Ways in which...

From the annals of www.alongthewritelines.blogspot.com

Flexibility will only get you so far...

Ways in which I've made a tit* out of myself as a writer (in no particular order).

1. Waiting one year, three months and 16 days to get a reply from a publisher. Mercifully, not an exclusive submission, but why, why, why did I bother?

2. Using the phrase, 'Yours ethically,' to a client (who freaked a little and went elsewhere).

3. Making a flippant comment to an agent after waiting an extra week to hear about a writing competition, only to hear that the reason my email had been delayed was that I'd been shortlisted. I didn't win, which arguably is karma.

4. Not asking, up front, what the rate was per word, and then having to listen to a load of pony about what a great opportunity it will be for me in the long-term. That is, once I'd learned to go without food.

5. Writing at a rate per word where, ordinarily, outside the writing world, you'd be searching the job ads during your teabreak.

6. Taking FOREVER to take the plunge and self-publish my own novel. I mean, seriously, what IS the worst that could happen? Nobody buys and reads it? Shit, that's the situation if it isn't published. I lose a little money on it? Big deal - as long as I learn something. To be filed under 'don't be a wuss'. 

7. Letting two payment deadlines go by before issuing a client with a take down notice. (If I just love them even more, maybe they'll change...).

8. Agreeing to exclusive electronic rights for two years, which is the approximate lifepsan of a mosquito fish. Just in case you were wondering.

9. While attending a writing course in London, after work, the tutor snootily asked me to define my work for the benefit of him and the class. I explained that the essence of the novel (see, I can do snooty, too) was that the plot mattered more than the individual characters. 

"Ah, he nodded sagely, you've obviously read a great deal of Chekhov." 

"No," I replied, "but I've watched all his appearances in Star Trek." Phasers on pun.

10. Admitting all the above in a blog post.

* Bearded, in my case, today. 

Difficult Second Album Syndrome

So, regular readers of this blog will know that last year I published a book, Dark Dates. It wasn’t a good fit for my previous publisher and I struggled to find an agent, so I thought, sod it, I’ll publish myself, and see what people say. Self-publishing has been a steep learning curve: it’s way more work than you imagine going in (although I’ve also found it more rewarding than I could have imagined) but the problem with publishing something yourself is you haven’t gone through the quality control procedure of agent-publisher-editor: there’s constantly the nagging worry in the back of your mind, the little voice saying, ‘c’mon, if this was really any good someone would publish it for you’.

Some bloggers were really kind...

So when the reviews start coming in, you pay more attention than is healthy to what people say. I’ve been very lucky with Dark Dates – the reaction has been almost overwhelmingly positive. Of course, I’d like more people to have read it (it’s still incredibly difficult to get coverage for an indie book) but those who have, have tended to love it. I’ve been blown away by the feedback I’ve got – just this week I got another rave review from Indies R Us and was selected as Book of the Month at the TBR Pile, and I also made a couple of bloggers’ ‘Top 10 of 2012’ lists. It was exciting, and thrilling, and exactly what I wanted – the fact that people actually talked about my characters, had opinions about them, cared about them: this was the very thing I got into writing for.

See? Actual nice quote by person I don't know

 

Then I had to write the sequel, and suddenly The Fear struck. What if it sucked? Lots of people said the first book was funny: the second book was darker, but I thought it still had a nice streak of humour in it – but what if it wasn’t enough? I found myself scouring the text to see if I could put in jokes (I didn’t, in the end, because I find that kind of writing tiresome, but Lord, the temptation was there). There’s more sex in this one: is it too sexy? Will people still like the characters? Will they feel let down? Suddenly all I could see in my head was a stream of reviews from people saying how disappointed they were – and the fact that I connect with a load of bloggers via social media means I’d be unable to hide from their scorn. Maybe I should just leave Dark Dates alone, treat it as a success and then move onto something completely different? It’s ridiculous given that my readers probably only number into the hundreds that I was working myself into such a state – how do properly famous writers do it? No wonder George RR Martin always seems a bit grumpy.

Fingers crossed...

