Kenneth Atchity's Blog, page 182

Synopsis? Teaser? Timeline?

Agents and publishers may ask you for a synopsis, or a teaser, or a timeline. What do these terms mean?

A “synopsis” is a relatively brief narrative outline of your story, from first to last. It’s a detailed description of the action line and character development, especially for the major characters. The purpose of the synopsis is to provide its reader with an overview of what the story’s all about in enough detail that he or she can be confident that the story makes sense—that all its parts fit together.  Note that a synopsis is not a “treatment.” A treatment is a dramatic narration of the story elements to convince the reader of its film or television potential, forcefully emphasizing only highpoints of drama and character; while a synopsis is more matter of fact and thorough. The synopsis of Doug Fetterly’s Breach of Justice sounds like this:

LISHAN AMIR, an Ethiopian born child of a black father and white mother, is an ambitious and dedicated newspaper reporter at the Washington Mirror in D.C. She’s attempting to

expose the corrupt connections between big Food Co. mogul JACK CONNER and top FDA officials. Her bad tempered editor, JERRY, who’s in Conner’s pocket, is doing everything he can to keep her story out of the paper.  
   
Lishan illegally lives in an upscale student housing apartment building thanks to her ex-professor, ERIK, who manages the building and lies about her eligibility. They have a troubled relationship, BFFs with occasional sex that might be more, but she constantly sleeps around and he’s jealous. She’s equally jealous of him, leading to a long cycle of fights and reconciliations in between her investigation activities. They also discuss the crimes of the FDA.


Her search for dirt on the FDA leads her to a book banned by the FBI, whose author, FRAZIER, is in prison for defamation of character against Conner. She reconnects with an old colleague she slept with and dumped, RAFAEL, and sleeps with him again unaware he’s still mad. He steals the hard to find book to spite her…

A “teaser” (aka “sell-sheet”) is a one-page-maximum pitch of your story that leaves the reader longing to read the whole story. Where a synopsis is complete, a teaser is not—a teaser leads the reader to wanting to read the whole manuscript. Here’s how the teaser for “Dark Surf,” a film we’re developing, begins:

Great white sharks are on the attack on beaches around the world, and a surfer falls bloody victim in a Southern California paradise.  But, something is suspicious, and beautiful Leilani Marley, a former surfing champion, is now an oceanographer investigating the attacks.  She runs into Tristan and the Nomads, night surfers who seem to show up within days of a shark kill.  Infatuated by his sheer power and good looks, Leilani begins to fall for Tristan and soon


learns his true identity as the creator and leader of vampire sharks, who are the guardians of the oceans and who perform righteous kills on any who pollute the waters or threaten its species.  He has loved her since saving her life off a reef accident twelve years earlier in Hawaii.  She bonds with the Nomads to fight the rogue vampire sharks who are killing for blood with a view to dominate the oceans, and possibly the entire world. ..

A “time-line” simply lays out the events of your story by reference to the story’s own clock or to the clock on the wall. In other words, a time-line may reflect the fictional world of a story or the real world surrounding it. Like a synopsis, the time-line contains all the chronological elements from first to last. Here’s an example of the first few lines of a time-line from the film in development, “Andrew Jackson—Battle for New Orleans”:

1814
March, Northern front – Admiral Alexander Cochrane assumes command of the British North American Station based in Halifax.

March 27, Southern front – U. S. force under General Andrew Jackson surrounds and crushes the Creek Indians at their stronghold at Horseshoe bend in Alabama effectively ending the Creek Indian War, and eliminating the Indians as allies to the British army.

April 1, Paris – Napoleon abdicates ending the Continental War freeing British troops for the American War.

May 10, Southern front – British party lands at Pensacola to recruit and supply Creek Indians that had escaped Horseshoe Bend for their upcoming offensive to capture Mobile and New Orleans.  Captain Thomas Woodbine in charge and is to report to Admiral Cochrane.

