Writers retreat

Just finished packing to leave for the Speed City chapter of Sisters in Crime's second writers retreat, which again will be at Bradford Woods, 30 miles south of Indianapolis. The chapter sponsored a weekend retreat in 2014, which was tremendously successful.

Looking forward to work sessions, talking and working with other writers, and just spending time alone to write or just walk through the woods and think.

I plan to finish an essay I have been working on for a while and a somewhat long short story. Also to bounce a couple of ideas I have for a novel in November.

Should be great. Looking forward to a great weekend.

Thanks for reading. See you in October.

Query advice

In my every-other-Wednesday critique group, two of the other writers last night passed around query letters to critique. One we went through one as we sat. But the other one we took home to read and will critique once we see each other again.

After reading the letter, I decided to write the author privately.

It must be stated that I'm not the best source for what is an effective query letter. If I were, I wouldn't have the tons of query rejection responses sitting on the hard drive of this laptop. But I think I have a handle on what is not a good letter.

Unfortunately, the query letter I took home wasn't very good.

The person who wrote the query is an excellent writer. I have read numerous examples of their writing and find it well-crafted, thoughtful, tight and entertaining. The writer is a great storyteller, with great imagination and color.

But to my complete surprise, none of that was displaced in the query.

It was flat and unfocused. I wasn't sure who the main character was (except that the author only mentioned one character by name but I still wasn't sure if they were the main character), and there was no conflict in the letter. The author also failed to clearly identify the genre and didn't mention the word count.

Nearly nothing in the query would entice me to read the whole letter. If I didn't know the writer, I would have stopped reading after the first paragraph.

I e-mailed them suggesting that they clearly identify the main charcter, show the challenges they face and the forces standing in their way. And I hope my comments weren't too harsh. I didn't mean for them to be.

Being in this group has helped me tremendously. I hope I was of help to this author. I haven't heard back from them. So only time will tell.

Thanks for reading. And never give up.

Going back into past material

I’m doing something I generally don’t like to do. Instead of just writing straight through to the end, then going back to make major changes in the text, I decided this week to go back to strengthen and braid more elements into the sub-plot in parts of the story already completed.

What works in terms of writing, re-writing and editing varies from writer to writer. Generally for me, going back into previously written material, particularly for major changes, is to be avoided. It serves as an excuse for not writing ahead and thus finishing the work. So what I do is make notes of changes I want and then refer to those notes when I start writing.

In both FIGHTING CHAOS and DEATH AT THE JUNGLE-BUNNY JOURNAL I made one big exception to the don’t-go-back rule. Before the halfway point in both those novels, I suddenly visualized the final scene in the books. Being pressed from inside my head, I jumped to the end and wrote the endings. Then I went back to where I was earlier in the book and continued writing until the beginning met up with the end.

That hasn’t happened yet in THE DEATH OF ART. I haven’t imagined the specific ending, although I am halfway through the novel. But I came to see that certain conflicts that will have to be resolved later are not being fully developed. So I jumped back to flesh out some earlier material.

The good part is that it has been exciting to revisit material I wrote months ago. And it helped to remind me why I liked it to begin with. I changed the name of a character whom I killed off and the name of a character who is going to meet a violent end later. But I want to finish back material as quickly as possible so as not to be bogged down in the earlier parts of the novel.

I will also admit that I am impatient for the ending. Various unfocused thoughts have been swirling around in my head for months but nothing has crystallized. Being only halfway, however, I still have plenty of time. I just don’t want to arrive at the ending and not have thought of one.

So that’s where I am at the moment. Still plugging along. And you should too.

Thanks for reading and get back to work.

Something bold II

More than a monthy ago on Dec.10, I mentioned that I was trying something bold for the 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel contest. I was changing my novel, "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal," from a third-person narrative to a first-person narrative. I said it would be hard but challenging and certainly bold.

When I started, I immediately cut out the scenes that didn't include my hero, Jason Crown. That in itself shortened the novel from 78,000 words to 45,000, 5,000 short of the minimum for the contest. But I still have to somehow cover some of the material from the scenes Jason wasn't it, in many places having to add him to a scene that he wasn't in originally or somehow having him around to learn of the crucial elements.

I never finished re-writing the first-person novel, realizing after weeks of work that it wasn't going to work. It was a good experiment that I don't regret doing except that it took time away from me preparing the third-person narrative for the Amazon contest.

