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 |  This is a continuation of my blogging here at WdC |
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This will be a blog for my writing, maybe with (too much) personal thrown in. I am hoping it will be a little more interactive, with me answering questions, helping out and whatnot. If it falls this year (2024), then I may stop the whole blogging thing, but that's all a "wait and see" scenario. An index of topics can be found here: "Writing Blog No.2 Index"  Feel free to comment and interact. |
| Publishing News An increasing number of small publishers have decided to stop having open calls and are no longer taking unsolicited manuscripts for novels. Some are even no longer taking unsolicited works for anthologies, and a few magazines are taking this step as well. There was a press release from Author’s Publish concerning this (though they did take the blame for something as well, and I think that’s unfair, so I’m not mentioning that here), and I received confirmation when a publisher requested a story for an anthology from me (no guarantee of publication). They both said the same thing: there are three issues. Like I said, one of the Author’s Publish issues is personal, so the second one mentioned here comes just from the publisher who contacted me. First, mass/bulk submissions. With the ease of doing it, there is a growing group of writers (and I have been told their demographic as well…) who just send their manuscript to every single publisher with an open submission policy. No matter what the publisher wants, they send it. A children’s publisher getting inundated with adult soft-core erotica is the example the publisher gave me; this children’s publisher is now going out of their way to bad-mouth the writers in question, and there are threats of legal push-back. Entitled writers who think their crap don’t stink. Second, (and this came from the publisher) is that a growing number of self-published writers are submitting the books they have already self-published to trad publishers because they believe the line in the submission guidelines about not doing that does not apply to them. Again, I do know the demographic (and it overlaps with the previous demographic…) who is inclined to do this, and it is becoming more and more common. Still self-entitled jerks. Third, and this should be no surprise, is the rise in AI. Writers using AI to write sections, to grammar-correct the whole work without checking the grammar checking is right, even works constructed whole-cloth using AI, all of these are increasing in number. This is a very different demographic to the previous two, and could see some entire regions or groups of writers just ignored if submitting to US publishers. Look, we are all writers. Those who wish to go the traditional publishing route (and that is me; I will not put up here my thoughts on self-publishing or why I feel that way) need to make sure they are doing the right thing, or else they are not only messing up their own potential chance for success, but ruining it for everyone. Like I said, though – that sense of entitlement is prevalent and, looking at the demographic breakdown, maybe some sections of society need a damn good reality check and wake-up call. Yes, I’m pissed off. Screw you, all those who are messing this up for those of us who are doing the right thing. |
| Government Forms I have mentioned that I am going through old files, seeing what is what and so on and so forth, and as part of that, I found this list of government forms. Not sure where I got it from, but this could help those writing fantasy, speculative fiction, alternative history or even some other genres. Now, as a word nerd, etymologically-minded folks should note the difference between the suffix '-archy', meaning 'rulership', and '-cracy', meaning 'power', which both come from Greek roots. It is subtle, but when these terms were coined, that difference meant something. “Rule by” and “power given to” or “power in” are very subtle. Anywho, here are a heap of different forms of government: anarchy: government by none androcracy: government by men (males) aristocracy: government by the nobility biarchy: rule by two individuals (aka diarchy) bureaucracy: power resides in civil servants cryptarchy: secret rule decarchy: government by ten individuals democracy: government by the people ecclesiarchy: government by a council of priests ergatocracy: government by the workers or the working class exarchy: government by bishops geriatocracy: government reserved for the elderly or very old (aka gerontocracy) gynaecocracy: government by women (females) (aka gynarchy) hagiarchy: rule by saints or holy persons hagiocracy: government by holy men hecatontarchy: government by one hundred people heptarchy: government by seven people hierocracy: government by priests or religious ministers kakistocracy: government by the worst kritarchy: government by judges matriarchy: government by women or mothers or the eldest females meritocracy: government by the meritorious militocracy: government by military leaders monarchy: government by an absolute ruler (aka autarchy) monocracy: rulership by one individual (aka autocracy) (note the subtle difference: one is rule by an absolute, the other is an individual has the power, but is not absolute) nomocracy: rule of law; government based only on a legal system ochlocracy: rule by mobs octarchy: government by eight people oligarchy: government by the few pantarchy: government by all the people; world government paparchy: government by the pope patriarchy: government by older men or fathers pentarchy: government by five individuals physiocracy: government according to natural laws or principles plutocracy: rulership by the wealthy (aka chrysoaristocracy) polyarchy: government by many people ptochocracy: rule of beggars or paupers; wholesale pauperization sociocracy: government by society as a whole stratocracy: military rule that is despotism technocracy: government by technical experts; in modern times, rule by computers tetrarchy: government by four people thearchy: rule by a god or gods; body of divine rulers theocracy: government by priests or by religious law timocracy: government by the propertied class triarchy: government by three people Long list, but I hope it helps someone. |
