Have a Peaceful Solstice!

Solstices are important markers in our relationship to the earth and our own mortality. Celebrating them makes sense. That's why pretty much all religions do it.

But you know what would make more sense? Celebrating the Winter Solstice with quiet meditative activities. Then celebrate the SUMMER one with all the partying and traveling and mailing of gifts.

Traveling to see the family. In summer instead of winter. When there's like, NO SNOW. A radical concept, I realize. But think about it.

So if you don't want to go out in the snow (or here in CA, the rain) risking your life to get to the mall to spend money you don't have, and you want to give a meaningful gift to that writer on your list, here are some suggestions:

1) Leave a nice comment on their blog. Or even something not so nice that stimulates argument. Nothing brightens the heart of a blogger like getting comments. The more the better. Yes, I know these blog programs make you jump through hoops to comment. Even on my own blog, if I want to add to the comment thread without being "signed in" the first time I hit "publish," I'm told I can't do it and have to try again. It always works the second time, but what's up with that?

But a little hoop jumping beats going to the mall and abusing that little plastic card, doesn't it?

2) If your friend has a book in print, write her a rave Amazon review. Give it five stars. Even if it isn't her best book. It will counteract the 1-star review she got from that troll who can't spell and hates the whole genre. It will also raise your own Google profile. And your friend may do it for you later down the road. Win/win.

Then go make some peppermint tea (love the Candy Cane Green Tea from Trader Joe's!) let the cat crawl into your lap, and spend the rest of the day reading that book that's been sitting by your chair since the holiday frenzy started last October.

It's what I'm going to do.

Have a peaceful season, however you decide to celebrate it.

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BOB DYLAN DOES LOVE, ACTUALLY?

Going off topic here, but I can’t help myself. I heard it this weekend: Bob Dylan. Singing Christmas carols. Sounding like your Great Uncle Harry on an eggnog binge.

Reviewers are asking if it’s a goof or not. I suggest these folks take a gander at the INSIDE of the CD cover: it shows nineteen-fifties dominatrix Betty Page in a black-gartered Santa suit. I have no doubt that's the cover Dylan wanted on the OUTSIDE.

Bob Dylan. Christmas. Betty Page on the Cover.

It’s hilarious! It’s Dylan doing the Bill Nighy character from Love, Actually—old rocker makes a sappy Christmas record for the money and thumbs his nose at the world.

But Bobby, if Christmas in the Heart makes it to the top of the charts, I expect nothing less than a televised nude performance a la Bill Nighy.

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Kirkus Dead: RIP Intellectual Habitat?

Kirkus Review, one the most prestigious book reviewers in the US, has been given the pink slip today. Kirkus, along with Editor and Publisher, has been axed by their owner Nielson, the New York Times reported this AM: http://bit.ly/6SDxfo. Nielson has apparently decided to sell off or otherwise rid itself of its Jurassic print media.

One reader, identified as bluewombat, said, “this is horrifying -- further evidence of the disappearance of a free and independent press in the United States…More and more, important intellectual habitat is disappearing. This is positively creepy.”

Kirkus negative reviews could be devastating, but a positive one could make a career. Now it’s all going to be about how good a review you can buy.

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Amazon Breakthrough to Include YA

YA fiction continues its ascendancy: Publisher’s Lunch reports today that the Penguin-Amazon Breakthrough Novel contest will now include a second prize for YA fiction.

Another way they’re keeping up with the times: the prize will also include novels that have been previously self-published.

OK, the monetary prize to the winners has gotten smaller: originally a $25,000 advance, this new contest's two winners will get $15,000 advances each. Still nothing to sneeze at.

They will accept up to 5,000 entries each in the fiction and young adult categories. The judges evaluating the three finalists (selected by Penguin editors) are author Tana French, agent Julie Barer, and editor Molly Stern for general fiction, and authors Sarah Dessen and Nancy Werlin, agent Amy Berkower, and publisher Ben Schrank for young adult.

Manuscripts can be submitted between Jan. 25 and Feb. 7, 2010 at http://www.amazon.com/Breakthrough-Novel-Award-Books/b?ie=UTF8&node=332264011 Up to 10,000 total initial entries will be accepted, with up to 5,000 each in the general fiction and young adult categories.

Three contest winners have been published so far by Penguin imprints--Bill Loehfelm's FRESH KILLS; BAD THINGS HAPPEN by Harry Dolan; and THE WET NURSE'S TALE by Erica Eisdorfer.

So polish up those NaNo manuscripts, people!

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How to Format Your E-Query

Casey McCormick continues to provide up-to-the-minute helpful info for writers trying to break into the biz. She posted detailed instructions on formatting the e-query on her Literary Rambles blog yesterday. It's the best advice on the subject that I've seen: http://caseylmccormick.blogspot.com/2009/12/how-do-i-format-my-e-query.html

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Catherine Ryan Hyde on YA vs. Adult

There’s been some discussion on other blogs about some of my statements about how publishers label things. Please know I’m just the messenger—I don’t condone those one-size-fits-all categories any more than other writers.

Catherine Ryan Hyde, author of Pay it Forward weighed in by directing me to a blogpost in her blog archives about the arbitrary way her books have been assigned to different genres. With her permission, I’m posting some of it here. You can read more from Catherine on her great blog (and occasionally get a chance to win a book):
http://web.me.com/catherineryanhyde/catherineryanhyde/Blog/Blog.html


Here’s what she said last March:

I want to talk about the labels (figurative labels, not price stickers and such) that we put on books. Particularly the ones that relate to reading levels. As in, “This one is for a teenager. This one is for an adult.”

Like there’s such a huge difference.

Here’s my opinion in a nutshell: I think it’s all meaningless.

A few examples. When I wrote Pay It Forward, I intended it for adults. But the year after it was released, the American Library Association put it on its "Best Books for Young Adults" list. So now it’s YA. So now angry parents write to me and say, How can you put such smut in a teen book? "Well, sorry. Didn’t know." What I don’t say is, "Your teen is not shocked by that ’smut.’ That’s just you." I try to be polite.

Another example. I originally wrote Chasing Windmills to be YA. After all, it’s about two young people falling in love on the subway system under Manhattan in the middle of the night. What could be more YA than that? So I wrote it all from Sebastian’s point of view, and presented it to my YA editor (at Knopf) who liked it very much. But didn’t think it was YA. Hmm. I really thought it was. But I’ve been wrong before. So I rewrote it from both characters’ point of view. Adding Maria’s point of view will make it much more clearly adult, I thought (remember, I’ve been wrong before). I presented it to my adult editor (at Doubleday) who published it. Before it was even released Publisher’s weekly said, "While this is being billed as an adult novel, its closest stylistic relative is S.E. Hinton’s YA classic The Outsiders." And then it got a glowing review in School Library Journal, which classified it as High School/Adult. So, it crossed right over.

It’s official. I don’t know anything.

Or… Or…maybe there’s really nothing to know. Maybe the whole reading level thing is meaningless. Maybe the books are for who they’re for. Maybe they should be read by anyone and everyone they will speak to. And maybe age is the least important factor of all.

Grownups (I do not classify myself as one, despite the advanced age of my outsides) seem a lot more dense about this concept than teens. Teens know they’re mature enough and sophisticated enough to read adult fiction. But lots of adults don’t seem to get that teen fiction is a really great read for anyone. I got more groans and complaints from my adult readers because, after four years off from publishing, my first book out was YA (Becoming Chloe). "Oh, no," they said. "We’ve been waiting all this time for a new book. And now we hear you’re writing for children?" Excuse me? Children? Chloe is suitable for about 14 through adult. I would never put it in the hands of a child. It has more mature subject matter than three out of four of my adult books. When I finally convinced the grown-up fans to read it, they wrote back and said, "Wow. I never would have known this was YA."
***********

So it looks as if none of us on the creative end of publishing can know what marketing people will decide to do with our work. All we can do as writers (and readers) is query widely and spread the word when we find something good--no matter where somebody decides to put it on a shelf, or who they say should like it.

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ARE TEEN GIRLS THE NEW LITERATI?

Young Adult and Middle Grade are fast becoming the dominant genres for new fiction. I heard at a writers’ conference recently that one publishing house has fired most of its adult fiction editorial staff and replaced them with YA/MG editors. Many of our most creative authors are now penning books aimed primarily at young people.

I’ve also noticed that most newly minted agents rep primarily YA/MG, and even many established agencies are switching focus to teen/tween fiction.

I suspect this can be explained in three words: “Harry Potter/Twilight.” Kid Lit is where the money is. Publishers are willing to take chances with the genres because the rewards can be so high. (Harry is MG; Twilight is YA.)

Nobody talks about this, but I also think the relatively lower advances for children’s books create a more flexible marketplace. Plus there has traditionally been more open communication between children’s editors and new writers. (My YA writer friends routinely get reads from editors without an agent as go-between.)

So a lot of us who have been writing for adults are now taking a look at these genres and want to know what the YA rules are—and what distinguishes it from MG.

Basically, it’s the age of the target reader—currently about 13-21 for YA and 8-13 for MG.) Word count isn’t so important any more, since many MG books are huge (witness J. K. Rowling’s tomes.)

YA writer Natalie Whipple has a wonderfully detailed post on the subject in her blog "Between Fact and Fiction": http://betweenfactandfiction.blogspot.com/2009/12/middle-grade-vs-young-adult.html.

If you aren’t in the habit of reading YA, go check out the shelves of your local bookstore or library. This fiction is as sophisticated as a lot of stuff for adults, and its themes can be even more “adult” than what's allowed in a lot of mainstream romance and mystery lines. It can also be more literary. In fact, some literary novels originally written for adults have found their ultimate success as YA. (Catherine Ryan Hyde’s Pay it Forward is an example.)

Another important factor to keep in mind is something I learned at a recent writers’ conference: the YA audience is mostly female.

