A Nice Surprise for Me

It was just announced at the 2016 eFestival of Words, a well-established virtual book fair, that The Templar's Cross is the winner of Best Historical Novel of 2016.

Yay!

Whatever your preferred genre, I strongly suggest checking out the list of winners. There are some great books on it.

Here is the complete list of winners. These are novels nominated by industry professionals and voted on by readers.

2016 eFestival of Words Winners

Historical accuracy in novels?

How much does it matter to you as a reader? How much as a writer?

I have to admit it matters immensely to me, but I'm never quite sure where to bend when writing my own historical works.

Examples of what annoyed me: a spinning wheel in 14th century England. They didn't have them. They used spindles to spin at that time. Spinning wheels came much later.

Men riding destriers as though they were every day horses makes me cringe. It would be about the equivalent of driving a tank down the road to work. In fact, even for warhorses constantly referring to them as destriers annoys me. Destriers were the heaviest of warhorses and not necessarily the most desirable. A rouncey or habelar was often used for their greater speed and agility and chargers were by far the most common warhorses.

Kilts in 14th century Scotland. NO!

I had someone do a first read on a novel I'm writing and he was baffled that I referred to a Scottish nobleman as a baron. But they're lairds, he protested. No. He was a baron. And I suppose I could refer to the Scottish earls as Mormaers but I suspect that would only confuse things further.

Oh, I won't even go into the introduction of feminism into medieval thought. I'm a feminist--a pretty avid one, and there were strong, capable women in the middle ages. They were not feminists, and few women got choices, such as who they would marry. Widows sometimes did, but the fact that when Edward I's daughter married a man of her own choice it caused the new husband to be thrown into a dungeon kind of shows how uncommon this was. Pretending women usually had these choices annoys me, but maybe not some readers. I can't bring myself to do it.

I think we can all agree that you should be accurate on the big details such as who was king when or who controlled which country. But what about those smaller details? They probably take some painstaking research and may conflict with people's expectation, such as the kilt thing that so annoys me. *grin*

I suppose where I falter is what are the important factors and what are not. It jerks me out of a story to read anything that is an anachronism, but I am SO likely to spot them. Would it bother most readers to read about that spinning wheel Catherine Coulter put in her 14th century novel? It sure did me. She got the politics wrong, too. Her medieval novels still did very well.

Even referring to rooms can be confusing. Should I call what was in fact referred to as a wardrobe as an office? It is the closest comparison. I cringe a bit, but the meaning of the word wardrobe has changed.

It's a fine line to try to not confuse people, not jerk them out of the story when introducing historical concepts that they may not be acquainted with, and yet maintain some degree of historical accuracy.

Anyone else struggle with this? Thoughts? Suggestions?

No more politics. But I'm not sure that writing about writing isn't more depressing.

I am currently of the opinion that being a writer pretty much sucks.

It isn't so much the rejections from publishers and agents although I certainly won't pretend I don't get my share of those. Don't we all? Boring subject.

What is the hardest for me and it seems to me for most writers is the way we beat ourselves up. I do. I'm not good enough. I'll never be good enough. There are days--weeks when I'm convinced that the best thing I could do is torch everything I've ever written.

Ugh! Self-pity is not a pretty sight. But it seems to be par for the course. Heck, even with my very small successes I've had more success and praise than a huge number of the writers out there in the slush pile. I really have no reason for having a pity party, except...

There are those days when I am convinced that what I've done is good--darn good. Better than 99% of what's out there so why don't people see it?

There are those days when (see above) I'm convinced that everything I've ever written is dreck.

There are days when I'm convinced that editors and agents must be crazed to choose to work with writers.

Sorry for whinging a bit. I feel better now and I will finish this new novel by the end of the month. Keep plugging people.

ARCs!

On a more personal topic:

I got an email from my publisher, Swimming Kangaroo Books, last night letting me know that the Advance Reader Copies of Warrior's Duty are off to Publisher's Weekly and Library Journal. They also sent one to my local daily, The Oregonian.

I'm both thrilled and nervous. There's no guarantee of getting reviews in any of those, of course, but SK has done well with getting reviews for their releases which is one of the reasons when I decided to look at small presses that I was impressed by them.

So now I'm holding my breath -- or not since it would be a long breath-holding. And you can imagine the: "Please let them review my novel -- but only if they like it" that's going through my mind.

Back to the previous subject with a new post tomorrow.

Outlining?

Outlining a novel. Put any two novelists together, bring up that subject and you're likely to start an argument.

Personally, I'm firmly in the non-outlining camp. I tried outlining which led to a horrible, stinking novel that got firmly trunked. It just didn't work for me which is what I judge techniques by. It can work for everyone else in the world, but if it doesn't work for me, I don't do it.

