Trouble in Paradise

It's been a while since I've posted on the blog.

Most probably assume that I've been busy. I have been. I'm not going to lie. I'm a stay at home mom with three kids, a dog that doubles as a pony and I deliver early morning paper routes. I'm also the go-to babysitter for all of my friends. I've started a book club in my area, I'm trying to plan a girls night dinner for my friends and I volunteer regularly at my kids school.

It's not why I haven't posted.

The last time my turn came up, I didn't know what to write.

No. Let's be honest. I was afraid to write. Afraid to the point it slipped away.

I want to be honest with you on where I'm at. The last two years have been hard. I signed with an agent. I started editing. I did more editing. I found a second manuscript with a small press that I'd forgotten about and informed my agent. We started editing the second ms, pushing the first aside. I continued to edit. I've been editing for the last two years. It's been a never-ending circle of re-reading the same two manuscripts over and over. To the point of frustration. To the point I don't want to write anymore.

The feedback is always the same. This isn't right, it isn't getting better. Read this. It will help.

Your relationship with your agent should be a working partnership. A give and take where you both discuss and understand your goals, and where you want to be. It should be somewhat of a friendship. You should feel like you're able to talk to your agent. Shoot them an email with concerns, let them know when you disagree with a decision that both of you are making about your work. If your agent isn't allowing you to talk to them, or listening to you when you do talk, it's time to re-evaluate the relationship.

Deciding whether or not an agent is right for you is hard. It feels like that agent may be your only chance. So you don't speak up. You don't voice your opinion. You don't want to offend your agent. While you're watching your career spiral into nowhere, you're losing your voice because you're afraid to use it in the first place.

Don't be.

Stand up for yourself. It's easy to get in a circle that goes nowhere. Because this is your only chance. Only, it's not. There are plenty of agents out there. There is one that will treat you with respect and listen to your opinions, wants and needs. They won't hold onto you out of pity. They'll guide you through every decision and push you to be the best. They'll become a friend as much as they are your agent, because guess what? Their career rides just as much on you as yours does on them.

Don't get sucked into the void. Don't be sucked in by the right words. It's hard. Some agents are smooth talkers. They know what needs to be said to get the deal. Sometimes those words don't amount to anything but empty words. Sometimes an agent seems right from the get-go, but you just don't mesh. You have nothing in common. It happens. Don't be afraid to voice how you feel.

It's difficult. I know. If you're anything like me, you feel guilty. Guilty for the work put in, guilty because you feel the way you do, worried you'll offend, but it's your career. It's your work. And if the person promising to help you to the best of their ability isn't, you need to step back. Take a hard, long look at where you are and what you want. They'll understand. Talk to them. Resolve the issue before it gets so out of hand you don't want to follow your dreams anymore.

Becasuse there is someone out there who wants you just the way you are.

A Manuscript Checkup: Are You Really Ready to Query?

I sometimes hear of querying authors lamenting the decline of “editorial” agents. In truth, all agents are editors of their projects. It just depends on where along a manuscript’s evolution do they want to jump in. What these authors aren’t realizing is that they might be looking for representation too early in their writing process. Most agents look for a project in its later stages or last stage of development. And the reason is simple and practical. The sooner an agent can get a project in front of editors, the sooner (hopefully) he can see a paycheck. If he’s very lucky, he might find a project that only needs one round of editing, but most likely, that one round of editing will uncover the need to do more.

I’ve been working on a client’s book project for over the last month. This is my third time going through the manuscript for this editing round. I’m fairly sure this is either my fifth or sixth time reading the novel. One thing is certain, though. I loved this story the first time I read it, and I love it more now. It’s true that with each edit and revision, the manuscript improves. But it’s more than that. While I could see issues when I first read the story, I could also clearly see solutions. And now that the changes are on the page, the story is better than I first imagined it could be.  

Often I'll get submissions that are so early in their development that I cannot even begin to unravel their issues, much less envision solutions. Those novels, while "completed," are not "market-ready.” Occasionally, time permitting, I’m able to send feedback. When I do, I am struck by how often the same recommendations come up.