Marketers believe boys stop reading books when they reach puberty. (I have some argument with that, but it’s what statistics say, I guess.) I think this is why Harry Potter is called MG rather than YA—not so much because of the actual age of the characters—since they age through the series—but because it’s popular with both genders.

If you're writing action, adventure, and epic fantasy aimed at boys as well as girls, it’s best to start with a young main character and call it MG. But if you’re dealing with sophisticated emotions and relationships, it can be YA—and pretty much anything goes. As long as your protagonist is under twenty.

So could it be that in the near future, teenaged girls will dictate the literary marketplace instead of a bunch of persnickety old dudes?

Maybe so. When I think of my own teenaged reading habits, I’m not sure that would be an entirely good thing, but it might bring some fun new changes.

And for those of us trying to scale the walls of the seemingly impenetrable fortress that is American publishing, change has to be good.

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LET'S PLAY "WHAT'S MY GENRE?"

Yeah, I know. We all hate labels. But if our ultimate goal is space on a bookstore shelf, we have to be able to suggest to an agent or editor what shelf that might be.

The best place to start is an actual bookstore. Find books like yours and see where they’re shelved (speaking as a former bookstore shelver, I can tell you how subjective this is, so don’t consider these hard and fast rules.) Some categories are traditionally paired, like Mystery/Crime and SF/Fantasy.

Or try Amazon. Look for books similar to yours and scroll down to "Look for Similar Items by Category."

Here are some basic fiction genres. You’ll notice how many overlap or can be combined. It's OK to combine up to three (but not more) in your query. Also, if you don't get nibbles with one category, it's OK to call your work something else. Agents say they do that all the time, depending on what an editor is looking for.

Chick Lit: People in the industry still use this term, but you’re not allowed to put it in your query or they'll make fun of you in a meeting, according to agent Barbara Poelle. It means light, funny women’s dating stories with a distinctive, can-we-talk voice. If it has a happy ending, try to shoehorn it into Romance as a “romantic comedy.” Otherwise, try Women’s Fiction.

Christian/Inspirational: any work that supports a Fundamentalist Christian world view. No explicit language, sex or content. Violence is OK.

Commercial: Traditionally, any plot-driven fiction, but now, according to AgentQuery, this means "high concept" projects with a unique subject and potential audience of zillions: stories that can be summarized in one wow-inducing sentence.

Crime Fiction: Stories centering on the physical aspects of a crime or the workings of the criminal mind.

Detective Fiction: Just-the-facts-ma’am details of bringing a criminal to justice. If the detective has a badge, it’s a Police Procedural.

Erotica: A major market in e-book publishing—especially erotica for women that has romantic and/or paranormal elements.

GLBT: This category sort of annoys me, since it segregates 10% of the population, but if your MC has a minority sexual orientation and this label helps you get published, go for it.

Fantasy: Not just about elves, dragons, and talking badgers any more. Dark Fantasy (vampires, were-persons) Urban Fantasy (spawn of Buffy) and Erotic Fantasy (vamps and were-persons hooking up) are big. Epic Fantasy (Tolkein-inspired) not so much. Try rewriting epics for Middle Grade.

Historical Fiction: A story set fifty or more years in the past that uses the time period as an element of the story.

Horror: Scare the pants off your reader — á la King. Not selling so well right now, according to agent Laurie McLean, except for Vampire Horror. And Zombies. Anything zombified is big. Splatterpunk (ick) has a small but steady readership. I guess it keeps them from torturing small animals.

Literary: Language and character trump story. Get a story published in The New Yorker first.

Mainstream: This once-basic category is on the wane. As Patrick Anderson detailed in his book, The Triumph of the Thriller, former mainstream staples like family chronicles, historical epics, and sweeping Micheneresque sagas are no longer big sellers.

Middle Grade—Novels in all genres for Tweens. Increasingly sophisticated these days.

Multi-Cultural: Anything NOT about middle-class characters of northern European heritage. Generally family sagas. Big plus if it’s set in a current war zone.

Mystery: Crime-solving puzzles. Classic Whodunits, Cozies, Private Eye, and Noir are still going strong, and Historical, Supernatural, and Literary mysteries are hot. Cozy series with craft and hobby themes are steady sellers. And a recent article by author Fleur Bradley for Sisters in Crime mentioned the emergence of “Geezerlit”—mysteries set in nursing homes and retirement communities with octogenarian sleuths.

Romance: Must follow specific publisher guidelines and provide happy endings. (One agent blogs bitterly about love stories submitted as romance.) Hot subgenres are Paranormal, Urban Fantasy, and Time-Travel. Also, Regency, Elizabethan and Scottish Medieval are perennial favorites. Western romance still sells. Plus there’s a growing market for explicitly erotic romance.

Romantic Suspense: Combines elements of romance and mystery with a fast-paced, protagonist-in-constant-jeopardy plot.

Satire: If you’re in the US and write for a sophisticated audience that gets irony, emigrate. Or sneak it in as another genre.

Science Fiction: The plot should be based on science rather than myth or make-believe. Subgenres include Social, Cyberpunk, New Wave, Alternate History, Military, and Apocalyptic. “Hard” science fiction—the kind where you have to know a whole bunch of physics—still sells, but not in the quantities it once did.

Speculative Fiction: Very hot right now. Any fiction that plays with reality. Popular subgenres: Steampunk (set in a faux-Victorian/Edwardian alternate universe) Time-Travel, and Slipstream (surreal literary-fantasy.)

Suspense: Fast-paced adventure with a protagonist in constant peril.

Thriller: Save-the-world, fast-paced adventure. The stakes must be high—not just one person in jeopardy, but civilization itself. Flavors include: Spy, Political, Military, Conspiracy, Techno-, Eco-, Legal, Medical, and Futuristic.

Westerns: Horses, guns, and stoic agricultural workers in the late 19th/early 20th century American West. Kind of a dead horse.

Women’s Fiction: Women struggling against adversity. Can be literary, gritty, weepy, or funny. If you’ve seen similar storylines on Lifetime or Oxygen, chances are it will fit in here. It usually, but not always, includes a realistic love story. Endings can be sad.

Young Adult: Any of the above categories written for teens. Literary novels with teen protagonists sometimes sneak into print as YA to avoid the hasn’t-published-in-The New Yorker police.

Mix and match as you hone your query, and with luck, you’ll find a genre label to reach your potential readers.

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Zombies, Steampunk AND the Apocalypse--how can they go wrong?

OK, this zombie thing is getting out of hand. Publisher’s Lunch just announced that Ballantine is coming out with, “a post-apocalyptic, neo-Victorian steampunk zombie novel in which a girl…falls in love with a rather sweet zombie boy.”

OK—A steampunk Twilight with zombies—and megadeath.

Can you wait for Harry Potter and the Clockwork Half-Zombie Prisoner of the Apocalypse?

Maybe we can bring back chick lit with A Shopaholic Zombie’s Guide to Bustle-Shopping and Scavenging? Or Bridget Jones’ Zombie-Zeppelin: the Edge of Extinction? Arrgghh.

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LITERARY OR GENRE?

Hundreds of folks weighed in on the great literary vs. genre debate on Nathan Bransford's blog last month http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2009/10/reverse-snobbery-of-low-literary.html (He says good writers need to read both. I agree.) A few days later, in a Writers Chronicle thread http://thewriterschronicle.forumotion.net/genre-f22/ more writers debated the subject. But nothing much got resolved—I think because the definitions of both words are so slithery.

I was surprised that so many commenters—mostly writers, presumably—said they dislike literary fiction. (This may explain why agents say there’s no money in it.) The general attitude seems to be: “If I had to read it for high school English, it’s literary and it sux.”

But the funny thing is, a lot of stuff you read for high school English started out as “genre.” Shakespeare was the original mass-marketer; Jane Austen wrote Regency chick lit; and Dickens’ novels were the soap operas of the Victorian era. Those authors only got promoted to “literary” status when they proved to have some serious staying power. In fact, even living “genre” writers with a long shelf life can ascend to "literary" realms. Stephen King gets published in the New Yorker these days, and Elmore Leonard is spoken of in reverent tones in a lot of literary circles.

Who knows, perhaps future generations of high school students will dread reading Helen Fielding (Bridget Jones) as much as Henry Fielding (Tom Jones) and someday Spock’s marvelous line from Star Trek 4 will be spoken in earnest: "20th Century American Literature: Jackie Collins, Danielle Steel—ah yes—the greats!"

So when agents say they won’t look at literary fiction, does that mean “anything that speaks to the human condition for more than fifteen Warhol minutes”?

Not really. What people usually mean by “literary” in that context is a particular style of self-conscious writing that’s in vogue in academia. Translation: “written by somebody with an MFA.”

When you’re deciding how to frame your query, keep that in mind. If you've got the academic moves, go for it. Otherwise, you’ll have a better chance calling yourself a genre writer.

But what, exactly, does that mean?

The dictionary definition of genre is simply “category or type”—from the Latin “genus.” But in publishing jargon it’s shorthand for popular, mass-market fiction that’s shelved in bookstores under headings like romance, mystery, thriller, suspense, sci-fi, horror, western, and fantasy.

And then there are totally separate shelving categories like Young Adult—genres unto themselves that include all the above subcategories: even literary. Other categories that are not “genre” in the sense of mass market, and include many subgenres are GLBT, Inspirational/Christian, and the newly minted New Adult. Then there’s the vast umbrella of Women’s Fiction.

Does that mean a literary novel with a YA or Women’s Fiction label has a better chance of being published than something called simply “literary?”

That seems to be the case.

Confused yet? I am. I think the publishing biz needs a more diverse, better defined vocabulary.

And what about “commercial” or “mainstream” novels. Are they “genre” or “literary”?

It seems they’re neither. If an agent says “no genre fiction” or “no literary fiction” you can send something you call “commercial.” But you may not get very far. Because nobody knows where adult commercial fiction is going these days, and they’re afraid of it. The days of big commercial books like James Michener’s epics or family sagas like the Thornbirds are over. Nobody knows what’s coming next.

