Baby Evil Writers 101: How Long Does Publishing Take

Baby Evil Writers 101: How long does it take to get published?

Julie Butcher

Write a million words.

So you see my sweet evil babies, it all depends on you. If you wrote one thousand words a day, every day. Then, in one thousand days, you would have your million words. But even the most fervent writer doesn’t work each and every day. The evil children must be fed and if you miss the evil queen mother’s birthday—you’re toast.

So let’s assume that you do not write for two days of the week and that you do write for five days. (Like a real job) Now you’re down to twenty-two days per month or 264 days per year and this doesn’t count holidays. Let’s take away twenty days for holidays and making dinners and birthdays and blowing up stuff on appropriate holidays. Now we have 244 days per year.

“Oh!” You say. “That is 244,000 words or around three manuscripts.”

Not so much. You’ll spend twice the time editing that you do writing—if you do it correctly. It will take a lot longer because you are new at evil. After a few books you’ll only use one day to edit for every day you write. Eventually, you won’t have to edit hardly anything because you learned all of the things. But now, that takes away from your actual working time so you’ll have one book to edit and I’ll be generous and say that your book is 100,000 words.

There’s one tenth of what you need to be awesome. Ten years until awesome hits the shelves.

Unfortunately, most of us are not quick learners. All of your words need to be filled with evil and wonder. Each word needs to further the plot of your book. Add two or three years to learn to plot without holes and to write concise sentences. (At 1.000 words per day it will take that long.)

Now we’re at twelve years if you write 1,000 words five days each week.

So put on your big kid pants, put your butt in the chair, and write. Dreaming about writing will not get you there. Stalking agents and editors on twitter will not make you one word closer. The one and only thing that will make your journey faster is to write.

Baby Evil Writers 101: There Is No Muse

Baby Evil Writers 101: There is no Muse

Julie Butcher

If one more person tells me they didn’t write today because the muse is gone on vacation I’m going to smack them hard.

There is no muse. Let me repeat myself, there is no muse.

The only thing there is, is to put your butt in the chair and open the document and think about the story until the words hit your fingers. There is self-control. There is hard work. There is stubbornness. There is a brilliant mind that wants to fritter away time on twitter and facebook and favorite TV shows. There is not, however, a freaking fairy that bops you on the head until they make a hole and shove a story into your brain.

Stress saps creativity. Hunger sucks main characters dry. Illness makes your story about bodily fluids which is nasty. But the straight truth is that you are your own muse and that if you don’t take care of yourself and eat and drink and sleep—you won’t write.

Quit making excuses that are the equivalent of telling a cop that you weren’t speeding, the car was going too fast because and invisible Bigfoot had his hairy appendage on the gas pedal. Listen to me, we both don’t believe you. Not one little tiny bit.

If you believe yourself about the muse thing then you are in big trouble. Also you should probably seek professional help.

I know people who were going through horrible experiences in their lives and yet still managed to write and publish a story. If you want to be paid money, then it is a job and sometimes jobs are hard WORK. If it were all fun and games then you would get no money and it would be called PLAY.

We don’t believe in a muse. We believe in work. If you want to keep fooling yourself, then go away from me. When I don’t write it is because I am stressed or lazy or sick. There is no invisible force stopping my fingers. There is only me, on the couch watching television. Sometimes there is me, working in the garden. But you know what? I know what I’m doing. I don’t blame others for me being lazy or evasive.

Suck it up people. Be honest with yourself, and get your butt in the chair.

Baby Evil Writers 101: Writing for a Living

Baby Evil Writers 101: Writing for a Living

Julie Butcher

I don’t think I’ve ever met a writer who doesn’t want to quit working, stay home and make their living from writing. Quitting the day job is the ultimate dream. The problem is making your dreams into reality. Those pesky children seem to want food every single day and then you need a roof, and electricity to run your laptop, and heat in the winter is a necessity and not a luxury. If this is a serious goal, you need to have a plan.

First of all, you have to sell some books. To live in a modicum of comfort, you need to have three books on the shelf for each and every member of your family. For most people this means that their career needs to be firmly established for ten years or more before they gain their freedom. During those ten years, you need to figure out some things.

1.      Where will the health insurance come from? If you are the working person who provides this necessity, you need to plan on paying for it yourself. It isn’t cheap. Unless you have a few hundred thousand dollars tucked away, this isn’t optional.

2.    Make a budget and learn to stick to it. An author gets paid twice yearly and that is a long time between paychecks. Ramen is good but it’s not that good. Also it will make you fat so there you go.

3.      Will any of your children be going to college when you plan to work at home? If so, add another book on the shelf for each child in college. Even scholarship students have expenses not covered by grants and loans

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4.      Pay off anything you can before you quit working outside of the home. You get bonus points for no mortgage and a decent, paid-for car that won’t need immediate repairs.

5.      Include in your budget traveling expenses for conferences and conventions. You’ll need the exposure and unless you’re a big time author, you won’t get your plane tickets paid for you

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6.      Don’t forget to set money aside for promotional items. Also don’t go nuts with these. It is kind of dumb to give away something that costs more than you make by selling a copy of your book.

