Randy Ingermanson's Blog: Advanced Fiction Writing, page 17

How Many Scenes Does Your Novel Need?

Nathan posted this question on my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page:

I'm following your Snowflake method for my novel, and while describing step 8, you mention that your spreadsheets usually have over 100 scenes. My spreadsheet, which is complete (with room for changes) has 62 scenes. Do you think that is too few for a novel to be complete? Is there an "average" number of scenes that a novel should include? Thank you!

Randy sez: I would guess the average number of scenes in a full-length novel is 80 to 100, but I've never tried to measure this average, so it's just a guess.

62 scenes in a novel is fine. It's far more important that each scene is GOOD than that it meet some arbitrary standard for length. Write a novel that works and don't worry too much about numbers like these.

Now if your novel only had 12 scenes, I'd be worried, because then every scene would be 30 to 40 pages, and that's just too long for the modern reader.

If you've got a question you'd like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page and submit your question. I'll answer them in the order they come in.

A Tale of Two Geniuses

I write novels featuring "geniuses in jeopardy," so it seems fitting to pay tribute to two geniuses who've hit the headlines this week.

Saul Perlmutter

Saul Perlmutter won the Nobel Prize in physics this week for his work in astrophysics. Back in the 1990s, Saul's team showed that the universe is not merely expanding — it's accelerating.

According to Einstein's theory of relativity, this can be explained by the existence of so-called "dark energy" which pervades the universe. It was a revolutionary discovery, and another team made essentially the same discovery at essentially the same time. Two physicists from that team shared the prize with Saul.

I single out Saul because, back in 1981, I was a second-year graduate student in physics at UC Berkeley. That year, I was the teaching assistant for the standard class in electromagnetic theory that all first-year grad students were required to take. My job was to grade the homework. I had 56 students in the class, as I recall, and I found that five of them consistently got perfect scores on their homework. One of those five was a guy named Saul Perlmutter.

If my memory is correct, Saul was the one who always wrote his assignments in blue ink with beautiful handwriting. I might be mistaken; it's been 30 years. It might have been one of the other four. But that's what my memory tells me.

As it turned out, Saul and I both wound up finishing our Ph.D. theses in the fall of 1986, which meant that we graduated in the same UC Berkeley physics department commencement exercises in the spring of 1987. I dug out the commencement program this morning and found that he's listed just across from me on the opposite page.

Saul went on to do some truly elegant work automating the discovery of supernovae, which led a decade later to his remarkable discovery. I know Saul doesn't read my blog; nevertheless, I have this to say. "Kudos, Saul! You've done a fantastic job and the Nobel is well deserved."

500 years from now, the astronomical advances of the 20th century may well be summarized for third graders in one sentence like this: "Edwin Hubble showed that the universe is expanding and Saul Perlmutter showed that it's actually accelerating."

Steve Jobs

Tragically, Steve Jobs made the headlines yesterday. I was devastated when I read that he'd died. I'm typing this blog on a MacBook Pro while I'm listening to music on my iMac. There's an iPhone in my pocket. In my backpack, my iPad is charging. My life is built on tools and toys that Steve created. I can hardly believe he's gone.

Steve Jobs brought elegance and art to computer engineering. There was simply nobody like him. He not only made the world a better place, he made it a qualitatively DIFFERENT place. Let me explain that.

Years ago, I had a boss who tried to summarize in a few sentences how computer science has evolved over the decades. "The key insight that made computers possible in the 1940s was the idea that everything is a number. The key insight that made Unix the best operating system in the 1970s was the idea that everything is a string of text. The key insight that made the Mac insanely great in the 1980s was the idea that everything is a picture."

Numbers are for geeks. Text is for geeks. Pictures are for everybody. Qualitatively different.

If Steve could see this blog, I'd want him to read this: "Kudos Steve! You put beauty and elegance back into engineering. You were insanely great."

500 years from now, first-year engineering students may very well be studying how Steve fused art and engineering to create elegant devices. First-year business students may very well be studying how Steve brought Apple back from the brink when he returned to the company in late 1996 and executed the business comeback of the century.

Take a Deep Breath—It Could Be Your Last…

[image error]

A new release of my novel Oxygen is finally out in both e-book form and in paper!

My coauthor (John Olson) and I wanted to write a space adventure novel with a strong female lead character and with a fast-paced storyline packed with suspense, humor, and romance.

As I write this blog, Oxygen has the following rankings on various lists on Amazon:

#141 on the main list for All Kindle Books.
#3 on the Science Fiction Adventure list.
#1 in Futuristic Romance.

About OXYGEN:

Valkerie Jansen is tough, beautiful, and has an uncanny knack for survival. But that doesn't explain why NASA picks her to be part of a two man, two woman crew to Mars — or does it?

Bob Kaganovski, the ship's chief engineer, is paid to be paranoid — and he's good at it. After a teeth-rattling launch, Bob realizes that his paranoia hasn't prepared him for this trip. He can deal with a banged-up ship, but how's he going to survive the next five months with HER just a flimsy partition away?

Halfway to the Red Planet, an explosion leaves the crew with only enough oxygen for one. All evidence points to sabotage — and Valkerie and Bob are the obvious suspects.

Oxygen is a witty, multi-award-winning roller coaster ride, with a plot that moves at the speed of light.

The authors had hoped to work in some cool controversy on science, faith, the meaning of life, the existence of God, and possibly even the Coke versus Pepsi debate, but they were having so much fun writing the story that they forgot to offend anyone.