So do you despair and throw your commercial or literary manuscript into the shredder?

No. Because maybe what’s coming next is YOU.

At the CC Writers Conference, agent Katharine Sands told us to query everybody, no matter what they say they represent because everything’s so up in the air that "the Chaos theory is in play." She says things move so fast that "changes in publishing are not always listed in the directories."

Still, you need a label in order to query, so in my next post, I’ll talk about genre categories and subcategories.

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Last Post on Harlequin Horizons

Harlequin Horizons is no more, according to Pub Lunch. After only two days, the company is going to drop the Harlequin name from the self-pub enterprise. Established Harlequin authors were seriously peeved.

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More on Harlequin Horizons (Not to be confused with Carina Press)

I guess I shouldn’t have allowed myself to be so hopeful about Harlequin’s new self publishing venture, which apparently is partnered with AuthorHouse. That's the uber-vanity press that has developed a ruthless reputation as it has gobbled up iUniverse, Trafford, Xlibris and so many others.

Writer Beware’s Victoria Strauss http://accrispin.blogspot.com/2009/11/harlequin-horizons-another-major.html has this to say about Harlequin Horizons—and the new Thomas Nelson Christian self-publishing line, West Bow, also an AuthorHouse enterprise.

“I don't for one teeny tiny second believe that discovering new writers…plays a major part here. That's just a marketing pitch. This is about money. Now more than ever, commercial publishers need to shore up their bottom lines--and adding self-publishing divisions is an easy and profitable way to do so.”

In other words, Harlequin and Thomas Nelson want your money (the self-publishing packages cost $600 and up) NOT your writing. Sigh.

Victoria has often warned against AuthorHouse and says these new enterprises show how powerful the self-publishing giant has become.

Some pretty lively discussions of Harlequin’s new venture are going on at Dear Author http://dearauthor.com/wordpress/2009/11/17/harlequin-horizons-shortsighted-or-farseeing/#more-15308 Jane Smith’s blog http://howpublishingreallyworks.blogspot.com/2009/11/harlequin-horizons-looking-to-future-or.html and Absolute Write forums http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=162391

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Harlequin's New Self-Publishing Line

Could self-publishing your Women's Fiction and Romance be a solid road to mainstream publication?

“Oh, no,” you say. “Scoff, scoff. Self-publishing is a dead end. The kiss of death for a fiction writing career. Strictly for amateurs.”

Well, maybe not anymore. Today Harlequin launched a new self-publishing line: Harlequin Horizons. All you eager self-promoters out there—this is your chance, because:

“Harlequin will monitor sales of books published through Harlequin Horizons for possible pick-up by its traditional imprints.”

That’s right: they’ll track your sales with an eye to taking you on as one of their traditional authors. This is a whole new way to think outside that ever-shrinking publishing box. Instead of being vetted by the endless, soul-crunching process of submissions and rejections from agents and editors, you publish yourself now and let the marketplace do the choosing.

It just might work. (Just make sure you get that book professionally edited first.)

More info at the Harlequin Horizons site

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Do You Write "New Adult" Fiction?

There’s a new fiction genre in the publishing world: “New Adult.” This means books for single people 18-30. According to author S. Jae-Jones’ recent blogpost http://tinyurl.com/yzwgq96 it includes most of the hipper literary works of the past couple of decades, plus the now defunct (just whisper it) chick lit. Her list of New Adult-erers includes David Eggers, Michael Chabon, Jonathan Safran Foer, Bret Easton Ellis, Junot Diaz, Stieg Larsson, Neil Gaiman, and yes, Lauren Weisberger (The Devil Wears Prada.)

Ouch. I guess old codgerettes like me are supposed to stay home and re-read our dog-eared copies of James Michener.

But here’s the thing. The major, sad thing: there's not much money in publishing new adult fiction these days. Especially adult literary fiction.

According to agent Rachelle Gardner’s super-helpful blog http://cba-ramblings. blogspot.com/search/label/Trends literary fiction is one of the toughest genres to sell (along with chick lit, memoirs, and novels over 100K words.)

This is why there has been such a stampede by serious writers to the Young Adult category. YA is wide open, even to literary novels. But to be YA, your protagonist pretty much has to be in high school. A bit limiting for those of us who prefer not to revisit the horrors of adolescence, thank you very much.

Hence the invention of “New Adult” –a sort of YA Plus.

So what does all this mean for the vast un/underpublished out here? What if you can’t shoehorn your work into the young hip-and-single categories?

Well, for one thing, don’t shoot yourself in the font by calling yourself “literary” unless you absolutely have to. Can you fit your novel into a genre like Women’s Fiction, Sci Fi, Mystery, Suspense, or Fantasy? Go for it.

Probably that novel chronicling the relationship between Elizabeth and Essex in a series of Petrarchan sonnets will have to wear the dreaded label, but it will help if you can build up some literary cred with an MFA and/or publication in a bunch of high profile literary magazines before you approach anybody with it.

Otherwise, pick a popular genre that’s closest to your work and see if it gets any nibbles. Or make your protagonist under thirty.

More on categories of genre fiction later.

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CARINA PRESS NOW ACCEPTING UNAGENTED SUBMISSIONS

It looks as if the future of publishing is now. While YA fiction still sells in print form, adult genre fiction—especially by new writers—has been a tough sell since the global financial meltdown.

But today, the forward-looking and seemingly recession-proof Harlequin Enterprises Limited offers us an alternative to print publishing. This morning they announced the launch of a new, all-digital publishing house: Carina Press (http://www.carinapress.com)

They are accepting submissions in all genres of commercial fiction—not just the romance lines they are famous for. And you don’t need an agent to submit.

This is what they’re saying, “If the book of your heart fits into a niche that has very little shelf space in a traditional bookstore, Carina Press is eager to read and potentially publish your story.”

This is good news for writers in almost all genres of adult fiction. They will specialize in erotica and romance, but they are also looking at women’s fiction, science fiction, fantasy, futuristic, mystery, thrillers, horror, and niches.

They will even consider shorter stories under 50,000 words, plus longer, and complex narratives of over 100,000 words—and will also acquire books that have been previously released in print form, but for which the author has either retained digital rights or had digital rights revert to them.

All submissions should be sent to submissions@carinapress.com.

Submission Guidelines:

Please submit queries for only completed, fully polished manuscripts. In the subject line of your query, please type manuscript name, author name, genre.

Queries should include the following:

Brief, introductory query letter listing genre, word count and a short description of the book, as well as any pertinent information about the author, including both legal name and pen name and any writing credits.

The manuscript saved as an RTF file and attached, with file name TITLE_MANUSCRIPT

2-5 page synopsis of book that details character development, plot, and conflict/story resolution. Attach as an RTF file with file name TITLE_SYNOPSIS .

Carina Press plans to launch in summer 2010 and will release new titles on a weekly basis. Between now and the launch, readers and writers can follow the progress of Carina Press via its blog (http://carinapress.com/?page_id=9).
For full submission guidelines (http://carinapress.com/?page_id=2) and more information on Carina Press go to www.carinapress.com.

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Writing Rule Number One: listen to your own voice

Great post by Holly Root at the Waxman Agency blog today. http://waxmanagency.wordpress.com/2009/11/06/with-a-boulder-of-salt/#comment-266
She says we shouldn't let all the persnickity advice about query letters terrify us out of submitting. Here’s a quote:

“Never, ever let any of the voices on the internet, no matter how helpful or authoritative they aim (or claim) to be, take away from your ability to hear your own unique authorial voice.”

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The Only Writer You Can Be is YOU

The wonderful YA writer Natalie Whipple has a great post today on how to write a first draft.

http://betweenfactandfiction.blogspot.com/2009/10/tips-for-first-drafting.html

Here’s a quote that’s a great antidote to all the marketing trends stuff that has been getting me down.

“The only writer you can be is you. The only story you can write is your own. The only way you're going to stand out in the market is by channeling your own unique voice. So just accept that and enjoy it.”

(Yeah, I tried that apocalyptic steampunk zombie thing, but only got 500 words. With the literary value of ‘a duck walked into a bar…”)

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Grand Prize Winner!

I won Grand Prize in the Writers Chronicle "Spookiest Movie" contest. I said the movie that scared me most was Bambi. When I was four, they had to carry my terrified, weeping self from the theater. They killed his MOM, for goodness sake!

And all you NaNoWriMo Warriors out there: ready, set...CARPAL TUNNEL! (Seriously, you are all brave. I tried it once and only lasted a week. ) Have fun!

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A Rosy Future for Bleak-Future Fiction?

Publishers Weekly reports this week that post-apocalyptic young adult fiction-- "the bleaker…the better" --is a major trend. Major enough, perhaps, to unseat the ruling neck-biting fiends. (Not that vampires will ever go away completely—they’re such a great metaphor for bad boyfriends/girlfriends.) The big draw of the apocalypse? "No parents." Almost as good as immortality and all the blood you can drink.

As the Rejectionist said in her Wednesday post “Apocalypse is the new vampire, everyone! Revise accordingly.”

So those of you working on bleak-future sci-fi for the teen set—write fast! (Followers Lorie and Chet—this means you!) Anybody else out there writing apocalyptic YA?

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Agents give tips on query letters

The great and glorious Nathan Bransford has a helpful post on how not to write query letters. He reminds us:

"Don't tell me what your novel is about. Tell me what happens."

http://blog.nathanbransford.com/2009/10/themes-schmemes.html

And Janet Reid (aka the QueryShark) has a great post on Chuck Sambuchino's Guide to Literary Agents blog.

She advises queriers to have a special gmail or earthlink (or, I would assume, yahoo) account for queries with your own, real name in the address. AOL accounts are problematic because the spam block will often eat your reply. Also you don't want a shared account or a cutsie address name: Sugarpiehunnybun isn't going to get the same respectful read as somebody who sounds like grown up professional. Just the way it is. All 20 of her tips are at http://ow.ly/15XETb

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SHOULD YOU REWRITE WITHOUT A CONTRACT?

