Category: Writing advice

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    • Good Enough for a First Draft

    You’ll often see writing advice about good first lines. It’s important to hook your readers right off the bat, to make them want to keep reading and find out what happens next. It’s important for finding a publisher too. A lot of publishers get hundreds of submissions and they have to sort through them very quickly to figure out which ones they’re going to reject, so you want to have a really strong opening that grabs your reader’s interest and makes them want to know more.

    You need an engaging and interesting opening sentence and opening paragraph.

    But the problem is that if you spend ages and ages trying to make the first sentence absolutely perfect, you might never write the second one. For me, because of my approach to planning, I often end up having to rewrite the opening to my books. For example, in Shadows of Tomorrow, I initially thought that the main character would be the one who became Cassie, so I started the book there, but I later realised that Gareth was the one making all the important plot decisions. Gareth turned into the real protagonist, so I went back and rewrote the opening to start with him. I could have spent ages and ages making that first scene with Cassie have the perfect opening line only to find that it didn’t need to be the opening line anymore.

    Knowing this about my writing style, I generally don’t fuss too much about the opening sentence until the end, until I know exactly how the story is going to end so I can write an opener that ties in with that. When I’m writing my first draft, I will just write whatever fits with the first scene as my opening sentence, knowing I can come back to it later. What I write is good enough for a first draft.

    And that’s the point. A lot of the time, you can write something knowing you can come back and fix it later. If you’re not sure how to get a piece of information to a character, you can write a clunky bit of exposition for the first draft, knowing you can come back and fix it in a second draft. I’ve seen someone advise just summarising what needs to happen next in square brackets: [and now the hero does something clever to escape]. There’s a large chunk of a scene that’s summed up by that one sentence, but you don’t have to figure out the perfect escape plan right now. You can keep writing and figure out the details later. I tend not to use this square bracket summary approach – I prefer to just write a clunky version of the scene I can fix later – but I can see why other writers might like it.

    The thing I do use though is ??? in place of details. I might want to think of the perfect name for a location, but I haven’t figured it out yet, so I’ll put ??? in every time the name would come up and I can easily find these parts and insert the name in a second draft. I do the same with details I need to research. ??? basically means little detail (usually a word or a name but sometimes a sentence) that I need to add later. It stops me losing my flow of writing to go and look something up there and then. Using the same set of punctuation every time I reach one of these points makes it easy to search through the document later to find the bits I missed.

    My first drafts tend to be pretty rough as I’m generally figuring out the plot as I go. I know I will have to come back and rewrite chunks later, so I don’t sweat the details. I can fix these little detail gaps later. I can find the perfect first line when I know the overall shape and themes of my story. I can fix the awkward dialogue exchange.

    If you fret about having every sentence perfect before you can proceed to the next one, you’ll never get the first draft finished. So write something that’s good enough for now and worry about making it perfect later. This means writing a second or third draft is critically important, but you can always improve a thing that exists more easily than you can make a perfect creation out of nothing on the first go.

    Posted on By jessmeats
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    • Rejected

    In my last blog post, I mentioned that I’d received a “please wait” response to a short story I’d submitted. Unfortunately, the story was rejected but I’m still seeing this as a positive outcome because it wasn’t rejected immediately. As it stands, I’ve dusted the story off and sent it out into the world once again.

    This is something you have to get used to as a writer. Rejection happens. It doesn’t mean a story is bad. Perhaps the editor who read it wasn’t in the right mood for it, or wasn’t the right person for it. David, my editor for Wolf Unleashed, has talked about how a story can be great but only if it matches the tastes and styles of the editor who accepts it. He’s told me an anecdote about how he rejected a novel submission but told the author to go and talk to a different editor who he thought it would be better suited for. That other editor later thanked him because the story was a perfect fit for them.

    Sometimes a story can be great but not quite right for the theme of the anthology or magazine it’s submitted for. Sometimes it could be great but too similar to another story that the editor has committed to publish and they want to have more variety. Sometimes a story is good but the other stories submitted were just slightly better.

