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Guest Blog Post: Writing and Rule Breaking

By Josh David Bellin

The best writing breaks rules.

Name a great book. Rule-breakers all.

Slaughterhouse-Five. Moby-Dick. Ulysses. To the Lighthouse. Beloved. On the Road. All of them, rule-breakers.

But okay, maybe I’m talking about classics of literary fiction, and I should be talking about popular fiction. Most of us aspire to write the latter, not the former. Isn’t popular fiction more rule-bound than literary fiction?

Perhaps. But that doesn’t mean it’s so rule-bound as to be rule-hobbled.

There are thousands of writing “rules” floating around out there, and there are just as many aspiring writers being, I fear, misled by them. Whenever I encounter one of those rules on some agent or other authority’s blog--whether the rule be, “never start your novel with a character waking up” or “never have a character describe herself in a mirror” or “never delay the inciting incident to chapter two” or “never insert a scene with a dancing pink hippo into your novel”--I find hosts of grateful comments from aspiring writers: “Thank you so much, Divine Agent! You have shown me the error of my ways and likely saved me from a lifetime of public humiliation! I will certainly never insert a scene with a dancing pink hippo into my novel ever again!”

But you know, maybe your novel needs a scene with a dancing pink hippo. Maybe your novel needs to begin with a dancing pink hippo waking up, looking at itself in a mirror, and then having a philosophical conversation with the ghost of Albert Einstein, thereby delaying the inciting incident until the second chapter. Maybe those are the particular rules your novel needs to break.

There is no rule in writing so ironclad that it can’t be broken for the right reasons. Just as it’s ridiculous to insist that all novels begin with dancing pink hippos, so is it ridiculous to insist that no novel can begin that way.

What’s the test? How do you know which rules to break?

The test is the story itself. Each story creates its own needs, its own form, its own rules. It’s the writer’s job to know her or his story well enough to know which rules to obey, which to bend, which to ignore. If you don’t know that, then really, what do you know?

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to return to writing my big dancing-pink-hippo scene. Trust me. It’s killer.

Josh has been writing novels since he was eight years old (though admittedly, the first few were very, very short). He taught college for twenty years, wrote a bunch of books for college students, then decided to return to writing fiction. SURVIVAL COLONY NINE is his first book, but the sequel's already in the works!

He loves to read (mostly YA fantasy and science fiction), watch movies (again, mostly fantasy and sci-fi), and spend time in Nature (mostly catching frogs and toads). He claims to be the world's worst singer, but plays a pretty mean air guitar.  He also like to draw, and will be putting up some of his artwork on his website as soon as he can. 

Oh, yeah, and he like monsters.  Really scary monsters.

You can find out more about Josh David Bellin and SURVIVAL COLONY NINE at http://www.joshuadavidbellin.com. 

How an Agent Changed My Life

Last week, I had the pleasure to cross something off my bucket list. Did I broker world peace? Cure cancer? Figure out the value to humanity of the slug? No, but any of those would be cool. Alas, all I did was SIGN WITH A LITERARY AGENT!!!

Yes, it’s true, and trust me, there is a blog post in the works describing how I got my agent. But this post isn’t about that. It’s about how finding my agent, Liza Fleissig of Liza Royce Agency, has already changed my life.

1. Free time is now a precious commodity. In order to enjoy more of it, I am decluttering the house and hiring a cleaning service. Let’s be honest, I don’t like cleaning in the first place, but having someone come in every week will certainly give me reason to do the small pick-ups in between!

2. I have realized that it is possible to be so tired from late nights of revision that food becomes an option.

3. I have been weaned off Facebook games. Good-bye Candy Crush.

4. I really don’t have much interest in watching TV, well, except for The Foster’s on ABCFamily. (Shameless plug for Dan Richter.)  I’ve even stopped watching Big Brother. The true test will come in the Fall when the new season starts.

5. I can no longer say I’m bored. There is always something to do and most of the time, I want to do it. (I’m talking about revisions. What’s that? No. I’m not insane.)

6. I was forced to seek out alternative sources of carry-out. The natives threatened to revolt. Apparently there is a such thing as too much pizza.

7. I’m earning Starbuck’s Rewards faster than even before.

So that’s it. Seven ways that signing with an agent has changed my life. Okay, it’s only been five days, so I can only hope that my life changes in other ways. Until then, BE PASSIONATE about what you love. Someday it might change your life!

