What do you think?

This week has been one with little writing but a lot of plotting and planning as my son and I attacked the outside sprinkler system, started refinishing the kitchen chairs and I spent the day rearranging furniture yesterday. Which means it's been a productive week in a lot of different ways, not the least of which has been creatively. I'm one of those writers who, when stuck, seems to be able to clear the logjam through mindless, muscle-numbing labor.

But all the time working outside gave me time to think about the state of the publishing industry and some of the blogs I've read lately. Maybe folks in the industry are doing the same thing because con season is now in full swing. Maybe it's because Amazon's new payment scheme goes into effect in just a few days. Whatever the cause, the blogs are alive with thoughts about where publishing is going, whether or not the public is ready for the "inevitable" flood of self-published authors and what the next big thing is going to be.

Before getting into the heart of my post this morning, I just have to share this. I've made no secret of my dislike of sparkly vampires and emo werewolves. I'm a traditionalist at heart when it comes to ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night. So, imagine my glee to read that Stephanie Meyer, she of the Twilight series, is tired of vampires. All kidding aside, I have to applaud her desire "not to write it badly". So she is waiting until she can be excited about the story again. While she does, will someone please step in and write some non-sparkly vamps for YA and adults? Please?????

Laura Miller has a wonderful article that asks if the public is ready for the influx of self-published books that are already hitting the online stores:

One thing is true: Aspiring authors have never had more or better options for self-publishing the manuscripts currently gathering dust in their desk drawers or sleeping in seldom-visited corners of their hard drives. Writers can upload their works to services run by Amazon, Apple and (soon) Barnes and Noble, transforming them into e-books that are instantly available in high-profile online stores. Or they can post them on services like Urbis.com, Quillp.com or CompletelyNovel.com and coax reviews from other hopeful users. If a writer prefers an old-fashioned printed copy of his or her opus, then all of these companies (and many others) would be more than happy to provide print-on-demand services, producing one hard copy at a time whenever one is needed.

"Digital self-publishing is creating a powerful new niche in books that's threatening the traditional industry," a recent Wall Street Journal report proclaimed. "Self-published books suddenly are able to thrive by circumventing the establishment." To "circumvent" means, of course, to find a way around, and what's waiting behind all those naysaying editors and agents, the self-publishing authors tell themselves, are millions of potential readers, who'll simply love our books! The reign of the detested gatekeepers has ended!

She goes on to point out that what the public will find itself faced with is a huge slush pile. Freed from the need to find and agent and go through the submission process, there are fewer checks and balances on quality of craft and quality of formatting. What this will mean, in the long run, is still up in the air, in my opinion (and I'll have more on this below). In the meantime, it really is a situation of buyer beware and be aware when purchasing an e-book if you don't check to see who the "publisher" happens to be.

Agent Lucienne Diver has an excellent post this week on "The Next Big Thing". As writers, we are always trying to figure out market trends, what the public likes and doesn't like, what is getting bookstore placement and that always elusive critter -- what does the editor want to see. "Deciding what to focus your attention on is a necessary part of the business, and one of the reasons it’s good to have an agent on your side to brainstorm and do career planning with you. However, you need to keep in mind two things: 1) where your strengths lie and 2) you never know when family sagas will come back into vogue. . . The point is, if a saga, or a thriller, or a science fiction extravaganza is where your heart lies, if it’s where your strengths lie…not just based on your opinion, but those of critique partners or professionals around you…you should go for it." (the family saga was her example of what a client might be wanting to write.)

According to Ms. Diver, you should write what calls to you because if you, as the writer, aren't engaged by the story, there's a pretty good chance the reader won't be either. Remember, the books on the shelves right now were bought months, even years ago. She suggests reading the trade magazines to see what is selling now. Check out the post for a list of several very good magazines to watch for market trends. The caveat she throws out is, "I’m not saying that you should be deaf to the markets, either. If you’re writing within a genre, it’s important to know what’s intrinsic to that genre. . . It’s important to have an awareness of which market you intend to be your primary. Publishers can only put one thing on the spine, which helps bookstores decide where the books should be shelved and readers decide whether your book suits their tastes. Books that are not quite one thing or another pose a bit of a problem. There can be quite a bit of genre blending, but in the end, it’s the focus of your novel…is it saving the world or getting the girl, for instance…that decides it."

