AI is the new buzzword. Everything is AI, has AI, offers AI. To be blunt, AI is not the problem. People believing the tool can replace the work is the problem.

Yes, I have been quieter on here far longer than usual. Not gone, just down and dirty in the trenches doing postgraduate work in AI/Machine Learning because y’all matter the world to me. You deserve more than an opinion piece.

For those who might be new to this blog, writers and tech are my jam. The “new shiny” is always something to be wary of. That was true with Web 1.0 and websites, Web 2.0 and social media, Web 3.0 and algorithmic alchemy, and it is truer now than ever in human history.

AI enters the chat.

In 2014, I introduced the concept of the SWOT analysis with 3 Simple Ways to Improve Your Writing & Increase Sales. Back then, the new tech shiny happened to be social media and algorithmic alchemy. Again, the tools evolve. If we want to remain in the game, stagnation equals death. What I said in 2014 is still relevant today, and we are all going to address the AI generated elephant in the room.

The AI Bubble is Already Here

I’ve been around since companies were tossing billions at anything with dot com at the end. I wrote very literally the first books on social media and branding back when writers were throwing holy water at email and snail-mailing agents.

Suffice to say, not my first rodeo.

Today, we are going to do a quick and dirty SWOT analysis because I want you to remember you matter, people matter and human voices matter.

I didn’t jump head first into AI commentary because I wanted to see how the pieces moved, how the machines “thought” and where we could spot and exploit the blind spots.

Because there are always, and I mean always blind spots.

SWOT: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats

Strengths. AI is an incredible tool for those who use it wisely. It can compress research time we might have once lost in a library, then later on Google. Using ChatGPT or Grok or Gemini or whatever can help us sort through sticky ideas and find our core through lines. This can save time, revisions, and stop us from spending months or—God forbid—years on a WIP that has no spine.

Weaknesses. If we fail to understand core AI concepts like hallucination, model confabulation, synthetic error, false interference, unverified synthesis, we can unwittingly train our chatbot to sign off on some really, and I mean really bad ideas.

Opportunities. Again, AI as a tool can cut down on time we spend chasing our tails. Additionally, AI can help us shoestring or outsource tech that we have to “know” to do this work on a professional level in a way that is incredibly cost-effective. For instance, need a basic website? When I started out, a basic website was outside of the scope of most people’s abilities. One had to drop five grand or more on just a simple web page that told the world we were actually being serious.

Threats. Mistaking the tool for the artisan who wields the tool.

Even the Big Wigs at Davos See This

Follow along the speeches at the WEF and the cracks are already showing. Many thought leaders pushing AI still cannot seem to make good on all the promises. And, personally, I am happy they’re admitting this.

AI can give the illusion of replacing real jobs—writers—but that is all it is.

An illusion.

Go hang around on LinkedIn and feeds are crammed with beautifully crafted posts that look great at a glance. But that is the problem. Beyond the glance, the reality is far more troubling. Yes, maybe social media posts before were ugly. Too many folks who misused your and you’re and goofed up there/their/they’re. But at least back then, despite the grammatical ugliness and typos, posts still had a human beating heart.

To quote The Incredibles, “When everyone is special, no one is.”

Social media sites have recently added AI as a feature so people could feel confident they were saying something thought-provoking and brilliant. Maybe we fell for it…for a while. It hit us (writers particularly) in the confidence because masterfully crafted sentences and proper usage of em dashes and colons once helped US stand apart.

Now? Everyone using an em dash properly has to prove they aren’t a bot.

No, the irony is not lost on me.

We have fallen into the AI Uncanny Valley where we wonder who and what is real. Who can we trust? Which people are doing the real thinking versus who’s offloading all their brainpower and human ingenuity? That is what we are going to drill into today.

Landman, Wildcatting & What Creatives Do BEST

For those who have yet to inhale watch the Paramount series Landman, no spoiler alerts. The irony of this wildly successful story is merely an illustration of exactly why AI cannot and will not replace authentic creativity.

All industries have blind spots. Multinational oil companies mistake decades of what they think they know while dismissing rule-breakers; entertainment does the same by churning out predictable, forgettable stories using outdated ideas of what “works.”

Landman is proof of concept. Audiences want great stories. They are wholesale rejecting formulas, especially formulas where investors and boardrooms hold more sway than the audience.

Maybe the reason Landman landed so hard with me (pardon the pun) is writers are wildcatters. We learn the emotional topography then drill. We pressure test, see what hits. What is a leak? When is a leak a sign we need to go deeper? How can we parlay that experiential intuition we know in our bones into a gusher?

When do we stop drilling and move on because the terrain is tapped out?

Many of us traipse off into the wilderness of story, trekking past the bones of countless who tried to strike it rich before us with only a dream, our instincts, and a stubbornness that can often look like madness.

AI cannot and will never replace that.

How many of you decided to become writers because you LOVE books? Back in the day, you queried agent after agent hoping someone would invest and kept at it despite rejection? Then with social media. How many of you risked everything starting a blog? Trying? Failing? Reinventing? How many of you self-published went indie or hybrid?

You, my lovely wildcatters, are the pioneers with a dream and the unconquerable spirit.

But let’s all be honest here. Maybe some of you never used AI or refuse to. Fair enough. Perhaps you’re in love with AI. Wonderful! Again, it can be a great tool. Yet, as I mentioned, the world has been drifting into a place that doesn’t need anymore drilling.

AI UNCANNY VALLEY is DRY

It might not all be “dry” but it’s either pumping out the predictable or it’s being worked over when it long ago needed to be ditched. Differentiation is the key, but this is where we need to reverse the mantra I’ve hammered for years.

Instead of working smarter not harder? It might just be time to also work harder not just smarter.

Just because Uncanny Valley is dry in no way means humans no longer yearn for great stories. The point is creative professionals might just have to go Old School to dominate the Brave New World.

Just like in the series, Landman, it is the person dismissed by “those who know” who often demonstrate exactly how much the power brokers are blind to.

AI is fabulous for optimizing, but that is the danger. It can over optimize exhausted terrain. This is where your instincts—instincts no machine can replicate—are going to be golden. While LLMs (large language models) can synthesize a human experience, they cannot replace them. They can’t translate humanity the way you can.

Many of us have been reading since we were children. We are the product of decades of novels, encyclopedias, lived experiences and we must get back to WHY PEOPLE LOVE WRITERS (Code for stories).

We see what non-writers cannot.

When we write stories about families, love, loss, murder, heartache, death, redemption there is a visceral nature to it that only other humans can recognize. Almost every human being has been in love, been betrayed, been misunderstood and the reason they read stories, watch movies, inhale series is that the artists are the ones who are the intermediaries.

We take the liminality of life and offer readers a vocabulary for what they feel. Why are they afraid, inspired, burned out, misunderstood? We put that into words and make it real, ironically…through fiction.

By definition…NOT REAL.

Why AI LOVING Your Writing COULD Be a Warning

Maybe it’s just me, though I doubt it. AI is impressive. It’s easy to start collaborating with your chatbot and finally feel heard, seen, revitalized. It is, however, also easy to suddenly feel replaced.

Maybe this AI thingy is better at this than I am. The writing seems cleaner, the ideas appear better, everyone seems to looove AI so do I even matter anymore?

*sobs into brownie batter*

It’s hard not to teeter on personal extinction. Creatives already struggle with feeling like we are “real writers.” In the early days, “real writers” had book deals out of NYC. Then the wildcatters struck out on AMAZON, hit big with self-pub, then suddenly how much money we made on a book—regardless of quality—became this new de facto benchmark of a “real writer.”

Now? Hell, we are trying to prove to a robot we are not a robot.

Then, if we post something that sounds sane, fun, imaginative that WE WROTE, deep down we are asking a new question, “Will readers think I am AI?”

Whether we were/are “real writers” has now literally transformed from our own emo-creative-insecurity talking to something tangible.

Are you a robot? *feeling the side eyes*

This is where we have to be careful with AI. Artists have always struggled with deep insecurity. It’s tragically the very quality that can make us damn good at what we do. We refuse to let go until something is “perfect.”

Until recent years, we understood that perfect is the enemy of the finished. Now? Perfect is no longer the enemy of the finished. AI can step in and “finish and perfect” a turd.

Enter in AI slop.

The next pivot around perfect is the enemy of the finished might just need to be that perfect is the enemy of authenticity/art.

Humans are Messy and So is ART

Remember the old films of oilmen who struck black gold? The gusher spewing oil everywhere and men cheering even though they were covered head to toe in sludge?

Why were they so happy?

***Took me a while to figure that out especially after getting covered in an oil spill in Corpus Christi when I was FOUR.

They were happy because they understood the value in that mess.

Humans are sticky. Our lives are rarely pretty and packaged perfect. Love, hate, loss, divorce, death, murder, intrigue is all ugly just like what comes out of the ground. But what comes out of the ground must be refined into what people use every day. Into what they VALUE.

Writers are the explorers, the drillers and the refiners.

Why so much that is coming out of the lazy use of AI is failing to keep our attention is that it is too perfect. It’s a food replicator synthesizing a five-course French meal without any of the messy pots and pans. Refuse to be intimidated by the food replicator. We want the real deal, dirty dishes and all.

The World Still Needs Us To Get “Dirty”

The new writing paradigm did a lot of great things for creatives. We were no longer solely beholden to gatekeepers. This was wonderful because gatekeepers had shareholders. They wanted what had demonstrably worked in the past from the next Twilight to Fifty Shades of the Same Old BS.

For those writers who didn’t fit neatly into boardroom projections, self-publishing and indie opened up areas of writing that had either been wholly abandoned (long form works, short form works) to what hadn’t yet been even tried (genre blending, mixed POVs, previously overlooked audiences).

And what happened? We suddenly had an explosion of some incredible works that never would have made it in any other market condition, E.g. The Martian.

Yet, algorithms stepped in and started lulling us into the same predictive models us wildcatters had hoped to shrug off. Suddenly, authors no longer had time to write thoughtful, deep, meaningful works because audiences wanted more and more and faster and faster.

Problem is? Optimization only takes us so far. Optimized garbage is still…garbage.

The market and technology has accelerated. This can be bad. We need to learn, grow, move, learn, pivot and somehow remain sane. Conversely it is also AWESOME. The cycles are getting shorter. Bad ideas are dying faster.

And THIS is where we drill.

Not every reader (or television audience) wants faster and faster if it is at the expense of quality. Writers are exhausted. We feel sold out and burned out and audiences now watch live streamers because too many plots are more predictable than my cat puking on the rug when there is TILE literally RIGHT THERE.

Refuse to Settle for Efficient When YOU ARE ESSENTIAL

No more low-hanging fruit. Yes, AI can help us plot, outline, turn bad ideas into better ideas. We can streamline what we do and nothing about that is bad. At no point will I ever tell you that spending a year or five or ten on an idea that needed to die on the cutting floor is a bad plan.

Being bad at managing our time does not an artist make.

Yet, the world doesn’t need anymore prefab “perfect” and utterly forgettable stories. Sure, we can use AI to churn out book after book after book and look super productive on the outside. Audiences might even bite initially, but AI is not our target audience.

PEOPLE ARE.

While AI might tell you everything you have is golden, AI isn’t spending time it doesn’t have and it’s hard-earned money to step through the wardrobe into another world so it can forget the world it lives in for just a little bit.

Again, people are.

And this is where y’all are going to shine and it’s how we “beat” the machines.

Or at least remember they work for US.

***DISCLAIMER: All em dashes are mine, any semicolons ethically sourced and plot bunnies raised humanely. Any and all typos are “certified organic” and run-on sentences are now “free range sentences.”

What Are Your Thoughts? I LOVE Hearing from YOU!

Where have you caught yourself optimizing instead of risking? Have you ever loved a piece of writing because it was a little rough? What part of your process would you never outsource—even if AI did it better? Have you started feeling the eerily perfect “sameness” of the AI Uncanny Valley?

I really DO love hearing your thoughts especially on AI. Again, I have missed y’all. Just learning to code, build LLMs, creating my own chatbots for school AND keeping up with the blog even been a bit much for me.

What are some of your fears? Expectations? Thoughts you’d like for me to explore? This blog is for you guys, so let me know!

The post If AI Loves Your Writing, Be Very VERY Worried appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Writers really are a strange breed and just so y’all know? The normal ship sailed without you a long time ago so relax. Your family or friends might not ‘get’ you but your fellow writers do.

I love being a writer. It’s a world like no other and it’s interesting how non-writers are simultaneously fascinated and terrified of us. While on the surface, people seem to think that what we do is easy, deep down?

There is a part that knows they’re wrong. That being a writer, a good writer, is a very dark place most fear to tread.

In fact, I believe somewhere at the FBI’s BAU (Behavioral Analysis Unit for the non-writers), there’s a caveat for the profilers. If they think they’ve profiled a serial killer, they need to stop and double check to make sure they didn’t just find a writer.

Hint: Check for empty coffee cups and candy wrappers.

Since we are now into October, we shall pause a moment talking about fictional anti-villains and talk us REAL ONES *evil laugh*

Writers, if you are NOT on a government watch list? You’re doing it wrong.

Seriously. I once spent an entire afternoon googling Fort Worth hotels to find the right one with a balcony to toss someone off of. I was like the Goldilocks of Murder.

Nope doesn’t face a street.

Not high enough to be fatal.

Don’t want them landing in a pool.

Apparently ‘normal’ people do not do this, which is why being normal is totally boring and for luzrs .

So, before friends and family turn you into the FBI, here’s a handy list of ways we writers are often mistaken for serial killers.

#1 Serial Killers Writers Need Alone Time

Generally, dealing with the public is only for a purpose (like making others think we are normal). To truly recharge and immerse in the art of what we do, we need to pull back and simply ‘get away.’

Many writers can be found in basements, dark corners of libraries, hiding in a blanket fort with Netflix streaming in the background or lurking behind a desk surrounded by illegal bear traps.

#2 Serial Killers Writers Often Hold Down a ‘Normal’ Job

Many writers are also teachers, lawyers, doctors, librarians, engineers (or likely married to an engineer—What is WITH that?).

We are often friendly, polite and on-time and hold down gainful employment. This is what makes writers SO terrifying.

Odds are, you probably work with one.

Might even be married to one.

If you don’t work with one, are not married to one, or related to one?

YOU ARE ONE.

#3 Serial Killers Writers Can Look Just like YOU

When our book comes out, neighbors will say, ‘But they seemed so nice and normal. Really polite. Always thought something was off, but writing? Really? Who can ever know these things?’

#4 Serial Killers Writers Understand Law Enforcement

And probably dated it…

 ….until they married an engineer.

When planning any murder or series of murders, we have to know our enemy. The cops. What are ways we can confuse them?