If you’re a diligent, talented writer who’s done your homework—and you have the good-luck fairy on speed-dial—sometime during your novel querying process, your phone will ring and you’ll hear the voice of an agent—a real, honest-to-goodness publishing industry professional—who’s impressed enough to spend money and time ringing up little old you.

(You know she’s the real thing because you researched her credentials before you sent off that query—didn’t you?)

So you’ve hit the jackpot. Somebody out there likes you; she really likes you.

But after you scrape yourself off the ceiling and order the kids to turn that noise down right NOW, you hear the agent asking for a rewrite.

Uh-oh. Maybe she doesn’t like you so much.

Not to worry. This is part of the process. Most agents make editorial suggestions before they sign a new client. That’s right: BEFORE they offer a contract. You’re asked to rewrite with no guarantee of representation.

Is it fair? No. But nothing in this industry is, so we get used to it.

Current rules dictate that you should NOT argue. You say, “Yes, sir/ma’am—O Great Publishing Industry Professional—you want the new manuscript when? Sure. I can skip my grandfather’s funeral and write while the surgeon is doing my pesky little heart bypass, and I’ll have it on your desk by Monday.”

And then she’s obligated to represent you, right?

Nope. The agent is likely to give you a pass anyway—or suggest further edits. One writer blogged about doing twenty-five requested rewrites for an agent who never did offer representation.

The first time an agent phoned me to ask for pre-contract changes, I was a newbie so clueless I didn’t know I was being honored. She asked me to change the sexual orientation of a major character so the heroine could marry him. I said I was happy to make minor changes, but that felt like a betrayal of my values. She hung up in a huff.

Did I screw up? I don’t think so, but I sure broke the rules.

Several years later, when another agent finally called—also asking for rewrites—I knew better. I agreed to edit all three manuscripts that interested her. The changes to the first were fairly easy, but for the second, she wanted massive shifts of plot, tone and character.

I put in months of painful, heartbreaking work, but she sent the manuscripts back—along with a copy of a novel she’d just placed, to show me how it was done. I found the model manuscript a boring, childish slog—something I’d never choose to read.

Obviously she didn’t sign me. I eventually sold the novels without representation and my editor took out every one of the agent’s “improvements.”

I’m not suggesting these agents did anything wrong. Editorial suggestions are a gift. They’re also subjective. Something in my work struck a chord, and they wanted to work with me. They knew what they could sell and hoped I could produce that product. I couldn’t. This is why we don’t quit our day jobs.

So what should you do if you get that call? I’d say give the edits a whirl—but stay in touch with your creative self (and save your original.) If you have to hide the new version from your friends, and/or start to sob when you sit down at the keyboard, it’s OK to say thanks but no thanks.

What you shouldn’t do is procrastinate or send the original back with only a few changes. The late, lamented Miss Snark said of an author who wouldn’t rewrite, “The author was really shocked when I said no, ’cause he believed my editorial comments meant an offer was a pretty sure thing. I said, look, you didn't make the changes I suggested…even if you did them now, I've got no confidence you'd be someone who can handle editorial direction.”

An agency is like a retail shop: it sells a certain type of merchandise. You’re being considered as a possible vendor. Don’t go into business if you can’t supply the product. If your rewrite is accepted, you’ll be expected to write more of the same.

So if an agent asks you to rewrite your western as a romance, or your biting satire as Middle Grade fantasy, agree to give it a try. But before you waste too much time, read some romances or Middle Grade fantasy he’s selling.

If you can’t read them, you can’t write them. Politely bow out and move on. There are other agents. And small presses. Keep sending those queries.

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Literary Chick Lit Westerns

After I named the "literary chick lit western" as a jokey example of what's not selling in today's market, I realized there is such a book, and it sells very well. Tom Robbins' Even Cowgirls Get the Blues has been in print since its debut in 1976. And it sure is literary. And a western. And I'm sure somebody in some editorial meeting would call it chick lit.

Another argument to write what you love now and find an audience later.

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Catherine Ryan Hyde on Publishing Trends

For folks who don't have time to read comments, I thought I'd repost the great comment to the post below from Catherine Ryan Hyde, author of Pay it Forward and a whole lot of other brilliant novels:

"Trends change so regularly that you will most often miss them if you try to write to fit them. And if you fake an interest in, say, romance, the lack of genuine interest usually tanks the work. I always thought the best plan was to write what you truly love. The love comes through and the work rises like cream to the surface, even in a tough market. Who knows, maybe next year I'll sell When I Found You in the US. I'm not betting the house on it, but stranger things have happened. Especially in publishing."

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SOFT MARKETS AND HARD SELLS

What’s NOT HOT in publishing:
More from the CC Writers Conference

The publishing world seems to have been left in a state of befuddlement by the economic meltdown and the e-book revolution sparked by the Kindle. This situation, I learned at the CCWC, has “softened” most of the adult fiction market. (BTW, when the market is “soft” in a genre, those books are a “hard sell.” Go figure.)

The sad truth is that if you’re unpublished and write for adults, breaking in is way harder than a year ago (unless you write Romance: Harlequin/Mills and Boon sales are actually up, while most other publishers have lost their shirts and are holding tightly to their trousers.)

So what’s the level of squishiness of your WIP?

Literary Fiction hardly ever makes money, so in a bad economy, editors are even less likely to take it on. If you can pick up the pace and throw in some ZOMBIES IN ZEPPELINS (see last Monday’s post,) you might have more hope of hitting the shelves. An MFA helps, too. So does a friend on staff at the New Yorker.

Or go to England, like Catherine Ryan Hyde (author of Pay It Forward) whose new literary novel, When I Found You had to find a publisher across the pond, and isn’t yet available to us downmarket Yanks. For more info, check out her blog at http://tinyurl.com/ygawlq6

Memoirs are iffy even in good times, so if you’re not a former Vice Presidential candidate who can see Russia from her house, you need to focus on one story arc and incorporate a lot of action and tension. A good memoir should read like a novel. It helps if you’re an African kid genius who built an electric generator with a library book picture and scraps he found in the village garbage dump. (Check out The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba–and for the review police: nobody gave me a free book to say that.)

Chick Lit. I know. This makes me cry. But so much dumb stuff was published in the genre that it killed itself DEAD—as in departed, deceased & defunct. They say the smallest possibility that your novel might be called chick lit will get it laughed out of an editorial meeting.

But I’m pretty sure this is formulaic chick lit they’re talking: books about shallow, whiny 20-somethings with more disposable income than self-esteem. Wonderful comic writers like Jennifer Weiner, Marian Keyes, Lauren Baratz-Logsted, and Sophie Kinsella, whose work was sold as chick lit a few years ago, are still selling just fine.

I can’t figure out what genre their books have been assigned, so if you know, do tell me. The savvy folks at AgentQuery seem to be in the dark, too, since they still name it as a genre. But DON’T use the term in your query, even if the agent is listed as repping it. They filled out those forms a long time ago.

Inspirational Romance. A saturated market. This doesn’t mean it’s been called home to be with the Lord. Just make sure you’ve got a unique voice and fascinating heroine.

Hard SciFi. The really techie stuff. There is a niche market, but if you want to break in, make sure you know your physics. You’re writing for science ubernerds.

Epic Fantasy for adults. Too many Tolkein wannabes out there. And videogames. But rewrite your Elf vs. Orc saga for Middle Grade and you’re golden.

Zombie-Free Horror. Standard horror has chilled. Except for splatterpunk. Ick. And all that amazing stuff Neil Gaiman writes, which is not called horror any more: it’s “New Weird.”

Cozy Mysteries. These aren’t bad sellers. It’s just that this is the genre with the most competition. If you write amateur-sleuth, body-in-the-library domestic mysteries, be prepared to have a harder time breaking in. It helps if your sleuth is majorly quirky.

Westerns. You kind of have to be Larry McMurtry. This genre has ridden off into the sunset. But western romance still sells.

So am I going to rewrite my comic romantic suspense novel and make my hero a 12-year-old zombie with a steam-powered space ship? Nope. The only really predictable thing about the market is that it’s unpredictable. Next month a Literary Chick Lit Western might shoot to the top of the charts and knock those vampires off their perch.

Hey, it could happen. Who thought there was a market for the long-dead British school-boy tale—in Halloweeny costumes, no less?

So don’t delete that squishy WIP. It’s always good to have inventory.
************

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The Grapes of Wrath of Khan

My above movie-title mash-up made finalist in Moonrat's contest! If you need a spirit-lift, go read all the entries. http://tinyurl.com/ygfpojc The winner was Bridge Over the River Kwai, the Beloved Country--my fave, too. Make sure you're not drinking anything, or you may destroy your keyboard.

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Write it Anyway

Department of "What have you got to lose"--Over at Mediabistro, poet & blogger Caroline Hagood has a great post on why you should write that first novel anyway. Here’s a quote:

“The worst that will happen is that your novel will be forced to endure the writer’s spring cleaning, taking up residence in the sock drawer with the sobering knowledge that the socks are more likely to get a publishing contract. Just remember the old adage that the first novel is meant to function as a sort of lubrication for the next tome to come shooting out of the writing mind.”

http://mediabistro.posterous.com/why-you-should-write-that-first-novel

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I Heart Nathan Bransford

For the five people who don't already follow him, Nathan Bransford is a Curtis Brown agent, MG fiction author, and blog-god. Five days a week he writes brilliant posts on all aspects of writing and publishing.

In case you missed his post on Monday about when to hire an editor, it’s a must read for anybody thinking about paying for professional polish of their WIP http://tinyurl.com/yasqpmw.

Here’s a quote:

“The advice should be positive, useful, strike you with the occasional, "Why didn't I see that?!" moment, and, perhaps most importantly, should be consistent with your vision for the project. In other words, the critiquer shouldn't simply be telling you how they would have written it.”