About the Authors:

John and Randy have been collaborating on one crazy project after another for the past fifteen years.

Not only are they novelists, Ph.D. scientists, and entrepreneurs who've founded four different corporations between them, but rumor has it that they prowl the night wearing steampunk battle gear to rid the streets of vampires, werewolves, and ducks that poop on your front lawn after it rains.

John and Randy deny all such tales as "vicious exaggeration."

Extra Goodies for Novelists

What's in it for you, besides a fast-paced story? John and I worked hard to add in some extra goodies that you, my Loyal Blog Readers, will love. We created four appendices totaling more than 21,000 words:

How We Sold Oxygen In Only 7 Weeks — Without an Agent
The Proposal for Oxygen
Randy's #1 Secret For Writing Fiction, those pesky Motivation-Reaction Units, applied to the entire first scene (which John wrote)
John Strikes Back — his analysis of the entire second scene (which Randy wrote)

Oh yeah, and there's an Eternal Coupon in the book, which is exactly what it sounds like. It's good for selected writing products on this site. It's reusable. It never expires. The discount is 50%. Yes really.

99 Cents? Are We Crazy?

We normally would sell what's in those appendices for at least $15. But in an e-book, we get incredible economies of scale, so we can include them at no extra cost, right along with the novel.

The everyday cost of Oxygen is $2.99. But for this week, now through midnight on Saturday, October 8, 2011, the price of the e-book is only 99 cents. Amazon and/or Barnes & Noble may charge a higher price to some customers outside the US, and they may not offer the e-book for sale in all countries. We gave both retailers full worldwide distribution rights and set the price as low as we could.

Where to Get Oxygen

Grab your e-book copy of Oxygen here on Amazon for 99 cents.

Grab your e-book copy of Oxygen here on Barnes & Noble for 99 cents.

If you don't have an e-reader, you can get free apps for Macs, PCs, iPads, and most smart phones on both Amazon and Barnes & Noble's web sites.

If you prefer paper and you live in the US, you can order a paper copy here at Marcher Lord Press for $16.99.

The paper edition has a different cover than the e-book, but it's the same content with one difference. The paper edition has an Eternal Coupon worth a 60% discount.

Collaborating on Writing a Novel: Ted and Tosca

Two years ago at a writing conference, my friend Tosca Lee was acting really weird. She disappeared from the conference hotel for a couple of hours on some lame excuse. Then afterwards, she didn't want to talk about it.

That evening, NY Times best-selling novelist Ted Dekker dropped by the conference hotel. I know Ted just a bit, and we chatted some. A group of us were about to go out on the town, and we invited Ted along. We all had a great time, but my finely tuned writer's antennae told me that this was not just a casual drop-by. Something was going on.

Tosca is one of my closest writing buddies, and it didn't take me long to figure it out. Ted and Tosca were planning to coauthor a book together. When I asked Tosca about it, she begged me to keep it a secret. For marketing reasons, big-name authors like to announce collaborations at special events.

I was happy to keep the secret — for seven months. And I was thrilled for Tosca, whose dark-side novels DEMON and HAVAH both got great reviews and made me think. Tosca is a wonderful, giving person, and a collaboration with Ted Dekker would be a huge boost to her career. I've often told Tosca that her books need more "exploding helicopters" and Ted is very much an exploding-helicopter kind of guy.

This week, Ted and Tosca's first book, FORBIDDEN, is launching. I asked Tosca if she'd like to do a Skype interview, so we spent about three hours on Monday night chatting. I wanted specifically to get her take on collaborating on a novel. Here is the MASSIVELY trimmed down transcript of our interview:

Randy: How did you and Ted decide to collaborate? You guys in some sense are a Dream Team of writers. But how did that happen?

Tosca: Ted had heard about me through his manager and so when I wrote to him asking if he'd take a look at endorsing the re-releasing of Demon, he recognized my name, and we started talking.

The main thing was why it made so much sense. We're both interested, thematically, in the same kinds of stories and questions. We have two totally different styles, but we're interested in the same kinds of explorations in story.

Randy: Yes, you both have kind of a dark edge to you.

Tosca: Muhahahaha.

Randy: So then Ted came to a conference you were attending two years ago and you were so hush-hush about it, you gave yourselves away (at least to me) by being so secretive.

Tosca: Now you know that I'm miserable at keeping secrets.

Randy: Had you already agreed to collaborate at that point?

Tosca: Yes. We were on the verge of signing contracts.

Randy: I like Ted. He's always been very nice to me. Not all big-shot authors take the trouble to be nice to mid-list authors. What was the most valuable thing about writing fiction that you learned from working with him? Aside from adding in more exploding helicopters?

Tosca: Well, there's the helicopter thing. Aside from that, one of the most valuable things I learned is that in a collaboration, you really need to be aware of what you're bringing to the table. The point for us was to produce something that neither one of us could do on our own.

Randy: Right, that's extremely important. Otherwise, there's just no point in collaborating.

Tosca: Exactly. But to do that, you have to be aware of your strengths as a writer.

Randy: Yes, absolutely. Now who came up with the storyline for Forbidden?

Tosca: We both did. We were talking about the kinds of stories and themes that interest us, and one of the things we landed on was what it really meant to be alive. What does it really mean to be human?

