ABNA -- brief update

I finally did it this evening. I entered ABNA.

I also did something I said I wouldn't do. I commented under my real name on one of the threads. I'm sorry but I couldn't help it. The threads are addictive and sometimes destructive. So, from now on, I plan to avoid the whole thing and let my writing stand on its own.

I entered under a pen name, and used the name of a male child that my wife and I never had. (We have daughters.) She smiled when I mentioned to her the name I used.

I haven't been very productive this month with my blog. Lots going on. But I should be back on the horse next month.

Have a good weekend and thanks for reading.

Cancer II

This is only the fourth time in the last 15 months I have written about cancer. But this blog is suppose to be about my journey as a writer and the things that affect me as a writer. (Which, by the way, brings up the point whether it should be affect or effect. I always have a hard time remembering which is which. So if I just got it wrong, well, at this moment I don't give a flying .... .)

I have some work to do on my current WIP but this evening I'm having a hard time with it. Writing fiction is like dreaming, and then writing it down. And tonight I'm having a hard time dreaming.

The reason is that I went to a prostate cancer support group meeting today, something I rarely do and I am now reminded why. It depresses me. Yes, I feel fine. Actually, I always have. The times when I haven't felt good have always been because of the treatment of the disease, not from the disease itself. I have never noticed a symptom of prostate cancer.

I went through eight-and-a-half weeks of external radiation treatment last winter. It was my "winter project," if you recall. But today I was reminded yet again that I don't know yet whether I am cured. I was told it could take 18 months to two years before we'd know for sure. I normally put such thoughts out of my mind because at the moment there isn't anything I can do about it, cured or not. But it is still like the Sword of Damocles over my head.

So tonight I can't write. Or at least it's a struggle.

I did everything I was suppose to do, everything my doctor and my pastor asked me to do. Now I just have to wait.

I hate this. I want the dreams to come easily like before. This really sucks.

But thanks for reading. And now I will try to take my oft-repeated advice and keep writing.

Endings . . . and redemptions

I am struck by the fact that I like happy endings, particularly in stories. Sentimental, yes, I know that. But it's not like I can't find satisfaction in a sad ending because I can. That is as long as the ending makes sense and there is some degree of redemption in the story.

So that brings me to my critique group. I won't mention names here, of course, but they all know I enjoy their stories and value them comments on my writing.

There is one woman in the group -- I will call her Kia -- who loves dark, creepy stories. I don't care for them much but I truly love her writing. She is a brilliant storyteller, has vivid descriptions and snappy dialogue. But she loves the dark side.

This week, we read a short story by another woman -- I will call her Angie -- that was full of mystical elements, which I could accept, and a surprising and shocking ending, where the protag is murdered. Now the protag wasn't a particularly likable person, certainly wasn't in the beginning. She was full of anger and pain. But Angie was wonderfully able paint a fuller picture of her as the story developed and there was a level of redemption in her life.

Then she is killed off.

Ninety to 95 percent of the story was great but Angie destroyed it in the last 300 words. I hated it and didn't pick it up again until my critique group meeting, though it was on my mind a lot. And I wondered how Kia, who loves the dark side, felt about Angie's story.

She disliked it, too.

The problem was nothing in the story up until that point -- not in its details or in its tone -- suggested the type of ending. It cheated the reader because there was little redemption and no justice in the outcome. It was like having a story about puppy dogs, and kitty cats, and unicorns, and daisies, and sunshine. Then suddenly at the end, having Freddie Kruger show up and stuff the kitties into a wood chipper. Despite the mere horror of it all, the ending would make no sense.

In my stories, I strive for them to make sense. I end them where I do because that's where the end is. I always want the ending to leave the reader satisfied, even if it's not totally happy.

Angie's story is a case study in what I will avoid.

Thanks for reading, and keep writing.

SinC survey

The Sisters in Crime Mystery Book Consumer Study is done and is online. I will look for the link and give it to you later. Analyzing the results should help in planning marketing strategies. So I will be looking at the study closely in the days and weeks ahead. I haven't read the study yet -- and I look forward to seeing some of the racial demographics -- but here are some of the results. (I am quoting below directly from the e-mail I got today.)

The majority of mystery/crime fiction buyers tend to be women over the age of 45. Overall, 68 percent of mysteries are purchased by women; more than half of mystery buyers are more than 45 years of age. Buyers 18 to 44 years of age purchase 31 percent of the mysteries sold.

Most of the mystery buyers – 48 percent – live in suburban areas, 27 percent reside in rural areas and 25 percent live in urban areas.

The majority of mysteries – 35 percent – are purchased by individuals who live in the South, 26 percent are purchased by people in the West, 20 percent by those in the Midwest and 19 percent by individuals in the Northeast.

Mysteries are obtained mostly through purchases from brick-and-mortar stores, followed by library borrowing and online purchasing. A total of 39 percent are obtained through in-store purchases, 19 percent are borrowed from libraries and 17 percent are purchased online. Online purchases in the mystery genre top those for other types of fiction.


More later.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

ABNA -- again!

I must be an idiot (or a glutton for punishment at the very least) but I decided to enter the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest again this year. But I also decided to follow some advice by online friend and published author James King, the 2009 ABNA winner.

I entered ABNA that year and found the expereince less than pleasant, though not because Jim ultimately -- and quite deservedly -- won. Some of the people I encountered in the online chat threads were not just competitive, which was to be expected -- we all were competitive -- but also downright nasty about it. I networked a lot on the threads and, despite the nasties, I thankfully met plenty of wonderful people and many of them I now consider friends.