| Writing Comedy This came up recently in the Newsfeed, when someone asked how I come up with the jokes I do and some of the weird little asides I put into things. I wish I had an easy answer. Comedy is something I write occasionally. My first ever book was a comedy about archaeologists, a riff on H.Rider Haggard (Relick); the only novelette I’ve had published (which I consider a short story) was a parody of Godzilla (Rex The Rotten: Beast From A Very Long Time Ago). Around two thirds of my published poetry is comedy, and 3 of the 5 creative essays I’ve had published were comedic. However, as I have seen with some of my Newsfeed posts, what is funny for some people is not funny for others. So many of my jokes people do not “get” or think are funny. More than any other genre, comedy is so subjective. And comedy is very cultural. I think Adam Sandler is as funny as turd on my bed; apparently United Estatians think he is a comedy genius. I find word-play, puns and clever double meanings the funniest; I really enjoy skewering of sacred cows. I find toilet humour and cringe humour or the humour of embarrassment to be painful and not at all humorous. What do I like? My favourite stand-up comedians are George Carlin, Paul Hogan (pre-Crocodile Dundee), Ricky Gervais and Bob Newhart; my favourite comic musician is ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic; my favourite comedy troupe is Monty Python and Life Of Brian is my favourite comedy film (though the films of ZAZ where all are involved are right up there as well); comedy duos I like include Roy & HG, Abbott & Costello and Sacred Weird Little Guys; my favourite comedy TV shows are Monty Python’s Flying Circus, Fast Forward, Blackadder, Fawlty Towers and Yes Minister/ Prime Minister; and my favourite comedy books are the Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy series by Douglas Adams, a lot of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, too much Robert Rankin, and Road To Mars by Eric Idle, while my favourite comedy short story is ‘Mr Big’ by Woody Allen. And I’ll bet 95% of the people reading this will not have heard of or seen half (or more) of those. So, this is not going to be about what makes things funny. No-one can tell you what is funny and what is not; that is your opinion… no matter how wrong I think you are. This is also not about the various types of comedy; they all have their nuances, but that’s for the writer to investigate. And this is not about stand-up; this is about stories – the written word. So… how to write comedy. First, you need a story. Comedy writing is not just a series of jokes. There needs to be a story to latch onto. And one thing I was told was that the story should remain compelling with the jokes stripped out. e.g. Pratchett’s The Wyrd Sisters would work well as fantasy story about witches without the funny bits. Second, you need characters. Not stereotypes, not people just to be funny, but actual characters that the reader can identify with on some level. And all characters need to be different; this was where I think the all-female remake of Ghostbusters didn’t work – all of them were trying to be the Bill Murray character, when the original had 4 distinct characters. While having characters is true of every story, many comedy writers think in clichés. You need people. e.g. Arthur Dent in Adams’ H2GT2G is an everyman character, and he is different from the universe-weary Ford Prefect. Third, the jokes need to be merged seamlessly into the narrative. You don’t stop just to tell a joke; the joke must occur organically within the story being told. An aside should come at the right time, a joke should fit where things are occurring that makes it seem right. The good story writers do this well and it is hard to say how they do it – they just do. e.g. The bits from The Guide in Adams’ H2GT2G series. Fourth, the story should not be joke after joke after joke. There needs to be room to breathe and room for the story to happen. If you hit too much then the jokes start to lose their impact. Even if you have pages of funny (like Adams), you need a page every now and then when the funny slows down. Fifth, the ending is the hardest thing to get right, not being a let-down after so much funniness. Too many humour novels (and films) peter out to some sappy ending that leaves the reader feeling meh. A great example of a good ending is Spike Milligan’s Puckoon, where the main character has been arguing with the writer for the whole book (from page 2!) about the way his legs were written, and the book closes with this character abusing the writer for not fixing his legs yet. Sixth, a funny situation or idea may not necessarily make a funny story in the written form. A classic example is Mike Harding’s Killer Budgies, which sounds like a hilarious concept… and ended up being as funny as an ingrown