May 28, Southern front – After defeating the Creek Indians Andrew Jackson is commissioned in the regular army to command the 7th Military District, which included Tennessee, Louisiana, and the Mississippi Territory.  

June 20, Northern front – Cochrane submits to the Admiralty, his plan for the invasion of United States including a southern campaign to seize New Orleans.

July 8 – In New Orleans, Pierre Lafitte is arrested and jailed for smuggling.  Secretary of the Navy, William Jones orders Commodore Patterson to crush the pirates’ operations at Grande Isle and orders the schooner Carolina to New Orleans for that operation.

August 8 – British and American negotiators begin talks in Ghent, Belgium….

I hope these definitions help you understand terms you’ll definitely hear at some point as your career progresses.

Reposted from My Addiction Books by  Nadine Maritz

Larry D. Thompson, Author of The Insanity Plea Interviews on Laurie's Thougts and Reviews

INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR LARRY D. THOMPSON
How did you start your writing career?
 
I started my writing career as a failure.  I started my first novel about ten years ago, finishing it about two years later (still working my day job).  Thinking I had written the great American novel, I sent it to agents and publishers and was rejected by all.  So, my wife and I promoted it and I finally landed my agent who sold the paperback rights to Tor/Forge.  That led to my next two being published by St. Martin’s Press and I was on my way. .

Tell us about a favorite character from a book.

Jackson Douglas Bryant is the protagonist from my last novel.  He’s a poor boy who became rich as a plaintiff lawyer and returned to his hometown of Fort Worth and started doing pro bono legal work from his RV parked on North Main in a poor section of town.  In Dead Peasants, he must figure out the connection between seemingly random murders throughout North Texas before his love interest is killed.  Readers liked him so well that my next story will be about him.


Where do you dream of traveling to and why?

My wife and I want to rent an apartment on the Left Bank iin Paris for six months where I will write a novel.  If it was good enough for Hemingway, it should work for me.

Tell us about your current release.

The Insanity Plea is the story of Wayne Little, a young Houston lawyer who must defend his older brother, a schizophrenic street person who is in the wrong place at the wrong time and is accused of a murder he didn’t do.  The physical evidence is so overwhelming that the plea must be “Not Guilty by reason of insanity.” Wayne enlists the help of his friend, Duke Romack, former NBA star turned criminal lawyer.  When Wayne and Duke review the evidence, they conclude that they either find the real killer or win the plea of insanity.  The former may be a mission impossible since the killer is the most brilliant, devious and cruel fictional murderer since Hannibal Lecter.  The chances of winning an insanity plea are equally grim. The story combines a legal thriller with tracking a serial killer and takes the reader on one helluva ride, right up to the last page and sentence.  . 

Tell us about your next release.

It’s in its embryonic stages, but I’m going back to Jack Bryant, the protagonist in Dead Peasants because my readers wanted to read more about him.

Has someone been instrumental in inspiring you as a writer?

Thomas Thompson was my brother who died way too young.  But he was a best-selling true crime author in the eighties, best known for Blood and Money and Serpentine.

Who is your favorite author?
 
Other than my brother, it would be Ken Follett.

What was your first sale as an author?

So Help Me God

When in the day/night do you write? How long per day?

I’m a morning writer.  I’m still a full time trial lawyer; so, I write a couple of hours in the morning if I’m not in trial and several hours on Saturdays and Sundays.

What is the hardest part of writing your books?

Re-writing and re-writing and re-writing until I am almost sick of my own creation.


Synopsis:

A young nurse is savagely killed during a pre-dawn run on Galveston’s seawall. The murderer slices her running shorts from her body as his trophy and tosses the body over the wall to the rocks below. As dawn breaks, a bedraggled street person, wearing four layers of old, tattered clothes, emerges from the end of the jetty, waving his arms and talking to people only he hears. He trips over the body, checks for a pulse and, instead, finds a diamond bracelet which he puts in his pocket. He hurries across the street, heading for breakfast at the Salvation Army two blocks away, leaving his footprints in blood as he goes.