So we were throwing this idea around and came up with this idea: what if everyone in the world were dead, and didn't know it? Not in the zombie brain-eating sense… But in the sense of what makes us human?

This is a story that takes place 500 years in the future, where all emotion has been genetically stripped from humans. And for me, it was really interesting to explore this idea of what motivates us more: fear… or love? Because I know I personally contend with the Fear Monster a lot.

Randy: You alone of all humanity, Tosca dear!

Tosca: I KNEW IT!!! WAAAHHHH!!! I'm going to go eat worms.

Randy: I think you know me too well to believe a word I'm saying.

Tosca: Oh. Now that I'm into my second nightcrawler, you tell me.

Randy: Because before we started this interview, I was telling you about being ready to throw up because of my own upcoming book launch. That little fear thing.

So put the nightcrawler down now, and nobody gets hurt!

Tosca: Oh, okay.

Randy: How many drafts of Forbidden did you write? And how much did the story change between Draft 1 and Draft N?

Tosca: We wrote several. The thing is, people ask all the time who wrote what, and how did we divvy up the work…

The secret is that we both wrote it. All of it. So it really took twice as long. There isn't a sentence that is all mine or all Ted's any more.

Randy: Wow. Yeah, that's about how John Olson and I worked.

Tosca: It's had several passes in order to achieve that voice that is not me … or him … but something entirely new.

Randy: Did you divide up the first draft, or did one of you do the first draft and the other edit it from there?

Tosca: Some chapters it was me. Sometimes it was Ted. Who took which chapters? The world will never know! Though I can tell you that any time anyone has guessed… they've gotten it wrong.

Randy: When John and I wrote stuff, he owned one main character and I owned the other. And we usually wrote the first draft for our own character. But not always. Did you work like that at all?

Tosca: Not really … though it definitely makes sense. We spent a lot of time talking before each section, each chapter, about what was going on, what would happen … our vision for the characters and the scene.

Randy: Yes, you pretty much have to do that, or somebody gets disappointed.

Tosca: And we found that to be crucial because it turns out we'd often be like, "Hmm. I see him being a bit different …" They turned out to be great conversations. But it takes a ton of time to get on the same page. As you know.

Randy: Oh yeah, it can drive you nuts sometimes. But it's also incredibly energizing when you're working with the right person.

If I were to ask Ted what he learned about the craft of fiction from you, what would he say?

[Long pause while Tosca texts Ted to ask him this question.]

Tosca: Ted says he's watching TV with LeeAnn. So I'm taking that as a go-ahead to say that he learned how brilliant I am. That I am, in fact, the goddess of writing.

Oh wait. He just texted… So he says that he's come to really appreciate my use of language, which is what I love to do … and conversely, I've learned more about pacing from him.

Randy: Yeah. Exploding helicopters.

Tosca: Exactly. Because that IS pure poetry. The thing is, I truly believe that we have many strengths–as people and as … authors … and that there are things we can definitely learn and improve on. Though some of them will never be our trademarks, because we aren't wired that way.

Randy: I hear you. Every strength has its own shadow, as John always told me.

Tosca: So I may never have Dekker-esque pacing. He may never have Lee-like prose … or Ingermanson Exploding Helicopters … But we can definitely learn more.

Randy: When you have two people writing with different strengths, you get binocular vision. That's powerful.

Tosca: Absolutely. And I think some things are innate … some can be learned … and some just can't be learned that well. And so the real challenge comes in trying to really capitalize on our strengths, and manage those areas where we are less strong, even if we're never GREAT at them.

Randy: Yes, I've learned a lot from you about the beauty of language.

Tosca: Aw, thanks, Randy.

Randy: You're writing another book with Ted right now, correct? What's that about, if you can talk about it?

Tosca: Right. We have three planned at this time in the Books of Mortals series. We were going to put one out every September, starting this year, but the response has been so great, that the publisher actually begged us to put them out faster. So we're hard at work on Mortal, which will now release June 2012. And we'll go right into Sovereign after that, which will release a few months later, in October.

ACK!

Randy: Holy moly! That's fast! Well, you probably have to get back to writing, so I should let you go.

Tosca: No! This is my only socialization time! You can't make me leave!

Randy: I suppose we could barbecue some more nightcrawlers and pork out!

Tosca: Mmmm. Nightcrawlers. Can I turn the questions around and ask you about your upcoming release?

Randy: Um … sure. I don't think I've ever been interviewed by my interviewee before, but you go right ahead. This is your show.

Tosca: So, I have to ask (I'm not going. You can't make me leave!)–I hear you and John have a release coming out the end of this month. Can you confirm or deny this rumor??

Randy: I'll confirm it. Oxygen will rerelease as an e-book on September 28. The paper version will be available a few days later. (Don't ask why. It's complicated.)

The book came out 10 years ago, and we got the rights back to it not too long ago, so we've been editing it relentlessly for months now.

Tosca: So when you edit a book that you wrote before, what is that like–what changes?

Randy: We get to fix all the things we hated in the first version.

Tosca: LOL! Oxygen is … what number in the number of books you and John have written together?

Randy: That was our first. We still look back on those days writing together as some of the happiest times we ever had.

Tosca: Did you take away any lessons from that first book that you took into your next collaboration? As far as working together?

Randy: We learned that you must NEVER write a scene without having seen the one that came before it.

And we learned that we worked best by each editing IN stuff that we are strong in, rather than editing OUT stuff the other guy is good at.

