C h a z z W r i t e s . c o m

See all my books at AllThatChazz.com.

03/08/2011 • 1:05 AM 10

George Carlin VIDEOS (plus Kick-ass Wake-up Call Questions for Writers on Getting It Done)

Giving up things that hurt you. Hm.

Pause for thought.

What are you keeping, as a writer, that’s hurting you? Are you addicted to distractions (Farmville, mindless surfing, TV, Sheen gossip, vegetating etc.,…)? Are you getting on with what you don’t want to do so you can accomplish what you do want? Are there people in your life who stand in the way of your dreams? I’ve been thinking about what to give up on. When I talk to that agent, is that really my ego and insecurity asking for validation? Do I need to be traditionally published anymore? Should I give up the magazine work and focus on books exclusively? What am I willing to give and give up to get what I want?

If you don’t have time to write, are you making time to write?

But you know it goes deeper than simple time management issues.

To get to edit your manuscript, you have to edit your life.

There are always things or people who stand in the way of you getting where you want to be. Do you surround yourself with cool people who support you and your writing efforts? Are there people in your life you can do without? Are there energy and time vampires who drain you? The uncool people subtract from your time with the cool ones. And too much distraction is leaking time away from your productivity. Are you your last priority?

Are you calling your martyrdom selflessness or are you just being lazy in the You department? If you allowed yourself to look a little more selfish, could you be the person your loved ones would love and respect more? If your friends don’t like you if you say no, are they your friends? If you take care of everyone else first, who takes care of you? If you became the person you want to be, the one who gets the big things done, couldn’t you take care of others better? Can’t the laundry wait? Can’t you teach the kids to do it?

If you say, “But everyone needs me all the time!” your martyrdom is empty narcissism. If they can’t do without you long enough for you to write, you aren’t letting them grow up. You’re hurting their potential for independence by insisting you’re so important. You’re not being imaginative enough in the How to Deal Department. You’re injecting yourself into the center of their lives, living through them instead of living your life. You aren’t just the sun of your roles. When you became Mommy, Daddy, Wife or Husband, you didn’t give away the right to be you. If someone else is always your focus, you’re dressing up your procrastination in noble rags. And that’s pathetic and needy. You’re a person, not a role. You’re a human, not a god or a robot.

You’re drowning in busywork and busy-ness, not your business. Writing was supposed to be your business. Remember?

What are you doing to yourself? Do you really need more information? Is more research really required or is that procrastination masquerading as productivity? They say time is money. Time is much more important than that. Time is life. But time is spent like money and once it’s gone, it’s gone.

But it’s not too late if you ask yourself the right questions and listen for the real answer.

Not the reflexive answer. I mean the real answer you don’t want to hear.

Is it really encouragement and more education you need? Or is a kick in the ass needed? A wake-up call? A reminder that you are acting like you are immortal? You’re not. A reminder that not only do actions have consequences, inaction has dire consequences, too. (The kind you regret most when you’re lying on coarse white sheets watching another faceless nurse change your IV bag through a fog.)

What did you want to do with your life? Why isn’t it done by now? What can you change today to move you in the right direction? Are you even pointed in the right direction? Is the day ahead going to be filled with joy and potential and stimulation and writing? Is it just another Tuesday on a treadmill to nowhere?

Are you taking care of yourself and pushing your goals forward?

If not, why not?

When did you decide to settle for less?

What made you think that was okay?

What will you do now that you’ve read this?

Your mind can be a sharp tool. Use it now, because your heart is a bomb.

The clock is ticking.

EXERCISE:

READ THE RANT AGAIN. THIS TIME MAKE IT PERSONAL. WHERE YOU SEE YOU, READ I.

EXAMPLE: IF I DON’T HAVE TIME TO WRITE, AM I MAKING TIME TO WRITE?

NOW READ IT ALOUD. AGAIN. YOU’LL GET YOUR ANSWERS.

YOU WON’T LIKE ALL OF THEM.

THE ANSWERS YOU LIKE LEAST ARE MOST TRUE.