So it was a bold experiment that failed. It's not for this novel nor the next one, "The Death of Art." but I haven't given up the idea of writing something in first-person.

Perhaps it will work for my Fall 2009 novel. I decided yesterday on what that novel should be. I will have to give this idea some thought.

Until then, thanks for reading and don't give up on writing.

Poor old 2008

This is my 96th -- and last -- blog entry of 2008. Not a bad output but less than I should have done. Overall, however, it has been a good year for my fiction writing. I still don't have an agent but finding an agent was only one objective this year.

The first and foremost objective was to become a better writer. And I think I aced that. As I look back at my fiction before this year and compare it to what I have done this year, there is little comparison. I like "Fighting Chaos" and it will always be special to me but this year's writing is much better.

In my first blog entry in 2008, which was on Wednesday, Jan. 2, a was still planning a murder mystery novel. I said I probably wouldn't start for several weeks and had not yet decided on how the victim would killed. I was thinking it would be poison. (Most of the blog, however, dealt finding names for characters, which is a problem I still wrestle with.)

Well, I started the novel about a week later, finished the first draft in May and the victim, George Wilson, is hit in the head and killed. (I thank Mariska Bogle for that idea. She suggested both the victim and the method.) And while I thought I had finished the final and seventh draft more than a month ago, I am pouring through it once more, preparing it for a writing competition at the beginning of February.

But that's not all.

I joined the Speed City chapter of Sisters in Crime and joined a critique group. Along with study and practice, the critique group is one of the reasons I have improved so much this year.

In addition to the finishing the novel (which is currently named "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal"), I wrote a 7,000 word short story for the racing anthology our chapter is putting together. I am also writing some of the factoids that will go between stories.
And I went to Philadelphia to begin research for my next novel, which is called, "The Death of Art," and have written two chapters. And while constantly re-writing Jungle-bunny has kept me from having completed more of DOA, I still plan on completing it over the winter.

And then the search for an agent will be renewed.

In 2009, I plan to increase my blog output, attend at least two writers conferences other than NABJ, find an agent, finish DOA, and plan and start whatever I will write after DOA.

So, it will be a busy year. I look forward to it.

Thanks again for reading, have a happy New Year and keep writing.

Something bold

I started something bold yesterday. The decision to do it wasn't easy months ago but when it re-surfaced two days ago, it was easy because it seemed so right.

I am rewriting "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal" in first-person.

I resisted this idea for months because, as a journalist, I'm far more comfortable writing in third-person. In fact, other than writing editorials for the Philadelphia Tribune, which were first-person plural, I have only written a handful of articles in first-person throughout my entire professional career. To tell the truth, I can only remember four instances.

But this venture, for me, is bold, radical, revolutionary. I was struggling with how to improve the novel and this came to mind.

I started yesterday, eliminating any and all chapters in which Jason Crown does not appear. That means I cut the novel down from 78,000 words to about 45,000, 5,000 short of what I need for the 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest in two months. But some of the information in the eliminated chapters will still be needed. I will just have to include it in another way.

I lost a lot of writing that I loved, particularly a scene between two teens in which the girl tells the boy she is pregnant. That was a particularly well-written chapter but it is no more.

After I go through everything I currently have, I will have to consider what is missing and how I need to add it. There will be a number of scenes I will have to add. In the end, I imagine the novel will top out at about 70,000 words.

So, that's it. A lot of hard work ahead but it is new and exciting. And I'm just waiting to see where it goes. If nothing else, I still have numerous earlier versions in third-person.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

Confidence

This is a balance between having confidence in your idea and your work and in being open suggestions and to criticism. But finding that balance can be a challenge.

I like "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal." I think it is funny and compelling and an interesting read. But is that enough to get an agent? A publisher? Is it good enough to withstand the rigors of a writing competition?

I'm not sure. And so I am pouring over Jungle-bunny, chapter by chapter, looking for those elements that can make it unsaleable. But I find myself greatly second-guessing myself. I spend several hours yesterday rewriting the opening of the novel only to find it uninteresting and unfocused. So, I am throwing all that work out.

As I learn more and read more closely, I find my final draft is generally good but could use some tighter editing. That is my goal. But in the end I second-guess myself. Am I doing the best thing? The correct thing? I don't know.

I feel lost again. I need it to be the best it can be before Feb. 2, the opening day for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel contest, but time is short and I'm uncertain as to what to do. Advice is often conflicting and can undermine confidence. But without it, you are shooting in the dark.