We also learned that you get a lot stronger book when you are merciless in editing it.

Tosca: Ahhh…. good point. How many books have you and John written together?

Randy: Just two. We'd love to write some more.

Tosca: Just two, but at least one of them was up for or won a Christy, right?

Randy: Both of them were Christy finalists. Oxygen actually won. And it was named by the New York Public Library to its prestigious list of "Books for the Teen Age."

Even though we were writing for adults, not teens.

Tosca: That's right. I knew they got critical notice. So … I know both you and John. And I know how you guys love to write together. Did it ever feel like work?

Randy: That's one of the great things about working with John. Everything's a game. He's a ton of fun. Can't imagine why he puts up with me.

Tosca: You guys really cook up some great stuff together. Mad scientist style.

Randy: I think writing should be fun. If it isn't, then why do it?

Tosca: True. Especially because you guys are such good friends. Writing is normally so lone-wolf.

Randy: OK, one more question for you: What's your favorite part of the writing process? Planning? First drafting? Editing? Destroying it with an ice pick?

Tosca: Ice Pick. Definitely.

Randy: Somehow I knew. It's that Vulcan mind melt thing. Well, I think we're done. Thanks so much! I know you're busy.

Tosca: Thank YOU!!!

Here's some more info on Ted and Tosca's book FORBIDDEN:

Three books. Two authors. One last chance for humanity.

[image error]

Visit the Books of Mortals website and get the short story prequel to Forbidden, "The Keeper" free there. When you sign the Book of Mortals you are entered to win a pile of cool stuff through the end of the month–including a trip to Rome, which is where the story takes place.

Many years have passed since civilization's brush with apocalypse. The world's greatest threats have all been silenced. There is no anger, no hatred, no war. There is only perfect peace… and fear. But a terrible secret has been closely guarded for centuries: every single soul walking the earth, though in appearance totally normal, is actually dead, long ago genetically stripped of true humanity.

Fleeing pursuit, with only moments to live, a young man named Rom stumbles into possession of a vial of blood and a cryptic vellum. When consumed, the blood will bring him back to life; when decoded, the message will lead him on a perilous journey that will require him to abandon everything he has ever known and awaken humanity to the transforming power of true life and love. But the blood will also resurrect hatred, ambition and greed at terrible risk.

Set in a terrifying, medieval future, where grim pageantry masks death, this tale of passionate love and dark desires from master storytellers Ted Dekker and Tosca Lee peels back the layers of the heart for all who dare take the journey.

Here's a photo of Ted and Tosca signing books at a recent trade show. From left to right, Sharlene Maclaren, Tosca Lee, and Ted Dekker.

[image error]

Here's a YouTube video of the trailer for the book:

And here's a photo of Tosca and me three years ago at an awards banquet. Tosca is the one on the left:

[image error]

More Thoughts on That Pesky Author Branding

Author branding is one of the scariest and yet most necessary things an author can do. But how tight should that brand be? Can you have a "broad brand?"

Teddi posted this question on my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page:

Randy, in the second half of your interview on StoryFix.com you mentioned branding and reader expectations. You said,

"New writers often fail to understand the importance of branding. When you attach your name to a novel and publish it, that's an implicit contract you're making with your reader: 'I promise to produce more fiction like this in the future.'"

I have a dozen stories in various stages of notes-and-development, and they are spread across several genres. I intend to pursue a certain amount of self-publishing, so the choice of branding is going to be in my hands for many of these projects.

Is author name really the key factor in reader expectations?

For example, one of my favorite authors is Lois McMaster Bujold. She writes fantasy, science fiction and things in between. Although I like some of her books more than others, it didn't really bother me to discover "the hard way" that I like her sci-fi better than most of her fantasy. I'd read anything she wrote, even in other genres outside SFF, because I like her writing.

Just wondering if that's atypical. Maybe we need new ways of categorizing things.

Lois Bujold: Science Fiction

Lois Bujold: Medieval Fantasy

Lois Bujold: Fantasy Romance

I'd prefer something like the above rather than having her identity obscured behind a totally different author name. Especially if her aliases weren't easily and publicly available.

Any thoughts on this? Do you think the publishing world is changing enough that this sort of thing will also change? Or should I simply make up a pen name for each genre and then put them somewhere on a website for folks who want to know "what all Teddi's written"?

Thanks!

Teddi

Randy sez: Imagine this scenario: You're in Cairo for the first time and feeling way out of your depth. Egypt is a very different world for you, and you're starting to feel just a wee bit homesick. Then you see the golden arches of a McDonald's fast food restaurant. Desperate for a taste of home, you walk in … and find that the only thing on the menu is crocodile pancakes.

Question for you: How do you feel about that?

I suspect you'd feel a bit put out. Nothing against eating crocodile. Nothing against eating pancakes. But you don't go into a McDonald's looking for either one of those. You go there because you expect exactly the same menu in Cairo as in California.

When somebody violates your expectations, you don't blame yourself. You blame them.

In the case of Lois McMaster Bujold, I don't see a problem. Fantasy and science fiction have long been joined at the hip. Whether she's writing in one sub-category or another really makes little difference.

I think you'd be a bit upset, however, if you bought one of her books and found it to be cowboy erotica. Or an Amish detective story. Or an Ayn Rand-like economic manifesto on the virtues of capitalism.

