Ignorance comes in many forms

I really don't get it sometimes.
I love the author community. There are so many great people writing and inspiring us with their fabulous stories. Generally it's a sophisticated world, even if people have a different opinion, we can often respect their expression of it through writing. Mutual respect and a degree of self-respect is a common feature, which probably means that we are not the best sales people. We don't like to impose ourself in others peoples space. We like customers to come to us and like us for what we are. Of course we have to learnt to do more than that and get over our natural hesitancy and push the message out there. That way we sell more books.
But...it can go to far.
Someone just took the liberty of posting on my wall on one of the various author sites I use, insisting that I read their story. It wasn't a name I recognised so I checked it out. This might sound petty and probably is, but it really annoyed me. Firstly this person chose to contact and ask me to read something without any attempt at social niceties. She assumed, as she probably did with all the other people she pestered, that they we would want to read it. The second more petty point was that it was some Christian morality love-in for which I'm afraid I wouldn't use in the bathroom. I'm all for people writing and believing what they like but just as I wouldn't post my stuff on others wall without knowing their likes and dislikes I would prefer others didn't do it to me. Sorry I don't mean to dismiss religious writers but I think this person wasn't quite living up to the standards she wrote about.
So please writers, I know we are all putting out our message and trying to create an audience, but this kind of thing just pisses people off.
Perhaps I'm naive and she was just a good saleswoman. Maybe it's just me and now I've probably pissed a number of others off just the same.

Got that off my chest now - feel better for it.

Indie Writers – Deluded or Undiscovered

I often ask this question, not because I’m trying to be clever or cruel but because I’m to trying to understand what drives us to keep writing, when critical acclaim is all but impossible.

Thousands of us will be typing away on our keyboards directing our ideas and ranting at the world in our own special way, many of us numerous books down the line.

Maybe when we write we consider what people think of us. Perhaps we simply try to challenge ourselves but mostly when we’re done, we really hope someone will read it and like it. I’ve talked before understanding criticism so no point going over that but perhaps in this case we need to understand praise.

People are polite and most (unless they are acutely rude) will tell you they enjoyed your book whether they read it all or not. People don’t want to be harsh as a rule and many will try to be tactful in pointing out the odd flaw in order to validate their praise and still come out the nice guy. I know because I often do this when reading the work of someone I like but don’t wish to offend. Maybe it would do us good to hear what people really think with all the niceties of friendships removed. I recall one of my colleagues when drunk telling me my book was a load of old tosh at the same time as wishing me well with it. I did refrain from emptying the contents of my drink over his head but it did make the point to me that whilst I know some people genuinely did enjoy my work, not everyone will.

The point of all this is to say that most of us as Indie Authors don’t have access to real critics. Our only major critic is usually the formal publishing industry which has given us a wide berth which may be for many reasons and not all to do with quality. So we are left with our friends and contacts and perhaps the odd stranger who has found our work and chooses to review it on Amazon.

Where does this leave us? Are we obliged to help our Indie Author friends and tell them when things are so bad that maybe they should go back to writing school and not throw any more cash down the self-publishing toilet? Or do we just say to all Indie Authors, write what you will; the market will find its own level.

I guess it’s the old ‘does my bum look big in this?’ discussion and only you as the friend of an Indie Author will chose to answer yes or no. It may indeed come down to what you expect in return for your lack of sincerity.

Are we deluded? No I don’t think so, but if you really want to know whether your writing is any good, and you genuinely want to learn, then join a writing group where people will give genuine and constructive comments. You will never regret it. There are many of them, some free, some funded. It just so happens I can recommend a free one Writers Cave as I run it.

www.writerscave.co.uk

It’s a small internet group with members from all over the world who taught me that sometimes I write good things, sometimes not so good, but nowadays I write less of the latter. That makes so much difference to confidence when someone asks you whether you are a writer and you can answer, yes, and quite a good one actually.

© S.G.Norris

A guide to managing complex storylines – Part 2 – Swimlanes

My previous blog concentrated on tips for building suspense in stories and how to leave hooks that the reader can grab hold of.

This week I am looking at planning and managing timelines, character storylines and how to ensure each thread is not lost in the mass of words that a book becomes.

So the concept I use is swimlanes. Anyone familiar with a project management textbook may know this already. It’s not quite a project plan, which can be a painfully detailed document to manage, but does borrow some principles.

Please don’t run off now that I have mentioned the words project and management, I’m not going to get all theoretical and start boring everyone with powerpoints and clip art. Writing is a creative activity but sometimes we need to borrow a bit of structure to stop ourselves descending into a confused mire.

The metaphor of swimlanes is to look at the timeline of the story as a swimming pool with lanes mapped along the pool. You can then plot storylines or characters within each lane at each point of the story. By using a swimlane for each element of the story you can visualise your characters at each stage and see where the overlaps are or gaps.

Before this gets too heavy here’s an example.

If I use the example of A Very English Revolution, the time line for the book was four weeks. I used Microsoft excel, the best piece of PC software ever, You can use a piece of paper on the wall, whatever works for you. I use excel because I can transport on my laptop with the text and and as opposed to MS word you never run out of page. Even the Lord of the Rings is not going to challenge the excel page limits.

I drew a column for each day of the 4 week period and then defined a row/lane for key characters in the story, Rachel, Joe, Lucy, Sarah. I then summarised the key story point in each day for them. Lucy on Saturday would meet Joe in the park at 2;00 p.m. I write that in the cell for Joe and Lucy for that day. I can then see for each of my other characters where they are at the same time. And it goes on.

Cell by cell you can plot out the storyline

There are probably numerous other ways to do this and I believe there are software packages that can be purchased for the purpose of. But I believe this is as good as anything. The key point is to take the time to think about how your story will pan out. I’m not saying you need to know every angle when you start but you can keep it up to date as you write. Use a different colour to show things you’ve done or yet to do. Things you have to come back to.

Every author probably has a how to structure a story methodology. It’s each to their own. I like this one as I can see where my characters are and can easily cross-reference key elements of the story to tick off.


© S.G.Norris