Chuck Wendig's Blog, page 79

Assorted Thoughts On Impostor Syndrome, Gathered In A Bouquet

So, a few weeks back I did a couple threads on impostor syndrome, which is a very common thing that writers of all experience and comfort levels seem to experience — I certainly do, and you probably do, too. If you don’t, you might be a monster, maybe some kind of Yeti, so get that checked out. I figured I should grab these tweets and pop them somewhere, like, say, at this little blog, to share with those who maybe missed the threads on Twitter when they first appeared.

This is two separate threads, broken out by asterisks.

And asterisks, as you know, are also Cat Butthole Emoji. So, look for the trio of ASCII cat poopers, and you know when the next thread is beginning.

[Note: I’m not using Storify for these anymore because Storify is going away.]

* * *

I will now tell my own impostor syndrome story, as it relates to @neilhimself.

So, two years ago, I had the distinct pleasure of getting to speak in NYC as part of @MargaretAtwood‘s birthday event at the 92Y.

I was one of the speakers alongside a set of luminaries like @leverus, @erinmorgenstern, and @neilhimself — in the presence of @MargaretAtwood herself.

I mean, holy shit, right?!

Already I was going to the event with the utter certainty I didn’t belong there. I felt like a shadow on an X-Ray, a notable stain on an otherwise beautiful skeleton.

When I got there, arriving a bit early for the event, I went into the green room and I was alone.

Except for Neil Gaiman.

Neil Fucking Gaiman. Good Omens! Sandman! The Ocean at the End of the Lane! Stardust and Coraline and American Gods and Neverwhere and…

(C’mon. Dark poet, elegantly mussed hair, you know him, you love him.)

And I stood there for a moment, utterly frozen. He was, if I recall, looking at his phone.

And I said: “I can go.”

Because I thought, I should leave him alone! I don’t belong here. THIS IS RARE AIR AND I DO NOT DESERVE TO BREATHE IT.

And then he Tasered me and called security.

*checks notes*

Wait, no.

He smiled warmly and invited me in and was friendly and delightful and made me feel like I belonged. The other authors welcomed me too and it was awesome, even if I (even now!) still feel like a stowaway on that boat.

As writers we so often have the feeling like we are a Scooby-Doo monster about to be unmasked. I don’t think you ever really lose that.

BUT — and here is a vital part of the lesson — you can help diminish that feeling in other writers by making them feel welcome and a part of the tribe.

Recognize other writers feel like impostors too — and you can combat the feeling in yourself by helping them combat it when you welcome them. In this, community blooms.

You’ll never lose it. But you can help others feel like they belong. And when community grows you feel less alone.

At whatever level you are, other authors are likely to feel isolated and impostor-ish. You aren’t alone. And you can help them not be alone, too. Thanks to @neilhimself for doing exactly that for me, that day. @leverus, @erinmorgenstern and obviously @MargaretAtwood, too.

* * *

Can we talk a little [more] about impostor syndrome? Let’s talk about it. More specifically, let me tell you how I — well, it’s not how I defeat it, but rather, how I lean into it.

DOCTOR PENMONKEY: HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LEARN TO LOVE THE IMPOSTOR SYNDROME. Or something.

(This is a follow up somewhat to last week’s thread, which talked about the value of community in regulating impostor syndrome in others and, by proxy, in yourself.)

[Note, seen above]

So, the facts on the ground are, blah blah blah, impostor syndrome is bullshit, but most (all?) writers suffer from it regularly, you’re not alone, it’s totally normal, and so on and so forth.

But —

A lot of advice goes toward how you stop feeling it, which is not always helpful because — ennnh, you’re gonna keep feeling it. You just are.

Maybe you’ll experience it with less regularity, but it’ll be there. It’s like a ghost. You thought you got rid of the ghost but then you go to shower and BOO, the ghost is there, and you pee yourself a little, because ghost.

For me, writing is two things: it’s DOING THE WORK plus MITIGATING MY MINDSET. The first part is sitting down and gnawing your keyboard until words come out.

The second part is all in my head. And it’s a heady, gurgling broth of mental adjustment, from managing expectations to punching self-doubt in the kidneys to not comparing myself to others to not second-guessing myself and the book every 13 minutes, and so forth.

Part of the thorny tangle of my authorial brain-briar is the snarling snare of impostor’s syndrome. You feel like you don’t belong, as if at any moment someone will unmask you like a Scooby-Doo villain. AND I WOULD’VE GOTTEN AWAY WITH IT IF IT WASN’T FOR YOU MEDDLING BRAIN WEASELS

And yes, I used the Scooby-Doo metaphor in the above thread, but I like it, and I’m keeping it, so.

*tasers you*

Here, though, is how I lean into my impostor syndrome rather than suffering from impostor syndrome:

I learn to embrace the joy of the forbidden.

What I mean is this: impostor syndrome wants you to feel like a new kid in class, and every moment of your career feels like you entering the classroom and going to sit down at a faraway desk as everyone stares at you, The New Kid.

But there’s a different version if it, where you experience an illicit thrill of being somewhere you’re explicitly not supposed to be.

It’s like sneaking backstage at a concert. Or hanging out in your high school after hours, after everything is shut and everyone is gone. Or getting a tour of the chocolate factory OOPS one of the kids fell into the drink ha ha ha that’s okay she’s chocolate now, it’s fine.

There are a few real-world analogs to this I’ve experienced — in Hawaii, I’ve been to places where you’re not supposed to go, off-the-beaten-path, and you can see some truly delirious waterfalls, beaches, cliffs, if you do.

Or, having crashed a party or an event you weren’t invited to? Suddenly you’re shoveling down fancy horse-doovers and pretending like you’re supposed to be there.