Can we kill in multiple jurisdictions knowing the law agencies will never properly communicate and thus we can kill as many people as our plot requires? Is it possible to run the police down a rabbit hole of distraction?

Could we evade them altogether? Get rid of ALL the evidence?

#5 Serial Killers Writers Use Terms Like T.O.D.

Throw T.O.D. around a writers’ group and no problemo. But using this term at Thanksgiving with the family? Meh.

We writers know the best time of year to kill and dump the body and which season a shallow grave is an acceptable option. No writer ever sees just a freezer. Or just a car trunk. 

Trust me, we are thinking how many people we can fit in that sucker and if we’ll have to saw apart the body first.

#6 Serial Killers Writers Hear Voices That Tell Them Who to Kill

And often talk to those voices. We might be driving to Costco when ‘The Voice’ (a.k.a. ‘The Muse’) visits and tells us that we really shouldn’t kill that @$$hat who stood us up for prom.

No, that guy who bailed on his ONE part of the group project, and we got a B instead of an A+? That guy.

Then, so enraptured with talking to The Voice, we find we missed the last fifty exits and have to hope there’s a Costco in the neighboring state.

#7 Serial Killers Writers Choose Victims Carefully

Generally our victims will include anyone who picked on us for playing too much Dungeons & Dragons (no such thing), broke up with us via text message, or told us reading was boring.

Victims can also include former professors who always assigned group projects, anyone who was IN our group for a group project, the person who invented group projects…or anyone who’s in charge at Comcast or AT&T.

#8 Serial Killers Writers Plan Their Kills Methodically

Sure you might get the fantasy or sci-fi author who just wipes out a bunch of villages or blows up a planet, but that’s a different profile. Mass murderer/spree killer is so unimaginative.

For the rest of us? No, we think our kills out. We can’t just kill anyone lest we be left with a pacing and plot problem.

Duh. This isn’t amateur hour.

#9 Serial Killers Writers Have a Timeline for Their Kills

Sure the body count will rise, but during revisions? We just go back and spend quality time with the souvenirs we took off our victims. We might even take breaks between books because we can’t murder characters without a plan.

Helloooo?

#10 Serial Killers Writers are Narcissists 

Seriously, we have to be. Who else can write hundreds of thousands of words just knowing the world will love every bit of what we put down? And PAY MONEY to consume it? Narcissists have a God-complex but unlike serial killers who pretend to be God?

We writers actually ARE GOD—muah ha ha ha ha ha *coughs*.

Moving on…

#11 Serial Killers Writers Take People Apart

We crawl in your head, but don’t get too freaked out. We crawl in everyone’s head. We think like you. We become you. 

Okay so when ACTORS do this it is OKAY and all AVANTE GARDE, but a writer does this and it’s creepy? Hypocritical much?

We need to know how people think, what makes them tick, what sets them off. What are the right pain points and speaking of pain…

#12 Serial Killers Writers Are Also Sadists

Excellent fiction is the path of greatest resistance which means good writers are all about exacting pain. Doling it out bit by bit. Upping the heat and making that victim and all who love him squirm, then panic, then question the very meaning of their existence.

We push our victims until just before that spark of hope in their eyes extinguishes completely…..

And then we give them a bone and rescue them so there. We aren’t completely heartless. Sheesh, these people are imaginary. 

Why so freaked out? Seriously, chillax.

#13 Serial Killers Writers Struggle with Addiction/Compulsion

Drugs and alcohol? Maybe. Sugar and caffeine? Highly likely. Carbs? DEFINITELY. Books and cute bookmarks we never use because we lost them and so have to use the receipt from purchasing the freaking bookmark as a bookmark? Absolutely.

Female serial killers writers can often be spotted wandering around a craft store talking to the yarn or contemplating learning to make their own jewelry. Males?

Computer stores.

Angels and Devils

Yeah, yeah writers could be mistaken for serial killers but in the end, everything we do is for the ultimate good. We actually have to write in mistakes lest our villain remain free and that is bad fiction.

Speaking of which, have you ever created a villain so good you had to go BACK and write in some oopses? Like, ‘Wow, this guy’s good. Nope, they’d never catch him. Ah $#%&.’

Also, our lowly protagonist can never rise to become a hero without overwhelming opposition.

Okay, so some of you by now are either laughing and nodding…or you’re dialing an FBI hotline ready to link them to my blog. Fine, when they haul me away in cuffs, trust me I am making mental notes so when I write a similar scene? I know how cuffs FEEL.

What are your thoughts?

Have you ever had strangers overhear you talking about how to kill someone and you had to stop and say, ‘It’s okay. I’m a writer.’

Do you love Discovery ID just a bit more than is probably healthy? Do you yell at ‘Forensic Files’ the way grown men yell at football? Do you freak out friends and family because autopsies make you giddy? Are you more than a little weirded out that we all seemed to marry engineers?

Food for thought…

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The post 13 Reasons Writers are Mistaken for Serial Killers appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Self-discipline usually is one of those terms most people use in January when hastily scribbling out New Year’s Resolutions. Of course, that was before 2020 came along and tore a hole in the space-time continuum.

Every day is now Monduesday. Ketchup is a vegetable and the past seven months have been like the IRS, TSA, and DMV came together and created their own version of the most un-fun mandatory Halloween EVER.

***The kind where NO ONE gives you candy, only hand sanitizer and a hard time.

It’s been a weird year for everyone in the world. Most people have had their lives totally upended.

I’ve been working from home for going on twenty years and homeschooling for almost four. One would think I would have a major advantage and be doing smashingly! Nope. Even I’ve been going bonkers.

Yes, even though I’m an introvert who enjoys alone time, my world has gone down a rabbit hole. For someone who used to excel at self-discipline, it’s become like trying to swim laps in a pool of quicksand. Me, being the curious person I am decided to ask…

Why?

Self-Discipline Isn’t Just About Self

I wrote a post back in April, The Truth About Introverts & Why the Quarantine is Hard on Us, Too. There’s a lot of misunderstanding about introverts. People tend to think that, out of everyone, the introverts would be doing AMAZING with shut-downs, quarantines, lockdowns, etc., but (barring some rare exceptions) that’s far from true.

Feel free to click on the blog to learn more about my theories, and I talk about the extroverts, too. Most people are a mixture of both (ambiverts). Pure introverts and pure extroverts usually cannot function in society.

This said, I think self-discipline is a sort of misnomer in my POV. Yes, WE are ultimately responsible for ourselves, but as the poet John Donne so eloquently put it:

No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main..

Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions and Seuerall Steps in my Sickness- Meditation XVII, 1624

Humans are biologically wired to be social creatures. Thus, I feel that a lot of developing self-discipline, strengthening, and maintaining self-discipline hinges on human connection.

Relationships, peer pressure, healthy competition and social interaction all help us create stability and strengthen healthy habits and routines.

Self-Discipline & Routine

I believe a lot of us are struggling with self-discipline because, first of all, a lot of the systems that built routines into our lives as a matter of course have been disrupted or even dismantled.

As I’ve already mentioned, I’ve worked from home for years. Until 2020, a lot of people were envious of me (and couldn’t understand why I would actually be envious of them).

There is something to be said for getting up at a certain time, clocking into a physical space that is NOT your home, working, clocking out, then going to the gym, going home, or whatever.

There is a delineation in your time. When systems that once used to be separated suddenly get tossed into a blender—work, cleaning house, working out, doing bills, schooling kids, cooking, spiritual activity—it’s a battle.

Routine is one of the best ways to develop self-discipline muscles.

A great example is going to the gym.

The hardest part really isn’t the working out, it’s the walking through the door. Once inside, we see other people, we feel the rush, the heathy peer pressure and we’re golden. The trick is to keep doing it, to build a system that feeds that routine.

Add in Social Accountability

I believe self-discipline is becoming harder than it’s ever been because it really is more and more self-discipline.

Going it alone, as in ALL alone is a rare quality. Social accountability makes self-discipline a lot easier. Think about trying to do yoga at home versus being in the middle of a yoga class.

You’re more likely to finish the 45 minute class, because you don’t want to be the one person punking out ten minutes in. Even if you simply curl up in child pose, you’ll stay to avoid the walk of shame criss-crossing through everyone’s mats.

Maybe just me.

We are actually capable of a lot more than we realize, and often give up way too quickly. The whole NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) proves this every year when regular everyday people rise to the challenge and write 50,000 words in a month.

Social accountability not only keeps us from tapping out when we really could do more, but it can also spark us to do MORE because of good old fashioned competitive FUN.

We Are Not Alone

Back in the olden days, writing was a very solitary profession. This was why I started the whole W.A.N.A. movement first on Twitter as a hashtag, then Facebook, and finally I just created my own site on NING, W.A.N.A.Tribe.

***W.A.N.A. stands for We Are Not Alone, btw.

Initially, I created these groups on social media because writers were terrified to be on-line (but that was really only a side benefit). The real reason I created community was because I understood a) that peer pressure was amazing when it came to developing self-discipline and b) no writer stood a chance of ever making it unless they could keep butt in seat long enough to finish the books .

Peer pressure gives accountability.

When you’re brand new and wanting to start a blog or write a novel and you’re all on your own, it’s tough. I know, because that’s how I began. Once I joined a local writing group, I started taking my writing more seriously.

But, after a few years, I outgrew even that and needed more.

Eventually, I got away from running the W.A.N.A. groups on Twitter and Facebook because there was just too much distraction, data-mining, spam, and drama.

I pay for W.A.N.A.Tribe out of my own pocket because I want people to have a safe space free from ads, spammers, drama, trolls, and distraction. We’ve been meeting in the chat section 5 days a week every week all year long for over six years now.

We do one-hour sprints where you can write, research, blog, do laundry, homeschool your kids, cook dinner, plot global domination using genetically enhanced sea monkeys, whatever.

Sure, it’s mostly for writing, but we all know that being a writer involves a LOT more than putting words on a page.

We go for an hour, then when we call time, you report what you accomplished. This is when we chat for a bit, laugh, joke, encourage one another, then we go again. And, like my gym or yoga example, between the structure, focused time, and peer pressure, you’ll be SHOCKED how much more your are capable of doing when you add in these additional factors.

Every year that we’ve had NaNoWriMo participants, we’ve had over 90% completion (usually 100%) and in record time. Shortest was 50,000 words in 11 days. It’s amazing what we are capable of with a team cheering us on.

This said, in this weird year, checking in at The Tribe has been one of the few things that’s kept any semblance of order in my life. But I won’t lie, it has STILL been really tough.

Self-Discipline Together

Self-discipline should feel good. I know 2020 feels like we’ve been strapped to Hell’s Tilt-A-Whirl and everything feels out of control. But, hard life fact here? Control is an illusion anyway.

So chill. Breathe. Find a couple areas where you can start and realize you are not alone. You’re human. Bad news? No one else can do this self-discipline thing FOR you. Great news? We can do it WITH you!

We might all be texting and zooming and meeting on-line, but this too shall pass and WE ARE NOT ALONE.

What Are Your Thoughts? I LOVE Hearing From You!

I know the whole W.A.N.A. Tribe thing sounds like an ad. I don’t make any money off any of y’all hopping in and telling us you’re gonna do some laundry in the next hour, finish painting the hallway, or outline your next romance. It’s a service I’ve been paying for since 2012.

I get the JOY of being on your team and knowing maybe I can help y’all add back some STRUCTURE into this crazy, crazy world.

That, and we do have a lot of fun.

What are your thoughts? Have you had a tougher time being self-disciplined? Do you think it has to do with our world having everything either closed down or closed off or the hours all weird? That the metrics we’d used for so long just went out the window and we’re trying to recalibrate? Maybe we are isolated and that’s jacking us up?

What are your ideas? Suggestions? I’d love different thoughts or angles. Because Halloween candy for breakfast will only cut it until the Reeses cups are gone…

The post Self-Discipline: Can’t Someone Else Just Do This FOR Us? appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

It’s the holiday season, and this is a tough time for most people. For, writers, it’s peace hell on Earth, largely—though not entirely—due to the whole ‘having to wear pants’ thing.

We authors, historically, have been a misunderstood group of people.

Burned as witches. No holiday there. Survival rate after a political coup? Close to zero. Odds of being shot? Pretty much hundred percent, which correlates closely with odds of keeping mouth shut #FunFact.

Friends and loved ones still invite us to holiday gatherings. Sadly, no ‘burned at stake’ or ‘firing squad’ option. Those require pants, but less talking and no prerequisite to bring some dumb@$$ ‘White Elephant’ gift and a nut-free appetizer.

*makes note to hunt down and murder person who invented ‘White Elephant’ game’*

*Why is the elephant white and not pink?*

*makes note to google that later*

*makes note to put that in novel and kill it*

*along with the person who invented it*

Where was I? Oh yes, holiday stuff. Writers. Why writers should be able to qualify for service animals every year. Holiday honey badgers that bite.

Sips egg nog next to holiday honey badger. No one dares approach. We both leave half lit in Uber. Write glorious prose (me and holiday honey badger). It’s amazing.

While the holidays are hard on everyone, they pose a unique set of challenges for writers. We have to back away from the keyboard, put on pants, and remember what it is to mingle among humankind….

…or mostly why we don’t.

#1: Holidays Are So People-y

Most writers are introverts. We can barely keep up with all the people in our head. And now we have to keep up with real people we can’t control or legally kill, which—trust us—is very frustrating.

If a character doesn’t do what we want them to do? We just toss them off the nearest imaginary cliff.

In life? Good defense attorneys are far more expensive. In a manuscript, we can just write in a billionaire bachelor who falls in love with us and coughs up the attorney fees.

Real life is just such a friggin’ hassle.

Seriously.

In our books, we never have to stand in line or miss a plane. We never have to deal with anyone we dislike that we don’t have the power to destroy.

So, as you see, reality is absurdly inconvenient.

It’s IMPOSSIBLE to ENJOY a holiday when you wait twenty minutes on a parking spot—in the rain—only for someone to swoop in and steal the spot.

Then, you have to park somewhere else…instead of calling down fire from the sky and incinerating them and all they love to ASH.

Seriously. There is zero justice in real life.

No idea why anyone even wants to deal with people without the ability to hex them.

#2: Serial Killers Not a Hot Holiday Topic

While everyone is sending out holiday cards posing with their kids and pets, your tour of the Ed Gein Murder House wasn’t nearly as big of a hit. Hey, you framed it with garland and lights.

That was festive. Right?

Parties are always a struggle (the pants thing again). No one gets your veiled references to Silence of the Lambs because, hey, you did bring a ‘nice chianti’ and a fava bean dip *wink wink*.

Sigh.

While the guys were going on and on about football and women chatting about shopping, all you can think about is how badly you wish you were home watching Dexter.

No pants required.

