Insights on Publishing Innovations, Issues, and the Writing Life

Friday Writing Exercise: Unputdownability

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Kelly Gunzenhauser

Recommendations, Please!

One of my New Year’s Resolutions was to read more, and so it’s time to start doing that. But, I don’t like to waste my time, so I would love some help. I want recommendations for good books, people. I would love to hear what you are reading and find out why you think it’s good enough to recommend. To that end, here are some things I like in a book.

First, I like suspense. I like to be kept waiting a little bit, whether it’s to find out who killed the butler, whether the guy will get the girl, whether the lawyer will win the case, or whether the dog wins the show. A good ending is worth the wait. So yes, a long book is fine.

Second, I enjoy male and female characters equally. My biggest complaint about The Hobbit? Geez, are there any women in here at all? But I like guys in my books, too. I am not one to bury myself in chick novels, or Lifetime movies.

Third, I like books with a touch of ye olde world about them. I like historical fiction, ancient fantasy, quests in general, mythical beasts, noble causes, impeccable manners, fine dress, and a looming battle here and there. Even a book set in the present that looks to the past, or talks about how past events affect the now, is fine for me.

But fourth, I also like books in the here and now. Books about stuff that goes on every day are fine as long as they have an interesting take on things. I once reviewed a submission about a kid throwing a tantrum while the main character tried to clean her house, or something like that. Too much like my own life—next.

But all of these are just trappings for the fifth, and final, thing I really like: a great story. Could you put it down? Not really? Then recommend it. A really good story with “unputdownability” transcends all other things that a reader says he or she likes about particular books. If the story is great, then it doesn’t matter what the setting, plot, and characters are. If that story about watching paint dry is truly compelling, then yes, recommend it.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

So here’s a two-part writing assignment, and if you care to share it, a favor to me. Write a blurb about the absolute best book you have read in the past year. What little kernel was it that made it the best; made it “unputdownable?” My rec, for example, would be The Hunger Games trilogy. What made it unputdownable was something that always seems to work for me—when an author successfully creates a believable “other world.” District 12 was pretty believable, once I got past the cringingly silly names of Katniss and Peetah. (Also, the amazing cruelty in the face of otherwise mundane lives reminded me of a favorite short story, “The Lottery,” by Shirley Jackson.)

Here’s the second part of the assignment. If you are writing a novel, then “unputdownability” is what you should strive for in your writing if you want to snag a publisher, editor, or agent. Even if you have just glimpses of it, it should certainly be worth your time to keep revising. So, find your own “unputdownability” and make the most of it. After you tell me what books to read, that is…

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged book recommendations, page turner, submissions, writing exercise | Leave a comment

Wednesday Writing Exercise: Be Shameless

Posted on February 1, 2012 by Wolf Hoelscher

I once made a profound observation to a friend of mine that there are two types of people in the world: those who enter a crowded room and slink to the nearest corner and those who jump up on a table and scream look at me!

If you’re a writer like me, you likely fall into the first category. At least to a degree. We love sharing stories but we’d prefer to tell them from a distance. Secretly though, we also dream of that book-cover glamour shot—you know, the one where you’re leaning up against a tree with that ever-so-slight smile and that subtly raised eyebrow.

These days, though, if you want at least your name on a book cover (that you didn’t pay to create), you have to break out of your shell a bit. Agents and publishers are now zeroed in on the idea of the author platform. (Check out this great post on Talking Writing from a former intern at the Epstein Agency.) Does the author have a radio voice? What kind of social media following does he have? Will she look good on Good Morning America?

Did you just gag a little? Sorry, but that’s the sad reality for those of us who want a big publishing contract these days. But a lot of writers I know would rather have splinters inserted under their fingernails than jump on that table. In fact, I just talked to one of those writers yesterday (yes, I’m talking about you, Kelly). We’re private people and it’s no one’s business what we had for breakfast, so buzz off, Facebook. Twitter? Don’t make me sick again.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

You’re about to embark on a journey of shameless self-promotion. No, keep reading! This won’t be that painful.

Personally, I attribute part of my own introversion to a confidence deficiency. Notice that I said “part;” most of my introversion is by choice and I like it that way. But let’s face it, confidence has something to do with it no matter how proud we might be that we were voted “Talks least, says most” in high school. We’re pouring our hearts out onto the page every time we write, even if it’s a story about mutant trolls who live in the back parking lot of a 7-Eleven. (Hey, there’s another writing exercise for you! Write that story!)

So it’s pretty daunting to think that someday it might be time to expose this soul child to a world of cynics with razor-sharp red pens. But if you want to earn a living (okay, receive a meager royalty check every quarter if you’re so lucky), then you have to kick the child out the door with his pants on fire.

So this week, your task is simple. I won’t tell you to grab your manuscript and go streaking on the quad. I won’t even tell you to go out and create a Facebook account. (But it would be great if you liked our page! See, shameless!)

Instead, I want you to pretend that you’re the subject of an interview for this very blog. From time to time we like to spotlight promising writers and we’ll ask questions like this:

When did you first decide that you were a writer?
What inspires you?
How would you describe your writing style?
What makes your book/story unlike anything we’ve read before?
What can we expect from you next?
If you were an animal, what kind of animal would you be?

Okay, go ahead and answer those questions, minus number 6. If you want brownie points, and you know you do, ask a friend to do a mock interview with you and record it. Then, post it on YouTube!

No, don’t worry. You don’t have to tell anyone. But, hopefully, this exercise will give you at least a teeny weeny boost in the self-confidence area—even if it’s all pretend. Because you’re good enough and people like you, dagnabbit!

–Wolf

Weekly writing quota for Wolf: 4.5 out 5 hours (it’s a start)

Posted in Exercises, Writers | Tagged author platform, Facebook, getting published, marketing your writing, self promotion for writers, Talking Writing, Twitter, writing exercise | Leave a comment

Friday Writing Exercise: Dialect for Your Dialogue

Posted on January 27, 2012 by Kelly Gunzenhauser

An important little box sits on my desk. In that box are three gray cassette tapes with purple and white labels. Those tapes are of me, circa age three. Yep, there was a time when my parents recorded my three-year-old voice on cassette tape. Every parent should record their children’s voices. No exceptions. This voice on tape is now unrecognizable to me. In fact, it’s almost unintelligible because our Southern accents are so thick. I lost that accent over many years. Shoot-fire, it’s amazing to be able to go back and listen to my three-year-old self in pure form, though. (That’s pronounced, “Shoooot-faaahr,” by the way.”)

Long ago, the phone company powers that be (a.k.a. Ma Bell) chose one generic accent to mimic. (I am sure you remember the voice of, “We’re sorry, you must first dial a one before…”) Combine that with the rapid rate at which we now move house across the country, and the nightly news anchors’ preferred accent that has been drummed into us, and it now seems that our regional American accents have over time become more and more homogeneous. We have lost a lot of our precious colloquialisms, too. Even though we continue to have a high rate of immigrants to this country, and their slang is creeping into our language, eventually I think their future generations’ unique voices will blend into the 10:00 news hour-speak just like those of the rest of us.

But still, especially early on, our families are responsible for how we sound when we talk. They are also responsible for sayings that creep out of our past and into our writing. Don’t believe me? Just listen to your significant other or roommate the next time he or she talks to someone from the same hometown over the phone. Hello, Jersey accent or Texas twang. We can thank those who raised us for whether we talk about using rubber bands or gum bands or elastics to bind things closed.

And while I am kinda glad some of the things on those long-ago tapes my parents made are never ever going to be heard, I am glad I get to hear them if I want to, even if it means that “ship” has about three syllables, and that somewhere I can probably hear my mom, an intelligent woman, half-joking that she’s going to “jerk a knot” in me. (I use that one with my kids. It’s a little bit funny, a little bit scary, and it means they are about two seconds shy of really crossing the line. One more toe over it and I am not laughing any more. Got it?!)