Recently I got to sit in First Class for the first time, and it was like, exciting because I knew I didn’t belong there. I was like HA HA FUCK YOU I AM DRINKING SCOTCH BEFORE WE TAKE OFF AT 11AM THAT’S RIGHT, I’M A FLY IN YOUR MILK, RICH PEOPLE

I SEE YOU LOOKING AT ME, GUY IN THE THIRD ROW. IT’S ME, THE BARBARIAN IN ROW 4, BUDDY. HUGS AND KISSES, GUY-WHO-IS-PROBABLY-A-CEO. HA HA HA SUCK IT

And it’s that “ha ha ha suck it” that feels so good about being somewhere you’re not supposed to be. There is a great deal of freedom, in fact, in that.

Being the barbarian at the gate comes with a great deal of reduced responsibility. Because you’re breaking the rules. You’ve changed the game. You’re not supposed to be here…

…and yet, here you are.

Impostor Syndrome can either be you, The New Kid, nervous about not belonging. Or it can be you, the Party-Crasher, joyfully gobbling down fancy foods and enjoying the anarchy of your uninvited presence.

* * *

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DAMN FINE STORY: Mastering the Tools of a Powerful Narrative

What do Luke Skywalker, John McClane, and a lonely dog on Ho’okipa Beach have in common? Simply put, we care about them.

Great storytelling is making readers care about your characters, the choices they make, and what happens to them. It’s making your audience feel the tension and emotion of a situation right alongside your protagonist. And to tell a damn fine story, you need to understand why and how that caring happens.

Whether you’re writing a novel, screenplay, video game, or comic, this funny and informative guide is chock-full of examples about the art and craft of storytelling–and how to write a damn fine story of your own.

Out now!

Indiebound  |  Amazon  |  B&N

Flash Fiction Challenge: Song Lyric Story

Okie dokie, hawks and doves, here’s the deal this week:

I want you to pick a song you really, really like. A song that moves you at the lyrical level — THE WORDS REALLY SPEAK TO YOU, WOW, WHOA, JEEZ.

Now, take a slice of those words — a smidgen of the lyrics, a line, a short stanza — and use them as the theme or basis for a bit of flash fiction.

(Example: I’m a huge Concrete Blonde fan — and some of you are sadly asking, “Who?” — and there’s a line in the song “Take Me Home,” where Johnette Napolitano sings, Life is beautiful and terrible and strange. It’s not particularly specific, but I always find that line sums up life pretty well for me, and the world, and people in general, and I could handily write a bit of fiction based on that single bit.)

Length: ~1000 words

Due by: noon EST, Friday the 19th

Post at your online space.

Give us a link to it in the comments below.

Ask The Wendigo: My Advice To A Young Writer

An email rolled into my inbox right at the end of November, and the email said this:

Hey man, I’m a big fan of yours and have been following your stuff since I was a kid. I’m 24 now, have just finished my Master’s in Creative Writing, and am seeking an agent for my fantasy novel which I’ve just finished.

I’m a couple of rejection letters deep at this point. Disheartening, as I’m sure you can remember, but I’m far, far from giving up yet. I write every day and take the craft of writing more seriously than, well, almost everything.

I just wanted to reach out to you and maybe get some advice on what I should be doing at this point in my career. Making it as a full-time writer is on my mind every day; my eyes are firmly set on this goal and they haven’t drifted – though at times it seems like an impossible thing to accomplish. After years of practising (and sucking), I am now confident in my skills and my ideas. The experience of writing a novel has honestly shocked me – it’s been exciting, tedious, frustrating, and immensely fulfiling all at once.

And I thought, instead of responding to this person individually, I would respond to him publicly (I asked him if that was okay, to be clear).

My easy, fast answer to this is, “YES, GOOD JOB,” because on a cursory read, hey, everything looks good. He writes a lot. He’s finished a book. He’s mindful of the work and the career. He’s right on about writing a book — exciting, yep. Tedious, sometimes. Frustrating, ha ha, oh shit, yeah. Immensely fulfilling? I certainly find it so, sure.

But I have deeper thoughts, too, if he — and you — care to listen.

Here goes.

a) “…have been following your stuff since I was a kid.”

OKAY SLOW YOUR ROLL, YOUNG MC — you’re only 24 and have been reading me since you were a kid? I’ve only been writing novels for 5-6 years now, jeez. Though I did work in gaming for years before that… oh god I’m getting older, aren’t I? Oh shit. Ohhhh shit. *cups hands over mouth* *eyes wide as pancakes* *quiet panic ensues*

b) “I’m 24 now.”

Actually, let’s hover over that number — 24. You’ve just finished a novel. Good! GOOD. That’s commendable work. You may very well be a talented, eager, and capable lad. But I want you also to realize that your brownies might still need to stay in the oven a while. I don’t know this. I haven’t read your book. But I’d argue most writers don’t really come into their own until their 30s — that’s not to say there are not a number of wunderkind who karate kick open the doors of publishing with their spry, energetic 24-year-old bodies, but at 24, you’re probably very limited, yet, in what you know, in what you’ve done. At 24, your brain literally stopped growing only a couple-few years before, and your heart is still a kettle of excitable fish. You don’t yet know what you know. But you expect to know everything.

You believe, at that age, you should have the world saddled up and already frothy with both vigor and distance. You expect to be miles down the road.

And yet, you’re not.

Here, then, is what I consider to be one of the more crucial tests of being a writer — it is the ability to dig in, demonstrate patience, and keep doing the thing specifically because you realize you’re not ready to do the thing.

What I mean is this: a lot of writers, at this stage, do as you have done. But then this happens: I HAVE FINISHED THE BOOK. I HAVE RECEIVED THE REJECTIONS. I HAVE EXPERIENCED THE DISHEARTENMENT AND ENNUI. THE WORLD DOES NOT UNDERSTAND MY VERBAL AND NARRATIVE PUISSANCE, AND SO I SHALL REJECT IT BEFORE IT CAN REJECT ME FURTHER.

They fuck off.

They fuck right off, and choose not to admit that they’re unready, but rather, they project it onto the rest of the world. Publishing isn’t ready. The audience isn’t ready.

