Category: Writing

Getting Critiques

While this isn’t the most fun part of writing, it is a useful tool to move on the way to publishing. (Or, at least, a better final product.)

I got a critique yesterday, as I mentioned, at the SCBWI-Iowa Spring Conference. It wasn’t all good, it wasn’t all bad, and it held at least one gem from my critique group. I knew they had a point when they brought it up, but I was hoping I’d solved it enough to keep going.

The answer is, I haven’t. I need a satisfying resolution to the puzzle. It’s not quite a Rubik’s Cube where you can just take the thing apart. (Note: I was never a fan of removing the stickers. Eventually they’ll stop sticking. Plus, it’s noticeable.)

So it’s not- quite- back to the drawing board. I just need to explore the other avenues that I had originally drawn up during my brainstorming phase and see in which direction my characters gravitate.

They (my group) will probably be glad to know I’m listening to them.

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SCBWI Conference

I attended today! It was all I could manage of the three day conference, but I got there. They offered a manuscript critique (of synopsis and first ten pages) from an agent, author, or editor.

First, the manuscript critique… I’m still mulling over the advice. I thought of one of them after I’d sent it, so that’s something. And my critique group had been wondering about another thing she brought up. I have to figure out how to fix the things she pointed out. I’ll owe a thank you to Laura Arnold from HarperCollins when Don’t Tell Your Mother gets somewhere.

Second, I managed to meet some members from my area. I haven’t been able to connect with them around here, though I keep running into the Romance Writer’s group. They say they do all genres, but there’s something to be said for joining specific organization that you write. SCBWI focuses on the children’s genres from picture books to young adult, and this is very different from the focus of RWA, who will tell writers all about romance, erotica, and the other shades of love writing. SFWA will tell still different things, taking a turn for the speculative. If we could easily get lumped into one genre, we wouldn’t have them.

But that’s just my opinion.

Third, I got to listen to some great speakers. I learned things about picture books, so of course now that’s what’s running through my head thinking about coming out. I doubt it’ll come out soon, maybe not even this year, but it’s bouncing. One day it’ll gel.

I’ll just worry about capturing it at that time. I’ll keep pen and paper by my side. (Like any good writer should do.)

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Work.

Authors don’t work like other people. We grab snippets of time for our novels where we can. At least, those of us who aren’t lucky enough earn our living each day writing.

So how many moments do we need to finish our masterpieces? Do you cram it in at the end of the day? Do you get up early to manage a few quiet moments before the other inhabitants wake?

Dedication means working in the stolen moments – but when is the downtime?

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Reading to Baby

I try to do this every day. Sometimes it’s difficult to choose the right books to read.

Writing and reading are related activities. I think about everyone agrees that reading to your children is a great activity to involve the family, but what do you read to your kids?

I vaguely remember the scene from Three Men and a Baby where Tom Selleck is reading to the baby from a sports magazine and telling one of the other guys, “It doesn’t matter what you read, what matters is the tone you use.”

Finding books on the subject isn’t too difficult. I’ve been reading Baby Read-Aloud Basics and I have another book on the subject that I haven’t perused yet. (love the library- they feed my brain!) They had it partly right. The tone does matter.

But it also matters what you read. Reading is giving your child a solid foundation of language. It’s also why you’re supposed to talk to the baby all the time. (even though it’s really hard when you never get coherent answers.) This is how the baby learns to speak, and the more you can do it, the better off the baby will be.

I know, that’s speaking. Reading is just as important though. Those books that you cart around have words you don’t always hear in regular conversations. It’s a wonderful way to boost the vocabulary. Yes, I mean baby books. No, I don’t mean Dr. Seuss.

Don’t think I’m knocking Dr. Seuss, though. He wrote wonderful books, but they’re for the beginning reader. (Proudly marked on their covers that way.) The beginning reader isn’t looking for tough things to say or read, just to gain familiarity. If we only read beginning reader books to our children, we aren’t giving them as many different, complex, learning tools for their vocabulary as we could be.

So one question is, when looking for a book for your baby: Will you be reading it, or will the child? Don’t shy away from books with larger words in them. What’s wrong with fuchsia for a color or exhilarating for a description when the adult is reading it to the baby? Absolutely nothing! If you never introduce your little one to those words, they’ll never know them.

It almost makes me want to read my dictionary to her, but not quite. Now if it had some pretty pictures…

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Where are we without characters?