Today’s Writing Exercise:

Trot down memory lane and think about how you talked during your childhood. I find this works especially well when you recall times your family members were shouting at each other, or when generations got together for special occasions. What weird phrases did you catch? Did “yous guys” get told to go down to the corner for a pack of smokes for your Pop? (Kids could do that, back in the day!) Did Aunt Linny make a cola cake so sweet it “might could make your teeth itch?” Did your Grandpa tell you he was the “tallest hog at the trough” when he was a boy? Make a list of these linguistic gems to use the next time you are building a character.

Just one word of caution. These should be used like cayenne in the barbecue: sparingly. Characters who talk in nothing but dialect and colloquialisms can end up sounding up more like cartoon characters than real ones. But a few well-placed family funnies can convey where your character is from and add a certain homegrown wisdom where plain speech falls short.

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged accents, dialect in dialogue, writing dialogue, writing exercise | Leave a comment

Wednesday Writing Exercise: Write for Love or Money?

Posted on January 25, 2012 by Wolf Hoelscher

I’m going through a bit of a writing slump lately. More like a sabbatical. As a self-employed entrepreneur, I have trouble justifying the allocation of an hour or two a day for writing fiction. If any of you reading this post struggle with the same thing, I would love to hear from you. Let’s face it—as a former acquisitions editor and now owner of the online submissions hub Pubmission, I know how hard it is to make any sort of profit on a work of fiction. Unless you’re among the elite few who have made it to Amazon’s Top Ten list, you likely know exactly what I’m talking about.

So do I do the things that I know will generate cash to pay the bills? Or do I sacrifice a few of those precious hours for doing what I truly I thought I was always meant to do: writing fiction?

For the past few months, I’ve opted for the former. I start my day responding to emails, scanning headlines for new developments in the publishing industry, writing my daily to-do list, or frantically trying to finish projects whose due dates are nipping at my heels.

Instead of an author, I’ve become a firefighter.

So after receiving some great advice this morning from business coach Pat Overby, I’ve decided to create what he called a “default diary.” (Thanks, Pat!) Basically, it entails making a list of tasks that I want to accomplish weekly, and assigning a number of hours to each task. Then, I’ll create a feasible schedule accordingly.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

I’m about to do this exercise myself. I’ll probably allot 5 hours a week to fiction writing. I wish I could do 40, but I need to eat. Then, for each of the weekly tasks I created, I will track my time and hold myself accountable to those goals. In fact, for every Wednesday exercise I write for you, I’ll post at the bottom those results right here so you can give me a big old kick in the butt whenever I fall short.

It will look something like this… Wolf’s Weekly Writing Total: 5 out 5 hours.

So if you’re struggling to find time to write, create your own default diary. Decide how many hours you want to spend each week doing what you love (or hate). Create a schedule. Track your time. (I’ll probably use the time tracking tool Toggl.) Post your weekly results on my Wednesday post in the comments section below. Then let’s help each other stick to it!

–Wolf

P.S. Here’s a short video from Nathan Hulls on how to use Google Calendar to set up a default diary.

Posted in Exercises, Writers | Tagged default diary, finding time to write, paying the bills, writing exercise | 1 Comment

Do you start your story in neutral?

Posted on January 24, 2012 by Wolf Hoelscher

Lately, I’ve seen a common trend in some of the Editor Coaching sessions I’ve worked on. For each session a writer submits an “installment” from his or her book so I or another Pubmission editor can provide edits within the text online. The first session with a writer is typically the first couple chapters of a book, and I’m often left with the feeling that these sessions are merely warm-ups for the writer, that he or she isn’t ready to throw their book into gear on page one.

An early warning sign of this—shall we say—author idling is the word “Prologue” pasted where “Chapter One” should go. Sure, there are times that a prologue can be an effective tool for providing back story, but more often than not it makes me cringe. Because I know that the author is about to tip toe into his story.

Related: Where Does Your Story Start?

We as readers (and editors) don’t need you to lay everything out for us before we get started. The “Once upon a time…” approach might have worked for the Grimm Brothers, but the modern reader’s patience is much more demanding. We want to be thrown into to story the instant we start reading. Turning to page two should be a reflex not a chore.

So rather than starting with an extensive description of your setting or the political structure of your fantasy world’s government, push your book into drive and get us started in the middle of an awkward conversation or a bank robbery or a beheading (been reading too much Game of Thrones lately). Don’t worry about easing us into it. Fill in the necessary details as we move along and have faith that your reader can figure out the rest. A little mystery—even if you’re not writing a mystery—can go a long way.

So does your book start with a prologue? Have you been toying with the idea of restarting your book deeper into the story?

Posted in Submissions 101, Writers | Tagged begin a book, how to start a story, write a book, Writing Links | 1 Comment

Friday Writing Exercise: Do I Offend?

Posted on January 20, 2012 by Kelly Gunzenhauser

For the most part, my writing world and my real world don’t meet very often. People are often surprised to find out that I write for a living. I don’t publish the kinds of books that scandalize people (at least, not yet).

But if you read last week’s blog and you are a Duke fan, you probably don’t like the author I interviewed, or me, too much right now. Hats off to you for coming back!

I haven’t read the whole Duke Sucks book since it doesn’t come out for a while, but a lot of it is pretty harsh. So as I was reading some of the excerpts, I wondered what Andy Bagwell, the author, thought about how he would feel running into Duke alums, or even Duke friends, after the book came out. It’s one thing to write about nameless, faceless fans or basketball players he will never meet, and quite another to write about people he will actually talk to.

Many writers face the “I-can’t-believe-your mama-raised-you-to-write-garbage-like-this-book-I-can’t-put-down” syndrome. I imagine that here and there, a new writer probably feels like running for the hills once her cherished, treasured, hard-wrought novel finally comes out and then she sees her child’s third-grade teacher reading the sleazy bar pick-up scene in chapter 4. Oh well, too late for the pen name.

Recently, this “syndrome” has been magnificently illustrated in the book The Help. Not only was the fictitious book within the book scandalous, it was downright dangerous for the main characters when people in Jackson, Mississippi figured out they had written the book about them. The ladies did not just write embarrassing scenes, they wrote things about their employers that could get them fired, or worse. But in this brave project, they found a voice, wrote through the fear, and found endings and new beginnings that, though not completely happy, were at least fulfilling.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

This week, the writing exercise is all about writing through your fear. Do you have something that you are reluctant to finish, publish, or even explore in your writing because you are afraid of what other people might think? If you think it’s a good idea, then it’s time to embark on it. Get it on paper, then lock it away for a few weeks and revisit it. Or, if you have already written it, get it out, and work on it. Start thinking about getting people to read it. Be brave, like Aibileen and Minny, and tackle that Two-Slice Hilly who is hiding in your writing closet.

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged writing exercise, Writing Links | Leave a comment

How to Translate Your Passion into Print: An Interview with the Co-Author of “Duke Sucks”

Posted on January 13, 2012 by Kelly Gunzenhauser

As part of Kelly’s regular Friday Writing Exercise, she interviewed Andy Bagwell, co-author of the newly released Duke Sucks: A Completely Evenhanded, Unbiased Investigation into the Most Evil Team on Planet Earth. Kelly, by the way, is one of the most fervent UNC fans I know…she regularly wears light blue face paint while typing her blog posts. Judge her as you will.

If you live in the South, or if you like men’s college basketball, then you are likely familiar with the UNC/Duke rivalry. The two schools are just 25 minutes apart if you travel down what news commentators refer to as Tobacco Road, and they boast two of the best basketball programs in the country, with nine NCAA titles between them.

With these two schools close enough for students to frequent the same bars on the weekends, the rivalry gets pretty intense. Much has been published on this great rivalry and today we’ll talk to Andy Bagwell, co-author (with Reed Tucker) of the book Duke Sucks: A Completely Evenhanded, Unbiased Investigation into the Most Evil Team on Planet Earth.

