Because having to read 100 posts in a week to pick out the gems makes me rage. But now you won’t have to.
1. I wish I was a Lannister.
2. You have a million excuses.
3. You remember that awesome post I did on where writers get our ideas? Well, it was a lie. We really steal them from teenagers on the bus.
4. You know that theory about how every choice we make creates a branch in the timeline? Well, it would certainly explain all the contradictory posts about the future of publishing.
5. Neil Gaiman’s Guide to Writing
6. If you don’t love agents, they won’t love you.
7. Bad Pick-up Lines for Snagging an Agent. And worse ones. Also, drunken beagles?
8. Alien planets are great. But how ’bout something a little more exotic?
9. Why you might not wanna leave a drawer full of crap for relatives to find.
10. Don’t trust the word “average” in publishing too much…
11. Even being a published writer these days can suck. Especially if your agent thinks they should be your publisher, too. That’ll probably look something like this. At least not everyone is doing it. And agents and editors are out to get you, or at least, the people they work for are. That said, if you do get an editor, you can be pretty sure they love your book. Of course, even if your publisher is still your publisher, you might find your contract amended automatically by e-mail. And it’s more than one publisher. Which might be good or bad for you as an individual, but says a lot about how well publishers are treating their authors. Not much of it good. The book industry is in more trouble than you though, huh? And the booksellers are in worse. But we can save it!
12. The above links talk a lot about how writers should know the business side as well. Tawna Fenske prefers not to. What about you?
13. The first week of sales matters. You probably knew that. Did you this?
14. Is your character boring? Passive? Perhaps even a bit wimpy? That’s okay. YA Historical Fiction author Katy Longshore has devised an 8-Step Program for Crappy Characters. You can save everybody.
15. Motivation is important. But just how obvious should you be about it? Janice Hardy has some suggestions.
16. Establishing your character’s, er… character, is very important. But studies show that circumstances can have a much more powerful effect on behavior than your underlying personality. Janice Hardy has some tips on how to incorporate this into your stories.
17. The Intern (is she really an intern, still?) dissects a book that readers couldn’t put down: Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. And goes on to explain how it’s like a video game, and why that makes it so appealing. Being a gamer myself, I have to agree with most of her analysis.
18. The first thirty pages of your novel are probably boring. Cut ’em.
19. What to do when an agent says no to your new project
20. How to Manage Your TIme as a Writer by Mindy Klasky.
21. When you’re a fantas or science fiction writer, you often deal with world-building, and creating new cultures. One way to make this easier is to learn ore about cultures on Earth. Here are some interesting stories from Juliette Wade.
22. An interesting discussion on the origins of various cultural structures and metaphors courtesy of Google + Hangouts.
23. How cosplaying can teach us about world-building. You know who you can ask about various types of clothing in different historical periods, or just about clothing in general? Cosplayers. Just because they may happen to be dressed up as pichu in high heels, that doesn’t mean they won’t know how to cut a Japanese yukata, or how to sew a Fauntleroy suit. The take-away: Even the craziest hobbies have unexpected value.
24. Is language completely arbitrary? Many studies say not. And you can use that in your writing and your world-building.
25. On the construction of story endings and tying shit up.
26. On hooking. Because all the best writers are doing it. 😉
27. Kids are the future, and they know it. So how come you don’t hear about it much in YA?
28. Lots of cons and conferences tout manuscript evaluations as a feature. John Gilstrap over at The Kill Zone give us his Ten Rules for Manuscript Evaluation and how to get the most out of it.
29. Meg Gardiner on drafting a novel. No lie, brainstorming is the best part. Writing the thing out is… somewhere in the top 10.
30. Kathleen Pickering on on-site reasearch.
31. What typos cost you. Courtesy of the NYT.
32. Three Ways to Publish from Anne R. Allen. Of course, there are more than three ways to publish. Plenty of folks are successful with web serializations. I’m gonna be publishing a manga a page at a time on Deviant Art. But Anne does tackle the three main methods of publishing a book-length work.
33. Jennifer Archer on selling her debut novel. Three times. 🙂
34. Genre vs. Literary: Why the hate? Thanks, Roni.
35. Best-selling vs. Best-writing from Meghan Ward.
36. Making Old Thoughts New Again
You know how I mentioned I read over 100 posts this week? That was a lie. That’s just the number in my blog reader. But blogs love to link, and I can’t help but follow. It was really something like 200. Which may explain my lack of novel-writing this week. XD
So why only 36 points? Well, keep in mind that some of them had more than 1 post. And some of the posts just weren’t worth passing on. Just be glad I read those ones for you. 😉
Atsiko's Chimney 