Not very far.

I keep trying to limit the number of projects I’m working on, but one character keeps inviting herself into my head. And she doesn’t leave.

I guess it’s a good thing, but it’s a little funny that I want to get through the rewrite and I can think of nothing but what else to do with this other project I’m trying not to write.

Ah, that’s how it goes. So tonight I made notes about her backstory. Perhaps tomorrow we’ll make it better.

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February’s End

And I got another rejection today.

I wasn’t surprised – I expected it. I knew seven other authors who also received rejections for this particular magazine’s round of submissions. It’s part of a group of authors who are trying to help each other get published. It’s an online critique group, but we don’t have a set meeting time.

I’m a recent addition to the group, and I’m not close with many members yet. However, I find the advice fascinating and I’m glad to have a contribution to the group.

One of my favorite things is sharing things I’ve learned. I started this with my mom and other writers when I get the chance. (Yes, my mom is a writer, too, for those of you who didn’t know. One day I hope to be able to point you in the direction of her published work.)

Next month I’ll begin again, sending more things out. I’m signing up for an SCBWI-Iowa conference in April, and I’m going to be working on my submission for the manuscript critique this weekend.

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Blogging Stories

Do you wonder about authors that do this? I know putting a story in a blog is self-published and not eligible to post elsewhere, like in e-zines, but what about stories that have been published and the rights have reverted back to the author?

Or, just for amusement on the blog? I read about an author doing that and it makes me want to read his blog for the stories, to see his style, and to read. (I think all writers love to read.)

Blogging is about a platform, and what better than to sporadically season with your own fictional work? Heavily edited, of course, and preferably by someone other than the author.

I’ve noticed as I work in critique groups how many times I can read the same passage and not see the problem with it until someone else says, “Really? I’d fix that.” Of course, I do the same thing right back, so we’re even.

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Old Novels

I think everyone has a novel idea in them somewhere. Not that everyone writes a novel or has the desire to, but the ideas are in there.

Some of these people talk about the idea to others. Sometimes people even start writing.

Do you ever wonder what happens to these ideas?

I think some of them get talked out. Eventually there is no way the paper version could even measure up to the image, or pieces get lost in the telling.

Some of them languish after a start and never get finished.

I’ve learned writing a novel is hard work. It doesn’t happen in a day or a week or usually not even a month. Those of us who finish NaNoWriMo are exhausted, with 50,000 words (more or less) to our names, and realize it needs a total overhaul before it’s really worth anything.

But most first drafts are like that.

I have two languishing from my past. One stretches back to high school, and I have notes and sketches about it somewhere. I’m not sure I ever really knew where the project was going. I’m not sure I could figure it out now. But maybe I’ll save some of those characters to make into something in the future.

The other one is much more recent- only four years past. I didn’t do enough world building at the beginning, and I’m almost to where I can make another go at it. My ideas have changed as the world has evolved. For the better, I think.

Either way, I wouldn’t be the writer I am today if I hadn’t had those ideas. I definitely wouldn’t be a writer today if I only talked about them and didn’t put pen to paper – or fingers to keyboard as the case goes now.

I read advice that says to write your ideas instead of talking about them, and for the most part I follow that advice. For one thing, it helps me hone that 100 word pitch for when I’m ready to shop it out.

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Ideas, Stories, and Submissions

I recently read an article that compared writers to baseball players. Not for much, just talking about a different thought of success.

We write stories and we submit them to magazines. Once we start getting an acceptance or two – we start thinking every idea we have can be turned into a saleable story, especially after completing an MFA program.

The point is that baseball players have a batting average. Some stories are just better than others. What if we did think about it as writing a .200? Of every five ideas, we finish a short story. Of every five finished stories, one is a gem.

It’s definitely an interesting theory. I know some of my stories touch the reader more than others. I also know some stories I read from other writers make me feel more than others.

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Comments on My Book

Somehow, it always amazes me when the themes from my book touched my friends who read it. It shouldn’t, I’m sure, but it does.

I wrote a book about a thirteen year old girl who wanted to be popular and smart. I gave her issues with her family and her friends and in her classes.

The more the book is out there, the more I hear from people about something where they relate to Janie. It makes me smile inside (and outside) and I want to share more of my stories with more people.

Guess I’d better dig into the next project to make it ready.

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