The authors derived the book topic from their podcast “Tarheel Bred, Tarheel Dead,” a podcast designed for UNC basketball fans. Obviously, they’re passionate about their subject matter, so I talked to Andy about how they translated that passion into a marketable book. (Which relates to the writing exercise at the end of this short interview.)

So let’s get to it! Duke fans, we still love you—proceed with the usual expectation of healthy rivalry, snark, and comments about Coach K’s otherworldly hair.

KELLY: I asked Andy to describe the book in general so that we could know what we are dealing with here:

ANDY: This book is more than just why UNC fans hate Duke. Heck, we’re supposed to. But the thing is, all sorts of people hate Duke. It’s universal. With that in mind, we wanted to find out why that was. What is it about Duke that makes them hated everywhere? Is there anything real behind it or is it just “haterade?”

So we did a lot of research into the reasons that people give for hating Duke: They flop; they get all the calls; they’re rich, white elitists; Coach K dies his hair; etc. From there, we did more research.

We talked to former non-Duke basketball players, people in the media that cover Duke, former ACC refs, and then dug into the stories that we had heard over the years. We laid all of these things out like a court case, bringing “charges of suckitude and then making the argument based on our research as to whether or not they were guilty of, well, sucking.

We ultimately try to tie all of this together in the end to see if there is one over-arching theme. We are simply laying out the facts and then let the readers decide for themselves if they agree with us. To the Duke fans out there, we even come to some conclusions in their favor. You’ll be surprised by what we found out about Coack K’s hair and we give them a pass on the relative attractiveness of their cheerleaders. So basically, that’s it. All done in a humorous way.

KELLY: How did you and Reed decide to do the UNC basketball podcast? Did you research whether there was a niche in the podcast “market,” or was it just something you were passionate about?

ANDY: Reed looked around and found that there was no such thing as a true fan-driven podcast for UNC Basketball fans. We wanted to re-create the feeling of sitting around the living room or at a bar or such and just talking about the Heels. So it was both a need that we felt wasn’t being served and we are clearly passionate about it.

KELLY: What kinds of things do you talk about on the podcast? How do you fill your time during the off-season, too?

ANDY: During the season, each podcast consists of the top three topics that are on the minds of UNC basketball fans that week. We also have one other oddball topic/segment that could be anything from a quiz, to rating the players like stocks, to talking about whether or not it is okay to make fun of an opposing player’s unibrow. And then we end every podcast with a segment called “Why Duke Sucks” and it’s a new reason every week. In the off-season, we’ll do monthly shows that might be about various topics: recruiting, NBA players, post-season recaps, pre-season prognostications, and we’ll bring in a guest or two.

KELLY: Why did you start thinking about moving from the podcast to writing a book together?

ANDY: The book obviously grew out of the closing segment of the podcast. In coming up with a topic for each week, we started to see that there was a LOT of material out there. And it was literally one of those, “Hey, we should write a book or something about why Duke sucks.” And away we went.

KELLY: Can you briefly describe how you wrote the book together, especially since you live several states apart and both work full-time jobs?

ANDY: The process was fairly straightforward. To start, we compiled a long list of “charges,” then split up the topics one by one. We each wrote an essay on that topic complete with research that we had done (quotes from articles, interviews, etc.). Then Reed, being the professional writer and all, would clean mine up where needed. We would then talk regularly about how things were going, compare notes and look over each other’s work via email and Google Docs. It was very collaborative.

KELLY: Where in the process did finding a publisher happen, and how did it happen?

ANDY: The easy part for us was that Reed already had an agent that he had been working with. We initially put together the book proposal and ran it by her. At first, we thought we should only shop it to some small niche shops and didn’t figure that it would go past that. However, the agent had a notion that it might play to a larger audience and sent it out to all of the big publishing houses. We got some decent responses right off the bat.

As luck would have it, right around the time it was sitting on the desks of these publishers, a national news story hit the media about Duke. Jalen Rose, in a documentary about his playing days at Michigan, referred to Duke players as “Uncle Toms” and talked about how much he hated Duke. This caused a firestorm nationally. The publishers suddenly realized this was a universal topic. We then got a small offer, and about a week later a larger one, and voila, we had a book deal. We now have Jalen Rose on our Christmas card list.

KELLY: What advice do you have for aspiring writers who want to turn a passion or hobby into a book?

ANDY: It’s so cliché, but write what you know. If you are passionate about something, it’s likely that there are several people out there who are just as passionate as you about the same subject. Try and have a unique take on it. We didn’t want to just spout off the tired old stories that everyone tells about Duke. We wanted to get to the facts and see if there was anything there. Also, get Jalen Rose to say something stupid about your topic on national television.

KELLY: Finally, a word to our Duke fans, who probably find the title less than flattering. What is it about the Duke men’s basketball program that inspires UNC fans to spill so much ink and ire?

ANDY: As I said before, we actually give Duke a pass on some of these charges and make a suggestion in the end for how to improve their standing. I will also say that some of the Duke fans that I have talked to welcome the book. They know that it’s all part of the fun of the rivalry. This isn’t Auburn-Alabama. We aren’t purposefully killing legendary trees. And if they don’t like it, we just laid out the blueprint for their own “Carolina Sucks” pamphlet (see what I did there?). Just don’t forget to send us a royalty check for the title.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

So readers, regardless of what side of the Duke/UNC argument you come down on (including the indifferent side), your writing assignment this week is to examine your life and decide which passionate interest could turn into a publishing opportunity for you. Stephen King wrote an excellent book about the art of writing, so even dedicated fiction writers can do it. Think about what you like to do with your time. Maybe you love flea markets. Maybe you are a superb chef. Maybe your friends ask you to let them borrow clothing before you hit the clubs because you put together the best closet full of cool stuff on a college budget. Everyone has a talent to share. Why not share it in writing?

Jot down a few paragraphs about what your talent is, how you do it, and why it’s a viable publishing idea. Maybe you will find that your passion, combined with a little writing about it, is a strong enough combination to motivate you to go further down the path toward publishing.

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Featured Writers, Interviews, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged andy bagwell, duke basketball, duke sucks, how to write a nonfiction book, unc basketball, writing exercise, writing passion | 1 Comment

Friday Writing Exercise: Taking Inventory

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Kelly Gunzenhauser

Here’s how much I despise taking down Christmas decorations. I am instead writing a blog about cleaning out writing folders, because that stinks slightly less. Between painstakingly picking tinsel out of the tree and even more painstakingly wrapping my mom’s antique ceramic nativity scene, which seems to get more chipped every season (this year, I lost Joseph’s thumb), I decided to write about something I did a while ago, but that I should have saved for now, because now is the time to do such things.

A few months ago, my ancient (going on eight years, I believe) PowerBook gave me an alarming message when, out of curiosity, I looked at how much memory I had. It told me, “Not much, lady.” So I got to work, purging all of the old newsletters, emails, art files, and other drivel taking up meaningless space on my packed hard drive.

Then, I turned to the SACRED FOLDER. (Insert echo sound effect here.) That’s the writing folder, of course. It holds the finished work, the works-in-progress, the snippets, the stories, the work people pay me for, the blogs, the story ideas I think might be worth something someday, the musings, the scribbles, the dreams I remembered long enough to get on paper, the first drafts, the next drafts, and everything else. It also holds the critiques, the responses, the ideas, the garbage, and everything else writing-related that I could never bear to toss out.

I opened the folder. And I read every single thing in it. (I recommend doing this late at night with a glass of wine. I did it in the morning with a glass of nothing and an uncomfortable chair. I do NOT recommend that.)