    As a writer, you have to develop a thick skin and just keep submitting. If a story gets rejected a couple of hundred times then it’s probably time to either do a major rewrite or move on to something else, but a story getting rejected once, twice, or even ten times doesn’t mean you should give up on it.

    I have already resubmitted the story that was rejected and if it gets rejected again, I’ll submit it again. Either I’ll find the right place to send it eventually or I’ll have got another story ready to go out in its place that I might have better luck with. I just have to keep trying and so should you. Every writer gets rejected. Every successful writer doesn’t let that stop them.

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    • When I was at Eastercon, I had a conversation with David, my editor at Guardbridge books, about book submissions and the process from his perspective. I did a video interview on the subject for my YouTube channel, but there are a few points of advice I thought it was worth highlighting here.

    1. Send Your Book to the Right Publisher

    Guardbridge Books publish science fiction and fantasy, usually books that have something a little bit weird or different about them. Yet, I was told that they receive quite a lot of submissions from authors of Christian fiction. I once attended a talk by another editor who talked about how the publisher she worked for, which produced educational books and text books, received loads of fiction submissions despite the fact that their website and information clearly stated they didn’t publish fiction.

    If you submit a book to a publisher that doesn’t publish your type of book, it’s a waste of everyone’s time. These days, a lot of publishers accept electronic submissions, but you might also be wasting paper, printer ink, and postage if you submit your manuscript physically. When you’re sending your book out to publishers, do a little bit of research to find out what publishers are likely to be interested. Check who publishes books that are similar in style to the one you’ve written. Don’t waste time sending your book out to publishers that will never in a million years publish it.

    1. Read the Instructions

    Pretty much all publishers have submissions guidelines on their website. These include information on how to approach them (inquiry email, sample chapters, full manuscript) as well as information on the formatting they’re looking for. Most publishers like double-spaced, left-justified, 12 point font, and things like that, but once in a while, you’ll come across a publisher that has a particular format they want to see. You’re shooting yourself in the foot if you don’t follow their guidelines.

    There are similar variations when it comes to synopses. Some publishers want a 1 page synopsis, some a 2 page, or 2-3 page. Some will ask for 1000 words or 500 words. And so on. When I was sending my first novel out on submission, it felt like every publisher had their own rules for how long the synopsis should be.

    You want to follow the guidelines of the publisher you’re submitting to. After all, if you can’t read their instructions, why should they trust you to write?

    1. Proof-read your submission

    This was one that David didn’t mention in the video, but he did mention to me afterwards. The submission doesn’t have to be absolutely perfect, especially since editing and proof-reading is part of the publishing process, but one thing an editor is going to do when looking at a submission is think, “How much effort is this going to take to get ready for publication?” A first page that has two or three typos in it is probably fine. A first page with two hundred is another matter entirely.

    If the editor looks at your story and it seems like you don’t understand how to punctuate speech or spell common words, they’re likely to think that your book will take significant effort. If your book is absolutely mind-blowing in other ways, you might get away with it, but you are definitely stacking the odds against you. Publishers put a lot of time and effort into getting a book ready to be released into the world, and the more you can do to convince them it won’t be a trial, the more likely they are to be interested in your book.

    Check out the video for the other suggestions and comments David had about the submissions process from an editor’s perspective, and good luck with your publication efforts.

    Posted on By jessmeats
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    • Writing Advice: Selling at Conventions

    In this video, I offer some advice for selling books at sci-fi and fantasy conventions, a lot of which is also applicable to book fairs, Christmas fairs, village fetes, and anywhere else you might get a table for a few hours to sell your books.

    There’s some general advice and tips from my experience. I’d hope some of it, like being nice to people, would be obvious, but it doesn’t hurt to say it.

    In convention news, I will be at Bath Comic Con, on 23rd March 2019. It’s in the Bath Assembly Rooms and I will have a table in the ball room if anyone wants to come along and talk to me about books, writing, or fandom in general.

