Monday Advice from Editors and Agents: Is Your Plot Contrived?

Posted on February 18, 2013 by Donna Maloy, Author

Larry BrooksToday’s advice comes from Larry Brooks, a critically-acclaimed bestselling author of four psychological thrillers, in addition to his work as a freelance writer and writing instructor (he also pitched for the Texas Rangers, among other careers). His new book, Story Engineering: Mastering The Six Core Competencies of Successful Writing, was released in early 2011 from Writers Digest Books, based on the idea behind his writing workshops. And the March/April issue of Writers Digest Magazine features an article (on page 60) by Brooks on writing subplots.

I have Brooks’ blog, StoryFix, delivered to my email inbox. I save almost every post. His blog, like his book and his workshop, is about getting real with your writing dream.

GETTING REAL

What does that mean? Well, among other things, it means admitting you have to put a lot of thought and planning into a book. It also means you need to understand the craft of writing—something that doesn’t happen overnight. Every one of my published author friends still buys how-to-write books; they still go to workshops and conferences to learn more about the craft and business of writing.

As it applies to your writing, “getting real” means staying within the bounds of reader credibility. No, that doesn’t mean you can’t write fantasy or science fiction, but it does mean that you can’t have sticky plot problems resolved by coincidence. Brooks addresses this in his November 7, 2012, post, “When Bad Ideas Sabotage Killer Concepts.”

“Fiction often demands more MORE CREDIBILITY THAN REAL LIFE.” Larry Brooks

Brooks gives several examples of taking the easy way out of plot problems.

  • A girl who wants to know more about her past gets a dream visit from her dead grandmother (and this isn’t a paranormal story)
  • The police won’t listen to a teen who thinks a city official is a criminal, so the teen hacks into the police data base.

According to Brooks, “Dreams and computer hackers are everywhere in stories that get rejected.”

?????????????????????????????????????????????????Well, maybe not everywhere. But his point is that if you give your hero the gift of a solution he or she hasn’t really earned with hard work and maybe a bit of soul-searching, that solution is counterfeit. A cheat.  A con.

He has some special words for writers of YA fiction whose plots have teens outsmarting every adult, including police and CIA, and winning every hand-to-hand fight with trained killers. Whether you call such unlikely success lucky or a gift from God, your readers will probably label it ridiculous or impossible. Contrived. According to Brooks, it’s almost always a deal killer.

In other words, you have to work as hard as your hero to make plot solutions happen naturally.

 WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Is Brooks right? Is it ever OK to have coincidences in a plot? Can you think of some famous stories that are based around coincidence?

Posted in Avoiding coincidence, Contrived Plots, StoryFix from Larry Brooks, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Monday Advice from Agents and Editors: Meet Rachelle Gardner

Posted on January 14, 2013 by Donna Maloy, Author

Rachelle-Gardner-low-res-for-webRachelle Gardner is an agent with Books and Such Literary Agency.She began her career in publishing in 1995. Since then she’s been a Senior Editor (launching the award-winning NavPress Fiction line), a ghostwriter (of eight published books), editor of more than 100 books, and now an agent who is has done more than 120 book deals between authors and publishers.

Rachelle’s Blog

Rachelle’s blog is full of great articles on topics every new writer (and even seasoned ones) can use. Here are her 10 most-viewed posts in 2012.

1. How to Title Your Book (2010)

2. How to Get Published (2011)

3. How to Write a Terrific Author Bio (2011)

4. If Shakespeare Had Written The Three Little Pigs (2012)

5. How to Write a Book Proposal (2011)

6. 7 Bad Habits of Successful Authors (2012)

7. Identify Your Novel’s Genre (2012)

8. How to Make a Living as a Writer, Part 1 and Part 2 (2012)

9. How to Write a Query Letter (2011)

10. Pinterest: 13 Things Writers Should Know (2012)

There’s More!

Check out the tabs at the top of Rachelle’s blog. You’ll find one there that says “Find Post by Subject.” What could be better?

Posted in Agent, Agents, Blogs, Rachelle Gardner, Rachelle Gardner, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 1 Comment

TEEN WRITERS: Famous Teen Authors and Some Just Starting Out

Posted on January 4, 2013 by Donna Maloy, Author

Do you know these famous teen authors?

  • The Diary of Anne Frank was begun when she was only 13 years old. Sadly, Anne Frank died before she had a chance to write more books.

    Photo by Tyler Greven

    Photo by Tyler Grevenks.

  • How to Talk to Girls was written by a nine-year-old boy, Alec Greven.It went on to become a New York Times bestseller and is now available in French, German and Spanish. Greven also wrote books on how to talk to Moms, Dads, and even Santa. His latest is called Rules for School.
  • In the Forests of the Night, the first book in the Den of Shadows quartet, was written by Atwater-RhodesAmelia Atwater-Rhodes when she was only 13. All four books in the quartet have become American Library Association Quick Picks. Teen People magazine also named Atwater-Rhodes one of the 20 Teens Who Will Change the World. P.S., she’s still writing….
  • Christopher Paolini was 15 when he wrote the first draft of Eragon.
    C. 2006 Perry Hagoglan

    C. 2006 Perry Hagoglan

    He self-published that book and his family helped promote it until it reached the attention of a major publisher. Paolini was only 23 when the movie of his first book came out.