Some of it was really funny; some was just worthless. Much of it I had forgotten completely. And some was definitely worth revisiting. Many things just got a simple backup. Some got moved to a “work on this” folder. Others migrated to a “I am finished and have seen the galleys/digital files/published hard copies so back it up and move it off” folder.

But other stuff? It got TRASHED! In the Trash Can, people. And then I emptied the trash using the secure empty button. And I didn’t even wring my hands or cry.

The fact is, we aren’t going to use every writing idea we generate. Every weird dream about a rain shower of silverware is not the basis for the next great novel. Every shifty character we observe blowing his nose into a newspaper on a subway platform is not a short story catalyst. Every quiet moment in nature or doctor’s diagnosis will not turn into e. e. cummings’s grasshopper jumping off the page or T. S. Eliot daring us to eat a peach. Every note we jot down about how to make our own loom is not the impetus for the next great how-to book. Some moments and ideas are just moments and ideas, meant to be enjoyed or endured just at that time, and for their own sake. And sometimes, when our hard drives get too full or our notebooks get too stuffed with sticky notes, it’s time to take inventory and purge, and separate the wheat from the chaff.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

Your assignment this week, should you choose to accept it, is to delve into those recesses of your writing mind and your computer or notebook that contain material filed away for future use. Open those dusty storage areas and read what’s there. Make new folders and reorganize what you want to keep. Dump the rest. If you really need it, it will come back to you or else it will beg to stay. Pay attention to those voices, but make sure you also listen to the voices that say, “Man, that wasn’t a great writing idea. It was just a funny comment made by that drunk guy at the next urinal.” Then let it go. Empty trash.

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged story ideas, writing exercise, writing ideas | Leave a comment

You’ve Signed a Great Book…What Now?

Posted on January 5, 2012 by Gabe Robinson

So you’re a publisher and you’ve managed to acquire what you think is a really stellar novel, a masterpiece, and you’re considering your next steps. My first bit of advice: relax. Rome wasn’t built in a day, right?

Before I go further, let me just say that relaxing does not mean kicking your feet up and doing nothing. You have a lot of work ahead of you. But there’s no need to burn yourself out on this book in the first month after acquiring it. Take your time, give each step its proper attention, and don’t work yourself into a frenzy over a hundred different details that don’t need attention yet. Don’t think that you need to rush it to publication just because it’s great and it needs to get out there now. Just the opposite: Because it’s great, don’t rush it to publication.

Here’s what to do:

1. First thing is to whip the manuscript into shape. “But it’s a great novel,” you say. “A tour-de-force book that only comes along once every generation.” Super. Good for you. But even if it’s great, I bet there are issues—both small and large—that need addressing. I’ve never worked with an author whose first draft was ready to hit the shelves, and if the author of this book you’ve just bought thinks that’s the case for his/her work, then good luck. You’ve got a live one on your hands. But in my experience, every author needs at least one—sometimes two, three, or four—good solid edit. There may be nothing wrong with the plot or the characters, but I guarantee you there’s still some polishing that can be done. Get this right first. If you go through all of the other steps and don’t get this one thing right, then it may all be for nothing.

2. This can happen simultaneously with the first step—start spreading the word. This doesn’t mean publicity necessarily, because no outlet is going to want to do anything so far in advance of the pub date. And even if they did, any effect it would have had would be null and void by the time the book goes on sale. The one exception would be a press release. Get one of these out if you can, with the details of the book and author, when the book goes on sale, and some talk about how this is the greatest book since the Bible.

But what I really mean when I say get the word out is you need to build the buzz. Blog about it. Tweet about it. Start setting up a webpage for the book. Talk to your industry contacts: reviewers, booksellers, editors of trade publications, agents, other publishers…everybody. Tell them you just bought a book and that’s it absolutely amazing. Give it an intriguing aura. Start planting seeds out there that you have something special in the pipeline. When the time comes to really start the publicity push in full, you’ll already be a step ahead.

3. Get the details right. You’re going to have a stretch of downtime between the editing stage and the on-sale date where all these little details that feel like administrative chores are going to need attending to. Catalog copy, jacket/cover copy, author bio, author photo, title, subtitle, cover art, etc. This stuff can be just as important if not more so than any other marketing/publicity you do. I read a study that said an overwhelming number of readers choose a book based solely on the cover copy. If that’s the case, then you better get this right, because if you don’t, then no matter how great the book is, you could lose readers before they even open it up. These little seemingly mundane details matter. Treat them accordingly.

4. This can be done at the same time as step three. Try to get some early copies into the hands of other writers. If you can get quotes, great, but quotes or no, getting the book to other writers has the potential to be an effective marketing tool. Writers can be powerful advocates for a book, and even a short Twitter mention about this book could reap great benefits down the road.

5. Start kicking your marketing into high gear. This is where you’ll really want to start ramping up production on the webpage and getting creative with ways to get the word out. Are there unique methods for getting this book to rise above all the other books out there? Are there themes or content specific to the book that might lend themselves to unorthodox advertising or cross-promotional opportunities?

Makes galleys and get them out there. If this book is as good as you think it is, then it deserves galleys. Get as many of these into reviewers’ and booksellers’ hands as you can. And follow up. Just having a placard that calls this another compelling read isn’t enough. Get those mental wheels turning and think outside the box. Reach readers in unusual places. Reach readers that aren’t readers yet—that is, reach consumers who might enjoy the book but don’t typically read much. Utilize technology. Be guerilla about it. This is your “big” book, so don’t give it your normal treatment.

6. A couple of months before publication, start hitting up the publicity front. Think of what makes this book special. Is it a war novel written by a former Marine? Is the author a twenty-one year old college student who wrote the book in three months while studying abroad in Mongolia? Publicity outlets love these little background stories, so see how you can take advantage of them. What kind of coverage can you get in papers, magazines, online outlets…maybe even television? Reviews are one thing, but utilizing some sort of publicity hook can really set a book apart.

7. Lastly, don’t ever stop talking about the book. Be obnoxious about it, and not just with fellow publishing folks. Talk to friends, families, your local bartender, the bagger at the grocery store, strangers—talk to everybody about the book. Word-of-mouth is the most powerful marketing tool out there, and it starts with you. Let the world know about this book, and keep letting them know, even after the book goes on sale.

There will come a point when you’ve done all you can, but don’t let that happen between acquisition and on-sale. Pay attention to each phase in the process, and leave it all on the floor, to use a sports metaphor. I can’t guarantee success if you follow these steps, but I can guarantee failure if you don’t follow them, at least to some degree. All the other publishers out there think they have the next big thing, and I can tell you that they’re all going to be doing as much, if not more, than you are. So you better be prepared to bleed for this book. I would like to think that good books will be found no matter what, but I’m not sure that’s the case, so if you have a really great book on your hands, take the time to get it right. Even the little things. Actually, especially the little things. You never know which piece is going to get a reader to open up the book and discover whatever magic it was that made you want to sign it in the first place.

Posted in Contributors, Gabe Robinson, Publishers, Submissions 101 | Tagged acquisitions, book marketing, book publicity, book publishing, editing, Publishing Links, signing an author | 1 Comment

Wednesday Writing Exercise: A Part of Your Mind Escapes

Posted on January 4, 2012 by Megan Lobsinger

2K12? Yeah? Think it will catch on? No? OK.

In any case, it’s a new year. A time when everybody tends to simultaneously assess the past, find stillness in the present, and daydream about the future. We also tend to make resolutions—to eat better, to read more, to call home. Or, if we’re writers, we make promises like these, found at Brevity’s Nonfiction Blog.

Every year around this time people (myself oh-so-included) get a surge of confidence to make major or minor life changes, but oh so often the backlash of such pressure is disappointment and defeat. As I read through the all-too-familiar list of writing resolutions, I started to have mixed feelings. Yes, I think it’s a great idea to resolve to do better, to write more consistently, to have a neater workspace (that’s my husband’s resolution for me), to finish the story that I started three years ago. And yes, I’m quite confident that these writers will succeed. But if not? How to avoid the disappointment? Maybe there’s a place of balance to be found between who we resolve to be and what we let ourselves see and hear and perceive.

I moved to gorgeous Asheville, NC, from the magnificent town of Athens, Ohio, in August of last year. And though I am blown away by the mountains and the clouds and the food trucks and the beer and the art everywhere, I dearly miss the community of friends I had in Athens. It’s strange to be caught between such disparate feelings, and I think my missing Athens has really prevented me from seeing Asheville. Inspired by everyone else’s new year’s resolutions, I wrote to a friend earlier this week. I said, this year I want to learn how to see better. When I walk Dinah (my dog), I want to be as open to the world as she is. Because sometimes I think seeing is the opposite of looking. It’s more a listening with all the senses. And I think maybe listening is what every kind of love is made of.

Do you know what I mean? Have you ever felt this way? Like what you were looking for was getting in the way of seeing?

And then I got a letter from a friend who was feeling a similar way. There is an impulse—isn’t there?—when we feel we have a clear sense of what we need, we get very impatient to enact it. When really, as my friend suggested, maybe we just need to make the space it takes for the eyes and the mind to open.

Missing Athens and my favorite writers, and reading through the resolution list, I got to thinking about the poet Becca J.R. Lachman, who has taught me so much about how to listen. She’s a musician, and she has a truly gifted ear for the cadence of language. Further, her poetry demonstrates a deep empathy for all of humanity. But more than this, I know, from watching her, that she makes it her mission every day to listen a little more carefully to the world around her. So this year I’m vowing to enact what I’ve learned from her.

Try This:

Becca is among those listed making writerly resolutions. Here’s hers: “I will write, as William Stafford puts it, ‘for the unknown good of my enemies.’” Here’s the poem she’s citing. Give it a read.

The poem is, yes, about reseeing our enemies, and in so doing allowing the lives of those who seem remote to be revealed. Included within this poem is the far-reaching idea that there’s so much we “turn our minds away from,” because in whatever way we’re unready to listen to what we see. The enemy is anything we won’t let ourselves perceive, whether within ourselves or somewhere else.

Spend some time with this idea. Sit with your blank page or computer screen and write what comes to mind. Open up and explore what your mind has turned away from this year. As the poem suggests, what we don’t let ourselves see is “the great mutual blindness” that “darkened that sunlight in the park.” When you better see, what will be illuminated?

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Megan Lobsinger, Writers | Tagged Asheville, Athens, Becca J.R. Lachman, writing exercise, Writing Links | Leave a comment

Friday Writing Exercise: Some Writing Resolutions

Posted on December 23, 2011 by Wolf Hoelscher

I hope that can keep my writing resolutions for 2012 as well as I kept my resolutions from last year when I lost a whopping 20 POUNDS PEOPLE AND KEPT NEARLY ALL OF IT OFF! That’s right. I am a force to be reckoned with. Now get those cookies out of my sight.

Here are my resolutions for this year:

Resolution #1:

Read a couple of books that I find really intriguing, or at least fun. I am really interested in Pier Forni’s new book The Thinking Life, which I think would be intellectually challenging. I am also quite interested in reading 11/22/63 by Stephen King, which seems like the Groundhog Day horror novel version of the Bill Murray film. Not all of King’s books are intellectual masterpieces (although the horror genre in general and King in particular get a lot more respect these days, what with Misery and Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption being successful, fulfilling film adaptations), but they sure are fun to tear through. I rarely give myself time to read books. My days are packed, and I have two books due myself this year. But I want to read these, and I am going to treat myself.

Resolution #2:

Clean out my office and make it a place I really want to work. I will blog about this one. I am writing on a tiny corner of my desk. I have so many book samples, kid school projects, grant writing information samples, and junk piles on my desk that I barely have a desk anymore. And although I managed to tear up carpet, since my husband moved a freelance business into the office with me, I have no space, no storage, and nowhere to do much of anything. It makes me crazy, and essentially it makes me work less. Gotta change that.

Resolution #3:

Train a new coauthor. I write a lot of education books, and I am working with a new coauthor. I want to help her smoothly through the process without a lot of false starts and missteps, which means being super organized and ready to delegate. So, I have to whip the book we are getting ready to write into shape. Fast. While I am at it, might as well do that for the other coauthor, too.

Resolution #4:

Organize my contracts. If there is one thing I hate, it’s keeping track of contracts and payments. It’s my nemesis. I can make a deadline like nobody’s business, but I am bad at keeping up with the paperwork. This really goes with #2; I need to make a space for where the contracts go and stay on top of that mess.

So that’s it. No mountains to climb, no “I promise to get published this year in a new genre,” or anything like that. I have a day job, a family, and a husband who is trying to find a job in addition to his freelance work. I have to keep it real. I also have a few other, nonwork-related goals to hit. But these I know I can reach. And I will. They will make me happier, more productive, and a better person and writer.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

By now you know your writing exercise. What are your writing goals? Make them attainable, and make them goals you don’t have to rely on others to hit. For example, “I will publish my novel this year,” is a lofty goal, but you can’t completely control it. “I will send my novel to five publishers,” is a goal that lies entirely within your control. So do that. Preferably, since they support this blog, by using Pubmission!

Happy writing, and see you in the new year.

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged New Years resolutions, writers, writing exercise, Writing Links, writing resolutions | Leave a comment

StarVision Membership Revoked

Posted on December 22, 2011 by Wolf Hoelscher

I hope this holiday season is finding you well. This week, I was excited to welcome an India-based company as a new publisher member on our site. However, though StarVision Press stated in their application, on their website, and in an email correspondence with me that they do not charge writers for publication, I have just received evidence that this is not the case. This publisher has a buyback clause in their contract that requires writers whom they’ve “accepted for publication” to purchase 1,000 copies of their published book at $5.00 each for a total of $5,000. I have therefore revoked StarVision’s membership.

This is absolutely not what I want from our publisher members. Writers using Pubmission should expect that our publisher members assume the cost of publishing their books in the traditional sense. If you ever encounter this to be not the case, please alert me right away. I’m adding a menu selection to the right of the writer’s dashboard that will allow you to do this quickly.

As of early January, Pubmission will be changing its pricing structure, requiring new publisher members to pay a small annual membership fee. We will also require that publishers with fewer than 5 books on their list submit a boilerplate author contract to us for review. I don’t want to discourage the many legitimate new independent publishers out there from using Pubmission to find writers such as yourself, but as the traditional publishing model continues to morph into many different forms, we need to be extra vigilant in discovering those who wish to prey on writers’ hopes. Any other suggestions you have for weeding out potential scammers such as StarVision Press would be most welcome. You can do so here: http://pubmission.wufoo.com/forms/starvision-press/

If you were asked to submit your full manuscript to StarVision Press, I sincerely apologize. You will likely receive another notification that they want to publish your book with a contract attached. Unless you wish to pay $5,000 for 1,000 copies of your book, I recommend that you reply by withdrawing your submission from their consideration.

I hope that this hasn’t caused you much inconvenience and I do apologize for the disappointment this has likely caused a number of you. This was the last thing I wanted Pubmission to do.

I hope you have a wonderful holiday and much writing success in the year to come. Again, please offer your suggestions and keep me posted if any publisher member asks you to contribute your own money toward publishing your book.

Wolf

Posted in Writers | 2 Comments

Can You Market a Great Book without a Great Elevator Pitch?

Posted on December 22, 2011 by Gabe Robinson

With books, as with just about any product, the marketing and sales pundits of the world will talk ‘til they’re blue in the collective face about the importance of the pitch. It needs to be pithy, engaging, to-the-point, and exhibit 17 other qualities to be effective. Most folks know of this concept as the “elevator pitch.” The idea is that you should be able to talk about a book and all of its selling points in the time it takes an elevator to travel from the ground floor to the top floor of your average skyscraper.