#3: Pretending to Be Normal

This is enough to make the best of us snap on a regular day. During the holiday season? *weeping* Most of us ended up authors because we finally came to the realization that the ‘Normal Ship’ sailed without us long ago.

Some of us are secure enough to wave that freak flag high…but not all of us.

And even the most brazen of us weirdos do try to at least make an effort to blend in with the ‘norms.’ Seriously, for all the regular people reading this? Y’all have NO IDEA how hard that %$#@ is.

Not correcting poor grammar? That alone should earn us a friggin’ medal.

***Clothes are hung. People are hanged.

When you’re at the gym and the anchor announces there is a serial killer on the loose and you fall off the StairMaster shouting, ‘It’s a SPREE KILLER, YOU IDIOT! Read Anatomy of Motive you mouth-breathing troglodyte!’

Yeah….

Not allowed back at that gym again.

#4: Pay Attention When Others Talking

Most of the year, we writers are fairly good at hiding. Holiday gatherings force us out of our tunnels.

Paying attention to anything NOT a book or writing a book is already tough. Listening while people talk—that isn’t a lecture on the history of stringed instruments or the evolution of bladed weapons—is arduous.

This is particularly applicable to those of us who write full time. We pretty much are always reading, writing, eating, or sleeping. Our world is very much in our heads. Many authors (not all) are also…crazy as a $#@!house rat.

Not a prerequisite, but it helps.

Meaning there are a lot of writers who happen to be ADD, ADHD, OCD, on the autistic spectrum, or who happen to like glitter way more than is healthy (*looking at you Jenn C.*).

I happen to be severely ADHD. Anyway, when you’re ADHD a lot of people believe that you’re like a spider monkey on crack—which is only partially true.

I gave up crack in college.

Kidding.

I’m too cheap to buy crack. Dealers don’t take coupons.

Anyway, we vacillate from being all over to being hyper-focused. When I’m on point, the house could burn down and I might not notice. In order to manage my ADHD, I use A LOT of timers and am a multitasker.

Doing more than one thing keeps me focused. I don’t even pretend to understand it.

So, if I have to do laundry, I will put on an audiobook so I don’t wander off and start painting the bathroom.

If I have to talk on the phone and actually listen to the person, I will fold laundry so my mind doesn’t drift.

This means, I have a VERY difficult time paying attention to people when they are talking if I am not also doing something else. So like I might crochet while holding a conversation.

WHICH, if the other person doesn’t understand? Comes across as me being rude.

Thus, the holiday season is a nightmare because, for me at least, I might as well keep a pocket full of cards reading:

Don’t be weird.

Inside words stay inside.

Remember to liste—OMG! JEFFREY DAHMER!

#5: Hiding Glee About New Plot Ideas

Writers have NO poker face. We are an open book, pun very much intended. Though not a hard and fast rule, we’re right below the chess club and slightly above the mathletes in social ineptness.

So when we hear a GEM of a story idea drift through the conversation at a party….

Yeah that meme floating around about that cat that saw the Christmas tree for the first time? That was fake news. The cat actually was doing the world’s most perfect impersonation of an author who’s just overheard the greatest plot twist EVER.

We get that joyful glazed look where we stop chewing our cookie and crumbs fall onto our chin and down our shirt. At which time the other person laughs awkwardly and says, ‘You’re not going to, like, put me in a book, right?’

Then we (the writer) *fake laughs* say, ‘Gosh! No!’ First of all, writers LIE. We deal in LIES, so don’t fall for it.

Also, as a disclaimer…

You have the right to remain silent or leave us off the guest list. If, however, you invite us to a party, force us to wear pants and talk to people, anything you say can and will be used against you in a work of fiction.

You have a right to preorder. You have the right to buy in paper, audio or hardcover. If you cannot afford the hardcover, the option to buy in digital will be provided for you. Do you understand these rights as they have been written out for you?

In the End

Maybe y’all aren’t as socially awkward as I am. Yes, I’m funny, but I can be overpowering and leave people needing a nap…or a bottle of Xanax. I struggle with balance, tend to talk over people and am…well what is the word?

No, the one that I can use in a PG-13 blog.

Extra.

I celebrate the holidays in my own way…mostly watching Muppets Christmas Carol over and over until my husband threatens to divorce me.

Then we switch to Krampus.

I’m still a work in progress at remembering to take turns, that ‘inside words stay inside’ and that—SIGHS—‘not everyone wants to talk about autopsies over seven-layer-taco-dip’ (though WHY I have NO idea) *rolling eyes dramatically*.

I’ve come to grips that I will never fit in, never be ‘normal’ and frankly? Normal is a setting on the dryer so *fair flip* WHATEVS….

*flounces off to watch Forensic Files from blanket fort wearing unicorn pajamas*

Y’all invited.

In the meantime….

Give yourself some goodies for Christmas. PANTS OPTIONAL!

I also have some treats, like a BRAND NEW class I’ve never taught before, and it turned out FANTASTIC. OMG BEST CLASS EVER for my FREAKY FRIENDS!

BTW WE FIXED THE API ERROR! Stripe was giving an API error for some of y’all trying to buy classes and we FIXED that! So get these classes while they are on sale before they are slated for deletion of stuck in cold storage.

ON DEMAND Dark Arts: HOLIDAY SPECIAL Building Your Villain is usually $55 and for the next few days is only $25. Three hours of psychopaths, sociopaths, narcissists, pathology and how that applies to writing.

It is like the Behavioral Analysis Unit for Authors. Tres FUN! Villains are some of the most enduring characters in literature. Why not add your own legends to the list?

I’m also offering ON DEMAND! Holiday Sale! Story Master: From Dream to DONE. This class is to train you how to plot whether you’re a plotter, a pantser or a mix of both. It’s also a crash course in creating dimensional characters.

I love hearing from you!

And to prove it and show my love, for the month of DECEMBER, everyone who leaves a comment I will put your name in a hat. If you comment and link back to my blog on your blog, you get your name in the hat twice. What do you win? The unvarnished truth from yours truly.

I will pick a winner once a month and it will be a critique of the first 20 pages (5K words) of your novel, or your query letter, or your synopsis (5 pages or fewer). 

In the meantime, PLEASE treat yourself to a class! We have a TON of classes that we will be deleting or putting into cold storage come January and will no longer be available. So STOCK UP while you can.

The BIG SPECIALS (other than what I mentioned above)

On Demand: Beyond Bulletproof HOLIDAY Barbie

Usually $55 and now only $25.

This is a THREE-HOUR class on guns, knives, weapons, fighting, law enforcement (from local cops to international espionage) and more. Everything you need to build a bad@$$—male OR female—and get the details CORRECT.

Spilling the HOLIDAY Tea: On Demand Blogging for Authors

Usually $75 and now only $40.

Get prepped and ready for the new year, new you, new blog.

New Classes NEXT WEEK FREE RECORDING INCLUDED

Tick Tock: How to Plot Mystery Suspense Series

Thursday, December 12th, 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST (NYC TIME). Use New20 for $20 off.

Can You Hear Me Now? Developing Character Voice

Friday, December 13th, 7:00-9:00 P.M. EST. Use New10 for $10 off.

NEW ON DEMAND CLASSES

Bite-Sized Fiction: How to Plot the Novella

Use New20 for $20 off

Why Are We HERE? Scenes That HOOK

Use New20 for $20 off

Popular On Demand Classes

The Art of Character: Writing Characters for a SERIES ON DEMAND

Use Binge10 for $10 off.

How do we create characters that readers will fall in love with, characters strong enough to go the distance? Find out in this THREE-HOUR class that also comes with detailed notes and a character-building template. 

This class dovetails with my previous class:

Bring on the Binge: How to Plot and Write a Series (ON DEMAND). Use Binge10 for $10 off.

Need some help with platform and branding?

Branding: WHEN YOUR NAME ALONE Can Sell (ON DEMAND)

Use brand10 for $10 off.

For the complete list, go to the OnDemand Section.

The post Five Holiday Challenges Only Writers Will Understand appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Writers really are a strange breed and just so y’all know? The normal ship sailed without you a long time ago so relax. Your family or friends might not ‘get’ you but your fellow writers do.

I love being a writer. It’s a world like no other and it’s interesting how non-writers are simultaneously fascinated and terrified of us. While on the surface, people seem to think that what we do is easy, deep down?

There is a part that knows they’re wrong. That being a writer, a good writer, is a very dark place most fear to tread.

Happy Friday the 13th! *evil laugh*

In fact, I believe somewhere at the FBI’s BAU (Behavioral Analysis Unit for the non-writers), there’s a caveat for the profilers. If they think they’ve profiled a serial killer, they need to stop and double check to make sure they didn’t just find a writer.

Hint: Check for empty Starbuck’s cups and candy wrappers.

Writers, if you are NOT on a government watch list? You’re doing it wrong.

Seriously. I once spent an entire afternoon googling Fort Worth hotels to find the right one with a balcony to toss someone off of. I was like the Goldilocks of Murder.

Nope doesn’t face a street.

Not high enough to be fatal.

Don’t want them landing in a pool.

Apparently ‘normal’ people do not do this, which is why being normal is totally boring and for luzrs .

So, before friends and family turn you into the FBI, here’s a handy list of ways we writers are often mistaken for serial killers.

#1 Serial Killers Writers Need Alone Time

Generally, dealing with the public is only for a purpose (like making others think we are normal). To truly recharge and immerse in the art of what we do, we need to pull back and simply ‘get away.’

Many writers can be found in basements, dark corners of libraries, hiding in a blanket fort with Netflix streaming in the background or lurking behind a desk surrounded by illegal bear traps.

#2 Serial Killers Writers Often Hold Down a ‘Normal’ Job

Many writers are also teachers, lawyers, doctors, librarians, engineers (or likely married to an engineer—What is WITH that?).

We are often friendly, polite and on-time and hold down gainful employment. This is what makes writers SO terrifying.

Odds are, you probably work with one.

Might even be married to one.

If you don’t work with one, are not married to one, or related to one?

YOU ARE ONE.

#3 Serial Killers Writers Can Look Just like YOU

When our book comes out, neighbors will say, ‘But she seemed so nice and normal. Really polite. Always thought something was off, but writing? Really? Who can ever know these things?’

#4 Serial Killers Writers Understand Law Enforcement

And probably dated it…

 ….until they married an engineer.

When planning any murder or series of murders, we have to know our enemy. The cops. What are ways we can confuse them?

Can we kill in multiple jurisdictions knowing the law agencies will never properly communicate and thus we can kill as many people as our plot requires? Is it possible to run the police down a rabbit hole of distraction?

Could we evade them altogether? Get rid of ALL the evidence?

#5 Serial Killers Writers Use Terms Like T.O.D.

Throw T.O.D. around a writers’ group and no problemo. But using this term at Thanksgiving with the family? Meh.

We writers know the best time of year to kill and dump the body and which season a shallow grave is an acceptable option. No writer ever sees just a freezer. Or just a car trunk. 

Trust me, we are thinking how many people we can fit in that sucker and if we’ll have to saw apart the body first.

#6 Serial Killers Writers Hear Voices That Tell Them Who to Kill

And often talk to those voices. We might be driving to Costco when ‘The Voice’ (a.k.a. ‘The Muse’) visits and tells us that we really shouldn’t kill that @$$hat who stood us up for prom.

No, that guy who bailed on his ONE part of the group project, and we got a B instead of an A+? That guy.

Then, so enraptured with talking to The Voice, we find we missed the last fifty exits and have to hope there’s a Costco in the neighboring state.

#7 Serial Killers Writers Choose Victims Carefully

Generally our victims will include anyone who picked on us for playing too much Journey (no such thing), broke up with us via text message, or told us reading was boring.

Victims can also include former professors who always assigned group projects, anyone who was IN our group for a group project, the person who invented group projects…or anyone who’s in charge at Comcast or AT&T.

#8 Serial Killers Writers Plan Their Kills Methodically

Sure you might get the fantasy or sci-fi author who just wipes out a bunch of villages or blows up a planet, but that’s a different profile. Mass murderer/spree killer is so unimaginative.

For the rest of us? No, we think our kills out. We can’t just kill anyone lest we be left with a pacing and plot problem.

Duh. This isn’t amateur hour.

#9 Serial Killers Writers Have a Timeline for Their Kills

Sure the body count will rise, but during revisions? We just go back and spend quality time with the souvenirs we took off our victims. We might even take breaks between books because we can’t murder characters without a plan.

Helloooo?

#10 Serial Killers Writers are Narcissists 

Seriously, we have to be. Who else can write hundreds of thousands of words just knowing the world will love every bit of what we put down? And PAY MONEY to consume it? Narcissists have a God-complex but unlike serial killers who pretend to be God?

We writers actually ARE GOD—muah ha ha ha ha ha *coughs*.

Moving on…

#11 Serial Killers Writers Take People Apart

We crawl in your head, but don’t get too freaked out. We crawl in everyone’s head. We think like you. We become you. 

Okay so when ACTORS do this it is OKAY and all AVANTE GARDE, but a writer does this and it’s creepy? Hypocritical much?

We need to know how people think, what makes them tick, what sets them off. What are the right pain points and speaking of pain…

#12 Serial Killers Writers Are Also Sadists

Excellent fiction is the path of greatest resistance which means good writers are all about exacting pain. Doling it out bit by bit. Upping the heat and making that victim and all who love him squirm, then panic, then question the very meaning of their existence.

We push our victims until just before that spark of hope in their eyes extinguishes completely…..

And then we give them a bone and rescue them so there. We aren’t completely heartless. Sheesh, these people are imaginary. 

Why so freaked out? Seriously, chillax.

#13 Serial Killers Writers Struggle with Addiction/Compulsion

Drugs and alcohol? Maybe. Sugar and caffeine? Highly likely. Carbs? DEFINITELY. Books and cute bookmarks we never use because we lost them and so have to use the receipt from purchasing the freaking bookmark as a bookmark? Absolutely.

Female serial killers writers can often be spotted wandering around a craft store talking to the yarn or contemplating learning to make their own jewelry. Males?

Computer stores.

Angels and Devils

Yeah, yeah writers could be mistaken for serial killers but in the end, everything we do is for the ultimate good. We actually have to write in mistakes lest our villain remain free and that is bad fiction.

Speaking of which, have you ever created a villain so good you had to go BACK and write in some oopses? Like, ‘Wow, this guy’s good. Nope, they’d never catch him. Ah $#%&.’

Also, our lowly protagonist can never rise to become a hero without overwhelming opposition.

Okay, so some of you by now are either laughing and nodding…or you’re dialing an FBI hotline ready to link them to my blog. Fine, when they haul me away in cuffs, trust me I am making mental notes so when I write a similar scene? I know how cuffs FEEL.