toenail. You need to have meat on the bones. Seventh, and this is something a lot of writers get wrong (and I learnt in the editing process of Relick) – do not belabour a joke. This is not stand-up comedy where you can draw a joke out to heighten anticipation for a cathartic release; this is the written word where you need to get to the point. Less is more is something that I say when it comes to horror, and it works just as effectively in comedy. Don’t draw individual jokes or funny situations out too long. Eighth, and finally, not everyone can write comedy effectively. That’s not to say you can’t be funny, but writing comedy is something that is difficult and is probably the hardest genre to get “right” (if such a term can be used for something so subjective). Not to big-note myself, I like to think I can. Adherennium Dr of Phoolishness gave me this review for a private item: “ Well it has taken me far too long, but I have now read it all. What can I say, I loved it. I know zombies are horror, but you inject a lot of brilliant humour into the story.” This is not to brag, but to show that I do have some experience in this topic. Anyway, I hope this was of help to someone. |
| Heinlein’s Rules for Publication with Commentary by Robert J. Sawyer Okay, this is taken from a newsletter by author Robert J. Sawyer [Copyright © 1996 by Robert J. Sawyer. All rights reserved.]. I first discovered Sawyer through the book Illegal Alien, then the Far-Seer trilogy… which had a strong first book and mediocre follow-ups. Still, his newsletter (mailed out to me from the USA, which means I got it like 4 weeks after it was sent) was something I received, and I transcribed it to the computer. In my search through my hard drives, I found this one and so thought I’d share. Sawyer’s commentary follows each rule, my additions are in italics. There are countless rules for writing success, but the most famous ones, at least in the speculative-fiction field, are the five coined by the late, great Robert A. Heinlein. Heinlein used to say he had no qualms about giving away these rules, even though they explained how you could become his direct competitor, because he knew that almost no one would follow their advice. In my experience, that’s true: if you start off with a hundred people who say they want to be writers, you lose half of the remaining total after each rule -- fully half the people who hear each rule will fail to follow it. I’m going to share Heinlein’s five rules with you, plus add a sixth of my own. Rule One: You Must Write It sounds ridiculously obvious, doesn’t it? But it is a very difficult rule to apply. You can’t just talk about wanting to be a writer. You can’t simply take courses, or read up on the process of writing, or daydream about someday getting around to it. The only way to become a writer is to plant yourself in front of your keyboard and go to work. And don’t you dare complain that you don’t have the time to write. Real writers buy the time, if they can’t get it any other way. Take Toronto’s Terence M. Green, a high-school English teacher. His third novel, Shadow of Ashland, just came out from Tor. Terry takes every fifth year off from teaching without pay so that he can write; most writers I know have made similar sacrifices for their art. (Out of our hundred original aspirant writers, half will never get around to writing anything. That leaves us with fifty…) This is something I tell so many people – just put pen to paper, metaphorically or literally. Rule Two: Finish What Your Start You cannot learn how to write without seeing a piece through to its conclusion. Yes, the first few pages you churn out might be weak, and you may be tempted to toss them out. Don’t. Press on until you’re done. Once you have an overall draft, with a beginning, middle, and end, you’ll be surprised at how easy it is to see what works and what doesn’t. And you’ll never master such things as plot, suspense, or character growth unless you actually construct an entire piece. On a related point: if you belong to a writers’ workshop, don’t let people critique your novel a chapter at a time. No one can properly judge a book by a piece lifted out of it at random, and you’ll end up with all sorts of pointless advice: “This part seems irrelevant.” “Well, no, actually, it’s very important a hundred pages from now…” (Of our fifty remaining potential writers, half will never finish anything -- leaving just twenty-five still in the running…) So many people give up because it’s “too hard” or they feel the story is not going anywhere. See it through; you never know how it is going to go until it’s all over. Rule Three: You Must Refrain From Rewriting, Except to Editorial Order This is the one that got Heinlein in trouble with creative-writing teachers. Perhaps a more appropriate wording would have been, “Don’t tinker endlessly with your story.” You can spend forever modifying, revising, and polishing. There’s an old saying that stories are never finished, only abandoned -- learn to abandon yours. If you find your current revisions amount to restoring the work to the way it was at an earlier stage, then it’s time to push the baby out of the nest. And although many beginners don’t believe it, Heinlein is right: if your story is close to publishable, editors will tell you what you have to do to make it saleable. Some small-press magazines do this at length, but you’ll also get advice from Analog, Asimov’s, and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. (Of our remaining twenty-five writers, twelve will fiddle endlessly, and so are now out of the game. Twelve