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ZOMBIES AND STEAMPUNK

What's Hot in Publishing.

At the CC Writers Conference, I finally heard some hope coming from the publishing industry. After last winter’s editorial carnage, and a spring and summer of discontent, life seems to be stirring in the book biz. (I hope it hasn't just been re-animated and zombified.)

That’s according to the three smart, fun, helpful agents on the faculty: Katharine Sands of the Sarah Jane Freyman Agency, Amy Burkhardt of Reece Halsey North (soon to be rechristened the Kimberly Cameron Literary Agency) and Laurie McLean of Larsen-Pomada.

I learned a lot and met some fantastic people. Also got inspired by Danish-American writer Christian Moerk (Darling Jim: Henry Holt and Co, 2009.) Yes, you still can get a first literary adult novel published in the US, but it does help if you’ve already sold it to the entire population of Denmark.

Here’s what’s hot in publishing right now.

Romance. It’s is the bread and butter of the industry—now more than ever—a whopping 50% of sales. (If you write it, and aren’t a member of RWA—join, say the agents.) Paranormal is the major seller, and Romantic Suspense is big, too. Historical is a perennial favorite, especially Regency, Medieval Scottish and Edwardian—and Elizabethan is growing.

Young Adult and Middle Grade are where the real growth is happening. This is not your mother’s YA/MG. Edgy literary/experimental fiction is alive and well and living on the YA shelves, which are now perused by young people all the way through Junior college, apparently. (They’re always nearest the coffee bar.) This means your protagonist can be as ancient as 22, and word count can be from 40K to whatever (but less is still more, Ms. Rowling notwithstanding.) Anything goes in terms of language/darkness/weirdness. Even Chick Lit still lives in YA, because of Gossip Girl et al. (But don’t even mention the term when pitching adult Women’s Fic. More later on what’s not hot.)

One caveat in YA: no boy’s adventure stories. (Pirates, mysteries, quest sagas.) Save that for MG. Marketers have proclaimed that boys don’t read after age 13.

Fantasy is still way hot in MG—over 50% of the market. What used to be YA material is now MG. Middle Grade still has restrictions on language/sexual situations, but it’s darker and grittier than it used to be. Your MC needs to be 13 or younger and word count between 20K and 40K. If you can change the age of your MC to 13 and pare down your word count, your fantasy WIP has a much better chance of being published. Funny is good too. Funny Fantasy MG for boys is golden.

Vampires are still taking a bite out of adult fiction, as well as YA, but the market may be getting saturated. The upcoming Wuthering Bites, about Heathcliff as a vampire may signal boredom with the conventional vampire saga.

But mashing undead/shapeshifter stories with classics took off with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, so anybody out there with a finished ms. of Jane Eyre and Zombies, the Golden Bowl of Blood, or the Last of the Mohican Werewolves, send it NOW—you’re on the brink of fame and fortune.

Zombies are huge for all ages (publishers tend to forget the existence of readers over 30, of course) I’ve noticed most of the deals listed in Publisher’s Lunch in the last two months have been zombie-related, and the success of the film Zombieland will only fuel the trend. But beware, says Laurie McLean. Trends like this can be short lived.

Steampunk is the new Big Thing. It’s something I knew about mostly from costume catalogues, but apparently it’s the new Goth—scary-sexy retro clothes without the emo angst. But more buckles. Lots more. And goggles. For the uninitiated, steampunk is sci-fi set in Victorian and Edwardian England. Think Jules Verne. Mixed with the TV show/film The Wild, Wild West. It’s set in a universe of steam powered computers and clockwork cell phones used by spunky hotties in corsets and bustles. Oh, yeah—and maybe they do a little space travel in wooden space ships a la Firefly.

Not much hope for people who write for grownups, but unfortunately, grownups seem to be glued to their TVs watching Dancing With the Biggest Loser these days—or that’s what book marketers think. If you want them to think differently—go out and buy a book. Preferably without a zombie Mr. Rochester wooing Jane Eyre on his clockwork cell phone.

More soon on what’s NOT HOT.

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Fun Halloween Contests

The CC Writers Conference was fantastic. And I won first prize in the YA category! I’m still digesting all the information. I’ll blog about it later in the week. Meanwhile, here are some fun contests you may not have heard of.

The Writer’s Chronicle Forum’s Halloween Contest. Tell your favorite spooky book or film http://thewriterschronicle.blogspot.com/2009/10/competition-alert-halloween.html

At Editorial Ass, http://editorialass.blogspot.com/ Moonrat has a movie title mash-up contest for invented mixed-up titles like “12 Angry Men in Tights” or “The Grapes of Wrath of Kahn.”

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WRITERS CONFERENCE TIPS

10 Dos and Don’ts

Next weekend, I’ll be attending the Central Coast Writing conference at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo, CA http://www.communityprograms.net/wc/wcindex.htm. It’s a great little conference, where I always learn something new.

To remind myself, and fellow conference goers--here are some tips to get the most out of a writers conference

DON’T dress to impress. (At one conference I attended, a woman came dressed as a tree. Shedding real leaves. Don’t do this. Also, dressing as one of your characters WILL get you noticed, but not in a good way.) Wear neat but comfortable clothing. The days will be long and intense.

DO wear a distinctive scarf, hat, or jacket every day that will help people remember you.

DON’T pitch your project unless you’re in a specified pitch session. I’ve seen writers pitch to agents through the bathroom stall door. Seriously. Don’t be that person.

DO offer to get an agent a cup of coffee or ask how she’s enjoying the conference. Or ask what books he reads for fun. It will give you great material for your query letter.

DON’T cart around all 800 pages of your magnum opus and try to thrust it upon faculty members.

DO perfect your pitch before hand, so you can tell an agent or editor in three sentences what your book is about. Then ask if you can query. (If you’re querying a novel or memoir, make sure to tell her if it’s complete.) If she says yes, you can put “REQUESTED” on the envelope. A big plus.

DON’T compete for faculty attention like a needy two-year old. The accolades will come when you perfect that book and get into print.

DO bring a notebook, several pens—and if you are attending a hands-on critique session workshop—a first chapter, story, or a few poems. Business cards, if you have them, will help with networking. Also, bring some protein bars and energy drinks and/or water. Your breaks may be too short to grab real food.

DON’T forget to have fun. You’re there to make friends as well as learn. One of the most important aspects of a conference is meeting fellow writers.

DO remember agents and editors are people too. As the late great Miss Snark said “It’s like visiting the reptile house. They're as afraid of you as you are of them. Honest.”

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More Kudos for Short Fiction

Just saw this: We all get to vote for the National Book Award!

The public gets to choose the best American work of fiction of the past 60 years from six finalists—four of which are short story collections:

The finalists, announced by the National Book Foundation today are:

"The Stories of John Cheever,"
Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man,"
William Faulkner's "Collected Stories,"
"The Complete Stories" of Flannery O'Connor,
Thomas Pynchon's "Gravity Rainbow"
"The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty."

Starting Monday, through Oct. 21, votes can be cast through the Web site http://www.nbafictionpoll.org. The winner will be announced Nov. 18.

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OPRAH PICKS A SHORT STORY COLLECTION

…and other reasons to write more short fiction.


The news is out. Oprah’s new book pick is—gulp—A short story collection. According to most agents, story collections are a tough sell (along with chick lit and memoirs) but maybe that’s about to change.

In any case, it’s time for us all to start re-thinking short fiction. I’m beginning to realize I’ve wasted way too much of the past 20 years writing book length-fiction. If I’d been writing more short stories and creative essays, I might have higher profile now, and maybe even a solid career, instead of two out-of-print novels and a drawer full of yellowing manuscripts.

People will tell you there’s no money in short fiction. But—newsflash!—there’s precious little in novel writing either, unless you’re one of a handful of superstars, and/or you’ve been anointed by Ms. Winfrey. Not only has the probability of an unknown writer landing a major book contract sunk below the chances of winning the Big Spin—but even if you score in the publishing lottery, there’s little payoff. A first novel/memoir generally brings in around $5,000 in an advance, and no royalties, according to industry blogger The Rejector (great publishing blog: http://rejecter.blogspot.com )

And yet, most novice writers are working on book length fiction or memoir. I recently visited a critique group where one writer complimented another with the misguided advice not to “waste” her crisp little story on a niche magazine and save it for a novel.

Back in the Jurassic days when I started writing, that wouldn’t have been bad advice. In the 1980s, short fiction had all but disappeared, but novels still flew off the shelves. If aspiring writers were urged to pen short stories, it was only as a warm-up for the serious business of writing books—like piano students practicing scales before the big recital.

So, with my eyes on the big prize, I spent a decade slaving on novels in all the once-popular genres: cozies, historical romances, family sagas—but when I finally got a novel published, it wasn’t between book covers—it was as a serial in a local entertainment weekly. I did the math recently, and the net profit from that serial, paid in regular monthly paychecks, with no agent commission, was higher than from either of my books.

This should have taught me something. Especially about the public’s changing reading habits. Attention spans get shorter and shorter. Committing to a whole novel is a major investment for most readers, not just of money but time. And time is what nobody’s got. We’re all here on the ’Net, reading blogs.

And what about the writer’s time? Since most first (and maybe second and third) novels never see print, that’s a lot of hours/months/years spent filling a file cabinet with moldering treeware.

However, even a newbie has a chance of getting a short piece published somewhere, especially online. You might even get paid.

“But I don’t read short stories!” you say. Me neither. At least I didn’t. I love immersing myself in a big, yummy novel. But I’m reading stories again—making a point of reading new online journals. Ten years ago, I would have had to invest big a chunk of change in subscriptions to literary journals to get a cross-section of the current story market, but these days, great short fiction is available all over the ’Net for free.

I’m not advising anybody to ditch that magnum opus—just saying it makes sense to put an equal amount of energy into shorter pieces. Instead of putting every idea that illuminates your brain into your novel, give it a spin as a short story first. (It helps to remember short stories are much better suited to screen adaptation than novels—and movies are where the actual money is.)

