Gearing Up for November in July

Just to give you all a heads up...

The National Novel Writing Month challenge starts in a little over 90 days so if you're interested in giving it a try, now might be a good time to start noodling around some ideas of what you want to write.

My method of being ready to rock on Nov. 1st is crude, but effective:

1. Go to the site (linked above) and sign up. It's free and there are no obligations of any sort -- even to participate in November.
   
2. Come up with an idea or two or three. Pick the one that interests/excites you the most.
3. Describe that idea in a sentence or two.
4. Expand those sentences into short paragraphs.
5. Expand those paragraphs into a two or three page synopsis. This is all "what might happen" kind of stuff.
   
6. Start breaking down the synopsis and converting it into an outline organized by chapters. You can be fairly arbitrary at this point. Write "Chapter One" and group all the info in your synopsis that you think might go in your first chapter. You don't have to be rigid, it'll change as you start writing. Do this for "Chapter Two" and so on until the end. My outlines tend to be anywhere from 25 to 40+ chapters and five to ten pages long.
   
7. As Nov. 1st approaches continue to go through your outline as often as you can, adding whatever you can think of in terms of story, setting, and character. Divide chapters that you suspect are too large, add new ones. Jot down character revealing snippets of possible dialogue, etc.
   

If you do this, I can guarantee that you'll be well-placed and eager to start writing when the bell sounds on the big day. Just to be clear, you are not writing your novel yet as that would be against the rules, you're getting ready to write.

Think about it. Yes, it's challenging but it's also very satisfying and well worth any effort you'll put into it.

American Gods - Mini Review

Yet another Neil Gaiman success, the story of "American Gods" centers around a character named Shadow -- an enigmatic everyman who is hired by a shady con artist by the name of Mr. Wednesday.

The underlying premise of the book is that various waves of immigrants (going back to those who came over the land bridge) brought their gods with them to America. These gods, made physical by the worship and adoration of their believers, still exist today -- although largely in a diminished capacity.

Now Mr. Wednesday is rounding up all the gods of the ancient mythologies to do battle with the "new gods" of the American pantheon -- Media, Internet, and Mass Transit to name a few. Apparent there's only so much worship to go around and each group is somehow threatened by the others existence.

Nothing is as it seems in this book which I can safely label as a "fantasy thriller". "American Gods" is a delightfully layered read which remains engaging from cover to cover despite complication after complication after complication...

Recommended.

Surprisingly Not Bad

I'm a little over fifty pages into the rewrite of my second middle grade novel "Magic Man". It took me this long to warm up to the task since by the end of last November, I was about as sick of my manuscript as an author could be. But I forced myself to finish the first draft, made a few feeble attempts to start the rewrite, then chucked the whole thing aside for seven months.

And you know what? It worked! As I'm going through the text of what I knew was an absolute piece of poo, I'm delighted to discover that it's actually pretty good. No really! The story pretty much makes sense, dialogue is fairly crisp, the funny parts are more or less funny, and the action sequences border on being exciting -- all the kinds of things I can fix during the editing part of the program. That's what rewriting is for, after all. Very cool.

I've often read that you should give yourself a bit of time before jumping into a rewrite -- to clear your head and let things settle down -- but who knew the suggestion actually worked?!

The Graveyard Book - Mini Review

With "The Graveyard Book", Neil Gaiman continues to define himself as one of the most original and inventive authors working in the business today. A fan of his work since the graphic series "Sandman", I picked up this book with the certain knowledge that I was in for a storytelling treat. I was not disappointed in the least.

The narrative centers around Nobody Owens, a boy who, as a toddler, was tragically orphaned by the brutal murder of his family. Adopted by the ghosts of a nearby graveyard and protected by a mysterious guardian, "Bod" grows up learning the ways of the dead and with the knowledge that the man who killed his family still hunts for him outside the protection of the graveyard.

Wonderfully illustrated by David McKean, "The Graveyard Book" is a fun and engaging read that easily exceeds all expectations. Highly recommended.

Incandescence - Mini Review

Wikipedia defines hard sci fi as "a category of science fiction characterized by an emphasis on scientific or technical detail, or on scientific accuracy, or on both."

By that definition "Incandescence" by Greg Egan is by far the hardest science fiction book I've read in my entire life. We're talking diamond hard here! If you're into the action-packed drama of space-time geometries, general relativity, and interstellar panspermia...have I got the book for you.

There is a decent story (lost alien race in peril at the forbidden center of the galaxy) buried throughout what amounts to a novel-length discussion of Einstein's theory of general relativity and Newtonian physics, but as a right-brained artist type, I found my eyes glazing over for significant chunks of this book.