Query Letter Available for Shredding

Here it is... the query letter for my latest manuscript. I've been sitting on it for a week, made some changes and am ready to open it up to hacking my my beloved writing community. Any and all comments welcome. (Especially the ones that say, "Perfect. Wouldn't change a thing!"... yeah, I don't think I'll get those, either!

Here you go:

REPLAY, a 76,000 word YA ghost story is Mean Girls meets A Christmas Carole. It can stand alone but also has trilogy potential.

Seventeen year old RJ always gets what she wants. So when her soul is accidentally collected by a distracted Grim Reaper, somebody in the afterlife better figure out a way to send her back or heads will roll. But in her quest for mortality she becomes a pawn in a power struggle between an over-zealous arch angel, who has grown tired of the white wings and harps and the Hawaiian-shirt wearing Death Himself, who isn’t about to give up his control over the newly departed without a fight.

While she waits the decision of the Tribunal, a three-angel panel charged with determining whether her life is worth rewinding the history of the world, RJ wanders through the afterlife where she meets the Cornhole-playing St. Peter, Al, the handler for the 3-headed Hound of Hell, and her Guardian Angel who doesn’t seem to like her very much. Finally, the Angels present her with two options: She can remain in the Lobby, where souls wait to be processed, until her original lifeline expires or she can replay three moments in her life, aided by three departed souls, in an effort to make different choices that will produce a future deemed worthy of being saved. It sounds like a no brainer. She’ll take the walk down memory lane. How hard can it be?

But with each moment, RJ begins to change her life until the self-proclaimed Queen Bee is a social pariah and she begins to wonder if walking among the living is worth it if she has to spend the next sixty years as an outcast. 

Ch-Ch-Changes

I don’t know about the rest of you, but it seems that every time I think life is about to settle down, an unpredictable event occurs, sending my world into a tail spin with a new adventure. And while I like adventure as much as the next gal, there is the sad realization that with new chapters in our life, we must let go of old customs. Time is never our friend. In this case, for me, it’s not the metaphorical time, but the actual 24-hours-in-a-day kind.

Recently, I went back to work out of the home for the first time in eight years. I love my jobs. I’m the Elementary Librarian for my children’s school and a Youth Services Professional at our public library. (I do the programming for the teens and I love it!) Add that to raising my amazing kidlets and continuing to pursue my career as a writer, and there’s not much time left for anything else.

Which is why I am regretfully going to discontinue my Kidletville Blog. As much as I enjoy writing about my adventures in parenting, the truth is, I can’t keep dividing my time or my life. This leaves me in a quandary. Do I blend this blog or keep it writer focused?

After much contemplation, I’m going to keep this blog mostly writing, but with a smattering of parental observations from time to time. Don’t get me wrong, but I love sharing the insanity that is my life with the world, but the world is hardly giving me time to be a mom, let alone blog about it. 

So now it’s time to start planning blog posts! I’m looking forward to taking this blog to a whole other level… hope you’re ready to come along. In the meantime, BE PASSIONATE about the time you have and how you spend it!

Guest Blogger: Putting Your Writing Life on the Shelf

Putting Your Writing Life on the Shelf

By Nicole Ross

Okay, this blog title is a bit deceiving. As a fellow author, I’d never encourage you to give up the craft entirely to pursue knitting or table tennis or chess boxing (yes, it’s a thing). Rather, I challenge every budding author out there to walk over and look at your bookshelf. Go ahead, look. How many books do you have about the craft of writing? None? Keep reading. A lot? Good for you. How many of them have you actually read?

If you’re serious about not just writing more, but writing better, your bookshelf should reflect it. Below you’ll find ten books from my personal collection that are must-reads for every aspiring author, no matter which genre or at what level you write.

Word to the Wise: You can find most of these books used on Amazon.com and save yourself a pretty penny. Plus, don’t forget to save your receipts and use them for tax deductions (as long as you’re pursuing publishing for profit versus writing as a hobby).