Any of those could be a fine, fine book. Or not. The quality of the writing is not the issue. The issue is that when you see Lois McMaster Bujold's name on the cover of a book, you expect a certain kind of story. If you don't get anything like what you were expecting, you don't like it.

Treat your readers the way you want to be treated. (This brilliant piece of advice works in many areas of life. I regret that I didn't invent it.)

This reminds me that my friend James Scott Bell just published a zombie legal thriller. No kidding, a zombie legal thriller. Jim has been writing legal thrillers for quite a while, but this one is out of his normal zone. So he wrote it under a pseudonym, K. Bennett. This is not a secret, so I'm not spilling any confidences here.

The novel, PAY ME IN FLESH, is hysterically funny. I'm tempted to say the novel is "brilliant," but that term gets thrown around so much that it's pretty useless. Let's just say that I haven't had so much pure fun reading a novel in a long time.

Any time you start a novel with a female lawyer being sexually harrassed by a lecherous judge, and the lawyer's immediate reaction is to wonder what the judge's brains would taste like, you've got a weird, wacky start to a hilarious book. I loved it.

I'm not a big fan of horror fiction, by the way, so I'd never have guessed that I'd enjoy a zombie legal thriller. But my friend, Susan Meissner, (whom I interviewed on this blog a few years ago), gave such a glowing review that I had to get the book. Susan is a gentle soul who writes literary women's fiction, and I figured if she could stomach the zombie stuff, then it wouldn't bother me either. I figured right.

In my view, Jim did the right thing by using a pseudonym here, even though a "zombie legal thriller" doesn't seem all that different from a "legal thriller." The fact is that the zombie element plus the humor element make this quite a bit different from Jim's usual writing. (Jim can be funny, but he doesn't usually do slapstick comedy, as he does in this book.)

The fact is that Jim's new pseudonym, K. Bennett, now effectively owns the entire subcategory of "zombie legal thrillers." So Jim can go on to break new ground in this wacky genre under this name, and if the category eventually fades out, he can walk away from it. Good move, Jim!

If you've got a question you'd like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page and submit your question. I'll answer them in the order they come in.

How Many Scenes Does Your Novel Need?

Is there a rule on how many scenes your novel requires? What are the typical number of scenes in a novel and how do you know if you've got too many or too few?

David posted this question on my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page:

I am finishing up the scene list spreadsheet you recommend in the snowflake model for writing fiction. I am super excited to move on to the next stage, the actual writing. However, I have found that I only have about 60 scenes, and you mention that you normally have over 100 for your novels. Is this too few? Do numbers of scenes vary greatly from novel to novel? Am I possibly not understanding something about scenes that I need to know? I have a page estimate of 320-350 pages, so the novel won't be short. Furthermore, the scenes I have outline the plot well, I'm saying I don't think I will need a whole lot more scenes. Should I be concerned?

I know you have addressed what a scene is in some detail, but I'm worried that I might be puting too much in to my scenes if I have to few of them in the finalized scene list.

Randy sez: Different writers are different. Some writers have chapters that average only 2 or 3 pages long. Others are much longer. Since each chapter contains one or more scenes, that means that scenes can be very long or very short.

I've written scenes that were less than 100 words. I've written scenes that ran longer than 3000 words. On average, my scenes run about 1000 words, which is four double-spaced pages. Since my novels typically run over 100,000 words, that means I end up with about 100 scenes.

There aren't any rules on the scene length, as long as the story works. You should write the scenes to the right length for your story.

I would guess that most novels have anywhere from 50 to 200 scenes. It might be an interesting exercise to go through some of your favorite novels and count the number of scenes. But a far more interesting exercise is to look at individual scenes and ask why the author wrote it to that particular length. Did she put in too much or too little? How would you have written the scene different?

It's always easier to analyze somebody else's work than your own. But analyzing theirs will help you when you go to write your own.

If you've got a question you'd like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page and submit your question. I'll answer them in the order they come in.

Is There a Magic Pill To Make You Finish Your Novel?

If you're a good starter, but a bad finisher, how are you ever going to get your novel written? That's a question many fiction writers face.

Rebecca posted this question on my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page:

Is there a magic pill for someone like me?

I can't seem to complete my first ever "bad" first draft. I've berated myself to no end as I struggle to complete just one of the many novels I've started and stopped writing over the last couple years, never able to get past the first couple hundred pages, which is when I tend to hit a block, usually seconding guess my story. And yes, I admit, am a chapter-one-aholic (Re-reading and re-writing chapter one . . . a lot!)

Writing classes, workshops, and conferences; critique groups; following blogs like Randy's; reading a ton of craft books (including "Writing Fiction For Dummies); reading specific genre novels; writing every day for hours . . . Snowflaking, outlining, pantsing, storyboarding . . . I feel like I've done it all in hopes of gaining the willpower to keep moving forward. And I continue to do each these things, all the while trying to reach my goal to finally type the words "The End" on the blank last page of my completed novel.

I love writing, and I've been writing every day since I fell in love with the art a little over two years ago. I have so many stories I'm interested in writing, filed away — on my computer, on many sticky notes, in stacks of notebooks, in my ever-buzzing brain . . . Is there something out there I haven't tried to cure me of this so-called hitting-a-wall illness?

One thing I haven't tried is a writing mentor. Would someone like me benefit from a personal writing mentor to guide me, coach me, push me along the way? Could that be the magic pill I need to get me off the starting block and finish a first draft so I can move on to the next steps?