NOBODY UNDERSTANDS MY GENIUS, MAN.

Now, Guy Who Wrote Me That E-Mail, I’m not saying that’s you! But it is a trap some young writers fall into. I certainly almost fell into it myself. Even older, more experienced writers can experience it from time to time.

The greatest gift you can give yourself is patience — and, should patience fail, give yourself the gift of its darker, crankier cousin:

Bullheaded, spiteful stubbornness.

When one book fails, you write the next book.

As your failures pile up, you use that hill to climb to the next level.

c) “A couple of rejection letters”

Ha ha ha, ohhh, hah. Hah. Hee. Yeah. Yeaaaahhh. You’re going to get a lot more of those. You need to get a lot more of those. Rejections are normal. I still get rejections. Since publishing books I’ve written a couple books that just weren’t ready to go out into the world. I have so many rejection letters from my 20s into my 30s I could literally wallpaper my writing shed, inside and out. I could use them to make a siege engine. I could make ten thousand origami swans. I could burn them for warmth and it would provide me with seven years of reliable heat.

Rejections, however terrible, are your friend.

Rejections are scars; proof you’ve been fighting in the arena.

Let them frustrate you. Then do better the next time.

d) “Making it as a full-time writer”

This isn’t the worst goal, but it’s a distant one. Most authors have day jobs. I don’t, because I spent years in the freelance trenches, and once I ejected from that, I got really, really lucky. One day I may need to go back — though, let’s be honest, at this point I have winnowed my skill-sets down to “mashing action figures together to make them fight-and-or-fuck and then I write all fancy about it,” so I’m not sure what kind of job I could even get.

Regardless, let the goal be writing a good book and getting it out there.

Then do it again, and again.

Only worry about the “full-time author” thing when you have no other choice — when you are forced into a position where you can either keep the day job or keep writing books. When that happens, you disengage from the day-job, and you leap into the warm, dark void.

e) “I am now confident in my skills and ideas.”

Don’t be.

Oh, you should be able to write with confidence.

But you also shouldn’t be married to that confidence.

So, this is a weird one, because there’s a line here, and it’s a thin line, but you should try to tap-dance merrily upon it — you don’t want to be overconfident, and you don’t want to be flailing around a pool of under-confidence, either. Overconfidence means you make mistakes. It means you don’t grow because you believe you’re already all growned up. It means you view failure as someone else’s fault rather than your own. Under-confidence means you don’t think you can do it, so maybe, potentially, you just don’t do it.

Gotta walk that line, thin as it may be. Be sure in yourself while at the same time admitting you’ve still so much to learn. Writers possess a peculiar kind of ego, I find — we seem sometimes to have a big presence, a bloated ego, but soon you realize it’s more like a balloon than a wrecking ball. It’s puffy and large and ultimately empty inside. Better instead to have the ego of a small stone. A small stone is small, yes, and small in comparison to the many other stones around it. But it can also be potent in the right hands — it can break windows, it can be slung into the skull of a giant, it can, uhh, what else could you do with a small stone? Choke a bear? Let’s go with that: choke a bear.

The good news is, Dear E-Mailer, if you find the writing of a novel exciting, frustrating, tedious and fulfilling in equal measure, then I suspect you’ve at the very least got the proper mind-set to really do this thing. Just know that doing this thing is not a one-and-done measure.

It’s not about getting a degree and writing a book and then just cashing those sweet checks. It might mean getting a day-job. It might mean writing two, five, seven more novels before you really hit on your voice, your skills, or even figuring out what the fuck you actually want to write. It might mean growing up more than you already are. It might mean endless more rejections, failure after failure, where after each you have to salvage some lesson, some truth, some kind of windy wisdom that will fill your sails and move your boat further upon this seemingly silent and often still sea. It means doing the thing even when doing the thing is hard. Harder this time than the last. Maybe even harder the next time you try.

But try, you must.

Onward you go.

* * *

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DAMN FINE STORY: Mastering the Tools of a Powerful Narrative

What do Luke Skywalker, John McClane, and a lonely dog on Ho’okipa Beach have in common? Simply put, we care about them.

Great storytelling is making readers care about your characters, the choices they make, and what happens to them. It’s making your audience feel the tension and emotion of a situation right alongside your protagonist. And to tell a damn fine story, you need to understand why and how that caring happens.

Whether you’re writing a novel, screenplay, video game, or comic, this funny and informative guide is chock-full of examples about the art and craft of storytelling–and how to write a damn fine story of your own.

Out now!

Indiebound  |  Amazon  |  B&N

Macro Monday Returns To Regularly-Scheduled Shenanigans

No, that’s not a macro photo.

OR IS IT

MAYBE THAT’S A CLOSE-UP OF A CAR WINDSHIELD

AND THAT BIRD IS JUST REALLY, REALLY TEENY-TINY

YOU DON’T KNOW

Ahem.

Hi!

Welcome back! Slowly, but surely, we kick the cold machinery that runs this place, pouring boiling water on it to unfreeze its gears and flywheels. I’m not sure we’ll return to a full-bore schedule just yet, as I’m in the midst of finishing a novel (and a somewhat important one, it being the very last Miriam Black novel, Vultures), so bear with me as everything slowly grumbles and grinds to life once more.

Finishing the last book in a series is traditionally very difficult, as it is here — compounded by the fact this is not merely a trilogy, but rather, six whole books (and a novella, and a short story). Just as you want to stick the landing on the final act of any book, you really really want to stick the landing on the final act of six books, because holy shit. But have trust: the books have been building to something, and after the, um, ending of The Raptor & The Wren, you’ll get some sense of where it’s headed — at least, until I knock you off balance once again.