Even after countless rejections, some authors may still find it easier to keep querying and keep submitting rather than go back into their novels to fix what is not working. Often it’s because they’re too close to the work and can no longer see problems in it. Some do see or sense there are issues but are unable to pinpoint them or don’t know how to solve them, or where to start.

I have put together some questions that you can use as a checklist to see if you should start or keep querying, or use them to jumpstart your next revision:

1. Are the stakes clearly defined within the first few paragraphs, or at least within the first chapter?
2. Are the scenes grounded with specific and unique details that make them tangible and immersive?
3. Do the main characters have inner lives with complex thoughts, reflections, memories, etc.? Even if they do not reveal their fears, faults and vulnerabilities to the outside world, do they let us in to see them?
4. Do we have context to the main character(s) emotional journey? Is there a personal journey at all?
5. Can we clearly envision distinct physical features of the characters that also reveal their unique personalities (or do we only see their hair and eyes)?

If you have answered “no” to any of the above questions, then this could be why you are receiving rejections or no responses at all.

Keep going through your manuscript, asking the next questions:

1. Is there an over-reliance or repetition of facial movement or expressions to portray emotions, such as “sighing,” “grimacing,” “groaning,” and “cringing”?
2. Are there large blocks of dialogue where nothing else is happening in the scene, or it is unclear what the characters are physically doing during the conversation?
3. Is there a lot of expository information (explanation of background, characters,  ground situation, etc.) revealed through dialogue?
4. Are there words, phrases, gestures, physical sensations that are used commonly or repetitively (such as “heart pounding” or “pulse racing”)?
5. Is there filtering language? (for example, a character sees something happening rather it just happens on the page, or rather than saying the thought, the character’s “sees it through his mind’s eye”)

If you have answered "yes" to any of these last questions, it appears, you have some work ahead of you.

Hopefully by going through these questions, you'll have a better perspective on your manuscript, and be in a better place to decide whether or not you should keep querying or look at revising. These questions also aim to provoke ideas on ways to tell your story better, so that the next time you query, there’ll be an agent or editor who not only falls in love with it, she’ll love it more each time she reads it.

THE END: A Commentary on Editing

THE END

Two of my favourite words. To a writer, they are the culmination of days, months, or years of blood, sweat, and tears. But they are misleading. We write them, sit back, and revel in our cleverness, in our determination, our grit, our savvy, our persistence, and our sheer magnificent brilliance. It could grace the page of a blog post, social media blast, short story, novella, screenplay, or novel. Writing THE END feels incredible, but it’s just another beginning. THE END is the start of EDITING.

I recently attended Bookapalooza, which is a really cool venue in my hometown where local authors get together and sell their wares. There were speakers and panels and celebrity guest authors. I was honoured to sit on a panel with fellow romance authors Molly O’Keefe and Mary Sullivan. These ladies are veterans. They’ve written a lot of books. They’ve been doing this a long time. Avelynn is my debut historical romance. I was the newb in the room, but they welcomed me with open arms. I was humbled and thrilled to sit at the table beside them. *girlie fan crush moment over* Back to my point: one of the audience members asked the panel a question, “What do you like better, writing or editing?”

Interestingly enough, both Molly and Mary liked the editing phase of writing better. I stared at them gaped mouthed as they waxed poetic about the brilliance of polishing a first draft and turning something misshapen and clunky into a work of art. I concurred with their sentiment, but ‘like_editing?’ That sounded like something out of a fairy tale. Seriously. Editing_is_hard!

Gone is the euphoria of creation, the buzz of new witty lines of dialogue, the high of brilliant lines of prose. In its place comes the breakdown and rebuild, the dissection and amputation. Our writing is better for it, sure, but the_pain, the_torture.