Any advice — or a magic pill! — you have to offer is greatly appreciated, Randy! Your blog has so many wonderful articles with great advice and interesting tidbits. Thank you for that!

Randy sez: If I had a magic pill to help people finish what they start, I'd be Xtremely rich. I started working on a magic pill like that once, but . . . then I got interested in something else.

I plead guilty to the same sin. I start more things than I finish. My only consolation is that it's probably impossible to do the reverse. (How could you finish more things than you start?)

A mentor might be the answer. When you go to the gym, you probably work out a lot harder if you have a personal trainer there to crack the whip or urge you on.

I'd love to have a mentor, but I don't. Instead, I have my writing buddies, and when I need help in getting things done, I turn to them.

Rebecca, do you have a writing buddy? Somebody to whom you can be accountable?

There are two basic kinds of accountability: carrots and sticks.

A carrot is a reward for good behavior; a stick is a penalty.

I tend to respond better to sticks. When I start having motivational problems, I talk to my writing buddy John, and we set up specific behaviors that I have to meet, on pain of paying a $10 fine. I can afford the fine, but I'd rather eat broken glass than pay a fine for something as stupid as not getting out of bed on time. So this works well for me.

Rebecca, for you, the desired behavior is to produce a certain quota of pages per day for your novel. (You probably want to exclude weekends.) Or possibly you might want to produce a certain quota per week. The rule is that the pages have to be on one particular novel and you're not allowed to quit until the novel is finished. No excuses allowed. You either put out the pages, or you pay up the fine.

See if this works for you. Find a writing buddy and set up an accountability system. You'll be amazed what you can do when you have to. And you'll be amazed at how small a fine it takes to produce the right behavior.

If you've got a question you'd like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page and submit your question. I'll answer them in the order they come in.

What If Those Pesky Agents Don't Bite?

What do you do when you've got a decent manuscript but the agents just aren't biting?

Stephannie posted this question on my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page:

I have a manuscript for which I am seeking representation. I have been told by editors of major publishing houses, during conference critiques, that it is "intriguing, well written, and very good". I've been shopping it around to agents and can't seem to get anywhere. I get great comments from them but no 'bites'. How do I determine if the book is unsellable or I haven't connected with the right agent for it?

Randy sez: Publishing is a subjective business, so there isn't any infallible way to to know if your book is unsellable.

There is an infallible way to know if your book is sellable, of course. If you sell your book, then it was sellable. But there's no way to determine that in advance.

However, there are indicators: How many editors have said the manuscript was "intriguing, well written, and very good?" What was their level of enthusiasm? Have you shown the manuscript to agents at conferences? What was their response? Have you studied up on how to write a query letter? How much research on agents did you do before sending them queries? How many agents have you queried? Did you get personalized rejections or were they form-letters? Do you have any friends who are published novelists and who are familiar with your work? If so, what is their opinion of the novel?

It's not possible for me to trouble-shoot things from here, since I've not seen the manuscript and I don't have the 8 hours it would take to evaluate it. (And I don't do full manuscript evaluations, ever. There are many people who would do a manuscript evaluation for a lot less money than I would charge, and I see no reason to compete with them when I have so many billions of other tasks on my plate.)

Here are some possible explanations of what's going on:

Maybe your manuscript really isn't all that good. Ouch! That's a painful and frightening possibility, isn't it? This is why I asked what the level of enthusiasm was of the editors who looked at it. Your answer to that will tell you whether this is a live option.

Maybe there's something in your pitch to the agents which is a show-stopper. Agents generally won't tell you this when they reject you, because they're too busy. They figure that if you can't be bothered to learn how to pitch your manuscript correctly, they aren't going to be bothered to teach you. (If you were an agent getting 100 pitches per week, you'd probably feel exactly the same way.) But if you were to pitch your novel to an agent at a conference, you'd have his undivided attention for 15 minutes, and if there was some major show-stopper in your presentation, he'd be very likely to tell you. Maybe nicely, maybe bluntly.

Maybe you aren't querying the right agents. Agents have different likes and dislikes. If they don't do your kind of fiction, they aren't going to want to represent it. I don't know how well you've researched agents before sending them queries, so I have no way to know if you're trying to sell ice cream to Eskimos. But my agent friends tell me all the time that they get queries for projects that are OBVIOUSLY the wrong sort of project for them, and anyone who had done their homework would know this.

Maybe you just haven't sent out enough queries. Good agents often have full lists and just aren't looking for new authors. That's the bad news. The good news is that there are plenty of agents out there, and if your manuscript is any good, and if your query letter is any good, you'll eventually hook up with the right agent. But it may take some time to find him. This is one reason I asked about whether you've got any published novelist friends who could give you an opinion.

Querying agents is not a full time job, so you should be spending the bulk of your time working on your next manuscript.

If you've got a question you'd like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page and submit your question. I'll answer them in the order they come in.

Writing Conferences and Your Allies

Later today, I'll be sending out my e-zine with an article on the importance of having Allies.

What are Allies? Allies are your writing buddies. They are your equals or near-equals. They are the people who understand you better than anybody except your closest family members. (And they understand some things about you better than even your closest family members.)

You can't succeed in publishing these days without Allies. You need them to bounce ideas off of. You need them to weather the storms of rejection. You need them (probably most of all) when you get successful, because a real friend can tell you when you're starting to get full of yourself.