 

In the end, of course, it boiled down to what it always does: having faith in the writing. When it comes down to it, I love these characters, and I’d write about them even if I was the only one who got to read the stories. They’re under my skin now and they aren’t going anywhere.

I sent the book, Wolf Night, to my beta readers who all came back with great feedback – but, importantly, also with comments on what didn’t work, and what needed to be made better (it’s good to have cheerleaders, but you also need people to be honest, especially when you don’t have the safety net of an agent or editor).

And so, after a lot of agonising, the book is out there. I’m trying to tell myself not to read reviews this time around (I can still quote the bad ones from Dark Dates) but I suspect I’ll fall at the first hurdle on that one – it really does matter to me that people like it, and don’t feel I’ve let them down. But I know it’s the best I could make it, and I know I’ve been true to the characters – and that’s all I can do, I guess. Anyway, I’m off to write the sequel now…

You can follow Dark Dates at darkdates.org

 

Joanna Thomas: the pleasures and pains of blogging

I started blogging just after my 30^th birthday, as part of a bucket-list style challenge to try out 30 brand new experiences before turning 31. Number one on the list was to start a blog, and the blog was to be about my journey through the challenges. You see what I did there? Wiped one challenge off the list with little more than half an hour’s worth of fiddling about with Blogger. Easy-peasy.

Except, blogging about my experiences has turned-out to be as important, challenging and rewarding as each of the other Thirty@30 experiences themselves. Writing the perfect piece takes me hours. I agonise over every word just as I agonise over the words in my novel. I pour my heart and soul into each blog, and worry as I send it, defenceless, into the world. I Facebook and Tweet my posts with the same anxious pride that others reserve for pictures of their babies. I hope that people are going to read, like and share them, and am hurt when some of my dearest, closest friends seem to ignore them. Conversely, I am elated when people share their own stories, and give me inspiration for new challenges. I am overwhelmed by the support of people I don’t even know, and, of course, many that I do. Putting your writing out into the world makes you vulnerable, but I’ve found that even swinging on a trapeze doesn’t match the exhilaration of hearing that people are moved, touched, or interested by my words. A particular highlight was being re-tweeted by the wondrous and bonkers Amanda Palmer. That piece received 600 page views in 24 hours, a huge deal for me.

My writing process for the blogs is completely different to my efforts at fiction. I have discovered a liberating sense of urgency around penning my posts, because I can’t wait to get them online. I’ll stay up until 3am tapping away at my keyboard, knowing that there’s going to be some fairly instant gratification once I’m done. The same can definitely not be said for my novel, which I have been working on for five years and which I fear has become stale. I keep worrying at it, prodding old wounds, burying my head in my hands at the exhausting hopelessness of it. For all that I agonise over my blogs, I rarely start writing one without finishing it, which I think and hope keeps them fresh. If only I could do that with my novel! Sometimes, of course, the blogs are too raw, and I have to go back and make tiny tweaks when I think no one’s looking. It’s worth it for the breathless excitement of typing straight into Blogger and hitting the ‘Publish’ button.

Blogger and writer Joanna Thomas

 

For all the differences in the process, blogging has taught me that good non-fiction, just like good fiction, is all about storytelling. If you give readers a story arc and a healthy dose of dramatic tension, humour and emotion, they’ll go with you, and forgive the raw moments or rough patches. Fortunately that’s something I find relatively easy to do when writing about my challenges, since each one implies a mini-journey for our hapless but bloody-minded heroine, aka me.

As I write these words I’m seven months into a twelve month challenge, and still have lots more Thirty@30 experiences waiting to be discovered, enjoyed (or not!) and written about. And whatever happens once the challenge ends, I know that blogging will forevermore be a part of how I express myself through words. Now, back to that pesky plot hole in chapter four…

Visit my blog: Thirty@30

Follow me on Twitter: @JoannaJosefina

Joanna Thomas is a London-based writer with a day-job as managing editor of a legal publishing company. She blogs, writes poetry, and is editing (and re-editing) her first novel. She is also a freelance fiction editor.

