, write write write—for so many decades, I thought the learning curve would flatten out once my “mature” mystery manuscript, Death Will Get You Sober, had actually been accepted and published. Not so.
That first book has been out for a year. The second, Death Will Help You Leave Him, has been through the hands of an editor and copy editor, back to me, and off to production to become the “uncorrected proofs” that my publisher will send as advance review copies to the powerful “big four” of pre-publication reviewers. The third, after many revisions and three sets of comments by carefully selected critique partners, is in my agent’s hands, to be submitted to my editor. And as I struggle to choose between the two stories that might come next in the series and start to turn them into first-draft reality, I am bowled over by how the challenges keep coming, by the amount of craft it takes to turn out the third and fourth and fifth mystery in a series, and by how much more I have to learn.
Much of my learning has taken place the hard way, over time and by living with my mistakes. I’m not complaining about this. I’m a social worker by training, and a beloved boss of mine (a psychologist himself) once said that the only two words social workers ever say are “appropriate” and “process.” In retrospect, I can see that nothing is wasted.
And that knowledge helps me keep going through the next round of rejections, false starts, distractions, and mistakes.
Here’s what I’ve learned so far:
Death Will Get You Sober. First draft completed 2002, accepted for publication 2006, published 2008
1. Don’t submit your first draft to agents—I was given this advice in 2002 but it took several years to sink in.
2. Kill your darlings—same as above.
3. Don’t quit five minutes before the miracle—after 125 agent queries and 35 publisher submissions with and without agents, I got a contract with St. Martin’s, where the manuscript had sat on an editor’s desk for 2 ½ years.
4. Rewrite the whole thing if you have to, if that’s the price of getting published—that’s how my recovering alcoholic Bruce got to be sole protagonist and my world-class codependent Barbara got demoted from co-protagonist to sidekick. In spite of a little feminist embarrassment, I’m so glad I agreed to do it. The result was a much better book.
Intended second manuscript in the series, title withheld. Revised several times. My agent loved it, my editor didn’t. It took me till 2009 to acquire enough craft to see what was wrong with it.
Death Will Help You Leave Him. Submitted March 2008, accepted November 2008, to be published October 2009. Having workshopped the first few chapters in 2006, I revised the first draft lightly. My editor liked it and made hardly any changes.
Next manuscript in the series, ready for submission. Writing the first draft was sheer torture, and I hated the result. For the first time, I couldn’t get away with no research. I had to talk to the police, pick strawberries, and go fishing, all lots more fun than I expected. Three hand picked critique partners helped me turn it into a manuscript I love.
Two candidates for follow-up to the last manuscript. I wrote 60 pages of Manuscript A and decided it wasn’t working. Not enough conflict, too large a pool of suspects. For the first time, I submitted an incomplete first draft to a critique partner. Her comments will help me write this book eventually if I decide to do it. But her key question was, “Is this a book you feel you have to write—if your publisher went bankrupt tomorrow, would you write it anyway?” I couldn’t say yes. But the next day, my thoughts about Manuscript B began to come together in my head. I could even see how much better it would be for the character and series arcs to make B the next one and A the one after that. I’m a little scared about my ability to write B—the stakes get so much higher once you’ve got a series going, especially in a bad economy—and I may have to try outlining for the first time. If so, it’ll be another vertical stretch in the learning curve. I’ll simply have to dig in my pitons and keep going.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Learning Today’s Publishing While U Wait
Elizabeth Zelvin
I first said I wanted to be a writer in 1951. I got my first rave rejection, for a children’s story, in 1970. (“So the next sentence should be an offer of contract. Unfortunately, Mr. Nixon…the economy….” Some things never change. And some things a writer never forgets.) I had an agent but failed to sell three mystery manuscripts in 1975 or so. I began my current journey toward publication in 2002, and my mystery came out just ten days ago.
What’s changed in publishing since 1951, or even 1991? What hasn’t changed? Small companies that cherished their authors and readers have become conglomerates focused on the bottom line as calculated by computers. Some have stopped publishing mysteries as a result. I know personally at least two award-nominated authors whose series have died because houses whose names were synonymous with mysteries—Walker for hardcovers, Pocket Books for paperbacks—stopped putting out that kind of book.
Thanks to the Internet, I know dozens, perhaps hundreds of mystery writers trying to break into print. I was one of them for five years between completing the first draft and getting an offer for Death Will Get You Sober. The process is rigorous and discouraging. The odds against are enormous. The pool of writers is vast and the pool of publishers small, even including small presses. My mantras throughout those five years were, “Talent, persistence, and luck,” and, “Don’t quit five minutes before the miracle.” May you never experience such a long five minutes!
Waiting was agony, and so were the many, many rejections. It was hard not to take them personally, even though thanks to the Internet I was in touch with others getting the same scribbled notes on their query letters, the same coffee-stained manuscripts returned; even though, in the long run, I came to agree with and learn from some of the criticisms offered.
Looking back, however, I can see that not a single day of that interminable wait was truly wasted. I used it to learn the craft of today’s mystery writing, which differs from the standards of twenty-five years ago in structure and pace and point of view and how people interact and what’s a viable motive for murder among other elements. And I served a priceless apprenticeship—in Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, e-lists like DorothyL and Murder Must Advertise, and social networks like CrimeSpace—in the business of 21st century publishing.