Once again I don't know what to do. Only that something needs to be done. I just can't find the balance between confidence and openness.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

When it's time to give up on something you've written

I was reading a blog I recently discovered and one of the topics it covered in the last couple of days was when is it time to give up on something you have written. That particularly comes to mind for me because my first book, "Fighting Chaos," is just sitting on the proverbial shelf.

In the end, the blogger said it's a difficult question and it's hard to know. However, he offered some insight.

Since I finished Chaos last December, I have grown a lot as a writer and my craft has significantly developed. Now as I look back at the novel, I have a better understanding of why it will never sell in its current form. The story is still good, I think, but the pacing is all off, there is too much backstory in too great of detail, some of the characters are wooden and stiff, and the plot doesn't propel the reader forward.

In the end, it reads like it was written by a novice, which, as it turns out, was the case.

But I am still very attached to the story. It is quite personal to me. Should I give up the ghost and drop it forever? I don't think so. I have chalked up the experience and moved on but there is still something interesting to tell in the story.

So, what do I do? Well, for now, I leave it where it is. In time, and when I have the time, I hope to get back to it. When I am stronger in my creaft, have a better understanding of the market and insight into upcoming trends, I hope to get back to the story. That, unfortunately, could -- and probably will -- take years. But the novel is on the shelf and isn't going anywhere, so why worry.

The blogger quoted (although didn't name) a famous writer, who said, "There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you."

That's not the case with Chaos. It no longer is just inside me. I would like for it to be read but, for the moment, that isn't going to be the case. But it is not an 'untold story.'

Now, on to the next . . .

Thanks for reading and don't give up on writing.

The opening

I am past the beginning of the (hopefully) final rewrite of my current novel, "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal." But I still find myself conflicted over the beginning.

I watched the beginning of the 1941 version of "The Maltese Falcon." I have seen the film at least once in the last year and re-read the book earlier this year. And I was amazed again at how effortlessly Dashiel introduced the hero, the villain and the conflict of the story at the beginning. It was compelling, which, I suppose, is why it is a classic.

In my critique group yesterday another one of the writers was happy to be getting a prologue for the work she was reviewing. But it struck me again how much a prologue can slow down the story. They can be done successfully and often are done successfully. But as a novice, I'm not sure I can pull that off.

Which brings me back to Jungle-bunny. Early on, several people who read the beginning thought my second chapter, which has a backstory, should be the first chapter. And in the fourth (or fifth version, I forget which one) it was. But I was also though I needed to introduce my hero sooner and develop him more fully so that people care about him and his problems, and root for him throughout the story.

But that would mean keeping my first chapter as the first chapter, which is the way it currently is.

In the end, I think I am past the objective reality stage and totally into the subjective. There is little telling what a particular agent will want. For some agents, a prologue, which in this case includes a backstory, is a red flag. For others, it is not.

I guess I must remain confident in my story and my writing because I'm not sure there is one right direction to follow.

And so I am starting Jungle-bunny with the chapters as I originally placed them.

Thanks for reading and don't give up on writing.

Being insecure

One of the things I like about the writing book I am reading __ "Don't Murder Your Mystery" __ is that it knows and acknowledges one of the most fundamental traits of all aspiring writers. We are insecure.

Now as a writer, I am not totally insecure. I have been a writer for years and long away stopped trying to guess-timate how many words I have writtern for print. It's in the millions.

But writing fiction is new to me. I have dabbled in it for years but have only started taking it seriously for the last couple of years.

This evening I was reading a portion of the book on revising, which the author says you must be willin got do over and over again. But the techniques of revision, such as with most writing, can vary. As a writer, you have options.

The author hates it when someone puts forward his way as 'The Way." I am uncomfortable with that too.

The writer says:

"When aspiring writers, already insecure, realize they aren't doing things the way they think a real author is suppose to, they have one more reason to feel inadequate.
The truth is, one one way is the right way. Revising, like writing, is a creative process, too complex to reduce to a formula."

Those are true words, and good thoughts to keep in mind.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

A start

I am still working on the final draft of "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal," mostly just tweaking things here and there. And while I should have kept my focus on Jungle-bunny, I wrote the first two chapters of my next novel, "The Death of Art." I may change that title __ I have thought of something else __ but I'm keeping it for now.

Death of Art will have a Prologue, a short first chapter and a longer but regular length second chapter. It is the second in a series with Jason Crown.