    Posted on By jessmeats
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    • Writing Advice: Prologues

    I am trying something new. Instead of a written writing advice post, this is my first video on writing advice, covering the subject of prologues in fantasy novels.

    This is my first video of this type, so I’m interested in feedback on how I could improve it, as well as ideas for other topics I could discuss.

    The series/books I discuss in this video are:

    The Lord of the Rings/The Fellowship of the Ring by J R R Tolkien

    A Song of Ice and Fire/A Game of Thrones by George R R Martin

    The Kingkiller Chronicle/The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

    Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J K Rowling

     

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    • My biggest problem with writing is not writer’s block, but new ideas. I will have a half-finished first draft that needs writing, or a second or third draft that needs edits, or a fanfic that’s half-posted with people in the comments saying they can’t wait for the next chapter, and a new, shiny idea will pop into my brain and go, “You’re writing me now.”

    That idea sits in my brain, soaking up all the creativity energy, demanding to be written, taking up the space where I can think about writing things and crowding out all the other stories.

    And I know I should be finishing the half-finished things, but this idea is just there and writing it feels easy. I can force out a couple of hundred words of the thing that I was supposed to be finishing, or I can blast out a couple of thousand words on the new thing with no apparent effort. And it all seems to go great until that idea is no longer so new and shiny. It’s become another half-written story and there’s another new idea jumping up and down in my brain going, “Me! Me! My turn!”

    It’s very easy to have a hundred half-written first drafts with nothing ever finished. It takes discipline to force yourself to go, “Yes, I know that the new idea is shiny and exciting, and I will write a bit of it today, but I still need to dedicate some time to the other thing.”

    One of the reasons I’m posting this now is because I’ve recently written several thousand words of a new and shiny idea, while the third Shadows of Tomorrow book is nearly finished, requiring edits on the last few chapters. It would be very easy to ignore the editing while I go write the new thing, but I’m putting this post out here as a commitment to myself that I will do the editing. If I just play with the new and shiny, nothing will ever get finished to the point of being read, so I will be getting this editing finished and I’m posting this publicly to try and hold myself accountable.

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    • Traditions

    I enjoy celebrating Christmas even though I’m not religious. I enjoy spending time with my family, exchanging gifts, eating good food, seeing all the lights everywhere, decorating the Christmas tree, and all the different traditions that go around it. But you also find that different family groups have their own traditions and practices. For some families, religion is the central piece of the celebration and so there are carol services and nativity events, mangers and midnight mass. For others, religion doesn’t play a part in it and the traditions are centred around family and friends.

    We have a few traditions in my family. Like meeting up to go and look at the wildlife photography exhibit in the Natural History Museum. Various aunts, uncles, cousins, partners of cousins, and so on all meet up to have a look at the photos and then go out for a nice meal. This isn’t something you would find in any summary of the Christmas traditions, but it’s something we’ve done for a few years now and so it’s become part of our tradition.

    We have other things, like a trip to the cinema on Christmas Eve with my parents, and a hamper that we all contribute too. This isn’t a fancy hamper packaged up by a shop, but a box that we all fill with special treat foods, things that we don’t get very often, or things that just seemed different and fun. Sometimes things in the hamper are specifically intended for one person (like the crystallised ginger my mum loves) but other things are intended for all of us (like a shared chocolate orange).

    So why am I talking about this on a writing blog?

    I think when world-building, it’s tempting to make everything too homogenised. All the people in this area follow the same religion and practice the same traditions in the same way. In the real world, it doesn’t work that way. Everyone has their own subtle takes on the standard. Even in the same region, culture, and religion, you will find variations. It’s worth including that in your stories, and especially tying it into other factors. The differences around a shared experience can be a great way of highlighting other differences between characters or showcasing their backgrounds or even bringing in moments of conflict and character development.