Then go to work researching journals—online and off—that publish pieces like yours. WritersMarket http://www.writersmarket.com/ has a comprehensive database. I got an update from them recently with news of four literary magazines that pay up to $40 a page—more than double the Rejector’s figure for a 300 page novel. My favorite source for paying market info is the tireless Hope C. Clark at Funds for Writers http://www.fundsforwriters.com/ . Her great newsletters are free. (Hope—thanks for all your fantastic advice!) Another great free source for worldwide markets is at Freelance Writing Organization-International http://www.fwointl.com .

Plus, short stories keep their value. Most journals only buy first rights, so you can publish them again. If, like me, you can’t kick your book-writing habit, try writing a series of short stories about characters you can work into a novel later. Polish up a few, send them off, enter a few contests, and you might even end up with some cash.

And “award-winning writer” has a nicer sound than “unpublished novelist,” doesn’t it?

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Lemonade Stand Award Nominee!

I'm honored to have been nominated (twice!) for the Lemonade Stand Award. Both nominators have fantastic blogs. Check out Writing Roller Coasters http://writingrollercoasters.blogspot.com/ and The Chronicles of Emily Cross, link on the blogroll to the left.

I'll nominate some of my favorite blogs later. I think I've finally uploaded the Lemonade stand! A triumph for a cybermoron like me.

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MEMOIR WRITING: SOME DOS AND DON’TS

They say we all have a book inside us—our own life story. The urge to put that story on paper is the most common reason people start writing. Adult education programs and senior centers everywhere offer courses in “writing your own life.” Memoir is the most popular genre at any writers conference.

Unfortunately, it’s the hardest to write well—and the least likely to be published.

Agent Kristin Nelson says she’s seen so many bad memoirs that she cringes when she meets a memoirist a writer’s conference. Author J. A. Konrath offers the simple advice: “Unless you're one of the Rolling Stones, don't write anything autobiographical.” Miss Snark pronounced, “every editor and agent I know HATES memoir pitches…I'd rather shave the cat.”

But memoirs like Angela’s Ashes, The Glass House, and I Feel Bad About my Neck make the bestseller lists. Readers are hungry for “true” stories: look how angrily they react to people like James Frey who pass off fiction as memoir.

So don’t toss that masterpiece-in-progress. But hone your craft—brilliant wordsmithing and/or stand-up-worthy comedy skills help a bunch—and follow some basic dos and don’ts:

DON'T write an autobiography: An autobiography is a list of events: “I was born in (year) in (place) and I did (this) and (that.) Mr. Konrath is right—unless you’re Keith Richards, nobody cares. (Except your family. Don’t let me discourage you from self-publishing a chronicle of your life as a gift to your descendants.)

DON'T confuse memoir with psychotherapy: Writing a book about a traumatic personal event may be cathartic for the writer, but there’s a reason shrinks charge big bucks to listen to this stuff. Put the raw material in a journal to mine later for fiction, poetry, and personal essays.

DON'T expect a big audience for medical journaling: If you or a loved one has a horrific disease, chronicling your experiences can be invaluable to those suffering similar trials. To the general public—not so much. Reach your audience through online forums, blogs, and magazine or newspaper articles.

DON'T be married to the book format. Beginning writers often make the mistake of jumping into a book-length opus. It’s smarter and easier to start with short pieces—what a writer/editor friend calls “memoiric essays.” Nostalgia, “Boomer” and senior-oriented magazines are great markets for tales of life in the old days, and niche journals focusing on hobbies, pets, disablities, veterans, etc. are always looking for submissions. Many of them pay: check Writer’s Market or our FWOI database.

DO tell a page-turning story. A book-length memoir is read and marketed as a novel. It needs a novel’s narrative drive. That means tension and conflict and one main story arc to drive the action. Most memoirs fail from lack of focus. Choose one storyline, like: “Orphan kids save the family farm during the Depression,” or “A cross-dressing teen survives high school in the 1950s.”

DO be selective in scene choices. Just because “it’s what really happened” doesn’t make an event interesting. Your happy memories of that idyllic Sunday school picnic in vanished small-town America will leave your reader comatose unless the church caught fire, or the bully who’d been harassing you lost his pants.

DO consider limiting the story to an area where your experience is significant and unique. If you gave birth in the mud at Woodstock, dated Elvis, or helped decipher the Enigma code, make that the focus of your book. I knew a musician who worked with of some of the great legends of American music. His memoir of those jazzy days was gripping, but because it was buried in his “happy ever after” life story, he never found a publisher.

DO look at regional publishers. A national publisher may not be interested in stories of the vanished ranch life of old California, but a local publisher who has outlets at tourist sites and historical landmarks may be actively looking for them. Another plus: you don’t need an agent to approach most regional publishers.

DO finish the book before you query. Memoirs are bought and sold like novels, so query with a synopsis, not a book proposal, and have the book polished, edited and good to go before you contact a publisher or agent.

Remember that a memoirist, like a novelist, is essentially an entertainer. Always keep your reader in mind. Never fabricate, but only tell what’s unique, exciting and relevant to your premise, and you’ll avoid the cringe-making amateurishness agents and editors fear

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THIRTEEN REASONS WHY YOUR NOVEL QUERY WAS REJECTED

The biggest mistake beginning novelists make is writing queries that sound as if they were written by—um—beginning novelists. I was cleaning out my files recently and found some seriously cringe-making queries I sent out a decade ago. I didn’t make all of the following mistakes, but I have to admit to several.

Here are some surefire rejection-getters:

1) WHINING and/or PARANOIA: It’s not a good idea to mention you’ve had over a thousand rejections and you’re thinking of taking the Sylvia Plath way out. Writers tend to be suicidal. This is not news. And don’t blabber about copyrights and pilfer-proofing your intellectual property. There are no new ideas; just new ways of writing them.

2) GETTING CHUMMY. It’s a business letter. Don’t cozy up with personal asides about the unfairness of the publishing industry, the health care debate, or the coming Rapture.

3) VERBOSITY: A query should be one page—under 500 words.

4) TOO MUCH INFORMATION: No matter what you’ve heard about “platforms,” most agents say they don’t care about a novelist’s hobbies or what we do for bucks—except stuff specifically related to the book. If your heroine works at a magazine edited by Beelzebub in Italian shoes, yes, do mention you’ve done time at Vogue, but keep to yourself how many years you’ve been a greeter at WalMart.

5) IRRELEVANT PUBLISHING CREDITS: I see this complaint on lots of agent blogs. They don’t want to know about your PhD dissertation on Quattrocento Tuscan pottery, or your Hint from Heloise on uses for dryer lint. When giving “publishing credits,” cite only fiction or creative nonfiction, plus articles specifically related to the novel’s subject matter—e.g. if your novel is about death by snack cake overdose, do mention your paper for The Lancet on the toxic properties of Twinkies.

6) EXTRANEOUS KUDOS: It’s OK to say you were second runner-up for the “Best Paranormal-Chick Lit-Police Procedural” award at the RWA conference, but don’t mention that a judge told you later over martinis that if they’d given an award for “best vampire-werewolf sex scene,” you would have won.

7) OMIT VITAL INFORMATION: Your first paragraph should give the book’s title, genre and word count. A great hook helps, but it’s gotta be attached to something.

8) GIMMICKS: No matter what your marketing friends tell you, don’t make your query into a jigsaw puzzle; include a pair of Barbie shoes with your SASE; or send the query by registered mail. Ditto printing your query with pink ink in the Curlz font or sending it in a black envelope shaped like a bat. This WILL get you noticed, but not in a good way.

9) CALL YOURSELF A NOVELIST IF YOU HAVEN’T PUBLISHED A NOVEL WITH A LEGITIMATE PRESS. Self-publishing isn’t considered publishing unless you’ve sold thousands of copies. Remember: pretentiousness invites ridicule.

10) CALL IT A “FICTION NOVEL.” This sets off immediate nitwit-detector alarms. All novels are fiction.

11) QUERY AN UNFINISHED PROJECT. If you don’t have an ending yet, you’re probably a year away from thinking about representation. Don’t send a query on a novel that isn’t finished, critiqued, polished, edited, and proofread.

12) MASS QUERY EVERY AGENT IN THE BUSINESS. Nobody will read past a generic “dear agent,” even if you’ve been smart enough to blind copy your mass mailing. Address each agent personally, and indicate why you’ve chosen her.

13) QUERY MORE THAN ONE BOOK AT ONCE. So you’ve got inventory. Most of us do. But don’t present all twelve unpublished novels and ask an agent to choose. Pick one. It’s OK to mention other titles in the final paragraph, especially if they’re part of a series, but hold to one pitch.


The ideal query letter contains four paragraphs: 1) Title, genre, and word count, plus a logline with an irresistible hook. 2) A brilliant, heart-stopping, three-sentence synopsis. 3) A one sentence bio with relevant awards and credits. 4) A nice thank you, mentioning why you chose to contact this particular agent.

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Do You Need to Hire an Editor?

Another article from the archives:

Choose the right editor: 7 tips

The term “editor” has several meanings in the book business. The “in-house” editors at publishing companies--the ones who decide what manuscripts to publish--don’t do a lot of literal “editing” these days. According to agent Jenny Bent, the amount of hands-on work they do, “varies wildly from editor to editor…because many editors simply don't have the time or desire to actually edit.”

By the time it lands on an editor’s desk, a manuscript needs to be close to print-ready. Agents can help, but they don’t have much time for nitty-gritty text-honing either, so most won’t look at manuscripts that aren’t carefully proofed and edited.