What are your thoughts?

Have you ever had strangers overhear you talking about how to kill someone and you had to stop and say, ‘It’s okay. I’m a writer.’

Do you love Discovery ID just a bit more than is probably healthy? Do you freak out friends and family because autopsies make you giddy? Are you more than a little weirded out that we all seemed to marry engineers?

Food for thought…

Now to the Bad Lamb Academy Public Service Announcement! UPCOMING CLASSES and NEW ON DEMAND!

Authors Who LEARN

Speaking of scary stuff…

Last post we talked about author empowerment and how important it is to understand the business of our business…which can be terrifying.

But RELAX. I am all about FUN. If we’re having fun, we’re more likely to learn. The more we learn the more we earn.

First, if you missed our killer craft classes like How to Write Deep POV or How to Write a Series and MORE, they’re available ON DEMAND.

Secondly, since Maria Grace was actually able to teach ME how to format (and I still can’t set up my email), I talked her into working her magic for Bad Lamb Academy.

We’ve melted our brains so YOU DON’T HAVE TO!

Grace has a class THIS Friday From Dream to Digital: E-Book Formatting 101(use Tech15 for $15 off). And in two weeks (once your brains cool off) she is teaching From Dream to DONE: Formatting for PRINT. If you sign up EARLY you get this class for $75 instead of $99.

BOTH classes are three hours long, but as with all our classes, you get a FREE recording included in the purchase price. So if you can’t make the class or if you DO make the class and simply want to watch the video over and over so you can learn? Up to you.

As for understanding search engines and SEO and blogs and branding? It can be and should be FUN. It’s so simple even I can do it.

This why I have two classes Branding: When Your Name Alone Can Sell (use Brand10 for $10 off) and Spilling the TEA: Blogging for Authors (use Tea10 for $10 off).

Both classes are designed to teach creative people HOW to build a brand that sells books and not your SOUL. Oh, and leave time to actually write the books AND ALSO HAVE FUN!

***You also can always pick up a copy of my evergreen branding book and definitive guide for social media for authors, Rise of the Machines: Human Authors in a Digital World.

See y’all next time!

The post Thirteen Reasons Writers are Mistaken for Serial Killers appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

The feeling of finding a good beta reader is a lot like what Japanese marine researchers felt when they caught the first image of the giant squid in 2013. Read about it here because it’s just so cool. It’s a whiff of the miraculous and literally inspiring.

Image courtesy of The Malaysian Times, January 7, 2013

Yet, it took a three-man crew more than 100 missions and 400 hours crammed into a tiny submersible to capture that image. We can totally, relate, right? I mean, we writers patiently paddle through the depths of the interwebs and wade through endless writing group cafe meet-ups in order to find our very own giant squid…er…beta reader.

It would be so easy to just settle for smaller squid, a couple of octopus, or even a cuttlefish. Anyone here immediately think of the South Park ‘Human CentiPad’ episode when I said that? There are lots of people out there who seem willing to be our sounding board.

What we want with a good beta reader is a squid who will become delicious pan-seared calamari with a side of chipotle aioli—enjoyable with a bit of bite. All too often, though, we end up tangled in tentacles, with suction cups stuck to our words, and hooks buried deep in our psychological soft spots.

Well, today, I’m going to teach you how to navigate treacherous waters and avoid getting mauled by predators. How? With the Reynolds & Lamb Field Guide to the North American Beta Reader.

The Beta Critic

It is easy to identify Beta Critic tracks by the copious amounts of red ink. The Critic often camouflages itself by wearing sophisticated scarves and dark nail polish. These creatures subsist mostly on coffee, white wine, and the tears of writers.

The Critic’s mating call tends to attract newer, more idealistic writers. Mates are drawn in by warbled promises of help in improving their writing. During the gestation of the draft, the Critic stays by its mate’s side, crooning a melodic mix of condescending encouragement and passive-aggressive critique.

Critics are extremely protective of their mates during the gestation process. They will snap in warning and attack to fend off any other beta reader who wants to offer a different opinion. The Critic considers itself a solitary apex predator and expects all other writers and beta readers to agree with it.

Mates must often try several times to leave the Critic, needing to recover from the failed escape’s emotional mauling. Permanent and debilitating scarring is often prominently visible on survivors.

As writers, we need criticism, and not just the ‘constructive’ kind. Hard criticism forces us to face and work on major flaws. It re-energizes us with a little healthy anger or challenge. Tough love is tough, but it’s the love that makes it so powerful and transformative.

The Beta Critic takes a good thing like tough love and strips it of the ‘love.’ They turn blunt honesty into blunt-force trauma in order bolster their own insecure egos by breaking down someone else’s. Even if they promise us to be better, to be kinder, we need to remember that a Beta Critic can never really change their spots.

The Beta Gusher

This friendly little fuzzy creature is easily lured out into the open with promises of being able to read stuff for free. They are known for their distinctive chirping noises and an unnatural perkiness.

One theory posits that the Beta Gusher evolved from the primordial camaraderie of the book club, developing in a petri dish of chardonnay and bad chick lit. Another school of thought believes the Gusher is a result of Amazon KDP’s tinkering with literary quality DNA.

The Gusher is highly adaptable to any genre, as well as to both in-person and online critique groups. They lure writers by emitting pheromones designed to trigger feelings of being empowered and encouraged.

Gushers are not without their defenses, should they receive actual criticism. It only takes an astounding .006 seconds for them to go from bubbly to blubbering. The Gusher’s guilt trip can induce temporary paralysis in the author. Prolonged exposure to Gusher guilt can result in extreme fatigue, depression, and social anxiety.

All fun aside, I get why we fall for Gushers. They deal praise like crack. Nothing is as addictive as validation of our dreams. And, we DO need our cheerleaders for those moments when the world gets rough with our dreams.

But, when it comes to being a critique partner, what we need most is honest feedback, kindly given. Support and critique are not mutually exclusive concepts. In the long run, a Gusher becomes a serious drain on our time, emotions, and energy.

Speaking of creatures who drain time and energy…

The Over-Committer Beta

The Beta Over-Committer is a multi-habitat creature found in all climate zones…all at the same time. Tracking the Over-Committer requires a specialized set of skills, such as the ability to smell broken promises a mile away and having the patience of a saint.

Of all the beta reader species we have examined today, it’s the Over-Committer that can actually do the most damage to authors. They are unique in their near-viral ability to take over its host critique partner.

Like insects flashing their eyespots to deceive predators, the Over-Committer flashes moments of thoughtful feedback and productivity to attract their prey. Authors are lured by the promise of useful critique and a partner with enough energy to power a small café of aspiring writers.

However, once the writer has taken the bait of a partnership, the Over-Committer attacks. Armed with incisors of sincerity, they go for the jugular, injecting their victim with multiple manuscripts to review. Afterwards, they administer small doses of gratitude as boosters to keep the prey docile and compliant.

Personally, I’ve been a victim of the Over-Committer many times in my life. I’ve also over-promised and under-delivered before, but the difference is that I didn’t defend myself by creating a cult of personality to justify or excuse my failures. Over-Committers combine the worst of the Critic and the Gusher, leaving us diminished, depressed, disenfranchised.

And the hardest part is that we never see it coming.

Good beta readers both give and take in equal measure. They put aside their ego and needs to invest in our work, and they expect the same from us. That kind of balance requires trust, compassion, commitment, and expertise…

Which means that good beta readers are basically unicorns.

The Unicorn Beta

So…does that mean we give up trying to find a good beta reader?

NEVER!

They are out there, and together, we can not only find them, but we can become better beta readers ourselves. To that end, I’m teaching a class this Friday where I’ll be handing out maps, equipment checklists, and freeze-dried wisdom to help you be successful in your hunt for the ever elusive Good Beta Reader.

Go Fish: Finding the Right Beta Readers

Instructor: Cait Reynolds
Price: $55.00 USD
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Friday, August 24, 2018. 7:00-9:00 p.m.

REGISTER HERE

Whoever said that writing a book is a solitary job is an idiot.

It takes a village (or at the very least a Facebook group, some friends, and possibly a bottle of wine) to write a book. As writers, we need other writers…and non-writers. But, how do we find the right mix of people to support us? What do we do when they don’t? How do we communicate what we need effectively to beta readers and crit partners? And what the heck is an alpha reader?

What’s more, how do we take the feedback from beta readers and use it correctly? It’s all too easy to fall into the trap of spinning our wheels on endless edits of the draft of the first draft, to react big and badly to criticism, or to drown in the obligations of reciprocating beta reading for our seventeen new best friends and their manuscripts.

Fear not! This class is going to show you how to hunt down beta readers like big game, befriend them in a way that puts Dale Carnegie to shame, and create long-lasting, mutually-beneficial beta and crit partnerships that are so Hufflepuff/Gryffindor, it makes my Slytherin soul cringe.

This class will cover:

• Wherefore art thou?: Where to find beta readers;
• Alpha betas, beta betas, omega betas: The different types of beta readers, and why we need them;
• Fish or cut beta: What to do when a beta reader relationship isn’t working – fix, fight, or flight?
• I’m looking at the beta reader in the mirror: Are you the best beta reader you can be, and why improving your own skills will make you a better writer;
• Gospel vs. grain of salt: How to balance thoughtful consideration of critique with Pavlovian instant tweaking, and why beta readers should never be the one holding the map on the hike.

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

MORE CLASSES!

(Check out our page of current classes!)

Also, a small house-keeping note: if you’d like to see more of our shenanigans, check out our video page! 

When Your Name Alone Can Sell

Instructor: Kristen Lamb
Price: General Admission $55.00 USD/ GOLD Level $175
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Thursday, SEPTEMBER 13th, 2018. 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST

REGISTER HERE

LEARN TO BE A BRAND BOSS!

All authors need a brand, so this class teaches how to locate and cultivate your audience into passionate fans who BUY YOUR BOOKS!

How can you grow your platform and turn your name alone into a bankable asset? Not as hard as you might have been led to believe.

You DO NOT need to be a tech guru/mega-high-pressure-sales person to excel at this. In fact, best you aren’t.

Yet, the reality is that in the digital age of commerce, consumers rely on brands more than ever in human history. They’re overwhelmed and we can help them out….by finding US.

Consumers (which is code for readers) buy from who they know, like and trust. In a sea of infinite choices a powerful NAME is a tremendous asset.

Can you say “James Patterson”?

The single largest challenge all writers face in the digital age is discoverability and connecting with our audience is a challenge but nothing we can’t handle.

This class will address:

• What is a brand? How to make one uniquely your own.
• How to BE YOU! You’re a writer, not an insurance salesman!
• Harness your imagination & creativity for better results (No one likes SPAM, so don’t serve it!).
• How to use this information to locate, engage and cultivate an audience.
• Myths about exposure.
• Common scams that will wreck your brand and earning ability.
• Why most promotion is a waste of money.
• A list of expensive and not-so-bright ideas for reaching readers.
• Knowing when and HOW to promote.

Overall this class is about working smarter not harder. This class is to teach you to think strategically so all energy is focused. Sure, we have to hustle, but why not hustle and there be an AUTHENTIC PAYDAY for all that hard work?

GOLD LEVEL AVAILABLE: This is you working with me (Kristen Lamb) for 90 minutes building, defining, refining your brand and putting together a PLAN! Time is money and professional consulting saves BOTH.

****A FREE recording is included with purchase of this class.

More Than Gore: How to Write Horror

Instructor: Kristen Lamb
Price: $40.00 USD
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: THURSDAY, August 30th, 2018. 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST

REGISTER HERE

Humans have always been fascinated with what scares them which is why horror fiction is a staple genre. It is also, quite possibly, the most challenging genre to write. Giant bugs and chainsaws just don’t get the screams they used to.

Blood, guts, gore and shock factor are low-hanging fruit (and always have been) and worse than that? They simply don’t have the impact they used to.

Audiences are too desensitized. This means we need to work harder to dig in and poke at what REALLY frightens/disturbs people.

Though this genre is extremely challenging to write well, there is an upside. The horror genre lends itself well to the short form (novellas and short stories).

Believe it or not, some of our staple horror movies–and the BEST horror movies—were actually adaptations of short stories and novellas (1408 by Stephen King and Hellbound Heart by Clive Barker being two examples).

Meaning, if you want to go Hollywood? Hollywood loooooves horror.

In this class we will cover:

• The science behind fear and why people crave it. Why fear is even healthy!
• Psychology of fear, thus how to locate the pain points.
• Why audiences are craving MORE horror (Yes, this actually does go in cycles).
• The different types of horror fiction.
• The importance of character in horror.
• How horror can actually resonate much like literary fiction.
• How to generate page-turning tension that will leave readers with a story they can’t stop thinking about…and that might even give them nightmares.

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

Keywordpalooza: Tune in, mellow out, and learn to love keywords for Amazon

Instructor: Cait Reynolds
Price: $55.00 USD
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Friday, September 7, 2018. 7:00—9:00 p.m. EST

REGISTER HERE

It’s one of the universe’s great mysteries… the same word can both boost and drown your book in a category (mind BLOWN, man!).

Keywords also seem to evolve every five minutes…or are we the one evolving, like a butterfly having a dream of SEO (trippy, dude!)? Like gravity and Jane Fonda’s hair in ‘Barbarella,’ the popular rules for using keywords value over-inflation and the slavish following of fads.

But, like Talbot’s tweed and mother’s pearls, certain marketing strategies and techniques are enduring classics that stand the test of time. They’re not flashy like bellbottoms, nor do they yield dramatic overnight results like ironing your hair. Yet, ignore trends, and we risk getting left behind…kind of like buying electric typewriter ribbon because that whole ‘computer word processing’ thing will never take off.

This class won’t just help you turn on, tune in, and drop out of the keyword rat race. We’ll also cover:

• Fully body contact SEO: when and where to use keywords, and what publishers know that you don’t;
• Fantastic keywords and where to find them: which websites, lists, search engines, and Magic 8 Balls yield the best keyword research results;
• Mix and match like a Parisienne: no, seriously, how to mix consistent ‘classic’ keywords with the latest trends like a Frenchwoman wears a crisp white shirt with this season’s Hermes scarf;
• Same bat genre, same bat book, different bat keywords?: learn the differences between keywords for ebooks, print, and audio;
• And so much more!

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

Building Planet X: Out-of-This-World-Building for Speculative Fiction

Instructor: Cait Reynolds
Price: $55.00 USD
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Saturday, September 8, 2018. 10:00 a.m.—12:00 p.m. EST

REGISTER HERE

Speculative fiction may be a way of seeing the world ‘through a glass darkly,’ but it can also be one of the clearest, most pointed, and even most disturbing ways of seeing the truth about ourselves and our society.