Wayne Little, former Galveston prosecutor and now Houston trial lawyer, learns that his older brother has been charged with capital murder for the killing. At first he refuses to be dragged back into his brother’s life. Once a brilliant lawyer, Dan’s paranoid schizophrenia had captured his mind, estranging everyone including Wayne. Finally giving in to pleas from his mother, Wayne enlists the help of his best friend, Duke Romack, former NBA star turned criminal lawyer. When Wayne and Duke review the evidence, they conclude that Dan’s chances are slim. They either find the killer or win a plea of insanity since the prosecution’s case is air tight. The former may be a mission impossible since the killer is the most brilliant, devious and cruel fictional murderer since Hannibal Lecter. The chances of winning an insanity plea are equally grim.

It will take the combined skills of the two lawyers along with those of Duke’s girlfriend, Claudia, a brilliant appellate lawyer, and Rita Contreras, Wayne’s next door neighbor and computer hacker extraordinaire, to attempt to unravel the mystery of the serial killer before the clock clicks down to a guilty verdict for Dan.

The Insanity Plea is a spell-binding tale of four amateur sleuths who must find, track and trap a serial killer as they prepare for and defend Wayne brother who is trapped in a mind like that of John Nash, Russell Crowe’s character in A Beautiful Mind.

Combining legal thriller with tracking a serial killer, Thompson once again takes the reader on a helluva ride, right up to the last page and sentence.


Larry D. Thompson is a veteran trial lawyer and has drawn on decades of experience in the courtroom to produce riveting legal thrillers. After graduating from the University of Texas School of Law, Thompson founded the Houston trial firm where he still serves as managing partner. The proud father of three grown children, he lives and works in Texas but spends his summers in Colorado, where he crafts his novels and hikes the mountains surrounding Vail. His greatest inspiration came from Thomas Thompson, his brother, who wrote many best-selling true-crime books and novels. 

Reposted from Laurie's Thoughts and Reviews

 

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Guest Post: Getting Notes on Your Script: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly by Dennis Palumbo

When I was a screenwriter in Hollywood, I hated getting notes from producers, directors or studio execs---even if they were good, cogent and likely to improve the script. No, especially if they were good, cogent and likely to improve the script.

Now, after 25 years working as a therapist with writers, I’ve learned that this seemingly contradictory attitude is not unique. For many of my patients, receiving “good” notes on a piece of writing---whether from an agent, editor, producer or studio---doesn’t necessarily elicit better feelings than getting insipid, beside-the-point notes. Which doesn’t, on the surface, seem to make sense.

Or does it? Let’s back up. For most professional writers, a good script or novel or play is the result of total immersion in the “world” of the story: the narrative, characters and thematic aspects seem all of a piece. At some point in the writing, these elements begin to have a kind of inevitability, an internal logic and trajectory beyond the control of the writer.

As with the fabled “runner’s high,” this is a situation familiar to most writers and a welcome indication that the writing is coming together well. The downside of this is that, when finished, the draft has a sense of completeness. It’s not just what it is; it seems to be exactly what it should be.

The isn’t mere hubris on the writer’s part: she legitimately feels she’s been on a journey, that she’s gone somewhere and back. And that this piece of work is the result.

Then the project gets handed in. After which, as every writer knows, things can get strange. (I’m reminded of a comment by noted screenwriter Fredrick Raphael: “You’d better have a good time writing the first draft. That’s the last moment of pleasure you’ll have on the project.”)

Anyway, the point is, now the writer has to get notes on the script. Which means, now the real work begins.

Let’s say the notes from the producer or studio head (or, God help us, the star) are bad: i.e., totally trashing the material, and/or coming up with alternative ideas that take the story far afield from anything halfway coherent or interesting. We’ve all been there. And as bad as this feels, as frustrating and disheartening as the experience can be, at least there’s the sense that you’re fighting the good fight. You’re trying to write well, but unfortunately you’re surrounded by idiots.