It's no secret, since he said so in his marvelous On Writing, that Stephen King doesn't outline. There are plenty of others in our side of the divide so don't feel like you have to if you don't. On the other hand, if you've never tired outlining, you might want to try it. I think we can't know what works for us or what doesn't until we try.

I'll be happy to admit there are plenty of good writers who do. David Farland in his excellent email blog "Kick in the Pants" talks frequently about outlining and how to do it. (I stick my fingers in my ears and say, "Neener, neener. . . I can't hear you.")

The other day Dave shared a wonderful article that I want to link because it's a technique that is "outline-ish" without quite being outlining that I'm going to try on some short stories. Maybe this will work for me when outlining doesn't.

http://www.yorkwriters.com/2009/02/sketch-novel-in-hour-exercise.html

They refer to it as "sketching" kind of the way an artist might do a preliminary sketch. It's definitely an article worth reading.

The Writer as Cash Cow

RANT WARNING!

I get really tired of all of the people who treat aspiring writers like cash cows. Whether it's people who write books and articles about how self-publishing is taking over the industry (Ha!), to the self-publishing companies that pretend they'll actually help market or that it's so easy (Ha!!), and even a few -- successful doesn't mean not greedy and this is why I say AAR membership is no guarantee of a good agent -- agents who have recently been "caught" sending writers they are rejecting to self-publishers, pretending this will lead to their being considered (see some recent blogs from Victoria Strauss), by far most people who self-publish are taken advantage of.

The number of self-published books, especially novels, that ever sell more than a handful of copies is miniscule. Pretending otherwise is dishonest. It is possible to do. However, it is also TIME CONSUMING, DIFFICULT AND EXPENSIVE!

Doing it successfully involves all kinds of things such as gathering cover quotes and inserted them, copyrighting the book, getting your ISBN number, and of course purchased a unique bar-code so that you can sell it. It probably includes, because you don't get decent sales of no-name writer on Amazon alone, sending out at least dozens, maybe hundreds, of review copies, sending press releases and media kits to newspapers, NPR, TV stations, talking to indies and chains to TRY to get carried (good luck!), setting up book signings, setting up blog interviews, etc., etc. etc.

Most writers don't want to do all that and wouldn't do well at it if they tried. How many writers really want to do what Christopher Paolini did and show up at high schools in costume? But do you see the people who make a profit from this stuff telling them that???!!! No, instead they're acting like it's as easy as getting your pocket picked. And in a way, I suppose it is since that's what happens.

It makes me really angry.

End of Rant

How Does a Writer Get Started?

A friend asked me this the other day. He's always been an avid fantasy reader but now he's starting on a novel. He loves it but he's not quite sure that he's doing it "right."

Should he start on page one and write to the end? Should he worry about picking up ideas from fantasies he's read in the past? Should he edit the first chapter until he's sure he has it perfect? And these are all things that new writers think about.

The thing is that when it comes to writing there aren't any hard and fast rules. What works is what you should do, but, of course, an inexperienced writer isn't sure what works. I've always started at the front and kept going until the end, but not everyone does that. If you're getting started, give that a try. But don't be afraid to write scenes out of order if that isn't working for you. Just be aware that if you write a scene in the last chapter, by the time you get there you'll almost certainly have to re-write it. That's ok too as long as it gets you there.

I can't tell you how strongly I advise against editing and re-writing until you've finished your first draft. I have known so many aspiring writers who got stuck writing the same chapter over and over for years. Think about the fact that by the time you've finished, something you decided on later may still mean going back to change what you spent so much time polishing. When you think of something to change, make a note. MS Word has a great function called Comment that allows you to put notes into a Word document. If you write on paper, just put a sticky note on it. But then keep going.

And don't worry if you find some elements of something you've read in your work. In your work, you'll put your own spin on it, make it your own. There are no new ideas, so that will happen. But there are new ways of using the old ideas.

One last thing, read some good books about writing -- ones written by good writers, agents or editors. Most of us start out writing because we love to read, and that's a good thing. But reading really doesn't make someone a good writer. After all, you're busy reading not watching the technique the author used, so there's a lot to learn.

I'll recommend a couple that I consider essential:

"Character & Viewpoint" by Orson Scott Card
"Beginnings, Middles & Ends" by Nancy Kress
"Self-Editing for the Fiction Writer" by Browne & King
"On Writing" by Stephen King

Hello

I'm a writer -- of fantasy and science fiction. Not a big name mind you. And what I'm going to share is the experience of a "not-big-name" in the world of publishing.

I've had a few short stories purchased by and published in a small online publication. I have a coauthored novel coming out in March from ePress-online and another solo novel coming out in April from Swimming Kangaroo Books. Both are "tradition" (that is royalty paying) micro presses.

Those of you who write and try to sell your writing know that it's a rough old road to travel. I'll share my experiences and what little expertise I have. And I'll be happy to hear from you and discuss publishing with you.

Thanks for dropping by.