Here they are, in no particular order:

Stein On Writing – Sol Stein
If you purchase nothing else on this list for your bookshelf, buy this one. Seriously, go buy it right now. I’ll wait. Whether you’re crawling through your first manuscript of pounding out your twentieth best seller, Stein will quite simply Blow Your Mind. As he says in the opening pages, “This is not a book of theory. It is a book of usable solutions--how to fix writing that is flawed, how to improve writing that is good, how to create interesting writing in the first place.”

The Emotion Thesaurus – Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi
I literally clapped my hands in delight when I found this book. Conveying character emotions in unique, compelling ways is ridiculously hard. Or, it used to be, before I bought this book. Reference 75 common emotions to get a list of body language cues, thoughts, and visceral responses that will help actually figure out how to “show” not “tell.”

On Writing – Stephen King
Part memoir, part master class by a writing GENIUS, this book provides a “practical view of the writer’s craft, comprising the basic tools of the trade every writer must have.” Changed. My. Life.

How to Grow a Novel  – Sol Stein
Dive into details and examples from Stein's editorial work with a #1 bestselling novelist as well as talented newcomers. Learn how to develop memorable characters and gripping plots. Create realistic dialogue. Most importantly, find out how to avoid common mistakes before submitting your manuscript.

Self-Editing for Fiction Writers – Renni Browne and Dave King
From dialogue, exposition, and point of view to interior monologue and more, you’ll walk through the same processes an expert editor would to polish your manuscript.

Description & Setting – Ron Rozelle
Subtitled, “Techniques and Exercises for Crafting a Believable World of People, Places, and Events,” this book helps you learn how to create powerful settings, tie them into your plot, and use just the right kind of description to help your readers paint a clear picture of where and when your story takes place.

Visible Thought – Geoffery Beattie
Are your characters too “mechanical” or “mundane?” Do they pace, wink, grin, and shrug like their lives depend on it? An author must learn to use more than the default elements of body language, and that’s just what this book will help you do. 

Writing Mysteries – Edited by Sue Grafton
You don’t have to be writing a mystery to benefit from this book. Every author can improve their pace, characterization, suspense, and other elements by studying mystery fiction. A compilation of advice by more than a dozen mystery masters, this book shows you “how to tighten the screws of suspense.”

Formatting & Submitting Your Manuscript – Chuck Sambuchino
If you’re writing in hopes of publishing your work in the future, this book is a MUST. Chuck helps you avoid rookie mistakes that will land your manuscript in the slush pile. Dig into more than 100 sample letters and manuscript pages, instructions for electronic submissions, formatting and submitting guidelines, and tips from agents and editors.

2013 Guide to Literary Agents – Chuck Sambuchino
Again, for writers looking to publish, this book needs to be on your bookshelf within easy reach. Regardless of what genre you’re writing, you’ll need a literary agent to secure a book deal (unless you self-publish). This guide helps you find the perfect agent by providing updated contact and submission information for more than 1,000 literary agents seeking new clients.

Happy  reading, happy writing and GOOD LUCK!

About Nicole: Nicole Ross is a corporate marketer, blogger, and freelance writer. She is a chronic, unconventional hobbyist, equally at home on the back of a horse, inside the boxing ring, pounding away at her keyboard, and perched in downward dog atop her yoga mat. She’s an active member of the Writers’ Center of Indiana and contributor to Punchnel’s online magazine. She lives in Plainfield, IN with her roommates, an olfactory-obsessed Beagle named Penny and a blood-red Beta fish named O-Negative. Learn more at www.nicolekristineross.com.

A note from Sarah: I have known Nicole for almost ten years and you will never find a writer more dedicated to studying the craft than her! I'm honored to have her share some of her "go to" books on writing with us! If you're looking for a way to usher in the Spring season of your writing, check out the links above! I know I have room on my shelf for one or two more!

Guest Blogger: Stay out of the hot tub!

5 lessons from a half-baked writer

By: J.R. Roper

Not all hot tubs are problematic, so hear me out.

Time is a great teacher, and what I have to share with you about the writing process is a cumulative product of years spent attending conferences, working with critique partners, reading — and gluing my butt to the chair and writing. There is a lot of contradictory advice out there and some is simply the same-old-same-old. Here are a few bits of advice to help you hold onto a thread of sanity (and some of your hair).

Always finish your work and do not submit until it is ready.