That seems then to be a good segue into a review of The Raptor & The Wren, this one coming in from Library Journal:

[Stuff cut out because slightly spoilery.] With a dark story line and an even darker protagonist, this vivid adventure takes readers on an emotional, violent ride. VERDICT: The fifth book in the series (after Thunderbird) drives further down the road into Miriam Black’s life: the trauma, the fears, and the forgiveness. It will please fans of Joe Hill and Joe Abercrombie. —Kristi Chadwick, Massachusetts Lib. Syst., South Deerfield

And, in case you missed it, Let’s Play Books is running a pre-order deal — buy the book, I’ll sign it, I’ll even personalize and predict YOUR DEMISE into the pages, and they’ll get it to you on release date with free shipping. Details here.

Or you can just come to the book launch at Let’s Play Books on 1/23.

Or or or you can come hang out with me at the Elgin Literary Festival (Chicago ‘burbs) on 1/26 – 1/27, should you so decide.

Let’s see. What else is a-brewing?

You will find that my Heartland series — think John Steinbeck’s Star Wars — is on sale for a buck per book for your Kindle, so, check out Under the Empyrean Sky, Blightborn, and The Harvest.

ANYWAY, here, have a tweet thread, goodbye!

“Put a jade egg in your hoo-ha.”

“Gwyneth, no.”

“Coffee enema.”

“Seriously, Gwyneth, c’mon.”

“Eat three rubies in a ruby smoothie and an elf will arrive to open your Sex Chakras.”

“What the fuck, Gwyneth.”

“Feed a stolen baby to a cunning wolf at midnight–“

“GWYNETH, NO.” https://t.co/POfpvQpGmY

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

“Steam the vulva.”

“Gwyneth.”

“Steam it. With moon-steam.”

“The fuck is moon-steam, Gwyneth.”

“It’s acai berries macerated in diamond powder and magic sugar and run through the bowels of a civet cat.”

“Gwyneth, this is cocaine.”

“Now put it all in your colon. All of it.”

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

“Transvaginal papaya cream.”

“Gwyneth, what does that even mean?”

“Irradiated lemur protein.”

“You’re just… you’re just saying things, now.”

“Activated urethra charcoal.”

“Gwyneth, what the hell — oh my god are those the launch codes?!”

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

“Make a cocktail of ghost peppers, cordyceps zombie ants, macaw sweat. Muddle with ancient lavender and mummy’s gauze. Pour over a poultice of forgotten aspirations. Put it in all your orifices. Pack it tight.”

“Gwyneth, can’t I just eat some kale?”

“Now you fight a jaguar.”

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

“Before you fight the jaguar, you must be naked. Except for this.”

“Gwyneth, is that a butt plug?”

“It is a lunar detox wand.”

“It’s a butt plug.”

“It is made from upcycled meteors.”

“Does it go in my butt?

“…”

“Gwyneth.”

“It goes in your butt.”

“Goddamnit, Gwyneth.”

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

“Just put it up there. To detox.”

“Gwyneth, where do you get this stuff?!”

“Goop.”

“What the shit is Goop?”

“It is a catalog. It is a way of life. It is primordial ooze that fills your negative psycho-spiritual nooks.”

“Gwyneth, are you high?”

“Yes.”

“On what?”

“On Goop.”

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

“Gwyneth, is Goop just cocaine?”

“No.”

“Gwyneth. We talked about this.”

“…”

“…”

“It’s cocaine and crime fraiche. And a little ayahuasca.”

“Jesus Christ, Gwyneth.”

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) January 7, 2018

Tansy Rayner Roberts: Five Things I Learned Writing Girl Reporter

From the award-winning author of Cookie Cutter Superhero and Kid Dark Against the Machine comes a brand new novella about girl reporters, superheroes, and interdimensional travel

In a world of superheroes, supervillains, and a machine that can create them all, millennial vlogger and girl reporter Friday Valentina has no shortage of material to cover. Every lottery cycle, a new superhero is created and quite literally steps into the shoes of the hero before them–displacing the previous hero. While Fry may not be super-powered herself, she understands the power of legacy: her mother is none other than the infamous reporter Tina Valentina, renowned worldwide for her legendary interviews with the True Blue Aussie Beaut Superheroes and her tendency to go to extraordinary lengths to get her story.

This time, Tina Valentina may have ventured too far. 

Alongside Australia’s greatest superheroes–including the powerful Astra, dazzling Solar, and The Dark in his full brooding glory–Friday will go to another dimension in the hopes of finding her mother, saving the day, maybe even getting the story of a lifetime out of the adventure. (And possibly a new girlfriend, too.)

I still have a lot to say about superheroes.

I talk about superheroes a lot, in my everyday life. My kids and borrowed kids have grown up in a world of superhero media and my longtime love of the genre has grown a lot over the last decade because of that.

When I wrote “Cookie Cutter Superhero” for the diverse YA anthology Kaleidoscope, I felt like that was my superhero story. It said a lot of things that were important to me, particularly about the role of women in super teams. It was short and punchy and done. Then I started to get comments about how much people wanted it to be a novel, which… okay, it’s lovely, I’m not going to whinge about that feedback. But I didn’t want to write a novel about superheroes. That’s why it was a short story.

Then the Book Smugglers slipped under my defences, with their Year of the Superhero short story theme and it turned out I had one more superhero story in me: Kid Dark Against the Machine, a love letter to teen sidekicks.

I was done. I was totally done. But then Ana and Thea asked me if I could write a novella set in the universe and… well. Okay. I still have a lot to say superheroes. But this time, I wanted to write about the women who report on superheroes, the love interests who don’t actually get to punch robots. Friday Valentina and her mother fell into my head as if Lois Lane herself had thrown a typewriter at me.

I may never be done writing about superheroes.

Everyone has a little smashed avo to unpack.

I’ve been making fun of the “Millennials are killing…” memes for almost as long as they’ve existed. Australia literally invented the story about how eating decadent brunches involving avocado toast was the reason that 20-somethings weren’t starting mortgages as early as their parents did.

A big part of Girl Reporter was about showing the generational divide in media… comparing an old school broadcast journalist’s career to that of a young vlogger with all the social media at her fingertips.