It’s not just the weird stuff that makes the settings of speculative fiction so unnerving. It’s the way ‘Normal’ casually hangs out at the corner of ‘Weird’ and ‘Familiar.’

But it’s trickier than it seems to get readers to this intersection without letting them get bogged down in the ‘Swamp of Useless Detail’ or running them into the patch of ‘Here be Hippogriffs’ (when the story is clearly about zombies). How do we create a world that is easy to slip into, absorbingly immersive, yet not distracting from the character arcs and plots?

This class will cover:

• Through the looking glass darkly: How to take a theme/issue/message and create a world that drives it home to the reader.
• Ray guns and data chips: The art of showing vs. telling in world-building.
• Fat mirror vs. skinny mirror: What is scarce in the world? Valuable? Forbidden? Illegal? What do people want vs. what they have vs. what they need?
• Drawing a line in the sand: What are the laws, taboos, limits of this world? What is unacceptable to you/the reader/the character? How are they the same or different, and why it matters.
• Is Soylent Green gluten-free and other vital questions: All the questions you need to ask about your world, but didn’t know…and how to keep track of all the answers.

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

Populating Planet X: Creating Realistic, Relatable Characters in Speculative Fiction

Instructors: Cait Reynolds & Kristen Lamb
Price: $55.00 USD
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Saturday, September 8, 2018. 1:00—3:00 p.m. EST

REGISTER HERE

It’s a time-honored tradition in literature to take an ordinary person out of his or her normal life and throw them into a whirlwind of extraordinary circumstances (zombies/tyrants/elves/mean girls optional). After all, upsetting the Corellian apple cart is what great storytellers do best.

It’s also that very same ordinariness and normalcy that first gets the reader to identify then empathize with the characters and stick with them (and the book) through to the end.

But, what do we do when our ‘ordinary’ protagonist lives with a chip implant and barcode tattoo, and our antagonist happens to be a horde of flesh-eating aliens…or a quasi-fascist regime bent on enforcing social order, scientific progress above ethics, and strict backyard composting regulations (those MONSTERS!)?

How the heck is the reader supposed to identify with that? I mean, seriously. Regulating backyard composting? It would never happen in a free society.

This leaves us with two challenges in creating characters for speculative fiction: 1. How to use the speculative world-building to shape the backgrounds, histories, and personalities of characters, and 2. How to balance the speculative and the relatable to create powerful, complex character arcs.

This class will cover:

• Resistance is futile: What does normal look like for the characters? What’s different or strange, and how to get readers to accept that retinal scans and Soylent Green are just par for the course.
• These aren’t the droids you’re looking for: What are the discordant elements around the characters? What are their opinions about it? What are the accepted consequences or outcomes?
• You gonna eat that?: Whether it’s running from brain-eating zombies or fighting over dehydrated space rations, what is important both physically and emotionally to the character? What is in short supply or forbidden?
• We’re all human here (even the ones over there with tentacles): The basic principles and techniques of creating psychological touchpoints readers can identify with.
• Digging out the implant with a grapefruit spoon: In a speculative world, what are the stakes for the character? The breaking point? The turning point?
• And so much more!!!

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

Beyond Planet X: Mastering Speculative Fiction

Instructor: Kristen Lamb
Price: $55.00 USD
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Saturday, September 8, 2018. 4:00—6:00 p.m. EST

REGISTER HERE

Speculative fiction is an umbrella term used to describe narrative fiction with supernatural or futuristic elements. This includes but it not necessarily limited to fantasy, science fiction, horror, utopian, dystopian, alternate history, apocalyptic fiction, post-apocalyptic fiction.

Basically, all the weird stuff.

Gizmos, gadgets, magic, chainsaws, demons, fantastical worlds and creatures are not enough and never have been. Whether our story is set on Planet X, in the sixth dimension of hell, on a parallel world, or on Earth after Amazon Prime gained sentience and enslaved us all, we still must have a core human story that is compelling and relatable.

In this class we will cover:

• Discovering the core human story problem.
• How to plot these unique genres.
• Ways to create dimensional and compelling characters.
• How to harness the power of fear and use psychology to add depth and layers to our story.
• How to use world-building to enhance the story, not distract from it.

***A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

The XXX Files: The Planet X Speculative Fiction 3-Class Bundle

Instructors: Cait Reynolds & Kristen Lamb
Price: $110.00 USD (It’s LITERALLY one class FREE!)
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: Saturday, September 8, 2018. 10:00 a.m.—6:00 p.m. EST.

REGISTER HERE

Recordings of all three classes is also included with purchase.

About the Instructor:

Kristen Lamb is the author of the definitive guide to social media and branding for authors, Rise of the Machines—Human Authors in a Digital World. She’s also the author of #1 best-selling books We Are Not Alone—The Writer’s Guide to Social Media and Are You There, Blog? It’s Me, Writer. She’s just released her debut thriller The Devil’s Dance.

Kristen has written over twelve hundred blogs and her site was recognized by Writer’s Digest Magazine as one of the Top 101 Websites for Writers. Her branding methods are responsible for selling millions of books and used by authors of every level, from emerging writers to mega authors.

Cait Reynolds is a USA Today Bestselling Author and lives in Boston with her husband and neurotic dog. She discovered her passion for writing early and has bugged her family and friends with it ever since. She likes history, science, Jack Daniels, jewelry, pasta, and solitude. Not all at the same time. When she isn’t enjoying the rooftop deck that brings her closer to the stars, she writes.

The post Field Guide to the North American Beta Reader appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Actually, it’s you. Love, the Editor.

Harsh, I know. Alas, sometimes tough love is necessary for the greater good. Cait Reynolds here today, and what I’m about to reveal is the secret heart’s cry of pretty much every freelance editor (at least the ones that don’t just run manuscripts through Grammarly).

Having worked as a freelance editor for many years, I’ve seen it all from the articulate and amazing, to the works of pure WTH?

I’ve also been given ARCs of books that are ‘professionally edited,’ but are appallingly full of typos, grammatical errors, and trite characters and plots.

I’m not necessarily blaming the editors in these cases. I get it. Sometimes, a work is simply so awful that we would have to completely rewrite it just to get it into passable shape. And, for a fraction of a penny per word, it isn’t worth it.

While there are definitely things editors can do to start helping to correct and cure this epidemic of literary mediocrity, there are things that writers need to do as well. That’s what I’m going to focus on today.

An editor hates…

1. When writers think they don’t have to do at least one or two rounds of their own editing before sending us a manuscript.

I’m not just talking about proofreading for commas (though, that’s another thing coming up). Everyone is in such a rush these days to get their work up on Amazon as fast as they can. So many authors finish up a “manuscript,” hit save, and then email it to their editor without a second thought….or a second look.

Let me throw out this hypothetical situation. Say we were sending this manuscript to an editor at Harper Collins or Penguin. Would we hit save and then send it off without combing through every line?

Or, would we let the manuscript sit for a week or two, giving our brain time and distance so we can go back at it with fresh eyes? Would we read through it critically, looking for (and correcting!) everything from typos and inconsistencies to doughy dialogue and plot holes? Would we repeat this process at least once if not twice more?

We probably would because we know the editor is probably hard-to-please with extremely high expectations about the degree of polish in any work they receive.

So why is sending a manuscript to a freelance editor any different? It shouldn’t be.

Freelance editors aren’t entirely innocent in this, either. We take on work instead of asking for a sample to see what the manuscript is like and then refusing to work on it until the author has gone back and cleaned it up. But, Amazon KDP has both exacerbated and preyed on authors’ fear of rejection to create a murky industry that cycles off of accepting mediocrity as a norm.

I digress.

2. When authors shop around for the cheapest editing services instead of the best editing services.

Editing is one of those things in life where we really do get what we pay for.

Professional freelance editors with experience and training beyond “I love reading,” and “I’m a writer, too,” are pretty rare commodities these days. If we are lucky enough to be taken on by one of these editorial unicorns, we should expect to pay the going rate for unicorns.

Many authors don’t want to go that route because it would mean having to save up money and probably publish fewer books. I don’t think that’s a bad thing because not every idea will make a good book.

Also, like cheese, wine, and wisdom, good ideas and stories need time to mature. We need time to noodle and daydream, to experience those moments of sudden inspiration while doing the dishes or walking the dog.

Instead, far too many authors slap down 60,000 words for whatever idea pops into their heads and then rush on to the next idea. Because if we’re not putting out three books a month, we’re gonna get tossed off the KDP Hamster Wheel of Death.

Producing books in volume means paying for production with an eye to getting volume-discounted services.

The average going rate for editors who provide services to these authors is about $240 for two rounds of editing on a 60,000-word manuscript.

Let’s say that an average editing effort takes 20 hours. That’s $12/hr (before self-employment taxes). It’s only our aversion to fryolators that keeps us from going to work at McDonald’s.

I’m not even going to talk about how authors will pay $500-$800 for a custom cover design but want that $200 editing job to cover concept editing, line editing, and proofreading. It’s enough to turn an editor into a jumper. Or cover designer because screw this $h!t.

An editor gets stabby when…

3. All an author does is accept track changes and sends the manuscript back for round two.

Yes, I have received manuscripts back like this. It’s like the author just ignored all conceptual, content, and craft comments I painstakingly made. This is frustrating because it makes editing incredibly tedious. More than that, it’s disheartening.

When a writer ignores editorial guidance, he or she is also turning down the opportunity to become better at the craft of writing. A good editor doesn’t just catch typos and minor inconsistencies. A skilled editor can identify a writer’s strengths and weaknesses and teach the writer to enhance the first and correct the second.

I’m not sure why writers are so often dismissive of editorial suggestions. Is it because they are in such a rush to get the book out (I see you, KDP Hamster Wheel of Death) that they simply don’t have the time to do a proper editing job?

Or, could it be that they don’t want to take on the daunting task of tearing apart a completed manuscript and painstakingly reworking and rewriting it? Maybe it’s because they’re afraid that trying to improve their writing would imply they’re not that good to start with and probably would never be able to get a traditional publishing contract.

Ignoring editorial guidance is also disrespectful. Let’s go back to that Harper Collins example. How inclined would we be to ignore an editor from Harper Collins who returned our manuscript with suggestions for not only reworking a good third of the book to tighten the plot, but also for learning to be more succinct yet vivid with our descriptions (meaning we need to go page-by-page on our own and make changes)?

So, why ignore guidance and suggestions just because an editor is freelance?

4. There are stupid grammar and usage mistakes in a manuscript.

Seriously. While I get that there are some fine points with grammar that we all fumble with from time-to-time, there is absolutely NO excuse for using the wrong word or using a word incorrectly.

Words are a writer’s business, like medicine is a doctor’s business. How much would we trust a doctor who glanced at a fractured tibia and said, “Uh, seems like you broke your leg thingy.”

How about a list of cringe-inducing usage mistakes I see every single day in manuscripts and self-published books?

• Conscious/conscience
• Weary/wary
• Disdain/distain
• Wondering/wandering
• Past time/pastime
• Shuttered/shuddered
• Chocked/choked
• Peak/pique/peek
• Lossed (not even a word)/lost
• Passed/past
• Lead/led

Are some of these typos or bleary brain slip-ups? Maybe, but frankly, these should be caught and corrected long before an editor ever sees the manuscript. However, when the wrong word is used consistently, that tells me the writer doesn’t actually know the meaning.

Even worse, when I see incorrect usage that has made it into the final book, I’m ninety-nine percent sure the editor doesn’t know what he or she is doing…or committed seppuku halfway through the editing process.

In terms of grammar, I get that we all have different levels of training. However, just like we don’t want a broken-leg-thingy doctor, I don’t want to see writers who don’t know and don’t bother to learn the most basic rules of language.

Personally, I like the Oxford English Dictionaries’ online grammar reference.

And finally, an editor really, really hates…

 5. When we can tell all a writer really wants is the look-at-me-I-published-a-book participation trophy.

The National Association of Recovering Freelancers* put out a study that said four out of five freelance editors suffer a nervous breakdown due to the near-lethal combination of shoddy writing, shoddier story conceptualization and development, and repeated exposure to bad grammar.

*I totally made up the National Association of Recovering Freelancers, but now that I think of it, I really like the acronym, N.A.R.F. Very ‘Pinky and the Brain.’

What drives freelance editors to give it all up? Why do they consider it more productive to search Pinterest compulsively for DIY seashell crafting than to edit a manuscript?

Part of it is the money. It’s also the soul-dulling tedium of slogging through clunky prose, bad grammar, and tired tropes (at $0.004 to $0.006 per word). Most of all, it’s nihilistic realization that so many writers care more about seeing their name on Amazon than whether their readers are getting the best possible story they could write.

Without the Amazon KDP platform, almost none of these writers would ever stand a chance with literary agents and traditional publishers. While the pre-KDP era was far from perfect, repeated rejection had one MAJOR benefit: either the writing got better, or it was never inflicted on the unsuspecting public.

It was the publishing industry’s equivalent of telling the broken-leg-thingy doctor to either go back to school or consider a different career like professional Zamboni driving.

See? Not all gatekeeping is a bad thing. But, freelance editors now have all the work and none of the power, and the reading public is the worse for it.

Harsh but hopeful?

The fact that you are here and reading this blog gives me hope. It means you actually care about becoming a better storyteller and craftsman. It isn’t that freelance editors want to see perfection right off the bat. We merely long to see progress.

Freelance editors do this because we love the written word. We are unflaggingly idealistic, optimistic, and altruistic…until we’re not.

If you or someone you love is a freelance editor who is showing signs of stress (common signs and symptoms include wild-eyed staring at the screen, increased consumption of alcohol/caffeine, and muttering, “Alas, poor literature, we hardly knew ye!”), N.A.R.F. recommends the following treatment options:

• Vitamin D. Take your freelance editor outside and reassure them that the light will not actually burn;
• Laugh therapy. Expose your freelance editor to a minimum of three minutes of cat videos twice a day;
• Calm panic attacks. Repeating “All is right with Strunk and White,” in a low, soothing voice will help ease anxiety;
• Homeopathic literature. Provide your freelance editor with Pulitzer Prize- or Mann Booker Prize-winning books. A selection of classic literature will also work in an emergency;
• Career development. Gently suggest that your freelance editor consider a different career…

Perhaps something in cover design?

I love hearing from you!

What do you WIN? For the month of JUNE, for everyone who leaves a comment, I will put your name in a hat. If you comment and link back to my blog on your blog, you get your name in the hat twice. What do you win? The unvarnished truth from yours truly. I will pick a winner once a month and it will be a critique of the first 20 pages of your novel, or your query letter, or your synopsis (5 pages or less).

Upcoming Classes!

