Before the Story....

How many times have you written a story or book and then wondered, what happened before the story began?

Ok I admit, it hasn't happened - yet.

But it can.

I realized that the way my girl zombie novel opens, it offers the perfect opportunity to offer a prequel, the set-up before the actual escalating event when the girl's cousin, who is turning into a zombie, comes home.

I've mapped part of it out but I still question - how much is too much? How much detail takes away from the other story?

Of course, writing a prequel means sticking to just that - the events and facts before the main escalating event in the book. It is a stand-alone story and using only events leading up to the one main event in the other story/book can help limit you so you don't go off on other unrelated tangents.

Some of these thoughts here are to help me as I figure out my prequel, and maybe they will help you if you are writing one.

** If you have written a prequel, share the points you took into consideration.

* What did your prequel contain?
* What is it about?
* How does it relate to the main story/book?

Some pros on writing a prequel:

* You can present some of the details that would have bogged down the beginning of the other book or story.

* You can share more about the main character and what prompted them to do what they did.

* You can show more about a character by the actions they take - or don't take.

* You can show more about the family dynamics before this event.

Cons on writing a prequel:

* You can get bogged down in details that don't matter.

* You can repeat some things already covered in the main story.

* ?

Tell us about your prequel!

* See other fiction by Christine Verstraete

The Mystical, Magical Moments in Creative Writing

OCD perhaps how we writers keep on writing in the face of defeat after defeat. I am reminded of the song lyric, "When my smallest of dreams won't come true..." We are accused of being dreamers and how can we not be just that? Our stock in trade is our dreams, our imaginations, our visions, those voices so demanding within us, in our hearts and in our heads, demanding to be released out into the world, and we visualize it all from the outset to the finish line as one perfect set of characters aligned with a perfect plot in the perfect setting be it aboard a doomed ship, in a wooded dale, in a dark and sinister city of our creation and sifted through the five senses and sometimes the sixth sense of our character(s).

Writing is in effect a huge leap of faith. Think of it, you set out with a single phrase, a single sentence, hoping it will lead to a single paragraph, knowing all the while that you are committing yourself to months, perhaps years of hard labor despite its being a labor of love. What motivates us to put down that first word in the building of yet another novel after the first? How do we ever manage to go on to the second and beyond that?

It really truly helps to thoroughly know your character(s), particularly those who can carry the weight of successive books on their shoulders as they make the new title a good deal easier to get into as you KNOW this ensemble so well from your having lived with them through a previous novel, previous perils and adventures. You get to know them often better than you know any real person.

Still what makes us driven to write and write again, despite the overwhelming odds. "Never tell me the odds, kid," says Han Solo to Luke Skywalker in Star Wars. If we were to dwell on the odds of actually completing a novel, and then actually finding anyone who'd care to publish it, and then any audience willing to pay good money for it....would we ever begin?  Is it really about that or is there some deeper, even cosmic reason behnd WHY...why we write?

Frankly, for me, I suspect it is  genetic--yes, all in the heredity of the born storyteller whose gift at birth then is nourished and allowed to flourish. If I could look into a crystal ball not at the future but at the past, would I find my Uncle John there, the great oral storyman looking back at me? What of a grandfather, a great grandfather in the old homeland of Scotland? And before that...in the time of the first men to sit about a campfire and retell events of the hunt?  Something in a story wants telling, needs telling, and needs people like you and me to hear it and hear it well, and to demand it be told well.

Voices out of the past, voices in the present, voices out of the future infiltrate a storyteller's mind and they all demand a hearing, and so it goes...we are OCD about getting all the stories we hear in our heads outside of us and on paper. We have little choice otherwise. The whole damn thing is mystical, and the older a storyteller gets, the more mystical the process becomes.

Robert W. Walker, author of Titanic 2012, Children of Salem, and more...

Read a good book lately?

One of the ironies about being a writer is not having as much time to read and when I do it's mostly non-fiction. So, when I do get the chance to curl up in bed with a work of fiction that I enjoy, it's one of the best pleasures in the world.

The book I'm reading know is titled Conscious Loving - The Journey to Co-Commitment - A way to be fully together without giving up yourself.

I actually bought this book sometime ago but am just now getting around to reading it and wishing that I had read it sooner. Hard to tell if events in my life would have unfolded any differently over the past decade but this book certainly is full of some wisdom I could have used along the way. Still, I guess we take things in when we're ready to take them in.

Allegedly, more people these days want to write a book than read one. Of course, if they truly realized just how much work it takes to write they wouldn't be so quick to declare such a thing.