On the other hand, let’s say the notes are good: i.e., the producer or agent responds positively to the material, truly understands the narrative and theme, and seems to be a genuine fan of the writing. But here, to your utter dismay, comes a list of suggestions that actually, if followed, would make the story better! And your heart sinks.

Why? Because, if you’re a good writer, you have to acknowledge the wisdom of these suggestions. They do, in fact, clarify the conflict, or deepen the characters, or improve the pacing. The professional part of you can’t ignore the aesthetic or pragmatic logic of these notes.

Which means you have to take a deep breath, squint hard at what you believed was the “finished” project, and figure out a way to once again enter its internal world. If the story and characters felt at all organic and inevitable as you were writing them, nothing is harder than deconstructing them and turning them into something else.

First of all, what Faulkner called a writer’s “precious darlings”---those cherished lines of dialogue, or scene descriptions, or surprise twists---often have to go. Plus, the moment you start exploding, reshaping or eliminating one segment of the script or novel, this automatically affects all the other elements of the material, often necessitating losing really good stuff in the process.

Finally, you have to muster the will and emotional involvement to put yourself in the open, creative space to inhabit the story’s world again. In other words, you have to take another journey there and back, while suppressing the feeling that you’re invalidating the initial journey you took. Your brain says these new ideas will make the project better. Your heart says, “Been there, done that.”

That said, how does a writer deal with this dilemma? One way to look at it is to remember that creativity happens in the here and now. That the experience you had writing the earlier draft, regardless of your belief in the finished product, took place in the past. This new draft is a totally different experience. You aren’t, in fact, making the same journey, but rather embarking on a new one. One that includes, inevitably, your feelings about and loyalty to the first journey, but that now has the potential to strike new creative chords in you.

Because, in the final analysis, creative work is never “done.” As more than one artist has pointed out, projects are never finished---they’re abandoned. They’re taken to a particular end-stage. Then, if revisited by the artist, taken to a new stage. The artist, too, has changed in the interim and can possibly bring this newness to the next step in the process.

From my perspective, this is the best way to accept and appreciate the “good” in good notes. Hell, it might be the only way!

Reposted From Hollywood on the Couch

Book Hostage Features Write: Quotes by Kenneth Atchity

Book Promotion: Write: Quotes by Kenneth Atchity
Today’s book promotion comes from Kenneth Atchity and his book called Write: Quotes. If you like Educational or Reference books, take a look below. You might just find another book for your “to read” pile!
Book: Write: Quotes
Author: Kenneth Atchity
Genre: Education & Reference
Publisher: Storymerchant
Format: Paperback, ebook
Release Date: 11/1/2013

Summary:
Memorable Words from Writers and Other Creators
This serendipitous collection of quotes spans inspiration, the creative process; the imagination; language and style; wit and entertainment; and what writers have to say about success, failure, editors, critics, readers, and audiences. An indispensable addition to your writer’s book shelf.

The Author:
Kenneth Atchity’s Website: Here
Kenneth Atchity’s Twitter: Here
Kenneth Atchity’s Facebook: Here
I want to thank Kenneth Atchity for allowing me to promote his book on my blog. I hope this post has inspired you to go out and read Write: Quotes!

Reposted from Book Hostage

Book Hostage Featurees Write: Quotes by Kenneth Atchity

Book Promotion: Write: Quotes by Kenneth Atchity
Today’s book promotion comes from Kenneth Atchity and his book called Write: Quotes. If you like Educational or Reference books, take a look below. You might just find another book for your “to read” pile!
Book: Write: Quotes
Author: Kenneth Atchity
Genre: Education & Reference
Publisher: Storymerchant
Format: Paperback, ebook
Release Date: 11/1/2013

Summary:
Memorable Words from Writers and Other Creators
This serendipitous collection of quotes spans inspiration, the creative process; the imagination; language and style; wit and entertainment; and what writers have to say about success, failure, editors, critics, readers, and audiences. An indispensable addition to your writer’s book shelf.