But I went too far. My editors pointed out that I had written myself into a binary corner in the first draft, with too much separation between new and old media as if they are different things (spoilers: it’s all media). Worst of all, I’d had Friday falling into the same habits as the older generation, sneering at the contribution of the younger women coming up after her.

I’d done the thing I usually criticized in others, going for the easy joke based on a stereotype. So that was embarrassing.

Rewriting is a pain, but it feels good to make the universe better, even when it’s your own fictional universe. Lift as you climb became Friday’s mantra.

Sometimes you have to steal from yourself.

Readers of my fantasy novel Ink Black Magic will laugh at me when they get to the scene where our heroes are transformed into retro parodies of their own superhero costumes. I didn’t realise I’d copied myself until it was TOO LATE to take that scene out because I loved it too much.

Kill your darlings? Pfft. I will defend my darlings to the death, even against myself. Fight me.

Sex is easy…

When my editors asked me to add a sex scene to tie the story up at the end, that part was easy. I adore writing sex scenes, and I wrote this one in a single sitting, without hesitation.

I once read a ‘how to’ guide on writing sex that said a scene can either be sexy or funny, not both. I have pretty much made it my mission in life to prove that advice wrong with everything I write. You learn so much from characters when you see how they turn each other on, and you learn even more when you find out what makes them laugh.

…but Romance is hard.

Writing romantic storylines are agony for me. I admire romance so much in other people’s books, but there’s something in me that always wants to undercut the moment, to leap over the tension and tropes and pretend they don’t exist. To skip to the good part, where the relationship is established and there are inside jokes and someone’s making a cup of tea.

Writing romance embarrasses me in a way that writing sex doesn’t, and I don’t know what that means about me as a writer! I’m still working on it.

What I do love to write is unromance. The characters that hook up because it’s convenient and need an intervention to figure out they’re genuinely into each other. The ones who aren’t ready to make the leap of faith yet (and oops, too late, the story’s over). The ones who admit they want to kiss each other right away, because who can be bothered with ‘will they, won’t they?’ Given a choice between star-cross’d lovers and the friends who stand on the sideline making fun of the star-cross’d lovers, I’ll take Beatrice and Benedick every time.

The central emotional relationships in Girl Reporter are about family – Friday’s baggage about her busy mother and unknown father, her intensely platonic ‘you’re my brother now, live with it’ friendship with Griff. Her romance with one of the female superheroes sneaked into the margins of the story, playing it cool, pretending it was no big deal.

(Turned out, it’s kind of a big deal!)

(I fell in love with them anyway)

There’s another sneaky romance in Girl Reporter too, which also manages to be both sweeping and epic. Trust me. You’ll know it when you see it.

* * *

TANSY RAYNER ROBERTS is an award-winning writer of science fiction, fantasy, feminist essays, and humour. She lives in Tasmania, Australia, with her husband and 2 superhero daughters.

Tansy Rayner Roberts: Website

Girl Reporter: Amazon | B&N

Awards Eligibility Post, 2017

I’m told now is the time to get those awards eligibility posts out there, and I don’t usually do these, but I’ve had a few people ask, so here we are.

I have complicated feelings about awards and eligibility posts — from me, not from you — because I like to think, if I wrote something really good, really impactful, you’d remember it. It would’ve stuck with you. That said, 2017 was the year that lasted ten years, and I have full-facedly forgotten what books actually came out in 2017. I only recently realized that Kameron Hurley’s STARS ARE LEGION came out in 2017? I thought it was 2016? (Probably because I read it in 2016, I think.) As a sidenote, I recommend that book and others over at the Book Smugglers.

So, given that two of my releases — Thunderbird and Empire’s End came out very early in 2017, I guess I’ll pop by and say, hey, those books.

I wrote them.

I hope you liked them.

I suspect there exists a zero percent chance anyone would nominate Empire’s End or the now-completed Aftermath trilogy for any Major Awards, because I don’t think that tie-ins tend to earn them. I am very proud of those books, though, and tried to own them and own the voice even while sharing this epic universe with all the Stars and all the Wars. And I do enjoy the fantasy of them earning a nomination, if only for the underwear-chafing that ensues amongst a certain bigoted cabal of very loud toilet-humans.

Bonus: I wrote a Jar-Jar chapter, and I think it is very good. Which I know, doesn’t sound like reality, but it is reality. It happened. Here we are.

Also, there’s Damn Fine Story, though I’ve no idea what award that would even go for, or if a book that talks about how the Emperor’s name is really a Star Wars version of “Steve” really deserves an award anyway.

So, there you have it.

Happy award season, word-nerds.

*stomps button with foot*

*trap door opens*

*quietly oozes into the open floor portal*

Flash Fiction Challenge: The Danger of Undeserved Power

AND WE ARE BACK.

*waves*

The holidays are over, and the time to commence with great wordsmithy is upon us. And by “great,” I mean, ennnh, you know, a thousand words or so. Let’s jump in with a theme, or, rather, the hint of a theme — the overall topic is the danger of undeserved power. What that means to you or says to you is yours alone.

Get writing.

Length: ~1000 words

Due by: Friday, January 12th, noon EST

Post at your online space.

Drop a link to it in the comments below.

Let Me Predict Your Death: Pre-Order The Raptor & The Wren

[image error]Psst.

You.

Yeah, you.

If you want to pre-order a signed copy of the fifth Miriam Black book, The Raptor & The Wren, then Let’s Play Books has you covered. They’ll ship it to you for free, and I’ll sign it, and for extra fun, if the book is personalized I will predict in it your demise.