I'm just hoping that people will start reading more and more. I suspect that people really are still reading, it's just that they're reading more of their material online or via an electronic device and therefore I'm not sure we're measuring it properly.

Publishers Weekly had an intriguing headline today - Lookout Kindle, Here Comes CellStories.net. It's a very interesting read. Here's the link:

http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6687027.html?nid=2286&rid=##CustomerId##&source=title

It's going to be interesting to see how the premise of this article and cellstories.net plays out. I'm definitely going to be watching and reading. Hope you will be as well.

A Busy Day

Most writers work day jobs because it's difficult to make a living as an independent writer, especially with ficiton. It's not impossible - just difficult. The irony is that the day job that pays the bills tends to infringe on the time available to write.

I love my day job but today was one of those days that just left me exhausted. Still, I managed to crank out a few sentences on the train and update my scene list as I work on my second romantic suspense novel. Now a few sentences doesn't sound like much but I learned awhile ago that writing even just one sentence a day is fundamental to making progress on completing any written work.

It takes discipline to turn on my laptop after a long day at work, but I'm enjoying my writing process so much that even penning one sentence is ample reward for me, although most days I write much more than that. A sentence or paragraph a day eventually leads to a chapter which leads to another chapter which leads to a novel length work of fiction. It's almost intoxicating.

So, what if I never get an offer for a book conract? What if my work is only read by a few people? Well, that might happen, but I'm not giving up. Writing is part of who I am now and expressing myself through my writing is as essential to my life as making a living. I'm fortunate that I enjoy both and find them both rewarding. I'm really fortunate that I can always depend on one of them to pay my bills. Anything else is icing on the cake - but then, I like icing on my cake.

Tension's High Wire Act by Rob Walker

Quoting from Making Shapely Fiction by Jerome Stern, who really
understood conflict and tension -- "Conflict is the high-wire of
tension upon which fiction balances." Or is strung and weaved
into one's plot. Okay, paraphrasing but this makes sense.
Violence is not the same thing as tension or conflict, and
conflict is not exactly the same thing as tension. One can have
conflict between two people who love one another. One can have
tension between a father and daughter, mother and son, siblings,
etc., and it don't gotta turn into no violence.

Tension comes about due to conflicting character wants and needs.
Conflict - say two or more characters at direct odds over
opposite goals or desires. To make a story compelling and
thrill-filled, you must begin with a character that is obsessed!
Truly, deeply obsessed. And both your protagonist and antagonist
must have their own obsessions. Yes, in fiction, obsessions are
gold. Your hero must run the gamut of a story about his or her
goal(s), goals they'd die for! Or in the case of my next novel,
DEAD ON, goals Marcus Rydell would LIVE for (put his suicide off
for!). And when nature or another man or woman becomes an
obstacle to the goal(s) of character A, it is due to the conflict
created by charcter B who wants just the opposite. A "clash of
desires" as in a Clash of Titans! And this is true in romance
novels as well as suspense or thrillers, horror novels, science
fiction and desent historical novels.

Don't believe me? Think of your favorite book of all time and
ask what did Atticus Finch most want in the story, even more
important, what did Scout want most? Father wants...daughter
wants. In any given scene, a conflict may exist between Atticus
and Scout or Jem. What did the narrator as child want from her
father? To understand her father, to "get" human nature, to make
sense of people? Who stood in her way? Her own innocence and
lack of years on the planet, her own innocence to the evil that
men do. Take the tense plot about Ahab and the White Whale --
Moby Dick. What did Ahab want? What caused the tension in this
fish tale? What was Ahab's most passionate obsession, and what
force of nature kept him from it? The whale is a force of nature
that fights for itself against Ahab and Ahab wants it dead for
having taken his leg and having destroyed his last ship (and crew
but they're expendable! as is the new crew and ship). The
tension is the highwire, the plot upon which all this is played
out. The plot is the thread upon which conflict and tension are
balanced. Think of Huck Finn having to fight for his freedom
from his pap, the Widow Watson, Hannibal, Missouri, society,
civilization. He has to fight his way out of each episodic
problem or conflict keeping him from being free, his
obsession--mirrored in Negro Jim's obsession to "get free" along
with getting his family free.

Then there are the serial killers who are obsessed, the vampires
who are obsessed, the bad guys who are obsessed coming face to
face with the good guys whose obsessions are "positive"
obsessions, like Bat Man or Superman whose strength comes from
being equally obsessed at capturing and putting an end to the
villain and or his activities. The tension is in the chase, the
conflict is in the goals, and the violence, if it comes to that
comes at the clash--as when Ahab catches up to the White Whale,
or as when another obsessed character battles the sea, the
mountains, the planet Mars, or a werewolf, or a vampire, or a
twisted religious fanatic.