Instructor: Cait Reynolds

Price: $55.00 USD

Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom

When: Friday, June 22, 2018. 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Remember Moonlighting? Dave and Maddie were the hottest thing ever…and then they kissed…and it was still kinda hot…and then they really got together and settled down to blissful domesticated bickering. And…we all stopped watching.

Because it was boring.

Remember the X-Files? The lucullan feast of smoldering restraint that was Mulder and Scully? Chris Carter refused to give the fans what they wanted with a kiss at the series end, and while fans gnashed their teeth, it was a kind of pro forma gnashing because we were still interested and could still dream about what might happen.

While the episode-based storytelling of television allows romance to be the B-plot (and only when it feels like it), novels are different. Whether we are writing squeaky clean romance or too-much-wasabi-level-hot erotica, we are always dealing with the same basic principle of THE TEASE.

And for all that romance gets a bad rap and is scorned as being ‘easy’ to write, sustaining the delicious, rippling tension and fizzing chemistry between characters is one of the hardest techniques to master. This class can help you (literally) keep the romance alive well past the 80,000-word mark and beyond!

Topics covered in this class include:

• ‘So, I’ll tell you what I want, what I really, really want’: recognizing what the reader wants, what the reader really wants but doesn’t know, and what the reader needs;
• How to Flirt with the Reader: giving an inch but taking a mile when it comes to sweet/romantic/sexy moments;
• Clean and Mean: putting the spark in sweet romance and fanning the flame without risking the brimstone;
• Down and Dirty: putting the emotion in erotica so every encounter leaves the reader panting for more…for more than one reason;
• The Speed Dating Trap: how to balance interest, interaction, and attraction without falling for the trap of insta-love (just add fate/pheromones/booze);
• Making it Last: how to chart a course for romance and pace it so it lasts…all book long…
• So much more!…

A free recording of the class is included in the purchase. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Instructor: Cait Reynolds

Price: $45.00 USD

Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom

When: Saturday, June 23, 11:30 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. EST

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

There’s something dashingly defiant and alluring about a proper young lady who throws caution (and often her petticoats) to the wind and picks up a sword to fight for what she believes in.

Whether it’s Eowyn from Lord of the Rings or Elizabeth (Badass) Bennet from Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, we all love that moment when a woman rises up to prove she’s more than society ever expected her to be.

Yet the market today is flooded with fantasy and historical that carry more trope baggage than Marie Antoinette for a long weekend at the Petit Trianon (sheep not included).

In fantasy, there are girls raised in servitude who suddenly discover their magical powers and royal heritage and must (really quickly) learn to wield swords and spells in order to save the kingdom.

Historical often isn’t much better, taking naive nineteen year-olds and turning them into near-legendary brigands, highwaymen, and pirates within the space of a few months.

Lack of believability, lack of character depth and arc, and lack of world-building/historical knowledge are the three major pitfalls when creating Ye Olde Action Heroine.

Luckily, this class will give writers a map with all literary here-be-hippogriffs clearly marked. Whether your gal is besieged by dragons, in a castle under siege, or in a castle under siege by dragons, this class can help!

This class will cover:

• En Garde! Choosing her weapons wisely;
• Ye Olde Fight Club: getting real about time & training;
• Why, How, and When: how to realistically get her on the path from baking to badassery;
• Hard Knocks: how to use failure and lack of skill mastery to create compelling character arcs;
• The Joan of Arc trap: how to avoid creating miracles and martyrs (unless you really mean it);
• The Pirate Bride: defining femininity in fantasy and historical in order ‘rebel’ against it;
• Consequences: what are the short- and long-term consequences of flouting convention?
• World Building & Re-Building: getting fantasy and historical settings right for your characters;
• And so much more…

A recording of this class is also included with purchase. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Instructor: Kristen Lamb

Price: $45.00 USD

Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom

When: Saturday, June 23, 2:00 – 4:00 p.m. EST

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Female characters have evolved from ‘damsel in distress’ to the ‘hardcore badass.’ Problem is, fictional females escaped one boring mold only to end up in another even MORE boring mold.

But with lipgloss AND karate!

Strong female characters fascinate audiences on the page and on the screen. From Atomic Blonde to Wonder Woman, Special Agent Scully to Dr. Laura Isles, women can exude power and danger in a variety of ways.

Sadly, the badass female has devolved into a tired trope with the depth of a puddle.

This class is to challenge the concept of the dangerous woman as protagonist and antagonist. Creating a powerful woman involves more than handing her weapons, a black belt, and a terminal case of RBF (Resting B$#@% Face).

• • Expanding ‘who’ the dangerous woman IS;
  • Still waters run DEEP;
  • Broadening backstory;
  • Motives matter;
  • The ‘Tomb Raider’ effect;
  • Combat, weapons, tactics;
  • Expanding her ‘arsenal’;
  • Generating authentic dramatic action/tension;
  • Making the dangerous dame ‘likable’;
  • AND MORE…

As an author, competitive shooter, and former combatives instructor, there are few characters I LOVE more than a kickass female action hero. Conversely, fewer things vex me more than the tired cookie-cutter female action hero trope. Women can be powerful in a myriad of ways, beyond hand-to-hand combat and shooting everyone in the FACE.

This said, while we’ll explore a wide variety of powerful women, if you long to write that female action hero, this class will (hopefully) make sure you do her justice.

A recording of this class is also included with purchase. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Can’t seem to choose between pirate princesses and bulletproof Barbies? We don’t blame you…and, you don’t have to!

With the Dangerous Dames BUNDLE, get both classes and SAVE MONEY.

Purchased separately, each class is $45. Go for BOTH and get $90 of instruction for ONLY $75. You also get to spend a HUGE part of the day with ME (Kristen Lamb) and my partner in crime Cait Reynolds.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Date: Saturday, June 23, 2018

Price: $75.00 USD 

PRINCESS PRODIGY: 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. EST

BULLETPROOF BARBIE: 2:00-4:00 p.m. EST

*Recordings of both classes included with purchase.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

The post Five Things Your Editor Hates About You appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

It’s Cait Reynolds blog time, which, as you know, is probably both a blessing and a curse. Haven’t blogged for a while but, it’s like the old Country & Western song: How Can I Miss You if You Won’t Go Away? But yes, I’m back which might be a blessing or a curse.

Speaking of curses, that’s what I’m here to talk about today.

Writers tend to be a superstitious bunch, much like runners. Even the most skeptical among us can tell when the stars are not aligned on a writing day. Runners can feel when their bodies just aren’t hitting on all cylinders.

From drinking the same tea while writing to wearing lucky socks for race day, many of us can’t help but look for and cling to signs/omens/Tarot readings for encouragement.

Because we ALL need encouragement.

But, sometimes, there comes a moment when it feels like all the forces of nature are against us. No amount of stretching our prose or IT bands seems to make any difference. It’s positively spooky how blocked we get.

Now, living in Boston and being both a runner and a Red Sox fan, I consider myself something of an expert in curses. I mean, it took Bruce Springsteen’s rock n’ roll exorcism during his concert at Fenway Park to lift the curse of the Bambino…and that year, we finally won the World Series.

You can’t tell me that ish doesn’t work.

Do you know how hard it was to find funny Boston memes without the f-bomb for this post? DO YOU?!! DO YOU F*$#@*&* APPRECIATE WHAT I DO FOR YOU????!!!!

I also happen to be descended from a long line of eerily prescient/omniscient/ohnoshedidn’t Slavic women who can look right into your soul and see you didn’t wash your hands after using the public restroom.

Yeah. I know my curses.

Now, settle in, my loves. Ignore the goat demon in the corner. He’s harmless. Mostly. Oh, and careful with the salt circle. Summoning with a smudged salt circle can be…messy.

29 and Feeling Fine

Like all curses, the Mile 25 Curse begins with the seduction of possibility, invincibility, and a good pair of running shoes.

We get the Big Idea. Get all excited, develop characters, settings, plot, outlines. When we jump in, it’s both feet first and hit the ground running like we are our very own NaNoWriMo on meth.

The words are flowing. It’s easy. Effortless. This time…this time is gonna be different. We’re going to ride that wave of effortless all the way through to THE END. It’s just gonna flow.

It’s like that first run, when we blast our way through 1.5 miles at a blistering 14:06/mi pace. Hardcore, man.

We blow through the first 29,000-30,000 words of a full-length novel in record time. And it’s good work. Some of our best. We’re in it to win it, and this is rocking!

We’ve reached the end of Act I, and now, our characters are on their way. Only, the yellow brick road turns out to be paved with the broken backs of melting Peeps, and now, we’re running on a road that’s slow, sticky, and somewhat distressing.

Welcome to HELL…or Act II. Too many writers mistakenly believe writing a novel is a sprint or a fun run. No, it’s a marathon that requires training, preparations, patience and a very high pain tolerance.

Because all novelists will eventually hit…

The Heartbreak Hill of the WIP

But hey, we’ve got a plan. We’ve got an outline. The fresh idealism of the first 30,000 words has worn off, but we kinda knew this was going to happen. We had hoped it wouldn’t. But, it did. Just like we wish training for a 10k simply felt like training for two 5ks…but it’s sooo not.

So, it’s not totally shocking, and while it may take a few days to resign ourselves to the fact Act II will always be a slower, harder slog, we’re ready to soldier on.

The first stirrings of real unease might pop up around 40,000-45,000 words. We feel a little proud we’ve gotten this far. That’s a lot of words, probably around a halfway point for the whole book.

It’s also the Heartbreak Hill of our story.

Heartbreak Hill is the cruelest mile of the Boston Marathon. It’s a steady 3.3% incline for more than 2 km. Now, that may not seem like much, but remember, runners have already done 20.6 miles. There have been shorter, steeper climbs and longer, quad-punishing downhills.

Boston Marathon sign at Heartbreak Hill

Runners are caked in salt, blood, and sticky dried Gatorade. It could be beating down icy rain or unseasonably hot. Healed injuries are tweaking, threatening to unravel. The playlist is failing to inspire. Even the kisses and oranges from the Wellesley College girls (both offered freely to all) can’t quite distract from the pain.

All the cowbell in the world can’t help you now.

2014 Boston Marathon: the famous Wellesley kissing line.

Wellesley College student Lauren Dow solicited and RECEIVED kisses from the passing runners. Section: Sports, Suzanne Kreiter/Globe staff

Writers and runners slow and walk a few steps, cry a little, then grit their teeth and get back in the game. Because it’s only 5.6 miles or 45,000 words to the finish line. This is the hardest test of what we are made of. Can we ENDURE?

We got this….*weeps*

The Mile 25 Curse

I used to live right at mile 25 of the Boston Marathon, which is just before Kenmore Square (mile 25.2), where the crowds really start going wild. From Kenmore, it’s just one more mile to the finish line.

But there’s one last nasty surprise for runners. To get to Kenmore Square, they have to run over the I-90 overpass, a mini-Heartbreak Hill. It’s the psych-out sucker punch. CURSE it ALL!

Boston Marathon sign

For writers, that moment of despair generally comes at the end of Act II, or about 60,000 words-ish. It’s a sudden existential inadequacy and dread:

Oh-my-God-this-is-the-worst-stuff-I’ve-ever-written-what-was-I-thinking-is-it-too-late-to-take-up-Olympic-curling-as-a-career-instead-who-would-want-to-read-this-crap-I-suck-as-a-writer-I-should-just-go-crawl-in-a-hole-and-die.

You know…something like that.

Every writer faces a Mile 25 Curse moment. There are no talismans to protect us against it, no surefire cures. We are alone and unprepared to face our demons. Every. Single. Time.

The Mile 25 Curse can make us abandon our WIP to chase fluffy plot bunnies that PROMISE to be easier to write and give us instant fame, fortune, and a lifetime supply of Diet Coke.

The curse doesn’t care if our WIP is any good. It doesn’t care about our dreams. It has one goal: to trip us up before the finish line.

There are runners who collapse at mile 25 in the Boston Marathon, physically and mentally pushed beyond their limit. There are also the runners who slow to a walk as they digest the grim reality of one last hill. You can see them weighing the options in their heads. Should I just give up and walk the rest of the way? Do I have it in me?

How badly do I want this?

They take a deep breath…and resume running, even if it’s merely a limping jog. No way they’ve come this far to just give up.

So, they just keep running.

The Finish Line

And, really, that’s what I’m trying to tell you today. Keep pressing. Mile 25 is a finite thing. It is one mile…or 5,280 ft….or 1,500 steps, and each step brings you that much closer to the finish line.

Spencer the Boston Marathon dog will cheer you on!

When we are at the end of Act II, there isn’t that much further to go. It’s another 15,000-20,000 words at most for Act III. We know how the story is going to end (or should) and what needs to happen. There’s no more slogging through the confusing, mushy bits we’re not sure of in Act II.

This is a final sprint for the FINISH!

A marathon is about crossing the finish line. It isn’t about sashaying, moon-walking, or pronking across it. How we cross doesn’t matter. We simply have to cross it, limping, bloody, and shaking from way too much caffeine after writing the worst 12,000 words of our lives.

Nobody looks good crossing the finish line of a race. Even the 100-meter dash–sure, it’s not far enough that hair and makeup get mussed, but there’s the awkward ‘runner face’ everyone makes, which is halfway between the putting-on-mascara face and the O-face.

Not even Kenyans look their best at a finish line.

I have yet to finish a book and wake up the next morning looking like a million dollars. It’s more that I look like a reject extra for The Walking Dead. I probably smell like a reject extra from The Walking Dead, too, because who has time to shower when we’re 4,000 from the finish line?

The point is, it doesn’t matter if you are sweaty, blotchy, puffy, a drippy mess from allergies, or prone to random hysterical laughter by the time you finish your book. YOU FINISHED.

And as a fellow writer and perhaps a fellow runner…I’ll be there to cheer you on!

Coach Cait is ready! (Post-run on a GOOD day)

***

Thank You CAIT!

Kristen here. If anyone ever sees me running? RUN FOR YOUR $%#@#$% LIFE! Because there is something with teeth or a chainsaw behind me.

But, whether we are runners or not, writing is an endurance sport. I choose motherhood, grappling in Jiu Jitsu, and time with my mother to train my endurance. It helps .

***Scroll down for new classes from Cait and for On Demand classes for hardcore storytelling training from MOI!

What Are Your Thoughts?

I love hearing from you!

Do you find yourself starting and never finishing? Is this from lack of planning? Failing to fully prepare? Not enough training? Maybe underestimating HOW FREAKING HARD writing a novel ACTUALLY is?

Are you being too hard on yourself? A commenter last time was really down she couldn’t finish her FIRST ‘novel.’ Hell, it took me no less than FIFTEEN ‘novels’ before I finished. That whole ‘endurance training thing’ .