Deconstructing Cynicism (celebs.icanhascheezburger.com)
The Democracy Delusion with George Carlin: Go Back to Bed America (iflizwerequeen.com)
George Carlin “Get off Your Ass And Change Things!” (vfxinsider.wordpress.com)
George Carlin – It’s a big club and you ain’t in it (tomhuff.wordpress.com)
George Carlin – AutoTuned! (bigalblog.wordpress.com)

Filed under: authors, Books, DIY, ebooks, getting it done, links, publishing, Rant, Writers, writing tips, accomplish, DIY. finding tiime to write, George Carlin, how do I find time to write?, Publish, self-publishing, Time Tracking, writer, writers write

02/24/2011 • 5:34 AM 4

Writers: Two mavericks to follow (plus a surprising original)

Image via Wikipedia

Are you indie? Are you non-indie but want to increase your awareness of what goes on behind the scenes in the publishing industry? Here are two blogs to follow:

Dean Wesley Smith takes the publishing industry’s engine apart, looks through all the pipes and valves and gives you the goods on what you need to know.

And you need to know what Kristine Kathryn Rusch has to say about making your way as a writer.

BONUS:

There is a guy who got into blogging early. You know him. You’ve seen him. He’s cooler than you thought. And he’s showing others they can self-publish, too.

Click here to find out who I’m talking about.

Writers: Self-publishing links (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Writers Top Ten: Why blogging about publishing is important (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Writers: Time for some controversy (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Writers : How “hands-on” do you want your agent to be? (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)

Filed under: authors, blogs & blogging, Books, DIY, ebooks, links, publishing, Rant, rules of writing, self-publishing, Useful writing links, web reviews, Writers, writing tips, Blog, Dean Wesley Smith, helpful writing links, Publish, Publishing and Printing, publishing industry, solving publishing problems, writing

02/23/2011 • 4:26 AM 3

Writerly link roundup: word counts by genre (& send in the cavalry!)

I’m in the editing basilica today but I wanted to take a moment to lay out three little info-gifts for you, and then, something special.

Three interesting links:

An Author’s Perspective on Scribd versus Bookbuzzr

What word count fits your manuscript’s genre?

A writer and her hate mail

And finally, an author decides to give away his e-book. What makes this special? No gimmicks, no forms, no following, no email subscriptions, zero ordeal.

JS Chancellor’s book got pirated but he’s turning things around. It will be interesting to see how his strategy works to promote the book.

So let’s help. Pump up his blog. Pump up the volume. Go see if you like his writing and maybe a great experience and reader-writer relationship will begin.

He calls it “a shameless plea for help.” I say we help out because, hey, we’re writers! We can help out other writers! More important, we’re readers! And helping out feels good.

And the dude’s giving you a book! What’s to think about? If you like it, spread his word. Go there, bookmark it and pick it up March 1.

Check here for details:

Free Copy of Son of Ereubus

[process] On Word Count (jlake.com)
Success in a New Genre (robinespana.blogspot.com)
Counting Text On The Fly (lockergnome.com)
Word Count by Genre (worddreams.wordpress.com)
Why It’s Called The Slush Pile (terrywhalin.blogspot.com)
The New Site Figment Asks Users to “Write Yourself In” (blogher.com)
Count words in documents in bulk with Total Assistant (techattitude.com)

Filed under: authors, Books, ebooks, links, publishing, Useful writing links, writing tips, Arts, fiction, JS Chancellor, Sons of Ereubus, Word count, word count by genre, wordcount, writer, Writers Resources

02/18/2011 • 5:00 AM 2

Top 13: My Favorite Writing Things (via Conjuring My Muse)

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I love my AlphaSmart Neo! Here are a few other things for writers to love, thanks to Conjuring My Muse. Enjoy her list. I did.

If you think ballplayers and crazed sports fans, with their amulets and gestures and habits all meant to bring about a win, are the only superstitious people in the world, think again. Writers can be just as quirky when engaging in their sport. And so I present a baker’s dozen of my favorite writing things, in no particular order. 1. Men’s cashmere sweater This is my go-to, get-in-the-mood wear when it’s time to write and the season is autumn, w … Read More

via Conjuring My Muse

Filed under: book reviews, Books, links, publishing, Writers, writing tips, AlphaSmart, Arts, things writers love, Writers Resources

01/24/2011 • 1:13 PM 0

News Flash: Allan Stratton’s sales are about to go way up (even more)

Cover of Chanda's Secrets

This e-mail just in from my friend Peter:

The film Life Above All based on the lovely book Chanda’s Secrets by the
lovely Allan Stratton is on the Oscar nom short list. Fingers crossed!