At the time, Jim wasn't one of them. And that was probably because his approach to the contest was smart.

I met Jim face-to-face for the first time last fall during at one of his book tour events in Ohio. And I asked him whether he read or commented in the ABNA threads during the contest. He said no. He just entered and let it rip.

So I decided to do the same this year. I'm going to enter and just let my writing speak for me. I won't hang out talking and waiting. I don't plan to get all caught up in the contest as I have before. I will know something when they contact me.

I won't say which novel I will enter and I will use a pseudonym, though I haven't decided which name to use. I am reading over my entry now, nipping and tucking where I think it may need it. And I'm going to have my wife, who is great at marketing, write the first draft of my novel pitch, though I won't blame her if I don't make it past stage one because I will write the last draft of the pitch.

So there you have it. This is probably my last mention of this year's contest unless I make the semi-final round later in the spring. And I may not mention it then, either.

I have the talent, I believe, but success is often a matter of luck. So wish me luck.

And, as always, thanks for reading.

Gender bias

I joined Sisters in Crime several years ago for a variety of reasons and have totally embraced the concept of equality for female writers in the industry, in general, and in the mystery genre, in particular. To me, it isn't a question of limiting men or of limiting men's access in the industry. It is about elevating the access of women.

Put it like this. It isn't just about women getting a bigger piece of the literary pie. It's about caking a bigger pie. Then, everyone benefits. (Not the perfect analogy, I know. It has flaws. But I think you get the point and I want to move on.)

There is an issue I was unaware of before I joined SinC and something the organization has been crusading about for years. It's the issue of gender bias in book reviews. Who is reviewed and why?

SinC's Monitoring Project has for more than two decades tracked mystery book reviews in key publications. And the bottomline is that even in the 21st Century -- yes, the enlightened 21st Century -- male authors tend to get more reviews than women. The Project recently reported that in 22 publications through the third quarter of 2010, only four reviewed more female authors than men.

An article in SinC's December newsletter mentioned a monitoring project conducted by Slate, the online magazine, in which it counted the adult fiction reviews in The New York Times over a two-year period. Its results showed 67 percent of the reviews went to men. And of those getting a double shot, with a review in the daily paper and in the Sunday Book Review, the number shot to 71 percent in favor of men.

(The newsletter also pointed out that only men made Publishers Weekly's Best of 2009 list.)

All of this makes me wonder -- Are there that many more male authors than female authors? I don't know the demographics but I doubt that is the case. Then -- and I can barely believe I'm about to say this -- are men inherently better writers than women? I doubt that, too.

So the only reasonable conclusion is there is a gender bias. But why?

I have worked for a national business news magazine (BusinessWeek), an international wire service (United Press International) and a newspaper (the African-American daily, The Philadelphia Tribune), and have written book reviews for each. And I know that if a publication wanted to review more books by women it is a simple decision to do so. Publications get tons of manuscripts. And it is up to the editors which books are reviewed.

It's obvious, it seems to me, something is wrong here. The question is, will anything be done about it. Since SinC has been fighting this battle for decades, it doesn't seem promising.

But what is promising is that three years ago I was totally unaware this problem existed. I wasn't enlightened. (I don't remember every book I have reviewed but I must sadly admit that probably only a few were by women.) So maybe education is part of the answer. Bringing this issue to light should help in its solution. I can't imagine that in the 21st Century it wouldn't be. And that, as the newsletter pointed out, is "precisely why Sisters in Crime started the Monitoring Project."

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

Query rejections

I got into a heated discussion with my wife a couple of nights ago. We were in the car and she was talking about her work, and I could feel the anger rising up in me as she talked. I couldn't believe she was being so stupid and short-sighted. Or, to be accurate, I thought her position was stupid and short-sighted.

She is a senior vice president for her employer and two positions reporting directly to her are vacant. This is a serious problem for her because the positions are critical and until they are filled and the people are fully functioning, doing her job will be much harder for my wife.

It's an employers market and she says they have more than 300 applications, and most are qualified for one of the positions. But no more than half the applications will ever land on her desk at any point and fewer than 20 applicants will get any sort of interview.

She says she has dozens of cover letters to review and she makes up her mind in seconds whether consider or reject the applicant. And one of the deciding factors is whether there is a mistake -- ANY SORT OF MISTAKE -- in the cover letter. Spelling, grammar, a typo -- doesn't matter. The person is rejected. They could be perfect in every other way, could be perfect for the job, but she rejects them.

"Why would you do that?" I asked. "You have made small mistakes before."

She said there has to be a method for quickly getting through the applications and cover letters, and that is one method she uses.

The reason I got so hot under the collar was because just the day before I was reading some agent who said a tiny mistake in a query letter isn't a good thing, of course, but it doesn't necessarily mean you're going to get a rejection.

After listening to my wife, whom, by the way, is a beautiful woman I'm most proud of, I wasn't so sure the agent was telling the truth. In fact, I thought they were lying.

Agents get dozens of query letters a day, hundreds a week, much like the hundreds of applications my wife has. And agents must weed through them. And I suspect a small error will get you bounced. Agents can't possibly have the time to seriously read all those queries. They have to find ways to get to the bottom of the pile.

Knowing I could be rejected for as minor a problem as one misplaced comma is a scary thought. All prospective writers pour over their letters looking for something to give them a slight edge. But I hate to think that an otherwise wonderfully written query letter could sink the chances for a brilliantly executed novel because the writer had a little typo. It puts even more pressure on you to have the perfect query. (As if you don't have enough pressure.) But anyone can make a mistake.

Life just doesn't seem fair.

Thanks for reading and don't give up. See ya next time.