What do you WIN? For the month of MAY, for everyone who leaves a comment, I will put your name in a hat. If you comment and link back to my blog on your blog, you get your name in the hat twice. What do you win? The unvarnished truth from yours truly. I will pick a winner once a month and it will be a critique of the first 20 pages of your novel, or your query letter, or your synopsis (5 pages or less).

Also NOW OFFERING MORE CLASSES PLUS ON DEMAND…

Retelling Myths & Fairytales

Instructor: USA Today Best-Selling Author Cait Reynolds
Price: $65 USD Standard (Cool Upgrades Available)
Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom
When: FRIDAY May 25th, 7:00 PM E.S.T. to 9:00 P.M. EST

Myths and fairytales are as fundamental to human existence as communication itself. We grow up hearing these stories, being formed by them, and often rebelling against them.

One of the hottest trends in publishing right now is bringing these stories back and giving them new life with creative interpretations and retellings.

Done right, a retelling can capture the public imagination, give us new insights into our society and ourselves, and sweep us away to a time and place where everything, including justice and happy endings, is possible. Get your spot today! HERE.

The Yarn Behind the Book: Backstory

Instructor: Cait Reynolds

Price: $55.00 USD

Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom

When: Friday, June 1, 2018. 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST

Behind every good book is an entire story that happens before the reader ever opens to page one. This is the backstory, and done right, it is what sets the stage, provides clues and cues, and rescues you from writer’s block.

A good backstory will help with logic and consistency in the plot, developing complex motivations for characters, and sorting out exactly what needs to happen going forward as you either plot or pants your way to the end.

This class will cover the following topics – and much more:

• The elements of a backstory;
• How to take your current plot idea and work backwards into a backstory;
• Integrating character profiles and the backstory;
• How the backstory relates to the logline and synopsis;
• Using the backstory to dig yourself out of corners and shake off writer’s block;
• Why a backstory is crucial to writing a series.

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

About the Instructor:

Cait Reynolds is a USA Today Bestselling Author and lives in the Boston area with her husband and neurotic dog. She discovered her passion for writing early and has bugged her family and friends with it ever since. When she isn’t cooking, running, or enjoying the rooftop deck that brings her closer to the stars, she writes.

On Demand Training!

Ready for Book Beast Mode? I Live to Serve…Up Some TRAINING!

For anyone who longs to accelerate their plot skills, I recommend:

ON DEMAND Plot Boss: Writing Novels Readers Want to BUY. 

Two hours of intensive plot training from MOI…delivered right to your computer to watch as much as you like .

The Art of Character is also now available for ON DEMAND.

And if you’re ready for BOOK BEAST MODE and like saving some cash, you can get BOTH Plot Boss and Art of Character in the…

Story Boss Bundle (ON DEMAND).

Almost FIVE HOURS with me, in your home…lecturing you. It’ll be FUN! 

I also hope you’ll pick up a copy of my debut novel The Devil’s Dance.

The post The Writer’s Marathon & The Curse of Heartbreak Hill appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Today, it’s me, Cait! Join me as we venture into a common craft mistake committed by virtually every emerging writer—something I like to call ‘dismemberment.’ Because nothing says love like body parts strewn about.

Sarcasm aside, dismemberment is a bad habit that can impact the flow of the story, collapse the fictive dream, and confuse or even insult the reader.

Dismemberment is literary filler that demonstrates we (as the writer) don’t trust the readers’ intellect, thus we are “brain holding” as Kristen likes to say.

Offering fair warning: I’m in a stabby mood today. Really stabby.

Dismemberment is one of the most common craft mistakes, but it’s also one of the most insidious. It’s one of the most prevalent reasons readers lose interest in a story, or fail to get interested in the first place.

We (readers) get tired of stopping and trying to figure out what the hell is going on. We keep pausing because our brains keep pondering tangents unrelated to the actual story.

If Taylor’s eyes just flew across the room at a dinner party, how does he discreetly get them back if he can’t see? Was any partygoer hit by a flying eyeball? Oh hell! Is one of his eyeballs stuck in some debutante’s expensive up-do?

Aaand this is when the whole story goes off the rails *explosion noises* *screams of pain*

So, what is dismemberment?

Dismemberment is when body parts move around independent of the character.

When we (as editors) see a sentence like, “Seraphina’s violet orbs roved around the room,” our first instinct is to stab. Uh, I mean pick on the obvious issues like…’orbs’ and ‘violet.’

For readers, their first instinct is usually…HUH? What the hell just happened? Do her eyes get dust bunnies on them?

The core issue has nothing to do with Seraphina gazing around the room. Rather, it’s her eyeballs going for a stroll *cue image of eyeballs rolling across the floor like marbles*

Now that you can’t un-see that in your head, let’s dig a little deeper into what dismemberment looks like, why it’s a writing no-no, and how to avoid, fix, and occasionally even use it (properly).

Dismemberment Makes Things Awkward

Remember The Addams Family and Thing?

The show was brilliant, and took the idea of dismemberment and ran with it. The show turned a disembodied hand into a character with attitude, opinions, relationships, and interaction with the other characters. It was hilarious…because it was so weird.

The problem is that what’s funny weird for a television show becomes disjointedly bizarre in a novel. Once we start being able to identify dismemberment, we can’t help seeing it everywhere. We also can’t help seeing the unfortunate imagery of random body parts moving around.

Eyes, hands, and feet are the usual body parts featured in dismemberment, though I’ve definitely seen a fair share of shoulders, legs, arms, and heads.

“His head flew across the room…”

“Her shoulders slumped down…”

“His hand reached out to her…”

Why do we fall into the trap of dismemberment? One possible answer is that we are struggling with how to describe the action in a scene. This is the fault of what I like to call the Inner Pushy Stage Director. Similar to the Inner Editor, the Inner Pushy Stage Director has a lot to say about gestures, blocking, and interpretive dance. #JazzHands

The Inner Pushy Stage Director doesn’t trust the reader to instinctively know the series of movements involved in the simple actions of picking something up or a character moving through rooms.

Her hand reached out to open the door.

Oh-kay.

To be blunt, we (readers) are not stupid and we “get” one would have to reach out a hand to open a door unless telekinetic powers are involved. If telekinetic powers NOT involved, then we as readers assume the character can simply open a door without explaining how this “opening a door” process happens. We’ll keep up just fine. Promise.

By believing we need to give the reader every single detail of an action, we use twenty words to explicate what maybe two or three words could do far better. Inexperienced writers often resort to giving agency to a body part as a way to vary the prose away from constantly using the ‘he’ or ‘she’ as the driver of action.

And, that’s how we end up with Seraphina’s violet orbs roving around the room…maybe stopping to get a canape… See? Creepy, right?

Happy Feet

Body parts do not have emotions. Period. Ever.

There is no situation in which the following sentence is correct: “His hands clenched into angry fists.”

No. Nope. Zipit!

Another reason we fall into the trap of dismemberment is that we use it to portray a character’s emotion, whether it’s Seraphina’s POV or her noticing that Taylor is angry.

What has really happened is that we have flubbed the technique of drawing attention to a physical ‘tell’ for a character’s emotion.

Instead of:

His hands clenched into angry fists.

As opposed to clenching hands into joyous fists? #Weirdness

What we really mean to say is:

He clenched his hands into fists.

If we have the correct dialogue/action/inner thoughts leading up to that moment, we shouldn’t have to use the word ‘angry’ at all. We should also be able to avoid turning Taylor’s hands into their own POV characters. We also can just say that he clenched his hands since the word “fists” is implied.

You do not want to end up like Cartman and Jennifer Lopez.

Why is Dismemberment So Bad?

Isn’t variety the spice of life? Aren’t we supposed to try and find new and creative ways of describing our characters and conveying actions? Couldn’t you say that it’s ‘artistic’?

No. No, and no. (See, totally stabby this morning.)

Dismemberment violates one of the fundamental rules of writing: Always maintain connection between reader and the story. Always.

You know what breaking the connection does? It creates…bookmark moments. Every instance of dismemberment lets the reader drift a little further away from the engrossing empathy that keeps them immersed and turning pages. It’s a subtle loss of connection that, given enough time, may even relegate our books in the DNF (Did Not Finish) pile.

I will sacrifice everything for a book hangover because I *have* to find out what happens to Seraphina. Or Taylor. I identify with the choices and emotions of Seraphina and Taylor, but if those choices and emotions are assigned to body parts, I’m just not as invested in the outcome of the characters.

If there is too much, Seraphina’s head flew across the room when Taylor unexpectedly arrived to the party, then I’m more concerned why the partygoers aren’t trampling each other in terror to flee the room and the flying head.

Dismemberment takes the edge off of tension and blunts the poignancy of the ‘either-or’ that drives plotting and character arcs.

There’s one other reason that dismemberment is so very, very bad.

Welcome to Amateur Hour

Dismemberment is one of the clearest symptoms of amateur hour. Editors can spot a sloppy writer in any number of painful ways, but dismemberment in a FINISHED, EDITED, AND PUBLISHED BOOK is the equivalent of the author holding a neon sign over his/her head flashing ‘AMATEUR HOUR – 24/7.’ 

Even worse? The fact that whoever was paid to edit and proofread did not catch the dismemberment…just maybe see about a refund.

In my opinion, amateur hour editors sin worse than amateur hour authors. There is more to being an editor than running a manuscript through Grammarly and finding typos, which is why writers need to use prudence and maybe referrals when choosing an editor (not just price).

If you think I’m being harsh, I’m a small fry compared to agents and NY editors. They’re inundated with more manuscripts than they could read in a lifetime, meaning they are actively looking for reasons to stop reading. The moment these folks see dismemberment? Their head doesn’t fly across the room, our novel does.

#SlushPile #NoTimeForN00bs

Putting Humpty Dumpty Back Together

So, now, we have to pick up all the scattered body parts and emotions, and order the 40-pack of super glue from Amazon.

The first part of recovery is to train ourselves to recognize dismemberment so we can get out of using it improperly. While it might take some time to break the dismemberment habit, this is one case where we do need to stop and listen to our Inner Editor as we draft.

Instead of noting the dismemberment and promising to deal with it in revisions, we should take the time to correct it then and there. It’s simple to fix. Just delete a few words and reassign the emotions to the character instead of the body part.

Do this over the course of 50,000 words, and you’d be surprised how quickly a new and better habit forms…

When you start to hear Cait’s voice as your Inner Editor…

Of course, no one is perfect (except for me, duh). That is why there is the editing phase of writing, when we catch those sneaky little instances of dismemberment that slipped a body part in our path without us noticing.

In terms of actually fixing dismemberment, think of a movie. Really think and try to recall how often the director has the camera zoom in on a JUST a body part (okay ASIDE from porn).

Funny how it’s a little tougher than you thought to come up with examples. Why is that?

Well…wait for it…because the moviegoer identifies with the character, not the body part.

There’s one other thing to watch out for when we are correcting a scene with dismemberment, and that is the dreaded ‘SHOW DON’T TELL’ problem. In this case, it manifests in the far-too-frequent and indiscriminate use of the word felt.

Seraphina felt her ears heat up from embarrassment.

There’s no dismemberment in this sentence, but it’s kinda blah. I mean, the whole point of the sentence is to inform the reader that her ears are getting hot. Meh.

Like I said earlier, if we are guiding the scene the right way, we won’t need to point out that she’s getting embarrassed. The reader will already be getting the sense that Seraphina’s experiencing humiliation/shame/whatever.

We could make the sentence more interesting and ENGAGING with just a couple tweaks.

Seraphina fought to keep her expression neutral, even if her burning ears were bright pink giveaways.

In this example, I changed up the passive ‘felt’ for a more active purpose to the sentence. We still understand that she’s feeling embarrassed, but now, she doing something other than just passively experiencing a sensation. Also, I’ve given the other characters in the scene something to notice and/or react to with Seraphina’s obvious struggle to keep a straight face.

When correcting dismemberment, just remember: put the emotion back in the character’s head, and have him/her/it DO something to express it.

Disciplined Dismemberment

Like every rule, there *are* exceptions to the ban on dismemberment.

Once we are on auto-pilot in terms of avoiding dismemberment, we can finally use it as the tool it was really meant to be. (Hey, you can’t go through medical school without gross anatomy – dissecting body parts has its place!)

We can use body parts when we are trying to heighten tension.

For example, let’s say Seraphina and Taylor have been gagged and tied up, but there’s a knife nearby to cut their bonds. Just riffing here:

Seraphina held her breath as Taylor tried for the knife. His fingers flexed and stretched as long as possible, desperate for the blade. Tendons popped out on his hands, hands that reached farther and farther until they shook from strain, only to finally slacken in defeat.

In this moment, Taylor’s ability to reach the knife is critical. By zooming in on his hands and their actions, my goal is to build tension and create a vivid, visceral visual. It’s worth nothing that in this situation, Taylor’s hands are the only part of him that can have any action.

If he wasn’t tied up or his arms were free, then I’d describe the moment differently and put Taylor himself back in the driver’s seat.

Another way of using body parts is by having the POV character notice a particular action or emotion on the part of someone else in the scene.

Taylor did a double-take when Seraphina’s eyes widened a mere a fraction. He wasn’t sure if she was surprised or angry, but it was enough to put him on his guard.

The reason this example works is because I’m showing, not telling, and the dismemberment provides something for the POV character to react to – in this case, a confusing signal from Seraphina. When used in this way, dismemberment can be an excellent tool for revealing or concealing clues, creating misunderstandings, and varying communication between characters between verbal and non-verbal forms.

THESE EXAMPLES DO NOT GIVE US PERMISSION TO GO BACK TO HACKING UP BODY PARTS AND HAVING THEM RUN AROUND DOING THINGS ON THEIR OWN!

Just like truffle oil…a little goes a very long way.

Class with Cait this Friday!

I’m offering a really cool class tomorrow night! It’s my blurb-writing class. In it, I will show you all my secret tips and tricks (even beyond what I wrote in this blog post) to painlessly writing those crucial 150 words that will SELL YOUR BOOK!

What’s extra cool about this class is that I will take TWO blurbs from attendees and rework them LIVE AND ON-THE-FLY IN CLASS to demonstrate just how simple and effective my techniques are.

Yeah, I know. Super cool.

Anyway, here are the details–hope to see you tomorrow night!

BLURB BOSS: WRITING BLURBS THAT SELL BOOKS

Instructor: Cait Reynolds

Price: $45.00 USD

Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom

When: Friday, November 10, 2017. 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST

If the cover is an invitation to the party in your book, then the blurb (the back cover description, the summary, your entire book in 3 short paragrahs) is the RSVP card readers check off as attending-with-the-chicken-option when they buy your book.

The trouble is that for so many books, while the cover is invites you to a rave, the blurb reveals it’s really polka night at the VFW.

So, if the blurb is so important, why is it so hard to write? Raise your hand if you hate writing blurbs. Raise your other hand if you agonize over writing a blurb, and it still feels like it’s awful when it’s done.