Go see the movie and better yet go buy the book and see if you don’t blat before you finish!

I’ve met Allan Stratton and can confirm that he is indeed lovely. We had dinner at Garlic’s and then went to the Grand to see one of his plays. Lots of lovely all around. Yes, indeed, read the book! See the film!

For more information, follow the link from the press nugget below:

LIFE ABOVE ALL (CHANDA’S SECRETS) has made it into the Oscar finalist
pool of nine films from which the five nominees will be selected for
Best Foreign Film. Nominees announced tomorrow.
http://www.allanstratton.com
http://allanstratton.blogspot.com

Literature/Inquiry Circles Meets Research: Author Allan Stratton Visits The Unquiet Library via Skype (theunquietlibrarian.wordpress.com)
Incendies on short list for foreign language Oscar (theglobeandmail.com)
Leslie says… the 10 Oscar ‘Best Movie’ nominees are (pbpulse.com)

Filed under: authors, links, Media, movies, Publicity & Promotion, publishing, Writers, Academy Award, Allan Stratton, Arts, Awards, Chanda's Secrets, Filmmaking, movies

01/24/2011 • 7:15 AM 5

Publishing: Change or Die

Cover of "Change or Die: The Three Keys t...

Cover via Amazon

I read a fascinating book called Change or Die recently. It documents what makes us change and what makes us resist change. Quoting heart disease and lifestyle specialist Dr. Dean Ornish, “People don’t resist change. They resist being changed.” But change is coming and it’s happening faster than so-called experts predicted just a few months ago.

The premise is that for people to adapt, they must harness the power of community, process and engagement. Leaders must lead by example. Facts and fear don’t change people, even in dire circumstances. The author looks research showing how heart patients and career criminals made real positive change and adapted. Real change is collaborative.

What’s interesting about the changes that are happening to publishing is that, despite a long history to draw on, the changes are still happening to publishers. Publishers are harnessing the awesome power of denial to affirm that they are still on top and will always be on top. We’ve heard this tune before and you know it ends with a swan song.

For instance, in Change or Die, we can see the same pattern with GM. GM insisted their cars were superior despite facts. GM execs even changed the scale of how they measured their success (i.e. number of car defects) to protect their illusions. Throughout, they would not acknowledge the superior reliability of foreign cars. GM had to lose a fortune before they began to see they sucked. Arrogance nearly killed them. Thanks to a huge reality check and huge government checks, they got saved from themselves. (Publishers aren’t too big to fail though, so we’ll see many big publishers disappear or become micro-publishers soon. Well, that’s really already happening.)

Traditional publishers have had market dominance so long, many still think it will last forever. They take the facts—self-publishing and ebooks are going through growing pains—and affirm their eternal dominance. Nevermind all those people buying e-readers! Nevermind the expansion of self-publishing and DIY due to technological changes. The e-book ad POD problems aren’t a sign of their demise. That’s growth. No technology emerges in its final form. There is no final form until we’re extinct.

The market is changing under publishers. They aren’t, on the whole, acting in a proactive way. And yet, we can’t scare them into believing the revolution is here. Facts don’t work, but fear doesn’t, either. (I’m not writing this to scare anybody, though inevitably it will scare some.) The publishers and agents of the traditional structure will survive long-term when they decide these aren’t problems but opportunities.

When they turn from despair for the old models to hope, then they can begin to adapt to new market conditions. Then they can change and thrive. There will be room for everybody. There are more readers reading more (but they are reading in new and fractured media.)

As a writer, I see the opportunity to promote my work. I might sell part of it myself and go the traditional route with other parts. (No, publishers can’t assume they get all the rights anymore. I’ll have to work harder and diversify and they’ll have to accept less or get nothing. Everybody gets to take part in the adaptation process and it won’t all be fun, but how much of business is all fun? Suck it up, writers and publishers.)

As an editor, I see more opportunities to work with diverse authors on their self-published books. I don’t have to live in Toronto anymore to work in Canadian publishing. In fact, where I am isn’t at all relevent. (Loved T.O, but I like raising my kids in a smaller city.)

As a reader in an electronic world, I can get easier access to books I never would have been aware of in my local bookstore. Yes, there’s more curation to do, but there’s always been curation to do. Now I can find out from friends and trusted blogs new stuff to read that isn’t on a top ten list.