Not at all the author's fault as you can tell it's a well-written and carefully reasoned book, but I'm not the kind of reader who's smart enough to appreciate the effort Mr. Egan put into it.

I like sci fi stories about people (alien or otherwise) who have an adventure. I don't need to know about the extremely complicated physics behind that adventure.

Seriously, if you're a gifted scientist/mathematician who delights in theorizing about plasma accretion disks around black holes, you'll totally groove on this book. If you're a dummy like me, not so much.

Finally!

Well, it took longer than I'd expected but I finally finished my screenplay rewrite and sent it off to a trusted reader. He'll give notes which I'll incorporate before sending it off to my writing agents (who will no doubt have additional notes). All part of the process.

I'm very pleased with how this script is turning out. Full of sci fi action and with a healthy dose of comedy, it'd be a movie that I'd like to see if I were a kid. Hopefully that translates into appealing to the current batch of fresh humans.

Like I mentioned before, it'll either make a cool cgi-heavy live action flick or an awesome animated adventure in the style of Japanese anime (with characters not quite as bouncy as the figure to the left). I wouldn't complain either way.

Done! Done! Done! Well, Almost.

Finished up a rough first draft of my Script Frenzy screenplay this weekend. It ended up being 124 pages long. I'd say the last 24 pages took me longer to write than the first 100 for a variety of reasons including time travel, world building logic, and an intense action sequence at the very end. My tiny brain is throbbing but it felt great to type "The End" at the bottom of the page yesterday.

Now the fun part begins -- the editing. The goal is to crank on the rewrite this week and hopefully get it to my trusted beta readers by early next week.

Stepsister Scheme - Mini Review

"The first in what looks to be a 4 or 5 book run, The Stepsister Scheme is an enjoyably cheeky examination of what happens to three famous fairy tale princesses after the "happily ever after".

Cinderella's Prince has been kidnapped so her magically powerful mother-in-law assembles the princesses (also Snow White and Sleeping Beauty) in what can be described as a sort of Charlie's Angels-style ninja strike force. They set off to rescue the Prince, encountering lots of danger, intrigue, and magic along the way. The tone is an interesting blend of heroics, humor, and some "darker" themes. Inventive and original, it does not disappoint by being a typical "mining" of the fairy tale world.

The only negatives are a somewhat gratuitous deus ex machina level character trait for one of the princesses and some rough sexual imagery that kept me from recommending the book to the pre-teens in my family. Yes, despite the cover art obviously designed to appeal to the younger set, this is a book for adults and older teens. Other than that minor quibble -- Recommended."

Blade of Tyshalle - Mini Review

"The second book of Matthew Stover's "Caine" series, "Blade of Tyshalle" is equally as entertaining and well-written as "Heroes Die".

This time around Hari must deal with an even more potent array of foes, both old and new, who have conspired to completely, and I do mean COMPLETELY ruin his life and those of the ones he loves. Their collective goal is to break Caine and make him suffer to the point of despair before killing him. If they were dealing with an ordinary man they might be justified in thinking they'd succeed -- but this is Caine. Never one to surrender, he begins fighting back with a ferocity that is both breath-taking and satisfying. Recommended."

My Query Letter

Okay, so you finally get your novel to the point where you think it's ready to be seen by a publishing professional. That usually means sending it off to an editor or literary agent. But as every aspiring author should know, nothing sours the disposition of one of these hardworking book folk more quickly than a big ol' unsolicited manuscript. They don't want them, they get mad at people who send them, and they immediately flush any that show up in their virtual or physical mailboxes.

So what do you do? Write a query letter, of course.

The purpose of a query letter is to briefly describe your manuscript (c.300 words or less) and ask if it's okay to send them the first chapter or two. Most sources that I've found seem to think that writing a good query is nearly as important as your actual novel and great care should be taken when crafting it. That makes sense to me. Since you can't just dump the whole manuscript on an editor's desk, that one page letter has to be pretty darned good.

The ideal query letter intrigues the editor or agent just enough so that they want to read more.

After Leonard was rejected at the query stage by the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, sniff, I began to suspect that I needed some help on my own query (genius that I am). Fortunately, I had somewhere to turn for help, running it past Evil Editor and his trusty minions. They offered some very helpful suggestions about how to make it better. I highly recommend putting your query to the test over on his site. They can be a little rough (tough love), but if you check your ego and go there to be educated, you'll benefit immensely from the feedback. I know I did. Oh, and another cool thing is that it's all for free.