*opens up trenchcoat*

*inside are various implements of murder: a machete, a blow-gun, a garden weasel, a Venus flytrap, a cokehead squirrel, a portable black hole that spins and spins and from which emanates dread whispers of your true name and social security number*

See, some may already know that when I sign the Miriam Black books in person, I sign them with a prediction (usually batshit absurd) of your death. (Translation: “nibbled to death by grackles,” not “I dunno, bowel cancer?”) I will do this to these books. You gimme a book to sign, I will sign it with a prediction of your gloriously bizarre end. Just as Miriam would, and could. (Note: This also applies to any of the Miriam Black books you buy, which are also part of the deal.)

Details here at the Let’s Play Books website.

Order by Tuesday, the 16th, to get the book by launch day.

Also, be aware that I’ll be at Let’s Play Books to launch the book on the 23rd, if you’re in (or can get to) the Lehigh Valley area of Pennsylvania. Details here at the bookstore’s Facebook page.

Publisher’s Weekly recently said of The Raptor & The Wren — “Wendig is in top form for his fifth horror-thriller… [he] expertly splashes Miriam’s considerable emotional pain across the page, never sparing her the price of her gut-wrenching circumstances, and closes with a shocking twist that is a true game-changer.”

The description of the book:

Miriam Black, in lockstep with death, continues on her quest to control her own fate in The Raptor and the Wren, the brand-new fifth book in the Miriam Black series.

Having been desperate to rid herself of her psychic powers, Miriam now finds herself armed with the solution — a seemingly impossible one. But Miriam’s past is catching up to her, just as she’s trying to leave it behind. A copy-cat killer has caught the public’s attention. An old nemesis is back from the dead. And Louis, the ex she still loves, will commit an unforgivable  act if she doesn’t change the future. 

Miriam knows that only a great sacrifice is enough to counter fate. Can she save Louis, stop the killer, and survive? 

Hunted and haunted, Miriam is coming to a crossroads, and nothing is going to stand in her way, not even the Trespasser.

It’s out January 23rd.

Vultures, the sixth and final Miriam Black book, releases January 2019.

Pre-order your signed, doom-inscribed copy at Let’s Play Books.

Writer Resolution, 2018: Write With Intentionality

Last year, the resolution for 2017 could easily be the same as 2018 — I told you to WRITE DESPITE, meaning, no matter how deep the world is buried beneath an endlessly burning pile of horseshit, carve out some time and some space and create something anyway. Because writing is a form of resistance. That one still works, should you so require it.

This year, the writing resolution is for me less political and more personal:

Write with intentionality.

What it means, is this: you can write a story by simply wanting to tell it, and then telling it. You can let the story be, if you will, a river into which you have been tossed. And this can feel right and proper, because a story feels like a winding, animated thing. It pulls you along, and ideally, pulls the reader along, too. A lot of storytelling comprises, as Bob Ross calls them, “happy accidents.” Meaning, moments and pieces that seem serendipitous, that seem born of some strange narrative alchemy that is not precisely in your control — you just slapped together a couple of elements and it made, I dunno, a new element, or a lightning strike, or a rainy day, or a magic wish-granting bear. (What, you don’t have a magic wish-granting bear? WRITE HARDER.)

Happy accidents are good. Storytelling should be that way, sometimes.

But it isn’t always that way, either.

In writing comics, I’ve learned the power of really taking the time to — for lack of a better term — practice your aim. Writing a novel often feels like spraying the pages down with machine gun bullets, just chewing prose until you rat-a-tat a story into the fucking wall. But comics, man, you have a narrative economy to deal with. You have so much of a page, and only so many ways to frame out what happens. It’s fucking hard. It’s like writing a kid’s picture book. You ever try writing one of those? Haha, you think they’re gonna be easy, because it’s like, 100 words. But turns out, making 100,000 words work is easier than making 100 work. Because in a hundred-thousand-words, you can spackle over a lot of dents. In a hundred, every tiny ding, every off-angle, every bit of dirt on the lens — it is keenly seen, diminishing the potency of the tale told.

Film, too, works this way: you only have two hours-ish, and you have to make each moment on the screen, with image and dialogue and music, a goddamn triumph. (Might I recommend EVERY FRAME A PAINTING? It is now retired, but the archive exists, and go right now to check out “Edgar Wright, How To Do Visual Comedy.”)

This year I wrote a monster-sized book. I’ve gone on about it (sorry!) because holy shit, I have never done this before. Before this year, the longest book I’d ever written was Zer0es, which was 125,000 words (and is on sale, along with Invasive, for $3.99 right now, prod, prod). The average Miriam Black novel is around 70-80,000 words. This book, Wanderers, ended up at 260,000 words, more than twice my longest book.

I have no idea what the final word count will be. I await edits from the (truly spectacular) editor, who I trust will help me shape this thing into the massive epic horror-ish siege weapon I need it to become. But in writing this thing, I tried to take it slow, even as I wrote it fast. I tried to pause with scenes and chapters and ask myself along the way: why is this here? Not only that, but what do I want this scene, this chapter, to do? Specifically, what do I want it to do to the reader? I want them to feel a certain way, so how do I engineer that feeling with story and character? Often, first drafts involve me rolling myself into a ball-shape and then pitching myself down the side of a mountain, screaming as I tumble unstoppably forward… but this time I tried to be more deliberate, more aware, of what I was doing, and how, and why. I tried to feel every step of the thing. That doesn’t mean I was successful, mind you. But it does mean that I tried to develop a keener, more highly-tuned sense of what the story was as I was writing it.

I tried to treat every page like a frame in a comic book.

What’s happening?

What’s the economy?

What’s the point? What am I saying? What should you be feeling?

And I would engineer it ahead, too — I would think, okay, this is a downbeat, I need an upbeat soon. This is some dark shit, how do I intersperse with humor for contrast? This next bit, I want to hurt the reader, I want to hurt ’em so damn bad, so how do I reach through the page, grab the reader by the heart, rip out the heart, then force them to re-eat their own heart again?

It was difficult.

Again, no idea if I was successful.

It’s like playing chess instead of checkers. It’s not chopping onions; it’s filleting a fish.