more will finally declare a piece complete. The twenty-fifth writer, the one who got chopped in half, is now desperately looking for his legs...) And Stephen King’s advice to actually stop editing at some point comes in here as well. But it is worth noting that very few in-house editors who look at work offer advice any longer because of the sheer number of submissions they receive. An external editor, however, is a good idea, or a good beta reader. Don’t trust yourself. Rule Four: You Must Put Your Story on the Market This is the hardest rule of all for beginners. You can’t simply declare yourself to be a professional writer. Rather, it’s a title that must be conferred upon you by those willing to pay money for your words. Until you actually show your work to an editor, you can live the fantasy that you’re every bit as good as Sean Williams (my change; the author he had here is “problematic.”) or William Gibson. But having to see if that fantasy has any grounding in reality is a very hard thing for most people to do. I know one Canadian aspirant writer who managed to delay for two years sending out his story because, he said, he didn’t have any American stamps for the self-addressed stamped envelope. This, despite the fact that he’d known dozens of people who went regularly to the States and could have gotten stamps for him, despite the fact that he could have driven across the border himself and picked up stamps, despite the fact that you don’t even really need US stamps -- you can use International Postal Reply Coupons instead, available at any large post office. [And those in Toronto can buy actual U.S. stamps at the First Toronto Post Office at 260 Adelaide Street South.] (How out of date is this?! But the premise still holds – finding that market and sending it off.) No, it wasn’t stamps he was lacking -- it was backbone. He was afraid to find out whether his prose was saleable. Don’t be a coward: send your story out. (Of our twelve writers left, half of them won’t work up the nerve to make a submission, leaving just six…) This is only applicable if you want to be a professional writer, I do understand that. Yes, some will just go the self-publishing route, and that’s their choice. This is for those aiming for traditional publication. Rule Five: You Must Keep it on the Market until it has Sold It’s a fact: work gets rejected all the time. Almost certainly your first submission will be rejected. Don’t let that stop you. I’ve currently got 142 rejection slips in my files; every professional writer I know has stacks of them (the prolific Canadian horror writer Edo van Belkom does a great talk at SF conventions called “Thriving on Rejection” in which he reads samples from the many he’s acquired over the years). If the rejection note contains advice you think is good, revise the story and send it out again. If not, then simply turn the story around: pop it in the mail, sending it to another market. Keep at it. My own record for the maximum number of submissions before selling a story is eighteen -- but the story did eventually find a good home. (And within days, I’d sold it again to a reprint-only anthology; getting a story in print the first time opens up whole new markets.) If your story is rejected, send it out that very same day to another market. (Still, of our six remaining writers, three will be so discouraged by that first rejection that they’ll give up writing for good. But three more will keep at it…) Firm believer here. My record is 24 rejections for a piece before acceptance. And I have collected over 500 rejections since 2012 (I did not submit in 2016-7); who knows how many before then, considering I started submitting in 1987? Not everything has sold, but many have. Rule Six: Start Working on Something Else (Sawyer’s rule) That’s my own rule. I’ve seen too many beginning writers labour for years over a single story or novel. As soon as you’ve finished one piece, start on another. Don’t wait for the first story to come back from the editor you’ve submitted it to; get to work on your next project. (And if you find you’re experiencing writer’s block on your current project, begin writing something new – a real writer can always write something.) You must produce a body of work to count yourself as a real working pro. Yep, always. I have between three and 10 items on the go at once. Of our original hundred wannabe writers, only one or two will follow all six rules. The question is: will you be one of them? I hope so, because if you have at least a modicum of talent and if you live by these six rules, you will make it. Most definitely – these are what I follow. Is that the reason I’ve managed to sell a reasonable amount? I hope you found this illuminating. |
| How I Learnt To Write Fiction Okay, the title is odd, but I struggled to find another one that fit. Of course, I learnt to write at school. Through primary school (which I know is not a US thing, but that’s your issue, not mine), I was taught how to construct written works beyond a simple sentence, and was shown the beginning-middle-end(as it was called when dealing with 8 year olds) structure; I read a lot from a very early age and things entered me by osmosis; I even tried my hand at a novel when I was 11 (as detailed in a previous post). By the time I hit high school at age 12, writing was well and truly in my blood. I wanted to write fiction that was like the things I read, but I struggled to put things down on paper the way I saw them in my head. Even I realised my writing lacked “something.” As part of my getting into the elite private school I did (through