As a result, I'm arriving on the field well equipped to beat the odds. Will I succeed? As Dick Francis has written, anything can happen in a horse race. The same is true of the gamble of mystery publishing. But at least I’m not starting out with blinders on. I find that when well-meaning friends offer suggestions or ask questions, I can bring a lot of knowledge to my answers. Just a few:
Q. Why don’t you go on Oprah?
A. That would be great—do you know anyone who has a contact with her? You can’t send her your book—it doesn’t work that way. She has to find it for herself.
Q. I’ll wait for the paperback to come out.
A. Unfortunately, if we don’t sell enough of the hardcover, the publisher won’t bring out a paperback. The book will go out of print, and in most cases, no other publisher will take the series.
Q. What about John Grisham and J.K. Rowling?
A. The odds are about the same as winning the lottery.
Q. The publisher doesn’t arrange your book tour?
A. No, not for a debut fiction author unless you’re a celebrity or have written a blockbuster. But that doesn’t mean the publisher’s publicity department does nothing. My publicist at St. Martin’s has worked actively with me to sell the book to booksellers, make sure reviewers get it, and make the most of any kind of hook so I’ll stand out from the crowd.
Q. Isn’t MySpace just for kids?
A. Not at all. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the process of building up to 1160 friends on MySpace. They include fellow writers, mystery lovers, and people in recovery from alcoholism, other addictions, and codependency—the very people who might get a kick out of Death Will Get You Sober. There’s a culture and a community on MySpace, and it’s fascinating. You can learn so much about people—their interests, their dreams, their heroes—as well as what they read and whether they drink. What a great way to find readers!
I first said I wanted to be a writer in 1951. I got my first rave rejection, for a children’s story, in 1970. (“So the next sentence should be an offer of contract. Unfortunately, Mr. Nixon…the economy….” Some things never change. And some things a writer never forgets.) I had an agent but failed to sell three mystery manuscripts in 1975 or so. I began my current journey toward publication in 2002, and my mystery came out just ten days ago.
What’s changed in publishing since 1951, or even 1991? What hasn’t changed? Small companies that cherished their authors and readers have become conglomerates focused on the bottom line as calculated by computers. Some have stopped publishing mysteries as a result. I know personally at least two award-nominated authors whose series have died because houses whose names were synonymous with mysteries—Walker for hardcovers, Pocket Books for paperbacks—stopped putting out that kind of book.
Thanks to the Internet, I know dozens, perhaps hundreds of mystery writers trying to break into print. I was one of them for five years between completing the first draft and getting an offer for Death Will Get You Sober. The process is rigorous and discouraging. The odds against are enormous. The pool of writers is vast and the pool of publishers small, even including small presses. My mantras throughout those five years were, “Talent, persistence, and luck,” and, “Don’t quit five minutes before the miracle.” May you never experience such a long five minutes!
Waiting was agony, and so were the many, many rejections. It was hard not to take them personally, even though thanks to the Internet I was in touch with others getting the same scribbled notes on their query letters, the same coffee-stained manuscripts returned; even though, in the long run, I came to agree with and learn from some of the criticisms offered.
Looking back, however, I can see that not a single day of that interminable wait was truly wasted. I used it to learn the craft of today’s mystery writing, which differs from the standards of twenty-five years ago in structure and pace and point of view and how people interact and what’s a viable motive for murder among other elements. And I served a priceless apprenticeship—in Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, e-lists like DorothyL and Murder Must Advertise, and social networks like CrimeSpace—in the business of 21st century publishing.
As a result, I'm arriving on the field well equipped to beat the odds. Will I succeed? As Dick Francis has written, anything can happen in a horse race. The same is true of the gamble of mystery publishing. But at least I’m not starting out with blinders on. I find that when well-meaning friends offer suggestions or ask questions, I can bring a lot of knowledge to my answers. Just a few:
Q. Why don’t you go on Oprah?
A. That would be great—do you know anyone who has a contact with her? You can’t send her your book—it doesn’t work that way. She has to find it for herself.
Q. I’ll wait for the paperback to come out.
A. Unfortunately, if we don’t sell enough of the hardcover, the publisher won’t bring out a paperback. The book will go out of print, and in most cases, no other publisher will take the series.
Q. What about John Grisham and J.K. Rowling?
A. The odds are about the same as winning the lottery.
Q. The publisher doesn’t arrange your book tour?
A. No, not for a debut fiction author unless you’re a celebrity or have written a blockbuster. But that doesn’t mean the publisher’s publicity department does nothing. My publicist at St. Martin’s has worked actively with me to sell the book to booksellers, make sure reviewers get it, and make the most of any kind of hook so I’ll stand out from the crowd.
Q. Isn’t MySpace just for kids?
A. Not at all. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the process of building up to 1160 friends on MySpace. They include fellow writers, mystery lovers, and people in recovery from alcoholism, other addictions, and codependency—the very people who might get a kick out of Death Will Get You Sober. There’s a culture and a community on MySpace, and it’s fascinating. You can learn so much about people—their interests, their dreams, their heroes—as well as what they read and whether they drink. What a great way to find readers!
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