Most of all you need to get into the habit of setting aside writing time each and every day and sticking to your schedule.  Working from home is still working. No work, no food. Easy-peasy.

You Are Going to Miss Something

I was talking with a friend yesterday about an opportunity she had to do some content editing. She's new (but will be excellent, I have no doubt), and was struggling with what to charge. Of the many considerations and issues she weighed, one concern that came up was charging money for a service like this and then missing something during the work.

A typo. A plot hole. An improper word usage. A pacing issue. There are all things that can be missed.

And here's what I told her, which I wish someone had told me way back when but I had to figure out with a lot of trial and error: you are going to miss something.

Just get that out of the way immediately.

Whether you're writing, or you're beta reading, or you're editing. Whether it's paid work or a favor. Whether you're the first set of eyes to go over something or the fifteenth.

You are going to miss something. You are going to make a mistake.

I know this because I read. I've been a reader since I was a toddler and able to hold a book.

And I have never, in my life (or at least recollection), read a single book without some kind of error in it. Whether it's something small that changes the sentence (recently I saw "didn't" when it should've just been "did"), or a grammar thing ("lay" when it should be "lie"), or a style thing ("my Mom" when it should've been "my mom"), or a chunk of text that was accidentally copied and pasted twice, or factual error, or something that contradicted something else (like a character wearing one shirt removing it twice in one scene).

No, not self-published books, either (let's not even touch those ones for the moment). Books with large publishers--in some cases, by NYT bestselling authors. And no, I'm not bringing this up to support the utter bullshit "editors don't edit anymore" cry that idiots spout.

I have a crystal-clear memory of when I was eight years old, on a trip to Santo Domingo, sitting at the resort poolside with a book in hand. It was one of the Nancy Drew Files. And suddenly there was a girl named Beth in the scene.

Beth.

I went back a few pages, scanned. No Beth. Who the hell was Beth? And then I realized it was meant to be Bess. Nancy's friend. Two letters off.

This happened well over twenty years ago. So my point is that this is not a new occurrence.

I know a lot of writers and editors. I know how hard people work. All of the examples above? The Nancy Drew book from the 80s? People worked their asses off on those books. Multiple pairs of eyes went over them. Extremely skilled people, who are damn good at their jobs, combed those books thoroughly. I have no doubt many, many errors were caught.

Something always gets missed.

As an editor, I've been handed books that went through three to four beta readers, multiple rewrites, and I still found timeline confusion and logic holes. And even then, after publication, I've been notified of yet another error I missed, and felt like a complete idiot over it.

As a writer, I spend hundreds and hundreds of hours on my books. I reread them dozens of times, poring over all 100K-odd words of them. Other people go over comb them for errors. And yet someone, even years later, inevitably finds a typo (and deigns to notify me of this fact with implications I'm a moron for not seeing it).

None of this is meant to excuse deliberately sloppy work. In fact, this post isn't even directed at those sorts of people--as far as I'm concerned, they are still sitting in the corner without dinner and I will speak to them later when I think they've learned their lesson. No, I'm talking to those of you who try so goddamn hard to be perfect and beat yourself up later when you realized something slipped through. Or those of you who get so paralyzed by the fear of missing something that you don't get started.

You are going to miss something.

This doesn't mean you don't try to be perfect. It's not an excuse to get lazy. It's not a reason to stop striving for improvement.

But it means accept that even busting your ass, you're going to fuck something up somewhere along the line. It's just going to happen. It is like death and taxes that way. The most skilled people with extreme attention to detail and years of training and experience will still do it. We call it "human error" because we're humans: people with eyes that get blind to text and brains that get tired and workdays that get interrupted and memories that forget.

You are going to miss something.

You accept this, strive to do your best, and if you find out you made a mistake, take note of it and try better next time. Beating yourself up after the fact or being too paralyzed to start in the first place (both of which have happened to me) isn't going to Fix All the Errors, and even if it did...

One day in the future, you will still miss something else. Accept that now and save yourself the stress, because your energy is better spent on doing the work rather than worrying about the work.

Are We Having Fun Yet?

While I’ve tried to be an evil little bunny here and talked about writing-related things recently, the truth is I’ve felt like a big ol’ Liar McLiarson lately. And if you follow my personal blog in any capacity, you know why.

I was in a bad spot throughout 2013-writing wise (and a chunk of 2012 too).

You see...I stopped enjoying writing.

I do not call this “Writer’s Block” because, obviously, I think that whole concept is bullshit and if you whine at me that you’re “blocked”, I’m going to stab you with a pen. I wasn’t blocked; ideas were constantly streaming, I had tons of works in progress. In 2013, I wrote about 400 000 words total on various novels, novellas, and short stories.

I just...hated all of them.