Habits are important and this is definitely true for writing. If you make it a habit to complete even the worst drivel that ekes from your fingertips into your word processor, you will find a healthy level of mental success. A story that starts out terrible — but finished — can be fixed. And, when it’s fixed, it might be a well-written story. But when is this well-written story ready for the world to read?

The short answer — when you KNOW it is ready. I wrote a short story in 2009 while on vacation in northern Wisconsin. It was the only short story I had ever written and I never liked it because I didn’t know how it should end. Then in the winter of 2012, I brought the story out of my dreadful writing file and solicited help from my writing group (more on them and the hot tub later). Their prompts about possible endings helped, and in the end, an offspring of their ideas worked brilliantly. This short story, titled “Of The Lake,” became my first piece of writing accepted for publication! Had I sent it out before fixing the ending it might’ve never been accepted, and with short stories, the market for specific themes is limited.

Write every day? Seriously?

This advice is probably the best writing advice ever, but also the worst advice for anyone with a day job, spouse, children, dog, house to keep up with, need for sleep to remain sane, and smallish reading addiction. Writing and rejection are inseparable, like Star Wars and popcorn. The problem with this best-advice-ever is it leads to feeling like a failure if you do not or cannot follow it, and that’s the last thing you need. My advice is to scrap everyone’s advice and figure out what works for you. If aiming for a daily word count leads to constant failing, why not aim for a weekly word count to hold yourself accountable? That way, when the juices are flowing, you can write, write, write. And if you need a night to drink beer and watch The Bachelor, you’ve got it!

Try a different genre.

I have always thought of myself as a fantasy novelist for middle grade and YA readers. And for many years, this was all I worked on. I wrote and rewrote the first two novels in my middle grade trilogy until the characters’ souls were pressed from the page. Then, one day, I heard a friend tell a real life story that absolutely frightened me. So I sat down and tried to communicate that terror in a story of my own. In the process I realized that I love writing horror! Since then I have had five horror stories accepted for themed anthologies. I certainly will not get rich writing short stories. But it has pushed me to keep writing something even when I’m stuck in the novel doldrums. It has provided connections to several editors I’d love to submit more work to in the future. And hopefully, these little bits of success I find by having my name in print will help relieve the near-constant sting of rejection that inevitably comes with writing.

The stream of ideas will not dry up.

If you are alive and listening, if you read often, and if you jot down the occasional compelling dream, you will continue to develop good ideas for stories. In fact, you might not have enough life to write them all. Your best idea for a story is probably your next one. So when you finish your current project, don’t wait. Get started again right away. Common worries for new writers stem from fears like this is the only publishable idea I will ever come up with and if I don’t write this now, someone will steal my idea. There really is nothing new under the sun. Your story idea has already been done in some way, shape, or form. But no one can tell your story like you, so as Dori says, “just keep swimming.”

Stay out of the hot tub!

Writer friends and critique partners that feel like family (but aren’t actually family) are your most important allies in the quest to write great stories and have them published. Some of your friends (see Kelly Stanley from the January guest blog post) will experience success before you do. Some of your best writing friends whom you met at writing conferences might already be successful authors (see D.E. Johnson, Kelsey Timmerman, and Julie Hyzy). Other writing friends are on the cusp of being published (that’s you, Sarah Schmitt!). The point is these are the people who care about your long-term success because they love you as a person. I workshop with two writing groups, one made up strictly of fantasy novelists, and the other a rich mixture of fiction writers and poets. The people who attend are some of my best friends who aren’t afraid to tell me when my writing stinks to high heaven.

So what’s with the hot tub? At a writing conference in 2011, a hot tub full of literary agents invited me to join them! A writer’s dream, you say? Maybe, but I did not get in the hot tub. All of the agents still requested full or partial manuscripts at the conference and a few gave awesome feedback, but ultimately they all passed on my story. And had I gone into the hot tub, the story would have still been rejected, and my wife might have murdered me. Instead, on that fateful hot-tub-bubbling night, I went out and had a drink with my writing buddies. And guess what? They are all still with me — my writing family.  

J.R. Roper is a speculative fiction writer and teacher living in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He is working on his third novel, a YA fantasy and several short horror stories. For more strange tidings and publication updates visit joerroper.com.

As a side note from Sarah, he's also one of the coolest kids around and can rock a bald head like nobody else I know, except maybe D.E. Johnson.