an academic scholarship), I was given my first bookcase as a gift from one set of grand-parents. The books I already had filled the bed-head and sat in boxes in a corner; now I had somewhere to put them all, arranged by genre, then size (nowadays I ignore genre and put my books in alphabetical order of author, with the Stephen King books and books featuring me having their own spots). I almost filled it straight away with what I already owned. But this meant I went through my books properly for the first time in a long time. I noticed had a lot more books which were novelisations of movies than I realised. Now, we had also recently got our first VHS video player (this was 1983) and I decided, just on a whim, to see how well the books compared to the films. Clash Of The Titans by Alan Dean Foster was the first, based on the 1981 Harryhausen film. And then it struck me – what I was seeing was being so well put into words on the page. That was the first one, and it led to a few more, and then I decided to write a novelisation of my own, based on the Hammer film The Gorgon, still one of my favourite Hammer films. My version was ten pages long; the novelisation was 220 pages. What was I missing? The stories were identical, the basis was the same… and when I compared the two it dawned on me what I was missing. The descriptions, the show not tell (though I didn’t know it was called that at the time), the way every little thing from sideways glances to a tap of fingers to the sound of the bodies turning to stone were detailed. I tried again with the film Conan The Barbarian, which was a new VHS release at the time so we could only borrow it for one night. This time my version was 50-odd pages long while the version L Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter was 250 or so. I was getting there. But that was how I learnt what was needed in fiction – novelisations of movies. I know many authors decry them as the lowest of the low, turning someone else’s screenplay into a book, but they were vital to me understanding what stories needed. Anyway, that’s me. |
| Language Trivia Something different today! As many who have read my Word Trivia Newsfeed posts over the past few years may be aware, I have collected a huge amount of trivia in my life as a perpetual student and nerd of all things… thingy. (Wow! Good words, Mr Writer!) So, having gone through a bunch of little Word and wps docs on an external hard drive in order to collate them into one document, I came across some little nuggets of language trivia, and I thought I’d share a dozen of them with my readers. Both of you. 1. Long in the tooth, meaning “old,” came from a descriptor used by horse buyers, and dates back to medieval times. See, as horses age, their gums recede, giving the impression that their teeth are growing. Therefore, the longer the teeth look, the older the horse. 2. The English (allegedly) letter combination “-ough” can be pronounced in eight different ways. The following sentence contains them all: A rough-coated, dough-faced ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough, coughing and hiccoughing thoughtfully. rough -> ruff dough -> doe ploughman -> plowman through -> throo Scarborough -> Scarbruh coughing -> coffing hiccoughing -> hiccupping thoughtfully -> thortfully 3. Rhythms is the longest English word without vowels. Euouae is the longest English word without consonants. It is an acronym from the Latin; a musical term used in religious music is a euoua and more than one (being Latin) is euouae. 4. A poem written to celebrate a wedding is called an epithalamium. The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets. The two lines that connect your top lip to the bottom of your nose are known as the philtrum. The white part of your fingernail is called the lunula. 5. Anthropophagy is the technical, scientific term for cannibalism. 6. In 1945 a computer at Harvard malfunctioned and Grace Hopper, who was working on the computer, investigated, found a moth in one of the circuits and removed it. Ever since, when something goes wrong with a computer, it is said to have a bug in it. 7. In English, the word set has the most varied definitions. Oxford gives over 190; here are the most common 30. Verbs i) to put an object in a certain place (they set the vase on the table) ii) to have a film or story occur in a certain place and time (Rollerball is set in the future) iii) to cause something to be in a particular state (they set the building on fire) iv) to cause something to begin (their remarks set me thinking) v) to give work or a particular task to someone (I set to work on dusting) vi) to decide or establish (the school set a high standard for students) vii) to prepare something for future use (I set my PVR to record at 10pm) viii) to make certain (the meeting was set for Thursday the 8th) ix) (jewellery) to affix (a ruby was set into the gold of the brooch) x) (medicine) to put a bone in place to heal (the doctor set my fractured tibia) xi) (fashion) to style hair (they set their hair in a Mohawk) xii) to make a body part tight (they set their jaw firmly when insulted) xiii) to become firm (the jelly set in the dog-shaped mold) xiv) to assign (the teacher set 10 pages of homework) xv) (music) to provide music for lyrics or a poem (Harrison set the music for Starr’s songs) xvi) to go below the horizon (the sun set at 6pm) Nouns xvii) a group of similar things (I had a set of seven race cars) xviii) a collection of objects used for a distinct purpose (a chess set or chemistry set); also used in physical exercise (I did a set of 25 