“My words are broken” was my constant refrain. I kept putting my head down and working anyway, hoping to get through it, but I hated writing. Each word felt like it was plucked from my brain with tweezers and put on the page all wrong. Revision involved picking at the same sentences over and over and having them make less sense the more I looked at them. Editing involved excising large chunks of text, entire characters, and subplots, only to put them back again (and then delete again, etc etc). Given the choice between writing or knitting while watching shitty TV, I was picking the latter for the first time in my life and certainly for the first time in the dozen-odd years I've been doing this seriously. And this is nothing like me—no matter how painful, or difficult, or how scary writing was, I have always enjoyed it.

But whether it was a for-pay project or something for my own enjoyment, I’d come to hate all of it. I’d lost that burning need to tell the story, to express something. I stopped dreaming about the characters. I stopped hearing them. With no exaggeration, I can say it’s the most terrifying feeling in the world for me. Like I stopped knowing who I was.

Not to be overly dramatic but this is totally me.

What I’m saying is: it was bad.

It still is.

One of the hardest things for me is to ask for help, but I finally did, going to Lilith Saintcrow as she’s been at this longer than me and I knew from her writing-related blog posts that my typical process and productivity was similar to hers. She reassured me it’s a normal phase careers go through and offered me strategies to get through it (citing long term burnout as part of my problem—WHO WOULD HAVE GUESSED THAT BEING A WORKAHOLIC MIGHT BREAK YOU?), including refilling the well and not writing for a few months.

So I did that (which helped--the slight stirring of WANT is there again), but I was going through a major life upheaval around the same time. I picked up TheArtist’s Way and twitched my way through all the mentions of God to grab the bits of wisdom, trying to both recover myself and dig down deep to see what specific steps put me here. There are many of them (obviously, as it takes a lot to fuck me up THIS severely), not the least of which is the amount of pressure I put on myself. Especially now that an average of seventy-five percent of my income comes directly from writing—the rest being freelance—it’s hard to sit down and do anything without thinking about what I should be writing so I can pay rent and stuff. “You’re going to stave if you don’t spend your time wisely”, paradoxically, is quite paralyzing.

But I busted ass all fall writing shit I hated that would help pay the bills, and decided that this month—January—I was starting the year off right. I’d take the pressure off and the ONLY project I would write was a brand new book purely for myself, at my own pace.

I wrote 3K words over a week.

And I hate it.

The character isn’t talking to me. The world isn’t clear. I’m missing entire chunks of backstory. I’m convinced I am not smart enough to tell this story (it’s set in Nairobi—WHY would I set a freakin’ book in Nairobi??).

On the weekend, I got organizing stuff for the for-pay writing I do—just a list of projects I was overdue giving someone—and I had the mad thought of, “Why don’t I fuck around with one of these for a bit?” (Since I don't do freelance work on the weekend.)

Evil writers, let me tell you something.

I had fun.

I had fun on something I normally resent. I played with the characters, I wrote scenes that highly amused me. I didn’t stress about an outline or word count goals or the end result. But for a few hours, writing felt less like a job and more like something fun again, and in the most unexpected of projects--something for the market in a genre I loathe. But I grabbed onto that fun and held on, because it was the only spark of something I've felt in a while.

And you know what else? Last night before bed, the Nairobi book started talking to me as well. I don’t have a full handle on it yet, but it tossed a few huge revelations my way, and I know it’s simmering.

So here we are, evil writers.

We talk a lot here about shutting the fuck up and doing the work, because that’s what a writer does: she does the work. She sits her ass down every day and writes, whether it’s five hundred words or five thousand words. She values discipline and follow-through, and constantly strives to improve her craft. She doesn't wait for the muse: she beats it over the head with a two-by-four, drags it into the house, and pokes it with fire when it doesn't behave.

But she also needs to have fun.

Because when you’re on the twelfth reread of the book, you’re going to hate the story even more if you didn’t even like it when you first wrote it.

When your royalties work out to about ten cents an hour spent on a book and you’re questioning why you wrote it in the first place, perusing the first few enjoyable lines of the story should answer that for you. 

When the negative reviews come in getting the characters’ names wrong and seeming to have skimmed large chunks of the book, you have to remember that someone did like the book: you.

Because the only constant in this job is you. Everything else is a variable: who will read it, who will like it, who will buy it. None of that is in your control. Just you are.

Write for money—write to pay the bills. Deliver that sequel you’re not as jazzed about as the first book. Keep the market in mind when you’re brainstorming. There’s nothing wrong with any of that: skills to pay the bills, and bitches gots to get paid.

But if you're losing that joy, recognize it and do everything in your power to grab it again. Have fun or else you’re better off becoming a career artisan hummus maker*.

*Or something similar. Not that. Because that’s MY backup career.

Baby Evil Writers 101: When to Query

Baby Evil Writers 101: When to Query

Julie Butcher

We’ve talked about a lot of things here my evil darlings but, we haven’t covered when to query your  evil manuscript of doom. I made the mistake of querying too soon and suffered (and rightly so) the hordes of rejection letters and pangs of baby evil writer growth spurts.