I love Jerome Stern's Making Shapely Fiction. Great out of print
little book filled with great complete well thought out answers.
Told me how I do what I do and why I do it the way I do it. Felt
like Stern got into my head where even I had not gone (scary
place, really).

Hope this "defines" the difference between tension, conflict, and
violence. You can toss out the violence in a ficitonal work, but
you MUST have conflict and tension.

Happy Writing and Reading everyone, and for an early look at DEAD
ON visit my website!

Rob Walker
www.robertwalkerbooks.com

WRITING The COVER LETTER, the AUTHOR BIO, & the SYNOPSIS w/EXAMPLES - FOR FICTION BOOKS by ROBERT W. WALKER

Cover letters, synopsis, author bios – how much is enough when a new author is facing the daunting marketplace in fiction books? Writing fiction books, novels, short story collections is the fun part; the most difficult writing for most new authors and many older ones is writing about oneself and one’s “baby” – the fiction book itself.

I’m going to walk you through it using my wife’s first novel, a suspense thriller entitled The Wishing Well . . . think creepy wishing well.

LET’S begin with the cover letter. This is a business letter and should get to the point and have all the salient points, and today often, surprisingly or not so surprisingly, editors are accepting the query letter itself via e-mail. I’m going to speak of it as a hardcopy here:

First at the top left or right (be consistent), all your contact information below your name along with the type of fiction book – say Mystery and the number of words, be it 80,000 for a fiction book or 7500 for a short story. After this comes the date—centered

June 20, 2007

Dear SPECIFIC NAME*,
Please! Send your manuscript to a person with a name, not Sir, not Madam, not Editorial Director. Do a spot of homework and learn the name of the editor at XYZ Publishing who handles your type of novel.

First paragraph:


For seventeen years I have worked in medicine as an RN with a degree in psychology and a minor in sociology, and most recently I am employed by the West Virginia State Bureau of Medical Services. Medicine and medical procedures are like breathing for someone of my experience, and I have the imagination of a writer of intrigue and suspense. Now I have combined these skills to a thriller novel, The Wishing Well (approximately 85,000 words). This Megan McKenna mystery compliments my background, as the unfolding story involves medicine, state government medical services, foster care, police, and law enforcement. These realms are rendered in dramatic terms as FBI Agent McKenna is faced with difficult personal and professional choices even as she gives chase to the maniacal Wishing Well killer whose victims are found in remote, eerie wells in and around Baltimore.


Paragraph Two:

I have had the manuscript professionally edited and it has been rewritten and polished. Still, I remain flexible to input and ideas—such as more sex, sin, and violence (lol). Below this letter, please find a brief biography and a full description of the novel as it might appear on the back-jacket copy. I would be happy to forward the entire manuscript for The Wishing Well should you request to see it in its entirety.

Thanking you in advance for your valuable time,
Miranda Phillips Walker

Next is an example of ONE WAY to lay out your synopsis or “brief” overview of the novel as you may wish to set it up as your ideal of what should appear on the back of the book in the way of a description. A good practice—write your ideal copy for your fiction book.

See Below for Pitch\Jacket-Copy:


The Wishing Well
by Miranda Phillips Walker

The Wishing Well Killer is terrorizing Charm City – Baltimore, Maryland. His victims are cropping up all over the area with two things in common: They’re wrapped like garbage and thrown down a well shaft, and each is in some bizarre way connected to an unfolding investigation of a Maryland foster care agency. The killer himself is a deformed Quasimodo type, plagued by a voice in his head, and he cannot take the slightest insult from any quarter. Anything can set him off.


The heroine FBI agent Megan McKenna and retired decorated police dog, Max, who she uses as a sounding board and friend, are faced with the most important case of her career. She’s hunting down a killer whose victims (ranging in age from pre-teen to adult) are in some bizarre fashion connected to a foster childcare agency operated by a pair of disreputable lawyers out of a former school called Our Lady of Peace. A marksman’s eye and a wicked sense of humor help Megan during her most stressful moments. She is tenacious and eager to prove herself, as her last case has left her scarred and vulnerable. Helping Megan are former lover and Agent Reese DiTrapano, a psychological profiler, and Phil Jenkins, a veteran Baltimore Police Detective who has eyes for Megan. In fact, both men harbor strong feelings for Megan, and through a sweltering summer of 2007, this trio tracks a madman only to learn he is someone from Megan’s past, someone all too willing to taunt her and place her in mortal danger.