The Author:
Kenneth Atchity’s Website: Here
Kenneth Atchity’s Twitter: Here
Kenneth Atchity’s Facebook: Here
I want to thank Kenneth Atchity for allowing me to promote his book on my blog. I hope this post has inspired you to go out and read Write: Quotes!

Reposted from Book Hostage

EHuman Dawn by Nicole Sallak Anderson Reviewed by Tome Tender

Cue the music, “In the Year 2525…” and strap in for a trip to future Earth, the year, 2242 where mankind has conquered the ills and frailty of humanity by virtually wiping out what makes us human. The World Government has created a way to take the essense of the human mind and implant it into a virtually indestructible android body. Get tired of that one? Get a new body, the catch? All memories of your existence, all of your personal memories are erased and poof, you are another eHuman. But is this true freedom of choice? Is there more to the government’s involvement than meets the eye? Is there any true privacy?

Adam Winter, an investigative reporter, has never changed his body in over 200 years, and he questions the truths the people are told. Is it possible that the rumors of a resistance living outside the “safety” of the cities actually exist? Is it true the government plans to cut off the power of the life-sustaining Neuro system the population relies on daily? Have big business and big government gone in league with each other to betray ehumanity? Will the eHuman, Dawn show Adam the path to the truth? Was it fate or Destiny that will bring these two together in such dire times?

eHuman Dawn by Nicole Sallak Anderson is a startling look at a future that is as bleak as any time known to mankind. As she builds her dystopian world, the façade of peace and prosperity hide the ugly underbelly of a government gone wrong. Her world is painted with bold words, brilliant imagination and creates a thought-proving look at a “what if” future. Her characters come to life with their thoughts, their questions, their agendas and that never-ending fight of good vs evil as she allows her story to unfold at a steady pace. I was fascinated by the plot, the concept and the characters, not to mention the action that ramped up the pace to warp speed.

Are you a Sci-fi lover? Do you like intrigue or mystery or even the thought of the strength of a few who want to better things for the masses? There is a lot to think about in eHuman Dawn PLUS great reading!
 

Synopsis:

The Great Shift is coming.... are you ready to jump?

Fast forward to the year 2242--a world in which death, disease, war and famine have been conquered, and where everything, including humans, are devices on Neuro, a complex network operating system that is controlled via human thought. Adam Winter has lived for nearly two hundred years in an eHuman body--a man of metal, fiber optics and plastic, on a world where no one dies and no one is born. Paradise on earth--until Adam discovers that the World Government is cutting power to entire cities, and his own city is on the list!

Trapped in a body that must recharge on the network, Adam is swept up into the underworld of an eHuman anti World Government resistance, led by Dawn, the very first eHuman created. While the Resistance wages war against those in power, Dawn reveals to Adam a shocking secret about their past that not only bonds them together, but is also the Resistance’s ticket to gaining control over Neuro and taking down the World Government once and for all. Caught between the past and the future, Adam must rise up, claim his inheritance, and face his destiny-- before eHumanity is powered down, forever. 

Reposted From Tome Tender

EHuman Dawn by Nicole Sallak Anderson

Cue the music, “In the Year 2525…” and strap in for a trip to future Earth, the year, 2242 where mankind has conquered the ills and frailty of humanity by virtually wiping out what makes us human. The World Government has created a way to take the essense of the human mind and implant it into a virtually indestructible android body. Get tired of that one? Get a new body, the catch? All memories of your existence, all of your personal memories are erased and poof, you are another eHuman. But is this true freedom of choice? Is there more to the government’s involvement than meets the eye? Is there any true privacy?

Adam Winter, an investigative reporter, has never changed his body in over 200 years, and he questions the truths the people are told. Is it possible that the rumors of a resistance living outside the “safety” of the cities actually exist? Is it true the government plans to cut off the power of the life-sustaining Neuro system the population relies on daily? Have big business and big government gone in league with each other to betray ehumanity? Will the eHuman, Dawn show Adam the path to the truth? Was it fate or Destiny that will bring these two together in such dire times?

eHuman Dawn by Nicole Sallak Anderson is a startling look at a future that is as bleak as any time known to mankind. As she builds her dystopian world, the façade of peace and prosperity hide the ugly underbelly of a government gone wrong. Her world is painted with bold words, brilliant imagination and creates a thought-proving look at a “what if” future. Her characters come to life with their thoughts, their questions, their agendas and that never-ending fight of good vs evil as she allows her story to unfold at a steady pace. I was fascinated by the plot, the concept and the characters, not to mention the action that ramped up the pace to warp speed.