It helped me understand the story better, that intentionality. Usually it’s a thing I tend to in subsequent drafts, but now I try (key word: try) to get my hands around its throat on the first draft. I want a firm grip from the first page. Hell, the first line.

That’s not to say there are not, contained within, a number of happy accidents — there are, and ideally, always will be. (In Vultures right now I wrote a random Uber-driver character who I liked so much he has become a primary supporting character with agency to push and pull on the plot. He was an extra, but now he’s got a supporting role.) And it’s not to say it made a cleaner first draft; arguably, I think it made it messier, because if things didn’t quite fit for my vision of how a chapter or scene needed to go, I’d just scrap them, leaving the floor littered with plot scraps and swatches of ill-fitting narrative. But it helped me get a larger sense of the thing. And it helped me focus up what I’m trying to do, not just in the macro, but in the micro, too.

So, for me, and maybe for you, there’s power in writing with intentionality.

Decide how you want the reader to feel, and write that way.

Decide what you’re trying to say, and why, and then fucking say it.

Know the purpose, aim your voice, write with vigor and deliberation.

Take command. Be confident. Be willful.

And play, too, to find out how to make it work. Compose and recompose a scene. Go one way with it, then rewrite it another way. Learn to see how intentional changes make for a butterfly effect in the work. Learn the weave and the weft of it. Don’t just go down the river. Put objects in the water, see how fast they move. See if they block the flow or speed it up or break the river in twain.

Write with intentionality.

Try it out.

Let me know how it goes, how it feels, how it works.

And I’ll see you in 2018.

* * *

[image error]

DAMN FINE STORY: Mastering the Tools of a Powerful Narrative

What do Luke Skywalker, John McClane, and a lonely dog on Ho’okipa Beach have in common? Simply put, we care about them.

Great storytelling is making readers care about your characters, the choices they make, and what happens to them. It’s making your audience feel the tension and emotion of a situation right alongside your protagonist. And to tell a damn fine story, you need to understand why and how that caring happens.

Whether you’re writing a novel, screenplay, video game, or comic, this funny and informative guide is chock-full of examples about the art and craft of storytelling–and how to write a damn fine story of your own.

Out now!

Indiebound  |  Amazon  |  B&N

2017: The Year That Lasted Ten Years

A week or so before Christmas, I had the following thought:

What if we’ve ended the world and just haven’t realized it yet? What if we’ve entered the walking ghost phase of Humanity Poisoning, and we’re all walking around, toodling about on our social media and taking selfies with dogs, but we haven’t yet realized that the world has already gone beyond the brink and no part of it can be saved — but we just haven’t caught up to the reality yet? Meaning, we’ve flipped all the switches, spun all the dials, then caved in the control panel with a crowbar to make sure you can’t undo any of the settings. Electing the Fucking Asshole to the highest office of the land was like setting off a chain of dominoes, except the lead domino is actually just a giant concrete slab that crushes the entire domino chain before they can clickity-click-click together, one after the other. We careen toward economic depression and climate catastrophe and each mass shooting bigger than the last. And now we wait as this unfixable machine slowly rattles itself to pieces, largely unaware and at least vaguely, foolishly, spitefully optimistic even as we watch the pieces fall off or burn up.

I don’t believe it’s true, to be clear.

But I had the thought, and it’s a pretty good indicator of where my head is at in this, the Year That Took Ten Years, 2017.

I’ve been ping-ponging between optimism and pessimism in a nearly manic fashion. I began this year fearing the worst, but then took some comfort that the monsters that grabbed the wheel of our democracy are actually very, very stupid. My evaluation: they’re not good at it. They are comically inept, in fact, and it feels less like watching the Wehrmacht and more like watching ten clowns fuck each other in an over-inflated bouncy-house. Less like watching a finely-tuned military operation, and more like watching a drunk guy running around Disneyworld hitting people with a hammer. Less like pure evil and more like weaponized dipshittery.

On the other hand, the clown orgy, the hammer-smacking, the rampant dipshitty — well, like I said, it’s fucking rampant, isn’t it? It’s ceaseless. And that’s where my optimism suddenly rides the roller coaster into a deep valley — these people are stupid fucking assholes, yes, but they are tireless at it, and there are many of them, and though they are not efficient, they are still doing damage left and right, en masse. You let one guy with a hammer run around Disneyworld all day, he’s gonna brain a lot of people. And the news is just like, ohh, goddamnit. You open social media and it’s like, the Thing That Should’ve Been A Scandal Yesterday has now been replaced by seven more, and that last Shoulda Been A Scandal feels like it happened six years ago even though it happened six hours ago. And it’s so ceaseless I fear we’re becoming inured to it. “Ahh, I see President Asshole has changed the law so now it’s okay to enslave children at factories, that’s cool. And he personally killed the last bald eagle before tweeting his 3,412th tweet this week about how Hillary Clinton is the head of ISIS and how she and the FBI should be sent to a Moon Prison, except he misspelled Moon, which is a thing I didn’t know you could do. Cool. Everything’s cool. This is normal.”

(The last bald eagle’s dying whisper: “This is not normal.”)

Then I feel optimism again because despite the gerrymandering and suppression and winnowing of our voting laws, we’ve made some real strides there. I mean, Virginia? Alabama? (Yeah, know Doug Jones is a Milkshake Duck, but he’s a Democrat in Alabama, who’d you think he was gonna be?) But then it goes back to pessimism again because dear god how did the GOP ever support Roy Moore and wait how the fuck did they ever support President Asshole and god if I have to see Paul Ryan’s smug, gormless face anymore I think I’ll literally take a shit on the Constitution, and don’t even get me started on the melting candle that is Mitch McConnell and —

See what I’m saying? Back and forth, back and forth.

I guess that’s the best thing I can say about 2017, in terms of all that out there *gesticulates in the general direction of the real world* — at least it coulda been worse. That’s 2017, to me: it coulda, maybe shoulda, been worse.

Personally and professionally, I’m doing pretty all right.