Can blogging actually harm your writing?

One of the things I always advise would-be writers to do is to start a blog: it’s a great way of getting into the habit of regular writing, and with writing, like any talent, practice makes perfect – so the more you do it, the better you get. But am I right? Or can blogging actually damage your writing, and stall your ambitions?

I think that one of the biggest myths about writing is that it’s all the same thing: that if you can write short stories, you can write a novel (or vice versa); that it’s just one basic skill that works across all media. While there is, of course, a degree of transferability  – if you’re a decent writer, you’re not suddenly going to lose the ability to string together a sentence if you decide to switch from business writing to blogging, or playwriting to penning a novel. There are plenty of examples where writers have ability across a range of fields – but just as many where they don’t. Talent in one area doesn’t necessarily equate to skill in another. Some of my most beloved novelists write terrible short stories, because they simply can’t contain a plot in a few thousand words; one of my favourite non-fiction writers is now publishes historical novels that are so bad they make me want to stick things in my eyes.

In part this is because we read different materials differently: for example, if you’re writing online material, you need to ‘front load’ your piece more (people may not even see more than the first paragraph, and they have less patience if you’re obscure in your opening text). While a killer opener is important for a book (or play, or short story), readers tend to be more patient – they are willing to enjoy a slow burn, to let you layer information and to take a longer route to where you’re going. With blogging, too, there is a tendency to accept a certain lack of polish: you often write quickly, and post without much re-editing, while longer prose often requires a willingness to edit, and re-edit , and to be brutal with yourself over what you keep in and what you lose.

The other issue with blogging is that you can end up running to stand still: you write and write and write without ever actually ending up with an end product you can use. I’m not saying there’s no benefit to blogging for the sake of it – I do that myself, it’s enormously enjoyable – and some blogs, depending on style and topic, can actually add up to a cohesive whole. I’m also not a snob about it – I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being ‘just’ a blogger (and there are plenty of people who are very successful at this – it’s nothing to be snippy about). But it’s also tempting to tell yourself you’re moving forward in your goal to write a book, when all you’re doing is creating content for a blog.

Given all that – it’s still advice I’d stand by. Blogging is fun, it’s a great way of connecting with people (and helping build a ready-made audience if you do eventually publish a book), and getting into the habit of regular writing is a discipline that will serve you well. But as with so many other aspects of being a writer, the trick is being honest with yourself: if you’re using it as an excuse to procrastinate or put off a ‘proper’ project, then it’s not doing you any favours, and you may be better going offline.  

Take our poll

It's an oft-debated subject whether writers should stay true to their art regardless of anyone else's opinion, or write for a specific market. When blogging publicly like this, however, it would be pretty odd if we didn't care what our readers want. We're thinking about how to improve Strictly Writing over the next few months and we'd love to hear what you would like to see on the site.

Please tell us what you like best about the blog by taking our poll, and if you have other feedback about new things we could be doing (within reason - we don't mean stuff like posting nude pics of the team or anything) then let us know in the comments. You can even give constructive criticism if you like - we promise not to go all 'Greek Seaman' about it.

If you can't view the poll below, you can also access it here.

Guest post: From frustration to self-expression by means of a little light blogging

Today's guest blogger, Stephen (a.k.a. BillyGottaJob) writes the excellent At-Long-Last-I've-Got-a-Job Blog. Here he explains his reasons for starting to blog - and why it's worth continuing.

I’ve never had any trouble “finding my voice”, as anyone who’s had the misfortune to share a management team meeting with me will testify. I’m not a great talker socially, but get me started on stimulating cultural change in an organisation, and you’ll almost certainly wish you hadn’t. On the other hand, if you are obliged to read one of my written reports at work at least it will have a bit of style, a reasonable grasp of when a comma, or even a semi-colon, would be a good idea, and a dearth of unlovely management-speak. No, it’s not lack of voice that’s my problem; it’s a lack of an audience that has chosen to be such, rather than the work ones for whom discretion is the better part of pissing me right off.