I don’t want that for you, my malevolent dears. So I have  a baby evil check list for you before you send your firstborn into the world.

1.       You have a completed manuscript. It can’t be part, it can’t be almost. You must have finished the entire thing. There isn’t an exception for this rule unless you write non-fiction. Not ever and not past ever.  So that would be NEVER.

2.       You have already started another story. Not the sequel to the first thing you wrote—a new story. I know you want to immediately go to the next book in your series. I know this and I did this. But sweet heathens, the market changes . What sells today won’t necessarily get you a book deal next week. I’m not trying to burst your lovely bubble but this is an industry fact. Start something different. The submission process takes months and even years. You need something new to keep you going when the rejections come in.

3.       You have sent this manuscript to a critique group, or to a professional editor with a good reputation, and you have made sweeping changes in the story and to the characters. If you haven’t done this. Stop thinking about submitting your manuscript to Agents and Editors. Stop right this minute! No one can write without a reader’s opinion. Even big name authors have beta-readers. You cannot count your family or your close non-writer friends in this tally.

4.       You have read your manuscript out loud at least three times. This is an important step for all true minions of evil. You catch mistakes like crazy-town and you will improve your work, guaranteed. Evil is as Evil does. Unless your friends, family, and the people at the coffee shop think you are insane, you’re not finished.

5.       You have put this manuscript aside for at least three months and worked on something else. Time may heal all puss-filled wounds but in addition, it gives you clearer eyes for your own work. Our minds are funny things, my dears, and absence makes them clearer and able to see the giant infested plot holes of doom.

6.       You have line-edited your work for punctuation errors or sent your work to a line editor to be corrected. Some editors and agents can see past where the comma fairy pooped all over your work. Others run screaming into the dark to nurse the migraine your manuscript caused. Probably blinding pain will not get you representation or a book deal.

7.       You have mentally prepared yourself for rejection and have physically stocked your lair with chocolate, liquor, or whatever items help you to conquer despair.

8.       You have researched agents and editors to make sure they not only represent the genre you write, but are open to and accepting unsolicited queries. Personally, I tend to remember the names of people who defy my wishes right to my virtual face. Don’t be that person.

9.       You have spent more than a week perfecting your query letter and have gotten awesome reviews on it from your beta readers.

10.   You have scourged the idea of self-publishing if you haven’t sold within a few months from your psyche. I will take my ball and go home or find someone else to play with doesn’t cut it in this industry. True evil lasts forever. You have to be ready for the long haul. Sure, lightning can strike. But how many times have you personally been hit?

That’s what I thought.

Baby Evil Writers 101: Evil is as Evil does

Baby Evil Writers 101: Evil is as Evil does

Julie Butcher

Face front Baby Evil Minions and give me your attention.

Begins rant

I know that all of you evil trainees are putting your worst foot forward. You have conquered the malevolence that is facebook. You’ve stalked agents and editors with the sneaky and quiet feet of seasoned cat burglars on twitter. You chat with other writers and industry professionals, and post all of the things, online, forever.

Once you’ve put your words and feelings on the ether that is the wicked internet—IT NEVER GOES AWAY.

Vicious is not evil. Malevolent tweets against other people/sexual orientations/races are not evil. Do not let your fingers run away on the keyboard and let all of your stupid fall out. Whining especially is not evil. If I see one more tweet about how horrible writing a query is, I will come for you in the night—with a sword—and it won’t be pretty.

Queries are a necessary evil, so is writing a synopsis. If you are truly following in our wicked footsteps, SUCK IT UP AND SOLDIER ON. Those things are evil and therefore belong to us. We embrace the evil.

You are not allowed to whine in public. There is messaging on facebook and direct messaging on twitter. Use those to have a pity-party with your friends. Make your family miserable instead of the entire world. Did you ever see Frankenstein’s Monster gripe about those awful, heavy shoes? Did Dracula complain about sleeping with dirt in his coffin? Ummm…let’s see…that would be a resounding NO.

Rejections are not a happy-shiny thing but they are necessary. What isn’t necessary is your moaning and groaning on social media. No one wants to work with a complainer. It is irritating. It is also permanently on the web forever. Do not jump off the roof and then complain that you broke your leg. OF COURSE YOU DID BECAUSE THAT WAS DUMB.

True evil is strong and silent. Not stupid.

Ends rant

Why Writer?

If you make the decision at some point to put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) eventually someone is going to ask you why. It's inevitable. Someone here posted a great quote awhile back to the effect that: writing is very hard and has little chance of any reward for that effort.

It's a good quote.

So, people are going to want to know the reason you've apparently lost your mind. Your friends and family first, and at some point, other authors. They'll talk a great deal about your motivation and though they insist there is no right or wrong answer, you can tell by the tone in their voices that there IS in fact a correct and an incorrect response.