I released Empire’s End, aka the last of the Star Wars: Aftermath trilogy (Print | eBook). It hit list, landing at number three on the NYT Bestsellers list, which truly proves the hater’s narrative that these books are terrible and don’t sell any copies. (Which I see is also the narrative now somehow surrounding The Last Jedi — the very bad movie that no one saw, and is so bad and is performing so poorly that it has buried Disney in piles of money, oh well, guess they won’t make Episode IX after all.) I think we’re supposed to do AWARDS ELIGIBILITY POSTS, and I’ll casually note that I’d love for the Aftermath trilogy to get an award nod somewhere, just to put a burr in the bigots’ panties. Sidenote: the Aftermath trilogy continues to pop up at the Locus Bestsellers List.

Also out: the fourth Miriam Black book, Thunderbird (Print | eBook). This did not sell as well as I’d hoped, and continues to kinda… poke along. As to why that is, I have some ideas, but I’ll unpack them at the close of the series in a year’s time. I’m proud of the book, regardless. I hope that over time it finds its audience. If you’re a Miriam Black fan, please: proselytize the books as you can! Books like that do well with word-of-mouth. So. OPEN MOUTH, SHOOT OUT WORDS.

Damn Fine Story (Print | eBook) also came out this fall, and has had sales that surpassed my wildest dreams — people seem to be responding to it very well, I think, and they seem to dig that it’s like Stephen King’s On Writing, if Stephen King were instead a drunken, lusty elk who had learned the Ways of Man and how to tell stories to his fellow elkfolk. The greatest compliment I get on this book is that people have read it and emailed me or tweeted at me to say that it helped them figure out a problem in their work, which is ideal. It’s the whole point!

Had a short story in From A Certain Point-of-View about Wuher, the cantina barkeep on Tatooine, and why he hates droids so damn bad. Very proud of it, even though it clearly proves that Lucasfilm would never hire me again after the dismal failure that was Aftermath (*snerk*).

I wrote some more comics: in this case, a relaunch and reboot of the Turok character for Dynamite. The last issue, number five, comes out this Wednesday, so if you want a dude kicking the ass of fascist dinosaurs, I got you covered. Lot of fun to write, and working for Dynamite has been a blast, so: woo and hoo.

Invasive was optioned for TV with David Slack and Jerry Bruckheimer, imagined as a show called Unthinkable — technically, it was optioned in 2016, but only this year did it start to get some power behind it. I’ve read the script this past week and it’s amazing, and I’m hopeful it lands on your television sets this next year if only because the script is so good I want to see it myself. (Slack is a fucking master.)

I wrote a 260,000-word book this year. That book is Wanderers.

I’m also currently finishing up the final Miriam book, Vultures.

And personally, family has been great — B-Dub continues to grow up and be an amazing little dude. He’s eager and engaged and he reads and writes, and he sits every day at his drawing table and draws amazing things. He plays guitar and can read music. We’re good here. I traveled a lot. California. Vegas. Utah. Colorado, NYC, Florida.

Unsure exactly what 2018 will bring.

Politically, probably more manure.

Though hopefully elections in 2018 will be decisive.

Professionally, well.

In January, The Raptor & The Wren lands (Print | eBook), and it’s a book I’m particularly proud of — Miriam Black’s penultimate adventure is an unholy ride, I hope. I wrote it in the midst of some serious insomnia last year, but honestly, I think that helped produce the book that it became.

In fact, hey, look, I just found the Publisher’s Weekly review:

“Wendig is in top form for his fifth horror-thriller (after 2017’s Thunderbird) featuring sharp-edged psychic Miriam Black, who has the power to learn how and when people will die. Miriam has discovered a new ability: she can control birds with her mind. It’s a neat trick, and one that will come in handy in the days ahead while she helps former FBI agent Thomas Grosky track down a killer who looks just like her and is a blast from her very messy past. Miriam’s search takes her into the darkest, most vicious depths of her talents, and back into the arms of former lover Louis Darling, whose eventual fate Miriam has already glimpsed. She knows fighting her destiny is a losing proposition, but she tries anyway, all while dodging a horrifying entity that wants to annihilate her. Wendig expertly splashes Miriam’s considerable emotional pain across the page, never sparing her the price of her gut-wrenching circumstances, and closes with a shocking twist that is a true game-changer.”

And then after that —

Then after that —

*checks notes*

*shakes notes*

*stares at them for a while*

I got nothing.

That’s it for 2017.

One book.

That’s because Wanderers, my Very Big Epic Horror-ish Novel, is now publishing in 2019.

This is a very new phenomenon for me.

One book? In one year? WHO AM I AND WHAT HAVE I BECOME

Real-talk, though: this is essential, because when I publish too many books traditionally, I end up competing with myself on bookshelves. That’s a hard, weird reality to being an over-productive writer. Bookstores can only carry so many of my books, and so — I make it harder for them to do this. That’s just the reality of physical shelf-space, sadly.

So, I’ll take 2017 and just write more fucking books, I guess. Comics, too, I hope.

As is my way.

Anyway.

That’s it for me. I’ll be some places, if you care to find me.

I hope you’re well.

Let’s kick 2017 to the fucking curb and let’s make 2018 better than the last. Which means we have to be invested and involved. It means we gotta work toward the light and fight the dark. It means we have to champion causes and our principles even when it hurts, even when it’s hard. It means we have to vote. It means we have to create, not destroy. It means we have to share love, even if we have to do so aggressively and in the face of danger and oppression. We have to see our privilege and demand restitution. We gotta do better. So let’s do better, together.

Fuck off, 2017.

Hello, 2018.

See you on the other side, my precious muffins.

P.S. no matter what happens, at least we still have dogs, btw

P.P.S. me and drunken bad-ass Kameron Hurley show up on the Ditch Diggers End-of-Year podcast with Mur Lafferty and Matt Wallace, so give that shit a listen, you silly little wizards, you