I recently (like yesterday) finished editing the second book in the Avelynn series. It took me just as long to edit the manuscript as it did to write it. Now, I blame NaNoWriMo for part of the first draft’s shortcomings (writing 50,000 words only to cut 40,000 of them, sucked) but I’m also a pantser. The first draft is a misnomer, it should be called Hundreds of Pages of Verbal Diarrhea. It’s the thrill and rush of creating new worlds, populating them with interesting people, and then making them do all sorts of crazy shit. Shit that just pops into your head, like out_of_no_where.

Inherent in that wild, organic process is wee bit of surplus and ludicrous, irrelevant tangents. We write THE END and then grab our red pens, or click up our track changes and get to work. And we keep working. For_a_very_long_time. We tweak and hone, over and over again. First drafts become tenths drafts and then morph into eighteenth drafts. We get to a point when we can’t figure the damn thing out anymore and call in for back up. We send it out to beta readers and beg for perspective and direction. The verdict comes in, and we crack our knuckles and sit down and get to work. Again. For_a_very_long_time. By the fortieth something draft, we pray we’ve reached the finish line. We send the manuscript to our agent or editor, or we query and submit. We get feedback. It’s still not quite cooked all the way through. So we sit_down_again.

For this final round of baking, I used the Heminway App. The whole writing process this is a never ending learning curve. I now know, I should have tried this handy little resource a few drafts prior. But, nonetheless, I plugged in my pages and reduced my passive voice, cut my adverbs, and cleaned up my run-on sentences. In a final pass through, I obliterated my comma splices and polished my prose until it shone. In short, I made Avelynn #2 as close to phenomenal as I could possible get it.

The good news is, I’m getter faster. My process is more efficient. I’m learning. Avelynn took me six months to research, a year and a half to write, and a year and a half to edit. The second book in the series took me a month to research (same time period just a slightly different setting) a year to write, and a year to edit. I’ve shaved my process in half!

Editing is essential. It’s a tough market out there. As authors, we have to put our best work forward. That being said, do I like editing? I love the results, but I’d rather each broccoli. Trust me. That’s saying_a_lot.

What do you think? Editing: love it or tolerate it. :D

In gratitude,

Marissa xo

High on Writing

 

There are some moments in a writer’s life that make the blood, sweat, and tears all worthwhile. Those magical, blissful moments that make us believe we can actually do this. The ones where we sit back and think, ‘Oh, yeah. I’m awesome!’

Think of that great scene you just finished writing. Fresh off from a brush with brilliance, you’re feeling pretty good about your skills. Sure, there are passive words or adjectives and adverbs that still need slashing, heck, you may even have to kill that darling in the greater scheme of things. But right now, at this fateful moment, everything is all right in the world.

Remember when you wrote that shockingly good chapter? You were so stoked when you finally discovered that twist—that jaw-dropping moment that raised the stakes and blew your own expectations out of the water. Remember that? Oh, yeah. You are awesome!

A writer’s high could be hidden anywhere: a musical turn of phrase, a poetic verse of description that sets your heart singing with accomplishment and confidence. It doesn’t have to be a big thing to make one appreciate the gift of being a writer, but there are those golden, grand moments that put the cherry on top of the gooey icing.

Think about the moment when you completed your first draft. Didn’t that feel good! You know you have to edit it later, but you don’t care. You just finished spewing out tens of thousands of words. And they make sense! More than that, they make a story—a world you created and then populated with fascinating, original characters. There is a start, a middle, and an end. You pulled this out of the ethos and nailed it down. It’s yours, and you finished it. How sweet is that? That is a yummy, warm, delicious, hot cocoa kind of moment.

Then there was that time you completed your edits! Now, if you’re a pantser like me, this can be a long, drawn out, painful process, but depending on how many drafts you go through, there still comes a time when you are actually finished with editing. When you look at what you’ve created and think, ‘I’m done. This is ready!’ Not ‘ready’ as in ready to send to publishers or agents, mind (unless you have one already and he/she is chomping at the bit to see your latest masterpiece) but ready to send to beta and critique readers. You’ve done the best you can, and now it’s time for others to have a fresh look at it. It’s out of your hands. Nothing to do but wait and get ready to bask in their glory!