pull-ups) xix) (maths) a group of objects with distinct, stated characteristics (of the 25 shapes, only 3 made up the set of red squares) xx) a group of people who have a similarity (the art set of Sydney is ridiculously pretentious) xxi) (performance) where a film or play occurs, including the furniture and props (the movie set was a kitchen) xxii) part of a game of a number of sports (a tennis set is generally first to win 6 games) xxiii) a part of a musical performance before and/or after a break (the band’s first set last an hour, their second ninety minutes) xxiv) a position held by a body part (the set of their jaw told me they were angry) xxv) the act of having hair styled (a shampoo and set cost me $150) xxvi) a television (the TV set sat in the corner of the room) Adjective/Adverb xxvii) ready (are we all set?) xxviii) likely (he is set to become world champion in 2025) xxix) never changing (I have to be at work at a set time) xxx) (education) required (Beowulf is a set text for English Lit class) 8. The y in signs reading ye olde… is properly pronounced with a “th” sound, not “y”. The “th” sound does not exist in Latin (which is odd as it exists in Greek), so when ancient Romans occupied (present day) England, they used the Germanic rune “thorn” to represent “th” sounds, adding a new letter to the Latin alphabet. With the advent of the printing press the character from the Roman alphabet which closest resembled thorn was the lower case “y”. The “th” letter combination reappeared in the 14th century, though etymologists are not sure why. 9. The correct response to the Irish greeting, “Top of the morning to you,” is “and the rest of the day to yourself.” 10. The last thing to happen is called the ultimate. The next-to-last is called the penultimate, and the second-to-last is called the antepenultimate. 11. The right side of a boat was called the starboard side due to the fact that the astronavigators used to stand out on the plank (which was on the right side) to get an unobstructed view of the stars. The left side was called the port side because that was the side that you put in on at the port. 12. The study of insects is called entomology. The study of word origins is called etymology. Don’t get them confused…  |
| Imposter Syndrome Imposter syndrome is something that affects a lot of writers, especially when they start to get accolades or sales. It is a hard transition to go from something that may have been a hobby or a part of your life to something that gets you recognition. You feel you don’t deserve it and question why you’re being looked at in the way you are. That is “Imposter Syndrome.” However, let me start from a different angle. The following is a common story, and these sort of people are people I have encountered here on WdC. Not too often, but often enough. A person asks you to beta read their manuscript, or maybe pay you for editing, before they send it to a few agents who they are sure will pick it up. They tell you this will sell to one of the Big 5 publishers because it is that damn good. You proofread and edit 50 pages of his 350 page work. If you were a teacher, you would have worn out three red pens. There is no story; it is something that happens. You decide to rewrite, from scratch, the first chapter to show them how to format and what a story entails. This person tells you you’re full of shit, you’re jealous, this is a masterpiece, and they know it. You have done courses, been edited and received some accolades, maybe even had a few short stories or poems traditionally published. You think you’re wasting everyone’s time; they think they are going to be the next David Mitchell (or, probably, EL James). You have Imposter Syndrome; they have unrealistic expectations and unrealistic impressions of their own ability. Okay, let’s look at this logically. Maybe they’re really optimistic and don’t realise agents take less than 1 in 200 submissions. Maybe they have had success in other aspects of their life, and think this will be as easy. Maybe they don’t read much and don’t realise what their shortcomings are. On the other hand, you understand the industry and realise the writing world is as cut-throat as anything, maybe second only to the acting world or visual art world. You know you have to fight to survive. But there is a psychological reason. It’s called the Dunning-Kruger Effect. First postulated in 1999 and subsequently proved many times, Dunning and Kruger discovered that people with low level of ability in a field tend to overestimate their talent or abilities in that field. They don’t know what they don’t know, but have an inkling of what is required, the bare minimum. The most common thing in Dunning-Kruger is they have a small bit of knowledge and take that to mean they know everything about a topic. This is where pseudo-science comes to the fore. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. However, the Dunning-Kruger Effect does go on and finds the inverse is also true: people with a high level of ability or a higher talent in a field often underestimate their skill in that field. And isn’t that what Imposter Syndrome is? What causes this? No-one knows. For a writer, it could be rejections, a string of bad reviews, comparing themselves to the best writers unfavourably, apathy about their chosen career (and apathy can be more harmful than hostility), thinking they have not improved since they started ten years earlier (or more). But also ask if this goes into other aspects of your life? In my case, I suffer quite badly. I have over 100 pieces traditionally published, including 5 books, and yet I know I am crap. I was also a crap teacher, despite winning awards for my teaching three times in my career. I was a terrible pro wrestler, despite having a career lasting more than 20 years. But I keep trying. Because I can do nothing else. So, you might have Imposter Syndrome, and it might be holding you back, but, in my mind, it is preferable to the alternative, and suffer from Idol Syndrome – you think you’re great because your mum/ sibling/ grandma/ friends tell you you’re great. (Yes, I’ve mentioned Idol Syndrome before – the worst thing to happen to any artist.) |