The elevator pitch is extremely important from a marketing and sales perspective. I would never try to say that it wasn’t. You may not always have a significant amount of time with some bookseller or reviewer you feel needs to hear about a book, so being able to talk about it in a succinct, efficient manner has great value.

But what if you’re a publisher looking to acquire a book and the only thing you can think is that there’s no elevator in the world tall enough to provide the time needed to pitch this thing properly. It’s a good book, a great book, a book that has struck some chord deep within you—something that doesn’t often happen (and you read a lot of books)—but your sales and marketing folks are telling you it’s too hard to describe, it doesn’t fit nicely within a certain box, what are you going to put on the cover copy? etc., etc. Do you bail, even if they’re right?

I would say absolutely not. This is a valid issue, to be sure. It’s a challenge. But don’t let it be a deal-breaker. Think about some of the great authors and books out there. Even recent ones. I guarantee there are a fair number of them to which the elevator pitch rule can’t be applied, at least not in such a way that really does the book justice. Murakami, anyone? Bolaño? How about David Foster Wallace? Hard to talk about their books appropriately in just two minutes, right? Or think about movies. Are you really going to describe a David Lynch film in the time it takes to get to the top of the Chrysler Building? You might get a few key point across, but there’s no way you can fit it all in. Clearly this doesn’t mean any of these projects weren’t worth taking on.

While I was at HarperCollins, I received on submission one of the best books I’ve ever read. But I wasn’t able to buy it. Why? Basically, because it was a hard one to describe. Because it wasn’t elevator pitchable. It would be a difficult one for sales and marketing. I could tell you that it’s a literary book and that it involves time travel and murder and romance and that the author is a star in the making, but that would just be scratching the surface. To really give this book the spiel it deserves, I would need a plane ride, not a measly elevator trip. Well, maybe if the elevator got stuck for 15 minutes.

But that doesn’t mean this book wasn’t a great book, a book worthy of publishing. It would have just meant a little more work on our end. We would have had to come up with some unique ways to get the word out there on this book, ways that didn’t rely on a brief pitch. We would have had to get creative. We would have had to think of some crazy way to get people to actually read the damn thing. Because that’s where the greatness of this book lay—in the read, not in the pitch. But these days, sadly, it seems that if you don’t have the pitch (the perfect, two-minute pitch), you can’t get the read. Probably my biggest disappointment from my time at Harper was not being able to buy this book.

Having a snappy, gripping, efficient pitch is extremely important, but it’s not the be-all and end-all. If you’re considering acquiring a book and it’s hard to describe but you still love it—I’m talking here about really, truly loving it, like you haven’t loved many books—find a way to make it work. Maybe the perfect pitch will come to you later. Maybe it won’t but you’ll think of another way to communicate the book’s greatness. It all comes down to passion and how much you’re willing to put into the book. But you better not buy it and then hope it sells itself. Not gonna happen. You’re going to have to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty. And if at the end of the day you’ve busted your butt and the thing still just didn’t sell, well at least you’ll feel good about yourself. Because you gave your all, you put yourself out there, for what you believed to be a great (if not easily described) book. And isn’t that what it’s all about?

I almost said earlier that not being able to buy that book at Harper was one of my biggest regrets, but that wouldn’t be true. I fought tooth-and-nail for that book, and I lost. It sucked. But when that book comes out (it already got bought elsewhere) and people see it for the great book it is, I’ll puff up my chest with pride and remember it as that time travel, love story, murder mystery—oh, let’s just call it a masterpiece and leave it at that—that I almost had. And if you have 15 free minutes, or maybe a couple of hours, I’ll gladly sit down with you and really tell you what it’s all about.

Posted in Contributors, Gabe Robinson, Publishers, Submissions 101 | Tagged acquiring books, acquisitions, elevator pitch, marketing a book, publishing a book | Leave a comment

Wednesday Writing Exercise: The Return of the Light

Posted on December 21, 2011 by Megan Lobsinger

Man, who doesn’t love this time of year? Dark, cozy nights with family, delicious holiday pie, the pretty little lights you can glimpse on the tree in your neighbor’s bay window, shopping for perfect gifts, listening to those same old songs on the all-holiday radio stations. Not to mention that deep and overwhelming sense of community and belonging. The sense that, yes, we’re all in this together.

These are the joyful lists we make. And we all get these same goofball grins on our faces every year. Nevermind the cussing of the holiday drivers, the stress and mayhem of retail’s Most Wonderful Time of the year. Oh, bother.

This is an auspicious time of year precisely because of the way it symbolically and literally pulls our hearts in dichotomous directions. Nearly everyone expresses both holiday cheer and befuddlement over holiday stress. In the Christian tradition, believers celebrate a birth while remembering a death. Outside, the world is plunged into its deepest darkness, so we decorate our houses with light. Like being suspended at the top of the world’s most magnificent roller coaster, we inhale deeply that long pause, and wait for the return of the sun. The magic of the end of December is its simultaneous stillness and gathering potential.

This is the space art is born out of. The deep external stillness that bubbles over with creativity. Or, to put it so so so much less romantically, this season is the eleventh hour of staring at the blank screen, when all that time you spent waiting yields the fruit of your patient faith.

And, really, isn’t this season desperate for its artist? To create light where none is present, in honor of the light that will gradually return each and every successive day. When the world is at its darkest, its the artists and writers and dreamers who need to reveal the light to the people.

Try this:

Consider what it means to you to find light in the darkness.

Maybe this will help:

“Goethe’s final words: ‘More light.’ Ever since we climbed out of that primordial slime, that’s been our unifying cry: ‘More light.’ Sunlight. Torchlight. Candlelight. Neon, incandescent lights that banish the darkness from our caves to illuminate our roads, the insides of our refrigerators. Big floods for the night games at Soldier’s Field. Little tiny flashlights…. “

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Megan Lobsinger, Writers | Tagged holiday writing, writing exercise, Writing Links | Leave a comment

Friday Writing Exercise: Season’s Greetings from Snark-o the Christmas Elf

Posted on December 16, 2011 by Kelly Gunzenhauser

Christmas is the only time of year when I get letters from anyone other than my bank, insurance, or credit-card companies. These letters seem to pop up from just a few people on our Christmas card list. Some of them are brag lists: here’s what we accomplished this year. Some are testimonies about particular religious beliefs: don’t forget the reason for the season, etc. Others are full of warmth and humor: See how silly we still are? All of them are welcome, though, because I know the people behind them, and they cared enough to write to me. I love that, even though sometimes I roll my eyes a little at the content. Don’t we all?*

I had an experience with another kind of letter this year, vicariously through a good friend of mine who lost both of her parents. Her mother died after a long, off-and-on battle with cancer. Her father died just a few months later, peacefully, in his sleep, the week of Thanksgiving. The physical cause was an undetected blockage in a major artery, but her family feels he died of a broken heart, missing his wife of many years. While the family is very sad, they are happy to think of the couple as no longer separated by death.

This particular friend runs a blog, and she recently posted about a letter she wrote to her mother earlier this year while she was still living. In it, she thanked her mom for everything she had done for her over the years. It was the little stuff she emphasized in the letter, like dancing in the kitchen to make cleaning it more fun, and giving gifts to bus drivers and lifeguards. It’s the little stuff that people do for us I think we often remember as most important. Sure, I remember the puppy I got for Christmas and the piano I got for my birthday, but I also remember the time my mom made my entire room into a tent using sheets and blankets so that I would have a place to read the new copy of Charlotte’s Web she bought me. Little stuff stands out.