The scam: As McKenna and law enforcement throw out a net to catch the maniac, they uncover an insidious under-the-table scam in the Maryland State foster care system, and a link between it, a pair of lawyers, and the killer. The fraud places foster care recipients in danger. The pace of the story is fast and as furious and twisting as a rollercoaster gone haywire. Not even Megan or her dog Max can predict what happens on the next page, nor will readers until the last wickedly humorous and wicked clue is uncovered.

Author Biography:

Miranda Phillips Walker is uniquely qualified to pen The Wishing Well as both a suspenseful mystery and an expose of the corruption and graft in the underbelly of our Nation’s foster care system. Walker, an RN, has a psychology degree with a minor in sociology and has been a registered nurse for over seventeen years. Her life in medicine has been far more exciting and colorful than any program on TV such as ER or Grey’s Anatomy. Walker has a wealth of knowledge that she brings to bear on the writing of a novel of aberrant behavior and the ins-and-outs of the agencies that abuse the foster care system. She currently works for the State of West Virginia as an RN for the Bureau of Medical Services. She has four children and is married to a professor of English, who is also a prominent author. She currently resides in the Charleston, West Virginia. Miranda says of The Wishing Well, “I understand the demons that drive Crusher, the killer, and I have insights into the Child Protective Services that few possess. Going into the writing of this novel, I was armed with the right tools to make it work. I trust that the reader will agree.”


Everyone has to write his or her own bio, back-copy or synopsis, and cover letter, but hopefully this example from one in your shoes will be of help if you are facing this most difficult task. The hardest but most important story—and the shortest—that you will ever write is the story about your story. That which has the purpose not of entertaining but enticing someone to read your novel or short story collection.


Rob
www.robertWalkerbooks.com -- new site
Interview in the Charleston Gazette --
http://wvgazette.com/News/200806120572

More on Marketing

What a great blog Norm. I echo everything you wrote and hope you will indulge me in adding some of my own comments.

Marketing, or promoting a book, is sometimes a larger part of an author's experience than actually writing the book that he/she is promoting. Ironic, isn't it! Especially since an author, particularly of fiction, must write more and more books to reamain viable in today's publishing world. Sometimes, they have to write more than one a year. The big-name publishing houses are now often owned by big business and books have become a product - a commodity - and the big business wants to make money on their products. Who can blame them. Authors are also judged on how well their last book sold and if those numbers aren't 'good' then they are not likely to be asked for more of their product since the last one didn't fare so well. So you see the catch-22 the author is in. The last book written must sell well enough for the next one to be even considered. Imagine all the time and effort and author spends writing and promoting, often at the same time.

These days authors are often asked for their platform, even by agents, before the full manuscript is even read. Marketing departments will want to know how to promote or sell the book to their clients which are typically the larger conglomorate bookstores. Often the sales person for the publisher gets a minute or less per book to grab the attention of the buyer at the bookstore. So that saying, don't judge a book by it's cover - well, that happens more than any writer cares to admit. Yet writers rarely get input on the cover of any of their books let alone the titles.

Promotion isn't excactly a foreign concept to those in the arts. There's an old saying that all publicity is good publicity or "-that there ain't no such thing as bad publicity," although I think politicians, especially today, would disagree with this sentiment. But consider Britney Spears and all the bad publicity she's received; it seems to have worked in terms of selling her recent song. I grew up in Los Angeles, Venice to be exact, and I like to tell people that I went to the high school where the movie Grease was filmed, although years after I graduated. Those of us who grew up near 'Hollywood' are all too familiar with the many young people that came to the area looking to be discovered like the fabled story of Lana Turner sitting in her tight sweater at the counter. Us locals knew that was more of a myth perpetrated by some movie studio or marketing department but it worked.

So, how far should an author go in promoting his/her book--specially today when audiences' attention spans are shorter than ever and more and different types of media are competing for those shortened attention spans? In fact, surveys over the last few years reveal that the average person is reading less and less - despite the success of such books as the Harry Potter series. In fact, more people today want to write a book than read one.

Perhaps the most famous and drastic act of promotion occurred on October 30, 1938 when Orson Welles developed a scheme to promote H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds by adapting to the format of a real news broadcast, resulting in mass panic. As a result of the promotion sounding and 'feeling' like a real news broadcast millions of listeners really thought that the Martians were invading. It was a marketing success but a public safety disaster. (For more information, on this go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orson_Welles).

Promotion, like the poor, death, and taxes, will always be with us. How authors can most effectively promote their works seems to be a debate that will last just as long.

Think blogging will help?

www.storytellerroad.com