| Writing A Play I’ve seen a few scripts on WdC, so I thought I’d go back through my university notes and write down how to actually write a play. Not the technical aspects – that differs from country to country, theatre to theatre. Look online and see what the dominant style being used at the moment is and go for that. Every five years I need to change the way I present a play, everything from font to where the names of the characters go to what is capitalised. It’s a pain, but that’s the nature of the beast. First, theatre is a very different medium to video or the page. It is visual, but the human is the camera, and it is essentially static. If you only watch film, do NOT try to write a play. They are totally different. So, if you want to write a play, go and see a few plays! Not just Shakespeare, not just the classics, but your local community theatre, school performances. I’ve had one play performed and another coming up this year (I hope), both done by schools. If you can, get involved backstage so you can see how scenes change, how props are made, make-up, the minutiae that does not matter in film, especially in these days of CGI. In a play, your character is not going to turn into a werewolf in front of the audience, and unless you use a mask, not going to be able to transform offstage in two minutes either. The make-up people will kill you if you demand that. The theatre is a medium of “less is more.” A great example of this is that many calls for plays from community theatres only want 4 to 6 characters in total. My plays have many more, but that suits a school environment. Settings as well. One or two settings is what most want. Then again, look at a play like Death Of A Salesman (Arthur Miller) – it takes place in one house, two rooms. The whole play. Do not set design in your play. You may have things that need to be places or specific colours, but if you design the whole set, you are taking away from the director, and imposing a budget that might not be possible. Give only the important details and no others in the design of sets and scenes. Next is time. Your characters are not going to be able to age, scenery is not going to able to age. The exception is, of course, if the first half is one year, and then the intermission allows for aging to occur if that is what you need for your action. Characters, time and place are very minimal. The action is linear and occurs over a short period. Things that have happened beforehand are not shown in flashback, but are learnt through exposition of dialogue (without it being info dumped). Most plays also start in the middle – in media res – so the action is on stage from the word go. Think about hamlet – the king is already dead, the queen is already remarried and Hamlet is already being an emo jerk. Next we have characterisation. And in plays motivation is the key component here. Characters have a desire or want that is so strong they will do anything to achieve it. In a play I would suggest really doing a full character study before writing it. You must know where the character lives and why. What does he or she do for a living? Is the character educated? Age, religious beliefs, political leanings, and social behaviour are all parts of a person. These items may not be revealed in the final work, but a strong character study enables you to create a round and dimensional character. To reiterate, not everything you create will appear in the final product. And this must be done for every character. Something a lot of playwrights do is impose their own thoughts and ideals on characters that have not been set that way. Avoid this at all costs; the audience will know. Finally, avoid idealising characters. The ideal person does not exist. Hamlet had a problem making decisions. Othello trusted the wrong man and had bad judgment. Don’t be afraid of giving your characters a flaw, or even two. After all, nobody is perfect. Next, dialogue. The characters speak sort of like real people, but not quite. They are telling the audience things, but they shouldn’t be things other characters would already know. Get people to read your play out loud so you can test if the dialogue works. More than anything else, play writing is about expressing humanity on the stage. Most successful plays say something about the human condition. Even the musicals. Sure, there are some exceptions (Cats springs to mind), but most say something about people. Even if back-dropped by world-shattering events, the play itself is focused on the people involved. One point in time. So, that’s probably not what you were hoping for, but writing a play is, to me, the most difficult of things to write. I am not even close to successful. A couple of people on WdC have read one of my plays. But I am going to make money as a short story writer or novelist. Still, some stories just cry out for a theatrical setting. |
