NaNoWriMo draws to a close

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It's November 24th, and if you've been doing NaNoWriMo, you're going to be doing either one of two things. On one hand, you might be feverishly typing like crazy to ensure you've got 40k words in order to hit your 50k mark on Saturday, or you might have already sailed past the 40k mark, and you're now cruising towards your goal with days to spare.

No matter which NaNo-er you are, let me congratulate you on getting this far. Whether you've written 10k words, or 50k words, that's still a huge chunk of writing to have committed to paper. True, 50k is now well below the threshold considered a 'novel', but hey, you've possibly just written more in one go than you've ever written before.

I'm sure Saturday still feels like a long way off, but what exactly should you do when you hit 50k?

1) Take a break.
You've earned it. Take a couple of days off writing, and do something totally unrelated. Go to the cinema, visit friends, take in a show - anything you want, just don't write. Racking up 50k words in 30 days can take a lot out of you, so you'll need to recharge your batteries if you're going to survive the onslaught that is Christmas. However, at some point, you'll also need to...

2) Finish your novel.
If it's 'finished' at 50k, then you need to decide if you want to keep it as a novella-length piece, or you want to extend it to 80k or more to hit the 'novel' mark. If you want to extend it, consider sub plots, or padding out those scenes that you probably rushed in order to meet the deadline. If you've finished NaNo at 50k but your book itself is still far from complete, then get the rest written. Take your time - the mad panic is over. But one way or the other, get it done.

3) Edit, edit, edit.
Your book is far from finished - it is a first draft, at best. Even if you've typed 'The End' it's still not ready for the public. Put it to one side for a few weeks, maybe even start something new. Put some distance between yourself and your words, so that when you go back to them, you can critically decide what you need to do with what you've produced. Edit it once, and then edit it again. Find a beta reader, or a critique partner - or better yet, find an editor. If you want to put your book out there, it will need to be perfect if it's going to make it in a crowded marketplace.

Now you've finished reading this, get back to your NaNo effort. Only 10k words to go...

To Sell or To Buy? Shifting books ain't easy

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I sometimes think the only thing harder than writing a book is selling it. We've all been on Twitter, and bombarded with "Buy my book!" tweets, and if we follow a lot of the same writers, our feeds can be jammed with the original tweet, and fifteen retweets. After a while, you start to tune them out. On Christmas Day, I was astounded by the number of "Did you get a Kindle for Christmas? Then buy my book!" tweets doing the rounds. Take a day off, people!

So how DO you sell a book? Well I'm not entirely sure. I find it quite difficult to approach people to sell my book because I don't want to look like all I'm interested in is selling. I have tried blog tours, tweeting, joining discussion groups about my genre on Facebook, setting up a Facebook page for the book itself - I even took quotes from the book and turned them into 'quotes pages' which I uploaded onto both Facebook and a Pinterest board I created for the book. I've included an example in the post, not to sell the book but to give you an idea what I mean by 'quote page'. The book is a Western so I tried to choose a design aesthetic that would scream 'Old West'. Obviously if you're not a designer that's going to be more difficult to do, so this option of creating interest might not work for everyone.

So I figured instead of talking about how I sell books, I'd talk about what makes me buy books, in the hope that some specks of wisdom can be found in looking at the situation from the point of view of a reader - after all, readers are paramount.

I talk to a lot of writers on Twitter and Facebook, and I don't necessarily talk to them solely as a fellow writer - in a lot of cases, I'm one of their readers, too. However, I don't respond well to sales pitches, or "buy my book!" statuses and tweets. It's too "in your face" and intrusive. When anyone tells me to buy their book, my default response is "Why?" So I tend to ignore those writers who plaster links everywhere but don't really engage with anyone. The writers I do respond to are those who I just get chatting to, about everything and nothing - conversation flows, we get to know each other, and if I think they're cool, I'll check out their blog. Lo! They have a book for sale! At this point, my interest is piqued because I like them as a person, not as someone trying to directly sell me something. So I trot off to Amazon and download a sample. Now I'm a potential reader, and the only way the writer can make a sale is to write a good book. If I like the sample, I buy the book. Simple!