This is where I’m at. Right now. I’ve just finished going through the final draft before I send it off. I still have to enter my changes into the computer, but I’m so close, I can taste it. And it’s like a cinnamon roll crepe with apple pie filling and caramel and butterscotch drizzle draped over rich vanilla ice cream and topped with whipped cream and a waffle cookie. OMG that sounds awesome! Someone needs to invent that. Seriously. Then send me a sample!

Kinda like this... but even better!

This is why I write. I’m addicted to this incredible high and when it happens, it feels fantastic. In my mind, in that glorious space and time, I’m confident the story is solid—all the plot holes filled and patched, the character motivations solved and solidified. It’s only a brief moment. All too soon, the self-doubt will niggle back, and I’ll start questioning my skills, undermining my confidence, and knocking down my pedestal. I’ll start sweating and pacing when I haven’t heard back from my beta readers. My agent’s silence will become deafening. But right now, all that is in my distant future. At this moment, all I can think is, ‘Oh yeah. This is awesome!’

What’s your favourite writing high?

In gratitude,

Marissa xo

Pitch Perfect

With the advancement of the interwebs and social media, the publishing world has exploded with opportunities for aspiring authors to get their work in front of editors and agents. Sure, the tried and true query method still works. But gone are the days of mailing off a sample of your manuscript and waiting six months to a year to hear back.

Oh wait, I lied. Some agents and pub houses still take six months to a year to give you a response. And then, it's most likely the ugly form rejection letter via email. With the influx of querying via email, those poor agents and editors are often inundated with queries. Some getting up to 10,000 a year! And having friends on both ends of the spectrum, I now understand the necessity of the form rejection.

So, what's a poor author to do to get your work in front of those amazing agents and editors?

Well, here's one idea we can explore today....contests. But, where do you find a contest? Your biggest asset in today's day and age is social media. You will find out all about the many contests you can enter. Now, beware. Not all contests are created equal.

Do your homework. Research your options. <----you just knew I was going to throw that in there, didn't you.

There's partial manuscript contests that you can pay to enter a sample of your work, usually the first 5000 words or so. A lot of these are done by RWA (Romance Writers of America) chapters, and they use the entry fees to help support their chapter. So it's a good investment because your partial will be seen by a number of pubbed and aspiring authors in the first round. And if you're lucky enough to make it to the next, your manuscript will be seen by agents and editors!

There's also the free contests around the world wide web. There's query contests, first 250 word contests, Twitter pitch contests. The big daddy of them all, Pitch Wars, run by the immeasurable Brenda Drake, is one you should definitely have on your radar.

Query Kombat, Pitmad, Pitchmadness, Pitchmas, Nestpitch, Sun vs. Snow, Nightmare on Query Street are just a sample of the great contests that you can enter!! Now some of these may have already passed for this year, but keep them on your radar for the next submission period so you can prepare. 

So, that being said, each contest has it's own rules. Some require just a 140 Twitter pitch, like Pitmad. Some require a query and the first 250 polished words of your manuscript. Some require a 100 word blurb only. Some are query only. 

Yeah. What's the difference between a blurb, a pitch, a query?

Well, let's see if we can dissect that.

A query is what you should always have at the ready for your book baby. You'll need it pretty much no matter what avenue you're taking to get in front of an agent or editor. There are so many websites, books, seminars on how to write a good query. The best place I can recommend is Janet Reid's Query Shark blog.

But here's an example of a query from my own WIP, my Space Opera entitled CLANDESTINE CHAOS. I've entered this before in a few contests so if you've run the circuit you may have seen it before. 

Pre-med student Kadence Murphy's sole mission in life: get out of college and into scrubs. Struggling with a hormone-surged roomie, a two-timing almost boyfriend, and financial aid problems, the only thing keeping her from shivving someone is her part-time job in the campus library. She discovers a cryptic book that entwines its storyline with reality.

