One Less Thing I’m Scared Of

My email box has been deluged with offers of online writing classes and workshops and seminars since I started entering writing contests a couple of years back.  I’ve alternately been skeptical of and tempted by them, with my skepticism always winning out.  Until this week.

I finally registered for a Writer’s Digest “boot camp” being put on by four literary agents from Dystel & Goderich Literary Management, mostly because one of them was on my list of potential dream agents.  I had the $200 and I had the time, so I figured I’d give it a shot.

The three day webinar was called “Vital Insights on Writing and Selling Your Story Boot Camp” and it lived up to its name.  It featured a one hour live lecture from one of the agents and then a three hour live chat (via Blackboard) with all four agents.  All of this was geared toward getting my query letter and first five pages polished and ready for submission.  I sent both items off to my assigned agent (the one I was already interested in) this morning.  And I’ll get a critique back by the end of the month.  In addition to that, the webinar came with a one year online subscription to the Guide to Literary Agents atwritersmarket.com.

Even if my assigned agent hates my submission and I only get to scratch her off my list, I’m glad I participated.  I learned so much in that tight little window of time.  Mostly from the incredibly generous agents that somehow didn’t wilt under the machine gun-like questions my fellow students and I fired at them for three hours, but also from the other participants.  And it was comforting to see so many other unpublished novelists who share my fear and confusion over how to approach an agent.  All of that aside, the best thing I came away with was my query letter.  It has yet to be read by anyone outside of my critique group, but I have never been happier with it.  For the first time I feel ready to send it out into the world.  That alone was worth $200 and a few hours of my life.

So, if one of these Writer’s Digest University classes looks like something you want to try, I encourage you to give it a shot.  Sure they’re offering them to make money off of you, but now I also believe that they’re trying to help folks like me who just want to figure out how to get their book published.

The Backseat Writer reads Katherine Catmull

If you’re reading my personal blog at bradleypwilsonliterary.com, then you’re familiar with my new Backseat Writer series. In it I invite you to read along with me as I satisfy my fiction addiction. The basic idea is that I will periodically post about what authors do that works well. In other words, I’ll read like a writer and write about it. I encourage you to join in the discussion so long as you keep your comments positive. This series is not about bashing anybody. It’s about delving into what authors are doing right, so that we can all learn how to write better.

This is my second post aboutKatherine Catmull‘s debut novel,Summer and Bird. I’m now about a hundred pages in to this middle-grade fantasy and I continue to be amazed by her use of language.  In particular, near the beginning of her tenth chapter she employs a wonderfully apt metaphor to describe the thoughts of one of her protagonists: “She pushed and dug at the pain in those stories over and over, the way you dig at a loose tooth, tasting the blood.” Nice. Visceral. Even without knowing the context, you get a pretty good idea of what the character’s feeling.

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Advice for Young Writers

Hello readers! 

I spend a lot of time talking with young writers about writing.  Whether it’s the art of putting a novel together or ways to break into the industry, I get asked a lot of the same questions.  So I thought I’d compile a list of tips here for writers getting started at any age.  Maybe you’ve heard some of these before, maybe not.  Either way, I hope they help you along your path.

1. Show, don’t tell.

Yes, you’ve definitely heard this before.  A million times over.  But what does it mean?  The difference between showing and telling is the difference between sitting in a cafe in Paris sipping a latte and reading a menu online.  You want to immerse your reader.  If I’m telling, I’m over-describing, maybe even listing scenery.  If I’m showing, I’m slipping in details where they fit naturally.  If I’m telling, I’m talking about how my character feels.  If I’m showing, the character does things characteristic of his feelings.  Yep, it’s a hard rule to figure out, but once you do, it’s going to make your writing one hundred percent better.

Buffy is skeptical of your tell-y exposition. Try SHOWING her.

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Commas and Apostrophes and Periods – Oh My!

Creating characters, setting them off on great adventures and sending in villains to thwart them are the fun parts of writing. But as writers, our own villains are often those pesky commas, apostrophes, em dashes and more.

There are so many rules. And there are times when the rules are allowed to be broken. Grammar can make the most creative of us squirm and feel enclosed, trapped. But done well, proper grammar and spelling can set your story free.