Digital books are easier for me to access and eat. Digital books are easier for me to produce. E-books are easier to edit. Oh, look, I’m a curator, too! Look at all those links to check out!

And now you have another book to buy: Change or Die by Alan Deutschman.

Digital publishing should put design above file conversion (radar.oreilly.com)
The Felicities of New Publishing (or Why Traditional Publishers May Someday Die) (seedlingsinstone.blogspot.com)
Two mistakes Publishers keep making (ireaderreview.com)
It’s enough to make me cynical from Whitehall ParaIndustries (whitehall-paraindustries.blogspot.com)
Is Publishing Dead?: Wubbit’s Founder Says No…and Offers Five Key “Edits” That Can Revive the $40-Billion Industry (prweb.com)
Writers: Why self-publishing sucks (and what you can do about it) (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)

Filed under: authors, book reviews, Books, ebooks, Editing, Editors, links, publishing, Rant, self-publishing, Change or Die, changes to publishing, Do it yourself, E-book, Print on demand, Publish, publishers, publishing

01/14/2011 • 7:52 AM 0

Writers: The Power of Small (and why press releases don’t work)

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When I worked in a city newsroom, one of my jobs was to go through press releases to find gems. There weren’t many of those clichéd diamonds in the rough. Reporters see so many press releases, they begin to look upon them with suspicion and even resentment.

What’s an author to do? You want an interview. You want your book reviewed. How do you make it happen? The traditional approach was to send out lots of press releases and books. It wasn’t very effective. In fact, sending out a lot of review copies is expensive.

There’s an alternative:

Go small. Go low-tech. Write a note.

This isn’t a practical approach for in-house publicists working for major publishers (but they usually work in short bursts for particular authors, anyway.) The low-tech, patient strategy is for indie authors looking for ways into the media. Unfortunately, publishers focus on very small windows of opportunity. They are looking to move a lot of books quickly (before the book stores send them all back for credit.) Marketing in book publishing has been long periods of silence interspersed with short frenzies. As an indie author selling e-books, you’re opting out of big, expensive and short-term strategies. This isn’t so much for Wiley (publishers since 1807!) authors. This is especially for wily indie authors.

As an independent author and publisher, you can play the long game instead. You can write a note or two a day. One author/guru Carolyn See made it her practice to write a “charming note” every day to an editor or publisher or agent.* Why not to reporters, too?

But there’s a trick to making it effective. You know how I’m always saying that if you want to hit up an agent, don’t look for the big, established names? Agents fresh from the factory who are up and coming in established agencies are better bets. They are still hungry and not as jaded. They don’t hate all queries yet. They still have hope and the scales have not yet developed over their eyes.

The same is true for reporters. The book editor of a large magazine already has lots of books lined up. The independent author has lots of indie-spirit, but most book editors still look down on them. So screw them.

Work on getting into smaller newspapers. Send a charming note to a general reporter who would love to do a cushy author interview instead of chasing some city council member who doesn’t want to speak to them. I’d rather talk to an author than cover a house fire any day.

You know why it will work?

It will work because you will be charming (“Loved that piece you wrote on the local scaled railroad hobbyists so I thought…”)

It will work because general reporters think entertainment reporters have a cushier job (and they’re right.)

It will work because all journalists also want to write a book some day.

And while we’re talking small, send off a friendly email to book bloggers. That counts as a charming note, too.

Ask to guest blog. Bloggers love a break and crave hits, connection, track backs, links and love.

Ask for an author profile. I profile an author on Chazz Writes almost every week. It’s not the New York Times Review of Books, but since they aren’t calling, how about alerting like-minded people to your creations? If you can’t go huge, you can still be ubiquitous.

Instead of just showing up at a bookstore and asking to see the manager, send a charming note ahead of you to break the ice and soften her up for a reading. Better, be even more charming and offer to organize readings for your local bookstore. (Later this year I’ll profile an author who did just that. Not only did he help many other authors, his own career got a boost from building community among colleagues.)

Your book needs attention. I’m sure you’re already working on developing and maintaining your audience. Don’t forget that etching away at it a day at a time over the long haul can reap big rewards. With patience, you can build your empire. Don’t underestimate the power of a low-tech, targeted, personal and charming note.

These days, the mail is mostly for bills. This approach is more powerful than it ever was because you hate what’s in your mail box. But when you get a letter, you’re excited. It will work because it has worked.

*Read Carolyn See’s Making a Literary Life for details. Or, don’t fool around and head straight to Amazon to buy her book.

Writers: The Secret to Writing a Bestseller

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The only thing you can do to ensure

you come at all close to writing a bestseller is:

Write your book!

After that? I hate to disappoint you, but there is no secret.

There is information you should consider, however, like acting on the things you can affect (factors) and refraining from making yourself crazy trying to change things that have a negative effect on you (variables.)

Don’t focus on variables.

Focus on factors you can control:

1. Write the best book you can.

2. Build your audience (Teach, review, tweet, blog, network, learn, connect etc.,…)

3. Get your book to market (trad or indie publishing—that’s a different post.)

4. Do it again.

You’re going to want to come back to and act on 1 – 4 again and again.

The rest is explication.

I can already hear howls of protest about the title of this post. However, if you get an email from someone claiming they have insider secrets to making your book an instant bestseller, you can safely move on. There are some wacky claims out there, so let’s unpack and debunk.

First off, there are far too many variables that are out of your hands for any one person to direct you to bestsellerdom. In the publishing process there are a lot of variables. All of them have to fall into place for your book to be sold, but even if that were to happen, there are no guarantees your book will climb the charts…even if it’s good.

There are a lot of good books. Sadly, that doesn’t mean we’ve heard of them.

Consider Chuck Palahniuk‘s Fight Club and Choke. They both became movies, but just before it was announced Brad Pitt was going to do the Fight Club movie, I saw it in the remainder bin. They got whipped out of there when his book got the movie deal and the newest hire had to peel off all those stickers that read: Marked Down. The author wrote a great book in Fight Club, but he was headed back to anonymity before the lucky break. (He’s proved his worth since over and over, too; he’s prolific and, weirdly, I even saw a major review that didn’t even mention Fight Club.)

His case is a perfect example of something falling into place that was totally out of the author’s control. If Antonio Sabato Junior had played the role instead of Tyler Durden and Lindsay Lohan had played Marla instead of Helena Bonham-Carter, you would never have heard of Palahniuk’s books (because that’s a lot of stink to overcome.) Antonio was good in the few minutes he was in The Big Hit, but generally, if you see a movie poster with Lindsay and Antonio, you don’t think, “Ooh, gotta see that!”

The most important reason you can’t just follow set rules and write a bestseller is that what William Goldman said about Hollywood also applies to publishing. “Nobody knows anything.”

That’s why there are sleeper hits. I wandered into Fargo and Highlander, didn’t know what to expect, and was blown away. Margaret Atwood snuck up and surprised me with The Year of the Flood—okay, maybe other people expected great things from Atwood every time, but that’s the book that turned me around on that author. (Can’t wait for the third in the series!)

When manuscripts go up for auction to big publishing houses, acquiring editors bid because they want a hit. Even when books go for big money, that’s no guarantee of great success. In fact, if the author doesn’t earn out that big advance, it’s a very public failure. That blemish on their record hurts authors when they try to sell their next book.

It’s a subjective business. If agents and acquiring editors really knew much beyond their own taste, then every book they bought would sell very well. Look at the bestseller lists. There are only so many spots in the top ten lists. Then look at the book store shelves packed with midlist titles. That’s a lot of books, and those are just the books the stores stock. There are many more books published than ever make it to bookshelves, yet somebody thought each book would earn out its advance.

Nobody’s betting on losers on purpose. The bestsellers are the frontlist. The books that aren’t expected to do as well are the midlist. Midlist authors are still generally expected to earn out their advance, however. Remember: it’s business, not charity.

Hm. Somebody’s going to object that there are exceptions (and, of course, there always are. Can we say much at all without some generalizing?) So I must admit I did know a publisher who bet on losers pretty much exclusively. Maybe he was noble and doing it only for the art (and government grants) or maybe his judgement was just galactically poor. He’s out of business now so no more art. (Last parenthetical, I promise: And if you publish poetry, nothing is frontlist or midlist because no one pubishes poetry expecting to make money.)

Back to the book store: See all those dogs in the remainder bin? Somewhere, someone bet a lot that each one of those books would sell really well.

Some books aren’t a surprise when they do well, but for those books, that’s not the game anymore. When a publisher buys a Sarah Palin book, they aren’t so concerned whether it will sell. Their concern with a book like that is, how much and how fast will it meet higher expectations and sell more? When a book succeeds, the publisher has to time the next printing right and gauge how much promotional money should go into the publicity campaign to push it as far as it can profitably burn.