Well it sounds simple, and I know there's more to it than that - there are a lot of writers using social media, and it's impossible to be friends with everything because one day they might buy your book, but the point I'm trying to make is that I'm far more likely to buy a book because the writer interacted with me in some way. Maybe they bought my own book, or maybe they just helped me promote it. Maybe we swapped guest posts on each others' blog. Maybe they're the kind of cat who's happy to talk nonsense at 3am when neither of you can sleep. Either way, there's a personal connection there, and that's something you just can't forge with an automated direct message on Twitter.

What makes you want to buy a book?

Are reviews worth anything any more?

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For a while now, people have been blogging about Amazon's purchase of Goodreads. The fear is that the much-valued independence of Goodreads might be consumed by the retail behemoth, and that GR reviews might be subject to the same censorship as they are on Amazon. I read a blog post, though I can't remember where, that pointed out that Amazon have also bought LibraryThing and IMDB, both of which have retained their own identities and continued on in their own way, albeit with an injection of cash from Amazon to make them thrive. Reading statements from the heads of both Amazon and Goodreads would imply that no one wants to change the current working practices of either organisation - so as yet, no one has any reason to panic.

I think the biggest thing people are worried about is how the purchase might affect the quality of the reviews on Goodreads but what we need to consider is the nature of reviews to begin with. I must admit, I tend to ignore reviews for fiction, but I pay close attention to them for non-fiction. I think it's pretty much because I know how much reviews can be governed by personal preference, and what doesn't work for one reader might work for me. Plus, I always download samples if they're available (or I read the first chapter while standing in a bookstore) so I've got a good idea if the book is the right one for me before I buy. Non-fiction is a different case as it relies on research and knowledge, so if it's been reviewed by others in the same field who say it's full of holes, then I don't want to know.

But are reviews even trustworthy? For one thing, there's no way of knowing if the writer of the review knows the author - for good or bad. Non-fiction authors might slate others in their field to boost their own books, and fiction authors might do the same within their genre. Likewise, reviewers might be positive about books solely because they're friends with the author. I do think there are ways to tell - read the review, and see what the reviewers issues are. Are they leaving a one star review because they felt $1.99 was too much to pay for an e-book? See what other books they've reviewed - if they've only reviewed one, it sounds like they have an axe to grind.

My own review policy is fairly straightforward. I'll leave both good and bad reviews for non-fiction, because I want people to know if the content is worth spending money on (and let's be honest, if I've bought a book of knitting patterns and all of them have mistakes in them, then I'm going to want to warn buyers). For fiction, I'll only leave a bad review if it's poorly formatted and full of mistakes. For good reviews, I'll only leave one if it's worth four stars or more. On my blog, I only review books for four stars or more because I want to share books I've loved - I don't want to make space for books I don't feel I can recommend.

What about you? Do reviews influence your purchasing habits, and if so, how?

Spring Clean Those Files

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By Sayurta

Spring is just around the corner, although you might not think it to look at the weather, and it's a traditional time of cleaning around the home. I've read a lot of writing blogs over the years, and many of them advocate clearing your writing desk as part of your spring cleaning routine - it has the benefit of a) making projects, research and other bits and bobs easier to find and b) helps minimise distractions. I must admit, I don't have a set space for writing, since I write at work on my lunch break, in various places around Castle Sedgwick, and even sitting on the train. Without a set space, I have nothing to spring clean...or do I?

There is absolutely nothing stopping any writer from applying the idea of spring cleaning to their work instead of their work space. I'm at that stage where the coming spring is making me champ at the bit to start working on new projects, but I can't help feeling like that will be counter productive. All I'll end up with is yet more works in progress and no actual finished work. So my plan for spring cleaning is deceptively simple - finish my outstanding work.

By Jonathan Joseph Bondhus

I've got a raft of short stories that I have yet to finish, not to mention a novella that needs a final chapter, and a finished novella that needs another round of edits before it goes to my editor. It's always a good idea to let work marinade between writing a story and beginning edits - I edit much faster than I write, and as I'd love to get some new stories out for submission, I have no option but to actually write them in order to get onto editing them. Writers are always counselled to keep producing content but if I don't finish it, how can I get that content out there?