  • S. E. Hinton began writing The Outsiders when she was 17; it was published when she was 19 and a freshman in college.  Four of her books have been made into movies (The Outsiders, Rumble Fish, Tex, and That was Then…This is Now) starring such actors as Rob Lowe, Matt Dillon, Tom Cruise, Diane Lane, Ralph Macchio, Emilio Estevez, and Patrick Swayze.

And these are just starting out!

There are lots of teen authors today who are self-publishing, and quite a few who have been signed by major publishing houses. Unless their biography is available, readers might not know how young these talented writers really are.

  • Stefan Bachmann is 19 and a dual U.S.-Swiss citizen. stefan-bachmannHe began writing his steampunk novel The Peculiar (published in September, 2012) at age 16. The book was named a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year, became a #1 bestseller in Switzerland, and rights have been sold in seven languages.
  • Bestselling self-published author Tammara Webber wrote the first half of Easy when she was 19.
  • YALSA (Young Adult Library Services Association)’ The Hub blog recently featured these young writers:
    • Nancy Yi Fan wrote Swordbird at age 11, to deal with her emotions about September 11th. Now 19, Fan attends Harvard University and has written two more books. Click here to read her inspiring pep talk for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo).
    • Australian-born Jack Heath published his first novel, The Lab, in 2006 at the age of 20. Thirteen other books for teens and adults have followed.
    • Kody Keplinger was 19 when her book The DUFF: Designated Ugly Fat Friend (2011 Top Ten Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Adult Readers) was published in 2010.

Ready to be famous?

Check out these markets and contests that accept teen writing, or A Teen’s Guide to Getting Published: Publishing for Profit, Recognition, and Academic Success.

If you’re not quite ready, try a summer boot camp for writers.

  • The Iowa Young Writers’ Studio – A summer camp specifically for high school students who want to improve their writing. Intensive classes offered in poetry, fiction, and essay writing. Very prestigious. Lots of hard work!
  • Located in northern Michigan, Interlochen Arts Camp offers summer creative writing programs for students in grades 6-12. Study poetry, fiction and playwriting in a supportive environment, guided by a faculty of professional writers and teachers.
  • ·         The Summer Young Writers Workshop at Bard College at Simon’s Rock  is a three-week summer writing program for students currently completing grades 9,10, and 11.
  • Two separate Summer Teen Writing Camps at University of Minnesota-Rochester for grades 7-9 and 10-12.
  • For other programs, do an Internet search of “teen writing camps.”

Best wishes to all the teens who are writing, writing, writing!

Let me know what you’re working on.

Posted in Authors, Teen Authors, Teen writers, Teen writers, Tips for Teen Writers | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Monday Advice from Agents and Editors: Dress Your Manuscript in Layers

Posted on December 4, 2012 by Donna Maloy, Author
Molly Jaffa

Molly Jaffa

No, not with jackets and sweaters. With crucial elements of STORY.

Last month, Molly Jaffa of Folio Literary Management chatted with the Young Adult online chapter of Romance Writers of America. She had lots of interesting information for new writers about social media, advances, foreign rights, etc.

The moderator asked Jaffa what she was seeing too much of right now. Her response included this significant bit: “I also see a lot of middle grade centered around issues…  Bullying is a real problem for today’s young readers, and it’s important that middle grade novels are true to the issues they face, but it becomes problematic when your manuscript is A Book About Bullying, if that makes sense. It needs more layers.”

The “Issue” Book

Lots of teens enjoy issue books and lots of authors are right now trying to fill that need. But writers who forget that the best books are “about” characters may have a hard time selling to agents and editors.

As I see it, there are two separate problems here. One is easier to fix than the other.

The first problem lies in the way an author answers the question, “What is your book about?” A book that’s “about” an issue should rightly be nonfiction. In fiction, an issue like bullying may play a pivotal role as a component of Conflict. But it’s only one component of the overall story. Other necessary components include sympathetic characters worthy of being called the story’s heroes, the goals (both story goals as well as personal goals) that are central to the lives of those characters, an interesting and believable setting, conflict that stands in the way of both kinds of goals, choices and sacrifices the characters must make to achieve those goals, and lessons learned (the theme of the story).

So when an author answers the inevitable question, the answer should address as many of those components as possible. For example, you could say your book is about Ben, a 14-year-old boy who wants to be a dancer. Ben’s classmates and his 18-year-old brother constantly make fun of his goal, growing more derisive the more successful he becomes. When an opportunity arrives to audition for a Broadway play, the teasing reaches a new high and Ben decides he must find a way to either silence the bullies or give up. But the easiest way to silence them is to become just like them.

Fixing this first problem is really just a matter of thinking hard about your story realizing there is more to it than just an issue.

Layers

But if you think analyze your story and find it doesn’t have much more than one thing going for it, you’ve run into the second problem. The one that’s harder to fix. It lies in finding and adding enough substance (layers) to the basic issue problem to make the story interesting to readers.