Publishers concentrate their limited resources on the few books they think will have a shot at bestsellerdom because they will take a loss on most of their catalogue. Some don’t believe it and authors lament it, but publishing is a business. And it’s a business with very small margins.

Even when publishers get books on the shelf, it’s not even over then. The sell-through is what’s important. Unlike any other business, publishing’s tradition—blame Simon & Schuster—is that books that don’t sell may be returned for credit. It’s a tradition that may eventually be dropped, especially when there are fewer book stores around.

I’m dying here! Give me some good news, Chazz!

Okay. The good news is that when you get rejected, you can take comfort in the knowledge that nobody knows anything. Maybe the guy who rejected you also rejected JK Rowling, so what do they really know anyway? Maybe you are destined to be a sleeper hit.

Do better than that, Chazz! I said I’m dying!

Sorry. How about this? Contests, bestseller lists, critics and reviews might help an unknown author, but it’s really word of mouth that makes a book popular. (Or a big movie deal.) The antidote to your angst is to keep writing and pitching. Find your audience and put yourself out there to be found.

How?

Go back to Factors 1 -4 at the top of this post.

Better? Now go write.

Writers: The mire of conflicting advice & unfair criticism (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Writers: Top 10 of the 2010 Top 10 Chazz Writes posts (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Chuck Palahniuk’s Book Trailer Basically Straight-Up Porn [Books] (gawker.com)
Monumental Shift for Book Publishing Industry as Best-Selling Author Steve Farber Signs Deal Repurchasing Rights to his Top 100 Business Book (prweb.com)
Readers of Suspense Note Steve Bederman Rising on BestSeller Lists with ‘The CEO’ and ‘Executive Execution,’ #1 on Fictionwise.com (prweb.com)
A Look Back At The Year In Palin [The Year That Was] (jezebel.com)
The Race to Zero – $6.94 and £2.18 are the new $9.99 (ireaderreview.com)
Twain’s “new” book blowing up the bestseller list (salon.com)
The New York Times Will Post E-Book Bestsellers (observer.com)
E-book bestseller lists currently require guesswork (teleread.com)
Writers’ Resolutions: Want to see the reason I live? (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Author profile: Alicia Hendley’s Subtle Thing (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)

Filed under: authors, Books, Editors, getting it done, links, Poetry, publishing, Rant, Rejection, rules of writing, Writers, writing tips, bestsellers, chuck palahniuk, fight club, Publish, William Goldman

01/03/2011 • 8:01 AM 1

Writers: On sending your stuff

J. K. Rowling, after receiving an honorary deg...

Image via Wikipedia

To the right is a picture of JK Rowling. Notice that she is not me. As with Highlander, “There can be only one!” I’m sorry this has become necessary to point out.

One of the posts here is a neat spreadsheet that shows how JK Rowling plotted out Harry Potter. Recently I got an email with several errors addressing me as JK Rowling that asked me to email the writer so I could read some of her work. Billionaire authors don’t do that much. In fact, as presented, I wouldn’t do it, either.

I’d feel bad about pointing out this error so publicly, but it’s apparent the writer is not someone who reads this blog. Please read the blog (and also www.chazzwrites.vpweb.ca). When someone jumps from my bio page to ask about my bio, it just feels like spam and carelessness. Writers are detail-oriented and email, no matter how casual you want to appear, should reflect that. (In fact, I’ve sometimes gone through several drafts on queries to make them appear breezy and casual.) Whether you’re sending a manuscript, a query or a short email, you must pay attention to the details.

I know what you’re thinking. You already know this. Okay, but obviously many people still don’t. One writer told me she had already written several books. That’s a good sign. However, in one short paragraph, she made seven errors. That went into my evaluation of how much I could help her right away. I decided editing her book would be time and cost-prohibitive for me and for her.

When I take on a project, I have to take into account how much time I will have to invest in the book. From that short paragraph, I had to conclude that, were I to take her on, the job would be rewriting, not editing and proofing. When it starts out that bad, it doesn’t make me confident about larger issues like attention to detail, story arcs, characterizations and narrative logic and consistency. I have ghosted a couple texts. Writing and rewriting are not out of the question, but I have to know the scale of what the job requires going in (or I may as well be working behind a counter wearing a paper hat and slinging fries.)