Where do you get Allies? You get them wherever you can find them. I made a list just now of my nine closest Allies. Of these, I met seven at writing conferences. The other two I met online, but I really only became Allies with them after meeting them in person at conferences.

I've often blogged about the importance of conferences, but usually I've talked about the fact that you meet editors and agents there, you learn how to behave like a professional, you get great training, and eventually you meet exactly the right agent or editor and make exactly the right pitch at the right time and you get the break you need and suddenly you get published.

But the unspoken secret that most professional writers know is that writing conferences are where you meet Allies. Allies are combinations of friends, professional colleagues, mentors, and shoulders to cry on. All in one.

Allies are typically writing in the same general niche that you are. The writing world has many niches. Romance writers. Mystery writers. Science fiction and fantasy writers. Etc.

Not everyone has exactly one perfect niche that they could fit into, but most writers do find one where they can belong. And most of their allies will also identify with that niche.

My own niche for most of the time I've been a writer has been the world of Christian fiction. It's not the perfect fit for me. Given how weird I am, nothing could be the perfect niche. But Christian fiction has a lot going for it (including double-digit growth in market share for most of the last two decades).

It's been a good place for me in many ways. My most recent book (WRITING FICTION FOR DUMMIES) doesn't fit that niche, and I have some novels planned for the future that also won't fit that niche, but that's OK.

Most of the teaching that I do is still at Christian writing conferences (although this has also been changing in the last few years).

I have two favorite conferences, the two places where I've consistently met with my Allies and found new ones: The Mount Hermon conference (in the spring of every year) and the American Christian Fiction Writers conference (in September of every year).

I taught again at Mount Hermon this year and it was incredible, as always. Mount Hermon is where I met my coauthor John Olson, and it's where some of my happiest memories in writing have happened. I had a great time this year, teaching a mentoring track with five students, hanging out with friends, meeting many new people.

I'm already gearing up mentally for this September, when I'll be teaching a major track (on that pesky Snowflake Method of writing a novel) at the American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) conference.

ACFW is an exceptional organization. It's roughly modeled on RWA (Romance Writers of America) in its organizational structure. ACFW now has about 2500 members, many of whom are published novelists.

Last year, the ACFW conference had about 600 attendees, and we expect more this year. It was terrific last year and it looks to be even better this year. You can make appointments with any of 26 different fiction editors. Or with any of 17 different agents. Just about every Christian publisher and every Christian literary agency tries to send somebody to ACFW.

If you happen to fit into the niche of Christian fiction, there is simply no better conference on the planet than ACFW. And yes, I'm biased. I've been on the Advisory Board of ACFW since 2004. I've watched it grow from a small cadre of mostly romance writers into a massive organization of writers of every kind of Christian fiction you can imagine.

One of the high points of the ACFW conference is the awards banquet. ACFW runs two major kinds of awards, the Genesis award (for unpublished writers) and the Carol award (for traditionally published books).

These awards have grown amazingly in prestige in the last few years. Winning in one of the Genesis categories is now considered one of the best ways for an unpublished novelist to get noticed by the publishers. And winning a Carol award is now considered roughly equal in prestige to winning a Christy award.

But for me, the highest of the high points at ACFW has consistently been the time I spend hanging out with my Allies. Writing is a lonely business. It's also a tough business, where you are only as good as your last book. Editors and agents come and go, but Allies accumulate.

As I noted earlier, my own career is trending more toward the general market. That's just because no one niche is perfect for me. I'll always be a multi-niche guy. The publishing world is changing and so am I. I expect that I'll always have one foot in the niche of Christian fiction, where so many of my friends and Allies live. (I should note that some of my Allies are also trending toward the general market, so no matter where I go, I'll never be without Allies.)

For the foreseeable future, I just plain can't imagine missing the ACFW conference every September. Which means I'll continue to see many of my Loyal Blog Readers there.

And for those Loyal Blog Readers who live in a different niche, it also means that there's a good chance that I'll see some of you as I continue to expand my footprint into other niches.

It's a big world out there. The more Allies you have, the happier you'll be and the better you'll do.

You can get more info on the ACFW conference on the ACFW web site.

What's a Newbie Novelist to Do?

The publishing world is changing so fast that a newbie novelist can't help feeling confused by all the options out there. Now that e-books are hot, hot, hot, should an unpublished writer try to self-publish herself or should she go with a traditional publisher?

Lisa posted this question on my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page:

Randy I want you to pretend you are a new author and would have your first book completed and ready to submit in six months to a year from today. Would you go the traditional route of getting an agent/publisher or would you self publish as an ebook and why would you choose that route?

This is the timeframe I am looking at and since the market is changing so rapidly I am concerned about going one way or the other and having it be the wrong decision. If I go the traditional route and ebooks take an even larger chunk of the market I may waste precious time marketing a book that no publisher will take because I am not a proven comodity.

If I go the ebook route and am not able to market it effectively my book could fail due to my lack of marketing abilities.

Lastly most of us dream of getting one of our creations turned into a movie, if don't go the traditional route have we made this dream impossible?

I love your ezine and like so many have writen my novel using the snowflake method and can't thank you enough!

Randy sez: Wow, Lisa, that's a tough decision. Two years ago, I'd have automatically said, "Go with the traditional, royalty-paying publisher, because your odds of making it big as a self-published novelist are roughly one in ten million. Whereas your odds of making it big with a traditional publisher are roughly one in a hundred thousand."