So, back to how this all fits together. There are authors bemoaning the advent of more and more venues where people can go to self-publish that book they haven't been able to get out through traditional means. There are others, like Ms. Miller, wondering if the public is ready to delve into the slush pile that will result from the influx of self-publishing options in this digital age. I'm not sure how the dust will settle. What I do know is the readers on the Kindle boards are starting to demand that Amazon put in place some sort of editorial minimum for anything published on the Kindle. Amazon has been known to pull e-books if there are too many complaints about poor formatting. To be included in the "premium" catalog at Smashwords, there are certain formatting requirements that must be met. Other e-book outlets such as Fictionwise require a minimum number of previously published books or a publisher or author with a minimum number of authors or pen names AND at least 10 books (iirc) to be offered through Fictionwise for inclusion in their catalog.

What does this mean? It means that some sites are requiring some minimum level of quality control already. I have a feeling we are going to see sites like Amazon, Barnes & Noble and others slowly requiring editorial minimums as well. But what I really think we'll see is the level of proof-reading will improve over time. Why this and not editorial requirements? Two reasons. First, for whatever reason, it seems easier to pick up on the oddly formatted paragraph or page, the misspellings, etc., in an e-book than in the paper copy. Or maybe it's that we are less forgiving in an electronic format because it is easier -- and cheaper -- to make the correction digitally than in recalling hard copy books, reprinting and redistributing them. The second reason is, in my opinion at least, one of the reasons the print book is suffering now and why so many e-book readers are willing to try small press and self-published e-books. There are too many books on the shelves now that aren't entertaining, aren't well-written and -- and this is what is inexcusable, in my opinion -- aren't well edited.

Will we, as readers, have to wade through a bunch of slush in our quest for good books? Sure we will. But we do that now. E-books have an advantage here. Most e-tailers allow you to download a sample of a book before you buy it. It may be a few pages or even a few chapters. That's more than enough to know if you like a writer's style and if the plot is going to grab you. All I know is that I've discovered a number of authors I'd never have read by checking out the freebies offered for the Kindle and by downloading samples of authors recommended by other readers on the kindle boards. As readers, we're going to have to educate ourselves to what is out there and the best way to decide who and what we want to read without wasting too much money. As writer, we're going to have to educate ourselves on the best way to reach and keep our readers.

I'm actually excited about the changes in the industry. Will there still be a need for agents and editors? Absolutely. They are, as we've said in the past, the gatekeepers. However, there is room in the industry for those authors who publish through small presses and who even self-publish. What do you think?

And the winners are....

Sorry to be so late with this.

For the first paragraph, a couple of general comments, first. Most of you went waaaayyyy beyond one paragraph. Also, a couple of them were very good except for a tendency to ricochet between present and past tenses.

Among those who disqualified themselves through length but whom I wish to mention as very, very good are Brendan and Behind The Pyramids. Among the verb tense disqualify the best was Ori's.

So -- now, the winner and the runners up. Email me at sahoyt - at- hotmail - dot - com for what your choice of my book is. The first place gets one of my books and Dragon's Ring. The others get one of my books, excepting the Shakespeare trilogy AND the first of the musketeers' mysteries (sorry, guys, but I'm down to two copies.)

First place -- Synova, for your first entry. You really couldn't improve on that!

Then Pam and Mike (for Mike's last. The others were way too long)


Now, Rowena's contest -- the winners are fourth guy and Brendan. Please email her at rowena -at- corydaniells (dot) com with your snail mail.

Me and my (Imaginary) Friends

It struck me as strange the other day that some of the most successful novels and television series concentrate very strongly on relationships and friendships, yet the typical writer is very introverted - more of a lone wolf type character. So what's happening here?

Are writers able to absorb all these things from others despite their lack of personal interaction and bring it forth in a convincing way (in a variety of mediums), or am I just outing myself as a social misfit, and most other writers have huge circles of friends?