The heart’s cry goes up from every single writer ever: “THIS IS HARDER TO WRITE THAN THE 90,000 WORDS OF MY BOOK!”

And yet, it shouldn’t be. Approached from a different angle, a blurb should be one of the easiest and most fun things to write. Yes. I went there. I said it. Hopefully, after taking this class, you will be saying it, too. No more blubbering over blurbs. Ever.

This class will cover:

• Understanding the purpose of a blurb in attracting readers;
• The top secret formula to structuring a blurb;
• How to plug-and-play every blurb, every time;
• Why everything you think is important in your story really isn’t (in terms of the blurb);
• The secret to keywords, blurbs, and algorithms.

As a bonus, bring a copy of your blurb to the class for group workshopping! I will pick two and edit them LIVE IN CLASS to show you just how easy it is!

A recording of this class is also included with purchase.

Register today!

For subscribers, click to my site to view gallery of upcoming classes (gallery doesn’t show up for you). But here are the two biggies coming up from ME (Kristen LAMB)…

BRAND BOSS! When Your NAME ALONE Can SELL! November 14th, 7-9 EST and comes with FREE RECORDING. $45 for General Admission, GOLD Option Available!

PLOT BOSS! Writing Novels Readers WANT TO BUY! November 16th, 7-9 EST and comes with FREE RECORDING. $40 for General Admission, GOLD Option Available!

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The post Dismemberment–Taking Characters Apart in All the Wrong Ways appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

It’s me, Cait Reynolds, and I’m going to be brutal here. You’ve been warned. But, honestly, I get a little stabby when I encounter a Mary Sue in a book. Mary Sues are death to fiction, yet they’re more common than head lice in Kindergarten (and about as desirable). For the sake of time today, we will focus on the most common Mary Sue peeve…the Mary Sue Shopping Spree.

What is a Mary Sue Shopping Spree?

It’s wish fulfillment at its worst.

First of all, for anyone who is unfamiliar with the term “Mary Sue,” the best definition is here at Urban Dictionary. But, for our shorthand use, a Mary Sue is an impossibly perfect character.

She’s beautiful (flaming red hair and emerald eyes, for example) and smart (better grades than Hermione Granger but never seems to be in the library). A Mary Sue falls in love with the hero/hero falls in love with her early, often and easily.

What IS a “Mary Sue”?

There are all kinds of Mary Sue’s–no genre is safe. Here’s just a sample:

• Victim Sue! with an impossible streak of bad luck/tragedy/knack for getting kidnapped and/or stalked.
• Warrior Sue! who has a mouth like a sailor, throws a mean punch, fights like Lara Croft and Bruce Lee’s love child (and probably has a lineage about as weird), and still looks amazing in a ball gown (but doesn’t want to be taken for a sissy girl!).
• Magic Sue! with similarities to Warrior Sue in that she has unheard of powers that usually get her into trouble (see Victim Sue) until she learns to control them, and then with a wave of her (slender, delicate) hand, saves the day without chipping a nail.
• Misfit Sue who is the proverbial ugly duckling, except all she needs really is some good conditioner, a fairy godmother, and a gift certificate to Forever21 in order to turn into the hottie that suddenly attracts all the guys.

There are so many issues with Mary Sues, but the single largest Mary Sue staple is—GROANS—the shopping spree.

This is the point in a story where everything grinds to a halt so the heroine can get ready for the ball/date/wedding/party/sacred mage ceremony, etc.

You know the kind of scene I’m talking about…but in case you don’t, let’s look at an example.

Mary Sue Goes to the Ball

Let’s use my favorite Mary Sue stand-in Seraphina to illustrate. Seraphina has had a hard life as a disinherited princess living in hiding in a faux medieval village and secretly training to use her immense magical powers to take back the throne and rid the land of evil.

She finds a way to infiltrate the castle by sneaking into a fancy ball that the king is giving. But, in order to blend in with the crowd, she will need…a ballgown.

What comes next is any combination of the following descriptions:

• Shopping or gathering all the necessary clothing
• Hairstyles
• Dresses
• Jewelry, and other accessories
• Makeup (!)

But…it’s not just descriptions. We, the readers, are subjected to descriptions in excruciating detail.

Also, every character involved in the scene is kind, excited, happy to help with the preparations, and relentlessly cheery. Apparently, there can be no conflict in the dressing room (unless it’s Seraphina objecting to the ‘girly pink’ or ‘frilly’ dress, thereby making a statement of profound strength of character and independence).

We read about sweetheart necklines, bias cuts, skirts that gently flare out, lace gloves, sleeves that come to just above the wrist, silver embroidery patterns of magical runes (or flowers, whatever).

Gritting our teeth, we skim over the part about hair that is piled high with loose curls falling softly around her face, or braids intricately woven with pearls and jeweled flower pins with just a few errant and untamable curls falling softly around her face.

The author beats us over the head with the fact that she only wears a little bit of eyeshadow and lip gloss (WTH? Do they even have lip gloss in faux medieval realms?) because she doesn’t really need any makeup to enhance her natural beauty.

That strangling noise?

It’s us. The readers. Being garroted….

With the heroine’s delicate chain complete with cheesy symbolic pendant (dragon, rose, snake, rune, whatever) because that’s not a dead giveaway to the bad guy(s).

Hey, doesn’t that girl with the opal-eyed dragon pendant that looks like the one that belonged to Queen Margitte look a lot like dead Queen Margitte?.

Also, a general rule of style is to match the formality of jewelry to the formality of the outfit. One doesn’t wear parure with buckskin breeches, and conversely, charm necklaces are not to be worn with ballgowns. (Yes, I just channeled my inner Tim Gunn.)

Let’s not forget how Seraphina chooses sensible low-heeled slippers as opposed to the…um…lucite platform heels offered by the empty-headed ninnies who only care about boys and clothes.

Because taking time out from pace, tension, plot, and relevance to talk about dressing a character totally doesn’t paint the author as having the emotional range of a fifteen-year-old. 

All joking aside, let’s look a little closer at WHY the Mary Sue Shopping Spree is so problematic.

Go Ahead. Sue Me!

It’s not really Seraphina’s fault that the author wants to play out a Cinderella fantasy. Unfortunately, this violates one of KLamb’s most basic rules: NEVER MAKE IT EASY FOR THE CHARACTERS!

Nobody wants to read about everybody being happy, getting along, and things going their way. Can you say, “Snooze-Fest?”

Can you imagine Harry Potter if he’d grown up with his parents alive, been BFFs with Draco Malfoy, and figured out how to vanquish Voldemort without leaving the comfort of Hogwarts?

No, you can’t because no reader would have made it past page TEN. Harry Potter would have been another forgettable character in yet another bad book.

But he isn’t. Why? Harry Potter is legendary because of CONFLICT and seemingly insurmountable odds. Not everything slipping in place as if his life is coated in Teflon.

The same goes for the Cinderella moment. Let’s look at why.

Slumber Party or Plot Point? 

Getting-ready-for-the-party scenes must obey the rules of fiction just like all the other scenes. Where is the conflict that drives the story? What is the relevance of the getting-ready-for-the-ball scene? Is there any character growth? Are there any obstacles?

If the answer is no, then we need to think twice about putting in a scene like this.

Hemming and Hawing 

Set aside the sins of over-descriptiveness for a moment. Instead, look at the science of how we read and process the written word. In general, we read at about 200-400 words per minute (cool, non? Read this for more!).

That means that careful description is critical to the FLOW of a reader’s understanding and visualization. If we STALL the flow by making a reader stop and try to visualize EXACTLY what a character is wearing (I’m looking at you, hem lengths and embroidered bodices!), we risk losing the reader’s immersion in our world.

Anachronism Alert!

The Mary Sue Shopping Spree also showcases when an author hasn’t bothered to do his or her homework with either historical research or fantasy world-building (LIP GLOSS???). With historical, this is easily solved with just a modicum of research–and luckily for you, I’m obsessed with historical fashion.

Check me out on Pinterest for a decade-by-decade breakdown of fashion across the centuries (and a WHOLE lot more!).

With fantasy, there’s still no excuse for not considering things like climate, culture, how easy it is to get your hands on expensive clothing, etc. Thinking it through isn’t hard. We just have to do it.

Get Seraphina a Personal Shopper and Move on

All of this isn’t to say that we can’t have a makeover scene now and then. There’s just a better way to do it. Here’s how.

Relevance

Makeover scenes must be relevant to the plot and/or character. For example in my book Downcast, I use a literal shopping spree to reveal Stephanie’s growth as a character, in beginning to make her own choices and tap into her own confidence.

More than that, though, Stephanie’s shopping spree sets up a MAJOR conflict.

In fact, it’s one of the biggest pivot points in the whole plot. Could I have used another ploy to get me there? Sure. But, a teenage girl going to the mall for her 18th birthday is both plausible and appropriate for the context (and the YA genre).

If we’re going to use the shopping spree–be it contemporary, ye olde, or beware hippogriffs! style–always ask three things:

• Is it relevant? Does it move the plot forward?
• Will it offer any new clues/information or set the characters up for conflict?
• Does it reveal and/or conceal anything important about the characters (from each other, the reader, etc.)?

If we can answer yes to all three, then we move to the next step, which is…

Bippity-Boppity BORING!

Fairy godmothers way overrated. Why not have the wicked step-sister be the one to have to help get Cinderella ready for the ball? Will the Wal-Mart generic brand wand be up to the challenge of whipping up a ballgown?

Is there a crack in one of the glass slippers? Does the color blue make her look jaundiced? Is anyone willing to tell her that?

What if she really, really wants to wear blue, but the only color the Wal-Mart wand can produce is pink? She has to wear the pink dress. If you transform a pumpkin into a carriage, does it smell like pumpkin on the inside? Is that a good thing? Are the mice unionized?

You get the idea.

The point is the getting-ready-for-the-ball scene should be FULL of delicious difficulties and confectionary conflict. Remember KLamb’s rule: MAKE IT WORSE UNTIL YOU MAKE IT WEIRD. NOTHING COMES EASILY…EVER!

If everyone is happy and excited to help Seraphina get ready for the ball…meh.

What’s the point?

What makes me (reader) want to turn the page? But, if Lady Jordan slips itching powder down Seraphina’s chemise, or the fairy godmother makes an unthinking remark about how to fix the way Seraphina looks a bit puffy…well, NOW we have something to work with!

Give Up Control

The reader will never, ever, ever be able to picture a gown exactly the way we see it in our mind’s eye. Ever. You can tell me all you want about length and fabric and cut and jewelry. However, it’ll either be too much detail, and I’ll lose track of all of the bits I’m supposed to remember, OR, I will just skim and skip until the plot resumes.

Seriously, we need to give up the idea that our descriptions will ever create an exact picture for the reader. Descriptions are meant to be evocative. They also…yeah, you know what I’m going to say here…wait for it…have to be RELEVANT.

And, yes, here’s another handy checklist to work through to determine if a description is relevant:

• Is there something unique, interesting, or important about the dress, jewelry, etc.?
• What is truly different about these clothes for the character and her life experience?
• Are there smells, textures, or sounds (like bracelets clinking) that are unusually pleasurable or uncomfortable?

For example, for a fantasy genre scene, I might describe Seraphina’s reaction to her ball gown like this:

Her first instinct was to decline the gown. The fine silk and rare lapis-dyed color screamed the kind of wealth she had barely ever encountered, let alone would feel comfortable impersonating. She didn’t dare touch it, afraid that the calluses on her fingers would catch and snag the delicate fabric.

Still, she drew closer, fascinated by the  pattern of dragons in mid-flight picked out in silver thread around the hem. When Lady Jordan gave the skirts an expert–if impatient–flick to smooth the creases, the embroidered dragons looked as if they were truly in flight.

A brisk ‘tsk’ from Lady Jordan jolted Seraphina from the daze of admiration, and she shrank from the disapproving moue on the older woman’s lips.

I would probably also make the dragons mean something or be symbolic in some way, though I might not have Lady Jordan inform Seraphina of that because…well, she doesn’t really like the girl or want to help her, and if she must dress a sow’s ear in a silk purse, then at least she will get some entertainment out of it later when the girl stumbles over the etiquette of the significance of the embroidery.

Because being mean to my characters is what makes it fun for my readers.

And, it has nothing to do with being a sociopath. AT ALL.

Next up…Getting Stabby About the Taylors and Shifters

If you’ve read any of my blog posts here, you know that Taylor is Seraphina’s male counterpart. And, Taylor can often be found in romance novels–especially shifter romances. If you think I’m prickly (and hilarious–admit it, you giggled at this post!) about Mary Sue shopping sprees, just watch me rip into shifters…and how to make them better.

You can even watch me do it LIVE this Friday!

Instructor: Cait Reynolds

Price: $45.00 USD

Where: W.A.N.A. Digital Classroom

Date: Friday, November 3, 2017. 7:00-9:00 p.m. EST

Shifter romance is one of the hottest genres in publishing right now. It’s easy, right? You just take a hot guy and have him morph into a wolf…or bear…or…panther…or…

Well, you and the thousands of other shifter romance writers. So, how are readers going to tell your lusty wolf boys apart from another author’s lusty wolf boys? Sure, you can invent clan/pack rules and give your shifters certain features or restrictions.

But, if you want to create unforgettable shifters that will have readers coming back for more, you need to shift your world-building into high gear. (See what I did there with the play on words with ‘shift’? Ha! I’m so funny.)

This class will help you create richer shifter ‘cultures’ by showing you how to:

• Construct the history of your shifters, and by history, I mean real history
• Use science (even if you’re not a science person) to add delicious bits of plausibility to your shifters
• Catch world-building details that create giant gaps in logic that can distract the reader from your story
• Develop stronger characters by giving them a richer, fuller historical, scientific, and world-building context
• Drive action and plot twists in unexpected ways using expanded shifter world-building
• Amp up the romantic and sexual tension using the history and science of your shifters

We are now offering ADVANCED LEVELS for this class. Extra help from an EXPERT.

In a world of a gazillion forgettable shifters, let Cait help you take your shifter to a WHOLE NEW LEVEL.

Shifter GOLD

You get the class (recording included in price) with Cait plus one hour of personalized one-on-one consulting regarding YOUR story. 

Shifter PLATINUM

You get the class (recording included in price) with Cait plus two hours of personalized one-on-one consulting regarding YOUR story and bonus worksheets. These worksheets will efficiently guide you through in-depth world-building and research, providing you with consistency for your writing and an excellent reference/style sheet for your editor and proofreader.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER!

Other upcoming WANA classes!

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The post Stories That Make Us Stabby: Mary Sue & Why Readers Hate Her appeared first on Kristen Lamb.