My friend found the letter she wrote to her mother when she was going through her things, and she was so grateful she wrote it, and so sad she never wrote one to her father, expecting him to be alive long enough for her to get around to it. Finding letters, especially now, is like finding treasure. What will our descendents find? Somehow, the idea of blowing the dust off of the old laptop and scrolling through our old emails isn’t nearly as romantic or interesting as finding an old letter. We don’t write letters much anymore. When was the last time you thought about writing a letter to someone? And, when was the last time you used letter writing as a device in your own writing?

Today’s Writing Exercise

Here’s your writing assignment. Write a real letter to someone, whether it’s used in a piece of your fiction writing, or it’s an actual letter to a friend or family member. If you are using it in a piece of fiction, give it a pivotal role in the story.

Does the letter reveal a secret?
Confirm a rumor?
Blow the lid off of something previously concealed?
Change a life?
Lead to recovery of a lost object?
Or, simply change the way readers view the writer?

Make the letter important. Then, grab a pen and an appropriate piece of paper, and write it in longhand. Make the handwriting match the subject matter. If you write a real letter, again, no typing allowed, and make sure you mail it. Imagine how it feels to get a real letter in the mail that isn’t offering you a lower interest rate or 5% cash back. It’s worth the time and the stamp, believe me!

* If sentimental letters aren’t your style, or if your part is being played by Snark-o the Christmas Elf this year, then have a little fun with this assignment. For example, if you are a parent who has the kids with the snotty noses and holey jeans and the C+ in your family, write a sarcastic letter about your family’s latest fabulous underachievements. Have fun with it, then burn it on the Yule Log.

** Years ago, I thanked my thesis chair with a signed copy of The Christmas Letters by Lee Smith (Algonquin, 2002). While it’s a stretch to believe that all the information is for the letter reader’s benefit alone, it’s a great example of how reading a group of letters together tells a life story—an art that will be lost to future generations who delete emails and texts and tweets.

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged annual Christmas letter, letter writing, writers, writing exercise | Leave a comment

December Writer of the Month: Jason Pisano

Posted on December 15, 2011 by Wolf Hoelscher

Jason Pisano’s autobiography submission in Pubmission’s general database caught my eye not just because he has an incredible life story, but because he seems to have so much fun telling it.

Like Christy Brown, best known for his portrayal by Daniel Day Lewis in My Left Foot, Jason has cerebral palsy and uses his left foot for things that most of us use our hands for. One of those things is writing. Another is running marathons.

Jason Pisano

That’s right. Jason is a marathon runner. And an accomplished one at that. Using that left foot, he pushes himself backwards those 26.2 miles in a custom-made racing chair. A few years ago when I slogged through my first and only half-marathon, I marveled at the runners wearing t-shirts that said they’d run 50 marathons in 50 states. Well, we’re going to have to add another state to accommodate Jason. He’s competed in 51 races.

When I select a writer of the month, I do so based on the qualification that after reading the submission, I want to see the full manuscript—which means that the writer has done his job with the submission. Though Jason refers to himself as “severely disabled” in his submission abstract, you wouldn’t get that sense from reading the short selection from his autobiography. As he matches wits with his buddy ex-boxer Vinny Paz, you instantly know that Jason doesn’t let much get in his way.

“It took me two years to write it,” says Jason of his autobiography, titled Unstoppable Heart: The Jason Pisano Story. “I wrote about racing and my childhood. I feel it’s funny but inspirational at the same time.” He writes using an over-sized keyboard on the floor and a trackball mouse—again all with his left foot.

In addition to his marathon racing, he was a journalist for 11 years, won two world titles at the 2005 Cerebral Palsy Games, was a torch bearer at the 1996 Summer Olympics, and was inducted into the New England Wheelchair Athletic Hall of Fame. He’s also written a children’s book that he’d like to publish in addition to his autobiography.

As for his future conquests, he’s planning to add to his marathon total by competing in the Boston marathon in honor of his grandmother. Maybe I’ll get off my butt and sign up for another half-marathon myself…

To read Jason’s submission Unstoppable Heart, click here. If you’re interested in contacting him, send an email to info@pubmission.com.

Posted in Featured Writers, Writer of the Month, Writers | Tagged autobiography writing, Jason Pisano, memoir writing, online submission, Writer of the Month | Leave a comment

Wednesday Writing Exercise: Critical Hit

Posted on December 14, 2011 by Megan Lobsinger

My husband plays a popular collaborative, interactive storytelling game. He plays it with four of his dearest friends—four of the most creative, intelligent, fun-loving, joy-seeking people I have ever met. This game is played, via the magic of the Internet, from a handful of different states: North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Minnesota, to be precise. Weekly, these individuals meet virtually and make decisions of plot, place, character, and momentum. Weekly, they invent an entirely fictional world together, and they live in it, for the space of approximately four consecutive hours at a time.

Actually, to be fair, my husband spends significantly more time throughout the week planning for these weekly collaborative sessions. My guess is that the others do, too. Those others whose names are as follows ….

Oooooh. If he weren’t currently rolling a multi-sided die, he’d probably be cringing at the thought of being mentioned so publically here, where my million-and-counting readership might figure out what collaborative interactive storytelling game we’re talking about. To which I’d say, Relax. No one knows.

But maybe you do. And maybe, if you don’t yet, it would help to know that behind me phrases like, “What are you rolling?” and “your love-sandwich continues, and you are getting smote upon with a short sword,” and “you’re just taking six damage from the little one” and “the ugly dwarf is going to chase you as best he can” are currently being uttered.

Yes. We’re talking about Dungeons. And Dragons.

And truly (madly deeply), as a writer, I (ok, I admit it) so admire and envy what these guys do.

What’s remarkable about Dungeons and Dragons play is the degree to which decisions are made by committee. We writers are so often a compulsive bunch, unwilling to relinquish control of the most minute minutiae—that is my story, my bedside lamp, my curly raven hair. We get stuck in our heads. We can’t see beyond the fire in the hearth in the dining room of the only room mentioned in the 3,000-page novel we’ve been writing and not sharing for the past twenty years. We should be so lucky, to have written 3,000 pages, okay, but my point is that sometimes we’re better served if we let other people teach us (and in so doing, delight us).

(Here it comes. The critical hit.)

Today’s Writing Exercise:

So. For this week’s Wednesday Writing Exercise I’m asking you to try my favorite collaborative writing exercise, which lives somewhere between Telephone and Pictionary.

Begin (and I understand, this might be the hard part) by assembling your four favorite creative friends. I know, I know, this is hard—people have complex work schedules and many, many previous commitments. Allow yourself to be inspired (as I am) by my husband and his wonderful friends, who commit to G-Chat, Skype, Video Chat, what have you, and get ‘er done. This is easier.

Assemble your four favorite creative friends, and begin a storytelling round. Via USPS, email, Facebook, or Twitter, start to tell a story together.

Here’s how it works. Whoever goes first, writes a sentence. Whoever goes second, draws a picture based on the sentence to move the plot forward. Next, one uses a sentence to further the plot. And so on and so forth, until you make it around twice. By then, you will have five full, elaborate stories.

(I should say the art provided here is care of a spouse of one of my husband’s D&D buddies. And the D&D significant others are an equally ((if not exceedingly)) intelligent, creative, fun-loving, and joy-seeking bunch.)

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Megan Lobsinger, Writers | 2 Comments

Friday Writing Exercise: The Christmas Song

Posted on December 9, 2011 by Wolf Hoelscher

My seven-year-old is driving me crazy. He ran into my room at 10:00 last night and said, “Mom, things are buzzing around my head and I can’t sleep.” Once I had ruled out lice, I figured out that he meant Christmas songs. He is obsessed with them. Here’s how a typical conversation between us starts lately.

“Mom, if you had to rank these four Christmas songs from best to worst, which would you put in first place, last place, and in between?” “Mom, if you had to listen to just two Christmas songs for the rest of the year, which two would you pick?” “Mom, what’s your least favorite Christmas song ever? Mine is that chestnuts roasting song because I don’t understand it.” (Okay, stop groaning. I swear I have tried to explain that “The Christmas Song” is a list of things people love about Christmas, but let’s face it—with storm windows, not too many kids know about Jack Frost these days, nor do they roast their own chestnuts. I am working on it, I swear.) But tonight, he asked me a question that stumped me completely.