I was re-reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone the other day - the first JK Rowling HP book. You know that old Harry - greatest wizard in the world - does not actually do a single magical spell in the whole book? It's true. I checked. He does accidental magic at the beginning. He hops onto a broomstick and finds that he is an automatic natural at it. And there are vague references to him learning spells as part of his schoolwork, but you do not actually see him wave his wand and do a spell.

What you do see in the HP books is tons of stuff on relationships. A lot of time is spent on the building of relationships and the testing and proving of them. I think someone said once the HP books were like 'Famous Five with magic'. It's about the gang, not the magic - that is almost setting.

So, anyway. The portrayal of relationships and friendship is crucial to the success of fiction, and is a strong element in bestseller YA.

How can we, as lone wolf writers, learn to do this so well? Or are we just continuing our relationships with our imaginary friends from childhood into adulthood?

Progress, of a sort

Thursday through Sunday: Well, the last few days someone turned off the valve and slowed the information to a trickle. I'm not sure why - possibly it's the day job ramping up again for the next phase of the Neverending Project (I seem to get a lot of these. I think someone 'likes' me). At any rate the most I've gotten in a few days is that Milord Alvar is quite willing to hold out as long as necessary until I get his name right. And Millie finds this very amusing.

The Evil Prince has yet to show himself, although I have the weird feeling that he's there, he's just still buried somewhere in my subconscious. Based on past experience, this probably means I'll wake up one morning with him kibitzing with some of my other villains - all of whom are certifiably evil psycho bastards (so are most of my heroes - the difference is the heroes tend to fight it rather than revel in it). This does not reassure me at all - and anyone who knows what my villains are like will be cringing at the prospect.

Monday: So after days of silence, I get a major dump courtesy Subconscious Data Delivery - a service about as reliable as a two-bob watch - when I start drifting to sleep. It proceeds to haunt my dreams, and I'm still processing what emerged.

To start with "Seraph" is the royal family name - only it's actually a corruption of a much older title that related to the ship that crashed on the planet in the first place. I have no idea what that title was, but it applied to the people who had been genetically engineered to have the Engineering gift - the rapport with machinery. There's a vague sense that the gift was essential to keeping people alive initially, so those who had it became a kind of nobility during the time the accidental colony struggled to survive. It's translated to a sense that it's very wrong to have any kind of "useful" ability and not use it in the service of one's people.

His Royal Horribleness is a little clearer: physically he could be Milord Alvar's twin. They're cousins through most of the branches of the family lines back to the common ancestors, although it never got closer than second or third cousin, I think. The royal family has full time geneologists keeping track of who is where in the accepted line of inheritance. It doesn't help that they all tend to use the same given names - generally honoring particularly notable ancestors. Who, of course, are shared all over the family trees of the extended royal family. The Emperor is His Imperial Majesty Arthur James William Seraph, Twenty-Fifth of the Name, Forty-Second of the Dynasty, Lord of Eldarsund, Defender of the Holy, etc etc (the full list of titles goes on for half a page or thereabouts).

The Evil Prince is only "Royal", not "Imperial" because he's not confirmed as the heir, only presumed to be as the closest male line relative.He rejoices in a similar list of titles, most of them courtesy titles attached to being the heir presumptive. The names that matter are William James Albert Seraph. Milord Alvar shares all but one of them - his family name is William Arthur James Seraph. Without all the extraneous titles, he's generally known as Will Seraph, Lord Alvar - or just Lord Alvar. I think he's a little older than HRHorrible - no more than a year older.

HRHorrible is straight out of Evil-Bastard-Central - which seems to be where my subconscious lands no matter what I do. Even in my lighter stuff there's elements of it. Hell, Milord Alvar is just as much a product of Evil-Bastard-Central, only he chooses to control that aspect of his personality where HRHorrible doesn't.