It is about 3,400 words, nearly 5 percent of what I project as its future total length. I did about 750 words last Thursday and everything else on Sunday afternoon after church and into the evening.

I wrote them because I hadn't decided on what to give to my critique group for this month but didn't want to provide another chapter of Jungle-bunny Journal. They have seen chapters 1-4 and I didn't see much value in getting comments on work I have already dealt with. There is only one person in my group who has seen the entire manuscript and I have already weighed her comments and used everything that I thought was useful.

In Death of Art, I used the niece of some friends as inspiration. She was nearly the correct age but had the overall look I wanted in the murder victim. Too bad. I guess I should mention that to her one day. "Hey, I have some good news and some bad news. You inspired me and I used you for a character in my novel. That's the good news. The bad news is I killed you off near the beginning of the book."

I missed a couple of book signings over the weekend. I always like them and I like supporting authors but they can also be a bit of a downer for me. I wonder if and when I will be able to do a singing. Oh well . . .

Back to work. I am looking forward to completing the final touches of Jungle-bunny and to moving on to Death of Art. The story isn't as complicated but I think it will be just as much fun.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

Rethinking "Fighting Chaos"

I have been rethinking "Fighting Chaos." No, I am not abandoning "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal" nor am I thinking of postponing my next novel, which tentatively will be titled "The Death of Art." I will probably start "Death" some time in September.

But I have been giving some thought to "Chaos", its plotting and character development and setting. Brewster is a strong character and one the writer can root for. But he could be stronger. I show his strengths but, other than his being single, I don't draw the reader in enough with his weaknesses.

I can strengthen it without making the novel longer because I think I need to trim the narrative background material on Mark and Harriett. It is interesting. I certainly like it. But even when the couple were the main characters in the novel the background was too much. Some of it will stay but much will have to go. The good thing, however, is I can probably use it for other characters at another time.

But back to Brewster. The conflict is clear __ find the Red Lady before she strikes again. But I can use his earlier failure to capture her to a greater advantage, particularly if I can make it a touch more personal. Perhaps I can even involve Marsha Norwood more.

This novel, as you might understand, is much more personal to me than "Jungle-bunny" because it comes out of something that happened in my life. So I am reluctant to further reduce the roles of Mark and Harriett. But it is needed.

I'm not sure when I will get to it. Probably after I get an agent. Perhaps after I get a published book or two under my belt, I will be able to interest my agent in giving "Chaos" a look. It is an interesting story and I certainly hope I can find a home for it one day. Just not today.

I will take some notes, perhaps an outline, and put them in a file until some time in the future.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

It's time again

I am in particularly good spirits today, which is good because my last posting was a bit of a downer. I am playing the main theme from "The Legend of Bagger Vance" and thinking about what I did just an hour ago.

I sent out a query letter via e-mail. And now I am in that period before any rejection letters where I have all the hope for the future and all the possibilities it brings. It's a wonderful feeling.

I think the novel looks good at just a hair under 80,000 words and the top is complete and ready for an agent to see. I continue working on rewriting the rest to sharpen its focus.

But for now, the world is in front of me and I'm looking forward to what comes next. Regardless of what responses I get when I jump full swing into querying, I am not giving up on my writing. I will probably start my next novel in August and certainly by September, even if I am still querying for Jungle-bunny.

So that's it for now. I have to run.

Thanks for reading and keep writing.

Re-write

I have completely gone through the novel and have started the re-write. I reads well but there are still a couple of problems, mostly dealing with research. I am having a particularly hard time with asthma __ the symtoms and what causes an asthma attack.

I have several friends, including one author, who are going to read the book. And I plan to send it to them in the next week. Two are from out of town __ including one in England __ so they will get it via e-mail. The last person, the author, is local and we will probably get together in a local coffee shop or bookstore.

I am still very nervous about the book. Is it any good? Is it interesting? How well is the story told?

I know I must sound like a Nervous Nellie but I can't shake it. I haven't developed a good sense of perspective and I wonder if I ever will.

I have started writing down little notes regarding the next novel. It will use the same main character as is in "Death at the Jungle-bunny Journal," Jason Crown, but it will be set in Philadelphia where he will be attending an NABJ convention. And, like I think I mentioned before, the story will evolve around art at the Barnes Foundation in suburban Philly.

I haven't decided who the villian is yet so I have much work to do. And there is a lot of research I will need to finish on the Barnes Foundation, although I have some background in that area having previously written about and having visited the Barnes.

Keep writing and thanks for reading.