My blog first began as a way of allowing me to get the frustrations of unemployment off my chest. Even with the limitations of a work-based audience that I’ve described, at least it is one of a sort. When you’re out of a job, and your wife is evading her wedding vows to provide you with an audience on demand, you’re in danger of rampant schizophrenia when you try and operate as both voice and audience. So The Still-Jobless Blog, as it then was, fulfilled its purposes admirably and, to my delight, even seemed to entertain total strangers.

Having managed to get back into employment (although I write as Mr Osborne’s public not-spending fetish is only just beginning, so watch this space) I’ve found that the weaknesses of the obligated work audience have been amplified by the luxury of having established a voluntary electronic one. It's not just the involuntary nature of a work audience that's a problem, it's also the stiflingly narrow range of topics available to write about. But a blog has no such restrictions; so I’ve broadened my writing beyond angst-filled tirades about unemployment to include similarly angst-filled tirades about a whole lot of other things too. The freedom to range from the scarily scatological (Should I raise my obscenity quotient?) to the philosophically speculative (It's almost as if God exists...) via the whimsically sentimental (Valentine's Day massacre...) is liberating and stimulating in equal measure.

Thus now re-named as The At-Long-last-I’ve-Got-a-Job Blog my writing has become an indispensable part of my tool-kit of self-expression. I have established a small but loyal following and whilst, in audiences as in willies, it would be nice to have a bigger one I’m genuinely more interested in satisfaction than in size.

.

The At-Long-Last-I've-Got-a-Job Blog
Follow BillyGottaJob on Twitter

Blogging - look before you leap

A couple of months ago, Colin Mulhern did a guest post for us on the advantages of blogging. So let's say you have decided to go ahead and are currently canvassing opinion about the merits of Wordpress, Blogger, Posterous and Tumblr. With free software so quick and easy to set up, it's tempting to dive right in and launch 'Fred's Self-absorbed Musings' with a post about how the publishing industry hates you and writing is soooo hard and only slebs get book deals because agents are too stupid to accept your stream-of-consciousness account of life as a depressed headlouse. Before starting a blog, however, there are a few things that might be worth considering:

What's it for?
There is no right answer – everyone has their own motivation, but it's helpful to know what that motivation is. A few examples:
To attract the attention of agents or publishers
To publicise an already-published book
To keep a personal journal
To regale the world with your superior knowledge about everything
To enjoy the achievement of completing short pieces while working on a novel.
To campaign on an issue that is important to you.

Identifying the purpose of your blog will help you start – and, more importantly, keep going - on the right track.

How are you going to sustain it?
You don't have to blog every day, but to build up a regular readership you do need to update often – preferably two or three times a week. Is this possible? Have a think about what subjects you want to write on – will you really be able to keep generating regular posts for years, or will it soon become a chore?

Who will read it, and will they all be people you know anyway?
Consider whether your blog will appeal only to the 20 people you already talk to every day online. If that's exactly who you want to reach, that's fine, but if you're looking for a wider audience, think about what will attract and retain them – the blog needs to give them something (e.g. entertainment, knowledge, useful advice), not just beg for their attention.

Does it really have to be about writing?
Just because you're a writer, that doesn't mean you have to blog about writing. Of course, there might be tons you want to say on that subject – if so, great! There are other topics in the world, however. I made the mistake of setting up a writing blog and then realising I don't know a whole lot about it. My history blog, however, has a bottomless supply of material that appeals to people who like history – many of whom also like to read historical fiction.

What's it going to be called?
It's possible to set up a blog very quickly in a fit of enthusiasm. But it's worth spending some time thinking about a name. 'My Ponderings' might be ideal for a personal diary that you don't expect others to read, but it won't necessarily stand out from everyone else's musings, jottings, random thoughts etc. A name can also end up limiting what you write about – be too specific and it will be difficult to shift the direction of the blog once you've got into the swing of it.

These are just a few points I wish I'd put more thought into before I started my first blog. Of course, one of the wonderful things about blogging is that you can write what the heck you like without me or anyone else telling you how – but I reckon it's worth doing a bit of planning before you jump into the blogosphere head first.