Millie is the catalyst. She's the wild card that kicks off the whole sequence, and to some extent part of Milord Alvar's redemption. Oh, and she's the cause of the ending of book 1. She's found one of HRHorrible's 'playhouses' and - naturally - goes in there to free the women (in a permanent and lethal fashion if necessary. Yes, HRHorrible is that perverted. I'm not sure how I'm going to make that work without overdoing the ick or backing off too much from it). Milord Alvar finds out, and goes charging in to "rescue" her - not only does she not need rescuing, she ends up back-to-back with him fighting off MRMorrible's henchmen. While the whole place is sinking into lava, since the only way Millie could get the slaves out was to disable the damping systems in the complex. Several of the henchmen find out what it's like to become a carboniferous anomaly in a volcanic deposit.

Of course - as those of you who know how my mind works have probably already figured out - HRHorrible isn't the main villain. I'm not sure who is, except that it's someone who's around in a minor role in book one, apparently something of a non-entity. I'm not sure Milord Alvar and Millie know who he is by the end of book one: only that he exists.

HRHorrible... think cold, arrogant, superior, convinced the rest of the world exists to serve him. Constantly looking for something to "entertain" him - and growing more depraved and decadent with each new amusement he contrives. Nucking futz, but in that kind of cold, rational, self-interested way that's a hell of a lot more frightening than ranting and raving crazy. The only thing I'm sure about is that the Ultimate Nasty is worse. The Ultimate Nasty is convinced he's doing the things he does for the Greater Good...

Religion. This is a religious society. I'm not sure they were terribly religious when they crashed on this world, but they sure as hell are now. Something about surviving by the grace of god and the quality of one's mechanical expertise will do that. The general ethos is along the lines of God helps those who help themselves mixed with if God gave you the gift it's a sin not to use it for society. Sorta-kinda-Christian based, although not really recognizable as such any more - although the hellfire and brimstone part is very familiar, since they live with it all the time. At some point the idea that they're there to "redeem" their world crept in, so there's a lot of social value attached to "improving" the land by siphoning energy off the everpresent volcanic substrata to power all manner of mechanisms, by speeding up the process of turning lava to productive soil (which in turn leads to a voracious demand for more improvable land and an outwards expansion of the Empire), and so forth. Think the words of "Jerusalem" - "And we will build a new Jerusalem in England's green and pleasant land": that's their notion of Heaven. Greenery, pleasant climate, and real night and day. Most people believe God intends them to build it themselves.

Tuesday: Now I know why HRHorrible gets involved with all of this - it's Millie. She's seen too much, but while she was still a street brat it was too much trouble to track her down and eliminate her. Besides, who would ever listen to a street brat? If the information comes via Milord Alvar, it's much more credible. Also, Alvar has the resources to dig up evidence that can't be covered up: the pair of them are a risk to HRHorrible's existence.

Ah. Yes, the little lightbulbs go on while I'm writing this. The ultimate Big Bad is someone in the Academy. He recognizes the threat Millie poses to HRHorrible and passes on the warning. I'm still not entirely sure what he recognizes, since to him one street brat is much the same as any other, but whatever it is Millie has no idea about it. It's not appearance or her name... so it has to be something she says without realizing what the impact could be. Oh. (Cue little lightbulb again - I just love the way my subconscious works). Alvar wants to know why she's so skittish with him. She tells him he looks just like the man who killed her mother (trust me, it's not nearly that simple or clean). Big Bad hears the conversation - and since he knows what HRHorrible does for recreation, and is working his way towards greasy eminence, he naturally warns HRHorrible.

Wednesday: I need to find a new name for book 1. Twilight would be perfect if not for certain sparkly vampires, and this book does not have sparkly vampires. It doesn't have vampires, period. Shadowlands is also out, courtesy a rather better book that's also too well known. Since I suck at this kind of thing, any suggestions would be welcome.

Oh, and for those who might be wondering, no I'm not worried that anyone is going to steal my idea. I could hand this set of notes to a dozen people and ask only that the names change, and get a dozen totally different books - with everything from horror to hysterical comedy and all points between.

Why Not GIVE All of Me?