Here's a hint. The right answer is not "for the money" or "to become famous." Both those answers will earn you a measure of scorn proportionate to the ridiculousness of the suggestion. (In truth this is exactly what they wanted you to say, because they in fact are holding on to the "right" answer and have been dying to whip it out and show off) They make a big deal of this right answer. I have seen it on many blogs, forum posts, Facebook...all the fancy places. I'm going to make a big deal about it too, but only so I can make fun of it. That's sort of what I do.

The right, just and valid reason for becoming a writer is: Because I have to write. (This is even better received if you emphasize the have to. haaaaaaaahve tooo write.) It is often paraphrased thus: There is a story inside me that has to come out. 

hmmm.

As it comes down to it, I don't have any problem with "the correct" reason to write, except that I don't believe in "one correct" reason for anything. And they make a good point in that, if you can easily walk away from writing and never look back, you should probably go for it. It's hard and often thankless, yes, yes. I'll run with that. But who cares if someone decides to write just for the money or to try for fame? Isn't that their decision?

But I (emphasize the I ) write because I have something inside of me that must come out.

Well, isn't that just SPESHUL. See it's not the reason I have issue with, it's the tone. My way is more valid, you shameless, greedy, hack. Etc.

And as it happens, the correct reason is in fact not so lofty, is it? Technically, it is exactly the same reason you poop. Yup. I went there. Exactly the same reason. Not so fancypants in that light, is it?

Perspective does wonderful things. As it happens, I like "the reason" much better in this light. Some days, in fact, that is exactly an appropriate comparison.
I think if we all imagined our art in that way, we'd stay a lot more grounded...

And possibly more regular.
~ Frances

Currency

I practice manipulative parenting. I'm not proud of it, nor am I ashamed. It works, you see, and with kids you do what works. Parenting classes, books, videos etc. talk a lot about finding your child's currency. It's a big deal, and funnily enough, it has nothing whatsoever to do with money.

It means finding the one thing that your kiddo cares about enough, wants badly enough that it will work as a sort of leverage. It's not as mean as it sounds, really. And at the risk of inciting child rearing debate (my kids are super spoiled and healthy as horses) I'll switch to my point, which is how this applies to writing.

You see, I recently found my own currency. Other authors will recognize this as "motivation." We talk about it a lot, in particular when the royalty checks are slim and we're considering day jobs at the check-out stand. "Why do I do this?" or alternately, "What am I really going through all of this for? Money? Fame? Masochism?"

I've never been ashamed to admit that the money was important. I believe authors should get paid, and it would be really great if one of them was me. Fame scares the shit out of me, so that's pretty much off the table, but making a living at this, I always assumed, was the goal.

Until I found out what my best friend was doing.

It's not as weird as it sounds. You see, she's amazingly supportive and kind and generous and has been purchasing every one of my books religiously. She's ponied up good money to have a copy of everything Frances Pauli has written, because she's just that kick-ass of a friend.

But she hasn't been reading them.

I get a little horrified shiver just thinking about it. "You...You what?" I stutter, clutching at my chest.

"But I bought them all."

"But...but..."

But she doesn't know what happens in book two. She never met character X, never watched so and so die, never read the ending.... aaaaaaaaaaaaagh! I lost sleep over this, and let me tell you, sleep is a big deal at my house.

And suddenly it was crystal clear. I don't give a rat's hiney about the money, not really. Not when it comes down to it. I want people to read the books. I want to share the stories. This shouldn't surprise me, not me, who like a zealot force feeds every one of my favorite movies to anyone I can get to sit in a chair  and look, looooook, LOOK! (watch, Joyeux Noel, asap)

Don't you dare talk through it.

Motivation is a funny thing. So is perspective, and though I still like the idea of getting paid, I feel a lot more relaxed about it now. Of course, I have a whole new kind of panic about readers, and feedback and...well you get it. It was a big aha moment for me, and one that has really changed my outlook. Currency is a funny word for it, but it fits.

Now if I could just find hers, I could make her read......

;)
Frances

I Got This

Two things happened last weekend. First, I was in the middle of a pretty substantial revision. Second, I was on my family’s annual ski trip (and by family I mean parents, siblings, spouses and kids O.O) I could tell you how revising is like spending time with the extended family, but I’d rather talk to you about skiing.

You see, I didn’t learn to ski until I was an adult. Not sure why, but it never happened when I was in school, so I hit the slopes for the first time when I came home from college to visit friends. The fact that two of those friends proceeded to rate every fall I took (and believe me, I took some magnificent tumbles) will tell you a little bit about what skiing was like for me at first. It took quite a while before things improved at all. You know those little kids who snowplow all the way down a ski hill? Yeah. They were better than me.

Over time (and four years in Colorado) I got better. Not great by any stretch (black diamonds still scare the crap out of me and if I end up skiing in the terrain park, I promise it was by accident), but I can hold my own.

Then two years ago, my ski boots died a tragic death (I’d say untimely, but they were the ones I’d owned since my second-ever time skiing.) The bottom bits of plastic (that hold them in the skis) literally crumbled. They were done. Kaput. Finis. The hunt for new boots was not a fun one.

You see, my family has very sturdy legs and generally very short legs. That means our calves are bulky (this was true even when I was thinner.) We need rear-entry boots. When I went shopping, I was told everyone had stopped making them. So I found what I thought were comfortable boots. We could close them securely and they didn’t hurt too much.

Until I wore them skiing last year. They hurt so bad that I was not only bruised, I actually broke into tears skiing from the pain. Fast-forward a year, and I stupidly hoped we’d just put them on wrong (plastic bits under when they should have been over…that sort of thing). Not so much. However, I made it through the first day with no tears and only some bruising. (Because I’m a tough bitch and tough bitches can take that much pain.)

Then we went out again the next day, and the boots were pressing on my swollen and bruised bits. You know those assholes who see a person with a bruise and poke at it to see if it hurts? My ski boots are those assholes. But I’m a tough bitch, so I was skiing anyway.

Went down the first hill and I had a little less control than I liked, but I figured I just needed to warm up. The plan was to find my sister and her husband so the boys could go do their thing and she and I would hang. So hubs and I took the little side path to a different lift.

I hate this path. HATE it. But I skied it with no problems the day before, so I’m all “I got this shit covered.” Until I didn’t.

You’re probably reading this (if you held on so far) wondering what the hell any of this has to do with writing. So I should clue you in. Revisions (no matter how necessary) are painful (like bad ski boots). It doesn’t matter how shiny those boots were when you first bought them or how much you think you can handle, the moment comes when you get cocky and think “I got this shit”… only you don’t. You know what happens then?

Your ski/story hits a rough patch and your skis cross… and you get up close and personal with the side of the mountain. Yes, boys and girls, I skied off the edge of the trail. And I recently did that with revisions too.

What they have in common is the pain that you’re trying to work through and the panic when you hit that moment where everything has gone to hell and you don’t know if you can fix it. At that moment, the best thing you can hope for is a quick stop and a soft landing. (Skiing I was lucky enough to have both, otherwise the tree and I would have become good friends.)

And just like with skiing, the best thing to do when that happens with revisions is to haul your ass back up the mountain, look at the story that tried to do you in and flip it the proverbial bird. You know why? Because even if it hurts so bad it makes you cry and leaves you beaten and bruised in the end…you got that shit.

So when revision time rolls around, strap on your boots, pack your attitude—and for all that is good and holy wear a damn helmet!—point yourself down the mountain and go. Because nothing worth doing comes without a little work and hurt. And the only difference between skiers/writers and non-skiers/writers is the willingness to get back up and do it all over again despite the pain.

You got this shit. 

I Hate... I Love...

For those of you who aren't aware, I'm on Pinterest (this is me). There have been quite a few people posting writerly type quotes lately. Here are a couple that hit me:

"Writing a first novel takes so much effort, with such little promise of result or reward, that it must necessarily be a labour of love bordering on madness." ~Steven Saylor

and

"Writing a synopsis is my favorite thing to do. 
Said no author, ever." ~ (I have no clue who to credit this to. It's been around a while though)

And it got me to thinking... being an author is hard. I know, I know, this isn't a surprise, but sometimes I do forget. You see, I love my job. LOVE my job. Parts of it are less fun than others though. So let's go through the list of things some author somewhere hates (generally in the order they are done):

• Research
• Drafting
• Revising
• Critique partners
• Synopsis writing
• Querying
• Waiting (at any stage of the game)
• Contract deciphering
• Cover info sheets
• Cover copy writing
• Editorial letters
• More edits
• Line edits
• Copy edits
• Release day
• Promo
• Reviews
• Conventions
• Sequels

Now, there are parts of that list that I love, parts I like, parts I have love-hate relationships with, parts I'm not fond of and parts that make me cry. Best parts for me? Drafting, my crit partners, revising, early stage edits, & conventions. Worst? Research, waiting, contracts, cover copy,  & promo.

What about you? If you're published, use the whole list. If you aren't yet, use the list as you see fit (either just what you have experience with or how you think you'll feel about it later)

Selling yourself

I'm trying to sell my car (because I'm getting a new awesome one!) and it's made me think about marketing yourself, which is applicable here.

Promotion is a pain. It is also, unfortunately, how you sell books. While it would be delightful to write a book and then never do anything again and have it sell millions of copies, that's just not how it works. Promotion and marketing are especially important if you're published with a small press or self-published. The big publishers will do more to promote your books, but unless you're one of their best sellers, you can still be doing more.

You can always do more.

But, don't be obnoxious about it. That's your basic rule of thumb, I think. Like anything, promotion is good in reasonable quantities. If you overdo it, people will want to hit you. Trust me, I will.

I love Twitter. I think it's a fabulous way to connect with people, see what people are up to, and it's especially great in the writer community. But there are inevitably those people who sign up for an account and then spam-blast their 2 followers every hour on the hour with promotional tweets. Uh, no. That's not why ANYONE followed you. Same goes for Facebook. The people who follow you or like you or are friends with you are there because they're interested in you. In your books too, sure, but you as a person more. So go ahead and promote yourself on Twitter or Facebook or other social networking sites, but don't let that be the only thing you do.