Does your project have to be perfect for me to work on it? Of course not. If it were perfect you wouldn’t need anyone (and you’d be god.) I’m not being nitpicky or cranky. It’s just that when I get a query, I’m looking for signs the author is serious. If you’re asking me to take your work more seriously than you do, that’s a bad sign.

Queries and sample chapters give you an idea of how I work and they tell me how much time your book will take up. That’s one of the main variables in determining my rate, so please, don’t shoot off an email—to me or any other editor—before reading what you wrote at least once.

I’m trying to end on a positive note, so I’ll add that I just took on an editing project that excites me. The author’s serious, nice and I can’t wait to dig into her book and take it from great to fantastic. In fact, the antidote to amateurish folks is waiting on my desk. I’m off to work on the manuscript.

POTD: J.K. Rowling’s Plot Spreadsheet for ‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’ | /Film (slashfilm.com)
Writers: The mire of conflicting advice & unfair criticism (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Writers: Does the term “wannabe” irk you? (chazzwrites.wordpress.com)
Writers: Don’t Set Your Self-Worth By a Publisher’s Opinion (blogher.com)
Lit Agent Tells the Cold Hard Truth (psychologytoday.com)
J.K Rowling Website (harrypotterfanworld.wordpress.com)
Stop Sending Emails that Trick me into a Conversation. (customerthink.com)
Writing The Perfect Query Letter (write4kids.com)
Five Writers Explain How They Got, Kept and Fired Agents (theawl.com)

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12/24/2010 • 7:01 AM 1

Writers: The mire of conflicting advice & unfair criticism

The hierarchical structure of the autobiograph...

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When I got into the business, there was a criticism meant to shut writers down.

“Too autobiographical” was the kiss of death.

That’s ironic for several reasons:

Biographies and autobiographies are moneymaking books. Sarah Palin‘s ghosts have already published more books than you and possibly more books than she’s read. Okay, that was a cheap shot, but somewhat funny and it has the added bonus of being an Irish fact—that is, something that is a lie, but should be true.

I digress.

Back to the issue of unfair criticisms and misguided advice:

The mind boggles at Augusten Burroughs work. How much childhood trauma can one man recycle into his fiction and non-fiction? He has enough monsters, addictions and insanity in his past that he’s set for several more books at least.

“Too autobiographical” is now a stale criticism when you consider the movement of the market toward tell-alls, whistleblowing and confessionals. There’s a lot of popular fiction that’s thinly veiled life story, too. In fact, if you’ve been a lion tamer-stripper-celebrity-prostitute, you’re a much easier sale than if you’re just another writer working away at your desk making stuff up.

Diablo Cody is a talented writer, but she had a lot more heat going into the fray because of her tattooed image and history as a stripper. I’m not saying she wouldn’t have sold the brilliant Juno script anyway, but really, how many celebrity screenwriters can you name besides her, McKee and William Goldman? If you came up with a few names, it’s probably because they are famous writer-directors, not just writers.

(And notice that irksome phrase “just writers.” I use it advisedly, as a synonym for “merely,” since that’s the stature writers generally have in film, television and publishing.)

“Too autobiographical” was once a stinging barb. It marked a talent that was undeveloped. It suggested teenage angst worthy of a diary, not of publishable quality.

The worm has turned. Now your tortured history as a brawler helps; Chuck Palahniuk brawled a bit and escorted sick people to support groups long before Fight Club. Your time in seedy bars lends authenticity to your writing and manuscript evaluators may well take you more seriously because of the stuff you don’t want your mom to know. A work can still be too autobiographical, but that criticism doesn’t carry the weight it once did.

Evaluators can be off the mark in what they think qualifies as authentic, anyway. One writer, for instance, was told that her dialogue didn’t ring true for how contemporary teenagers speak. She was advised to hang out with some kids to catch the flavor of the real thing. What the manuscript reader didn’t know was the writer was 17 at the time.

We’re a culture that worships celebrity, so “too autobiographical” isn’t a criticism that comes up as much (unless your life story is deadly dull.)

The true irony is that the same editors who would say “too autobiographical” would also routinely tell aspiring writers to “Write what you know.”

That’s bad, even egregious advice. Don’t write what you know. If you only write what you knew, there wouldn’t be much fantasy, science fiction…or much literature at all, come to think of it.