When #1 son was learning to sing, we had the hardest time getting him to “let out his full voice.”
This was not helped by the fact that #1 son has a very powerful voice – like my parents who used to sing at local celebrations in a pre-microphone age – and that his... um “very nice” music teacher taught him to suppress it so he wouldn’t overpower the other students in the choir.

When doing solos, the kid was still suppressing. Throttling back. Closing the spigot somewhat. Because the alternative was too scary. Mind you, he still sang very nicely when holding back. It was pleasant, not bad to listen to, and we never felt the need to tell him to shut up when he sang around the house. But on the few occasions (for various reasons he no longer pursues music) we convinced him to let out the full power of his voice, you got a voice and a song of operatic dimensions. It filled the house and probably the block, not just with volume but with richness and it made you vibrate with the emotion in it.

We often talk about voice in writing, though of course, it’s in a more metaphorical sense. Or is it? I’ve been in enough writers groups that I can tell you that most writers have as much of a natural voice range – expressed or not – as most singers: a voice range that can be forced but won’t sound good if you go out of your “natural range.”

How could it be otherwise? The physical limits to your voice are like the physical limits to your writing. One involves vocal cords and hearing apparatus (the reason younger son and I ARE told to shut up if we start singing,) and, to an extent, personality which dictates what you’ve listened to and practiced, which in turn affects your vocal cords and lungs and all that. The other involves brain pathways, the way the individual experiences the world (a neurological complex akin to hearing, if far more complex), and personality, which affects what you chose to read and learn and practice writing, which in turn affects your brain pathways and the way you experience the world.

This doesn’t mean you don’t grow or change. Like #1 son changed in his singing through his choir experience (no, we won’t go there) writers learn what they can’t write or can, and this expands their tool box, their ability to use certain ways to turn a scene. But it means you have a certain range. One of my friends seems prone to write mostly dark – psychological and/or physically dark – she does it very well, NATURALLY, even if she holds back more than she should. Another friends writes naturally light comedy, hitting all the right notes. She does it very well naturally. If you tell one to write what the other does, you can have some success to a point (and there’s a lot to be said for broadening your palette and expanding your toolbox, if only to learn how far you can go.) But if either of them tries to write the extreme of the other, you get a falsetto or a flat drone. It is simply NOT in them to FEEL or express that range. The voice doesn’t reach.

Now I’m not saying this to give you an excuse. That is something you should rid yourself of at the very outset. No excuses. If you’re unpublished – or even if you’re not! – at some point every writer thinks there are things they can’t write and these things are usually stupid. For instance, for years on end, I thought I couldn’t write women characters, until a workshop exercise forced me to. That type of thing is silly. I hope you understand I’m talking about a “higher level” of ability or inability. To illustrate: imagine Laurel Hamilton or Jane Evanovich attempting to write Pratchett. Look at ALL the people who have tried to imitate either Pratchett or Heinlein or Ray Bradbury. We had a saying that “The literary road is littered with the corpses of people who tried–”

This is not a judgement of quality, btw. It’s a judgement of range. I read and enjoy at least some of both Hamilton and Evanovich. But both their ranges are markedly shorter in echoes and tones and palette than Pratchett’s. This is not a criticism. If the man were an opera singer, he’d be one of those that go down in legend, able to hit the bright high notes and the deep, dark ones perfectly, often in the same phrase. Most people who try to imitate Heinlein, likewise, can hit one or two things right – the action, or the future history, or the “attitude” or (for later Heinlein) the sex (I’ve yet to see one who could even attempt to hit the way in which Heinlein’s characters are profoundly human) – but I’ve yet to find one who can hit ALL the notes.

As for Bradbury – listen. I’ve met a lot a people who dismiss him as one of those “literary” sf and fantasy writers. This is wrong. I don’t know which came first, though I think he did and the others are imitators. At least I hope so. But at least he managed something that the others aren’t but a shadow of – the man can write a plotless story that captures a fragment that is only incidentally “future” or “fantasy” and stir the reader’s deepest emotions. His range is not wide. In fact, I’d say it is rather limited. But what he does, he does extraordinarily. It’s like someone who sings in a range that very few people can achieve without sounding contrived, but he does it beautifully and hits all the right notes.