    Perhaps one character makes a big deal about the shared meal because they used to go hungry a lot when they were younger, and having lots of good food is a reminder to themselves that those days are over. Perhaps one character follows an older set of traditions because of a religious upbringing. Perhaps one character feels that they have to shower everyone with gifts while another feels uncomfortable receiving so much and ashamed because their own gifts are small. Perhaps that could be a cause for resentment between those characters.

    I enjoy creating traditions, rituals, and celebrations in my world building, but it can be fun to think about all the different takes people might have on these same traditions, and the ways that they might add to them based on their situation or character. Next time you’re inventing some big holiday in your world, consider each of your characters and imagine how each of them might treat this holiday a little differently.

    Posted on By jessmeats
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    • Antagonists and villains

    In writing, the antagonist of a story is a person who is directly opposed to the desires, goals, or well-being of the protagonist. They are the person that the hero of the story is fighting against or trying to overcome, or an obstacle in the path to achieving their desired outcome. Very often, people conflate antagonist with villain and often, especially in sci-fi and fantasy, they clearly are. Sauron in Lord of the Rings is the main antagonist and he is definitely a villain – a force of evil trying to conquer the world. Voldemort is a fascist murderer. But someone can be an antagonist without being a villain – and this can sometimes lead to interesting conflict and more nuanced stories.

    I’m going to give an example for a TV show recently aired on Netflix that had surprising nuance for the kids fantasy show that it is: The Dragon Prince. Only a handful of episodes have aired so far, so it’s not certain what direction the writers will take the story or how the conflicts between characters will play out, but it seems to have a lot of potential for interesting dynamics between the characters.

    The heroes of the show, the protagonists, are clear. The story is about two human princes, Callum and Ezran, and the elf assassin Rayla trying to stop a war by returning a stolen dragon egg to its mother. The antagonist of the show are more complicated because there are a number of characters who directly oppose these characters without necessarily being villains. I am going to give some spoilers here, so if you’re interested in watching the show, be warned, but I’ll try to avoid spoiling anything major.

    Runaan is the leader of the assassins who come to kill the human king and Prince Ezran. He wants Ezran dead along with their father/step-father. He won’t hesitate to kill humans he comes across. At first glance, his character seems like a clear villain, except his actions are also about protecting the lives of his team, and getting justice for a crime committed by humans. Within the narrative, he is quickly put in a position where we as the audience are meant to feel pity for him. While he is narratively opposed to the heroes, we can have sympathy for him as well.

    Soren is even less like a villain. When he is introduced, he is training Callum in sword-fighting, doing so in a teasing and joking manner that shows affection between the characters. He is a friend to the princes, and is a generally likeable character, laughing and joking, messing with his sister. He has his flaws and shows occasional meanness in his jokes, but overall his character is firmly on the side of the good guys. Except he is given the instructions to kill the princes. This order is framed as being for the good of the kingdom, to ensure that someone with experience is on the throne when war comes. He is told that this is for the greater good, but the choice still clearly troubles him. This is a character who wants to do what is right being told to kill the heroes of the show but still not quite being a villain.

    Claudia is in a similar position. She is given the task of hunting the princes down and in an early episode tries to kill Rayla, but she does so to protect Callum and Ezran. She uses magic and sometimes has the appearance that would more normally be associated with a dark magic doer in a fantasy show, but she uses her magic to defend the princes from a perceived threat. Seeing the scenes where she’s joking with her brother, it’s hard to picture her as a villain, but she’s clearly an antagonist.

    General Amaya is even more clearly one of the good guys. She tries to kill Rayla but she does so because she thinks Rayla is a bloodthirsty elf who had kidnapped the princes. She wants to protect the princes and the kingdom. She wants to stop someone claiming the throne through treachery. She stands in the way of the heroes’ goals, but because she is trying to help them without having all the information.

    It will be interesting to see where the show goes with all these different character dynamics, but I’m looking forward to seeing it. As writers we can look at an example like this and think about how to put more nuance into the relationships between the characters in our stories. Just because someone is an antagonist doesn’t mean that they have to be an evil villain. There’s a lot of potential for interesting drama when they’re far from it.