Are you a Sci-fi lover? Do you like intrigue or mystery or even the thought of the strength of a few who want to better things for the masses? There is a lot to think about in eHuman Dawn PLUS great reading!
 

Synopsis:

The Great Shift is coming.... are you ready to jump?

Fast forward to the year 2242--a world in which death, disease, war and famine have been conquered, and where everything, including humans, are devices on Neuro, a complex network operating system that is controlled via human thought. Adam Winter has lived for nearly two hundred years in an eHuman body--a man of metal, fiber optics and plastic, on a world where no one dies and no one is born. Paradise on earth--until Adam discovers that the World Government is cutting power to entire cities, and his own city is on the list!

Trapped in a body that must recharge on the network, Adam is swept up into the underworld of an eHuman anti World Government resistance, led by Dawn, the very first eHuman created. While the Resistance wages war against those in power, Dawn reveals to Adam a shocking secret about their past that not only bonds them together, but is also the Resistance’s ticket to gaining control over Neuro and taking down the World Government once and for all. Caught between the past and the future, Adam must rise up, claim his inheritance, and face his destiny-- before eHumanity is powered down, forever. 

Reposted From Tome Tender

Mysteries Galore Reviews Art Johnson's The Devil's Violin

Reviewed by Dianne Woodman



The Devil’s Violin begins with an act from the past that sets in motion an unexpected chain of events tying all the players involved in the story together. Niccolo Paganini, a world famous violinist termed by many as the Devil because of his extraordinary skills, is on his deathbed in Italy. Niccolo has promised his cherished violin to the mayor of Genoa so that it can be put on display in the museum. However, he wants the 1742 Guarneri to remain in the family, so he hides it along with secret documents that are inside the case under the floorboards in his apartment and leaves an exquisitely crafted forgery of the instrument for the museum. He plans to tell his son where the real violin is hidden, but dies without revealing his secret.

The story then moves forward to the present day in Los Angeles. Max Pendleton, a Hollywood film producer, hires two top-notch thieves to steal the violin from the museum. Plans for keeping the heist under wraps go slightly awry when a violinist in Italy is found with his throat cut, and the man fleeing the scene is described as a man dressed all in black. This act triggers a manhunt led by Special FBI Agent Chris Clarke for the man in black, since the MO at the murder scene is consistent with a contract killer who has eluded the FBI for years.

Art Johnson has artfully integrated believable and relatable characters into a story filled with violin history, secret societies, deception, intrigue, greed, and non-stop action that keeps the reader invested in the outcome of the story. The tension builds throughout the novel culminating in a nail-biting confrontation in Italy between the players who have a vested interest in locating the violin. There are surprising twists and turns in the plot that makes for an engrossing mystery thriller. The few minor grammatical mistakes do not detract in any way from the overall enjoyment of the story.

The author has left it open for this book to be the beginning of a highly entertaining and captivating series. There are unanswered questions involving a couple of the key players who assisted the FBI, and Special FBI Agent Chris Clarke has a new case to solve.

Reposted from Mysteries Galore

Connecting the World in film - Ken Atchity on My Addiction Books

Ken, as usual it’s a huge honour to host you on M.A. With all that’s happening in our local film industry, I thought it good to do an interview on America’s interest towards filming in S.A.

Filming in South Africa appears to have blossomed exponentially within the past two to three years. I think for me, being an absolute outsider in the industry, it appears that interest has deepened since the release and success of District 9.  What is your take Ken?
I think the interest has always been there, and in direct proportion to the SA Government’s film incentive program. Filmmakers throughout the world choose locations not only for their natural beauty and appropriateness but also because a goodly portion of the film’s budget is covered by local governments wanting to attract the business. That’s why so many films are being made in Canada, Louisiana, Georgia—and Bulgaria.
We started 2014 off with hype around parts of the new Avengers being shot in Johannesburg, with the balance of interest moving towards the story about Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt coming to stay close-by for a few months. Does America have a new found interest towards filming in SA?
Again, the answer lies in the government’s incentive program.
If you look at one of our latest films, Konfettiand our own actress Casey B Dolan, who just won the Best Actress award at the Julien Dubuque International Film, it’s clear that local South African films are being nominated for notable awards. What does this mean for our local film industry?
It adds to its credentials, though awards aren’t as important to us as the financial and physical conditions of the shooting location.
From my point of few, it appears as if Australian actors have saturating the American film industry. If you think of Hugh Jackman, Cate Blanchett, Nicole Kidman, Jai Courtney, the dearly departed Andy Whitfield and our favourites Chris and Liam Hemsworth – do you think South African talent could be looking at similar exposure?
It could be, if your government continues supporting film-making, thereby introducing your talent to the world market. That’s how the Australians broke into the global awareness—so many films were being made there, and it was economically feasible to hire local talent in addition to the stars we drag along from Hollywood. Now some of those stars—like Jackman and Kidman and Crowe—are from Australia. No reason why SA shouldn’t follow the same pattern.
Based on everything that’s happening right now, where do you see the future for South Africa’s film industry?
It’s bright if the government stays with it.
You harbour a close relationship between novel-to-film adaptations. Do you ever see yourself investing time and energy towards one of our local published authors whose work might hold international appeal?

 Absolutely. If the story truly stands out as high concept from a global perspective. Or if it comes with development funding to enable us to do our thing in putting the film together on the global scale.
How has getting noticed in the film industry changed over the past 10 years?

 It really hasn’t. It all starts with a great story, then depends on an excellent director who appreciates it and excellent actors who bring it to life.
What does local talent – actors, authors, screenwriters, directors etc need to do to get noticed by the American industry?
Do excellent work in films that have guaranteed distribution from major global distributors. Local distributors are of little use in this regard.
Something I always wanted to know – What is the difference between a screen writer and just a writer?
A screen writer writes just for the screen.  Writers is a general category that includes novelists, screenwriters, poets, children’s, and textbook writers among others.
Can an author write a screenplay? Has any author ever written a screenplay which was produced?
Authors regularly attempt screenplays, though they’re usually the worst possible ones to adopt their own work. Yet it’s happened repeatedly. William Faulkner himself, for example, wrote the screenplay for “The Sound and the Fury.”

A while back you did an interview called Turning Writers into Filmmakers. You stood firm behind the norm that writers should write good male leads, since majority of the viewership will always be female. Since the success of films like, Twilight ( and yes, I know not everyone would agree- but the fact remains that this film is what started the latest hype, even if it is among the Young Adult genre), Hunger Games, Buffy, Electra, Lara Croft and the latest The Divergent Series, these days it appears as if woman love female heroines equally. Do you still stand firm on that norm?
I stand firm on it only because it ups your chances of getting a deal since there are far more male stars available for roles than female stars who can carry a movie.
What does the success of YA adaptations mean for the existing film market?
It means we’re always looking for successful YA novels to translate into film.
Ever since the completion of the Twilight series, it does appear as if new YA films are struggling to remain as popular. Apart from the Hunger Games and maybe Divergent the balance of the releases appear to have fallen flat, what do you think is the reason for that? 
I think people are spoiled by excellence. Twilight did well enough but it wasn’t as excellent as Hunger Games, nor was Divergent—and none as good as the Harry Potter books, not to mention Lord of the Rings.
Ken, as usual it’s been a huge honour to pick your brain on local trends in the market. Thanks so much for setting aside some time and sharing your views. 

Reposted from My Addiction Books by Nadine Maritz