So, it’s not the matter of your range that determines quality. It’s whether you’re singing out with your full voice, or merely obediently trying to hit the notes the way the choir teacher (editor, publisher, agent or more commonly your own perception of the market) tells you to. Whether you’re singing as yourself or a pale imitation. Whether you’re filling your chest and letting it all come out, or holding back.

Yeah, you know what I’m talking about. Though likely you don’t.

There is some level of holding back we all do. There is some level of holding back inherent in writing. I often feel as though writing is trying to paint on canvas using ONLY fog. Or like pinning a beautiful butterfly to your collection without killing or hurting it.

You are aware of that level. Everyone who’s ever finished a novel is. It’s a compromise with ourselves. “There’s no way I can show her full personality without making the book incomprehensible. She’s the villain. I’ll show her being nasty.” My pathway from unpublished to published followed that. I started getting published when I concentrated on ‘giving the reader the right signals.’ Likely most of you have figured that out. And know you’re holding back that much. And go “um. But if I let that out...”

That is not what I’m talking about. That is the equivalent of your learning to sing to the music, instead of doing what kids do and just belting out the words at the top of your lungs, not caring if there is a melody behind. Yeah, it’s discipline and in that sense “holding back.” But it’s not the holding back of anything that hurts your performance. It’s more learning to fit the form.

But in the process of learning that, you learn to sing with the choir, too. You learn to hold back, because otherwise you’ll stand out too much and the choir teacher – editor/publisher/market – will never buy/like/accept it. And you’re not even aware of those barriers. Well... most of you aren’t. I wasn’t. For the last ten years, I have been desperately trying to reach for my full voice, knowing I was falling short, but not knowing where or why.

Part of this is because a lot of the barriers were erected before you even learned to form letters. Look, like a kid with a strong voice – oy, don’t I know this – you get told some things you don’t do. “Use your indoor voice.” Or in my – and apparently Synova’s – case “grown ups don’t cry.” Or “don’t make a fuss.” Or “this is not something people show or talk about.” And by the time you reach your writing maturity you are consciously avoiding what you think are socially unacceptable actions.

I think in my case it was reinforced by being of the generation that came after the boomers. When you watch the younger adults in your life “letting it all hang out” – when you have to read a short story in literature class where the whole point seems to be that the character has diarrhea, because this was never written about in the past, so the author must (pardon the image) rub the reader’s face in it – your tendency is to go the other way. Preferably go the other way very fast. And stay there. Because you realize, after being forced to read a few of these things that this is not art but a toddler’s “I can get away with this” self satisfaction.

So, if you think I’m telling you to let it all hang out, I’m not. That’s no more art than keeping it all in. Primal screams aren’t songs. Art is the way we convey emotion but to be art it must be conveyed in a controlled/purposeful way. Preferably a way that intensifies it and makes it more real than reality to the reader.

So, what in heck am I telling you to do? Ah, I’m telling you to do something much more difficult. I’m telling you to let your full voice out in a professional way. Whatever your voice is, let it shine through. Don’t worry about trying to be dark when you’re naturally light. Don’t worry about trying to be serious when you’re naturally funny. Try the “other side” every once in a while, but don’t FORCE yourself.

Mostly, though, stop “dampening” the notes of your song. Look, you know as well as I do what I mean. How many times do you have a character cry? This is one of my favorite examples, because even though most of us were trained not to make a fuss, we often have the character cry rather than describe/feel/express his emotions. Why? Because it feels “real” but it isn’t. It certainly isn’t more real than real. Nina Kiriki Hoffman, in a workshop, said that if the character cries, the reader doesn’t need to. More importantly, if the character cries, the writer doesn’t need to. So we do this instead of crying. “She cried” or even “Tears dropped down her face.” is a cop-out. An escape hatch, when the writer feels uncomfortable. If you refuse to write that and instead scratch the surface and write what’s going on in the character’s head that makes him/her want to cry, the scene will be much more powerful. For those of you who’ve read the last fifteen pages or so of Draw One In The Dark, I was in danger of shorting my keyboard with tears. And Kyrie doesn’t even realize she’s in pain.