| Plurals Okay, another request. Plurals! How do we pluralise words? We add and 's'. That's all, right? I wish. This is going to get technical, and those who hate grammar rules are going to hate this blog entry, but I am a grammar nerd, and this is the way things are... technically. I know many ignore them, and that is their choice, but I like to stick up for English as she is. So, most words, yes, add an 's' to make a plural. dog -> dogs planet -> planets However, if a word ends in -s, add an '-es' boss -> bosses biceps -> bicepses (yes, biceps is the singular, because of the Greek basis) If a word ends in -y after a consonant, drop the -y and add '-ies'. butterfly -> flies sky -> skies If a word ends in a vowel, then a 'y', just add -s. However, in US English, if a word ends in -ey, drop the -ey and add '-ies'. honey -> honies money -> monies Remember, In the UK, Australia and other places that use that form of English, it would be: honey -> honeys money -> moneys If a word has two or more syllables, ends in -us and is from a Latin base, drop the -us and add '-i'. cactus -> cacti hippopotamus -> hippopotami Oh, quickly, virus technically has virus as the plural because it is fourth declension, not second... but that's a Latin thing. Just remember viruses is allowed, but virus can be its own plural. Latin originated words that end in -is, drop the -is and add '-es'. crisis -> crises metamorphosis -> metamorphoses Technically, the plural of Elvis would be Elves (pronounce the second "e" - el-vays - or else it's the plural of 'elf'). Latin words that are singular and end in an -a, add an '-e'. formula -> formulae stela -> stelae Bus is an interesting one. It is an abbreviation of the Latin word "omnibus" which means "for everything/for all" and, as such, is already declined into a plural state (the singular is 'omnis'), so adding '-es' is all we can do. bus -> buses Back to things that are their own plural, 'sheep' is its own plural, 'fish' is its own plural when speaking generically or about one single sort of fish, but fishes is allowed when referencing all manner of fish. 'Species' is its own plural; there is no 'specie'. Same with 'series'. Back to the -us ending. If the word is taken from Greek, as opposed to Latin, drop the -us and add '-odes'. octopus -> octopodes platypus -> platypodes However, in these cases, just adding '-es' is also acceptable (e.g. octopuses, platypuses). If a word ends in -o, add '-es'. potato -> potatoes tomato -> tomatoes The exceptions are if the word comes directly from Italian piano -> pianos cello -> cellos If a word ends in -f or has an -f near the end, replace the -f with a -v calf -> calves knife -> knives life -> knives The exceptions are if the -f comes after two vowels proof -> proofs reef -> reefs Then there's the weird ones: goose -> geese mouse -> mice man/woman -> men/women foot -> feet tooth -> teeth louse -> lice ox -> oxen child -> children person -> people crux -> cruces Now, false singulars: Phenomena is the plural; the singular is phenomenon. Data is the plural; the singular is datum. Bacteria is the plural; the singular is bacterium. Dice is the plural; the singular is die. And I've probably forgotten or missed some, but that is the general way plurals work. |
| How To Get Your Manuscript Rejected People always ask me how I manage to get my short stories accepted. Well... I dunno. Sorry. I just sell things. But... I can tell you how to NOT sell your story! Follow these 10 rules to ensure you never get looked at again. 1. Use your cover letter to beg the editor to buy your novel so you can afford to pay for your grandmother's hip replacement. 2. Write a cover letter telling the editor how you are the next coming of Stephen King, Isaac Asimov and JRR Tolkien all rolled into one. There is selling yourself, then there is making yourself look like a jerk. 3. Look at what the place you are submitting to is asking for and usually publishes, then just send them your favourite piece. really good to send a poem to a prose magazine, or vice versa, and horror editors love getting historical romances. 4. If the submission process says send an email, send it by snail mail; if it says send by post, send an email; if it says use the submission portal, send it by email AND snail mail (just to make sure). 5. Tell the editor that it's his job to edit your work, because you have the most unique ideas and he should be happy to just get the story; grammar and punctuation and spelling and homophones are the editor's problem. 6. Put that little copyright symbol © on each and every page, or, better yet, as a water-mark on the pages. In addition, warn the editor you will get a lawyer if he dares steal your ideas. 7. If you are rejected, respond by sending the editor the most hate-filled email telling them how stupid they are for having rejected your story. 8. If the editor makes suggestions to improve your work, in the same email, tell him that he knows nothing. How could he - he rejected you! If he makes those suggestions so he might accept the story later, tell him he doesn't have an artistic bone in his body and how dare he stifle your artistic vision. 9. Use emojis instead of words. Everywhere. In fact, don't use words. Just use emojis. and the best way: 10. Send the manuscript without using the formatting they ask for. Use the fanciest font you can. Use large fonts and no line spacing. Colour the text; multiple colours work best. Add background colours, pictures and/or designs. After all, you're the artist! What better way to stand out than to ignore everything the editor asks for? I hope that helps you. If you want to be rejected, these rules can help you achieve that goal. |
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