“Mom, if you were going to make up a new Christmas song, what would you call it and what would it be about?” I racked my brain but I couldn’t think of anything that hasn’t been done to death. We have songs about snow, and Santa, and bells, and Jesus, and plants (holly, ivy, mistletoe), and candles, and merry gentlemen, and kings, and mangers, and even drummer boys. What is left?

Writers reference songs in their writing all the time. They make up folk songs (remember the creepy one from The Hunger Games? Bet they cut that out of the film.), and use real songs as references in dialog or to start chapters all the time. Stephen King is a particular master of that—he loves to put song lyrics in his books. Children’s book authors use that preschool teacher trick “to the tune of” all the time. And obviously, songs are poetry set to music.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

I want you to be stumped along with me, then. If you celebrate Christmas, or at least can get into the spirit of cold weather, or want to warble on paper about Hanukkah or Kwanzaa or the New Year, then write a song that is relevant to the season. Here is my cynical, feeble attempt at holiday songwriting.

Black Friday at Wal-Mart (sing to the tune of “Deck the Halls”)

Time to run down other shoppers
Before they get all the cheap iPods.

Grab some ammo for your daddy
And a brand new fishing rod.

There’s a stack of cheap pajamas
Grab all of the ones that have Sponge Bob!

One more thing—I need some Wii games
Then we can check out and leave this mob!

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Kelly Gunzenhauser, Writers | Tagged Christmas song, holiday songwriting, songwriting, writing exercise | 1 Comment

Wednesday Writing Exercise: Back to the Word

Posted on December 7, 2011 by Megan Lobsinger

I’m a Sagittarius. (And a happy upcoming or recently passed birthday to my fellow Sags.) Represented by the archer, we Sagittarians notoriously put our carts in front of our horses. I seek, I seek, I seek, we say, hurrying ahead, and forgetting to pick up the milk at the market, to comb our hair and tie our boots, to call our mothers on Sundays.

Not that I buy into all that astrology stuff. But if the shoe of neurosis fits, one ought to wear it.

See, sometimes I get caught up in projects. I start thinking, say, about what I should make for dinner, and moments later I’m making plans to move to Ohio and start a farm. I think, hey, it might be fun to learn to play guitar, and from the first strum I’ve named the band and we’re trying to decide whether or not we should sell out and transition from playing small venues to huge arena shows.

You see what I mean. It’s the daily emotional equivalent of arriving at your destination without so much as realizing you’d put the car in drive. And from a writing standpoint, that means I sometimes hop straight from the first flicker of inspiration to the three-volume novel.

And while there’s nothing inherently wrong with aiming for the outer atmosphere—as they say, go big or go home—one’s hopes and dreams can easily be crushed by their own enormity. In other words, as we all know but some of us need to be (constantly) reminded of, the big accomplishments in life are made tiny step by tiny step.

Today’s Writing Exercise:

So this week’s writing exercise is an attempt to scale it back, slow it down, break it apart, and go small. We’re getting down to our morphemes. We’re forgoing our epics, our elaborate plot structures and flourishes of character development, and we’re remembering the delicacy, and glory, and complexity of the word.

Remember the dictionary game? Where you close your eyes, open to a page, and swirl your finger around until you land on a word? That’s what we’re doing. I want you to sit down at your computer or in front of your blank page, dictionary and preferred timepiece at your side, and pick a word at random. Write that word at the top of the page, and then spend a strict sixty seconds writing. Go wherever you will, just keep going.

I want you to do this at least five times. Maybe certain themes will emerge, maybe you’ll begin to cultivate a story, maybe your mind will start to go wild. That’s fine. But for each unit of sixty seconds, I want you to focus your attention on that one word, and keep it there.

Post your results!

Posted in Contributors, Exercises, Megan Lobsinger, Writers | Tagged dictionary game, Sagittarius, writing exercise, writing focus | Leave a comment

Is Instant Gratification Bad for the Book (and Baby) Business?

Posted on December 2, 2011 by Wolf Hoelscher

Okay, I’m going to tread into some personal territory here. My wife and I are currently locked in a battle over the baby in her belly. No, it’s not a custody battle. More like a gender battle.

This is our second child. For the first, we did what just about everyone else does these days—with the help of technology, we found out that we were having a boy about 20 weeks into the pregnancy.

This time around, though, I declared to my wife, perhaps somewhat unilaterally, that I would like to wait. The birth of my first son was the most magical moment of my life. Unlike the fathers of my dad’s generation, I had the opportunity to be right there when it happened. But also unlike the days of yore, I knew quite a bit more about the baby before he poked his head out into the world for the first time. I knew that he had a healthy heart. I knew what his approximate size would be. And I knew that he was going to be a boy.

But this time around, wouldn’t be nice to add an extra element of magic and awe to the birth of this second child? At first, my wife reluctantly agreed to my wish to wait.

But now it’s Christmas. And next week, we’re due for the second sonogram, the sonogram that can tell us the baby’s sex. My wife has had a change of heart. Just about every day she’s trying to appeal to my logical sensibilities with a practical reason for why we should find out. And like my now almost four-year-old son, I’m crossing my arms and stomping my feet.

I’m nearly 40 years old, and by this point in my life, I’ve learned that I’m a caver. Not of the spelunking variety, but in the pushover sense. I can feel my moorings loosen every time I see my wife’s face when she offers one of her reasons. I’m weak. (If she reads this, I’m in trouble.)

But geez, isn’t there a place for delayed gratification in our lives any more? We have everything at our fingertips. We can write and research a book without visiting the library. If I’m searching for the perfect word (or can’t think of one like a few minutes ago with “spelunking”), I don’t have to wait for it to come to me. I don’t have to grapple with it. I can just Google a similar word and scan the search results. Ah, there it is. Moving on.

I notice it with my writing, too. As I endlessly revise my novel, I’m cutting like crazy. We don’t need to know what that character is thinking. Get on with the story already, Wolfgang. Does that dialogue have to be that long? Is that back story crucial to the story or is it slowing down the read?

Sure, I think these are valid and somewhat necessary questions to ask of my writing, but am I also asking them because I feel that my readers won’t have the patience to see it through, that they need a cliffhanger at the end of every chapter to stop them from downloading another book on their Kindles.

And this is the point in the story where I make the connection between learning my baby’s gender and e-books. Thanks for sticking with me. (I’m about to exceed my 600-word limit for a blog post and breaking every rule for effective blog writing and formatting—no helpful subheads or bullet points here to help you quicken your read.)

Yes, the magical e-book. The instantaneous ability to get the book I want without vacating my seat to visit the local bookstore. I admit it; I love my iPad. I’m reading Game of Thrones, and within minutes of finishing the first book in the series, I was able to purchase and start on Book Two. I’m trying to learn more about PHP coding, so rather than waiting until January to take a course at the local community college, I downloaded a five-star book on it within minutes of deciding that I wanted to stuff my head with this gobbledygook.

But here’s what I’m afraid of. In this age of instant gratification, are we sacrificing some of the magic that comes from waiting? Are we in danger of losing that moment of tingly discovery when we find that long forgotten childhood favorite gathering dust on the back shelf of a used bookstore? Is even our method of storytelling losing something as we trim the fat out of every tale? Would Moby Dick be 150 pages shorter if Melville had written it today? Will knowing now if my baby is a boy or girl diminish some of the magic of his/her first day on Earth?

I don’t have the answers. Maybe I should ask Google for them.

Ah, there they are.

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Posted in Publishers, Writers | Tagged book buying, bookstores, ebooks, instant gratification, Kindle, Writing Links | 4 Comments

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