February 2011

Setting Life Changing Goals

Submitted by jlpowers on Sat, 02/12/2011 - 6:40pm

For most of us, there comes a time in our lives when we want to change everything. Our house, our finances, our health, our relationships, everything! And we want to change them all right now!

Being good little goal-setters, we set goals for each of these areas. And they're great goals, measurable, achievable, and we have control over them. We know they are excellent goals and we're all excited for a couple days.

Then reality strikes. And we discover that we can't change everything at once, because it's just too much. Too much change, too much chaos, too much brain rewiring.

So, let's go back to step one and let's lay down some ground rules.

#1 - People can handle only so much change at one time.

Granted, the amount of change a person can handle varies from person to person, but each person has their limits. And it doesn't matter how strongly they claim they want to make all these changes, if the amount of change required is beyond their ability to cope, then the changes won't happen. End of story. Either they will begin to sabotage one or more of the goals, or they'll just randomly forget about some, or they'll worry themselves literally sick and end up stuck in bed for days on end.

If this is you, then you need to suck it up, admit that you're human, and realistically determine how much change you, as an individual, can handle.

Look for the signs that you're trying to change too much too quickly. Your signs are unique to you, but a starting point is to look for common signs like unconscious sabotage and sickness, then as you pay attention, over time you can determine what your unique back-off signs are. (Read more)

Genre & Sub-Genre

Submitted by jlpowers on Mon, 02/07/2011 - 10:38pm

The basis for the following lists are from www.FictionFactor.com/genre.html and www.cuebon.com/ewriters/genres.html (see their website for definition of the sub-genres), with additions from various other sources. (Read more)

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Deciding Your Story's Genre

Submitted by jlpowers on Mon, 02/07/2011 - 9:25pm

Deciding your story's genre is one of the first decisions you have to make when writing a novel or short story. Experienced writers often know the genre before the story is begun, but it's not unusual for the inexperienced writer to be faced with the decision after the first draft is completed.

Why is a story's genre so important? Can't I just write any story I want?

For a short story, its genre decides which magazines/e-zines you can send your story to, or which anthologies you can submit to. Therefore, if you have a magazine in mind, you need to write a story that adheres to their genre guidelines if you want to be accepted.

For a novel, the genre most obviously decides where in the bookstore the book will be shelved. But genre also decides many other things for a novel, including:

the audience for your book;
often, major plot line requirements;
what un-written rules will have to be adhered to;
sometimes, the length of the book;
which agents you'll submit to, as they often specialize in their favorite genres;
and which publishing houses and imprints you'll submit to.

Okay, I can see that it's important, but what is "genre"?

Merriam-Webster's dictionary defines "genre" as "a category of artistic, musical, or literary composition characterized by a particular style, form, or content." So, for a story, the "genre" of the story is the "category" of the story "characterized by a particular style, form, or content." (Read more)

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Revision Letters Part 2: Symptoms

Submitted by jlpowers on Mon, 02/07/2011 - 10:59am

You have received a revision letter from an editor or agent, or any kind of detailed critique, and you're falling apart at the seams. How can you fix the situation so you can do what needs to be done?

First, you need to: Take your ego out of the whole situation. See Revision Letters Part 1: Ego

After you've done this, the second part of dealing with revison letters and critique is to:

View every critique as a list of symptoms not a list of factual problems or issues.

Because most times, a "problem" exists in the manuscript long before it grows big enough for the reader to notice.

So an editor can say "fix X"... but the real problem isn't "X"... because "X" just happened to be the first place the issue got big enough for the editor to notice that something was wrong. The real problem is "Y" that happened three chapters before, and in the intervening chapters "Y" _grew_ into "X".

So, instead of taking the editor/agent at their literal word and fixing "X", which doesn't fix the real problem, because the real problem wasn't "X" it was "Y"...

View "fix X" as a symptom, apply some brain cells to the situation and say to yourself:

"The editor says 'fix X', but is 'X' a real issue in itself, or a symptom of something else?"

Sometimes "X" is the real issue, but a lot more of time it's only a symptom of something else.

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Revision Letters Part 1: Ego

Submitted by jlpowers on Mon, 02/07/2011 - 10:50am

First, you need to:

Take your ego out of the whole situation.

You can do this by remembering two things:

1) Edits requested for a manuscript have no bearing on you as a person.

Just because your manuscript wasn't perfect when you sent it in doesn't lessen your worth as a person. It doesn't mean you're a "failure" in any sense of the word.

In fact, edits have nothing whatsoever to do with you as a person.

You could be Mother Theresa, and if you submitted this book under a name that wasn't 'Mother Theresa', they'd still ask for the same edits.

You as a person and your worth as a person don't even come into the equation.

So save yourself the grief, and take your ego out of the equation... your manuscript isn't "you"!

2) The manuscript isn't your baby.

Getting a request to fix a manuscript doesn't mean that you're chopping off fingers or toes... because...

A manuscript is a thing.
It's a product you produced. (Read more)