Be personal, let people into your life a little bit. I'm not saying show them pictures of where you sleep, but let them get to know you. Whether that's funny stories about how your writing was going, typos that made you giggle, or whatever, but don't make it all promotion. Because I (and most of the rest of the universe) are likely to unfollow you as fast as possible and possibly report you for spam.

Most people seem to have gotten the hang of social networking these days, fortunately. But word to the wise, real life is like that too. (What? Life is like the internet? No way! It's true. Fewer cats, probably. I digress). Asking your friends and family to buy your book is great. Please do not badger them about it. People have a variety of reasons for not being able to purchase a book. I'm pretty sure your Uncle George is not the reason you didn't make it on the New York Times bestseller list.

There you have it. Promote, but not too much. Just don't be obnoxious.

Words to live by  :)

Skye

It's Not Butt In Chair, It's Hands On Keyboard

Gothic Goddess, here.

There's been a lot of talk lately about your word count and producing words and so on, and this is understandable. It's a new year, which means new beginnings and new goals and so on, and productivity/changing your habits is usually one on a lot of people's New Year's Resolutions list.

I'm okay with this. BUT!

Here's the thing. Like any new routine or goal, the enthusiasm and drive behind it can fizzle out about a week or so into it. They say it takes about three weeks to make or break a habit (some sources say six, but we'll go with three for argument's sake), so sticking with it (what’s called "discipline" for you free spirit hippy types) can be a challenge. This is where wanting it badly enough comes in, but I've covered that topic before.

What I'm going to talk about today is not desire, but fear.

See, I share our Bad Horse's opinion on the subject of writer's block. There's no such thing as writer's block. (I'm not talking about writer's angst or writer's apathy. These are two different animals I'll discuss here another time.) There's only fear.

And if you're going to be a writer, you have to stop being afraid.

That right there is the real goal. Anyone can produce words. It takes courage (guts, huevos, brass balls, a pair, cojones, a set, a backbone, a spine – you get it) to write, and I've met more than a few people who should really step back and admit to themselves that they're not brave enough to be a writer.

And you know what? That's okay.

It's okay to be afraid. It is. What makes the difference between a writer and someone who writes is what they do with that fear.

Someone who writes cries "writer's block" or whines about how they have no time to write or how they wish they could write or that they "should/want to get back to their writing" (that they haven't touched in months or years).

A writer sits down and puts their hands on the fucking keyboard and lets it happen, and THAT is terrifying. Every damned time.

Just because you accustom yourself to something doesn't mean it's less scary. It just means you're less afraid. Writing, like anything else you want to become proficient at, is scary as hell the first time you do it, but unlike firearms training or driver's education, every time you touch the keyboard, something different happens. There is no "getting used to" writing.

There's only letting yourself be okay with the fear.

Writing is about surrender, every time, and that can be tremendously frightening for control freaks.

But it's also insanely addictive and seductive. You create your own worlds, can control them (sometimes – more often than not they do what they want/control YOU), are familiar to the inhabitants of that world, you know the rules, on and on. It can be intoxicating, and sometimes you never want to leave. (Other times you can't wait to get the hell out, but that's another topic.)

When you put your hands on the keyboard, you're taking a risk of losing yourself, and that's what the majority of people who "want to write" don't understand and never will. They still think they're in control and don't want to give any of it up, when that's exactly what you absolutely must do if you're going to be a writer. (I'm smirking evilly at you,"indie" authors.)

So many of those who "want to write" think that because they blog about their various personal issues and oh-by-the-way-throw-in-something-wordsmithy-here they're a writer.

This is not so.

Being a writer is about more than production. More than being paid to make words. More than "wanting."

Being a writer is about putting your hands on the keyboard and surrendering yourself to whatever may happen. It's about losing control and letting go and not knowing where you're going or what's going to happen to you when you get there (thank you, Starman, I just totally nicked that quote).

Writing is about fear and the courage to face it.

It ain't for wussies. 

P.S. For those writers who are committed to their wordcount/goal and want a nice way to keep track and have a good visual record of their progress, may I recommend this excellent word tracker shown to me by our beloved Bitchstress Dreamkiller, available free from the wonderful Svenja Liv.

Shouldn't You Be Writing?

by Seleste deLaney

I have this author friend. She's seen a bit of success and has picked up an uber-fan. Not quite Annie Wilkes (Misery), but an uber-fan nonetheless. This fan keeps poking at my friend about the next book. At first I shrugged it off because it looked like it had only happened a couple times, but lately it's happening more often. A couple weeks ago, she made the "mistake" of posting about something on her social media that *gasp* wasn't writing. Uber-fan basically told her to get back to work.

Um... excuse me?