How do you do that? Well, you can start with your characters. Of course you have a bully and a victim. Now readers may sympathize with a victim, but they want him to triumph in the end. So you have to layer in his inner strengths, revealing his inner hero. What makes him keep going? And of course, what makes the bully act the way he does?

What else is going on in the lives of these two characters… events and conflicts that make the bullying worse or better? Layer in at least one other major conflict.

What are the weaknesses and strengths of the hero and the bully? Layer in the perfect combination to make it hard for the hero to conquer his fear and anger, and yet possible for him to do it. If the bully is going to learn something, layer in the personality traits that will allow that to happen. Let us see all these personality characteristics in action.

I think you see what’s happening here. It’s a story “about” bullying that’s getting all dressed up with someplace to go.

Posted in Issues, Layering, Queries and Pitches | 1 Comment

Monday Advice from Editors and Agents: Pinch Your Pitches

Posted on November 12, 2012 by Donna Maloy, Author

Rachelle Gardner, with Books and Such Literary Agency, blogged last week about writing one-sentence summaries of your book. These ultra-short summaries, or “loglines,” are what you use to pitch a story to an editor or agent. These are not the same thing as queries which may run to two or even three paragraphs, teasing the editor/agent with details about character and plot. A logline is definitely not the same thing as the one- or two-page synopsis that accompanies your chapters in a proposal or full submission.

Gardner defines a pitch as one sentence of about 25 words that “takes your complex book with multiple characters and plotlines and boils it down into a simple statement that can be quickly conveyed and understood, and generates interest in the book. “ Think television episode descriptions/teasers.

Gardner goes on to give some tips for what to include in a pitch. She also advises writers to avoid pitching themes (e.g., forgiveness, the line between right and wrong, the meaning of independence). I’d like to expand a bit on that advice.

What to avoid in a pitch

A pitch answers the question, “What is your story about?” Here are some WRONG answers to that question.

  • “My book is about a young girl who grows up and comes to realize her purpose in life.” What you’re saying here is that your book is about a character. Period.
  • “My book is about a battle between humans and frog-like gremlins.” You’re saying the book is about a particular conflict. Nothing else.
  • “My book takes place in a concentration camp during the last days of World War II.” All you have here is little more than setting.
  • “My book is about two people who fall in love while attending a business conference.” Basically, all you’ve said is that your book is a romance.

I think you can see a pattern emerging. Many authors attempting to write their first pitch have problems confining a 350-400 word manuscript within a 25-word boundary. So they go for what they think is the heart of the book. The courageous hero, the exotic world of Faery, martial-arts battles to the death, the love story. But a book that’s going to get an agent or editor’s attention, a book that’s going to win a publishing contract, is about more than its heart.

How to fit in all the good stuff

Gardner advises that a good logline should reference Character, Conflict/Issue/Choice/Goal, Stakes, Action, and Setting (if important). Whew! That’s a lot of stuff to cram into “about 25 words.”

In Gardner’s blog, she gives the classic Randy Ingermanson example from Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone: A boy wizard begins training and must battle for his life with the Dark Lord who murdered his parents. In this example, Setting is suggested by “training” which implies a school of some sort.

Hey, this looks easy, doesn’t it? Until you try to fit your “mature” story into those “skinny” pants.

You can start by trying to give a two- or three-word description of your Main Character. Then add a mini-statement about the person, group, or habit/event/circumstance/etc. the MC must confront.

  • Examples of main character: Boy wizard, bulimic girl, lonely geek
  • Examples of what MC must confront: Dark Lord, poor self-esteem, lack of experience with girls

Now try to put the major conflict/issue/choice/goal into a few brief words.

  • Examples of conflict: actual battle, perform in the school play, get a date for the prom

As I see it, Stakes are always extreme; the worst that could possibly happen to your MC; the jeopardy that endangers the goal or is attached to the conflict.

  • Examples of Stakes/Motivation: For Harry it’s all about avoiding his parents’ fate, which is DEATH—talk about high stakes! For the bulimic girl, at issue could be a complete humiliation she can never recover from (a definite worst-case scenario). For the geeky boy, the prom could signal either the end of loneliness or total social isolation (achieving one, avoiding the other—which is more important to your MC?).

Action can be hard to condense, especially if it’s the major part of your story—as in a mystery, thriller, adventure, or complex relationship-building plot. Some very mundane words can be your friend here.

  • Examples of Action:  Battles for his life, confronts her fear, makes a list of strategies

Setting can often be described with adjectives or a short adverbial phrase. They are used to convey the time period, era, age group, geographical location, etc. WHEN NECESSARY.

  • Examples of Setting: Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, 6th grade play, all-boys school. In the first case, naming the school isn’t really necessary; we know enough from other words in the pitch to know he’s getting wizard training. In the second example, we really need to know how old our MC is. And in the last example, the all-boys school explains his lack of girl-friendly experience.

More examples

Gardner’s blog  prompted readers to submit loglines for comment. Watching how the pitches improved in response to comments is fun and very enlightening.  I heartily recommend checking it out.

And… I invite you to post your own logline here for comment, or show how you took a lengthy pitch and trimmed it down to size.

Posted in Agent/Editor Pitch, Submission | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment