Heidi Ruby Miller's Blog, page 68

MGOC Contributor: Mike Mehalek

Read an excerpt of Mike Mehalek's essay "Deus Ex Machina Undergoing Repairs: Save Your Characters by Letting Them Save Themselves" from Many Genres, One Craft.

PATHS TO PUBLICATION: Victoria Thompson

Paths to Publication

As part of the virtual book tour for Many Genres, One Craft , I have more contributor interviews this week: Victoria Thompson , K. Ceres Wright , Sally Bosco , Matt Duvall , and Tim Waggoner .



Now, find out how Victoria Thompson got published.



I wrote my first novel without really intending to get it published. I just had this story in my head and couldn't forget it. I wrote it down so my head wouldn't explode. When it was finished, I started thinking I should try to get it published, so I sent it out to five publishers who published Westerns, thinking it was a Western. By the time I'd been rejected by all five of them, I had realized it was really an historical romance set in the Old West. I sent it to an agent who didn't want to represent me but who suggested I send it to Zebra Books, because they specialized in first time authors and maybe they could give me some tips. The editor at Zebra liked the book, and her tips were to make it 200 pages longer and put in more sex. I did that, and they bought it. This was my first book, Texas Treasure.



-Victoria Thompson



Victoria is a contributor to Many Genres, One Craft: Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction , a writing guide edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller and based on the Seton Hill University Writing Popular Fiction graduate program.

PATHS TO PUBLICATION: Randall Silvis

Paths to Publication

As part of the virtual book tour for Many Genres, One Craft and Armchair BEA 2011 , this week kicks off my MGOC author interview series for the next month and a half! This week we'll hear from David Morrell , Jason Jack Miller , Tess Gerritsen , Susan Mallery , and Randall Silvis .



And, now, Randall Silvis :





I lived in the woods and wrote my ass off for ten years and collected nothing but rejection slips. Then suddenly one summer, four stories accepted and an invitation to the MacDowell Colony and a literature fellowship grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and a couple of playwriting prizes. Next year the Drue Heinz Literature Prize. Meantime I kept writing my ass off and eventually had ten more books published. I'm still writing my ass off and still trying to write the best book I've ever written and still wondering why nobody loves me enough to hit me upside the head with a shovel and tell me, "Enough already!"



-Randall Silvis



Randall is a contributor to Many Genres, One Craft: Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction , a writing guide edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller and based on the Seton Hill University Writing Popular Fiction graduate program.

PATHS TO PUBLICATION: Susan Mallery

Paths to Publication

As part of the virtual book tour for Many Genres, One Craft and Armchair BEA 2011 , this week kicks off my MGOC author interview series for the next month and a half! This week we'll hear from David Morrell , Jason Jack Miller , Tess Gerritsen , Susan Mallery , and Randall Silvis .



And, now, Susan Mallery :



Don't give up. Getting published is a whole lot less about talent than it is about persistence. There are hundreds of talented writers who will never sell because they won't finish/edit/submit their work. No publisher is going to knock on your door and beg to read what you've written. It's up to you to polish it and get it out there. It's also up to you to write the next work.



You never know which book is going to be "the one." I started writing romance in college, while studying accounting. One December, during my second to last semester, I was very close to beginning my big push for finals. I was in my last writing session for nearly two weeks. I had the whole day to write and I was so excited to spend all that time with my characters.



About ten that morning I got a call from the agent I had at the time, telling me I had a rejection. Being a brave little soldier, I handled the call professionally and went back to my computer. Just before lunch, I went to check the mail and there was a different rejection. Two in one day, on different projects.



I really lost it. I started crying and knew I could never do it. I would never sell. I didn't have whatever was required and I should just give up. I thought about not going back to write in the afternoon, but something told me if I gave up at that moment, I would never go back to it again. That I would forget about writing and my dream to be published would be over. Frankly, I wondered if that was so bad. Who was I to think I could be published?



But the dream was more powerful than my disappointment, so after lunch I returned to my computer where I wrote the first kiss in that story. I was crying the whole time, knowing I was an idiot for believing, but I wrote it anyway.



That first kiss still exists, word for word, in my first published book. Because that's the one I sold. If I'd stopped that day, I would never have known how close I was. I wouldn't have achieved my dream.



So don't give up. You can't know when it will happen or where. Yes, it's hard. In NY publishing, approximately one in a 1000 submissions are bought. One in 1000. But I did it. Other people did it. It's not that we're so much more talented—it's that we didn't give up. Neither should you.



-Susan Mallery



Susan is a contributor to Many Genres, One Craft: Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction , a writing guide edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller and based on the Seton Hill University Writing Popular Fiction graduate program.

PATHS TO PUBLICATION: Tess Gerritsen

Paths to Publication

As part of the virtual book tour for Many Genres, One Craft and Armchair BEA 2011 , this week kicks off my MGOC author interview series for the next month and a half! This week we'll hear from David Morrell , Jason Jack Miller , Tess Gerritsen , Susan Mallery , and Randall Silvis .





Tess Gerritsen took an unusual route to a writing career. A graduate of Stanford University, Tess went on to medical school at the University of California, San Francisco, where she was awarded her M.D.



While on maternity leave from her work as a physician, she began to write fiction. In 1987, her first novel was published. Call After Midnight, a romantic thriller, was followed by eight more romantic suspense novels. She also wrote a screenplay, "Adrift," which aired as a 1993 CBS Movie of the Week starring Kate Jackson.



Tess's first medical thriller, Harvest, was released in hardcover in 1996, and it marked her debut on the New York Times bestseller list. Her suspense novels since then have been: Life Support (1997), Bloodstream (1998), Gravity (1999), The Surgeon (2001), The Apprentice (2002), The Sinner (2003), Body Double (2004), Vanish (2005), The Mephisto Club (2006), The Bone Garden (2007), The Keepsake (2008) and Ice Cold (2010; UK title: The Killing Place.) Her books have been translated into 37 languages, and more than 20 million copies have been sold around the world.



Her books have been top-5 bestsellers in the United States and abroad. She has received the Nero Wolfe Award (for Vanish) and the Rita Award (for The Surgeon) and was a finalist for the Edgar award (for Vanish.)



Her series of novels featuring homicide detective Jane Rizzoli and medical examiner Maura Isles inspired the hit TNT television series "Rizzoli & Isles," starring Angie Harmon and Sasha Alexander.



Now retired from medicine, she writes full time. She lives in Maine.



Tess is a contributor to Many Genres, One Craft: Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction , a writing guide edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller and based on the Seton Hill University Writing Popular Fiction graduate program.

HEIDI'S PICK SIX: JASON JACK MILLER (The Devil and Preston Black)

HEIDI'S PICK SIX

As part of the virtual book tour for Many Genres, One Craft and Armchair BEA 2011 , this week kicks off my MGOC author interview series for the next month and a half! This week we'll hear from David Morrell , Jason Jack Miller , Tess Gerritsen , Susan Mallery , and Randall Silvis .



So, without further introduction, ladies and gentlemen, Jason Jack Miller:





Jason Jack Miller



1. Which of your characters is your favorite?



2. Tell me about your travels.



Costa Rica was fer-de-lances, kinkajous and volcanoes. Mexico was pyramids and beaches. Zion was cool nights and red rock claustrophobia. Florida is cypress knees and egrets and a mouse. Czech Republic was Kafka and cabs and a rekindling. Outer Banks is family and hush puppies and sea grass. Germany was train stations and beer and holding hands. Canada was border guards. Vegas was Mesa Grill and bling. Austria was pizza and fog and church bells. Kentucky is barbecue and bourbon. West Virginia is wild and wonderful, snuggled in a tent with a handful of blueberries beneath a sky filled with stars and thousands of their seldom-seen cousins.





3. Coffee, tea, or milk?

Coffee for when the writing is going so well I can't stop to eat. Milk for the Captain Crunch and Nutter Butters. Tea for the rest of the time. Darjeeling or English Breakfast in the morning, green the rest of the day.



4. What else can you do besides write?

5. Who are you reading right now?

6. Pop culture or academia?

7. What is the toughest scene you ever wrote?



8. Where do you find your inspirations to write?

I probably would've stopped writing a long time ago if it wasn't for my wife, Heidi. She believes in me when I'm down on myself and helps me to keep going when I think I'm ready to throw in the towel.



9. Food you could eat everyday.

New York Pizza and Pasta, round pie with pepperoni and peppers, Los Mariachis' chili verde, Jameson whiskey, Black Bear Burritos Pizzadilla, Martin's Red Hots, Woodford Reserve bourbon, Fabrizi's homemade spaghetti, Sirianni's pizza, Saffiticker's soft serve, Eat'n Park wedding soup. You didn't say I had to pick just one. Oh, and Colasessano's pepperoni buns. And pekoras from Mother India.



10. Are you into sports or other physical activities?



11. What kind of music speaks to you?

Johnny Cash, Wilco, The Clash, The Beatles, Zeppelin, The Roots, Jack Johnson, Radiohead. I like music that takes me somewhere or tells a story. I like it when an artist leaves a little blood on the stage.



12. Do you outline your stories or do they just take you along for the ride?

13. Celebrity crush.



14. Who are the biggest influences on your work?

John Lennon, Jack Kerouac, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Joe Strummer, Neil Gaiman, Ed Abbey, Sherman Alexie. And Sara Gruen. Water for Elephants is a darn-near perfect novel.



15. Do you still watch cartoons?



Jason Jack Miller is a writer, photographer and musician whose work has appeared online and in print in newspapers, magazines and literary journals, and as a smart phone travel app. He has co-authored a travel guide with his wife and served as a photographer-in-residence at a Frank Lloyd Wright house. Jason is an Authors Guild member who received a Master's in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill where he is adjunct creative writing faculty. He is a contributor to the new writing guide Many Genres, One Craft . In between projects Jason can be found mountain biking in West Virginia or looking for his next favorite guitar. He is currently writing and recording the soundtracks to his Appalachian Gothic series , which includes the novels, The Devil and Preston Black , Under the Rainbow, and Hellbender. Find him at http://jasonjackmiller.blogspot.com .

HEIDI'S PICK SIX: DAVID MORRELL

HEIDI'S PICK SIX



As part of the virtual book tour for Many Genres, One Craft and Armchair BEA 2011 , this week kicks off my MGOC author interview series for the next month and a half! This week we'll hear from David Morrell , Jason Jack Miller , Tess Gerritsen , Susan Mallery , and Randall Silvis .



So, without further introduction, ladies and gentlemen, Dr. David Morrell:





David Morrell



1. Which of your characters is your favorite?

2. Tell me about your travels.

3. Coffee, tea, or milk?



4. What else can you do besides write?

One of my novels, The Shimmer, has several scenes about small private planes. As research, I took some flying lessons (I'm the authorial equivalent of a Method-trained actor) and enjoyed the experience so much that I became a private pilot. I love being able to get above everything and clear my head by flying.



5. Who are you reading right now?



6. Pop culture or academia?

I'm a rarity, a fiction writer who had formal training as an academic (I was a full professor of American literature at the University of Iowa). I'm reminded of the great jazz pianist Oscar Peterson who had classical training and performed Bach etc. before he devoted himself to jazz. My knowledge of literary history and of how books are put together has been a big help to me.



7. What is the toughest scene you ever wrote?

8. Where do you find your inspirations to write?

9. Food you could eat everyday.



10. Are you into sports or other physical activities?

Hemingway compared writing a novel to running a marathon. He was talking about mental attitude, but I think the metaphor has a physical application also. To me, it's essential to exercise as a way of compensating for long hours at a desk. For many years, I ran five miles a day. Then I switched to tennis. Now I favor a treadmill. Physical conditioning helps an author think better, I believe.



11. What kind of music speaks to you?



12. Do you outline your stories or do they just take you along for the ride?

In my writing book The Successful Novelist, I describe an alternative to outlines. Basically it's a long letter that I write to myself in which I ask why a particular project is worth a year of my life. Then I start probing the book's general idea, asking questions, looking for the story's implications. The final document is sometimes 30 single-spaced pages and sets the direction for the book.



13. Celebrity crush.



14. Who are the biggest influences on your work?

At Penn State, I wrote my Master's thesis on Hemingway's style. While I don't write like Hemingway, he certainly influenced me as did a British thriller writer, Geoffrey Household, whose Rogue Male (1939) showed me how to describe action in an outdoor setting, sort of like Wordsworth with weapons.



15. Do you still watch cartoons?



David Morrell is the award-winning author of First Blood , the novel in which Rambo was created. He holds a Ph. D. in American literature from Penn State and was a professor at the University of Iowa. Noted for his research, Morrell has written numerous international bestsellers that include the classic spy trilogy The Brotherhood of the Rose (the basis for an NBC miniseries after the Super Bowl), The Fraternity of the Stone , and The League of Night and Fog .



International Thriller Writers honored him with its ThrillerMaster award . His writing book, The Successful Novelist , discusses what he has learned in his almost four decades as an author.



David is a contributor to the new writing guide Many Genres, One Craft: Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction , based on the Seton Hill University MFA in Writing Popular Fiction program and edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller .



Jason Jack Miller is the next author interview.

HEIDI'S PICK SIX: Carole Waterhouse

HEIDI'S PICK SIX





Carole Waterhouse



1. Which of your characters is your favorite?



2. Tell me about your travels.

I've always loved traveling, even as a child, and often do so in unconventional ways. When I was in college in the late seventies, I spent a summer backpacking through Europe with a friend and then spent four months the next year traveling alone through England, Ireland and Wales on a bicycle. A man I met on the first trip, while waiting in the standing room line at the Vienna Opera House, was the one who inspired me to travel by bicycle. He had been had been doing that and absolutely everything had gone wrong. His bike had been stolen in Italy and he was going to have to return home early because he had run out of money. His clothes were completely tattered. He asked me and my companion to stand behind him while entering the opera house so that no one could see the holes in the backside of his pants. I listened to his tale and realized that while nothing had gone quite right, he was still having a wonderful time. That's when I became brave enough to try something similar the next year. Lately I've been going on hiking trips, including the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, the Cappadocia area in Turkey, and inn-to-inn walks in the Austrian and Swiss Alps. This year I have plans to hike along the Amalfi Coast in Italy. The older I get, the more I want to see of the world, and for some reason I feel compelled to do it on foot.



3. Coffee, tea, or milk?

4. What else can you do besides write?



5. Who are you reading right now?

I just finished A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. I especially like work by international writers and find fiction an especially inviting way of learning about other cultures. Maybe it has something to do with my love of travel. Reading international work is like traveling through words.



6. Pop culture or academia?

7. What is the toughest scene you ever wrote?



8. Where do you find your inspirations to write?

All around me. I take details from interesting people I meet and conversations I have, mix them together, and let my imagination take off from there. Most of my characters are based on composites of people I've met. One of my all time favorite characters is a woman I created who was based on a combination of my father's personality and one of my favorite horses.



9. Food you could eat everyday.



10. Are you into sports or other physical activities?

I love horses, hiking and biking. I live on ten acres with my three horses, one of which I foaled myself, and another that I raised from a two-year-old. I'm often conflicted because morning is my favorite time to ride and write. Riding always seems to win. My horses have been making their way into my writing more and more. In fact, every book I've written has a horse in it somewhere. There's a scene in The Tapestry Baby that describes the birth of a foal and the details were all taken from the experience of watching my own foal being born. I spent three weeks sleeping in my own barn so that I wouldn't miss it.



11. What kind of music speaks to you?

I enjoy many different types of music, everything from pop to classical. I've always liked the liveliness of Celtic music and several years ago I joined a Scottish Country Dance group. Several times a year I go to a ball where live music is played. There is nothing like the experience of dancing to live bagpipes!



12. Do you outline your stories or do they just take you along for the ride?

I never outline. I always have an ending in mind--I at least have to have a general direction before I can start--but it rarely ends up being the ending I actually find myself reaching. The characters always end up changing things as I go. By the time I reach the new ending, the beginning usually no long fits and so I start from the beginning again, refining everything as I go along.



13. Celebrity crush.

14. Who are the biggest influences on your work?

15. Do you still watch cartoons?



A creative writing professor at California University of Pennsylvania, Carole Waterhouse is the author of two novels, The Tapestry Baby and Without Wings , and a collection of short stories, The Paradise Ranch .







Her fiction has appeared in Arnazella, Artful Dodge, Baybury Review, Ceilidh, Eureka Literary Magazine, Forum, Half Tones to Jubilee, Massachusetts Review, Minnetonka Review, Oracle: The Brewton-Parker College Review, Parting Gifts, Pointed Circle, Potpourri, Seems, Spout, The Armchair Aesthete, The Griffin, The Styles, Tucumari Literary Review, Turnrow, and X-Connect.



A previous newspaper reporter, she has published essays in an anthology, Horse Crazy: Women and the Horses They Love , and Equus Spirit Magazine. Her book reviews have appeared in The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Pittsburgh Press, and The New York Times Book Review. Visit her online at her website: http://www.carolewaterhouse.com and her blog: http://carolewaterhouse.wordpress.com .

SECRET WRITERS: ANNE HARRIS

Secret Writers


Anne Harris

As part of the three month mega VBT for the writing guide Many Genres, One Craft , Calum, The Secret Writer , and I are hosting the Secret Writers series.

ANNE HARRIS
Somewhere around 2007 or so, I bifurcated. That's not as disgusting as it sounds. Up until then I had enjoyed a modest career as a science fiction and fantasy author under my real name, Anne Harris. But a number of circumstances coincided that led me to stop writing under that name, and reinvent myself under not one, but two new pseudonyms.

I had a young adult science fiction novel, Libyrinth, under consideration with my longstanding publisher, Tor. My editor loved the book. The problem was my sales history. My previous books, though well-reviewed, were not runaway bestsellers, and I was beginning to experience the dreaded Death Spiral, wherein booksellers order increasingly fewer and fewer of your titles, and sales diminish accordingly. I was asked to adopt a pseudonym so that Libyrinth could be presented to the buyers as a debut title from a new author, thus separating it from the handicap of my past numbers and hopefully inciting larger orders. That's how Pearl North came into being. As to how I settled on that particular name, that's another story and you can read about it here http://heidirubymiller.blogspot.com/2010/11/paths-to-publication-pearl-north.html (along with a more detailed and grisly account of the Death Spiral.)

But that's not all that was going on in my career at that time. The muse is a law unto herself, and I had found mine in yaoi manga, slash, m/m romance--pretty much any genre you can think of devoted to men falling in love with other men. For my copious thoughts on what the hell that's all about, you can check out the Why We Like It http://www.friskbiskit.com/why-we-like-it category on my blog. For now, just take my word for it that I had seen the light and there was no turning back. Unfortunately, many of those around me were less than entranced with this exciting new direction in my work. In particular, the reluctance of my agent and of my editor at Tor constituted real stumbling blocks to my pursuit of creative fulfillment. Maybe some authors would have obediently shelved their plans for world domination through boylove in favor of sane, commercial pursuits. But I've never had that kind of self control. One day it dawned on me that I didn't need anyone's permission to write whatever I wanted. At that moment, adopting the pseudonym Jessica Freely for my m/m work seemed blatantly obvious. Since then, I've published nine m/m erotic romance novels, novellas and short stories, primarily with epublisher Loose Id. I'm working on a new one right now.