That was the beginning of my ripping off the thin crust of ice over my writing voice. I did more/more intensely of it in Darkship Thieves, partly because the character forced it on me. She is so locked in herself that you need extreme events to rip it out. A friend recently told me the scene where Kit makes the choice of surrendering to Earth is one of the grimmest he ever read, and he’s a hard core horror addict. The reception of that book has told me that my full voice might not be there, yet, but it’s starting to shine through. Same with the Daring Finds mysteries. There the full voice is “full on zany.” In the second book – French Polished Murder – the editor tried to get me to take out the part where one of the characters writes the rats’ names on the rats with laundry marker. It felt to her like a bridge too far. But I’ve gotten more fan mail about that passage than any other. Why? Well, it’s “full voice zaniness.” It stands out from the choir.

And then there’s the just-completed Sword and Blood, which has sexual overtones. These make me uncomfortable, not the least because the sex involved is to put it mildly “odd” and I’m afraid people will think it’s my particular kink. (It’s not.) I realized I was stopping fully before any chapter where sex needed to be and then ‘got around it’ by TALKING about sexual feelings. Because that was rationalizing it, and I’m more comfortable with rationality. But the character is not rational about this. In fact, that’s a great part of his challenge. So I had to pull my damper out of it and go in full voice.

Is this scary? Oh, heck yeah. It’s terrifying. I don’t think I’ve ever been as nervous about my agent reading anything of mine as I am about Sword And Blood. The first time you try to let a part of your voice full out, it’s easy to lapse into primal scream. And you won’t know at first which one you’ve done – scream or sing. You’re just not used to it.

So, how do you know if you’re singing full voice? How do you avoid dampening it? My guess is if you allow yourself to think/feel about your work, you’ll know full well where you’re falling short. You’ll know where you got squirmy and went “but I don’t write that” or “But what will people think” even though you know full well it’s needed for the cohesion of the novel. One good way to think about it, is that you need to give us the low notes as well as the high.

One way to break through it, for me, is to read stuff I normally don’t read, stuff that goes where I normally don’t go. Erotica, for instance. Or some incredibly violent, graphic account of violence and murder. Or the biography of someone who went through unimaginable trauma. Or a violent thriller. That teaches me to listen to those notes. And learn to put them in.

Which ways have you found? What would you like to try? What do you think would work? Or do you think I’m completely off my rocker?

KRK Giveaway!

Well the books are here and I've had a chance to catch my breath. Now I'd like to give away two copies of 'The King's Bastard' to two of the loyal Mad Genius Club blog followers.

I'm going to ask a question and the answer will be cleverly slipped into my blog, so listen closely Grasshopper.

Some things stay with you. When I was about 10 my family went to play tennis at a set of courts in the back blocks of the Gold Coast. This was in the days when the holiday strip was not as gaudy and glitzy as it is now. My parents loved to play tennis and they told me to watch my little brothers, 8 and 5 and my sister 3. Behind the courts was a stretch of land backing onto a creek. There were white sand dunes, scrubby trees and it was the perfect place for us to play (in those far off days when kids ran wild most of the time). This photo is me at 11, thinking I am very cool.


As the eldest I was used to organising the games and I always saw myself as a sort of hero character so we'd play these long involved games with my younger siblings as my army, following orders, fighting great battles against enemy foes.

While running down one high white sand hill through the hollow into the next we left my little sister behind. Halfway up the next dune I turned around to find she'd run through the deepest part of the hollow and the sand, which appeared to be solid, had given way. She was knee deep in some sort of sticky sand-clay mix and couldn't get out. Having seen plenty of Tarzan movies, I immediately thought of quicksand.

A real emergency! I told my brothers to stay back, afraid that they'd get trapped too, and edged forward. The sand's surface broke up under my feet. It was cold and smooth and wet, and I didn't know what was under there. My eight year-old brother (who was almost as big as me) came and grabbed my arm to pull me out if I got stuck. I managed to grab our little sister's arm and hauled her out of the sticky sand-clay which did not give her up easily. Meanwhile the five year-old brother danced on the edge of the danger zone in desperate to help and likely to get himself into trouble.