First, no one works 24/7. No one. I'm a mom, and even I get a couple hours away from that job every night to sleep. Everyone needs sleep, food, exercise, and a bevy of other things that aren't work. As much as writers joke about how we never stop writing (not entirely a joke, but I'll get to this in a bit), we don't spend all day every day at our computers tapping out stories. It is a job that most of us spend more than the normal 40 hours a week at, but it is a job.

Second, an author's job involves a lot more than just writing. If all we had to do was type out stories, we could (most of us) churn out 6-12 books a year, no problem. Most of them would be crap, but we could. You see, we also have to make time for editing, which can take as much time as writing. We also have to make time for querying/submissions/paperwork/etc--all the businessy parts of dealing with publishers. We also are supposed to be active in promoting our work. That means blogging and book tours and social media. Unless an author is making a solid six-figure plus income, they're probably doing most of that solo, which is more work. And none of this even takes research into account. Authors do the job because we love the job, but there's more to it than just writing the story, and all of it takes time.

Third, (and I am a classic case of this) if all a person does is work, they will burn out. That well of stories in their head? It will dry up because everything will sound like a crappy idea. They won't be able to write because the idea of sitting in front of the keyboard and creating a world out of nothing is exhausting. It's ceased to be a joy and it's become drudgery. At that point, the author that you love? They're not only going to not be working on the next book in the series you're anxiously awaiting; they're not going to be working on anything. Maybe ever, but certainly not for a while. Everyone needs to recharge sometimes, and writing can be incredibly emotionally and mentally taxing.

Lastly, that bit about how writers are always writing? It's both true and false. It's false because of all the things I've mentioned above. It's true because when we listen to music, we often find inspiration. When we see a movie, watch TV, or read someone else's books, we're learning new story-telling paths. When we go on vacations, we're finding new and exotic places to authentically include in our work. When we spend time with our children, pets, family, friends...we're having actual interpersonal connections that we can bring back to our work and make it more alive.

Writers are all readers. We know the frustration of wanting the next book now. As often as not, we wish we could write faster so we could get more stories to our fans, because we appreciate you and your excitement. But we also know the reality that no matter how fast we write, some things are out of our control (release dates included).

We're all on the same side here, believe it or not.

Let "Show, Don't Tell" Be Your 2013 Mantra

It's standard writing advice, right? Show, Don't Tell? As a writer, you hear those words so often, you probably want to pull your hair out and HERE is Mama Bitchstress saying them to you AGAIN, OMGWTFBBQ SKYLA??

As often the case, that which is true in writing also is in life.

I read this Cracked article the other day. Go check it out.

No really, I'll wait.

*two hours pass*

Right. I forgot to warn you Cracked is like a gateway to procrastination hell. (Second only to TV Tropes.)

Sorry.

Anyway, you'll notice in a lot of ways the article basically sounds like our Gothic Goddess giving advice, straight down to proclaiming the hippies as being wrong (those dirty, dirty hippies). But one of the things that stuck out to me was "What You Are Inside Only Matters Because of What It Makes You Do" on the second page.

Let this be the year you show what you are instead of tell.

If you are a writer, stop telling people this. Just stop. Stop and do. Spend a week loosely tracking how many hours a day you spend talking about writing/telling people you're a writer vs the actual motherfucking writing you DO. The former should not be greater than the latter.

Notice I say "write" and not run out and throw your shit on Kindle. Publishing doesn't make you a writer; actually writing does. Honing your craft does.

Are you querying? I can't tell you how many fucking cover letters I've read where the writer assures me the book is really funny. Again, our advice for life: don't TELL ME you're funny, SHOW ME. Write a query letter showcasing your sense of humor.  This is not rocket science.

And yet it is, actually, or feels like it. In life it's very easy to say you're something when your actions say something else.

But here's the thing: Life is not a YA novel and you are not the secretly awesome, compassionate, funny but shy girl no one notices. The Hot Boy is not going to one day zero in on you and see The Real You and defy social expectation by hanging out with you because he just "knows" deep down your amazing, kind heart by just looking in your fabulous probably-violet-coloured eyes.

What you think happens.

What actually happens.

Someone isn't going to notice you in life and then take you to the prom because you're SO AWESOME INSIDE and live happily ever after.

You don't become a better writer without writing stuff. You are not going to get a publishing contract without submitting stuff and showing stuff like you're an entertaining storyteller. You are not going to successfully network and make friends in this industry unless YOU make YOURSELF someone that other people will want to hang out with.

Sit down and make a list of everything you think you are. All of the various attributes. Now...what have you backed up with actions in the last week? In the last month? Writers, have you written anything? If you're compassionate, have you actually done anything for anyone recently? If you consider yourself gracious, have you thanked people for things? If you believe you're a good friend, have you reached out to anyone lately? Have your actions shown that you are the various things you think you are?

Because I can tell you, the world at large doesn't give a fuck who you think you are inside; what matters is what you do, how you interact, and what you contribute.

Don't answer the questions above. Don't think. Don't tell me. Simply do. Make this the year that you decide to show who and what you are instead of just tell people.

And be sure to make your actions evil.

Happy 2013: The Year of Eviltry. Now do the work.