Here's how my query letter turned out:

Dear (Editor),

Leonard the Great is a middle-grade fantasy novel (77,000 words) set in the days of King Arthur. It's the story of Leonard Albacore, a young page who dreams of getting Sir Ronald the Mediocre, his kind but incompetent master, a seat at the Round Table. After a chance encounter with a suicidal dragon, he cooks up a plan that will get both of them what they want -- death for the dragon and a sure-fire invite to Camelot for Sir Ronald.

But the plan backfires horribly when the snooty Knights of the Round Table show up and arrest Sir Ronald for "attempted bravery without a license", dragging him off to Camelot's dungeons.

Wracked with guilt, Leonard vows to do whatever it takes to free his master. But it won’t be easy. An ancient evil has taken over Camelot, and unless Leonard can figure out how to defeat it, both Sir Ronald and Arthur’s dream are doomed.

Full of rough and tumble action, this boy-centric novel is also rich with irreverent asides and unique characters.

I would be happy to send a sample chapter at your request.

Sincerely,
Roger Eschbacher

So there you go. Short, to the point, and (hopefully) effective. Bring on the multi book deals!

Heroes Die - Mini Review

"I guess I'm a relative latecomer to the whole sci fi/fantasy mashup thing but dang! I am loving this sub genre!

Like Williams' "Implied Spaces", Stover's "Heroes Die" is a perfect blend of hard sci fi and sword and sorcery style fantasy. On Earth, Hari Michaelson is a wildly popular actor whose off world adventures are recorded through his eyes and sent back real-time for the amusement of his fans. On Ankhana, Hari is known as Caine, perhaps the most lethal assassin who has ever lived. When the "link" to his ex-wife, (also an actor) is mysteriously severed and a clock starts ticking toward her demise, Hari contracts to go to Ankhana and save her -- realizing that with the lethal forces arrayed against him, it may end up being his own personal "series finale".

Magic, technology, swordplay, and fey creatures abound in this richly told tale that is so well done and captivating, I'll be immediately moving on to the next book in the series. Highly recommended."

Frenzied Finish

I am pleased to announce that I beat the Script Frenzy challenge late last week and have been using the remaining days to finish my script. I'm guesstimating that it will clock out at around 120 pages -- way too long as an average screenplay runs between 100-110. But not to worry. Editing will commence immediately following completion of the first draft.

I really like the script and think/hope kids will like it too. Lots of exciting action, a fun sci fi storyline, and some interesting kid characters that have a nice arc. What's not to like?

The Children of Hurin - Mini Review

"Based on a manuscript left unfinished by JRR Tolkien, this book suffers greatly from any comparison to the master's fully completed works.

The story itself revolves around the consequences suffered by Hurin's family after he dares to defy the evil Morgoth (Sauron from LOTR's bigger and badder boss). Chock full of unlikeable characters and relentless tragedies, it is a heavy and frankly depressing book to wade through.

(Son) Christopher Tolkien states that he completed the manuscript "with a minimum of editorial presence" and "without distortion or invention." But therein lies a large part of the problem. The Children of Hurin has a choppy, incomplete feel and was sorely in need of some vigorous "invention" to make it read more like a fully developed novel and not merely an expanded outline.

Interesting in a dry academic sort of way, it lacks any of the humor, warmth, and inspirational qualities of The Hobbit or LOTR. In short, The Children of Hurin is a dull and bleak read -- of interest, I'm afraid, to none but the most extreme Tolkien fans."

Half-Frenzied

Reached page 55 today so I'm over half way to my goal of 100 pages by the end of the month. A screenplay certainly utilizes a different set of writing muscles than a novel -- much more dialogue than description, no internal monologues, present tense rather than past -- that sort of thing. In general, I'm finding it "easier" as long as I remember to keep the writing uncomplicated and to the point. No room in a screenplay for the kind of richly descriptive writing that you need to do in a novel. Economy is the watchword when writing for the silver screen.

That being said, it still has to be an entertaining enough read that the script readers will want to send it up the food chain. After all, what screenwriter doesn't dream of seeing his script produced?

A Scripting Fool

Well, only two days into Script Frenzy and I find myself in the very pleasant position of being 16 pages into my script -- and liking it, too! It's called Timer and can best be described as a Family/Youth/Action/SciFi/Comedy. Yeah, that's what I'd call it. I think it might make a great middle grade novel so don't be surprised if that title shows up on my NaNo page in the fall. As I've mentioned before, I find that screenplays make great expanded outlines for novels as you've been able to work out a lot of the kinks already.