End of story, she was fine and we kept on playing. I don't think we even told our parents about it, because by the time they finished playing tennis our game had moved on and that was old news. But I will always remember that sense of something under the ground opening up and proving dangerous.

In King Rolen's Kin power seeps up from the land's heart, infecting people and animals. Only those trained to contain this power go near Affinity Seeps. Now you see how a childhood adventure can be the inspiration for something in a story many years later.

These days I don't order my younger brothers and sister about to play out my great battles, I have a cast of characters and they play out the battles in my books.

The giveaway question is -- In King Rolen's Kin what are the places called where power seeps up from under the ground? Answer in the comments on this post. We'll give it until Saturday and then put all the right answers in a virtual hat and draw two out. Dan can announce the winners on the Saturday Post.

Meanwhile, have you used events from your childhood or adult life as triggers for stories?

So how do we get there from here?

Are we there yet?

Ok I am feeling fundamentally silly, because after the long, long haul with Save the Dragons et al... finally my dearest beasts arrive here tomorrow. Wednesday and the cats are in Launceston, Roland and Puggle arrive with her tonight, and the lot fly over with the mailplane tomorrow. So today has been frantically tying to finish the fence, because we thought there was another day.

And THE TEARS OF IT ARE WET appears to be gasping its last. It might have been over today, except that the fence intervened. And in the process I have done a nice hole in my finger. Frodo must have had a hell of a time, typing.

During the week someone called my attention to a very old article - (part of discussion about a publisher insisting on world rights - because this might possibly impact on their e-sales. Curiously enough the same publisher has been pushing prices up to restrict e-sales eating hardcover sales. Kind of dog-in-the-manger process. 'We don't actually want it, we're not going to do anything with it, but we really don't want you have it, in case you do something with it.' Sigh. I have yet to have my publisher to sell a solitary right of any sort, so it does irk me, especially as I know this can be 2/3 of a writer's income, and that's for writers who sell less than I do. Maybe in some wonderful future authors Utopia contracts would all have use it or lose it clauses. - anyway - the article makes two wonderful points about 'piracy' - that terrible pervasive fear that so many authors dread or blame. Over the years I've noticed there seem to be an example of inverse square law in 'piracy fear' - The less it matters to you if you are pirated, the more rabid you are likely to become about it. This applies for instance to Josepha Nerverherdover (who is so invisible any notice is good - and she'll never earn her advance anyway -so even if pirated copies were lost sales, which they usually aren't, she lost nothing) and the Rowling-in-it extreme who really are going to be bankrupted ha ha by a handful of pirate downloads (because, surprisingly to people in charge of large corporate publishing houses, our readers are remarkably honest and actually like to reward their beloved favorite authors. I'm actually a bit taken aback by Ms. Rowlings attitudes - but then I don't bother to buy (and I don't 'pirate') her books after the first couple. I'm very grateful that she got lots of kids reading old-fashioned fantasy. I wish mainstream publishing would realise how popular it could be) O'Reilly does a good job of debunking the obscure author's fear. And I'm with him. I wish I was popular enought to be a 'pirate' target. I could use the publicity. That's why they're up for FREE at the Baen Free Library. And yes, he's quite right too. By the time you're getting the vast bulk of publishing's effort and publicity and push -- the tiny 'loss' you'd suffer from from having someone swipe copies is not relevant - and based on my experience with SAVE THE DRAGONS, if readers knew you were getting it (or most of it) instead all the middlemen... and moreover, if they know you need it, fair numbers of readers do pay, with no incentive to be honest at all.

The point I found most interesting in the article was lesson 6: Free is eventually replaced by a better quality paid alternative. And how right that is. The first fix is free.:-)

So: how do we move forward? How do we make e-books a big seller - especially ours!? And how do we stop people worrying about 'piracy'?

I am sorry this is all over the place tonight. But my head is.