The majority of writers learn to edit themselves with the help of a beta reader or two, but if you can afford it, hiring an independent editor is the best way to give your work an extra polish. You’ll can find good editing services advertised through magazines like Writers Digest and Poets and Writers, the Funds For Writers newsletter http://www.fundsforwriters.com/, or Freelance Writing International, services@fwointl.com. A really impressive editor I’ve recently met is Victoria Mixon http://victoriamixon.com/ (she sometimes offers freebies of first paragraphs or hooks.) I even take on the occasional editing project myself.

But I turn down more clients than I take on, because I don’t feel comfortable working on projects I don’t feel will earn back my fees. Too many newbies hire editors when what they really need is a few basic writing classes and some knowledge of the industry.

Of course, if price is no object, you can hire an editor as your personal writing teacher. A number now offer “writing coaching” services. But most professional writers learn their craft through workshops, extensive reading, critique groups, and years of trial and error.

The writers who benefit most from a freelance editor’s work are:


1) Self-publishers. I urge ALL self publishers to hire an independent editor before going to press. The “editing” most POD publishers offer isn’t much more than a spell-check.

2) Experts whose primary field is not the written word. This includes self-help books by psychologists or medical professionals, specialty cookbooks, local history, etc.

3) Memoirists who have a unique, marketable tale to tell, but are not planning a career in writing. (These people may require a ghostwriter rather than an editor.)

4) Writers who have been requested by an interested agent or publisher to give the book a polish. Many agents will ask a writer to hire an independent editor at this stage.

5) Novelists who have polished their work in workshops and critique groups, but after many rejections, can’t pinpoint what is keeping them in the slush pile.

If you decide to hire an editor, do some research and be clear in your goals. The standard pay scale for editorial services is posted by the Editorial and Freelancers Association at http://www.the-efa.org/res/rates.html. Plan to spend from five hundred to several thousand dollars for a book-length manuscript.

Choose carefully. You don’t want just any out-of-work English major. Check Writer Beware for in-depth advice: http://www.sfwa.org/beware/bookdoctors.html. The Edit Ink scam of the late ’90s bilked thousands. Here are some warning signs:

1) Extravagant praise and promises. Anybody who guarantees you a place on the best-seller list is either crooked or delusional.

2) Claims that all publishers require a professionally edited ms. Not true. It’s also not true that an edit will get you a read. The Wylie Merrick agency recently blogged, “Just received a query from a writer who stated that his PROFESSIONALLY EDITED book weighed in over 150,000 words. . . Ask for a refund.”

3) An agent or publisher who recommends their own editing services or gives a specific referral. Beware conflicts of interest. Edit Ink scammed writers by giving agents kickbacks for referrals.

4) One-size-fits-all. You need a specialist in your genre. I can’t picture sex with elves without laughing, and torture scenes make me retch. You do NOT want my help with your dark fantasy or horror novel.

5) Direct solicitation. Scam editors purchase mailing lists from writing magazine subscriber lists. Beware.

6) Sales pressure. “Limited time offers” are rarely good deals.

7) No client list on their website. You should be able to get a list of clients and a sample of the editor’s work on request.

There are many kinds of edits, priced differently, so be aware of what you need.
Manuscript evaluation: A broad overall assessment of the book.
Content editing: Help with structure and style.
Line editing: Reworking text at the sentence level.
Copy editing: Attention to grammar, spelling, punctuation and continuity.
Proofreading: Checking for typos and other minor problems.

A good editor can make the difference between a successful book and a dud. Just choose your editor carefully and wait until you have a marketable project before you make the investment.

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YOU MAY BE A BESTSELLING AUTHOR ON TRALFAMADORE

This week, agent Nathan Bransford posed this question on his blog: “How Do You Deal with the ‘Am-I-Crazies’?”

Those are the blues that can overwhelm the unpublished/underpublished novelist as we slog away, year after year, with nothing to show for our life’s work but a mini-Kilimanjaro of rejection slips.

The truth is, most fiction writers spend much of our lives sitting alone in a room generating a product that has zero chance of ever making a penny—or even being seen by a person outside our immediate circle of friends, relations and/or personal stalkers.

So—not surprisingly—we occasionally ask ourselves that big, existential question: WHAT ARE WE—NUTS?

Trying to answer can plunge a writer into despair. So how do we cope?

Most of the over 250 respondents to Nathan’s post answered with variations on the following advice:

1) EMBRACE THE CRAZY and accept that we are, most of us, deeply and certifiably Looneytunes.
2) Chocolate helps
3) Ditto booze and caffeine
4) Ditto sunrises, music, and long walks
5) Ditto the company/blogs/tweets of other lunatic writers
6) And reading good books
7) Or crap books, because we know we can do better than THAT
8) Funny, nobody mentioned sex
9) But denial is good. Really good.
10) And keep writing, even if it’s just for ourselves, or the one person who reads our blog, or the dog, or whoever…because: WE CAN’T STOP OURSELVES.

And why is that?

Well, I have a theory: It’s the Tralfamadorians. If you’ve read your Vonnegut (and what business do you have calling yourself a writer if you haven’t read Vonnegut?) you know about Tralfamadore. It’s a planet where a super-race of toilet plungers exist in all times simultaneously. The name of their planet means both “all of us” and “the number 541,” and they control all aspects of human life including social affairs and politics.

Since these beings have infinite time on their hands, I figure they’ve got a lot of leisure to fill up with reading. And how do they get their books? Of course! They compel earthlings to write novels. Hundreds of thousands of them. Way more than earthbound publishers and readers can handle. But on Tralfamadore—hey, they’re consumed like Skittles.

In fact, the Tralfamadorians are so eager for new material, they’ve figured out how to transmit stories right from our brainwaves to their TralfamaKindles the minute you type “the end” on that final draft.

And it could be that right now, as we speak, your first novel—the one that has been sitting in the bottom of a drawer along with its 350 rejection letters and the restraining order from that editor at Tor—could be at the top of the New Tralfamadore Times bestseller list.

Think about it. You could be the Dan Brown of that whole part of the galaxy, where readers are desperate—pining, pleading and panting—for your next book.

And that voice in your head telling you to pound away, day after day, trying to finish that opus, even though everybody, even your girlfriend—and your MOM for god’s sake—says it sux? That’s a transmission from the Doubleday Company of Tralfamadore saying, “Hurry up, dude, we gotta have this for our Christmas list!”

Hey, just prove to me it’s not true.
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5 Tips on How to Query the Right Agent

More updated advice for newbies--from the archives of INkwell Newswatch

Recently I cautioned against scam agents, but also noted that the ratio of legit agents to newbie novelists is approximately one to twenty-five gazillion.

So what do we do—throw mass queries at big-name agents, perhaps employing the services of a Mafia henchperson or Voodoo practitioner?

That would be a no.

One of the reasons the process is so gruesome is that beginners clog the query pipeline with clueless mass-mailings, making agents harder to reach (and way crankier.)

A little research saves everybody grief, and it doesn’t have to cost you. (I’m annoyed by mindless old-fashioned instructions to “read The Literary Marketplace.” LM is too costly even for strapped libraries to keep current copies, and in such a fast-changing industry, the latest version is out of date before it sees print.) Writer’s Market and Jeff Herman’s directories are less pricey for the starving writer, but also pretty much obsolete on delivery. You can subscribe to Writers Market online for about $4 a month, but I find free sites often have more current info.

For A-list agency addresses, the AAR website is up-to-date and free. To find new agents who haven’t been in the business long enough for AAR membership, check sites like Query Tracker, Agent Query and Freelance Writing Organization-International. The best sites will indicate which agents are actively looking for clients, and they do their best to screen out the scammers. Then follow a few guidelines:

1) KNOW YOUR GENRE

The most common mistake new writers make is querying agents who don't represent what they write. If you write romance, mystery, science fiction, or fantasy, sites like RWA, MWA, and SFWA offer lists of genre-friendly agents

If you write stuff with murkier definitions, like literary, commercial, women’s, or mainstream, browse amazon entries for books similar in tone or subject to yours. Often amazon lets you look at the first few pages, where authors may thank their agents. (Or peruse your local bookstore.) Also, authors often mention their agents on their websites. Or you can do a search with the author’s name and keywords like “agent” or “represented.”

Note: if you don’t have an MFA and a/or friend on staff at the New Yorker, it’s probably best to avoid calling your book “literary.” It’s something of a closed market.

If you don’t know your genre, you’re not ready to query. This doesn’t mean your book isn’t good enough. It means you need to learn more about the business. Go to writers conferences, browse every writing site you find, and read, read, read.

2) VISIT THE AGENCY WEBSITE

This is imperative. The closer to the source, the more up-to-date the info. An agent who accepted queries last quarter may now have a full client list or an Everest-high mountain of partials she has no time to read. Submission guidelines change weekly. Someone who took e-queries six months ago may only accept snail mail after a barrage of spam. One member of an agency wants a synopsis with the query; another likes a few pages of text (pasted in the body of an e-mail—NEVER as an attachment.)

Look for new agents in established agencies who rep your genre and are “building a clientele.” They’re more likely to have time to read their slush piles

Of course, some agents don’t have websites. The venerable agency Curtis Brown had none until a few weeks ago. But some of their agents, like the wonderful Nathan Bransford, have blogs. A Google search will turn up an agent blog. Which leads me to…

3) READ AGENT BLOGS

OK, this can become something of an addiction, but blogging agents provide precious insider info—not just about their own likes and dislikes, but about the industry in general. They can be cranky and snarky, and you may see your own query ridiculed in front of the entire blogosphere, but they give up-to-the-minute news of sales and trends. They’ll tell you what markets are overfilled; what’s on their wish list, and what sort of faux pas will get their panties in a bunch.