You might be wondering how finishing my outstanding work can be considered as spring cleaning, and it's quite simple - I like to keep all of my works in progress in one folder, while I have separate folders for finished projects. If my WiP folder is full of half finished files, then after a while I forget what most of the files are even for. If I go back to those stories or novels, there's a good chance I might forget how I was planning to end them. If that happens, that's essentially a wasted idea. And I hate waste.

So by the end of my spring cleaning period, I'm hoping to have a lot of WiP files moved to individual project folders, and a good defragment should have my laptop running a lot faster than usual - which should get me writing more!

Images from Wikimedia Commons.

Introducing Icy Sedgwick

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Icy and I are both new to Peevish Penman.  She interviewed me last week, and now it's my turn to ask her some questions.

1) What is the first book you remember reading as a child?  What is the first book that affected you deeply?

I remember reading the Puddle Lane books with my mother, where half of the text was more 'complex' for the parent to read, with the easier version below for the child, except I kept reading the passages for adults, but I remember reading an awful lot of Enid Blyton and Roald Dahl. Having said that, the first book that really affected me was Colin Dann's A Fox Cub Bold, from the Animals of Farthing Wood series. The ending upset me rather a lot and my mother came into my room to find me in floods of tears. Never read another one of that man's books after that.

2) How did you know that you wanted to become a writer?

It wasn't really something I made a conscious decision towards. Writing was just always something I'd done, and it never really occurred to me not to do it. I suppose I was sixteen when I really made an effort towards it and did a creative writing course at my college, and I've been doing it seriously since then.

3) How do you cope with writer's block?

This is going to sound arrogant but I don't really get it. Mostly because I find that if I get stuck with one project, I just start working on something else until I come up with a solution for the original problem. I don't think there is such a thing as writer's block - I think it's something we try to rationalise, when really it's just that point when you're too burned out to think of anything else. Take a break from writing, or writing that particular project, but your unconscious will still be working on it. Let them get on with it while you get on with something else.

4) I know that most of your writing publicly is fiction, but do you also write non fiction as well?  What are the biggest differences between the two styles for you?

I write academic work and the two are vastly different. Some people have tried to say that writing my PhD thesis is no different from writing a novel and it's utter nonsense. Of course it's different - if I write a novel, I'm making it up as I go along, but my thesis has to be based on evidence and research, etc. Academia and fiction are different disciplines - one requires the suspension of disbelief, and the creation of a world in which to immerse the reader, while the other is more about expanding the knowledge of the reader, and leading them through your thought process to explain your argument. 

5) How do you balance the world of social networking and promotion with the work of actually writing?

You just grab time where you can. I can do my social networking on my smartphone on the way to and from places, or on my lunchbreak etc., and then I can actually write when I have more time to sit down and work out an idea. To me, social networking is something you just always do, the same way you're always talking to people 'in real life', and writing is something I do when I'm sat on a train, or at my desk.

6) One sentence.  Tell me who Icy Sedgwick is.

She's an elaborate ruse!

7) What piece of writing are you the most proud of?

I'm torn between The Midas Box, which was the first short story I ever had published back in 2008, and The Guns of Retribution, which was the first novella I ever had published - and the first book I could hold in my hands that had my name on it. I'd had stories in published anthologies before, but there's something special about having a book with your name on it that is solely your work.

8) What will you bring to Peevish Penman?

Hopefully fun, japes, and a bit of Northern stoicism.

9) You are in a PhD program currently.  What is your goal after that is completed?

Eventually the plan is to lecture in Film Studies, and also to continue to write about the horror and fantasy genres. Unless I become bigger than Stephen King in the meantime, of course.

10) What is the most important piece of advice anyone has ever given you about writing?  What would you say to someone just starting out?

I've had a lot of advice and some of it is good for some people, some of it is good for others. All advice holds some value...it's just not always right for the person receiving it. Personally, I'd say that Lee Child's advice to treat writing like a job, so you just sit down and do it, has been the best for me - it strips away this mystical ethos around the writer needing the right conditions, and the aid of the Muse, to get the job done, and turns it into something practical. I'd probably offer the same to someone starting out...unless I just told them to listen to all advice, ignore what sounds wrong and try what sounds like it might work.

Thanks, Icy!