So that's it. That's the story of how Anne Harris became Pearl North and Jessica Freely.

Thanks for reading!

BIO
Anne Harris writes science fiction, fantasy and, as Pearl North, young adult sf. Her novels include Accidental Creatures, which won the Spectrum Award for glbt sf, Inventing Memory, a Book Sense Pick, and Libyrinth. Her short story, "Still Life with Boobs," was a 2005 Nebula Award finalist. She also mentors grad students in Seton Hill University's Writing Popular Fiction program. Her essay "Perfect Disaster: Don't Let Perfectionism Squash Your Creativity" appears in Many Genres, One Craft, edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller. Visit Anne and Pearl at bookviewcafe.com.

LINKS
Anne Harris - http://bookviewcafe.com

Jessica Freely - http://www.friskbiskit.com

Many Genres blog - http://manygenres.blogspot.com

Many Genres, One Craft - http://www.amazon.com/Many-Genres-One-Craft-Lessons/dp/0938467085/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302017939&sr=1-1

Accidental Creatures – http://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Creatures-Anne-Harris/dp/0312875606/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303303112&sr=1-1

Inventing Memory – http://www.amazon.com/Inventing-Memory-Anne-Harris/dp/B000H2MXDI/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1303303246&sr=1-2

Libyrinth - http://www.amazon.com/Libyrinth-Pearl-North/dp/B003NHRAJ6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1303303280&sr=1-1

SECRET WRITERS: LEE ALLEN HOWARD

Secret Writers



Lee Allen Howard

As part of the three month mega VBT for the writing guide Many Genres, One Craft , Calum, The Secret Writer , and I are hosting the Secret Writers series.

LEE ALLEN HOWARD
A name is a trademark, one you hope will become known and connected to your writing. When you're writing in the genre world, a name can represent a certain genre that you pen for. My primary genre is horror -- always has been -- so I use my full name, Lee Allen Howard. (I started using all three names
when I discovered how many "Lee Howards" were out there!) I also liked that it has the same number of syllables as "Edgar Allan Poe," along with the same middle name. This gives me uniqueness with resonance.

I use a synonym for my erotica to maintain anonymity with those who may be offended by the subject matter. It helps prevent some who are prejudiced about the genre from attaching this stigma to my other work. Using a pen name also keeps readers with sex-on-the-brain from finding me in the phonebook!

Using a pseudonym protects me and helps maintain brand recognition between different genres -- important for someone who writes not only horror and dark crime, but gay erotica, and spirituality, believe it or not.

BIO
Lee Allen Howard has been a professional writer in the software industry since 1985. Besides editing fiction and non-fiction, he does editing and layout for health and fitness professionals. Lee writes horror, erotic horror, dark fantasy, and crime. His publication credits include The Sixth Seed, Severed Realtions, Cemetery Sonata anthology, Out newspaper, Thou Shalt Not... anthology, and Amber Quill Press. His article "Your Very First Editor" is part of the writing guide Many Genres, One Craft, edited by Michael A. Arnzen and Heidi Ruby Miller. Lee also writes about metaphysical and consciousness issues on his blog at http://buildingthebridge.wordpress.com. You can also visit him at http://leeallenhoward.com.

LINKS
Lee Allen Howard - http://leeallenhoward.com

Lee Allen Howard blog - http://buildingthebridge.wordpress.com

Many Genres blog - http://manygenres.blogspot.com

Many Genres, One Craft - http://www.amazon.com/Many-Genres-One-Craft-Lessons/dp/0938467085/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302017939&sr=1-1

The Sixth Seed – http://www.amazon.com/The-Sixth-Seed-ebook/dp/B004TTWWRM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1302019399&sr=1-1

Severed Relations – http://www.amazon.com/Severed-Relations-ebook/dp/B004WKR5KC/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=merchant-items&qid=1303330538&sr=1-2

Thou Shalt Not… - http://www.amazon.com/Thou-Shalt-Not-Allen-Howard/dp/0977187101/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302019326&sr=1-1