Nathan Bransford is the reigning king of the agent bloggers. http://blog.nathanbransford.com/ He is remarkably gracious and helpful. So is Kristin Nelson. http://pubrants.blogspot.com/ They both update almost daily and their archives offer mini courses in publishing. (Kristin’s series, “Agenting 101” offers a step-by-step picture of how a contract is negotiated.) Janet Reid, http://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com/ Bookends LLC http://bookendslitagency.blogspot.com/ , Rachelle Gardner, and Colleen Lindsay also offer must-read blogs. There are a whole lot more great ones coming along all the time. And for lots of great nitty-gritty info, there are the “Snarkives” of the late, great Miss Snark. http://misssnark.blogspot.com/


4) STUDY CLIENT LISTS

There’s a broad spectrum within genres: if an agent’s romance sales are mostly to Christian publishers, your gay vampire-demon romance probably won’t float her boat; and if all the mysteries sport pink covers, your hardboiled noir won’t make the list.

Check recent sales. The agency that sold mass quantities of chick lit in 2004 may only be selling steam punk now, and they’ll delete your chick lit query without a glance.

NOTE: it’s best to not to use the term “chick lit,” at all, even if that’s what you write. Call it “romantic comedy” or “women’s fiction.” Overbuying a few years ago has put chick lit on a publishing blacklist. Great discussion on this Rodney Dangerfield of genres at Carrie Kei Heim Binas’s blog http://heimbinasfiction.blogspot.com

5) SEARCH FOR INTERVIEWS AND PROFILES

Narrow your list further with a quick Google. Interviews, articles and guest blog posts can give valuable insight into an agent’s personality and needs. A fantastic blogger who provides regular agent profiles is Casey McCormick http://caseylmccormick.blogspot.com/

********
Finally, don’t take it personally if the “perfect” agent doesn’t respond. We’re in a brutal business. Go buy a lottery ticket. The odds will be more in your favor.

And there’s always that Voodoo practitioner…

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Agent Janet Reid adds a caveat

Re: young and hungry non-AAR agents. Veteran agent Janet Reid of Fineprint added this to the comments section:

"Young and hungry agents who are looking for clients may indeed not be members of AAR, but what you can ask them (BEFORE SIGNING!) is what literary agency they have worked in. Interned in or worked in. I'm always rather taken aback by people who decide they can be literary agents without actually having been inside an agent's office."

Oh, and she said my post was "nicely written." I can float around on that all day. Thanks Ms. Reid!

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Beware Bogus Literary Agents

Six Tips to Avoid Getting Scammed


I belong to the generation of women who were told we were more likely be shot by terrorists than find husbands. Several decades later, we’re all writing books about our fabulous single lives—as desperate now for literary representation as we once were for the white dress/gold ring thing.

I haven’t seen statistics about the comparative likelihood of being shot by a terrorist vs. finding a literary agent, but given the global political climate, I’d say odds heavily favor the terrorists.

But I guess I can fantasize that someday I’ll be shot by a terrorist who works for Curtis Brown.

We can’t blame agents. We’re in this situation because there are only 438 members of the Association of Author’s Representatives in the U. S. while most of the 230 million of us who own computers have at least one novel in progress in the files. (If as many Americans bought books as wrote them, our situation wouldn’t be so dire.)

With such vast herds of us overpopulating the planet, it’s inevitable that we’ve attracted our share of predators.

So here are six pointers to help you hang onto your dwindling cash reserves during this soul-crushing process (and no, publishing a few books with a small press to good reviews doesn’t do much to increase your chances of getting an agent’s attention—in fact it probably works against you—more on that in another post.)

1) NEVER PAY AN AGENT A “READING FEE”

Any agent who charges money to read your manuscript isn’t going to help your career. Publishers consider it unethical and won’t do business with them.

If you have to pay somebody to read your book, it’s not ready for publication. If you’re a newbie, DO pay a qualified freelance editor or book doctor, but never with a promise of publication attached. They simply can’t deliver.

2) NEVER PAY “MAILING” CHARGES UP FRONT

A popular scam. Bogus agencies sign thousands of clients and charge them each $250 or more per quarter for “copying and mailing.” But they never make a sale. I’ve seen heartbreaking letters from writers who’ve lost as much as $3,000 before they caught on.

Small agencies may legitimately ask for copying and mailing fees AFTER they’ve sent out your work, but they’ll provide proof they’re sending out your manuscript.

3) AVOID AGENCIES THAT ADVERTISE

A librarian friend recently forwarded me an intriguing ad from an agency advertising for submissions. I visited their refreshingly positive website and almost fell into the trap until I Googled them.

They appeared on the list of “20 WORST AGENTS” at the Writer Beware site: http://www.sfwa.org/beware/twentyworst.html

Do the math: agents don’t have to advertise.

3) CHECK OUT CLIENT LISTS

If there’s no client page on their website, run. Agents don’t keep client lists “confidential.” If they represent a literary star, they’ll pound their chests and bellow about it.

4) CHECK RECENT SALES

Even if somebody in the agency can claim to have represented Steven King, if it happened in King’s pre-Carrie days and she hasn’t sold anything since, don’t go there.

5) ASK HOW OFTEN THEY FORWARD REJECTION LETTERS

A good agent will always send on your rejections, usually every quarter. Some scammers do send manuscripts to publishing houses, but only in mass mailings addressed to no particular editor. Those go into recycling without a response.

6) VISIT WRITERS FORUMS WHERE AGENT INFORMATION IS SCREENED AND EXCHANGED.

The site I visit daily is AgentQuery—the best site for up to the minute agent info and also a great forum for writers to exchange information. http://www.agentquery.com/

And before you query an agent, make sure you check with those tireless watchdogs at Writer Beware http://www.sfwa.org/beware/index.html.

And here are some other great web sites that can alert you to scammers:

Preditors and Editors http://www.anotherealm.com/prededitors/

Absolute Write http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/

Query Tracker http://www.querytracker.net/

And do check the Association of Authors Representatives site http://www.aaronline.org/mc/page.do?sitePageId=9693&orgId=aar

But it’s important to note that an agent doesn’t have to be a member of AAR to be legitimate and even top-notch. New agents have to work for a certain number of years before they’re allowed to join—and it is the newer and hungrier agents who are reading queries from new writers and actively building their lists.

But most of all, don’t forget: Google is your friend. Check ’em out.

************

To all my new followers: Welcome! I hope to visit all your sites soon. I realize this info is probably old news to most of you who are already visiting blogs, but do pass on the information to friends who might need it. Everybody’s a newbie once.

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Everybody's a Critic: dealing with unsolicited criticism

Early into our journeys in wordsmithing, most writers discover our chosen art form has a major drawback: everybody’s a frakking critic.

For some reason, folks who happily offer praise to fledgling musicians, quilters, sculptors, or Star Trek action-figurine painters, feel compelled to launch into scathing critiques of the efforts of the creative writer.

I remember showing an early story to a boyfriend. He returned the manuscript covered with red-penciled “corrections”—changing characters’ names, dialogue, and much of the plot. He’d barely finished High School; I had an Ivy League degree. I asked why he felt the need to edit my story. He said, “What else would I do with it?” I said, “The same thing I do when you show me your woodworking projects—say something nice.”

He looked at me as if I were speaking Klingon.

Even my years of professional writing credits don’t deter a compulsive critic. Recently, a visual artist who’s always e-mailing me .jpgs of her latest work—which I dutifully download and praise—asked me about my latest project. I sent her the first chapter. She replied with a 100% negative critique.

Maybe this behavior is perpetrated by those grade-school teachers who had us read aloud our poems about “What Thanksgiving Means to Me,” and invited class comments—which often devolved into verbal spitball attacks. I don’t remember the same free-for-all judging sessions for our construction-paper Pilgrim hats or renditions of “Over the River and Through the Woods.” Maybe some grade-school teacher can tell me why.

Gratuitous criticism is often so clueless, we can laugh and ignore it. It can even be helpful. An untrained eye can sometimes help us look at problems in a new way.

But if it’s derisive, hostile and/or entirely lacking in praise, energize your deflector shields. It has nothing to do with your work and everything to do with the “critic.” An amazing number of people, even decades out of adolescence, still think negativity sounds smart. But it’s good to remember that any Bozo can look at a Picasso and say, “My two-year-old paints better than that!” Appreciation takes education.

We do need feedback. If you don’t have an editor or trusted beta reader, find a good critique group, preferably writers in your own genre. A good critique is a gift. You know when you hear one. It may sting, but it gives you an “ah-ha” moment that improves your work. Good critiquers know “not my cuppa” shouldn’t be expressed as “your story sux.”

Plus they’ll always give positive comments to balance the negative. Nobody can take undiluted criticism. The brain registers it as an attack, which triggers a fight or flight response.

Here are some suggestions for dealing with self-appointed critics:

1) Avoid showing first drafts to non-writers.

2) Consider the source. If Mr. Judgmental hasn’t read anything but the TV listings since he dropped out of Bounty Hunter school, this is not his field of expertise.

3) If someone asks to see an unpolished WIP, be clear you aren’t inviting critique. Say something like, “My editor prefers that nobody else edit my material. However, I’ll be happy to hear about what you enjoy, and please let me know if you catch any typos.”

4) Give the critic a sweet smile while plotting her murder in your next novel.

5) Think of this as practice for when you’re successful enough to be reviewed by snarky professional critics.

6) If something feels like verbal abuse, consider the possibility that it is. Ask yourself if the critic is:

a) Feeling neglected. Writers can be selfish with our time. Take him out for a drink and catch up.
b) A writer-wannabe: she’s dying to write, but too terrified/ blocked/lazy. Envy makes people mean.
c) A narcissistic bully. We writers are magnets for them. We pay attention, which is what they crave—and we’re solitary, which makes us easy prey. They lure us with praise and fascinating stories; keep us enslaved with threats and/or self pity; then try to erase our personalities and make us mirrors for their reflected glory.They will do or say anything to destroy a victim’s sense of self. Remember NOTHING a verbal abuser says has value. Win a Pulitzer, and you’ll hear, “What, no Nobel?” You’ll never please them by doing better, because nothing pleases them but having power over you.

Good criticism is necessary to any art form, but the unsolicited, negative variety is poison. If comments are unhelpful, ignore them and boldly warp into the next galaxy.

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