That was then. This is now. Now I'd say that your odds of making it big are about the same, either way: About one in a hundred thousand.

Of course, it's not necessary to "make it big" to be a happy, successful author. I define "making it big" to be this: Your first novel earns you more than $250,000.

A disclaimer is in order here. I don't know the real odds of making it big. One in a hundred thousand seems to be about the right order of magnitude. It's a guess. Might be high. Might be low.

What about if you lower your sights just a bit and think about earning, say, $5000 on your first novel? That's a lot easier, but it's still no cakewalk. Hundreds of novelists are going to be able to hit that level of success this year. Probably more than 1000. If we assume that there are 300,000 wannabe writers out there who want to publish their novel, then your odds of earning a $5k advance are probably one in a few hundred. It's doable.

Now the big question: What if those writers avoided the traditional publishers and went the e-book route? How would they do?

Absolutely nobody knows the answer to that question. My best guess is that some would do better, some would do worse, but on average, they'd probably average about $5k. With $2 royalty per book, they'd only have to sell 2500 copies in a year to do that. That's a couple of hundred copies per month. Maybe 7 per day. It's doable. A lot depends on their willingness to market themselves. Those willing to work hard could do Xtremely well.

What about the rest? What about the hundreds of thousands of wannabe writers who aren't yet writing well enough to sell to a traditional publisher? Would they do better by e-publishing?

That's easy. Of course they would. For these authors, the traditional route would earn them $0, and you can't do worse than that. Whereas by e-publishing, they could easily earn dozens of dollars.

So if your writing is not yet up to snuff, you can get in the game by e-publishing and you can earn a few bucks. You will almost certainly not earn very many bucks. But you will earn something.

Should you go that route? Here's my opinion: If you're not yet good enough to get published by a traditional publisher, then self-publishing won't hurt you, but it won't noticeably help you either. Your best bet is to put your energy into improving your craft.

In my view, self-publishing is most advantageous for the A-list authors. Authors whose name alone sells zillions of copies of their books. An author like that who self-pubbed at a price point of $2.99 would (I believe) see much higher sales than he would by publishing with a traditional publisher (who would want to price the hardcover at $26.99 and the e-book at $14.99.)

I'm guessing here, since I don't have hard numbers. Very few people have hard numbers. We'll know more when Barry Eisler's next novel comes out. (Barry recently turned down a 2-book deal for half a million dollars in order to self-publish.)

Self-publishing would also be a big advantage for a midlist author whose publishers haven't ever quite figured out how to market her. (There are tens of thousands of these authors out there.) Publishers do their best, but they have a lot of authors, and if they can't get a handle on how to market them all, you can hardly blame them.

A midlist author who took the time to market herself well would very likely do much better by self-publishing. How do I know that? Because there are a fair number of midlist authors who are very quietly doing exactly that RIGHT NOW. Read the last several months of Joe Konrath's blog to see interviews with a number of them, and references to many more.

Now finally, I'll answer Lisa's question, which was intensely personal. What would I, Randy, do if I were just starting out as a novelist? I'm going to assume Lisa means, what would I do if I had my current set of skills, which include the ability to write an award-winning novel and the ability to market myself online.

See, the answer to that is easy: I'd self-publish myself. Every publisher I've worked with has had a hard time figuring out how to market me. (Except for the publishers of WRITING FICTION FOR DUMMIES, who had no trouble at all figuring out how to market me, because I told them how.) I can't blame my other publishers. I didn't know how to market myself either, so I could hardly expect them to know. I'm a weirdo, and weirdos are hard to figure out how to market.

But now I do know how to market my work. Here, my weirdness actually helps. Weirdos are Xtremely easy to market, once you've figured out exactly what they are and why they're different from everybody else on the planet. So it makes perfect sense to e-publish myself in the current climate.

What do I mean by the "current climate?" I mean simply this. Currently, traditional publishers are paying no more than 25% royalties on e-books. (That's 25% of the money received from retailers, not 25% of the retail price of the book.)

Most authors consider that 25% rate to be unfairly low. Insanely low. I know that the publishers have their reasons for keeping the royalties at that level. But I still don't think it's a remotely fair royalty rate, and I don't know a single published author who thinks it's fair.

Eventually, I believe that publishers are going to raise their royalty rates on e-books. I have no idea when, but I think it'll happen. I don't know if they'll raise it to a fair level (which I would define to be somewhere north of 50% of what they receive.)

In the meantime, I think a midlist author can simply do better by e-publishing herself (if she has any marketing sense at all). That's the "current climate" in the publishing world. That could change tomorrow, or it might take ten years.

Here's something you probably learned in kindergarten which is still true: You can't make people play fair, but you can choose to play in a different sandbox.

So if you think you'll do better by not going the traditional publishing route, then you can try riding the e-ticket. And if you think you'll do better with a traditional publisher, then do so. You have options. Act in your own best interest, whatever that is.

Lisa also asked about movies. The fact is that your book has a vastly better chance of being made into a movie if it sells a lot of copies. So if you can sell a zillion copies of your book with a traditional publisher, then that's your route to moviedom. If you can sell a zillion copies by self-publishing, then that's your ticket. Either way, let's be brutally honest, a movie is a long-shot. Probably won't happen. Try not to have an aneurysm if it does.

If you've got a question you'd like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my "Ask A Question For My Blog" page and submit your question. I'll answer them in the order they come in.