That’s where good copy editing comes in.

A comma in the right place can make a big difference in meaning. For example, notice the difference between “Let’s eat Uncle Mark” and “Let’s eat, Uncle Mark.” Uncle Mark will be very grateful for that comma.

But using correct grammar doesn’t have to be clinical. It can be as much an art choice as a character’s decision. Used well, commas, periods and em dashes can change the pace and tone of a sentence, paragraph or scene, speeding it up for action or slowing it down to build anticipation.

Of course, proper grammar and spelling also helps the reader stay in the story. Every time a reader sees a spelling error or a missing period, it jerks the brain into remembering that these are words and this is a book — it’s not really the movie they’ve been experiencing in their mind. It pulls them back to the real world and away from the reality of the story, which is where you want your readers to stay.

Word and most other writing software have at least a spell check and maybe a grammar check too. These are useful tools, but their not fallible. A spell check won’t notice that the “their” in that last sentence should have been “they’re,” for example. And the grammar check won’t care whether Uncle Mark is dinner.

So, what to do? If grammar is your specialty, a good read-through paying close attention is a start. However, our brains are smart. They’re trained to fill in what’s missing. So you might have read “they’re not fallible” and not noticed the mistake until you read the next sentence. If you caught it, congratulations. But if you had written it, your brain would have remembered and most likely filled in what you meant to type instead of what you actually typed.

That’s is why it’s important to have others copy edit your work.

Having your manuscript edited is especially important for self-publishers. But it’s equally important for writers who are submitting to agents and editors. Sure they’ll forgive the occasional missing comma, dangling participle, or “that” instead of “which,” but too many errors, and you’ll have that reality check problem. When it’s your career on the line, and your manuscript is the last of 15 the agent or editor has read and it’s nearing midnight, you don’t want to give them any excuse to put it down.

Don’t let pesky grammar get in the way of your book deal. Call Yellow Bird Editors.

Want to be a good editor? Be a stupid reader.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve done all the things my fourth grade teacher told me not to do. I skim. I skip over boring parts. I speed up, rather than slow down, when I’m confused. And when I see a word I don’t understand, I most definitely don’t stop to look it up in the dictionary. In short, I’m a fourth-grade failure.

So how did I wind up here, editing novels and memoirs for a living? The truth is quite simple. Over the years, I’ve learned that my bad reading behaviors are actually some of the same attributes that make me a good editor.

Below are three rules of thumb for editing fiction—whether your own, or a friend’s. You might just be surprised.

1. Be impatient

If you read a manuscript too slowly, you can actually fool yourself into thinking it’s good. The real test is whether it will hold up in the face of a quick-read, which is how potential literary agents and editors (and their assistants and interns) will approach it, given the sheer volume of material they consider every day.

So when you read a manuscript for the first time, don’t stop to analyze every sentence. Don’t pause to parse each densely packed paragraph. Don’t pore over the imagery, waiting for hidden symbolism to manifest itself. Instead, read hungrily, like you’re devouring a slice of chocolate cake. The inedible pieces will quickly become apparent.

2. Be unforgiving

Inevitably, you will stumble upon something in the manuscript that doesn’t make sense. Let’s call this a “huh?” moment. In the face of a “huh?” moment, you might be tempted to re-read the confusing passage multiple times until you experience an “ah-ha!” moment. Once you have that “ah-ha!” moment, you might think, “OK, it makes sense after all. I was just being stupid.”

But, no! You weren’t. It was the manuscript that was confusing. And if you were confused, chances are someone else will be, too. In order to be a good editor, you must be unforgiving. You must not tolerate even a single ounce of confusion.

3. Be stupid

Authors are tricky people. I know because I am one. We sometimes try to sneak in clever metaphors, literary allusions, witty analogies, and other little nuggets that don’t quite fit with the story but are simply too brilliant not to use.

When you take off your writer’s hat and put on your editor’s hat, you can go ahead and forget about all that so-called brilliance. Instead, be as stupid as you can allow yourself to be. Do you still follow the metaphor? Still get the joke? Then it can stay.