Kadence drops into Captain Jeremiah Colt's lap, interrupting his latest effort to redeem his floundering business. Now stuck on a dysfunctional transport-ship, Kadence learns she’s in an alternate version of 2013 where Earth collapsed as a result of a global meltdown from Y2K. The survivors took to the skies in an attempt to colonize and sustain human-life on other planets.

Colt itches to dump her aggravating hide on the first planet they come to. Kadence can't last five minutes in his presence without the driving need to stab him with a spoon. A fierce attraction lies beneath their bickering, making Kadence rethink her quest to get home. But a mutinous crew member has other plans, none of which include Kadence, and he isn't above murder to get rid of her.

Now, that's the meat of the query and it's all of 185 words. Agents/editors view so many queries a day, if you can't capture their attention in less than 250 words, you're out the door with a form rejection. So keep it succinct, short, and captivate them to read more. Goal is to keep it around 250 words tops, including your bio & writing credits and cat/genre/word count.

Do not try and turn your query into a full synopsis and hit every plot point and character arc in your story. You want to merely engage the person to request more to read, not shove it down their throat in one fell swoop. You're only asking for a rejection that way.

Ok, well what about a blurb? How does that differ?

Think of a blurb as the back cover info on a book. Short, succinct, overall pitch of the book to make you want to read it. Often it's about 4 or 5 sentences, tops. Something you can recite off the top of your head, not have to write it down to remember. 

Here's my 100 word blurb/pitch from CLANDESTINE CHAOS:

Pre-med student Kadence Murphy discovers a book that entwines its storyline with reality. She drops into Captain Jeremiah Colt's lap, interrupting his latest heist, finding an alternate version of 2013 where Earth collapsed from a global meltdown duringY2K.

Colt itches to get rid of her as soon as he can. Kadence can't last five minutes with him without the driving need to stab him with a spoon. A fierce attraction lies beneath their bickering, making Kadence rethink her quest to get home. But a mutinous crew member has other plans and isn't above murder to get rid of her.

So you start with your 250 word query and narrow it down to the meat of the story. Hit the high points, inciting incident and what's going to make us want to read it? Leave all secondary characters out of it, you can hint at them but stick with the names of only your protag or hero/heroine. What is their goal? What are the stakes? They must be clearly defined. 

Stay away from hypothetical questions in a query, pitch, or blurb. IT IS KRYPTONITE! 

Ok, so then there's the Twitter pitch. You think you have 140 characters to play with. But in reality it's actually less, because often times in a Twitter Pitch party you have to include a hashtag for the agents to peruse like #pitmad, #pitchmadness, #adpit etc. And many require you to put in the category and genre. So you have to get creative. There's some rules here to strictly follow in a Twitter pitch:

1) DO NOT spread your pitch over 2 or 3 tweets. Those hashtags move so fast your first tweet will end up being 140 tweets away from your second. Also, don't make the agent work for it, you need to capture their attention in one tweet.

2) DO NOT try and short spell stuff like 4ever, 2gether, 2night etc. While it helps shorten your tweet, it looks like a damn text message to your bae. It's unprofessional and hard to read. It sucks having to condense your 80,000 word novel into 120 characters. But it can be done. You're the author, get creative.

3) Always have multiple versions of a Twitter pitch. One may not catch a person's eye, but maybe another one of yours will. It's good to change things up and have at least 3 or 4 if you can.

So here's some examples of Twitter pitches for CLANDESTINE CHAOS:

Kadence falls into an alt timeline. Colt can't decide if he wants to kiss or kill her. A mutinous crew member may do it for him. NA #pitmad

Losing yourself in a book has new meaning when Kadence's reality is entwined w/one. Colt wants her heart someone else wants her dead #RTSlap

Firefly meets Outlander. A book dumps Kadence in an alt timeline. Stuck in space, the one man who can help her she wants to kill. NA #PitMad

Hopefully you can take this knowledge into the universe and use it for good instead of evil. May the pitches be with you!